Nascent Drama

[The Dork Lord]

I was getting sort of used to the widow's ways, too, and they warn't so raspy on me.

 

[The Dork Lord]

Living in a house and sleeping in a bed pulled on me pretty tight mostly, but before the cold weather I used to slide out and sleep in the woods sometimes, and so that was a rest to me.

 

[The Dork Lord]

I liked the old ways best, but I was getting so I liked the new ones, too, a little bit. The widow said I was coming along slow but sure, and doing very satisfactory. She said she warn't ashamed of me.

 

[The Dork Lord]

One morning I happened to turn over the salt-cellar at breakfast. I reached for some of it as quick as I could to throw over my left shoulder and keep off the bad luck, but Miss Watson was in ahead of me, and crossed me off. She says, "Take your hands away, Huckleberry; what a mess you are always making!" The widow put in a good word for me, but that warn't going to keep off the bad luck, I knowed that well enough. I started out, after breakfast, feeling worried and shaky, and wondering where it was going to fall on me, and what it was going to be. There is ways to keep off some kinds of bad luck, but this wasn't one of them kind; so I never tried to do anything, but just poked along low-spirited and on the watch-out.

 

[The Dork Lord]

I went down to the front garden and clumb over the stile where you go through the high board fence. There was an inch of new snow on the ground, and I seen somebody's tracks. They had come up from the quarry and stood around the stile a while, and then went on around the garden fence. It was funny they hadn't come in, after standing around so. I couldn't make it out. It was very curious, somehow. I was going to follow around, but I stooped down to look at the tracks first. I didn't notice anything at first, but next I did. There was a cross in the left boot-heel made with big nails, to keep off the devil.

 

[The Dork Lord]

I was up in a second and shinning down the hill. I looked over my shoulder every now and then, but I didn't see nobody. I was at Judge Thatcher's as quick as I could get there. He said:

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Why, my boy, you are all out of breath. Did you come for your interest?"

 

[The Dork Lord]

"No, sir," I says; "is there some for me?"

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Oh, yes, a half-yearly is in last night -- over a hundred and fifty dollars. Quite a fortune for you. You had better let me invest it along with your six thousand, because if you take it you'll spend it."

 

[The Dork Lord]

"No, sir," I says, "I don't want to spend it. I don't want it at all -- nor the six thousand, nuther. I want you to take it; I want to give it to you -- the six thousand and all."

 

[The Dork Lord]

He looked surprised. He couldn't seem to make it out. He says:

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Why, what can you mean, my boy?"

 

[The Dork Lord]

I says, "Don't you ask me no questions about it, please. You'll take it -- won't you?"

 

[The Dork Lord]

He says:

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Well, I'm puzzled. Is something the matter?"

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Please take it," says I, "and don't ask me nothing -- then I won't have to tell no lies."

 

[The Dork Lord]

He studied a while, and then he says:

 

[The Dork Lord]

"Oho-o! I think I see. You want to sell all your property to me -- not give it. That's the correct idea."

 

[The Dork Lord]

Then he wrote something on a paper and read it over, and says:

 

[The Dork Lord]

"There; you see it says 'for a consideration.' That means I have bought it of you and paid you for it. Here's a dollar for you. Now you sign it."