Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn

1

- Mr. Twain!

Can we come in?

- Sure!

- Look, Mr. Twain, what we

found in the newspaper.

It's a picture of a ship.

A big Mississippi steamer

that has your name on it.

Does this boat belong

to you, Mr. Twain?

- Oh, my, no.

This don't belong to me, boy.

- But then, why does it

say your name on it?

- Mama told me that you

had been working on a boat

like that when you were young.

Can you tell us about it?

I also want to travel

on a big steamer.

- Well, better go pretty

quick, little princess,

'cause there ain't

many more of these left.

- What do you mean, there aren't

that many anymore?

- Well, son, the time was when

there used to be hundreds

of these steamboats...

mighty, mighty steamboats

going up and down

the mighty Mississippi.

But, with the invention

of the rail road,

many of these are gone now.

But that's a...

whole other story

in and of itself.

- Can you tell us a story?

- Yes please,

Mr. Twain!

Tell us your story.

- All right.

All right, pull up a chair

and sit a spell.

All right, here we go.

This story took place

way before you two

were ever even born.

But I still remember

just as it happened

way back in those days.

Once a week,

the "Paul Jones," the mail-boat,

would chug upstream

and dock right here.

And all the kids had

only one simple

but honorable wish...

to be the steamboat captain.

Sure, we entertained

the idea of becoming

a clown in the circus,

or maybe even a pirate.

But, no desire was so strongly

anchored in our hearts

as the one to be

a steamboat captain.

And one of us kids

was Tom Sawyer.

"Columbus departed

from Spain with three ships."

"The 'Santa Maria,

"the 'Pinta, and the 'Nina.

"Columbus first sailed

to the Canary Islands

"on September 6th,

"for what turned out

to be a five week voyage

"across the ocean.

A man looked out..."

- Thomas Sawyer.

Stand up, Thomas Sawyer,

and let the class know

the reason you are

so tardy today.

- Well, sir...

the reason that

I'm so late today

is because I was having

an intense conversation

with my best buddy,

Huckleberry Finn.

- Thomas Sawyer, that has got

to be the most amazing

confession I have ever,

in my entire life, ever heard.

An action of this sort

is deserving

an extra-special penalty.

This! Ls! Big!

- Please, sir...

punish me as you see fit,

just don't send me to sit

over with the girls, please.

- Not to the girls, huh?

Hmm.

Hmm.

He's gonna get it.

- Huh! Immediately go

to the girls' side

and no talking back.

Let this be a warning to

you, Mr. Thomas Sawyer.

Keep on reading.

"And spotted land"

"at about 2:
00

in the morning,

"and he immediately

alerted the rest of the crew

"with a shout.

"Then, the captain

of the 'Pinta,

"Martin Alonso Pinzn,

"verified the discovery

and alerted Columbus

"by firing a Lombard.

"Columbus later said

that he himself

"had already seen a light on the land

"a few hours earlier,

"and he claimed

for himself the money

"promised by King Ferdinand

and Queen Isabella to the..."

Already one day

later began a chain

of events that would result

in undesirable consequences.

- So, uh, what'cha

doing down here?

- Psh, nothing.

You know, I'm just...

just spitting.

- Hucky, you got a good life.

You don't need to go to school.

You can do what you

want when you want to.

I wish I had a father like

yours who was a drunken bum

and didn't make me do stuff.

- Yeah.

Yeah, well, it turns out, um...

my old man ain't that

bad after all.

- Do you mind if I take a pull?

- Yeah. Yeah, sure.

You're my buddy.

Go right ahead.

- Hey, Huck, what's that?

- Oh, this?

Uh, well, that's her.

That's my mom, my true mother.

- But, Huck,

you ain't got a mom.

Everybody knows that.

- Tom, I do have a mother.

She's out there.

See that?

Mississippi's my mother.

She was there when I opened

my eyes for the first time.

She was there when

I was growing up.

She's there when I get lonely.

Sometimes I come out here

when I'm alone...

and I talk to her.

It's weird, you know?

- Hey, Hucky, what you got

in the pouch?

- Nothin'.

Just a...

just a dead cat.

- That critter's stiff

as an ironing board.

Where'd you get it from?

- I bought it about

two weeks ago from Ben Rogers.

- And, uh, what does something

like that cost you?

- Ah, it ain't worth

talking about.

- Okay, and uh,

what's the dead cat good for?

- It banishes your warts.

- Okay-

How... how does

that work, exactly?

- You really want to know?

- Yeah.

- All right, well...

you go to the cemetery.

Now, you gotta go to where

some dead guy's laying

about six feet under,

and at the stroke of midnight,

the devil's gonna show himself.

Now, when that happens,

you're gonna hear a sound,

something like a hissing

or the wind

or maybe even words.

Anyways, when you

hear the sound,

you take the dead cat

and you gotta throw it

in the direction you heard

the sound coming from.

But, after you do that,

you gotta say this...

"Devil gets the cat,

cat gets the corpse,

warts get the cat,

and that's not where I'm at."

Then the warts go away.

- Okay, so when are

you gonna try this?

- Oh, I don't know.

I figure tonight,

they're gonna be coming to

get good ol' Ross Williams,

so probably then.

- Would... would you mind

if I tagged along?

- Yeah, sure.

Just better not get me

busted like last time.

Old man Hopkins

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