WELL, pretty soon the old man was up and around again, and then he went for Judge Thatcher in the courts to make him give up that money, and he went for me, too, for not stopping school. He catched me a couple of times and thrashed me, but I went to school just the same, and dodged him or outrun him most of the time. I didn’t want to go to school much before, but I reckoned I’d go now to spite pap. That law trial was a slow business—appeared like they warn’t ever going to get started on it; so every now and then I’d borrow two or three dollars off of the judge for him, to keep from getting a cowhiding. Every time he got money he got drunk; and every time he got drunk he raised Cain around town; and every time he raised Cain he got jailed. He was just suited—this kind of thing was right in his line.
He got to hanging around the widow’s too much and so she told him at last that if he didn’t quit using around there she would make trouble for him. Well, wasn’t he mad? He said he would show who was Huck Finn’s boss. So he watched out for me one day in the spring, and catched me, and took me up the river about three mile in a skiff, and crossed over to the Illinois shore where it was woody and there warn’t no houses but an old log hut in a place where the timber was so thick you couldn’t find it if you didn’t know where it was.
He kept me with him all the time, and I never got a chance to run off. We lived in that old cabin, and he always locked the door and put the key under his head nights. He had a gun which he had stole, I reckon, and we fished and hunted, and that was what we lived on. Every little while he locked me in and went down to the store, three miles, to the ferry, and traded fish and game for whisky, and fetched it home and got drunk and had a good time, and licked me. The widow she found out where I was by and by, and she sent a man over to try to get hold of me; but pap drove him off with the gun, and it warn’t long after that till I was used to being where I was, and liked it—all but the cowhide part.
It was kind of lazy and jolly, laying off comfortable all day, smoking and fishing, and no books nor study. Two months or more run along, and my clothes got to be all rags and dirt, and I didn’t see how I’d ever got to like it so well at the widow’s, where you had to wash, and eat on a plate, and comb up, and go to bed and get up regular, and be forever bothering over a book, and have old Miss Watson pecking at you all the time. I didn’t want to go back no more. I had stopped cussing, because the widow didn’t like it; but now I took to it again because pap hadn’t no objections. It was pretty good times up in the woods there, take it all around. But by and by pap got too handy with his hick’ry, and I couldn’t stand it. I was all over welts. He got to going away so much, too, and locking me in. Once he locked me in and was gone three days. It was dreadful lonesome. I judged he had got drownded, and I wasn’t ever going to get out any more. I was scared. I made up my mind I would fix up some way to leave there. I had tried to get out of that cabin many a time, but I couldn’t find no way. There warn’t a window to it big enough for a dog to get through. I couldn’t get up the chimbly; it was too narrow. The door was thick, solid oak slabs. Pap was pretty careful not to leave a knife or anything in the cabin when he was away; I reckon I had hunted the place over as much as a hundred times; well, I was most all the time at it, because it was about the only way to put in the time. But this time I found something at last; I found an old rusty wood-saw without any handle; it was laid in between a rafter and the clapboards of the roof. I greased it up and went to work. There was an old horse-blanket nailed against the logs at the far end of the cabin behind the table, to keep the wind from blowing through the chinks and putting the candle out. I got under the table and raised the blanket, and went to work to saw a section of the big bottom log out—big enough to let me through. Well, it was a good long job, but I was getting towards the end of it when I heard pap’s gun in the woods. I got rid of the signs of my work, and dropped the blanket and hid my saw, and pretty soon pap come in.
Pap warn’t in a good humor—so he was his natural self. He said he was down town, and everything was going wrong. His lawyer said he reckoned he would win his lawsuit and get the money if they ever got started on the trial; but then there was ways to put it off a long time, and Judge Thatcher knowed how to do it. And he said people allowed there’d be another trial to get me away from him and give me to the widow for my guardian, and they guessed it would win this time. This shook me up considerable, because I didn’t want to go back to the widow’s any more and be so cramped up and sivilized, as they called it. Then the old man got to cussing, and cussed everything and everybody he could think of, and then cussed them all over again to make sure he hadn’t skipped any, and after that he polished off with a kind of a general cuss all round, including a considerable parcel of people which he didn’t know the names of, and so called them what’s-his-name when he got to them, and went right along with his cussing.
He said he would like to see the widow get me. He said he would watch out, and if they tried to come any such game on him he knowed of a place six or seven mile off to stow me in, where they might hunt till they dropped and they couldn’t find me. That made me pretty uneasy again, but only for a minute; I reckoned I wouldn’t stay on hand till he got that chance.
The old man made me go to the skiff and fetch the things he had got. There was a fifty-pound sack of corn meal, and a side of bacon, ammunition, and a four-gallon jug of whisky, and an old book and two newspapers for wadding, besides some tow. I toted up a load, and went back and set down on the bow of the skiff to rest. I thought it all over, and I reckoned I would walk off with the gun and some lines, and take to the woods when I run away. I guessed I wouldn’t stay in one place, but just tramp right across the country, mostly night times, and hunt and fish to keep alive, and so get so far away that the old man nor the widow couldn’t ever find me any more. I judged I would saw out and leave that night if pap got drunk enough, and I reckoned he would. I got so full of it I didn’t notice how long I was staying till the old man hollered and asked me whether I was asleep or drownded.
I got the things all up to the cabin, and then it was about dark. While I was cooking supper the old man took a swig or two and got sort of warmed up, and went to ripping again. He had been drunk over in town, and laid in the gutter all night, and he was a sight to look at. A body would a thought he was Adam—he was just all mud. Whenever his liquor begun to work he most always went for the govment, this time he says:
“Call this a govment! why, just look at it and see what it’s like. Here’s the law a-standing ready to take a man’s son away from him—a man’s own son, which he has had all the trouble and all the anxiety and all the expense of raising. Yes, just as that man has got that son raised at last, and ready to go to work and begin to do suthin’ for him and give him a rest, the law up and goes for him. And they call that govment! That ain’t all, nuther. The law backs that old Judge Thatcher up and helps him to keep me out o’ my property. Here’s what the law does: The law takes a man worth six thousand dollars and up’ards, and jams him into an old trap of a cabin like this, and lets him go round in clothes that ain’t fitten for a hog. They call that govment! A man can’t get his rights in a govment like this. Sometimes I’ve a mighty notion to just leave the country for good and all. Yes, and I told ‘em so; I told old Thatcher so to his face. Lots of ‘em heard me, and can tell what I said. Says I, for two cents I’d leave the blamed country and never come a-near it agin. Them’s the very words. I says look at my hat—if you call it a hat—but the lid raises up and the rest of it goes down till it’s below my chin, and then it ain’t rightly a hat at all, but more like my head was shoved up through a jint o’ stove-pipe. Look at it, says I—such a hat for me to wear—one of the wealthiest men in this town if I could git my rights. “Oh, yes, this is a wonderful govment, wonderful. Why, looky here. There was a free nigger there from Ohio—a mulatter, most as white as a white man. He had the whitest shirt on you ever see, too, and the shiniest hat; and there ain’t a man in that town that’s got as fine clothes as what he had; and he had a gold watch and chain, and a silver-headed cane—the awfulest old gray-headed nabob in the State. And what do you think? They said he was a p’fessor in a college, and could talk all kinds of languages, and knowed everything. And that ain’t the wust. They said he could vote when he was at home. Well, that let me out. Thinks I, what is the country a-coming to? It was ‘lection day, and I was just about to go and vote myself if I warn’t too drunk to get there; but when they told me there was a State in this country where they’d let that nigger vote, I drawed out. I says I’ll never vote agin. Them’s the very words I said; they all heard me; and the country may rot for all me—I’ll never vote agin as long as I live. And to see the cool way of that nigger—why, he wouldn’t a give me the road if I hadn’t shoved him out o’ the way. I says to the people, why ain’t this nigger put up at auction and sold?—that’s what I want to know. And what do you reckon they said? Why, they said he couldn’t be sold till he’d been in the State six months, and he hadn’t been there that long yet. There, now—that’s a specimen. They call that a govment that can’t sell a free nigger till he’s been in the State six months. Here’s a govment that calls itself a govment, and lets on to be a govment, and thinks it is a govment, and yet’s got to set stock-still for six whole months before it can take a hold of a prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirted free nigger, and—” Pap was agoing on so he never noticed where his old limber legs was taking him to, so he went head over heels over the tub of salt pork and barked both shins, and the rest of his speech was all the hottest kind of language—mostly hove at the nigger and the govment, though he give the tub some, too, all along, here and there. He hopped around the cabin considerable, first on one leg and then on the other, holding first one shin and then the other one, and at last he let out with his left foot all of a sudden and fetched the tub a rattling kick. But it warn’t good judgment, because that was the boot that had a couple of his toes leaking out of the front end of it; so now he raised a howl that fairly made a body’s hair raise, and down he went in the dirt, and rolled there, and held his toes; and the cussing he done then laid over anything he had ever done previous. He said so his own self afterwards. He had heard old Sowberry Hagan in his best days, and he said it laid over him, too; but I reckon that was sort of piling it on, maybe.
After supper pap took the jug, and said he had enough whisky there for two drunks and one delirium tremens. That was always his word. I judged he would be blind drunk in about an hour, and then I would steal the key, or saw myself out, one or t’other. He drank and drank, and tumbled down on his blankets by and by; but luck didn’t run my way. He didn’t go sound asleep, but was uneasy. He groaned and moaned and thrashed around this way and that for a long time. At last I got so sleepy I couldn’t keep my eyes open all I could do, and so before I knowed what I was about I was sound asleep, and the candle burning.
I don’t know how long I was asleep, but all of a sudden there was an awful scream and I was up. There was pap looking wild, and skipping around every which way and yelling about snakes. He said they was crawling up his legs; and then he would give a jump and scream, and say one had bit him on the cheek—but I couldn’t see no snakes. He started and run round and round the cabin, hollering “Take him off! take him off! he’s biting me on the neck!” I never see a man look so wild in the eyes. Pretty soon he was all fagged out, and fell down panting; then he rolled over and over wonderful fast, kicking things every which way, and striking and grabbing at the air with his hands, and screaming and saying there was devils a-hold of him. He wore out by and by, and laid still a while, moaning. Then he laid stiller, and didn’t make a sound. I could hear the owls and the wolves away off in the woods, and it seemed terrible still. He was laying over by the corner. By and by he raised up part way and listened, with his head to one side. He says, very low:
“Tramp—tramp—tramp; that’s the dead; tramp—tramp—tramp; they’re coming after me; but I won’t go. Oh, they’re here! don’t touch me—don’t! hands off—they’re cold; let go. Oh, let a poor devil alone!”
Then he went down on all fours and crawled off, begging them to let him alone, and he rolled himself up in his blanket and wallowed in under the old pine table, still a-begging; and then he went to crying. I could hear him through the blanket. By and by he rolled out and jumped up on his feet looking wild, and he see me and went for me. He chased me round and round the place with a clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death, and saying he would kill me, and then I couldn’t come for him no more. I begged, and told him I was only Huck; but he laughed such a screechy laugh, and roared and cussed, and kept on chasing me up. Once when I turned short and dodged under his arm he made a grab and got me by the jacket between my shoulders, and I thought I was gone; but I slid out of the jacket quick as lightning, and saved myself. Pretty soon he was all tired out, and dropped down with his back against the door, and said he would rest a minute and then kill me. He put his knife under him, and said he would sleep and get strong, and then he would see who was who.
So he dozed off pretty soon. By and by I got the old split-bottom chair and clumb up as easy as I could, not to make any noise, and got down the gun. I slipped the ramrod down it to make sure it was loaded, then I laid it across the turnip barrel, pointing towards pap, and set down behind it to wait for him to stir.
And how slow and still the time did drag along. |
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Bueno, el viejo no tard en curarse y entonces se meti con el juez Thatcher en los tribunales para obligarle a que le diese aquel dinero, y luego conmigo por no dejar de ir a la escuela. Me agarr un par de veces y me zurr, pero de todos modos yo iba a la escuela y casi todas las veces me esconda de l o corra ms. Antes no tena tantas ganas de ir a la escuela. Pero ahora pens que ira para fastidiar a padre. Lo del juicio iba muy despacio: pareca que nunca iba a empezar; de forma que de vez en cuando le peda prestados dos
o tres dlares al juez para drselos y librarme de una paliza. Cada vez que tena dinero se emborrachaba, y cada vez que se emborrachaba armaba un jaleo en el pueblo, y cada vez que armaba un jaleo le metan en la crcel. Y l tan contento: ese tipo de vida era el que le gustaba.
Empez a pasar demasiado tiempo rondando por casa de la viuda, as que ella por fin le dijo que si no dejaba de rondar por ah le iba a buscar algn problema. Diablo cmo se puso. Dijo que iba a demostrar quin mandaba en Huck Finn. As que un da me estuvo esperando en la fuente, me agarr y me llev ro arriba tres millas en un bote y cruz al lado de Illinois, donde haba bosques y no haba ms casas que una vieja cabaa de troncos en un sitio con tantos rboles que no se poda encontrar si no se saba el camino ya antes.
Me llevaba siempre con l y nunca tuve la oportunidad de escaparme. Vivimos en aquella cabaa y siempre cerraba la puerta con llave; por las noches se acostaba con ella debajo de la almohada.
Tena una escopeta que creo que haba robado y me llevaba de pesca y de caza, que era de lo que vivamos. De vez en cuando me dejaba encerrado y se iba a la tienda, que estaba a tres millas, donde pasaba el transbordador, y cambiaba pescado y caza por whisky, y se lo llevaba a casa y se emborrachaba, se lo pasaba muy bien y me daba una paliza. La viuda se enter de dnde estaba y al cabo de un tiempo envi a un hombre para tratar de que me llevara, pero padre lo ech con la escopeta y no tard mucho en acostumbrarme a estar donde estaba, y me gustaba... salvo la parte de las palizas.
Todo era muy tranquilo y se pasaba bien, tumbado todo el da, fumando y pescando, sin libros ni estudios. Pasaron dos meses o ms y toda la ropa se me hizo jirones y se me puso sucia, y no entenda cmo me haba gustado estar en casa de la viuda, donde haba que lavarse y comer en un plato y peinarse e irse a la cama y levantarse a horas fijas y pasarse la vida con un tostn de libro mientras la vieja seorita Watson se meta con uno todo el tiempo. Ya no quera volver. Haba dejado de decir palabrotas porque a la viuda no le gustaban, pero ahora volva a decirlas porque padre no le vea nada de malo. Lo pas bastante bien all en el bosque, si se tiene todo en cuenta.
Pero poco a poco padre empez a aficionarse demasiado a darme de palos y yo no poda aguantarlo. Estaba lleno de cardenales. Tambin empez a pasar mucho tiempo fuera, y me dejaba encerrado. Una vez me encerr y desapareci tres das seguidos. Me sent horriblemente solo. Pens que se haba ahogado y que yo ya no iba a salir de all nunca ms. Tuve miedo. Decid buscar alguna forma de marcharme. Haba tratado de irme de aquella cabaa muchas veces, pero no encontraba la forma. No haba una ventana lo bastante grande para que pasara ni un perro. No poda salir por la chimenea porque era demasiado estrecha. La puerta era gruesa, de planchas de roble macizo. Padre tena mucho cuidado y nunca dejaba un cuchillo ni nada en la cabaa cuando se iba; supongo que yo haba registrado por all lo menos cien veces; bueno, la verdad era que me pasaba buscando todo el tiempo, porque era la nica forma de entretenerse. Pero una vez, por fin encontr algo; encontr un viejo serrucho oxidado y sin mango; estaba metido entre una viga y las tejas de arriba. Lo limpi y me puse al trabajo. Haba una manta de caballo clavada en los troncos a un extremo de la cabaa, detrs de la mesa, para que el viento no entrase por las ranuras y apagase la vela. Me met debajo de la mesa, levant la manta y me puse a aserrar una seccin del gran tronco de abajo, lo bastante grande para que cupiera yo. Bueno, me llev mucho tiempo pero ya estaba llegando al final cuando o en el bosque la escopeta de padre. Escond las huellas de mi trabajo, dej caer la manta y el serrucho y en seguida lleg padre.
Padre no estaba de buen humor, o sea, que estaba como de costumbre. Dijo que haba ido al centro del pueblo y que todo le iba mal. Su abogado le haba dicho que calculaba que ganara el pleito y conseguira el dinero si el juicio empezaba alguna vez, pero que siempre haba formas de irlo aplazando, y el juez Thatcher se las saba todas. Dijo que segn la gente iba a haber otro juicio para separarme de l y hacer que la viuda fuera mi tutora, y calculaban que esta vez ganara ella. Aquello me puso muy nervioso, porque ya no quera volver a casa de la viuda y a tanta disciplina y cevilizacin, como la llamaban. Entonces el viejo se puso a maldecir todas las cosas y a la gente que se le ocurra, y despus volvi a maldecirlos otra vez para estar seguro de que no se le haba olvidado nadie, y termin con una especie de maldicin general contra todos, hasta un montn de gente que no saba cmo se llamaba, as que cuando llegaba a ellos deca como se llame, y segua maldiciendo.
Dijo que ya le gustara a l ver cmo se me llevaba la viuda. Dijo que iba a estar atento y que si trataban de hacerle esa faena, conoca un sitio a seis o siete millas de distancia donde esconderme, y donde podran buscar hasta caerse muertos sin encontrarme. Aquello volvi a ponerme nervioso, pero slo un minuto; calculaba que para entonces yo ya no andara por all.
El viejo me hizo ir al bote a buscar lo que haba trado. Haba un saco de cincuenta libras de avena de maz y un cuarto de tocino entreverado, municiones, una jarra de whisky de cuatro galones y un libro viejo y dos peridicos para rellenar ranuras, adems de algo de estopa. Llev una carga y luego volv a sentarme en la proa del bote a descansar. Volv a pensrmelo todo y decid escaparme con la escopeta y algunos sedales, y cuando me escapara me ira al bosque. Pens que no me quedara en un sitio fijo, sino que ira de un lado para otro del pas, sobre todo de noche, cazando y pescando para tener comida, hasta llegar tan lejos que ni el viejo ni la viuda me pudieran encontrar nunca. Calcul que poda terminar de serrar y marcharme aquella noche si padre se emborrachaba lo suficiente, como supona que iba a pasar. Me entusiasm tanto que no me di cuenta del tiempo que pasaba hasta que el viejo se puso a gritar y me pregunt si me haba dormido o ahogado.
Llev todas las cosas a la cabaa y luego ya oscureci. Mientras yo cocinaba la cena el viejo se ech un par de tragos como para irse calentando y empez a armar jaleo otra vez. Ya se haba emborrachado en el pueblo y haba pasado la noche en la cuneta, y verdaderamente era un espectculo. Cualquiera pensara que era Adn: no se vea de l nada ms que barro. Cuando estaba bastante bebido casi siempre se meta con el gobierno. Aquella vez va y dice:
––Y a esto lo llaman gobierno!, pues no hay ms que mirar para ver lo que es. Hacen una ley para quitarle a un hombre su hijo: su propio hijo, con todo el trabajo y todas las preocupaciones y los gastos que me ha llevado criarlo. S, y justo cuando ese hombre por fin ha criado a su hijo que ya est en edad de ponerse a trabajar y empezar a hacer algo por l para que pueda descansar, va la ley y se lo quita. Y a eso lo llaman gobierno! Y no es todo. La ley apoya a ese viejo del juez Thatcher y le ayuda a quitarme mis bienes. Fijarse lo que hace la ley: la ley agarra a un hombre que tiene seis mil dlares o ms y lo encierra en una vieja cabaa como sta y deja que vaya vestido con una ropa que no es digna ni de un cerdo. Y a eso lo llaman gobierno! Con un gobierno as no hay forma de que uno tenga derechos. A veces me da la tentacin de marcharme del pas para siempre. S, y se lo he dicho; se lo he dicho al viejo Thatcher a la cara. Me lo oyeron montones de personas y pueden decir que lo dije. Voy y digo: Por dos centavos me ira de este maldito pas y no volvera ni aunque me pagasen. Eso fue exactamente lo que dije; Mirar este sombrero ––si es que se le puede llamar sombrero––, que se le levanta la tapa y el resto se baja hasta que se cae debajo de la barbilla y ya no es ni un sombrero ni nada, sino ms bien como si me hubieran metido la cabeza en un tubo de chimenea. Mirarlo, voy y digo: Vaya un sombrero para un tipo como yo, uno de los hombres ms ricos de este pueblo si me se reconocieran mis derechos.
Ah, s, este gobierno es maravilloso, maravilloso y no hay ms que verlo. Yo he visto a un negro libre de Ohio: un mulato, casi igual de blanco que un blanco. Llevaba la camisa ms blanca que hayis visto en vuestra vida y el sombrero ms lustroso, y en todo el pueblo no hay naide que tenga una ropa igual de buena, y llevaba un reloj de oro con su cadena y un bastn con puo de plata: era el nabab de pelo blanco ms impresionante del estado. Y, qu os creis? Dijeron que era profesor de una universidad, y que hablaba montones de idiomas y que saba de todo. Y eso no es lo peor. Dijeron que en su estado poda votar. Aquello ya era demasiado. Digo yo: Qu pasa con este pas? Si fuera da de elecciones y yo pensara ir a votar si no estaba demasiado borracho para llegar, cuando me dijeran que haba un estado en este pas donde dejan votar a ese negro, yo ya no ira. Y voy y digo: No voy a volver a votar. Eso fue lo que dije, palabra por palabra; me oyeron todos, y por m que se pudra el pas: yo no voy a volver a votar en mi vida. Y los aires que se daba ese negro: pero si no se abra del camino si no le hubiera dado yo un empujn. Yyo voy y le digo a la gente: Por qu no mandan a subasta a este negro y lo venden? Me gustara saberlo. Y, sabes lo que dijeron? Pues dijeron que no se poda vender hasta que llevara seis meses en el estado y todava no llevaba tanto tiempo. Pero vamos, para que veas. Y llaman a eso un gobierno cuando no se puede vender a un negro libre hasta que lleva seis meses en el estado. Pues vaya un gobierno que dice que es gobierno y hace como que es gobierno y se cree que es un gobierno y luego se tiene que quedar tan tranquilo seis meses enteros antes de echarle mano a un negro libre que anda por all al acecho, robando, infernal, con sus camisas blancas, y...
Padre estaba tan enfadado que no se dio cuenta de adnde le llevaban las piernas, as que se tropez con el barril de cerdo salado y se despellej los tobillos y el resto de su discurso fue una serie de insultos de lo ms terrible, sobre todo contra el negro y el gobierno, aunque tambin le dedic algunos al barril, intercalados de vez en cuando. Daba saltos por la cabaa como un loco, primero con una pierna y luego con la otra, agarrndose primero un tobillo y luego el otro, y por fin solt una patada de repente con el pie izquierdo contra el barril. Pero no hizo bien, porque peg con la bota por la que se le salan dos de los dedos del pie, as es que empez a gritar de manera que se le ponan a uno los pelos de punta y se cay al suelo, se ech a rodar agarrndose los dedos del pie y solt peores maldiciones que todas las anteriores. l mismo lo dijo despus: haba odo al viejo Sowberry Hagan en sus buenos tiempos y afirm que tambin lo haba superado, pero a m me parece que a lo mejor exageraba algo.
Despus de la cena padre le dio a la garrafa diciendo que all tena suficiente whisky para dos curdas y un delrium trmens. Era lo que deca siempre. Pens que estara totalmente borracho dentro de una hora, y entonces yo robara la llave o me escapara, una de las dos cosas. Sigui bebiendo y bebiendo y al cabo de un rato se tumb encima de las mantas; pero no tuve suerte. No se durmi del todo, sino que se despertaba a ratos. Se pas mucho rato gimiendo y quejndose y dando vueltas de un lado para otro. Por fin, me dio tanto sueo que no puede seguir con los ojos abiertos y sin darme cuenta me qued totalmente dormido, con la vela encendida.
No s cunto tiempo estara dormido, pero de pronto son un grito horrible y me despert. Era padre, que pareca loco y saltaba de un sitio para otro gritando que all haba serpientes. Deca que se le suban por las piernas, y despus daba un salto y un grito y deca que una le haba mordido en la mejilla, pero yo no vea ninguna serpiente. Empez a correr dando vueltas por la cabaa, gritando: Qutamela de ah! Qutamela de ah! Me est mordiendo el cuello! Nunca he visto a nadie con una mirada as de loca. En seguida se agot y cay al suelo jadeando; entonces se puso a dar vueltas a toda velocidad, pegando patadas por todas partes y golpeando el aire y agarrndolo con las manos, gritando y diciendo que se lo estaban llevando los diablos. Poco a poco comenz a cansarse y se qued callado un rato, quejndose. Despus se mantuvo quieto y no hizo ni un ruido. A lo lejos, en el bosque, se oan los bhos y los lobos y todo pareca estar en un silencio terrible. l estaba acostado en un rincn. Despus de un rato se levant en parte a escuchar, con la cabeza hacia un lado. Y va y dice, en voz muy baja:
––Paaam... Paaam... Paaam...; son los muertos, paaam... paaam...; vienen a buscarme, pero yo no me voy. Ah, ah estn! No me toquis... no! Fuera esas manos... estn fras; que me suelten. Dejad en paz a este pobre diablo!
Despus se puso a cuatro patas y se fue gateando, pidindoles que lo dejaran en paz, y se envolvi en la manta y se meti como pudo bajo la mesa de pino, mientras segua rogndoles, y despus se ech a llorar. Se le oa por debajo de la manta.
Luego sali rodando y se puso en pie de un salto con aire de loco, me vio y se me tir encima. Me persigui por toda la cabaa con una navaja de resorte, llamndose el ngel de la Muerte y diciendo que me iba a matar, y ya no podra volver a buscarlo. Le rogu; le dije que no era ms que Huck, pero se ech a rer con una risa chirriante, y no par de rugir, de maldecir y perseguirme. Una vez, cuando fren de golpe y lo iba a esquivar por debajo del brazo, me ech mano y me agarr por la chaqueta entre los hombros y cre que all acababa yo, pero me quit la chaqueta rpido como el rayo y me salv. En seguida volvi a agotar-se y se dej caer de espaldas contra la puerta y dijo que iba a descansar un momento antes de matarme. Escondi la navaja donde estaba sentado y dijo que iba a dormir para recuperar fuerzas y despus ya se vera quin era quin.
De forma que se qued dormido muy rpido. Entonces yo saqu la silla vieja que tena el asiento roto y me sub en ella con mucha calma, para no hacer nada de ruido, y baj la escopeta. Le met la baqueta para asegurarme de que estaba cargada y despus la coloqu encima del barril de nabos, apuntando a padre, y me sent detrs de ella hasta que l se moviera. Y el tiempo fue pasando muy despacio, siempre en silencio. |
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