- end_line
- 5031
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-28T17:35:34.210Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 4950
- text
- Harper shall know of this before I’m an hour older. I’d like to see her
get around _this_ with her rubbage ’bout superstition. Go on, Tom!”
“Oh, it’s all getting just as bright as day, now. Next you said I warn’t
_bad_, only mischeevous and harum-scarum, and not any more responsible
than—than—I think it was a colt, or something.”
“And so it was! Well, goodness gracious! Go on, Tom!”
“And then you began to cry.”
“So I did. So I did. Not the first time, neither. And then—”
“Then Mrs. Harper she began to cry, and said Joe was just the same, and
she wished she hadn’t whipped him for taking cream when she’d throwed it
out her own self—”
“Tom! The sperrit was upon you! You was a prophesying—that’s what you
was doing! Land alive, go on, Tom!”
“Then Sid he said—he said—”
“I don’t think I said anything,” said Sid.
“Yes you did, Sid,” said Mary.
“Shut your heads and let Tom go on! What did he say, Tom?”
“He said—I _think_ he said he hoped I was better off where I was gone
to, but if I’d been better sometimes—”
“_There_, d’you hear that! It was his very words!”
“And you shut him up sharp.”
“I lay I did! There must ’a’ been an angel there. There _was_ an angel
there, somewheres!”
“And Mrs. Harper told about Joe scaring her with a firecracker, and you
told about Peter and the Pain-killer—”
“Just as true as I live!”
“And then there was a whole lot of talk ’bout dragging the river for us,
and ’bout having the funeral Sunday, and then you and old Miss Harper
hugged and cried, and she went.”
“It happened just so! It happened just so, as sure as I’m a-sitting in
these very tracks. Tom, you couldn’t told it more like if you’d ’a’ seen
it! And then what? Go on, Tom!”
“Then I thought you prayed for me—and I could see you and hear every
word you said. And you went to bed, and I was so sorry that I took and
wrote on a piece of sycamore bark, ‘We ain’t dead—we are only off being
pirates,’ and put it on the table by the candle; and then you looked
so good, laying there asleep, that I thought I went and leaned over and
kissed you on the lips.”
“Did you, Tom, _did_ you! I just forgive you everything for that!” And
she seized the boy in a crushing embrace that made him feel like the
guiltiest of villains.
“It was very kind, even though it was only a—dream,” Sid soliloquized
just audibly.
“Shut up, Sid! A body does just the same in a dream as he’d do if he was
awake. Here’s a big Milum apple I’ve been saving for you, Tom, if you
was ever found again—now go ’long to school. I’m thankful to the good
God and Father of us all I’ve got you back, that’s long-suffering and
merciful to them that believe on Him and keep His word, though goodness
knows I’m unworthy of it, but if only the worthy ones got His blessings
and had His hand to help them over the rough places, there’s few enough
would smile here or ever enter into His rest when the long night comes.
Go ’long Sid, Mary, Tom—take yourselves off—you’ve hendered me long
enough.”
The children left for school, and the old lady to call on Mrs. Harper
and vanquish her realism with Tom’s marvellous dream. Sid had better
judgment than to utter the thought that was in his mind as he left the
house. It was this: “Pretty thin—as long a dream as that, without any
mistakes in it!”
- title
- Chunk 2