Mitch grew awful serious and was still for a long while. Finally he said: "Skeeters, I just live Tom Sawyer and dream about him. I don't seem to think of anything else--and somehow I act him, and before I die, I mean to see him. Yes, sir, this very summer you and I, if you're game, will look on Tom Sawyer's face and take him by the hand." "Why, Mitch," I said, "how can you do it? It must be more'n a hundred miles from here to where Tom lives." "You bet it is," said Mitch. "It's near two hundred miles. I looked it up. But it's as easy as pie to get there. Look here--we can bum our way or walk to Havaner--then we can get a job on a steamboat and go to St. Louis--then we can bum or walk our way to Hannibal--and some fine mornin' you and I will be standin' on the shore of the Mississippi--and there'll be Tom and Huck, and you and me. And I'll say, 'Tom Sawyer, I'm Mitch Miller, and this here is Skeeters Kirby.' How's that for fun? Just think of it. I dream about this every night. And we'll strip and go swimmin', and fish and all go up to McDougal's Cave. And what would you say if we persuaded them to come back with us for a visit? Tom and Huck, you and me all walkin' arm in arm down the streets here? Why, the town'd go wild. And we'd go out to your grandmother's and stay all summer and just roll in pie and cake and good things--and ride horses, and fly kites. My--I just can't wait!" So Mitch went on this way for quite a spell and then he switched and said: "Skeeters, what do you dream about?" "Flyin'," says I. "No!" said Mitch. "Do you really?" "As sure as you're livin'," I says. "Well, ain't that funny," said Mitch, "so do I. But how do you do it, with wings or how?" "No," I says, "I seem to reach up my hands and pull myself up, by rounds on a ladder, ropes or somethin'; and I'm always trying to get away from somethin'--like bears or sometimes it's a lion. But pa says it means I'm an aspirin' nature and born to pull up in the world. But," says I to Mitch, "do you ever dream of the Judgment Day?" [Illustration: The Judgment Day]