Poor Huck was too distressed to smile, but the old man laughed loud and
joyously, shook up the details of his anatomy from head to foot, and
ended by saying that such a laugh was money in a man s pocket, because
it cut down the doctor s bill like everything. Then he added:
Poor old chap, you re white and jaded you ain t well a bit no wonder
you re a little flighty and off your balance. But you ll come out of it.
Rest and sleep will fetch you out all right, I hope.
Huck was irritated to think he had been such a goose and betrayed such
a suspicious excitement, for he had dropped the idea that the parcel
brought from the tavern was the treasure, as soon as he had heard the
talk at the widow s stile. He had only thought it was not the treasure,
however he had not known that it wasn t and so the suggestion of a
captured bundle was too much for his self-possession. But on the whole
he felt glad the little episode had happened, for now he knew beyond all
question that that bundle was not _the_ bundle, and so his mind was
at rest and exceedingly comfortable. In fact, everything seemed to be
drifting just in the right direction, now; the treasure must be still
in No. 2, the men would be captured and jailed that day, and he and
Tom could seize the gold that night without any trouble or any fear of
interruption.
Just as breakfast was completed there was a knock at the door. Huck
jumped for a hiding-place, for he had no mind to be connected even
remotely with the late event. The Welshman admitted several ladies and
gentlemen, among them the Widow Douglas, and noticed that groups of
citizens were climbing up the hill to stare at the stile. So the news
had spread. The Welshman had to tell the story of the night to the
visitors. The widow s gratitude for her preservation was outspoken.
Don t say a word about it, madam. There s another that you re more
beholden to than you are to me and my boys, maybe, but he don t allow me
to tell his name. We wouldn t have been there but for him.
Of course this excited a curiosity so vast that it almost belittled the
main matter but the Welshman allowed it to eat into the vitals of his
visitors, and through them be transmitted to the whole town, for he
refused to part with his secret. When all else had been learned, the
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