CHAPTER X

After breakfast, Huck tries to discuss the dead man from the drift-house, but Jim refuses, fearing bad luck and haunting. While sorting their scavenged clothes, they find eight dollars sewn into an overcoat. Huck mocks Jim’s warnings about snake-skin bad luck, crediting their haul as “good luck,” which Jim cautions will turn.

Days later, Huck kills a rattlesnake in their cavern and, as a prank, places it on Jim’s blanket. That night the snake’s mate bites Jim on the heel. Huck kills the live snake, and Jim treats the wound with whisky, roasted snake meat, and rattles as charms. Jim suffers swelling and delirium but recovers after four days, reinforcing his belief—now shared by Huck—that handling a snake-skin brings misfortune.

Huck recalls other omens, like seeing a new moon over the left shoulder, citing Hank Bunker’s fatal fall as a cautionary tale. As the river drops back within its banks, they bait a big hook and catch an enormous catfish, finding odd items in its stomach.

Growing bored and eager for information, Huck proposes to slip into town. With Jim’s encouragement to go at night and in disguise, Huck shortens a calico dress, dons a sun-bonnet, and practices moving like a girl. After dark he paddles across, spots a new woman knitting in a long-empty shanty, and, banking on her being a recent arrival, knocks to gather news while maintaining his disguise.