Read all the adventures of Tom Sawyer. "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer": reviews

Mark Twain

Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Preface

Most of the adventures described in this book are taken from life: one or two were experienced by myself, the rest by boys who studied with me at school. Huck Finn is copied from life, Tom Sawyer too, but not from one original - he is a combination of features taken from three boys I knew, and therefore belongs to a mixed architectural order.

The wild superstitions described below were common among the children and Negroes of the West at that time, that is, thirty or forty years ago.

Although my book is intended primarily for the amusement of boys and girls, I hope that grown men and women will not disdain it either, for it was my design to remind them of what they themselves were once like, how they felt, how they thought, how they spoke, and how they what strange adventures they sometimes got involved in.

No answer.

No answer.

“It’s amazing where this boy could have gone!” Tom, where are you?

No answer.

Aunt Polly pulled her glasses down her nose and looked around the room over the top of her glasses, then lifted them onto her forehead and looked around the room from under her glasses. She very rarely, almost never, looked through her glasses at such a trifle as a boy; These were ceremonial glasses, her pride, purchased for beauty, not for use, and it was as difficult for her to see anything through them as through a pair of stove dampers. She was confused for a minute, then she said - not very loudly, but so that the furniture in the room could hear her:

- Well, wait, just let me get to you...

Without finishing, she bent down and began poking under the bed with a brush, catching her breath after each poke. She didn't get anything out of it except the cat.

- What a child, I’ve never seen anything like this in my life!

Approaching the wide open door, she stopped on the threshold and looked around her garden - beds of tomatoes overgrown with dope. Tom wasn't here either. Then, raising her voice so that she could be heard as far as possible, she shouted:

- Sooo, where are you?

There was a slight rustle behind her, and she looked back - just in time to grab the boy's arm before he slipped through the door.

- Well, it is! I forgot about the closet. What were you doing there?

- Nothing.

- Nothing? Look what you have in your hands. And the mouth too. What is it?

- I don’t know, aunt.

- I know. This jam is what it is! Forty times I told you: don’t you dare touch the jam - I’ll tear it out! Give me the rod here.

The rod whistled in the air - it seemed that trouble was imminent.

- Oh, auntie, what’s that behind your back?!

The old woman turned around, picking up her skirts to protect herself from danger. The boy jumped over the high fence in an instant and was gone.

Aunt Polly was taken aback at first, and then laughed good-naturedly:

- So go with him! Am I really not going to learn anything? Does he play a lot of tricks on me? It's time for me to wise up, I think. But there is no worse fool than an old fool. No wonder they say: “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” But, my God, every day he comes up with something, where can he guess? And it’s as if he knows how long he can torment me; he knows that as soon as he makes me laugh or confuses me even for a minute, I give up and I can’t even spank him. I’m not fulfilling my duty, to be honest! After all, the Scripture says: whoever spares a child destroys him. Nothing good will come of this, it’s just a sin. He is a real devil, I know, but he, poor thing, is the son of my late sister, I somehow don’t have the heart to punish him. If you indulge him, your conscience will torture you, but if you punish him, your heart will break. It is not for nothing that the Scripture says: the human age is short and full of sorrows; I think this is true. These days he's shirking school; I'll have to punish him tomorrow - I'll put him to work. It’s a pity to force a boy to work when all the children have a holiday, but it’s hardest for him to work, and I need to do my duty - otherwise I’ll ruin the child.

Tom didn't go to school and had a great time. He barely had time to return home in order to help Negro Jim cut wood for tomorrow and chop kindling for kindling before dinner. In any case, he managed to tell Jim about his adventures while he was three-quarters of the way through the work. Tom's younger (or rather half-brother), Sid, had already done everything he was supposed to (he picked up and carried wood chips): he was an obedient boy, not prone to pranks and pranks.

While Tom was having dinner, taking lumps of sugar from the sugar bowl at every opportunity, Aunt Polly asked him various tricky questions, very cunning and tricky - she wanted to catch Tom by surprise so that he would let it slip. Like many simple-minded people, she considered herself a great diplomat, capable of the most subtle and mysterious tricks, and believed that all her innocent tricks were a miracle of resourcefulness and cunning. She asked:

– Tom, wasn’t it very hot at school?

- No, aunt.

- Or maybe it’s very hot?

- Yes, aunt.

“Well, didn’t you really want to take a bath, Tom?”

Tom's soul sank to his feet - he sensed danger.

He looked incredulously into Aunt Polly’s face, but didn’t see anything special and so said:

- No, aunt, not really.

She reached out and felt Tom's shirt and said:

- Yes, perhaps you didn’t sweat at all. “She liked to think that she was able to check whether Tom’s shirt was dry without anyone understanding what she was getting at.

However, Tom immediately sensed which way the wind was blowing and warned the next move:

“At our school, boys poured water over their heads from the well. I still have it wet, look!

Aunt Polly was very upset that she had lost sight of such an important piece of evidence. But then I was inspired again.

“Tom, you didn’t have to rip your collar to get your head wet, right?” Unzip your jacket!

Tom's face lit up. He opened his jacket - the collar was tightly sewn.

- Come on! Go away! I must admit, I thought that you would run away from class to go swimming. So be it, this time I forgive you. You're not as bad as you seem.

She was both upset that her insight had deceived her this time, and she was glad that Tom had at least accidentally behaved well.

Then Sid intervened:

“It seemed to me as if you sewed up his collar with white thread, and now he has black thread.”

- Well, yes, I sewed it up with white! Volume!

But Tom did not wait for the continuation. Running out the door, he shouted:

“I’ll remember this for you, Siddy!”

In a secluded place, Tom examined two thick needles stuck into the lapels of his jacket and wrapped with thread: one needle had a white thread threaded into it, the other a black one.

“She wouldn’t have noticed anything if it weren’t for Sid.” Damn it! Sometimes she sews it up with white thread, sometimes with black thread. At least one thing, otherwise you won’t be able to keep track of it. Well, I’ll beat Sid. Will remember!

“On November 30, 1835, in the USA, in the village of Florida in Missouri, a child was born, who was named Samuel Langhorne Clemens. This year will be remembered by the inhabitants of the Earth for a majestic cosmic spectacle - the appearance in the sky of Comet Halley, approaching our planet once every 75 years. Soon, Sam Clemens' family moved to the town of Hannibal in Missouri in search of a better life. The head of the family died when his youngest son was not even twelve years old, leaving nothing but debts, and Sam had to earn his living in the newspaper that his older brother began publishing. The teenager worked tirelessly - first as a typesetter and printer, and soon as an author of funny and caustic notes ... "

It was a glorious Saturday morning. Everything around breathed freshness, shone and was full of life. Every face shone with joy, and cheerfulness was felt in everyone’s gait. The white acacia was in full bloom and its sweet scent was spreading everywhere.

Cardiff Mountain - its peak visible from anywhere in the city - was completely green and seemed from afar to be a wonderful, serene country.

It was at that moment that Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of diluted lime and a long brush in his hands. However, at the first glance at the fence, all joy left him, and his soul plunged into the deepest sorrow. Thirty yards of solid plank fence, nine feet high! Life seemed meaningless and painful to him. With a heavy sigh, Tom dipped his brush into the bucket, brushed it across the top board of the fence, repeated this operation twice, compared the insignificant bleached patch with the vast continent of what remained to be painted, and sat down under the tree in despair.

Meanwhile, Negro Jim jumped out of the gate with a bucket in his hand, singing “Buffalo Girls.” Until that day, it seemed to Tom that there was nothing more boring than carrying water from the city well, but now he looked at it differently. The well is always full of people. White and black boys and girls always hang around there, waiting for their turn, chatting, exchanging toys, quarreling, playing pranks, and sometimes fighting. And even though the well was only a hundred and fifty steps from their house, Jim never returned home before an hour later, and it also happened that someone had to be sent for him. So Tom said:

- Listen, Jim! Let me run for water, while you whitewash a little here.

- How can you, Mister Tom! The old mistress told me to immediately bring water and, God forbid, not to get stuck anywhere along the way. She also said that Mr. Tom would probably call me to paint the fence, so that I would do my job and not stick my nose where they weren’t asked, and she would take care of the fence herself.

– Why are you listening to her, Jim! You never know what she'll say! Give me a bucket, one leg here and the other there, that's all. Aunt Polly won't even guess.

- Oh, I'm scared, Mister Tom. The old mistress will rip my head off. By God, it will tear you off!

- Is that her? Yes, she doesn’t fight at all. Unless he snaps a thimble on the top of his head, that’s all there is to it – just think, the importance! She says all sorts of things, but her words do nothing, except that sometimes she herself bursts into tears. Jim, would you like me to give you a balloon? White, with marble veins!

Jim hesitated.

– White and marble to boot, Jim! This is not a bullshit for you!

- Oh, how it shines! But I’m really afraid of the old mistress, Mr. Tom...

- Well, do you want me to show you my sore finger?

Jim was an ordinary person - and could not resist such temptation. He put down the bucket, picked up a marble and, wide-eyed with curiosity, bent over his sore finger while Tom unwrapped the bandage. The next second he was already flying down the street like a whirlwind, rattling his bucket and scratching the back of his head, Tom was whitewashing the fence with frantic energy, and Aunt Polly was leaving the battlefield with a shoe in her hand. Her eyes glowed with triumph.

But Tom's zeal did not last long. His thoughts returned to how nicely he could spend this day, and he began to tan again. Other boys are about to appear on the street and make Tom laugh because he was forced to work on Saturday. They themselves go to different interesting places.

This thought burned him with fire. He took all the cherished treasures out of his pockets and inspected them: broken toys, balls, all sorts of rubbish may be suitable for exchange, but it is unlikely that this can buy at least an hour of freedom. With his meager capital out of sight, Tom put the thought of bribing anyone out of his mind. But at that moment, full of despair and hopelessness, inspiration suddenly struck him. A real inspiration, without any exaggeration!

Taking up the brush, he continued to work slowly and tastefully. Soon Ben Rogers appeared around the corner - the same boy whose poisonous ridicule Tom feared most. Ben's gait was carefree, he jumped every now and then - a sure sign that his heart was light and he expected continuous gifts from life. He was gnawing on an apple and from time to time he let out a long whistle, followed by a melodious chime: “Ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong” - at the lowest notes, because Ben was imitating a paddle steamer. Approaching Tom, he slowed down, turned into the middle of the fairway, tilted slightly to starboard and began to slowly approach the shore. At the same time, it had an unusually important appearance, because it depicted the “Big Missouri” with a draft of nine feet. At that moment, Ben Rogers was the ship, the captain, the helmsman, and the ship's bell, so when he gave a command, he immediately carried it out.

- Stop, car! Ding-ding-ding! “The mechanic carried out the command, and the ship slowly moored to the edge of the sidewalk. - Reverse! – Both of Ben’s arms dropped and stretched out at his sides.

- Right hand drive! Ding-ding-ding! Ch-choo! Choo! – The right hand flew up and began to describe solemn circles: now it depicted the main paddle wheel.

- Steer to the left! Ding-ding-ding! Chu-chu-chu-u! – Now the left one was describing circles.

- Stop, starboard! Ding-ding-ding! Stop, left side! Small move! Stop, car! The smallest one! Ding-ding-ding! Chu-u-u-f-f! Give it up! Get moving there! Well, where is your mooring end? Move to the bollard! Okay, now let me go!

- The car has stopped, sir! Ding-ding-ding! Sh-sh-sh-sh-sh-sh! - It was the steamer that was dumping steam.

Tom continued to wield his brush, not paying the slightest attention to the Big Missouri. Ben narrowed his eyes and said:

- Yeah, I got it! We've got you in tow!

There was no answer. Tom looked at the last stroke with the eye of a painter, then once again carefully ran his brush over the boards and stood back, thoughtfully contemplating the result. Ben walked over and stood behind him. Tom swallowed his saliva - he wanted an apple so much, but he didn’t show it and got back to work. Finally Ben said:

- What, old man, you have to work hard, huh?

Tom turned around sharply, as if in surprise:

- Ah, it's you, Ben! I didn't even notice you.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m going for a swim.” I don `t want? Although what am I talking about - you, of course, still have to work. This matter is probably more interesting.

Tom looked at Ben in bewilderment and asked:

- What do you call work?

– What do you think this is?

Tom waved his brush widely in the air and casually replied:

- Well, maybe it’s a job for some, but not for others. All I know is that Tom Sawyer likes it.

- Come on! Tell me also that you like to whitewash!

The brush continued to slide evenly along the fence boards.

- Whitewash? Why not? It’s probably not every day that our brother gets to tidy up the fence.

From that moment on, everything appeared in a new light. Ben even stopped chewing the apple. Tom carefully moved his brush back and forth, stopping from time to time to admire his handiwork, adding a stroke here, a stroke there, and assessing the result again, and Ben closely watched his every movement, and his eyes gradually lit up. Suddenly he said:

“Listen, Tom, let me whiten it a little too.”

Tom thought for a moment, pretending to look as if he was ready to agree, but suddenly changed his mind.

- No, Ben, it won’t work. Aunt Polly just prays for this fence; you see, he goes out into the street... Well, if it had been from the side of the yard, she wouldn’t have said a word... and neither would I. But here... Do you know how to whiten it? Here, perhaps one out of a thousand, or even two thousand boys will be able to cope properly.

- What are you talking about? Listen, Tom, at least let me smear, just a little! Here I am - I would let you in if I were in your place.

“Ben, I would love to, I swear on my scalp!” But what about Aunt Polly? Jim wanted it too, but she forbade it. Sid was lying at her feet, but she didn’t allow Sid either. That's how things are, guy... Let's say you get started, but something goes wrong?

- Come on, Tom, I’m doing my best! Well, let me just try... Listen, do you want half an apple?

- Well, how can I tell you... Although no, Ben, it’s still not worth it. I'm kind of afraid.

- I'll give you all the apples!

Without any desire, Tom let go of the brush, but his soul rejoiced. And while the former steamship "Big Missouri" worked hard in the very sun, the retired painter, sitting in the shade on an old barrel, dangled his legs, crunched an apple and made plans for further beating of babies.

It was no longer a matter of babies. Boys appeared on the street every minute; they stopped to sneer at Tom, and in the end they stayed to paint the fence. As soon as Ben was exhausted, Tom profitably sold the next line to Billy Fisher - for a used, but still very decent kite, and when he got tired, Johnny Miller acquired the right to the brush for a dead rat with a string tied to it - to make it more convenient to twirl in the air. And so it went.

By mid-afternoon, Tom had gone from being almost a pauper to a tycoon. He was literally drowning in luxury. Now he had: twelve balls, a broken harmonica, a piece of blue bottle glass to look at the sun, a spool without thread, a key to who knows what, a piece of chalk, a stopper from a crystal decanter, a tin soldier, a pair of tadpoles, six firecrackers, a one-eyed man a kitten, a bronze doorknob, a dog collar, a knife handle, four pieces of orange peel and an old window frame. Tom had a great time and the fence was covered with three layers of lime! If he hadn't run out of whitewash, he would have let all the boys in the town go around the world.

“It’s not so bad to live in the world,” thought Tom. Without knowing it, he discovered the great law that governs human actions. This law says: in order for a boy or an adult - it doesn’t matter who - to want something, only one thing is needed: that it be difficult to achieve. If Tom Sawyer were an outstanding thinker like the author of this book, he would come to the conclusion that work is something that a person is forced to do, and play is something that he is not obliged to do at all. And this would help him understand why making artificial flowers or carrying water in a sieve is work, but knocking down skittles or climbing Mont Blanc is pleasant fun. They say that in England there are rich people who like to drive a mail coach drawn by a four-wheeler in the summer. This opportunity costs them a lot of money, but if they received a salary for this, the game would turn into work and lose all its charm.

Tom pondered for some time over the change that had occurred in his property situation, and then went with a report to the headquarters of the commander-in-chief.

Mark Twain

ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER

translation by Korney Chukovsky

Chapter I

TOM PLAYS, FIGHTS, HIDES

No answer.

No answer.

Where did he go, this boy?.. Tom!

No answer.

The old woman lowered her glasses to the tip of her nose and looked around the room over her glasses; then she lifted her glasses onto her forehead and looked out from under them: she rarely looked through her glasses if she had to look for such a trifle as a boy, because these were her dress glasses, the pride of her heart: she wore them only “for importance”; in fact, she didn’t need them at all; she might as well have been looking through the stove dampers. At first, she seemed confused and said, not very angrily, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear her:

Well, just get caught! I...

Without finishing her thought, the old woman bent down and began poking under the bed with a brush, stopping each time because she was short of breath. From under the bed she did not take anything out except the cat.

I have never seen such a boy in my life!

She walked to the open door and, standing on the threshold, peered vigilantly into her garden - tomatoes overgrown with weeds. Tom wasn't there either. Then she raised her voice so that it could be heard further and shouted:

A slight rustling sound was heard from behind. She looked around and at the same second grabbed the edge of the boy’s jacket, who was about to sneak away.

Well, of course! And how could I forget about the closet! What did you do there?

Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What did you stain your lips with?

I don't know, aunt!

And I know. It's jam, that's what it is. Forty times I told you: don’t you dare touch the jam, otherwise I’ll skin you! Give me this rod here.

The rod flew into the air - the danger was imminent.

Ay! Aunt! What's that behind your back?

The old woman turned on her heel in fear and hurried to pick up her skirts in order to protect herself from a terrible disaster, and the boy at that very second started running, climbed onto a high plank fence - and was gone!

Aunt Polly was dumbfounded for a moment, and then began to laugh good-naturedly.

What a boy! It seemed like it was time for me to get used to his tricks. Or did he not play enough tricks with me? Could have been smarter this time. But, apparently, there is no worse fool than an old fool. It’s not without reason that they say that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. However, my God, this boy’s things are all different: every day, then another - can you guess what’s on his mind? It’s as if he knows how long he can torment me until I lose patience. He knows that if he confuses me for a minute or makes me laugh, then my hands give up, and I am unable to whip him with the rod. I am not fulfilling my duty, what is true is true, may God forgive me. “Whoever does without a rod destroys a child,” says the Holy Scripture. I, a sinner, spoil him, and for this we will get it in the next world - both me and him. I know that he is a real imp, but what should I do? After all, he is the son of my late sister, a poor fellow, and I don’t have the heart to flog an orphan. Every time I let him evade beatings, my conscience torments me so much that I don’t even know how to give him a flogging - my old heart is literally torn to pieces. It is true, it is true in scripture: the human age is short and full of sorrows. The way it is! Today he did not go to school: he will be idle until the evening, and it is my duty to punish him, and I will fulfill my duty - I will make him work tomorrow. This, of course, is cruel, since tomorrow is a holiday for all the boys, but nothing can be done, more than anything in the world he hates working. I have no right to let him down this time, otherwise I will completely ruin the baby.

Tom really didn't go to school today and had a lot of fun. He barely had time to return home so that before dinner he could help Negro Jim cut wood and chop wood for tomorrow, or, more precisely, tell him about his adventures while he was doing three-quarters of the work. Tom's younger brother, Sid (not a brother, but a half-brother), by this time had already done everything that he was ordered (collected and carried all the wood chips), because he was an obedient quiet one: he did not play pranks and did not cause trouble for his elders.

While Tom was eating his dinner, taking every opportunity to steal a piece of sugar, Aunt Polly asked him various questions, full of deep slyness, hoping that he would fall into the traps she had set and spill the beans. Like all simple-minded people, she, not without pride, considered herself a subtle diplomat and saw in her most naive plans miracles of malicious cunning.

“Tom,” she said, “it must have been hot at school today?”

It's very hot, isn't it?

And wouldn’t you, Tom, want to swim in the river?

It seemed to him that something evil was happening - a shadow of suspicion and fear touched his soul. He looked inquisitively into Aunt Polly's face, but it told him nothing. And he answered:

No, “um... not particularly.

Aunt Polly reached out and touched Tom's shirt.

“I didn’t even break a sweat,” she said.

And she thought smugly how cleverly she had managed to discover that Tom’s shirt was dry; It never occurred to anyone what kind of trick she had in mind. Tom, however, had already managed to figure out which way the wind was blowing, and warned further questions:

We put our heads under the pump to freshen up. My hair is still wet. Do you see?

Aunt Polly felt offended: how could she miss such important indirect evidence! But immediately a new thought struck her.

Tom, in order to put your head under the pump, you didn’t have to rip open your shirt collar in the place where I sewed it up? Come on, unbutton your jacket!

The anxiety disappeared from Tom's face. He opened his jacket. The collar of the shirt was sewn tightly.

Okay, okay. I'll never understand you. I was sure that you didn’t go to school and went swimming. Okay, I’m not angry with you: although you are a decent rogue, you still turned out to be better than you might think.

She was a little annoyed that her cunning had led to nothing, and at the same time pleased that Tom at least this time turned out to be a good boy.

But then Sid intervened.

“I remember something,” he said, “as if you were sewing up his collar with white thread, and here, look, it’s black!”

Yes, of course, I sewed it up in white!.. Tom!..

But Tom did not wait for the conversation to continue. Running out of the room, he said quietly:

Well, I’ll blow you up, Siddy!

Having taken refuge in a safe place, he examined two large needles, tucked into the lapel of his jacket and wrapped in thread. One had a white thread and the other had a black thread.

She wouldn't have noticed if it weren't for Sid. Damn it! Sometimes she sewed it up with white thread, sometimes with black thread. I’d better sew by myself, otherwise you’ll inevitably get lost... But I’ll still piss Sid off - it’ll be a good lesson for him!

Tom was not a Model Boy that the whole town could be proud of. But he knew very well who was an exemplary boy, and he hated him.

However, after two minutes - and even sooner - he forgot all the troubles. Not because they were less difficult and bitter for him than the adversities that usually torment adults, but because at that moment a new powerful passion took possession of him and drove all worries out of his head. In the same way, adults are capable of forgetting their sorrows as soon as they are captivated by some new activity. Tom was currently fascinated by one precious novelty: he had learned a special way of whistling from a negro friend, and he had long wanted to practice this art in the wild, so that no one would interfere. The black man whistled like a bird. He produced a melodious trill, interrupted by short pauses, for which it was necessary to frequently touch the palate with his tongue. The reader probably remembers how this is done - if he was ever a boy. Perseverance and diligence helped Tom quickly master all the techniques of this matter. He walked merrily down the street, his mouth full of sweet music and his soul full of gratitude. He felt like an astronomer who had discovered a new planet in the sky, only his joy was more immediate, fuller and deeper.

In summer the evenings are long. It was still light. Suddenly Tom stopped whistling. A stranger stood in front of him, a boy slightly larger than him. Any new face of any gender or age always attracted the attention of the residents of the wretched town of St. Petersburg. In addition, the boy was wearing a smart suit - a smart suit on a weekday! It was absolutely amazing. A very elegant hat; a neatly buttoned blue cloth jacket, new and clean, and exactly the same trousers. He had shoes on his feet, despite the fact that today was only Friday. He even had a tie - a very bright ribbon. In general, he had the appearance of a city dandy, and this infuriated Tom. The more Tom looked at this wondrous wonder, the more shabby his own miserable suit seemed to him and the higher he lifted his nose, showing how disgusted he was with such smart outfits. Both boys met in complete silence. As soon as one took a step, the other took a step, but only to the side, to the side, in a circle. Face to face and eye to eye - they moved like this for a very long time. Finally Tom said:

If you want, I'll blow you up!

Try!

And here I go!

But you won’t get blown up!

I want it and I'll swell!

No, you won't blow it!

No, I'm bloating!

No, you won't blow it!

You won't blow it!

Painful silence. Finally Tom says:

What is your name?

What do you care?

Here I will show you what I care!

Well, show me. Why don't you show it?

Say two more words and I’ll show you.

Two words! Two words! Two words! It is for you! Well!

Look how clever! Yes, if I wanted, I could give you pepper with one hand, and let them tie the other - I’ll describe it to me.

Why don't you ask? After all, you say that you can.

And I will ask you if you pester me!

Oh no no no! We've seen these!

You think how dressed up he is, he’s such an important bird! Oh, what a hat!

I do not like? Knock it off my head, and you'll get nuts from me.

You yourself are lying!

He only intimidates, but he himself is a coward!

Okay, get lost!

Hey, listen: if you don’t calm down, I’ll break your head!

Why, you'll break it! Oh oh oh!

And I'll break it!

So what are you waiting for? You scare, scare, but in reality there is nothing? Are you afraid, then?

I don't think so.

No, you're afraid!

No I'm not afraid!

No, you're afraid!

Silence again. They devour each other with their eyes, mark time and make a new circle. Finally they stand shoulder to shoulder. Tom says:

Get out of here!

Get out yourself!

I don't want to.

And I don't want to.

So they stand face to face, each with their foot forward at the same angle. Looking at each other with hatred, they begin to push as hard as they can. But victory is not given to either one or the other. They push for a long time. Hot and red, they gradually weaken their onslaught, although everyone still remains on guard... And then Tom says:

You are a coward and a puppy! So I’ll tell my older brother - he’ll beat you off with one little finger. I'll tell him - he'll beat him!

I'm very afraid of your older brother! I myself have a brother, even older, and he can throw yours over that fence. (Both brothers are pure fiction.)

You never know what you say!

Tom draws a line in the dust with his big toe and says:

Just dare to step over this line! I'll give you such a beating that you won't get up! Woe to those who cross this line!

The strange boy immediately hurries to cross the line:

Well, let's see how you blow me up.

Leave me alone! I'm telling you: you better leave me alone!

Why, you said you would beat me up. Why don't you hit?

I'll be damned if I don't beat you up for two cents!

The strange boy takes two large coppers out of his pocket and hands them to Tom with a grin.

Tom hits him on the hand, and the coppers fly to the ground. A minute later both boys are rolling around in the dust, clinging together like two cats. They pull each other's hair, jackets, pants, they pinch and scratch each other's noses, covering themselves in dust and glory. Finally, the indeterminate mass takes on distinct outlines, and in the smoke of the battle it becomes clear that Tom is sitting astride the enemy and hammering him with his fists.

Beg for mercy! - he demands.

But the boy tries to free himself and roars loudly - more from anger.

Beg for mercy! - And the threshing continues.

Finally, the strange boy mutters indistinctly: “That’s enough!” - and Tom, releasing him, says:

This is science for you. Next time, watch who you mess with.

The strange boy wandered away, shaking off the dust from his suit, sobbing, sniffling, turning around from time to time, shaking his head and threatening to brutally deal with Tom “the next time he catches him.” Tom responded with ridicule and headed towards the house, proud of his victory. But as soon as he turned his back to the stranger, he threw a stone at him and hit him between the shoulder blades, and he began to run like an antelope. Tom chased the traitor all the way to the house and thus found out where he lived. He stood at the gate for a while, challenging the enemy to fight, but the enemy only made faces at him at the window and did not want to come out. Finally, the enemy’s mother appeared, called Tom a nasty, spoiled, rude boy and ordered him to get away.

Tom left, but as he left, he threatened that he would wander around and give her son a hard time.

He returned home late and, carefully climbing through the window, discovered that he had been ambushed: his aunt was standing in front of him; and when she saw what had become of his jacket and trousers, her determination to turn his holiday into hard labor became as hard as a diamond.

Chapter II

GREAT PAINTER

Saturday has arrived. Summer nature shone - fresh, seething with life. A song rang in every heart, and if the heart was young, the song poured out from the lips. Joy was on every face, everyone walked elastically and cheerfully. White acacias were in bloom and filled the air with fragrance. Cardiff Mountain, overlooking the city, was covered in greenery. From a distance it seemed like the Promised Land - wonderful, serene, tempting.

Tom went outside with a bucket of lime and a long brush. He glanced around the fence, and in an instant the joy fled from his soul, and melancholy reigned there. Thirty yards of wooden fence, nine feet high! Life seemed meaningless to him, existence a heavy burden. With a sigh, he dipped his brush in the lime, brushed it across the top board, then did the same thing again and stopped: how insignificant the white stripe is compared to the huge expanse of unpainted fence! In despair, he sank to the ground under the tree. Jim came skipping out of the gate. He had a tin bucket in his hand.

He hummed the "Buffalo Girls" song. Tom had always considered going to the city pump to fetch water an unpleasant task, but now he looked at the matter differently. I remembered that a lot of people always gather at the pump: whites, mulattoes, blacks; Boys and girls, waiting for their turn, sit, relax, barter toys, quarrel, fight, play around. He also remembered that although the pump was no more than a hundred and fifty steps away, Jim never returned home before an hour later, and even then he almost always had to run after him.

Listen, Jim,” said Tom, “if you want, whiten it up a little, and I’ll run for water.”

Jim shook his head and said:

I can’t, mass Tom! The old mistress told me to go straight to the pump and not stop with anyone along the way. She says: “I already know, he says that Tom will call you to whitewash the fence, so don’t listen to him, but go your way.” She says: “I myself, she says, will go and watch him whitewash.”

Don't listen to her! You never know what she says, Jim! Give me the bucket, I'll run right away. She won't even know.

Oh, I'm afraid, massa Tom, I'm afraid of old missus! She'll rip my head off, by God, she'll rip it off!

She! Yes, she won’t lay a finger on anyone, unless she hits them on the head with a thimble - that’s all! Who pays attention to this? True, she says very angry words, well, but words don’t hurt, unless she cries. Jim, I'll give you a ball. I'll give you my white alabaster ball.

Jim began to hesitate.

White ball, Jim, great white ball!

That's right, it's a great thing! But still, Tom, I’m really afraid of old missus.

And besides, if you want, I will show you my blister on my foot.

Jim was only human and could not help but succumb to such temptation. He put the bucket on the ground, took the alabaster ball and, burning with curiosity, watched as Tom unbandaged his toe, but a minute later he was rushing down the street with the bucket in his hand and an excruciating pain in the back of his head, while Tom began to actively paint the fence, and Aunt left the battlefield with a shoe in her hand and triumph in her eyes.

But Tom didn’t have enough energy for long. He remembered how much fun he had planned to spend this day, and his heart became even heavier. Soon other boys, free from all work, will run out into the street to walk and frolic. Of course, they have all sorts of fun games going on, and they will all mock him for having to work so hard. The very thought of it burned him like fire. He took his treasures out of his pockets and began to examine them: fragments of toys, balls and similar junk; All this rubbish is probably enough to pay for three or four minutes of someone else’s labor, but, of course, it can’t buy even half an hour of freedom! He put his pitiful possessions back into his pocket and abandoned the idea of ​​bribery. None of the boys would work for such meager wages. And suddenly, in this dark moment of despair, inspiration descended on Tom! It is inspiration, no less - a brilliant, ingenious idea.

He took the brush and calmly got to work. Ben Rogers appeared in the distance, the same boy whose ridicule he feared most. Ben did not walk, but jumped, galloped and danced - a sure sign that his soul was light and that he expected a lot from the coming day. He was gnawing on an apple and from time to time he uttered a long melodic whistle, followed by sounds on the lowest notes: “ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong,” as Ben imitated a steamboat. As he got closer, he slowed down, stood in the middle of the street and began to slowly turn, carefully, with due importance, because he represented the “Big Missouri” sitting in nine feet of water. He was a steamship, a captain, and a signal bell at the same time, so he had to imagine that he was standing on his own bridge, giving himself a command and carrying it out himself.

Stop the car, sir! Ding-diling, ding-diling-ding!

The steamer slowly left the middle of the road and began to approach the sidewalk.

Reverse! Dilin-dilin-ding!

Both of his arms stretched out and pressed tightly to his sides.

Reverse! Right steering wheel! Shh, dilin-ling! Chsh-chsh-chsh!

The right hand moved majestically in large circles because it was a forty-foot wheel.

Left aboard! Left hand drive! Ding-ding-ding! Chsh-chsh-chsh!

Now the left hand began to describe the same circles.

Stop, starboard! Ding-ding-ding! Stop, left side! Forward and right! Stop! - Small move! Ding dilin! Chuu-chuuuu! Give it up! Come on, get moving! Hey, you, on the shore! What are you worth? Take the rope! Bow moorings! Throw a noose around the pole! Rear moorings! Now let go! The car is stopped, sir! Ding-ding-ding! PC! PC! PC! (The machine was releasing steam.)

Tom continued to work, not paying any attention to the ship. Ben stared at him and after a minute said:

Yeah! Gotcha!

There was no answer. Tom contemplated his last stroke with the eyes of an artist, then carefully stroked the brush again and leaned back again to admire it. Ben came and stood next to him. Tom's mouth watered at the sight of the apple, but as if nothing had happened, he stubbornly continued his work. Ben provided:

Why, brother, are they forced to work?

Tom turned sharply to him:

Oh, it's you, Ben! I didn't even notice.

Listen, I'm going for a swim... yes, a swim! Probably you want it too, huh? But of course you can’t, you’ll have to work. Well, of course, of course!

Tom looked at him and said:

What do you call work?

Isn't that work?

Tom began whitewashing the fence again and answered casually:

Maybe it's work, maybe it's not. All I know is that Tom Sawyer likes her.

What are you talking about? Would you like to show that this activity is pleasant for you?

The brush continued to walk along the fence.

Pleasant? What's so unpleasant about it? Do boys get to whitewash fences every day?

The matter appeared in a new light. Ben stopped gnawing on the apple. Tom, with the ecstasy of an artist, moved his brush back and forth, stepped back a few steps to admire the effect, added a touch here and there and again critically examined what he had done, and Ben watched his every movement, getting more and more carried away. Finally rendered:

Listen, Tom, let me whiten it a little too!

Tom thought for a moment and seemed ready to agree, but at the last minute he changed his mind:

No, no, Ben... It won't work anyway. You see, Aunt Polly is terribly picky about this fence: it goes out onto the street. Whether it was the side facing the yard is a different matter, but here it is terribly strict - you have to whitewash it very, very diligently. Out of a thousand... even, perhaps, out of two thousand boys, there is only one who could whiten him properly.

What are you talking about? I never would have thought that. Just let me try... well, at least a little. If I were you, I would give it to you. Eh, Tom?

Ben, I would love to, honestly, but Aunt Polly... Jim wanted it too, but she didn’t allow it. Sid also asked, but she didn’t let me in. Now do you understand how difficult it is for me to entrust this work to you? If you start whitewashing and suddenly something goes wrong...

Nonsense! I will try as hard as you. I just wish I could try it! Listen: I'll give you the middle of this apple.

OK! However, no, Ben, it’s better not to... I’m afraid...

I'll give you the whole apple - all that's left.

Tom handed him the brush with visible reluctance, but with secret delight in his soul. And while the former steamship "Big Missouri" worked and sweated in the hot sun, the retired artist sat nearby in the cold on some barrel, dangling his legs, gnawing on an apple and setting up nets for other simpletons. There was no shortage of simpletons: the boys kept coming up to the fence - they came up to sneer, but stayed to whitewash. By the time Ben was exhausted, Tom had already sold the second line to Billy Fisher for a brand new kite; and when Fisher was tired, Johnny Miller replaced him, bringing in as payment a dead rat on a long rope, so that it would be easier to twirl this rat - and so on, and so on, hour after hour. By noon, Tom, from the pitiful poor man he had been in the morning, had turned into a rich man, literally drowning in luxury. In addition to the things we just talked about, he had twelve alabaster balls, a piece of a dental buzzer, a fragment of a blue bottle to look through, a cannon made from a spool of thread, a key that would not unlock anything, a piece of chalk, a glass stopper from a decanter, a tin soldier, a pair of tadpoles, six firecrackers, a one-eyed kitten, a brass doorknob, a dog collar - without the dog - a knife handle, four orange peels and an old, broken window frame.

Tom had a pleasant and fun time in a big company, doing nothing, and there were three layers of lime on the fence! If the lime had not run out, he would have ruined all the boys in this city.

Tom showed himself that, in essence, life was not so empty and insignificant. Without knowing it, he discovered a great law that governs the actions of people, namely: in order for a man or a boy to passionately want to possess some thing, let this thing be as difficult for him to get it as possible. If he were as great a sage as the author of this book, he would understand that Work is what we are obliged to do, and Play is what we are not obliged to do. And this would help him understand why making paper flowers or, for example, turning a mill is work, but knocking down pins and climbing Mont Blanc is pleasure. There are rich gentlemen in England who, on summer days, drive a four-horse omnibus for twenty or thirty miles, simply because this noble occupation costs them considerable money; but if they were offered a salary for the same hard work, entertainment would become work, and they would immediately refuse it.

Tom did not move for some time; he reflected on the significant change that had taken place in his life, and then headed to the main headquarters to report the end of work.

Chapter III

BUSY WITH WAR AND LOVE

Tom appeared before Aunt Polly, who was sitting by the open window in the cozy back room, which was at once a bedroom, a living room, a dining room, and an office.

The blessed summer air, serene silence, the smell of flowers and the soothing buzzing of bees had their effect on her: she nodded over her knitting, for her only interlocutor was a cat, and even she was dozing on her lap. For safety, the glasses were raised up and rested on her gray hair.

She was firmly convinced that Tom, of course, had long ago run away, and now she was surprised that he had the courage to come to her for severe punishment.

Tom came in and asked:

Now, aunt, can we go play?

How! Already? How much have you done?

That's it, aunt!

Tom, don't lie! I can't stand it.

I'm not lying, aunt. All is ready.

Aunt Polly didn't believe it. She went to see with her own eyes. She would be glad if Tom's words were at least twenty percent true. When she was convinced that the entire fence was whitewashed, and not only whitewashed, but also covered with several thick layers of lime and even a white stripe was drawn along the ground along the fence, her amazement knew no bounds.

Well, you know,” she said, “I would never have thought... I have to give you justice, Tom, you can work whenever you want.” - Here she considered it necessary to soften the compliment and added: - Only very rarely do you want this. This also needs to be said. Well, go play. And don't forget to come home. Otherwise I have a short punishment!

Aunt Polly was so delighted with his great feat that she took him into the closet, chose and gave him the best apple, accompanying the gift with a little edifying sermon about how every item that comes to us at the cost of noble, honest labor seems sweeter and nicer to us.

Just at the moment when she ended her speech with an appropriate text from the gospel, Tom managed to steal the gingerbread.

He jumped out into the yard and saw Sid. Sid just started walking up the stairs. The staircase was on the outside of the house and led to the back rooms of the second floor. Tom had very convenient clods of earth at his fingertips, and in an instant the air was filled with them. They showered Sid with furious hail. Before Aunt Polly came to her senses and came to the rescue, six or seven lumps had already hit the target, and Tom had jumped over the fence and disappeared. There was, of course, a gate, but Tom usually didn’t have time to run to it. Now that he had settled accounts with the traitor Sid, who pointed out the black thread to Aunt Polly, peace reigned in his soul.

Tom circled the street and ducked into a dusty nook that ran along the back wall of his aunt's cowshed. He soon found himself out of any danger. Here he had nothing to fear that he would be caught and punished. He headed towards the city square, to the place where, by prior agreement, two armies had already met for battle. One of them was commanded by Tom, the other by his bosom buddy Joe Harper. Both great military leaders did not deign to personally fight each other - this was more suitable for small-timers; they led the battle, standing side by side on the hill and giving orders through their adjutants. After a long and fierce battle, Tom's army was victorious. Both armies counted the dead, exchanged prisoners, agreed on what would lead to a new war, and set the day for the next decisive battle. Then the two armies formed a line and left the battlefield in a ceremonial march, and Tom headed home alone.

Walking past the house where Jeff Thacher lived, he saw some new girl in the garden - a lovely blue-eyed creature with golden hair braided in two long braids, wearing a white summer dress and embroidered pantaloons. The hero, just crowned with glory, was killed without firing a shot. A certain Emmy Lawrence immediately disappeared from his heart, without leaving even a trace there. And he imagined that he loved Emmy Lawrence madly, adored her! It turns out that it was just a passing hobby, nothing more. For several months he sought her love. Just a week ago she admitted that she loved him. During these seven short days, he proudly considered himself the happiest boy in the world, and then in an instant she left his heart, like a random guest who came for a minute on a visit.

With pious delight he looked furtively at this new angel, until he was sure that the angel had noticed him. Then he pretended that he was unaware of the girl’s presence and began to “act” in front of her, doing (as is customary among boys) various ridiculous things to arouse her admiration. For some time he performed all these intricate and nonsensical tricks. Suddenly, in the middle of some dangerous acrobatic stunt, he looked in that direction and saw that the girl had turned her back to him and was heading towards the house. Tom came closer and sadly leaned his elbows on the fence; he really wanted her to stay in the garden a little longer... She actually lingered a little on the steps, but then stepped straight to the door. Tom sighed heavily when her foot touched the threshold, and suddenly his whole face lit up: before disappearing behind the door, the girl looked back and threw a daisy flower over the fence.

Tom ran around the flower, and then, two steps away from it, he put his palm to his eyes and began to peer intently at the far end of the street, as if something interesting was happening there. Then he picked up a straw from the ground and placed it on his nose, trying to keep it balanced by throwing his head far back. Balancing, he came closer and closer to the flower; Finally he stepped on it with his bare foot, grabbed it with his flexible fingers, jumped on one leg and soon disappeared around the corner, taking his treasure with him.

But he disappeared only for a minute while he unbuttoned his jacket and hid the flower on his chest, closer to his heart or, perhaps, to his stomach, since he was not particularly strong in anatomy and did not understand much about such things.

Then he returned and hung around the fence until the evening, still doing various things. The girl didn't show up; but Tom consoled himself with the hope that she was standing somewhere at the window and seeing how zealous he was for her sake. In the end he reluctantly trudged home, his poor head full of fantastic dreams.

At dinner he was so excited all the time that his aunt wondered: what happened to the child? Having received a good scolding for throwing lumps of earth at Sid, Tom, apparently, was not upset at all.

He tried to steal a piece of sugar from under his aunt’s nose and received a slap on the wrist for it, but again he was not offended and only said:

Auntie, you don’t hit Sid when he’s carrying sugar!

Sid doesn't torture people like you. If you weren't watched, you wouldn't get out of the sugar bowl.

But then the aunt went into the kitchen, and Sid, happy with his impunity, immediately reached for the sugar bowl, as if mocking Tom. It was downright unbearable! But the sugar bowl slipped from Sid’s fingers, fell to the floor and broke. Tom was delighted, so delighted that he held his tongue and did not even cry out for joy. He decided not to say a word, even when his aunt came in, but to sit quietly and quietly until she asked who did it. Then he will tell everything, and it will be fun for him to watch how she deals with her exemplary favorite. What could be nicer than this! He was so filled with gloating that he could hardly remain silent when his aunt returned and stood over the fragments of the sugar bowl, a sword of lightning of anger over her glasses. Tom said to himself: “Here it is, it’s beginning!..” But the next minute he was already lying on the floor! The domineering hand rose above him again to strike him again as he cried out in tears:

Wait! Wait! Why are you beating me? After all, Sid broke it!

Aunt Polly stopped, embarrassed. Tom expected that she would now take pity on him and thereby make amends for her guilt to him. But as soon as the gift of speech returned to her, she only said to him:

Hm! Well, after all, I think you got it for a reason. You probably pulled out some new thing while I wasn't in the room.

Here her conscience reproached her. She really wanted to say something sincere and affectionate to the boy, but she was afraid that if she became tender with him, he might think that she admitted she was guilty, and discipline did not allow this. So she didn't say a word and went about her normal work with a heavy heart. Tom sulked in the corner and tended to his wounds. He knew that in his soul she was kneeling before him, and this consciousness gave him dark joy. He decided not to notice her ingratiation and not to show her that he saw her mental anguish. He knew that from time to time she turned a sad look at him and that there were tears in her eyes, but he did not want to pay any attention to it. He imagined how he lay sick, dying, and his aunt bent over him and conjured him so that he would show her at least a word of forgiveness; but he turns his face to the wall and dies without saying this word. How will she feel then? He imagined being brought home dead: he had just been pulled out of the river, his curls were wet, and his suffering heart was calmed forever. How she will throw herself on his dead body, and her tears will flow like rain, and her lips will pray to the Lord God to return her boy to her, whom she will never, never punish in vain! But he will still lie pale, cold, without signs of life - an unfortunate little sufferer, whose torment has ceased forever! He upset himself so much with these mournful nonsense that his tears literally choked him, he had to swallow them. Everything was blurred in front of him because of his tears. Every time he had to blink, so much moisture accumulated in his eyes that it flowed abundantly down his face and dripped from the tip of his nose. And it was so pleasant for him to delight his soul with sadness that he could not allow any worldly joys to intrude into it. Any pleasure only irritated him - his grief seemed so holy to him. Therefore, when his cousin Mary came dancing into the room, happy that she had finally returned home after a long absence that lasted an eternity - that is, a week - he, gloomy and gloomy, got up and left one door, while songs and the sun entered with Mary into another.

He wandered away from the places where boys usually gathered. He was attracted to secluded corners, as sad as his heart. The log raft on the river seemed attractive to him; he sat down on the very edge, contemplating the dull expanse of water and dreaming about how good it would be to drown in an instant, without even feeling it and without exposing himself to any inconvenience. Then he remembered his flower, took it out from under his jacket - already withered and crumpled - and this further intensified his sweet sorrow. He began to ask himself, would she have pitied him if she knew how heavy he was in his soul? Would she cry and want to throw her arms around his neck and comfort him? Or would she have turned away from him indifferently, as the empty and cold light now turned away from him?

The thought of this filled him with such pleasant melancholy that he began to shake it in every possible way until it was completely worn out. Finally he stood up with a sigh and walked into the darkness.

At half past nine - or ten o'clock - he found himself on a deserted street where the Adored Stranger lived; he paused for a moment and listened - not a sound. In the window of the second floor, a dim candle illuminated the curtain... Is this the room blessed by the bright presence of his Stranger? He climbed over the fence, quietly made his way through the bushes and stood right under the window. For a long time he looked at this window with tenderness, then he lay down on his back, folding his hands on his chest and holding his poor, withered flower in them. This is how he would like to die - thrown into this world of indifferent hearts: in the open air, not knowing where to lay his homeless head; no friendly hand will wipe the mortal sweat from his brow, no loving face will bend over him with compassion in the hours of his last agony. This is how she will see him tomorrow, when she looks out of this window, admiring the cheerful dawn - and will not a single tear fall from her eyes onto his lifeless, poor body, will not a single weak sigh escape from her chest at the sight of this young brilliant life , so roughly trampled, so early cut down by death?

Snorting and shaking himself, the stunned hero jumped to his feet. Soon a flying object whizzed through the air like a projectile, a quiet curse was heard, the sound of broken glass was heard, and a small, barely noticeable shadow flew over the fence and disappeared into the darkness.

When Tom, already undressed, was examining his wet clothes in the light of a tallow candle, Sid woke up. Perhaps he had a vague desire to make a few comments about the recent insults, but he immediately changed his mind and lay very still, since he noticed a threat in Tom’s eyes.

Tom went to bed without bothering with his evening prayer, and Sid silently noted this omission.

Chapter IV

"TRAMPING" IN SUNDAY SCHOOL

The sun rose over the serene land and blessed the peaceful town with its bright radiance. After breakfast Aunt Polly performed the usual family worship; it began with a prayer, built on a solid foundation of biblical quotations, which she somehow held together with the liquid cement of her own conjectures. From this peak, as from the peak of Sinai, she proclaimed the stern commandment of the Law of Moses.

Then Tom girded up his loins, so to speak, and began filling his head with Bible verses. Sid had already prepared his lesson a long time ago. Tom strained all his mental strength to retain half a dozen poems in his memory. He deliberately chose a passage from the Sermon on the Mount because it contained the shortest lines he found in the entire gospel. By the end of half an hour he had received only a vague idea of ​​his lesson, no more, because at that time his mind was furrowing all the fields of human thought, and his hands were in constant motion, absent-mindedly wandering here and there. Mary took the book from him and began to ask the lesson, and he tried to feel his way in the fog.

Blessed poor in spirit... s... uh...

Yes... the poor... blessed are the poor... uh... uh...

Spirit; blessed are the poor in spirit... for... they...

For their... For their...

For theirs... Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs... is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the mourners, for they... they...

Because they... uh...

Because they are UTE... Well, for the life of me, I don’t know what they will do!

Oh, comfort... For they are comfort... for they are comfort... uh... uh... Blessed are those who mourn, for, for... What will they do? Why don't you tell me, Mary? Why are you so shameless!

Ah, Tom! You unfortunate, thick-headed boy! I don't even think about teasing you! No no! You just have to go and learn everything properly. Don't lose patience, Tom, things will work out eventually, and if you learn this lesson, I'll give you one very, very good thing. Be smart, go and get busy.

Okay... What will it be, Mary? Tell me, what will it be?

Don't worry about it, Tom. If I said a good thing, it means it’s good.

I know, Mary, I know. Okay, I'll go and learn!

Indeed, he began to cram very diligently; under the double pressure of curiosity and expected benefit, the lesson was brilliantly learned. For this, Mary gave him a brand new Barlow knife, worth twelve and a half cents, and the spasm of delight that Tom experienced shook his whole soul. Although the knife turned out to be dull, it was a “real” Barlow knife, and there was something extraordinarily majestic about it. Where did the boys of the West get the idea that someone would be willing to counterfeit such crappy knives and that counterfeiting them would make them even worse is a great mystery, which, one might think, will remain forever unsolved. Still, Tom managed to cut the entire sideboard with this knife, and he was about to start working on the chest of drawers, but he was called to get dressed, since it was time to go to Sunday school.

Mary gave him a tin basin full of water and a bar of soap; he went out the door, put the basin on the stool, then dipped the soap in water and put it in its original place; then he rolled up his sleeves, carefully poured the water onto the ground, entered the kitchen and began to rub his face with all his strength with a towel hanging outside the door. But Mary took the towel from him.

Shame on you, Tom! - she exclaimed. - How can you be such a bad boy! After all, water will not harm you.

Tom was a little confused. The basin was filled with water again. This time Tom stood over him for a while, gaining courage, finally took a deep breath of air and began to wash himself. When he entered the kitchen a second time with his eyes closed, groping for a towel, the water and soap suds dripping from his face made it impossible to doubt his integrity. And yet, when he emerged from under the towel, the results were not very brilliant, since the clear space, like a mask, occupied only part of his face, from forehead to chin; above and below these boundaries stretched a vast territory, not irrigated by water, rising onto the forehead at the top, and below laying a dark stripe around the neck. Mary energetically took hold of him, and after that he became a man no different from other pale-faced people: his wet hair was combed smoothly with a brush, his short curls were arranged with beautiful symmetry. (He immediately began to secretly straighten his curls, and this cost him a lot of work; he pressed them tightly to his head, because he was sure that the curls made him look like a girl; they were the misfortune of his whole life.) Then Mary took out for Tom a suit that he had been wearing only on Sundays for two years now. The suit was called “that other one,” and this gives us the opportunity to judge the richness of his wardrobe. When he was dressed, Mary straightened him, buttoned his jacket, turned the wide collar of his shirt over his shoulders, brushed his dress and finally crowned him with a colorful straw hat. Now he looked decent and at the same time suffering. He really suffered greatly: the neatness and elegance of his suit irritated him. He hoped that Mary would forget about his shoes, but the hope turned out to be deceptive: Mary carefully coated them with lard, as was customary, and brought them to him. Here he lost patience and began to grumble why he was always forced to do what he did not want. But Mary kindly asked him:

Well, please, Tom... be smart.

And he, grumbling, pulled on his shoes. Mary dressed quickly, and all three went to Sunday school, which Tom hated with all his heart, but Sid and Mary loved.

Sunday school classes lasted from nine to half past ten; then the church service began. Mary and Sid always voluntarily stayed to listen to the priest’s sermon, Tom also stayed, but he had more serious goals.

The church pews could accommodate about three hundred people; the benches had high backs without cushions, the building was small and unprepossessing, and on the roof protruded something like a narrow box made of pine boards - a bell tower. At the door, Tom fell behind his friends and turned to one of his friends, also dressed in a Sunday suit:

Listen, Billy, do you have a yellow ticket?

What will you take for it?

And what will you give?

A piece of licorice and a fish hook.

Tom showed. Things were in perfect order; property changed hands. Then Tom exchanged two white balls for three red tickets and also gave away a few trinkets for a pair of blue ones. He lay in wait for the boys entering and bought tickets of different colors from them. This lasted ten to fifteen minutes. Then he entered the church along with a crowd of neatly dressed and noisy children, sat down in his place and immediately started a quarrel with the first boy he came across. The teacher, a serious, elderly man, intervened; but as soon as the teacher turned away, Tom pulled the hair of the man sitting on the bench in front and, before he could look back, buried his nose in the book. A minute later he was already stabbing another with a pin, because he wanted to hear this other shout “ouch!” - and again received a reprimand from the teacher. However, the whole class was, as luck would have it, mischievous, restless, and noisy. When the boys began to answer the lesson, it turned out that no one knew the poems properly, and the teacher had to prompt them all the time. But, be that as it may, they barely made it to the end of the lesson, and each received their reward - a small blue ticket with a text from the Bible: the blue ticket was payment for two Bible verses learned by heart. Ten blue tickets were equal to one red ticket and could be exchanged for it; ten reds equaled one yellow; and for ten yellow coins the school director gave the student a Bible in a very simple binding. (This Bible, being cheap at that time, cost only forty cents.) How many of my readers would have had the strength and patience to memorize two thousand verses, even if they were promised a luxurious Bible with Dore’s drawings as a reward? But Mary earned two Bibles in this manner - at the cost of two years of tireless work. And one boy from a German family is even four or five. Once he knocked out three thousand verses in a row, without hesitation; but such a strain on his mental abilities turned out to be too great, and from that day on he became an idiot - a great misfortune for the school, since previously on special occasions, in public, the director usually called this boy to “wag his tongue” (as Tom put it). Of the other students, only the eldest took care of their tickets and indulged in dull cramming for a long time in order to earn a Bible - so the awarding of this prize was a rare and remarkable event. The student who received the Bible became a celebrity on this day. Is it any wonder that the hearts of other schoolchildren, at least for two weeks, burned with the desire to follow in his footsteps! It is possible that Tom's mental stomach never craved such food, but there is no doubt that his whole being had long craved the glory and splendor associated with receiving a Bible.

Exactly at the appointed hour, the director appeared at the department. He had a closed prayer book in his hand. His index finger was inserted between the pages of the book. The director demanded that his words be listened to with the utmost attention. When the Sunday school director gives his usual short speech, the prayer book in his hand is as inevitable as the sheet music in the hand of a singer who stands on the concert stage and sings his solo - but for what it is needed, one cannot guess, for neither in the prayer book, None of these martyrs ever looks at the notes.

The director was a shabby little man of about thirty-five, with a short haircut, red hair, and a goatee; the upper edges of his tightly starched stand-up collar reached almost to his ears, and the sharp ends curved forward along with the corners of his mouth, representing a fence that forced him to look only straight ahead or turn his whole body when he needed to look somewhere to the side. His chin was supported by a wide tie, no smaller than a bank note, edged with fringe; the toes of his boots were, according to the fashion of that time, steeply curved upward, like the runners of a sleigh - an effect that young people at that time achieved through hard work and patience, sitting for hours at a time against the wall and pressing the toes of their shoes against it. Mr. Walters had a deeply serious face, a pure, sincere heart: he had such reverent feelings for sacred objects and places and so separated everything sacred from the grossly everyday that whenever he happened to speak at a Sunday school, there was an imperceptible quality in his voice. For himself, special notes appeared that were completely absent on weekdays. He began his speech with these words:

Now, children, I would ask you to sit as quietly and straight as possible for two or three minutes and listen to me as attentively as possible. Like this! This is how all well-behaved children should behave. I notice one little girl looking out the window; I’m afraid that she imagines that I’m sitting there on a branch and telling my speech to some birds. (Giggles of approval.) I want to tell you how gratifying it is for me to see before me so many cheerful and clean faces gathered within these sacred walls in order to learn goodness.

And so on and so forth. There is no need to give the rest. The director's entire speech was compiled according to a ready-made model that never changes - therefore, it is known to all of us. The last third of this speech was sometimes overshadowed by the fighting that resumed between the mischievous boys. There were many other entertainments. The children fidgeted, whispered, and their unbridledness sometimes reached even to the foot of such lonely, unshakable cliffs as Mary and Sid. But all conversation fell silent as the director's voice began to deepen, and the end of his speech was greeted with an outburst of silent gratitude.

To a large extent, the whispering was caused by one circumstance, more or less rare - the appearance of guests: lawyer Thacher entered, accompanied by some decrepit old man. Following them appeared a middle-aged gentleman, very imposing, with graying hair, and a stately lady - undoubtedly his wife. The lady was leading the girl by the hand. Tom couldn’t sit still the whole time, he was irritated and excited. In addition, he was tormented by remorse: he did not dare meet the eyes of Emmy Lawrence, could not withstand her unclear gaze. But when he saw the girl enter, his soul was filled with bliss. He instantly began to “show off” as much as he could: to tease the boys, pull their hair, make faces - in a word, to practice all the arts with which he could charm a girl and earn her approval. Mixed with his delight was one unpleasantness: the memory of the humiliation that he had to experience in the garden under the angel's window; but the memory of this event was written, so to speak, on shifting sand. The streams of bliss that Tom experienced washed away her, leaving no trace.

The guests were seated in the place of honor, and as soon as Mr. Walters had finished speaking, he introduced the visitors to the schoolchildren.

The middle-aged man turned out to be a very important person - no more, no less than a district judge. The children had never seen such an important dignitary; looking at him, they asked themselves with curiosity what material he was made of, and they either longed to hear him growl, or were afraid that he might growl. He came from Constantinople, twelve miles away; therefore, he traveled and saw the world; he saw with his own eyes the county courthouse, which is said to have a zinc roof. The awe caused by such thoughts was evidenced by the silence in the entire class and a whole string of attentive eyes. It was the great Judge Thacher, the brother of the lawyer who lived here in the town. Jeff Thacher, a schoolboy, immediately stepped forward to show, to the envy of the entire school, how closely he knew the great man. If he could hear the whispers of his comrades, they would be the sweetest music to him.

Look, Jim, he's coming there! Look! No way, he wants to shake his hand?.. Look! Honestly, it shakes! Hello! Wow! Would you like to be in Jeff's place?

Mr. Walters “trumped” in his own way, fussily showing his zeal and his efficiency: his advice, instructions, orders rained down on everyone on whom he could bring them down. The Librarian also “trumped”, running back and forth with armfuls of books , while being terribly zealous, making noise, fussing. The young teachers “trumped” in their own way, gently bending over the children - whose ears they had recently pulled - with a smile, shaking a pretty finger at the naughty ones and affectionately stroking the heads of the obedient ones. Young teachers “struck” by demonstrating their authority through comments, reprimands, and the implementation of commendable discipline. Almost all teachers of both sexes suddenly needed something in the bookcase, which stood in plain sight - next to the department. They kept running up to him (with a very worried look). The girls, in turn, “trumped” in different ways, and the boys “trumped” with such zeal that the air was full of warlike sounds and balls of chewed paper. And above all this towered the figure of a great man, sitting in a chair, illuminating the school with a proud judicial smile and, so to speak, basking in the rays of his own greatness, for he, too, “trumped” in his own way.

Only one thing was needed for Mr. Walters to be completely blissful: he longed to show his distinguished guests the miracle of diligence and hand over a Bible to some schoolboy. But although some of the students had accumulated a few yellow tickets, this was not enough: Mr. Walters had already interviewed all the best students. Ah, he would give the whole world to restore sanity to a boy from a German family!

And at that moment, when his hope faded, Tom Sawyer steps forward and presents a whole bunch of tickets: nine yellow, nine red and ten blue, and demands a Bible as a reward! It was a bolt of thunder from a clear sky. Mr. Walters had long ago given up on Sawyer and was assured that he would not see the Bible for the next ten years. But it is impossible to go against the facts: here are checks with the government seal, and they must be paid. Tom was taken to the platform where the judge and other elected officials sat, and the authorities themselves announced the great news. It was something amazing. The school had not seen such a surprise in the last ten years; the shock it caused was so deep that the new hero seemed to immediately rise to the same height as the famous judge, and the school now contemplated two miracles instead of one. All the boys burned with envy, and the ones who suffered the most were those who only now realized that they themselves had helped Tom achieve such terrible success by selling him so many tickets for the treasures that he had acquired while whitewashing the fence. They despised themselves for being so easily fooled by this treacherous rascal, this seducing serpent.

The director handed Tom the Bible with all the solemnity of which he was capable at that moment, but his speech was not too warm - a vague feeling told the poor fellow that some dark secret lay hidden here: it would be sheer absurdity to assume that this boy had saved up in the barns his memory is two thousand sheaves of biblical wisdom, when his mind is not enough for a dozen.

Amy Lawrence beamed with happiness and pride. She took every precaution to make Tom notice her joy, but he did not look at her. This seemed strange to her; then she became a little alarmed; then suspicion entered her soul - it entered and went and entered again; She began to take a closer look - a quick glance told her a lot, and her heart broke, she was jealous, angry, cried and hated the whole world. And most of all Tom... yes, Tom (she was sure of it).

Tom was presented to the judge, but the unfortunate man hardly dared to breathe, his tongue stuck to his larynx, and his heart trembled - partly from fear of the formidable greatness of this man, but mainly because it was her father. Tom was ready to fall on his knees in front of him and bow to him - if it were dark here. The judge put his hand on Tom's head, called him a nice boy and asked his name. Tom paused, opened his mouth and finally said:

Oh no, not Tom, but...

That's it. I knew your name was probably a little longer. Good good! But still, of course, you have a surname; you will tell it to me, won't you?

Tell the gentleman your last name, Thomas,” Walters intervened, “and when you speak to elders, remember to add “sir.” You must be able to behave in society.

Thomas Sawyer... sir.

Here you go! Good girl! Nice boy. Good boy, well done! Two thousand verses is a lot, very, very much! And you will never regret that you took the trouble to learn them, because knowledge is more important than anything in the world. This is what makes a person great and noble. You yourself someday, Thomas, will be a great and noble man; and then you will look back on the path you have traveled and say: “I owe all this to the invaluable Sunday school that I attended as a child, I owe all this to my dear mentors who taught me to work on books; I owe all this to the good director, who encouraged me, and cherished me, and gave me a wonderful Bible, a beautiful elegant Bible, so that I could have my own Bible and always have it with me; and all this is because I was raised so well.” That's what you say, Thomas - and you, of course, would not take any money for these two thousand Bible verses. None, never! Now, would you agree to tell me and this lady something you have learned? I know you won’t refuse, because we are proud of children who love to learn. You, of course, know the names of all twelve apostles?.. Of course! Can you tell us what the names of the first two were?

Tom tugged at his button and looked blankly at the judge. Then he flushed and lowered his eyes. Mr. Walters's heart sank. “After all, the boy is not able to answer the simplest question,” he said to himself, “why is the judge asking him?” But still he considered it his duty to intervene.

Answer the gentleman, Thomas, don't be afraid!

Tom shifted from foot to foot.

“You will definitely answer me,” the lady intervened. - The first two disciples of Christ were called...

David and Goliath!

Let us lower the veil of pity over the end of this scene.

Chapter V

BITE BEETLE AND ITS VICTIM

Around half past ten, the cracked bell of the small church rang, and the parishioners began to gather for the morning sermon. The Sunday school students scattered in different directions around the church building, sitting on the same benches where their parents sat, so as to be under the supervision of their elders at all times. Here comes Aunt Polly; Tom, Sid and Mary sat down next to her, and Tom was seated closer to the aisle, away from the open window, so that he would not be entertained by the seductive summer sights. The worshipers little by little filled all the limits. Here is a poor old postmaster who has once seen better days; here is the mayor and his wife - for among other unnecessary things in the town there was a mayor; here is the justice of the peace; here is the widow Douglas, a beautiful, smart woman of about forty, kind, rich, generous: her house on the hill was not a house, but a palace, the only palace in the town; Moreover, it was a hospitable palace, where the most luxurious feasts that St. Petersburg could boast were held. Here is the crooked and venerable Major Ward and his wife. Here is lawyer Riverson, a new celebrity who came to these places from afar; here is a local beauty, and behind her is a whole regiment of charming maidens, dressed in cambrics and ribbons; here are the young clerks; all of them, as many as there are in the town, stand in the vestibule like a semicircular wall - pomaded admirers of the fair sex - stand and, smiling idiotically, suck on their canes until they let every last girl pass through the gauntlet. Finally, after everyone else, Willie Mepherson came, the Exemplary Child, who guarded his mother so carefully as if she were crystal. He always accompanied her to church, and all the old ladies spoke of him with admiration. And the boys - every single one - hated him because he was so well-mannered, and most importantly, because his good behavior was constantly “poked in their nose.” Every Sunday, the tip of a white handkerchief stuck out of his back pocket, as if by chance (as it did now). Tom never had a handkerchief, and he considered boys who owned handkerchiefs to be despicable dandies.

When the whole church was filled with people, the bell rang again to warn those who were late, and then a solemn silence descended on the church, interrupted only by the giggling and whispering of the singers in the choir. Singers are always giggling and whispering during church services. In one church I saw singers who behaved more decently, but I don’t remember where it was. Many years have passed since then, and I have forgotten all the details; it seems that it was somewhere on the other side.

The priest named the hymn that was to be read and began to read it - with a howl, beloved in these parts. He started on middle notes and gradually climbed up, climbed to a great height, placed a strong emphasis on the top word and then suddenly flew headfirst, as if into the water from a springboard.

The priest was considered an excellent reader. At church meetings, everyone asked him to recite poetry, and when he finished reciting, the ladies raised their hands to the sky and immediately dropped them helplessly to their knees, rolled their eyes and shook their heads, as if wanting to say: “No words will express our delight: this too beautiful, too beautiful for our mortal earth.”

After the hymn was sung, the Honorable Mr. Sprague turned himself into a local notice-sheet, and began to announce in detail the upcoming religious discourses, meetings, and other things, until the parishioners began to think that this very long list would reach the Last Judgment, a wild custom that has still been preserved in America, even in big cities, despite the fact that a lot of all kinds of newspapers are published in the country. Such things happen often: the more senseless an inveterate custom is, the more difficult it is to put an end to it.

Then the priest began to pray. It was a good prayer, magnanimous, generous, not disdainful of any little things; she did not forget anyone: she prayed for this church, and for the little children of this church, and for the other churches that exist here in the town; and about the town itself; and about the district; and about the state, and about the officials of the state, and about the United States; and about the churches of the United States; both about Congress and about the President; I'm talking about government members; and about poor sailors undergoing severe storms; and about the oppressed peoples groaning under the yoke of European monarchs and eastern tyrants; and about those enlightened by the light of the Gospel truth, but not having eyes to see and ears to hear; and about the pagans of the distant sea islands - and all this ended with an ardent prayer that the words that the priest would say would reach the throne of the Most High and be like grain that fell on fertile soil and produce a rich harvest of good. Amen.

The rustling of skirts was heard - the parishioners who had been standing during prayer again sat down on the benches. The boy, whose biography is presented on these pages, did not enjoy prayer very much - he only endured it as inevitable boredom, as much as he had the strength. He could not sit still: he did not think about the content of the prayer, but only counted the points that were mentioned in it, for which he did not need to listen carefully, since he had long been accustomed to this familiar road, which was the constant route of the priest. But as soon as the priest added even a word to his usual prayer, Tom’s ear immediately noticed the addition, and his whole soul was indignant; he considered lengthening prayer to be a dishonorable act, a fraud. During the service, a fly landed on the back of the front pew. This fly positively tormented him: she calmly rubbed her front legs, covered her head with them and polished it so diligently that the head almost came off the body and a thin thread of the neck was visible; then with her hind paws she cleaned and scraped the wings and smoothed them, like the tails of a tailcoat, so that they would fit more tightly to her body; She performed her entire toilette so calmly and slowly, as if she knew that nothing threatened her. And, in fact, she was in no danger, because, although Tom's hands were itching to grab a fly, he did not dare to do this during prayer, since he was sure that he would destroy his soul forever and ever. But as soon as the priest said the last words, Tom’s hand crept forward of its own accord, and the minute the “Amen” sounded, the fly found itself captive. But the aunt noticed this maneuver and forced him to release the fly.

The priest uttered a quotation from the Bible and in a monotonous humming voice began a sermon, so boring that soon many were nodding off, despite the fact that it was about eternal fire and boiling brimstone, and the number of the elect for whom eternal bliss was destined was reduced to such a small number that such a handful of righteous people, perhaps, were not worth saving. Tom counted the pages of the sermon: after leaving the church, he could always tell how many pages there were in the sermon, but its content completely eluded him. However, this time something interested him. The priest depicted a majestic, stunning picture: how the righteous of the whole world will gather in paradise, and the lion will lie down next to the lamb, and a tiny child will lead them behind him. The pathos and morality of this spectacle did not move Tom at all; he was struck only by the important role that would fall to the child’s lot in the face of the peoples of the whole earth; his eyes shone, and he told himself that he himself would not mind being this child, if, of course, the lion was tame.

But then dry reasoning began again, and Tom’s torment resumed. Suddenly he remembered what a treasure he had in his pocket, and hurried to get it out of there. It was a big black beetle with huge, scary jaws - a “biting beetle,” as Tom called it. The beetle was hidden in a box from under the caps. When Tam opened the box, the beetle first fell into his finger. Naturally, the beetle was thrown away and ended up in the aisle between the church pews, and Tom immediately put his bitten finger into his mouth. The beetle fell on its back and floundered helplessly, unable to turn over. Tom looked at it and longed to grab it again, but the beetle was far away. But now it served as entertainment for many others who were not interested in preaching. Then a poodle wandered into the church, melancholy, languid, exhausted from the summer heat; he was tired of being locked up, he longed for new experiences. As soon as he saw the beetle, its sadly drooping tail immediately rose and wagged. The poodle examined its prey, walked around it, sniffed it cautiously from afar; walked around again; then he became bolder, approached and sniffed again, then bared his teeth, wanted to grab the beetle - and missed; tried again and again; Apparently, he liked this entertainment; he lay down on his stomach, so that the beetle was between his front paws, and continued his experiments. Then he got tired of it, then he became indifferent, absent-minded, and began to nod off; Little by little his head drooped onto his chest, and his lower jaw touched the enemy, who grabbed onto it. The poodle squealed desperately, shook his head, the beetle flew two steps to the side and fell on its back again. Those sitting nearby were shaking with silent laughter; many faces were hidden behind fans and handkerchiefs, and Tom was immensely happy. The poodle looked stupid - he must have felt fooled, but at the same time his heart was pinched by resentment and thirsted for revenge. Therefore, he crept up to the beetle and carefully resumed the attack: he jumped on the beetle from all sides, almost touching it with his front paws, clanged his teeth at it and shook his head so that his ears flapped. But in the end he got tired of this too; then he tried to amuse himself with a fly, but there was nothing interesting in it; he followed the ant, pressing his nose to the very floor, but even this quickly bored him; he yawned, sighed, completely forgot about the beetle and calmly sat down on it! An insane squeal was heard, the poodle rushed down the aisle and, without ceasing to squeal, rushed around the church; just before the altar he ran to the opposite aisle, rushed like an arrow to the doors, and back from the doors; he screamed at the whole church, and the more he rushed about, the more his pain grew; Finally, the dog turned into some kind of comet overgrown with hair, spinning with the speed and brilliance of a light beam. It ended with the distraught sufferer darting to the side and jumping onto his owner’s lap, who threw him out the window; the howl, full of painful sorrow, was heard quieter and quieter and finally died away in the distance.

By this time everyone in the church was sitting with crimson faces, choking with suppressed laughter. Even the sermon stalled a bit. And although she immediately moved on, she stumbled and limped at every step, so there was no point in thinking about her moral impact. Hiding behind the backs of the church pews, the parishioners greeted the most solemn and gloomy phrases with muffled bursts of unholy laughter, as if the unfortunate priest had made an unusually successful joke.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when this torture ended and the last “amen” was said.

Tom Sawyer walked home cheerfully; he thought to himself that sometimes a church service might not be very boring if only some variety was introduced into it. One thing darkened his joy: although he was pleased that the poodle played with his beetle, why did the worthless puppy take away this beetle forever? Really, it's not fair.

Chapter VI

TOM MEETS BECKY

Tom woke up on Monday morning feeling very unhappy. He always felt miserable on Monday morning, as that day began a new week of long torment at school. He even wished then that there would be no resurrections in his life at all, since after a short freedom the return to prison would be even more difficult.

Tom lay there and thought. Suddenly it occurred to him that it would be good to get sick; then he will stay at home and not go to school. The hope is weak, but why not try! He examined his body. It didn't hurt anywhere, and he felt himself again. This time it seemed to him that a pain began in his stomach, and he was glad, hoping that the pain would intensify. But the pain, on the contrary, soon weakened and little by little disappeared. Tom began to think further. And suddenly he discovered that his tooth was loose. It was a great success; He was about to groan to begin with, but then he realized that if he mentioned a tooth, his aunt would immediately pull the tooth out - and that would hurt. Therefore, he decided that it was better to leave the tooth in reserve and look for something else. For some time nothing turned up; then he remembered how the doctor had spoken of an illness which had put a patient to bed for two or three weeks and threatened him with the loss of a finger. The boy, with passionate hope, stuck his foot out from under the sheet and began to examine the sore toe. He had no idea what the symptoms of this disease were. However, it was still worth a try, and he began to moan diligently.

But Sid was asleep and did not notice the moans.

Tom moaned louder, and little by little it began to seem to him that his finger really hurt.

Sid showed no signs of life.

Tom was even out of breath from the effort. He rested for a while, then took a deep breath and let out a series of extremely successful groans.

Sid continued to snore.

Tom lost his temper. He said, “Sid! Sid! - and began to lightly shake the sleeping man. It worked and Tom moaned again. Sid yawned, stretched, propped himself up on his elbow, snorted and stared at Tom. Tom continued to moan.

Sid provided:

Volume! Listen up, Tom!

There was no answer.

Do you hear, Tom? Volume! What's wrong with you, Tom?

Sid, in turn, shook his brother, anxiously peering into his face. Tom groaned:

Leave me alone, Sid! Don't shake!

What's the matter with you, Tom? I'll go and call my aunt.

No, don't, Maybe it will pass soon. Don't call anyone.

No, no, you have to call! Don't moan so terribly!.. How long has this been with you?

Few hours. Oh! For God's sake, don't toss and turn, Sid! You'll just ruin me.

Why didn't you wake me up earlier, Tom? Oh, Tom, stop moaning! Your moans just send chills through my skin. What is hurting you?

I forgive you everything, Sid!.. (Moan.) Everything that you are guilty of to me. When I'm gone...

Tom, are you really dying? Tom, don't die... please! May be…

I forgive everyone, Sid. (Groan.) Tell them about it, Sid. And give the one-eyed kitten and the window frame, Sid, to that girl who recently arrived in town, and tell her...

But Sid grabbed the clothes and out the door. Now Tom was really suffering - so wonderfully his imagination worked - and his groans sounded quite natural.

Sid ran down the stairs and shouted:

Oh, Aunt Polly, come quickly! Tom is dying!

Dies?

Yes! Yes! What are you waiting for? Go quickly!

Nonsense! I do not believe!

But still she ran upstairs as fast as she could. Sid and Mary follow her. Her face was pale, her lips were trembling. Having reached Tom's bed, she could hardly say:

Volume! Volume! What happened to you?

Oh, aunt, I...

What's wrong with you, what's wrong with you, child?

Oh, aunt, I have gangrene on my finger!

Aunt Polly fell into a chair and first laughed, then cried, then laughed and cried at once.

This brought her to her senses, and she said:

Well, you scared me, Tom! And now that’s enough: stop your tricks and let this not happen again!

The moans stopped and the pain in my finger instantly went away. Tom (felt in a ridiculous position.

Really, Aunt Polly, it seemed to me that my finger was completely dead, and I was in so much pain that I even forgot about my tooth.

Tooth? What's wrong with your tooth?

It staggers and hurts terribly, almost unbearably...

Well, it will be, it will be, don’t even try to whine again! Open your mouth!.. Yes, the tooth is really loose, but you won’t die from it... Mary, bring a silk thread and a burning brand from the kitchen.

Auntie, don’t pull it out, don’t, don’t tear it - it doesn’t hurt anymore! I should fall in this place if it hurts even a little! Auntie, please don't! I’ll still go to school anyway...

Will you go to school? So that's it! The only reason you started all this fuss was to evade your studies and run off to the river to fish! Oh, Tom, Tom, I love you so much, and you, as if on purpose, are tearing my old heart apart with your ugly antics!

Meanwhile, tools arrived to remove the tooth. Aunt Polly made a loop at the end of the thread, put it on the sore tooth and pulled it tight, and tied the other end to the bedpost; then she grabbed a flaming brand and poked it almost into the boy’s face. A moment - and the tooth hung on a thread tied to a post.

But for every trial a person is given a reward. When Tom went to school after breakfast, all the comrades he met on the street were jealous of him, since the emptiness formed in the upper row of his teeth allowed him to spit in a completely new, wonderful way. A whole retinue of boys gathered around him, interested in this spectacle; one of them, who cut his finger and had hitherto been the subject of general attention and worship, immediately lost every single one of his followers, and his glory instantly faded. This upset him terribly, and he declared with feigned contempt that spitting like Tom Sawyer was a trifling matter, but the other boy replied: “The grapes are green!” - and the debunked hero left in disgrace.

Soon after this, Tom met the young pariah Huckleberry Finn, the son of a local drunkard. All the mothers in the city hated Huckleberry with all their hearts and at the same time were afraid of him, because he was a lazy, ill-mannered, bad boy who did not recognize any mandatory rules. And also because their children - every single one of them - doted on him, loved to hang out with him, although this was forbidden, and longed to imitate him in everything. Tom, like all other boys from respectable families, envied the outcast Huckleberry, and he was also strictly forbidden to have anything to do with this ragamuffin. Of course, it was for this reason that Tom never missed a chance to play with him. Huckleberry dressed in cast-offs from grown men's shoulders; his clothes were speckled with multi-colored spots and were so tattered that the rags fluttered in the wind. His hat was a huge wreck; from its brim hung down a long piece in the shape of a crescent; the jacket, on those rare days when Huck put it on, reached almost to his heels, so that the back buttons were located significantly below the tire; the pants hung on one suspender and dangled like an empty sack at the back, and were decorated with fringes at the bottom and dragged through the mud if Huck didn’t roll them up.

Huckleberry was a free bird, he wandered wherever he pleased. In good weather he spent the night on the steps of someone else's porch, and in rainy weather - in empty barrels. He did not have to go to school or to church, he did not have to obey anyone, there was no master over him. He could fish or swim whenever and wherever he pleased, and sit in the water as long as he pleased. Nobody stopped him from fighting. He could stay up until the morning. In the spring he was the first of all the boys to start walking barefoot, and in the fall he was the last to put on shoes. He didn’t need to wash or put on a clean dress, and he was amazing at swearing. In short, he had everything that makes life wonderful. This is what all the exhausted, shackled “well-bred” boys from respectable families thought in St. Petersburg.

Tom greeted the romantic tramp:

Hey Huckleberry! Hello!

Hello, you too, if you want...

What do you have?

Dead cat.

Let me see, Huck!.. Look, you’re completely numb. Where did you get it?

I bought it from a boy.

What did you give?

A blue ticket and a bull's bubble... I got the bubble from the slaughterhouse.

Where did you get the blue ticket?

Bought it from Ben Rogers two weeks ago...gave him a hoop stick.

Listen, Huck, dead cats - what are they good for?

How - for what? And remove warts.

Really? I know a cleaner solution.

And here you go, you don’t know! Which?

Rotten water.

Rotten water? It's worth nothing, your rotten water!

Worthless? And have you tried?

I haven't tried it. But Bob Tanner - he tried.

Who told you about this?

He said to Jeff Tacher, and Jeff said Johnny Baker, and Johnny said Jim Hollis, and Jim said Ben Rogers, and Ben said to one Negro, and the Negro told me. So I know.

Well, so what of this? They all lie. At least, everyone except the black man, I don’t know him. But I've never seen a black man who didn't lie. All this is empty talk! Now show me, Huck, how did Bob Tanner remove warts?

Yes, like this: he took it and stuck his hand into a rotten stump where rainwater had accumulated.

Well, of course.

Facing the stump?

How about that?

And did he say anything?

As if he didn’t say anything... But who knows? Don't know.

Yeah! You would also want to remove warts with rotten water when you get down to business like the most clueless fool! Such nonsense, of course, will be of no use. You need to go alone into the thicket of the forest, notice a place where there is such a stump, and at exactly midnight stand with your back to it, put your hand into it and say:

Barley, barley and rotten water, Indian food,

Take all my warts away forever!

And then you have to close your eyes and very soon walk away exactly eleven steps and turn around three times in place, and on the way home not say a word to anyone. If you say it, it’s lost: the witchcraft will not work.

Yeah, that looks like the right way, but Bob Tanner... he cut warts, not like that.

Yes, that's probably not true! That’s why he has so many warts, he’s the wartiest of all the guys in our city. And if he knew how to use rotten water, he wouldn’t have a single wart on him now. I myself brought together thousands of them with this song - yes, Huck, from my own hands. I had a lot of them because I often tinkered with frogs. Sometimes I make them look like beans.

Yes, this remedy is correct. I tried it myself.

You take a bean and cut it into two parts, then you cut your wart with a knife to get a drop of blood, and you smear one half of the bean with this blood, and then you dig a hole and bury this half in the ground... around midnight at a crossroads, on a new moon, and the other You burn half of it. The fact is that the half on which there is blood will pull and pull the other half towards itself, and in the meantime the blood will attract the wart to itself, and the wart will come off very soon.

That's right, Huck, that's right, although it would be even better if, when burying half a bean in a hole, you said: “The bean is a wart in the ground; Now I’ll part with you forever!” That would be even stronger. That's how Joe Harper removes warts, and he's experienced! Wherever I have been. - I almost got to Kunville... Well, how do you bring them together with dead cats?

End of free trial.

Mark Twain

ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER

translation by Korney Chukovsky

Chapter I

TOM PLAYS, FIGHTS, HIDES

No answer.

No answer.

Where did he go, this boy?.. Tom!

No answer.

The old woman lowered her glasses to the tip of her nose and looked around the room over her glasses; then she lifted her glasses onto her forehead and looked out from under them: she rarely looked through her glasses if she had to look for such a trifle as a boy, because these were her dress glasses, the pride of her heart: she wore them only “for importance”; in fact, she didn’t need them at all; she might as well have been looking through the stove dampers. At first, she seemed confused and said, not very angrily, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear her:

Well, just get caught! I...

Without finishing her thought, the old woman bent down and began poking under the bed with a brush, stopping each time because she was short of breath. From under the bed she did not take anything out except the cat.

I have never seen such a boy in my life!

She walked to the open door and, standing on the threshold, peered vigilantly into her garden - tomatoes overgrown with weeds. Tom wasn't there either. Then she raised her voice so that it could be heard further and shouted:

A slight rustling sound was heard from behind. She looked around and at the same second grabbed the edge of the boy’s jacket, who was about to sneak away.

Well, of course! And how could I forget about the closet! What did you do there?

Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What did you stain your lips with?

I don't know, aunt!

And I know. It's jam, that's what it is. Forty times I told you: don’t you dare touch the jam, otherwise I’ll skin you! Give me this rod here.

The rod flew into the air - the danger was imminent.

Ay! Aunt! What's that behind your back?

The old woman turned on her heel in fear and hurried to pick up her skirts in order to protect herself from a terrible disaster, and the boy at that very second started running, climbed onto a high plank fence - and was gone!

Aunt Polly was dumbfounded for a moment, and then began to laugh good-naturedly.

What a boy! It seemed like it was time for me to get used to his tricks. Or did he not play enough tricks with me? Could have been smarter this time. But, apparently, there is no worse fool than an old fool. It’s not without reason that they say that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. However, my God, this boy’s things are all different: every day, then another - can you guess what’s on his mind? It’s as if he knows how long he can torment me until I lose patience. He knows that if he confuses me for a minute or makes me laugh, then my hands give up, and I am unable to whip him with the rod. I am not fulfilling my duty, what is true is true, may God forgive me. “Whoever does without a rod destroys a child,” says the Holy Scripture. I, a sinner, spoil him, and for this we will get it in the next world - both me and him. I know that he is a real imp, but what should I do? After all, he is the son of my late sister, a poor fellow, and I don’t have the heart to flog an orphan. Every time I let him evade beatings, my conscience torments me so much that I don’t even know how to give him a flogging - my old heart is literally torn to pieces. It is true, it is true in scripture: the human age is short and full of sorrows. The way it is! Today he did not go to school: he will be idle until the evening, and it is my duty to punish him, and I will fulfill my duty - I will make him work tomorrow. This, of course, is cruel, since tomorrow is a holiday for all the boys, but nothing can be done, more than anything in the world he hates working. I have no right to let him down this time, otherwise I will completely ruin the baby.

Tom really didn't go to school today and had a lot of fun. He barely had time to return home so that before dinner he could help Negro Jim cut wood and chop wood for tomorrow, or, more precisely, tell him about his adventures while he was doing three-quarters of the work. Tom's younger brother, Sid (not a brother, but a half-brother), by this time had already done everything that he was ordered (collected and carried all the wood chips), because he was an obedient quiet one: he did not play pranks and did not cause trouble for his elders.

While Tom was eating his dinner, taking every opportunity to steal a piece of sugar, Aunt Polly asked him various questions, full of deep slyness, hoping that he would fall into the traps she had set and spill the beans. Like all simple-minded people, she, not without pride, considered herself a subtle diplomat and saw in her most naive plans miracles of malicious cunning.

“Tom,” she said, “it must have been hot at school today?”

It's very hot, isn't it?

And wouldn’t you, Tom, want to swim in the river?

It seemed to him that something evil was happening - a shadow of suspicion and fear touched his soul. He looked inquisitively into Aunt Polly's face, but it told him nothing. And he answered:

No, “um... not particularly.

Aunt Polly reached out and touched Tom's shirt.

“I didn’t even break a sweat,” she said.

And she thought smugly how cleverly she had managed to discover that Tom’s shirt was dry; It never occurred to anyone what kind of trick she had in mind. Tom, however, had already managed to figure out which way the wind was blowing, and warned further questions:

We put our heads under the pump to freshen up. My hair is still wet. Do you see?

Aunt Polly felt offended: how could she miss such important indirect evidence! But immediately a new thought struck her.

Tom, in order to put your head under the pump, you didn’t have to rip open your shirt collar in the place where I sewed it up? Come on, unbutton your jacket!

The anxiety disappeared from Tom's face. He opened his jacket. The collar of the shirt was sewn tightly.

Okay, okay. I'll never understand you. I was sure that you didn’t go to school and went swimming. Okay, I’m not angry with you: although you are a decent rogue, you still turned out to be better than you might think.

She was a little annoyed that her cunning had led to nothing, and at the same time pleased that Tom at least this time turned out to be a good boy.

But then Sid intervened.

“I remember something,” he said, “as if you were sewing up his collar with white thread, and here, look, it’s black!”

Yes, of course, I sewed it up in white!.. Tom!..

But Tom did not wait for the conversation to continue. Running out of the room, he said quietly:

Well, I’ll blow you up, Siddy!

Having taken refuge in a safe place, he examined two large needles, tucked into the lapel of his jacket and wrapped in thread. One had a white thread and the other had a black thread.

She wouldn't have noticed if it weren't for Sid. Damn it! Sometimes she sewed it up with white thread, sometimes with black thread. I’d better sew by myself, otherwise you’ll inevitably get lost... But I’ll still piss Sid off - it’ll be a good lesson for him!

Tom was not a Model Boy that the whole town could be proud of. But he knew very well who was an exemplary boy, and he hated him.

However, after two minutes - and even sooner - he forgot all the troubles. Not because they were less difficult and bitter for him than the adversities that usually torment adults, but because at that moment a new powerful passion took possession of him and drove all worries out of his head. In the same way, adults are capable of forgetting their sorrows as soon as they are captivated by some new activity. Tom was currently fascinated by one precious novelty: he had learned a special way of whistling from a negro friend, and he had long wanted to practice this art in the wild, so that no one would interfere. The black man whistled like a bird. He produced a melodious trill, interrupted by short pauses, for which it was necessary to frequently touch the palate with his tongue. The reader probably remembers how this is done - if he was ever a boy. Perseverance and diligence helped Tom quickly master all the techniques of this matter. He walked merrily down the street, his mouth full of sweet music and his soul full of gratitude. He felt like an astronomer who had discovered a new planet in the sky, only his joy was more immediate, fuller and deeper.

Mark Twain

Mark Twain

Very dangerous and exciting adventures of Tom Sawyer and his friend Huckleberry Finn - meeting a ghost, discovering a corpse, etc. Tom unexpectedly became a detective - the boy showed amazing powers of observation and extraordinary deduction, which helped not only to expose the diamond thief and solve an insidious murder, but also to save an innocent man from prison.

The book was not published for a long time.

The extraordinary events described in this story were not invented by me, they actually took place, even the public confession of the defendant. I took these facts from an old trial in Sweden, changed the characters and transferred the action to America. I've added some details, but only one or two of them are significant.

Chapter I Tom and Huck receive an invitation

It happened in the spring of the year after Tom Sawyer and I freed our old negro Jim, when he was chained up as a runaway slave on Uncle Silas's farm in Arkansas.

The earth had already begun to thaw, there was a hint of warmth in the air, and every day the blissful time was approaching when it would be possible to run barefoot, and then the game of “marbles” and “siskin” would begin, it would be possible to chase a hoop, fly a kite, and Look, it’s already summer there, and you can swim. At this time, any boy begins to feel sad and count the days until summer. At such times you sigh, feel sad and don’t know what’s happening to you. You just can’t find a place for yourself - you’re moping, thinking about something, and most of all you want to leave so that no one sees you, climb a hill, somewhere on the edge of a forest, sit there and look into the distance at the Mississippi, which rolls its waters far away - far away, for many miles, where the forests are shrouded as if in a haze and everything around is so solemn that it seems as if everyone you love has died, and you yourself also want to die and leave this world.

Of course, you know what it is? It's spring fever. That's what it's called. And if you have already picked it up, you want it - you don’t even know what exactly it is - but you want it so much that your heart just aches. If you look at it, then perhaps most of all you want to leave, get away from the same familiar places that you see every day and which you are already tired of; go away to see something new. This is what you want - to leave and become a traveler, you are drawn to distant countries, where everything is so mysterious, amazing and romantic. Well, if you cannot do this, then you agree to less: go where possible - and thank you for that.

So, Tom Sawyer and I fell ill with this spring fever in its most severe form. But there was no point in thinking that Tom would be able to run away somewhere, because, as he himself explained, Aunt Polly would never allow him to leave school and wander around without anything to do. So Tom and I were in the most despondent mood. We were sitting on the porch one evening and chatting, when suddenly Aunt Polly came out with a letter in her hand and said:

– Tom, you’ll have to pack up and go to Arkansas. For some reason Aunt Sally needed you.

I almost jumped for joy. I was sure that Tom would immediately rush to his aunt and strangle her in his arms, but he (just think) sat motionless, like a rock, without uttering a single word. I almost cried with anger that he was acting like a fool when such a wonderful opportunity presented itself.

After all, everything could die if he speaks and does not show how happy and grateful he is to her. And Tom sat and thought, until I, out of despair, no longer knew what to do. Finally he spoke, so calmly that I would have simply shot him with it if I could.

“I’m very sorry, Aunt Polly,” he said, “excuse me, but I can’t go now.”

Aunt Polly was so taken aback by this cool impudence that she was speechless for at least half a minute, and I took advantage of this respite to nudge Tom with my elbow and hiss:

- Are you crazy? Is it possible to miss such an opportunity? But Tom didn’t even blink an eye and just whispered back to me:

- Huck Finn, do you really want me to show her how far I want to go? She will immediately begin to doubt, imagine all sorts of illnesses, dangers, come up with all sorts of objections - and will end up changing her mind. Leave this matter to me, I know how to handle her.

All this, of course, would never have occurred to me. However, Tom was right. In general, Tom Sawyer always turns out to be right - I have never seen a second head like him - he always knows what's what and is ready for any eventuality.

Aunt Polly finally came to her senses and attacked Tom:

- Excuse him! He can not! I've never heard anything like this in my life! How did it even occur to you to talk to me like that! Get out of here immediately and go pack your things. And if I hear one more word about what you can and cannot do, then you will see how I will forgive you with a rod!

We rushed into the house, but she managed to hit Tom on the head with the thimble, and Tom, flying up the stairs, pretended to whimper in pain. Finding himself upstairs in his room, Tom rushed to hug me; he was beside himself with happiness - after all, he had a journey ahead of him! He told me:

“We won’t even have time to leave before she starts to regret letting me go, but it will be too late.” Pride will not allow her to take back her words.

Tom packed his things in ten minutes - everything except those that Aunt Polly and Mary had to pack. Then we waited another ten minutes so Aunt Polly could cool down and become nice and kind again. Tom explained to me that it takes her at least ten minutes to calm down when she is half out of her temper, and twenty minutes when all her senses are outraged; but this time they were outraged, every single one of them. Then we went downstairs, burning with curiosity and desire to find out what was written in the letter.

Aunt Polly sat in gloomy thought, the letter lying on her lap. We sat down and she said:

“They have some serious troubles there, and they think that you and Huck will help them take their minds off, “calm down” them, as they write. I can imagine how you and Huck Finn will “calm down” them! They have a neighbor named Brace Dunlap, who courted Benny for three months, and finally they flatly refused him. Now he is angry with them, and this worries them very much. It seems to me that they believe that he is the kind of person with whom it is better not to quarrel, and therefore they try in every possible way to please him. They hired his worthless brother as workers, although they have no extra money and in general they don’t need him at all. Who are these Dunlaps?

“They live a mile from Uncle Silas and Aunt Sally’s farm.” All the farms there are about a mile apart. And Brace Dunlap is the biggest rich man in the whole area, and he has a whole bunch of blacks. He is a widower, thirty-six years old, and has no children; he is terribly proud of his money and loves to boss everyone around, and everyone is a little afraid of him. In my opinion, he is simply sure that if he just wants it, any girl will happily marry him. And the fact that he received a refusal from Benpy, of course, should have infuriated him. After all, he’s twice Benki’s age, and she’s so sweet and so beautiful—well, you’ve seen her yourself. Poor Uncle Silas, think what he has to put up with; It’s already hard for him, and he still has to hire this slacker Jupiter Dayalen just to please his brother.

- What kind of name is this - Jupiter? Where did it come from?

- Yes, it's just a nickname. I think everyone forgot his real name a long time ago. He is now twenty-seven years old, and he has been called that since he first went swimming. He undressed and the teacher saw a brown mole the size of a dime above his knee, surrounded by four other small moles, and said that they looked like Jupiter and his moons.

The boys thought this was very funny, and they began to call him Jupiter. So he remained Jupiter. He is tall, lazy, cunning, cowardly, and overall a pretty good-natured guy. He has long brown hair and does not grow a beard. He never has a penny, Brace feeds him, gives him his old clothes and doesn't give him a penny. In general, Jupiter had another brother - a twin.

-What is he like?

– They say it’s an exact copy of Jupiter. In any case, he was like that; only he has been missing for seven years now. He started stealing when he was nineteen or twenty years old, and he was sent to prison. And he ran away and disappeared - he fled somewhere to the north. Sometimes they heard rumors that he was involved in theft and robbery, but that was a long time ago. Now he is already dead. At least that's what they say. They haven't heard from him since then.

-What was his name?

- Jack. There was a long silence as Aunt Polly thought.

Finally she said:

“What worries Aunt Sally most is that this Jupiter is driving his uncle crazy.”

Tom was very surprised, and so was I.

- To the point of rage? Uncle Silas? God kill me, aunt, you're joking! I can't imagine how it would be possible to make him angry at all.

“Anyway, Aunt Sally writes that this Jupiter just drives my uncle crazy.” At times, Uncle comes to the point that he can hit Jupiter.

“Aunt Polly, this can’t be true.” Uncle Silas is as soft as porridge.

“Still, Aunt Sally is worried.” She writes that because of these quarrels, Uncle Silas completely changed.

All the neighbors are already talking about it and, of course, they blame Uncle Silas, because he is preachy...