gazing. Pretty soon Tom says:

"Huck, there's something mighty curious about this one, don't you know?
IT oughtn't to be going around in the daytime."

"That's so, Tom--I never heard the like of it before."

"No, sir, they don't ever come out only at night--and then not till after
twelve. There's something wrong about this one, now you mark my words. I
don't believe it's got any right to be around in the daytime. But don't
it look natural! Jake was going to play deef and dumb here, so the
neighbors wouldn't know his voice. Do you reckon it would do that if we
was to holler at it?"

"Lordy, Tom, don't talk so! If you was to holler at it I'd die in my
tracks."

"Don't you worry, I ain't going to holler at it. Look, Huck, it's
a-scratching its head--don't you see?"

"Well, what of it?"

"Why, this. What's the sense of it scratching its head? There ain't
anything there to itch; its head is made out of fog or something like
that, and can't itch. A fog can't itch; any fool knows that."

"Well, then, if it don't itch and can't itch, what in the nation is it
scratching it for? Ain't it just habit, don't you reckon?"

"No, sir, I don't. I ain't a bit satisfied about the way this one
acts. I've a blame good notion it's a bogus one--I have, as sure as I'm
a-sitting here. Because, if it--Huck!"

"Well, what's the matter now?"

"YOU CAN'T SEE THE BUSHES THROUGH IT!"

"Why, Tom, it's so, sure! It's as solid as a cow. I sort of begin to think--"

"Huck, it's biting off a chaw of tobacker! By George, THEY don't
chaw--they hain't got anything to chaw WITH. Huck!"

"I'm a-listening."

"It ain't a ghost at all. It's Jake Dunlap his own self!"

"Oh your granny!" I says.

"Huck Finn, did we find any corpse in the sycamores?"

"No."

"Or any sign of one?"

"No."

"Mighty good reason. Hadn't ever been any corpse there."

"Why, Tom, you know we heard--"

"Yes, we did--heard a howl or two. Does that prove anybody was killed?
Course it don't. And we seen four men run, then this one come walking
out and we took it for a ghost. No more ghost than you are. It was Jake
Dunlap his own self, and it's Jake Dunlap now. He's been and got his
hair cropped, the way he said he would, and he's playing himself for a
stranger, just the same as he said he would. Ghost? Hum!--he's as sound
as a nut."

Then I see it all, and how we had took too much for granted. I was
powerful glad he didn't get killed, and so was Tom, and we wonde