at looks powerful bad
for Tom, and I'll dig out for the island right off. So away I shoved,
and turned the corner, and nearly rammed my head into Uncle Silas's
stomach! He says:

"Why, _Tom!_ Where you been all this time, you rascal?"

"_I_ hain't been nowheres," I says, "only just hunting for the runaway
nigger--me and Sid."

"Why, where ever did you go?" he says. "Your aunt's been mighty
uneasy."

"She needn't," I says, "because we was all right. We followed the men
and the dogs, but they outrun us, and we lost them; but we thought we
heard them on the water, so we got a canoe and took out after them and
crossed over, but couldn't find nothing of them; so we cruised along
up-shore till we got kind of tired and beat out; and tied up the canoe
and went to sleep, and never waked up till about an hour ago; then we
paddled over here to hear the news, and Sid's at the post-office to
see what he can hear, and I'm a-branching out to get something to eat
for us, and then we're going home."

So then we went to the post-office to get "Sid"; but just as I
suspicioned, he warn't there; so the old man he got a letter out of
the office, and we waited awhile longer, but Sid didn't come; so the
old man said, come along, let Sid foot it home, or canoe it, when he
got done fooling around--but we would ride. I couldn't get him to let
me stay and wait for Sid; and he said there warn't no use in it, and I
must come along, and let Aunt Sally see we was all right.

When we got home Aunt Sally was that glad to see me she laughed and
cried both, and hugged me, and give me one of them lickings of hern
that don't amount to shucks, and said she'd serve Sid the same when he
come.

And the place was plum full of farmers and farmers' wives, to dinner;
and such another clack a body never heard. Old Mrs. Hotchkiss was the
worst; her tongue was a-going all the time. She says:

"Well, Sister Phelps, I've ransacked that-air cabin over, an' I
b'lieve the nigger was crazy. I says to Sister Damrell--didn't I,
Sister Damrell?--s'I, he's crazy, s'I--them's the very words I said.
You all hearn me: he's crazy, s'I; everything shows it, s'I. Look at
that-air grindstone, s'I; want to tell _me't_ any cretur 't's in his
right mind 's a goin' to scrabble all them crazy things onto a
grindstone? s'I. Here sich 'n' sich a person busted his heart; 'n'
here so 'n' so pegged along for thirty-seven year, 'n' all
that--natcherl son o' Louis somebody, 'n' sich ev