“Right now, if you say it. Are you strong enough?”

“Is it far in the cave? I ben on my pins a little, three or four days, now, but I can’t walk more’n a mile, Tom⁠—least I don’t think I could.”

“It’s about five mile into there the way anybody but me would go, Huck, but there’s a mighty shortcut that they don’t anybody but me know about. Huck, I’ll take you right to it in a skiff. I’ll float the skiff down there, and I’ll pull it back again all by myself. You needn’t ever turn your hand over.”

“Less start right off, Tom.”

“All right. We want some bread and meat, and our pipes, and a little bag or two, and two or three kite-strings, and some of these newfangled things they call lucifer matches. I tell you, many’s the time I wished I had some when I was in there before.”