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"Well, Ben Rogers, if I was as ignorant as you I wouldn't let on. Kill the

women? No -- nobody ever saw anything in the books like that. You fetch

them to the cave, and you're always as polite as pie to them; and by-and-by they

fall in love with you and never want to go home any more."

"Well, if that's the way, I'm agreed, but I don't take no stock in it. Mighty

soon we'll have the cave so cluttered up with women, and fellows waiting to be

ransomed, that there won't be no place for the robbers. But go ahead, I ain't

got nothing to say." ssssssssss

Little Tommy Barnes was asleep, now, and when they waked him up he was

scared, and cried, and said he wanted to go home to his ma, and didn't want

to be a robber any more. ssssssssss

So they all made fun of him, and called him cry-baby, and that made him

mud, and he said he would go straight and tell all the secrets. But Tom give

him five cents to keep quiet, and said we would all go home and meet next

week and rob somebody and kill some people.

Ben Rogers said he couldn't get out much, only Sundays, and so he wanted

to begin next Sunday; but all the boys said it would be wicked to do it on

Sunday, and that settled the thing. They agreed to get together and fix a day as

soon as they could, and then we elected Tom Sawyer first captain and Joe

Harper second captain of the Gang, and so started home.

I clumb up the shed and crept into my window just before day was breaking.

My new clothes was all greased up and clayey, and I was dog-tired.

ssssssssss

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