pped us all, and marched us right along, straight for the
graveyard, which was a mile and a half down the river, and the whole town
at our heels, for we made noise enough, and it was only nine in the
evening.

As we went by our house I wished I hadn't sent Mary Jane out of town;
because now if I could tip her the wink she'd light out and save me, and
blow on our dead-beats.

Well, we swarmed along down the river road, just carrying on like
wildcats; and to make it more scary the sky was darking up, and the
lightning beginning to wink and flitter, and the wind to shiver amongst
the leaves. This was the most awful trouble and most dangersome I ever
was in; and I was kinder stunned; everything was going so different from
what I had allowed for; stead of being fixed so I could take my own time
if I wanted to, and see all the fun, and have Mary Jane at my back to
save me and set me free when the close-fit come, here was nothing in the
world betwixt me and sudden death but just them tattoo-marks. If they
didn't find them--

I couldn't bear to think about it; and yet, somehow, I couldn't think
about nothing else. It got darker and darker, and it was a beautiful
time to give the crowd the slip; but that big husky had me by the wrist
--Hines--and a body might as well try to give Goliar the slip. He dragged
me right along, he was so excited, and I had to run to keep up.

When they got there they swarmed into the graveyard and washed over it
like an overflow. And when they got to the grave they found they had
about a hundred times as many shovels as they wanted, but nobody hadn't
thought to fetch a lantern. But they sailed into digging anyway by the
flicker of the lightning, and sent a man to the nearest house, a half a
mile off, to borrow one.

So they dug and dug like everything; and it got awful dark, and the rain
started, and the wind swished and swushed along, and the lightning come
brisker and brisker, and the thunder boomed; but them people never took
no notice of it, they was so full of this business; and one minute you
could see everything and every face in that big crowd, and the shovelfuls
of dirt sailing up out of the grave, and the next second the dark wiped
it all out, and you couldn't see nothing at all.

At last they got out the coffin and begun to unscrew the lid, and then
such another crowding and shouldering and shoving as there was, to
scrouge in and get a sight, you never see; and in the dark, that