never know how nigh he come
to getting lynched. But before night they changed around and judged it
was done by a runaway nigger named Jim."

"Why _he_--"

I stopped. I reckoned I better keep still. She run on, and never
noticed I had put in at all:

"The nigger run off the very night Huck Finn was killed. So there's a
reward out for him--three hundred dollars. And there's a reward out
for old Finn, too--two hundred dollars. You see, he come to town the
morning after the murder, and told about it, and was out with 'em on
the ferryboat hunt, and right away after he up and left. Before night
they wanted to lynch him, but he was gone, you see. Well, next day
they found out the nigger was gone; they found out he hadn't ben seen
sence ten o'clock the night the murder was done. So then they put it
on him, you see; and while they was full of it, next day, back comes
old Finn, and went boo-hooing to Judge Thatcher to get money to hunt
for the nigger all over Illinois with. The judge gave him some, and
that evening he got drunk, and was around till after midnight with a
couple of mighty hard-looking strangers, and then went off with them.
Well, he hain't come back sence, and they ain't looking for him back
till this thing blows over a little, for people thinks now that he
killed his boy and fixed things so folks would think robbers done it,
and then he'd get Huck's money without having to bother a long time
with a lawsuit. People do say he warn't any too good to do it. Oh,
he's sly, I reckon. If he don't come back for a year he'll be all
right. You can't prove anything on him, you know; everything will be
quieted down then, and he'll walk in Huck's money as easy as nothing."

"Yes, I reckon so, 'm. I don't see nothing in the way of it. Has
everybody quit thinking the nigger done it?"

"Oh, no, not everybody. A good many thinks he done it. But they'll get
the nigger pretty soon now, and maybe they can scare it out of him."

"Why, are they after him yet?"

"Well, you're innocent, ain't you! Does three hundred dollars lay
around every day for people to pick up? Some folks think the nigger
ain't far from here. I'm one of them--but I hain't talked it around. A
few days ago I was talking with an old couple that lives next door in
the log shanty, and they happened to say hardly anybody ever goes to
that island over yonder that they call Jackson's Island. Don't anybody
live there? says I. No, nobody, says they. I didn't say any