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00:00The Makers of Campbell's Soup presents the Campbell Playhouse, Orson Welles producer.
00:25Good evening, this is Orson Welles.
00:34Our story, as promised, is Huckleberry Finn, and our guest is Jackie Cooper.
00:38But since that promise was made, another star has joined the cast, Walter Catlett, whose
00:44face you remember from at least a hundred movies, whose voice of most recent memory
00:48is unforgettable in Pinocchio, in which Mr. Catlett created for Mr. Disney the character
00:53of Jay Worthington, Honest John Foulfellow the Fox, and who, I'm still talking about
01:00Walter Catlett, will enact for us tonight the taxing role of the Duke.
01:05Also with us in the Campbell Playhouse are Clara Blandick, Robert Warwick, Clarence Mews,
01:08and William Alland.
01:10These and others await their cues to play as many of the Mark Twain characters as we
01:14could cram into a single broadcast.
01:17They will strive to please you, everyone.
01:19But right now, they'd like me to read to you in a loud, clear voice the words printed
01:23on the title page of tonight's story.
01:25I quote, persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted.
01:32Persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished.
01:35Persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot by order of the author.
01:41Now before Huckleberry Finn, Ernest Chappell has something to say about entertainment of
01:45another sort.
01:46Mr. Chappell, sir.
01:47Thank you, Orson Welles.
01:48Ladies and gentlemen, when you entertain a dinner, your first concern is the pleasure
01:52of your guests.
01:53You want to be sure that they enjoy themselves and enjoy the food you serve.
01:58And to this end, don't you often play safe and serve chicken?
02:01I imagine you do because you've noticed that nearly everybody enjoys chicken in some form,
02:06roast chicken or fried chicken or chicken fricassee, let's say, as much as you yourself
02:10probably enjoy it.
02:12Now, I'm sure it must be this general liking for chicken that has made people take so wholeheartedly
02:17to Campbell's Chicken Soup.
02:20One after another, families have tried this chicken soup and found it rich in chicken
02:24flavor clear through, from its golden surface to the very bottom of the plate.
02:29They've seen how its broth fairly glistens with chicken richness, and they've relished
02:33the fluffy rice and the pieces of tender chicken meat in it.
02:36In every plateful, they've told others how much they like Campbell's Chicken Soup, and
02:40so its popularity has grown and continues to grow.
02:44Have you tried this deep-flavored, home-like chicken soup of Campbell's?
02:48Why not enjoy it tomorrow?
02:50I promise you, just as sure as you like chicken, you'll like Campbell's Chicken Soup.
02:57And now, Orson Welles starts our Campbell Playhouse presentation of Huckleberry Finn
03:01starring Jackie Cooper.
03:15Last week, we said that this week we'd broadcast Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.
03:22Well, you're expecting, then, a dramatization.
03:25Good.
03:26Clear.
03:27Concise.
03:28Ladies and gentlemen, you'll hear no such thing.
03:30We're sorry, but we think Huckleberry Finn is too good a book to be dramatized, exactly
03:35speaking, and so we won't.
03:36We won't even try a nicely plotted version of the story.
03:39We couldn't do it anyway.
03:40We don't even have to.
03:41For one thing, the story hasn't got what you'd call a nice plot.
03:44The principal part of it, of course, relates the deathless saga of a voyage down the Mississippi
03:49by the most celebrated rat the world has ever known.
03:52We're going to tell most of that story and as many of the others as we can and as nearly
03:56as possible in Mark Twain's own words.
03:59Now, you'll forgive me, please, but I must inject what may seem at first to be the personal
04:03note.
04:04Ladies and gentlemen, it would appear that during the course of this past week, there
04:08have been circulated rumors, rumors evil, unfounded, and unfair, nasty, vile rumors
04:13whose sources I cannot place and whose origins I'm at a loss to discover.
04:18It has been said that I will perform the role of Huckleberry Finn.
04:22You'll all be relieved, I'm sure, to hear from my own lips that this is not the case.
04:27It must be said, however, in all candor, that I restrained myself none too easily to be
04:33Huckleberry Finn even for an hour.
04:35This was not likely to be put to one side.
04:37However, I'm as happy as possible and as proud as I really ought to be to welcome now
04:42to the Campbell Playhouse that gifted and very young performer who will be Huckleberry
04:46Finn and who is actually Jackie Cooper.
04:57I'm mighty proud to meet you, Mr. Wells.
04:59Huckleberry Finn and a friend of Mark Twain's is always welcome here.
05:03Mr. Twain did write proud by me in his story, didn't he?
05:06Write proud is a bit of an understatement, Huck.
05:09And I think the very beginning of the book.
05:12You don't know about me without you've read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
05:17I thought you wasn't going to play Huckleberry Finn, Mr. Wells.
05:21Oh, pardon me.
05:23All right, Huck.
05:25You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
05:31But that ain't no matter.
05:33That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth mainly.
05:37There was some stretches in it, but then I never see anybody but lie one time or another
05:41without it was Aunt Polly or the witty Douglas.
05:44Anyways, that book winds up by Tom and me finding the money that the robbers hid in the cave,
05:49and it made us rich.
05:50And the witty Douglas, she took me for her son and allowed she would civilize me.
05:54It was rough at first going to school every day and living in the house all the time.
05:59Considering how dismal, regular, and decent the widow was in all her ways,
06:03but mostly things was going pretty smooth.
06:06That is, till the night I killed the spider.
06:08I was a sitting in my room.
06:10Can't I have just a paragraph or two, Huck?
06:13No more than a paragraph or two.
06:17Well, Huck was a sitting in his room, tired and lonesome,
06:21trying to think of something cheerful, but it was no use.
06:24He felt so lonesome, he most wished he was dead.
06:27The stars were shining.
06:28The leaves rustled in the woods ever so mournfully.
06:32It was an hour away off a hoo-hooing about somebody that was dead.
06:35A dog crying about somebody that was going to die,
06:38and the wind was trying to whisper something to him.
06:41Way out in the woods he heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes.
06:44It wants to tell something that's on its mind.
06:47A candle was almost burned away.
06:50That's more than a paragraph or two, Mr. Weld.
06:53All right.
06:55That's right, Mr. Weld.
06:58When this here spider went crawling up my shoulder,
07:00I flipped it off and it lit the candle,
07:02and before I could budge it, it was all shriveled up.
07:05I didn't need Miss Watson's slave, Jim,
07:07to tell me that that was an awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck.
07:11But I thought maybe I might as well know the worst,
07:14because then the thought of my pap came into my mind.
07:16Mighty powerful.
07:18Folks claimed, you know, that my pap was dead,
07:20but something inside me told me better.
07:23I put out the candle and climbed out the window
07:25and chinned down the lightning rod and started off to Jim's place.
07:28For Jim had a hair ball as big as your fist,
07:30which had been took out of the poor stomach of an ox,
07:32and he could do magic with it.
07:34There's a spirit inside that knows everything.
07:37What do you want to know now, huh?
07:39Think about your pap.
07:40Pretty considerable.
07:41Well, let me see.
07:43Let me see.
07:45What this spirit done say.
07:47He say,
07:49he say your old father don't know yet what he going to do.
07:52Sometimes you expect he'll go away and then again you expect he'll stay.
07:56Best way is to rest easy and let the old man take his own way.
08:01But Jim's all right.
08:03You're going to have considerable trouble in your life
08:06and considerable joy.
08:08Sometimes you're going to get hurt
08:10and sometimes you're going to get sick.
08:12But every time you're going to get well again,
08:17he wants to keep away from the water as much as he can
08:20and don't run no risk.
08:22This is down in the bills that you want to get hung.
08:26Thank you, Jim.
08:28It isn't everybody can rest easy and know for sure he's going to be hung.
08:36I was kind of low spirited next morning
08:39and I went down to the front garden and clumb over the stile
08:41where you go through the high board fence.
08:43There was an inch of new snow on the ground
08:45and I seen somebody's tracks.
08:47I didn't notice anything at first
08:49but next I did.
08:50There was a cross in the left heel boot
08:52made with big nails to keep off the devil.
08:55Then I knew.
09:02And that night when I lit my candle and went up to my room,
09:05there sat Pat, his own self.
09:12Surprising, eh?
09:15Just look at you.
09:17Starched clothes.
09:20Think you're a good dealer for big bugs, don't you?
09:23No, I don't, Pop.
09:24Hasn't come in under your lip.
09:27You've put on considerably many frills since I went away.
09:31I'll take you down with Peg before I got done with you.
09:34You're educated, too.
09:36Can read and write.
09:38You think you're better than your old man now, don't you?
09:41Because he can.
09:43I'll take it out of you.
09:45Who told you you could meddle in such high food foolishness, huh?
09:50Who told you you could?
09:51The widow.
09:52She told me.
09:53A widow, huh?
09:54Who told a widow she could put in her shower about a thing
09:57that ain't none of her business?
09:58Nobody never told her.
09:59Well, I'll learn how to meddle.
10:01And look here, you drop that school, you hear?
10:04I'll learn people to bring up a boy
10:06and put on airs over his own pappy.
10:09What's that yawn on the wall?
10:12Well, it's a picture the widow gave me.
10:14It's just a little old picture.
10:16That'll do for that.
10:18And I'll give you something better than that.
10:20I'll give you a car hiding.
10:22Ain't you a sweet-scented dandy, huh?
10:26A bed, bed killers.
10:28A looking glass.
10:29A piece of copper on the floor.
10:32Your old pappy's got to sleep with the hogs in the canyons.
10:35I've never seen such a son.
10:38But I'll take some of them quills out of you before I'm done with you.
10:41Why, there ain't no end to your hairs.
10:44They say you're rich.
10:46Huh?
10:47Is that so?
10:48I ain't got no money.
10:49That's a lie.
10:51That's Sash's got it.
10:52You get it.
10:53I want it.
10:54I ain't got only a dollar, and I want it.
10:55It'll make no difference what you want it for.
10:56You just shell out.
10:57Well, you can have the dollar, but...
10:59I can have the dollar.
11:01Hey, you can bet your bottom dollar I'm going to have more than that.
11:05I'm going to take you with me.
11:06And if that dead Sash here and your widow Douglas want you bad enough,
11:10they can come get you because there's a law that says a child belongs to his parents.
11:14They want you, they're going to pay plenty.
11:16Do you understand that?
11:17Hey, you come along with your pep.
11:19I'm not going.
11:20Hurry up.
11:21Oh, no, pep.
11:22I can't leave.
11:27Don't you think you need a minute to recover, Huck?
11:30You know, you just got hit, and the kid's yours.
11:32Oh, I was acting.
11:33Come on.
11:34Look, I think you'd better let me take over for a little while.
11:38Oh, you ain't fooling anybody, Mr. Wells.
11:40You just want to read some of Mr. Twain's book yourself.
11:43Well, old man Finn took Huck over to the Illinois shore to an old log hut where it was woody,
11:49and there was no house but this hut,
11:51a place where the timber was so thick you couldn't find it if you didn't know where it was.
11:56He'd lock Huck in, go off with a gun, which he'd stolen someplace,
11:59and get game and fish and trade them for whiskey
12:01and fetch it home and get drunk and lick Huck
12:03and then reach for the jug again, saying he guessed he'd had enough in that jug for two drunks
12:07and delirium tremens.
12:08And he had, too.
12:09It's all just as Mr. Twain says.
12:11But I finally fooled Pap, and I got away.
12:13I was scared of being followed.
12:15I didn't want nobody knowing where I was,
12:17Pap or the widow Douglas or Judge Thatcher or nobody.
12:20So I just bided my time.
12:22I had an old saw head out, and when Pap was gone, which was considerable,
12:26I'd hack away at the boards of the cabin till I made a hole big enough to get through.
12:30And one day, Pap went away in town to get drunk.
12:32I found an old canoe and hit it up to Creekaways,
12:35but it was the wild hog I caught in the marshes that gave me my real idea.
12:39It was pretty good, if I do say it myself.
12:42Only I did wish for Tom Sawyer to be there.
12:45I knowed he'd have taken an interest in the business
12:47and would have added some fancy touches.
12:49What'd you do, Huck?
12:50Ain't you gonna let me tell?
12:51Of course. I was just asking.
12:52Well, here's what I did.
12:53I shot the pig and fetched it in and laid it on the floor of the cabin
12:56and hacked into his throat with an axe
12:58and laid him down on the floor to bleed.
13:00Then I dragged him clear down the riverbank,
13:03leaving a trail all along the way.
13:05I pulled out some of my hair and blooded the axe good,
13:08stuck it on the backside,
13:09and after hacking up the cabin considerable,
13:11I slung the axe in the corner.
13:13And when I was done,
13:14I coulda sworn there'd been a murder committed,
13:17and I was dead.
13:18And then, sticking the pig in the sack,
13:20I jumped in the canoe and took off downstream.
13:31Well, Huck followed the river for a couple of miles or more,
13:37and the further he got,
13:38the longer that river seemed,
13:39stretching miles and miles and miles, it seemed.
13:42The moon was so bright he could count the drift logs
13:45that went a-slipping along, black and still,
13:47hundreds of yards out from shore.
13:49Everything was dead quiet.
13:52It looked late.
13:54It smelled late.
13:56You know how it is.
13:57The sky looks ever so deep
13:59when you lay down on your back in the moonshine,
14:02and how far a body can hear on the water such nights.
14:08I had to lay it all to myself,
14:10thinking about how all them boats
14:11was cruising about looking for my drowned body
14:14and me lying within shouting distance.
14:30It was about three days later
14:32that I saw a fire through the trees
14:34and a man laying on the ground.
14:36It was Miss Watson's Jim.
14:38Hello, Jim, I says.
14:39Hello, Jim.
14:40Don't you hurt me.
14:41Don't, don't hurt me.
14:42Don't.
14:43I ain't never done no harm to a ghost.
14:45Ghost?
14:46I always liked dead people.
14:47And don't I look good for them.
14:49You can go and get on back in the river again
14:51where you belongs.
14:52And don't you do nothing to old Jim.
14:54That's all as your friend.
14:55I'm not dead, Jim.
14:57I'm not dead, Jim.
14:58That's what you say.
14:59Well, if I was dead, could I say it?
15:01Now, pretend you ain't.
15:03If I find out you is,
15:04I'll quit pretending.
15:05All right, Jim.
15:08How you come to be here?
15:10Maybe I better not tell.
15:11Why, Jim?
15:12Well, there's reasons.
15:14But you wouldn't tell on me if I was to tell you.
15:17Would you, Huck?
15:18Blamed if I would, Jim.
15:20I believe you, Huck.
15:22I, I run off.
15:24You run off?
15:26Jim!
15:27Mind you, you said you wouldn't tell.
15:29You know you said you wouldn't tell, Huck.
15:31Well, I did and I said I wouldn't.
15:33And I'll stick to it.
15:34Honest engine.
15:35Well, I ain't going back there anyway.
15:37Thank you, Huck.
15:39Look at them young birds coming along.
15:41Flying a yard or two at a time and lightning.
15:43What about them young birds?
15:44Oh, that's a sign it's gonna rain.
15:47Well, maybe it is.
15:48Maybe it isn't.
15:49But I'll catch some of them.
15:50Oh, you can't.
15:51You can't, you mustn't.
15:52That'll be death.
15:53A lot of things are bad luck, aren't they, Jim?
15:56Yeah, you can't go against signs.
15:58Looks to me as though all the signs was about bad luck.
16:01Aren't there any good luck signs?
16:03Mighty few.
16:05And there ain't no use to nobody.
16:07What you want to know what good luck's gonna come from?
16:10Want to keep it all?
16:11If you've got hairy arms and a hairy breast,
16:14it's a sign that you's going to be rich.
16:17Now, there's some use in a sign like that.
16:19In case it's so far ahead.
16:21Have you got hairy arms and a hairy breast, Jim?
16:23What's the use to ask that question?
16:25Don't you see I have?
16:30It's raining, Jim.
16:31Ain't no surprise to me.
16:33I see the signs.
16:37Listen to me, child.
16:38Chickens know when it's going to rain.
16:40So do the birds.
16:42We've got to get on out of these woods and get someplace warm.
16:44I know a cabin up the island.
16:46Come on.
16:52Oh!
16:58Well, it rained for 12 days.
17:01The river went on rising till it went clean over the banks.
17:03And one day they caught a little section of a lumber raft
17:05just big enough to hold all their things,
17:07of which they had considerable by now.
17:09Even some women's clothes they found in a deserted shack along the river.
17:13And the 13th day the rain stopped.
17:16I reckon I'd slip over the river, Jim, and find out what's going on.
17:19That's a very smart idea, Huck.
17:21But you've got to go in the dark and look mighty sharp.
17:25How about them women's clothes?
17:26How about them, Jim?
17:27Do I look like a girl?
17:28Looks like they're most big for you, Huck.
17:30And with that sun bonding on your head,
17:32tied tight down,
17:33seeing your face would be like looking down at a giant of a stovepipe.
17:37Want to be sure you don't hitch up your dress.
17:39What do you mean?
17:40Don't go reaching in your bitch's pocket.
17:50Well, land safe, little girl.
17:52Come in.
17:53Thank you, ma'am.
17:54And what might your name be?
17:56Sarah Williams.
17:57Whereabouts do you live?
17:58In this neighborhood?
17:59No, in Huckertville, seven miles below.
18:01Well, it's a considerable way to the upper end of town.
18:03You'd better stay here all night.
18:05Take off your bonnet.
18:06Oh, no, no, ma'am.
18:07I'll rest a while, I reckon, and then go on.
18:09I ain't afraid of the dark.
18:10We've got plenty of excitement around here.
18:13A young boy called Huck Finn was killed the other day.
18:16For a while, some people thought that his own pap did it.
18:18Almost everybody thought it at first.
18:20You'll never know how nigh he come to getting lynched.
18:23But before night, they changed around
18:25and judged it was done by a runaway slave named Jim.
18:28Why, he!
18:29What was you going to say?
18:31Uh, nothing, ma'am.
18:33Are they after him?
18:34Well, you're an innocent.
18:36Is $300 lying around every day for people to pick up?
18:40Some people think he ain't far from here.
18:43No.
18:45I'm one of them.
18:46But I ain't talking around.
18:48What did you say your name was?
18:50Mary Williams.
18:51I thought you said it was Sarah when you first came in.
18:53Oh, yes, ma'am, I did.
18:54Sari Mary Williams.
18:55Uh, Mary.
18:56Sarah's my first name.
18:58Some calls me Sarah.
18:59Some calls me Mary.
19:00I see, Sarah Mary.
19:03I wonder if you'd do a favor for me.
19:05Anything you say, ma'am.
19:07Hold this ball of yarn for me.
19:08Here, catch.
19:10Oh, oh, shucks.
19:11I didn't mean to drop it, ma'am.
19:13Just as I thought.
19:15Now, what's your real name?
19:16Is it Bill or Tom or Bob or what?
19:18Oh, please, don't poke fun at a little girl like me, ma'am.
19:21If I'm in the way here, I can't...
19:22Yeah, well, now you can tell me your secret.
19:24And trust me, I'll keep it.
19:25And what's more, I'll help you.
19:27What's your real name now?
19:29George Jones Horsedrop, ma'am.
19:32Well, try to remember it, George.
19:34You do a girl tolerable poor.
19:36Bless your child.
19:37When a girl tries to catch anything in her lap, she throws her knees apart.
19:40She don't clap them together the way you did when you catched that ball of yarn.
19:43Now, trot along, Sarah, Mary, Williams, George, Jones, Horsedrop.
19:47And if you get into trouble, you send word to Mrs. Judith Loftus, which is me.
19:50And I'll do what I can to get you out of it.
19:52Thank you, ma'am.
19:53You've been awful kind to a poor little girl, and she ain't never...
19:55What's that?
19:56I mean to a little boy.
19:58And he ain't never gonna forget it.
19:59Thank you, ma'am.
20:06If I'd been in your spot with that woman, Huck,
20:08I think I could have done better, but we'll just forget about that.
20:11You could not have done better, Mr. Wells.
20:13Even Tom Sawyer couldn't have done better.
20:15I said we'd forget about it.
20:16For days, Huck and Jim on the raft slid down the waters of the Mississippi
20:20bound for Cairo, the bottom of Illinois.
20:22They traveled at night, laying up along the Missouri shore in daytimes.
20:26Mornings before daylight, Huck would slip into a melon patch
20:29and it'd be nice and cool for their breakfast.
20:32Lays through the day, swimming a little, maybe.
20:35Huck would show off his education.
20:37He'd read to Jim out of a book they'd picked up in one of their excursions.
20:41It's considerable in this book about kings and dukes and pearls.
20:48How much do the king get?
20:50Get? Why, they get $1,000 a month if they want it.
20:53They can have just as much as they want.
20:55Everything belongs to them.
20:57Ain't that giddy.
20:58And what do they got to do, Huck?
21:00They don't do nothing. They just sit around.
21:02No? Is that so?
21:04Yeah, they just lazy around or go hawking.
21:07Or other times when things are dull, they fuss with the parliament.
21:10And if everybody don't go just so, he whacks their heads off.
21:13But mostly they hang around the harem.
21:15Around the which?
21:16Harem.
21:17What's the harem?
21:18The place where a king keeps his wife.
21:20Don't you know about the harem?
21:21Solomon, oh, he had about a million wives.
21:24Oh, yeah, that's true.
21:26I didn't forget it.
21:28A harem's a boarding house, I reckon.
21:30Most likely there was rackety times in the nursery.
21:33There's other kings, Jim.
21:34There's Louis XVI that got his head cut off in France long ago.
21:37And there's a little boy, the Dolphin,
21:39that would have been king, but they took and put him in jail.
21:42And some say he died there.
21:43Poor little fellow.
21:45Some say he got out and got away.
21:47And he come to America.
21:48That's good.
21:49But he'd be pretty lonesome.
21:51There ain't no kings here, is there, Huck?
21:53No.
21:54Then he can't get no sedation.
21:58What'd he go on and do?
21:59Well, I don't know.
22:00Some of them gets on the police,
22:02and some of them learns people how to talk French.
22:05Why, Huck, don't French people talk the same way we does?
22:08No, Jim.
22:09You couldn't understand a word they say.
22:11Not a single word.
22:12Well, now, I'll be ding-busted.
22:14How'd he do that come?
22:16Oh, I don't know, but it's so.
22:17I got some of their jabber out of a book.
22:20Supposing a man was to come to you and say,
22:22Poli-voo-fran-zee.
22:24What would you think?
22:25I wouldn't think nothing.
22:26I'd take him and bust him over the head.
22:29Nobody call me that.
22:30Shucks, it ain't calling you anything.
22:32It's only saying, do you know how to talk French?
22:34Well, then, why couldn't he say it?
22:36Well, he is just saying it.
22:37That's a Frenchman's way of saying it.
22:39Well, it's a blamed, ridiculous way.
22:41I don't want to hear no more about it.
22:43Ain't no sense in it.
22:45Looky here, Jim.
22:46Does a cat talk like we do?
22:47No cat don't.
22:48Well, then, does a cow?
22:49No cow don't either.
22:50Well, does a cat talk like a cow, or a cow talk like a cat?
22:53No, it don't.
22:54Well, it's natural and right for them to talk different from each other than ain't it?
22:57Of course.
22:58Well, then, ain't it natural and right for a cat and a cow to talk different from us?
23:01Why, most surely it is.
23:03Well, then, why ain't it natural and right for a Frenchman to talk different from us?
23:06You answer me that.
23:09Is a cat a man, huh?
23:11No.
23:12Well, then, there ain't no sense in a cat talking like a man.
23:16Is a cow a man, or is a cow a cat?
23:19No, she ain't neither of them.
23:21Well, then, they ain't got no business talking like either one or the other of them.
23:25Is a Frenchman a man?
23:26Yes.
23:27Well, then.
23:28Then, blame it.
23:29Why don't he talk like a man?
23:31You answer me that.
23:41Well, Huck and Jim judged three nights more at bringing in sight of the lights of Cairo,
23:45where the Ohio River comes in.
23:47They could fill the raft and get on a steamboat and go way up the high amongst the free states
23:51where Jim would be safe and they'd be out of trouble.
23:53So for three days and three nights, they floated on.
23:56Huck and Jim alternating on watch.
23:59Seen most a dozen times one or the other of them thought they saw the lights of Cairo,
24:03but every time it turned out to be nothing but a little settlement or something.
24:06But then suddenly on the evening of the fourth day...
24:09What's worrying you now, Jim?
24:11Them lights over yonder.
24:12Oh, there ain't so many lights, Jim.
24:14We've been fooled before.
24:15It's Cairo.
24:16Yeah.
24:17It's the lights of Cairo.
24:19We're safe, Huck.
24:21We're safe.
24:22Jump up and crack up your heels.
24:24That's the good old Cairo in there.
24:27I knew it is.
24:28Foundation, Jim.
24:29I reckon you're right.
24:30Look at them lights, Jim.
24:31Lit up like a Christmas tree.
24:33I'm going over and take the canoe and see.
24:35Help me float it.
24:36There you have it, Huck.
24:37And here's my coat to put in the bottle.
24:39Now you'd be more comfortable that way.
24:41Let her go, Jim.
24:42Goodbye, Huck.
24:51There he goes.
24:53The old true Huck.
24:55The only white gentleman that ever kept his promise to old Jim.
24:59Well, that was quite a tribute, Huck.
25:01I guess so, Mr. Wells.
25:03Only I was getting sicker and sicker.
25:05I didn't know what to do.
25:07It was my bond and duty to Miss Watson not to help a runaway slave.
25:11But Jim had always been mighty good to me.
25:13And his last words seemed kind of to, well, to take all the tuck out of me.
25:17I went along slow, not knowing what to do.
25:20Right then along comes a skiff with two men in it.
25:23With guns.
25:24Hey!
25:26Boys!
25:28What's that floating yonder?
25:30Piece of raft.
25:32Any men on it?
25:33Only one, sir.
25:35Well, there's five slaves run off tonight up yonder.
25:39About the head of the bend.
25:41Is your man white or colored?
25:45Well, speak up, boys!
25:48He's white, mister.
25:51All right, boys.
25:53If you see any runaway slaves, you can help.
25:57Never!
25:58You can make some money by it.
26:01Bye.
26:02Goodbye, sir.
26:03I won't let no runaway slaves get by me if I can help it.
26:10Well, they went off, Mr. Wells.
26:12And I got aboard the raft, feeling bad and low.
26:15Because I know very well I've done wrong.
26:18And I see it weren't no use for me to try and learn to do right.
26:21A body that don't get started right when he's little.
26:24Well, he just ain't got no show.
26:27Then I thought a minute.
26:28And I says to myself, hold on now.
26:31Suppose you'd have done right.
26:33Suppose you'd have done right and give Jim up.
26:36Would you have felt better than what you do now?
26:39Well, I was stuck.
26:41I couldn't answer that.
26:43So I reckon I wouldn't bother no more about it.
26:46But after this, always do whichever comes handiest at the time.
26:52You are listening to the Campbell Playhouse presentation of Huckleberry Finn,
27:12produced by Orson Welles and starring Jackie Cooper.
27:16This is the Columbia Broadcasting System.
27:23And now Orson Welles resumes our Campbell Playhouse presentation of Huckleberry Finn,
27:29starring Jackie Cooper.
27:32Well, sir, two or three days and nights went by.
27:36I reckon I might say they swum by.
27:38You'd better let me take over a while, Huck.
27:40I'm sure you're tired.
27:41Oh, I'm not tired, Mr. Wells.
27:42I'm sure you're tired, Huck.
27:44Two or three days went by.
27:46I reckon I might say they swum by.
27:48They went along so quiet and smooth and lovely.
27:52It's a monstrous big river down there, sometimes a mile and a half wide.
27:56Huck and Jim would run at night in high daytimes,
28:00nearly always in the dead water under a towhead,
28:03and cut young cottonwoods and willows and hide the raft with them.
28:07They'd slide into the river and have a swim so as to freshen up and cool off,
28:11and then they'd sit down in the water where it was about knee-deep and watch the daylight come.
28:15Not a sound anywhere.
28:18Perfectly still.
28:20Just as though the whole world was asleep, only sometimes the bullfrogs were cluttering.
28:26Maybe now I'm in a raft sliding by.
28:28Please, Mr. Wells.
28:30Oh, all right.
28:32Then one morning, about daybreak,
28:35I took the canoe and crossed over a chute to the main shore.
28:38I wanted to get some berries for Jim's and my supper.
28:41Just as I was passing a place where a kind of a cow path crossed the creek,
28:45there comes a couple of men tearing up the path as tight as they could foot it,
28:48and are hanging on to a couple of the raviest, fattest carpet bags you ever did see.
28:52Boy! Boy! Save us! Save us! Hide us!
28:55You got a canoe, boy! If you don't let us in, it will be the same as murder!
28:58Quick, boy! Quick! You can hear them after us! Let us in!
29:01Jim! Jim! Grab ahold of the canoe! We've got company, Jim!
29:03I'm coming, Hoag!
29:05Ah! Oh, my boy!
29:07You will never regret it this year, good deed!
29:10No siree!
29:11My boy, you have saved the life!
29:13Two lives, young man. Two lives.
29:15Don't you two know each other?
29:17Not till we just met on the way, so to speak.
29:19What got you into trouble, brother?
29:21Well, sir, I've been selling a little article to take off the tartar from the teeth,
29:25and it does take it off, too, and generally the enamel along with it.
29:29But I stayed about one night longer than I ought to.
29:31What about you, Bob?
29:32Well, I've been running a little temperance revival in that town about a week,
29:36but somehow or another a little report got around last night
29:38that I had a way of putting in my time with a jug on the sly,
29:42and a fellow routed me out in the morning,
29:43told me the people was gathering on the quiet with their dogs and horses,
29:46and they'd be along pretty soon and give me about half an hour's start,
29:50and then they'd run me down if they could,
29:52and if they got me, they'd hard feather me and ride me on a rail shore.
29:55So I didn't wait for no breakfast. I went hungry.
29:58Say, I'm reflecting we might double-team it together.
30:01What do you think?
30:02I ain't indisposed.
30:03What's your line?
30:05Print up my trade, do a little patent medicines,
30:07theater actor, tragedy, you know,
30:09take a turn at mesmerism and phrenology,
30:11and then there's a change occasionally, teach singing,
30:14geography school for change, sling a lecture sometimes.
30:17Oh, I do a lot of things,
30:19most anything that comes handy as long as it's not work.
30:22What's your lay?
30:23I've done considerable in the doctrine way in my time,
30:25laying on of hands, as my best told,
30:27preaching to and working camp meetings and missionarying around.
30:30Dear, dear, dear, dear, dear lass, lass.
30:33What are you laughing about?
30:34To think that I should have lived to be leading such a life
30:37and be degraded down in such company.
30:39Right down your skin, ain't the company good enough for you?
30:41Yes, it is good enough for me.
30:43It's as good as I deserve.
30:44Well, who fetched me so low when I was so high?
30:47I did, I did it myself.
30:48I don't blame you gentlemen, far from it.
30:51I don't blame anybody.
30:52I deserve it all.
30:53Oh, let the cold world do its worst.
30:56One thing I know that somewhere there's a grave waiting for me.
31:00The world may go on just as it's always done,
31:03take everything from me, loved ones, property, everything,
31:07but it can't take away my little old grave.
31:10Someday I'm going to lay down in it and forget it all.
31:13My poor broken heart will then be at rest.
31:16I ain't blaming you gentlemen.
31:18I brought it upon myself.
31:19Yes, I did.
31:20I did it all myself.
31:21Brother, brought you down from where?
31:24Where was you brought down from?
31:27Oh, you wouldn't believe me.
31:28The world never believed, so just let it go, let it go.
31:30Let it pass, let it pass, no matter.
31:33The secret of my birth.
31:35The secret of your birth.
31:36Do you mean to say, brother, do you mean to tell me...
31:38Gentlemen, I am going to reveal it to you,
31:40for I feel that I may have confidence in you.
31:43By rights, gentlemen, I am a Duke.
31:45A Duke?
31:46No, you can't mean it.
31:47Yes, my great-grandfather, the eldest son of the Duke of Bridgewater,
31:50fled to this country about the end of the last century
31:53to breathe the pure air of freedom,
31:55married here and died,
31:56leaving his son, his own father, dying about the same time.
31:59The second son of the late Duke seized the titles in the estate.
32:03The infant real Duke was ignored,
32:05and I am the lineal descendant of that infant.
32:08I am the rightful Duke of Bridgewater, gentlemen,
32:10and here am I,
32:12forlorn, torn from my high estate,
32:15hunted by men,
32:17despised by the cold world,
32:19ragged, worn, heartbroken,
32:22and degraded to the companionship
32:24of fellows on a raffle.
32:27Oh, brother, brother.
32:28Oh, now, now, don't go crying there, Mr. Duke.
32:30I'm powerful, sorry for you.
32:33Thanks, Oliver.
32:34That helps, that helps.
32:36If there's anything we can do to help you now.
32:39Well, now, if you were to bow to me when you speak
32:42or call me your lordship, I wouldn't mind.
32:45In fact, I wouldn't mind if you called me plain Bridgewater,
32:47because after all, that's a title, not a name.
32:50Of course you're lordship.
32:51Then if you want to wait on me dinner time,
32:54not that I like it,
32:55but it's what I've always been used to.
32:57You hear that, Jim?
32:58I reckon I'll have to learn you to say,
33:00Would your lordship like a drink of water right now?
33:02It would be necessary.
33:03Would your lordship like a drink of water right now, sir?
33:06Yeah, that's good.
33:07You've got the idea fine.
33:09I regret to say, brother,
33:12but you ain't the only man who's had troubles like that.
33:16No?
33:17No, you ain't.
33:19You ain't the only person
33:20that's been snaked down wrongfully out in a high place.
33:23No?
33:24No, you ain't the only person that's had a secret of his birth.
33:27Hold on, what do you mean?
33:28What?
33:29Can I trust you?
33:30To the bitter death.
33:32The secret of your being.
33:33Come, man, speak.
33:34Bilgewater, I am the late Dolphin.
33:37You are the late what?
33:39Yes, my friend, it is too true.
33:40Your eyes is looking at this very moment
33:42on the poor, disappeared Dolphin,
33:44Louis XVII, son of Louis XVI and Mary Antoinette.
33:47Oh, boy, you at your age?
33:50No, no.
33:51You mean you're the late Charlemagne.
33:53You must be six to seven hundred years old at the very least.
33:56Trouble has done it, Bilgewater.
33:58Trouble has done it.
33:59Trouble has brung these gray hairs
34:00and this premature bollard.
34:02Yes, gentlemen, you see before you,
34:03in blue jeans and misery,
34:06the wandering exile,
34:07trampled on and suffering,
34:09rightful king of France.
34:11The king of France?
34:12The son of the king of France.
34:14The king of France by now.
34:16And if you want me to feel a bit easier and better,
34:18if you was to get on one knee when you spoke to me,
34:21always call me your majesty
34:22and always wait on me first at meals.
34:24Why?
34:25And don't sit down in my presence
34:26until I ask you.
34:27That'd help a lot.
34:29Yes, sir.
34:31Your majesty.
34:32Why, why should you be served first?
34:34What's this about sitting down in your presence?
34:36Now, Bilgewater,
34:38Bilgewater, we oughtn't to fight.
34:40My father was very friendly
34:41with your great-grandfather
34:42and all the other dukes of Bilgewater.
34:44They was a good deal thought of by my father
34:46and was allowed to come to the palace considerably.
34:49Bilgewater!
34:50Now, don't call me Bilgewater.
34:52Greatwater!
34:53Bridgewater, you and I should be friends.
34:55Well, all right.
34:57Very well, your majesty.
34:59Yes, your grace.
35:01Like as not, we're going to be together
35:03a blame long time in this boy's wrath, king.
35:05So what's the use of our being sour, hmm?
35:08I only make things uncomfortable.
35:10It ain't my fault I weren't born a king, is it?
35:12Ain't your fault you weren't born a duke.
35:14So what's the use to worry?
35:15Make the best of things the way you find them, says I.
35:18That's my motto.
35:19Mine too, brother.
35:20This ain't no bad thing that we've struck here, you know.
35:22Plenty of grub and easy life.
35:24Come on, give us your hand, king.
35:26Come on, let's be friends.
35:27Friends, friends, now and forever.
35:29Now and forever, now and forever.
35:31Oh, king, king.
35:32What is it, Bilgewater?
35:35I've got some plans hatching in my head.
35:38You know, there's a revival meeting
35:39just brewing down the river apiece,
35:41and I'd better hanker and tread the boards again.
35:44I can teach the king here, my friend,
35:47some of the fine rudiments of acting.
35:49Bilgewater, I've been looking at your handbill
35:51about your being Garrick the Younger of Drury Lane, London,
35:53and I think maybe there's as much to be made
35:55out of this play-acting business
35:56as in a revival meeting.
35:58Anyways, I'm just a-freezing for some pressure.
36:01Well, fallen grandeur,
36:03the first good town we come to,
36:05we'll just hire a hall
36:06and do the sword fight from Richard III.
36:08And in the balcony scene,
36:09we'll do a remissive Romeo and Juliet.
36:12Of course, I always have to do my specialty,
36:14the solo quid from Hamlet.
36:15Well, that's all right by me, Duke.
36:17But right now, I've got to hanker in for bed,
36:19and it's mighty wet tonight,
36:20and I'm plagued up with this exercise.
36:23What do you say we turn in?
36:25Well, if our pleasant young host
36:26will show us the beds in question,
36:28I'll be willing to join you
36:29in nocturnal repose,
36:31Your Majesty.
36:33Bilgewater.
36:34Yes?
36:35Well, there's only two beds.
36:37Yes, my son?
36:38Jim's and mine.
36:39Mine's a bit better being a straw tick,
36:41and Jim's is a shove tick.
36:43There's always cobs in a shove tick.
36:45Well, now, son, I'll just take your bed.
36:48Your grace, Bilgewater,
36:50I should have reckoned the difference in rank
36:52would have suggested to you
36:53that a corn shuck bed was just pittin' for me.
36:56Sleep on.
36:58Your grace will take the shuck bed.
37:00I will not.
37:01Oh, yes, you will, your grace.
37:02Oh, no, I won't.
37:03Oh, Bilgewater.
37:04Yeah.
37:05Right, Your Grace.
37:07Well, it seems to be my fate
37:08always to be ground into the mire
37:10under the heel of oppression.
37:12Misfortune has broken my once haughty spirit.
37:15I yield.
37:16I submit.
37:17It is my fate.
37:18I'm alone in the world.
37:20Let me enjoy my suffering.
37:22Let me alone to suffer.
37:23G'way, g'way, g'way, g'way.
37:25G'way.
37:38Ladies and gentlemen,
37:39hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry,
37:41step this way in one night only.
37:43The world-renowned tragedians
37:45David Garrick the Younger
37:46and Edmund Keane the Elder
37:47of the Royal Haymarket Theatre,
37:49Whitechapel, Pudding Lane, Piccadilly, London.
37:51London, gentlemen, London, England.
37:54In their sublime Shakespearean revival,
37:56step right this way, ladies and gentlemen.
37:58Listen to Hamlet's immortal soloquy
38:00by the illustrious Garrick,
38:02done by him three hundred marks
38:04in three hundred consecutive nights
38:06in Paris, in Paris, France.
38:09Gay free, boys, gay free.
38:11Here for one night only
38:12on account of imperative European engagements.
38:15Step right up.
38:16Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry.
38:17Ladies and gentlemen,
38:18admission twenty-five cents,
38:19children ten cents.
38:21Ten cents a thin dime,
38:22a tenth a portion of a dollar.
38:24Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry.
38:26Step aside, old man.
38:27Step aside, boy.
38:35To be or not to be.
38:39That is the bare bodkin
38:41that makes calamity of so long life.
38:44For who would fardels dare
38:46still burn of wood to come to Duncyday?
38:49There's the respect must give us pause.
38:52For who would bear the whips and scorns of time?
38:55The oppressors wrong
38:57when churchyards yawn
38:58in customary suits of solemn black.
39:01But that's the undiscovered country
39:03from which for no traveler returns.
39:06Breathe forth contagion of the world.
39:08And thus the native hue of resolution.
39:12Like the poor cat in the attic.
39:13His sickle adored with care.
39:15Her consummation devoutly to be with.
39:17But soft you, the fair Ophelia.
39:20Hope not thy ponderous and marble jaws.
39:23But get thee to a nunnery, Mekna.
39:25And damn thee he who first cries,
39:28Hold! Enough!
39:38Now suck that to the end, Mr. Wells.
39:40Because it ain't often you get a chance
39:41to hear the greatest poetry ever written
39:43recited as smart as all that.
39:46But when they started to do it the fourth time,
39:48I kind of figured I had got everything worthwhile
39:50out of it already.
39:52So I thought I'd go.
39:53Particularly when I noticed a lot of people
39:55on the outside of the crowd
39:57with buckets of tar in their hand.
39:59It wasn't going to be healthy around there
40:01in a little while.
40:02That weren't hard to see.
40:03So I beat it out and made it just as quick as I could
40:05down to the river to where I'd left Jim and the raft.
40:08Hey, Jim, set her loose, Jim.
40:09We're all right now.
40:10I ditched him.
40:11We're shut of him.
40:12Jim.
40:13Hey, Jim.
40:14Jim.
40:15Jim, where are you?
40:16Jim.
40:18Hey, boy.
40:19Hey, you.
40:20Hey, you know anything about a slave
40:22that was dressed in brown pants and a blue shirt,
40:24one sleeve tore off?
40:25Sure.
40:26Whereabouts?
40:27Down to Silas Phelps' place.
40:28Somebody catched him.
40:29Catched him?
40:30Said he was a runaway slave from New Orleans.
40:32Where's the Phelps' place?
40:33About two miles down the way.
40:35Hey, you got a tour of the back yard?
40:37I didn't wait to answer him, Mr. Wells.
40:39I was too full of trouble, full as I could be,
40:41losing Jim right away.
40:43And I knew there weren't but one thing to do,
40:45light out for the Phelps' place and just trust the luck.
40:48I must say, my luck held out.
40:57Land says good life.
40:59Can't you all keep still a minute?
41:00Be quiet, time.
41:01Good morning, ma'am.
41:02Is this the Phelps' place?
41:03It is, but well, land alive.
41:06It's you at last, ain't it?
41:08Well, ma'am.
41:09I wouldn't have known you.
41:10You don't look much like your mother's.
41:11I reckoned you would.
41:12Did you get your breakfast on the boat, Tom?
41:14Yes, ma'am.
41:15I got it on the boat.
41:16We've been expecting you for days, Tom.
41:18What kept you?
41:19Boat get aground?
41:20Yes, ma'am.
41:21Where's your brother, Sid?
41:22Sid, ma'am?
41:23Yes.
41:24Didn't he come with you?
41:25No, ma'am.
41:26Sid didn't come.
41:27Well, he was supposed to.
41:28Hey, Sally.
41:29The boat ain't come in yet.
41:30Oh, there's your uncle now.
41:31What do you mean, Silas?
41:32The boat ain't come in.
41:33Well, if it did, it just come.
41:34What?
41:35Who's that?
41:38Tom Sawyer.
41:39And who's that?
41:40Who is who?
41:41Coming up the road there.
41:42Who's that?
41:43Excuse me, ma'am.
41:44I didn't mean what I said.
41:45I'm Sid.
41:46What?
41:47Well, then, who's that?
41:48Well, who do you reckon it is?
41:52I ain't got no idea.
41:56Who is it?
41:59Tom Sawyer.
42:01Just one minute, Huck.
42:03Did you say Tom Sawyer?
42:04Aunt Sally said Tom Sawyer.
42:06Tom Sawyer?
42:07Well, there ain't never been but one Tom Sawyer.
42:10That's right, Huck.
42:11But still...
42:12Well, you can imagine, Mr. Wells.
42:13By this time, I was so confused, I almost slumped through the floor.
42:16But if the old man and the old woman were joyful, it weren't nothing to what I was.
42:20For it was just like being born again.
42:22I was so glad to find out who I was.
42:25I had only one worry now.
42:27That was to get to Tom before he got to the farm and tell him the way of things.
42:35Whoa, boy.
42:36Whoa.
42:37Whoa, now.
42:38Hold on there, Tom Sawyer.
42:39Stop a minute.
42:40Huckleberry Finn.
42:41What do you want to come back and have me for?
42:43I ain't come back, Tom.
42:44I ain't been gone.
42:45Honest, injured?
42:46You ain't a ghost?
42:47No, I weren't ever murdered at all.
42:49I played it on him just to get away from Pat.
42:51You come here and feel me if you don't believe me.
42:54I reckon you're real all right.
42:56All right.
42:57Now, Tom, there's something going on here.
42:59Nobody don't know it but me.
43:01And that is there's a slave here that I'm trying to steal out of slavery.
43:04And his name is Jim.
43:05Ole Miss Watson's Jim.
43:06What?
43:07What, Jim?
43:08I know what you'll say.
43:09You'll say it's dirty lowdown business.
43:10But what if it is?
43:11I'm lowdown and I'm going to steal him and I want you to keep mum, not let on.
43:18Will you?
43:22I'll do more than that, Huck.
43:32I'll help you steal him.
43:35Where do you reckon Jim is?
43:36In a little cabin just back of the barn.
43:38You mean in that little old shed?
43:39Yep.
43:40It's as easy as pie stealing a body out of there.
43:42Yeah, that's the trouble.
43:43This whole thing is just as easy as can be.
43:46That's what makes it so rotten.
43:47Difficult to get up a difficult plan.
43:49You've got to invent all the difficulties.
43:51Now, you've got to have a rope ladder and you've got to shimmy down it and break your leg in a moat.
43:56Gee, I wish there was a moat to this cabin.
43:58You know, if we get time tonight, an escape, we'll dig one, huh?
44:00Well, what if we...
44:01Oh, what do we want of a moat when we're going to snake Jim out from under the cabin?
44:05Oh, wouldn't do.
44:07Yeah, there ain't necessity enough for it, huh?
44:09Necessity enough for what?
44:10Why, to saw Jim's leg off.
44:11Good lamb, what do you want to saw his leg off for anyway?
44:14Well, some of the best authorities has done it.
44:16They couldn't get the chain off so they just cut their hand off and shoved.
44:19And a leg would be better still.
44:21So we'll let it go.
44:23But he can have a rope ladder.
44:24We'll tear him for sheets.
44:25What in the nation can he do with a rope ladder?
44:27Do with it.
44:28He can hide it in his bed, can't he?
44:29That's what they all do.
44:30And he's got it, too.
44:32Huck, you don't ever want to do anything that's regular.
44:35Well, all right, Tom.
44:36Fix it your own way.
44:37But if you'll take my advice, you'll let me borrow a sheet off in the clothesline.
44:41And borrow a shirt, too.
44:42What do we want of a shirt?
44:43For Jim to keep a journal on.
44:44Journal, your granny.
44:45Jim can't write a...
44:46I suppose he can't write.
44:48He can make marks on the shirt, can't he?
44:50If we make him a pen out of an old pewter spoon or a piece of old iron barrel hoop or a brass candlestick or something.
44:55And what'll he make ink with?
44:57Iron rust and tears.
44:58But that's the common sort.
44:59The best authorities use their own blood.
45:01Jim can do that.
45:02And when he wants to send any little common, ordinary, mysterious message to let the world know where he's captivated,
45:08well, he can write it on the bottom of a tin plate with a fork and throw it out the window.
45:12The Iron Mask always done that, and it's a plain good way, too.
45:15Jim ain't got no tin plates.
45:16Feed him in a pan.
45:17Well, we'll get him some.
45:18Can't nobody read his plate.
45:20That ain't got nothing to do with it, Huck Finn.
45:22All he's got to do is to write on the plate and throw it out.
45:24You don't have to be able to read it.
45:26Why, half the time you can't read anything a prisoner writes on a tin plate or anywhere else.
45:30Then what's the sense in wasting the plates?
45:32I blame it all.
45:33It ain't the prisoner's plates.
45:34Well, it's got to be somebody's plates, ain't it?
45:36Well, I reckon we'll have to dig them out with our case knives, then.
45:39Tom, there just ain't no sense in using case knives to dig Jim out in that cabin.
45:43Well, you wouldn't want us to use shovels, would you?
45:45It's too easy.
45:46But Tom found it.
45:47It's foolish, Tom.
45:48It don't make no difference how foolish it is.
45:50It's regular.
45:51It's just got to be done this way, Huck.
45:53Sometimes it takes weeks and weeks and weeks and forever and ever.
45:56One prisoner dug himself that way out of the castle deep in the harbor of Marseille.
46:00How long was he at it, do you reckon?
46:02I don't know.
46:03Thirty-seven years.
46:05And he come out in China.
46:07But Jim don't know nobody in China.
46:16Silence! Silence!
46:18Listen to this letter.
46:19Don't betray me.
46:20I wish to be your friend.
46:22There is a desperate gang of cutthroats from over in the Indian Territory
46:25going to steal your runaway slave tonight.
46:27I am one of the gang but have got religion and wish to quit it
46:30and lead an honest life again and will betray the hellish design.
46:33Well, then everything's all right.
46:35They will sneak down from North End along the fence at midnight with a false key
46:39and go in the slave's cabin to get him.
46:41I am to be off a piece and blow a tin horn if I see any danger.
46:45Instead of that, I will bar like a sheep so as they get in and not blow at all.
46:49Then, whilst they are getting his chains loose,
46:51you slip there and lock them in and can kill them at your leisure.
46:54Don't do anything but just the way I am telling you.
46:56If you do, they will suspicion something and raise hoop-jamboree-hoo.
47:00I do not wish any reward but you know I have done the right thing.
47:03An unknown friend.
47:05Silas, you've got to do something.
47:07On what, Sally?
47:08Oh, we've got to get help, Silas.
47:10Round up men from the village with guns.
47:12Bring them here at once.
47:13Silas!
47:19Charlie.
47:20Shh.
47:25Charlie.
47:26Charlie.
47:27Shh.
47:28What is it?
47:29The house is full of men with guns.
47:30Yeah.
47:31Is that so?
47:32Gee, ain't that bullies?
47:33How many?
47:34Most a hundred.
47:35Why, Huck, that ain't nothing.
47:36If it was over to do again, I betcha I could fetch two hundred.
47:39See if we could put it off until the morning.
47:40Now, where's Jim?
47:41Right here, Huck.
47:42You all set?
47:43All right.
47:44Now, we'll slide out and give the sheep signal.
47:46Shh.
47:47Baa.
47:48Baa.
47:51Baa.
47:52That's the signal, men.
47:53Ready.
47:54Now, run for it.
47:55Careful, Tom, that's a fence.
47:56Hurry, Jim.
47:57Come on, Tom.
47:58Oh, wait.
47:59I caught my pants on the splitter.
48:00Ouch!
48:01Right here.
48:02Here they are.
48:03If you run, we'll shoot.
48:04We've got to try and make it, Huck.
48:05There ain't no other way.
48:06Here they are.
48:07Give me a hand.
48:08Ouch!
48:09What's the matter, Tom?
48:10Are you hit?
48:11Oh, go on.
48:12Go on, Tom.
48:13Don't mind me.
48:14Hey, you.
48:15Stand by it.
48:16Oh, Tom.
48:17Tom.
48:18Well, I'll be blowed if it ain't the young ones.
48:21You mean, ma'am, these is your kinfolk?
48:23Yes, the rascals.
48:24One of them hurt, ma'am.
48:25Hey, hey.
48:26Come here, you.
48:27I don't even know what it's all about, mister.
48:29Why don't you get away, eh?
48:30We'll shut you up this time where you can't get away.
48:33Get a doctor quick.
48:34Tom's been shot in the leg.
48:35Hurry, Tyler.
48:36You can't shut Jim up.
48:37You can't, Aunt Sally.
48:38He's as free a queen as walks the earth.
48:39Get out of his head, whatever does the child mean?
48:41I mean every word I say, Aunt Sally.
48:43I've known him all his life.
48:45What's the notion you're talking about, Sid Sawyer?
48:47That's it, Aunt Sally.
48:48He ain't silly.
48:50Oh, it's no use now.
48:53We might as well tell the truth, Huck.
48:55I'm Tom Sawyer, but this here is Huckleberry Finn.
48:59Huck Finn?
49:00Well, I never.
49:01Now, think again.
49:02Huck was dead.
49:03Huck.
49:04I didn't tell you, but old Miss Watson passed on away two months ago,
49:08and she set Jim free in her will.
49:10Then what on earth did you want to set him free for?
49:12Me seeing he was already free?
49:14Well, now, that is a question I must say.
49:16And just like a woman, my Huck and me wanted the adventure of it.
49:20Now, we'd have been willing to wade neck deep in blood for it, too.
49:22Well, I reckon I ain't seen such scams in all my years before.
49:25Them takes a lie.
49:27Yeah, now, Huck, what I tell you.
49:30What I tell you up there at Jackson Island,
49:32I told you I got a hair of bread and what the sign on it.
49:36And it's come true.
49:38And here she is, Donna.
49:40Don't talk to me.
49:41Signs is signs.
49:43And another thing, Huck.
49:45Your pap ain't coming back anymore, Huck.
49:47What's that, Tom?
49:48They found his body floating in the river.
49:50So your money is all yours now, Huck.
49:52All yours and safe as everything.
50:03A happy ending, eh, Huck?
50:05Well, that depends on what you call happy, Mr. Wells.
50:08Well, I should say you all ought to be happy.
50:10Well, that's just it.
50:12You should say.
50:13It just so happens that I'm Huckleberry Finn,
50:15and Mr. Twain wrote the book about me,
50:17and I'm the one to say.
50:19All right, Huck.
50:21You say.
50:23Well, Tom's most well now.
50:25He got his bullet around his neck on a watch guard for a watch.
50:28And he's always seeing what time it is.
50:30So there ain't nothing more to write about.
50:32And I'm a rotten glad of it.
50:34Because if I'd have known what trouble it was to make a book,
50:37I wouldn't have tackled it.
50:39And ain't gonna no more.
50:41But I reckon I gotta light out for Indian territory pretty soon.
50:44Because Aunt Sally's gonna adopt me and civilize me.
50:47And I can't stand her.
50:49I've been there before.
51:12You have been listening to the Campbell Playhouse presentation of Huckleberry Finn,
51:16produced by Orson Welles,
51:18and starring Jackie Cooper.
51:20In just a moment, Mr. Welles and his guest players will return to the microphone.
51:23Meanwhile, one quick reminder.
51:26You'll be serving soup frequently these early spring days, won't you?
51:29I'm sure you will.
51:31And in letting Campbell's make your soup for you,
51:34as I hope you will,
51:36may I suggest you think often of Campbell's chicken soup,
51:39you'll find its full, rich chicken flavor will delight everyone at your table.
51:43They'll enjoy, too, the fluffy rice
51:45and tempting pieces of tender chicken meat
51:47that help to make this chicken soup of Campbell's
51:49so home-like in taste and good nourishment.
51:52Have it tomorrow, why don't you?
51:54If you will, then I know with your very first spoonful
51:57you'll understand why I say,
51:59just as sure as you like chicken,
52:02you'll like Campbell's chicken soup.
52:06You'll like Campbell's chicken soup.
52:08And now, ladies and gentlemen, Orson Welles and his guest.
52:11Ladies and gentlemen, may I present Mr. Jackie Cooper.
52:14Good evening.
52:15Say, I'm sorry about that little misunderstanding we had over who was to read the book.
52:19That's all right, my boy, quite all right.
52:21Mr. Cooper, ladies and gentlemen, turned back the calendar a few years tonight.
52:25In movies, as you know, he's just done himself very proud
52:28over the Paramount lot in Booth Tarkington's Seventeen.
52:32Till next Sunday night, and as to Benny and June Moon,
52:34my sponsors, the makers of Campbell's soups,
52:37and all of us on the Campbell Playhouse remain, as always,
52:40obediently yours.
53:03The makers of Campbell's soups join Orson Welles
53:06in inviting you to be with us in the Campbell Playhouse again next Sunday evening
53:10when we present Jack Benny in June Moon.
53:14In the meantime, if you've enjoyed tonight's Playhouse presentation,
53:18won't you tell your grocer so tomorrow when you order Campbell's chicken soup?
53:23This is Ernest Chappell saying thank you and good night.
53:32© BF-WATCH TV 2021