{"id":"01KG177B4C5QZ3TGW67PXZHJRH","cid":"bafkreiczkbzf63gkztm2i3hkzpdburo2d43hclxlltlavtc5qkkpudblcm","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":581,"extracted_at":"2026-01-28T02:34:21.011Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG0K71QZ8KK7RGEGSNTB5534","start_line":487,"text":"CHAPTER I\r\n\r\n\r\n“Tom!”\r\n\r\nNo answer.\r\n\r\n“TOM!”\r\n\r\nNo answer.\r\n\r\n“What’s gone with that boy, I wonder? You TOM!”\r\n\r\nNo answer.\r\n\r\nThe old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the\r\nroom; then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or\r\nnever looked _through_ them for so small a thing as a boy; they were\r\nher state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for “style,” not\r\nservice—she could have seen through a pair of stove-lids just as well.\r\nShe looked perplexed for a moment, and then said, not fiercely, but\r\nstill loud enough for the furniture to hear:\r\n\r\n“Well, I lay if I get hold of you I’ll—”\r\n\r\nShe did not finish, for by this time she was bending down and punching\r\nunder the bed with the broom, and so she needed breath to punctuate the\r\npunches with. She resurrected nothing but the cat.\r\n\r\n“I never did see the beat of that boy!”\r\n\r\nShe went to the open door and stood in it and looked out among the\r\ntomato vines and “jimpson” weeds that constituted the garden. No Tom. So\r\nshe lifted up her voice at an angle calculated for distance and shouted:\r\n\r\n“Y-o-u-u TOM!”\r\n\r\nThere was a slight noise behind her and she turned just in time to seize\r\na small boy by the slack of his roundabout and arrest his flight.\r\n\r\n“There! I might ’a’ thought of that closet. What you been doing in\r\nthere?”\r\n\r\n“Nothing.”\r\n\r\n“Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What _is_ that\r\ntruck?”\r\n\r\n“I don’t know, aunt.”\r\n\r\n“Well, I know. It’s jam—that’s what it is. Forty times I’ve said if you\r\ndidn’t let that jam alone I’d skin you. Hand me that switch.”\r\n\r\nThe switch hovered in the air—the peril was desperate—\r\n\r\n“My! Look behind you, aunt!”\r\n\r\nThe old lady whirled round, and snatched her skirts out of danger.\r\nThe lad fled on the instant, scrambled up the high board-fence, and\r\ndisappeared over it.\r\n\r\nHis aunt Polly stood surprised a moment, and then broke into a gentle\r\nlaugh.\r\n\r\n“Hang the boy, can’t I never learn anything? Ain’t he played me tricks\r\nenough like that for me to be looking out for him by this time? But old\r\nfools is the biggest fools there is. Can’t learn an old dog new tricks,\r\nas the saying is. But my goodness, he never plays them alike, two days,\r\nand how is a body to know what’s coming? He ’pears to know just how long\r\nhe can torment me before I get my dander up, and he knows if he can make\r\nout to put me off for a minute or make me laugh, it’s all down again and\r\nI can’t hit him a lick. I ain’t doing my duty by that boy, and that’s\r\nthe Lord’s truth, goodness knows. Spare the rod and spile the child, as\r\nthe Good Book says. I’m a laying up sin and suffering for us both, I\r\nknow. He’s full of the Old Scratch, but laws-a-me! he’s my own dead\r\nsister’s boy, poor thing, and I ain’t got the heart to lash him,\r\nsomehow. Every time I let him off, my conscience does hurt me so, and\r\nevery time I hit him my old heart most breaks. Well-a-well, man that is\r\nborn of woman is of few days and full of trouble, as the Scripture says,\r\nand I reckon it’s so. He’ll play hookey this evening,[*] and I’ll just\r\nbe obleeged to make him work, tomorrow, to punish him. It’s mighty hard\r\nto make him work Saturdays, when all the boys is having holiday, but he\r\nhates work more than he hates anything else, and I’ve _got_ to do some\r\nof my duty by him, or I’ll be the ruination of the child.”\r\n\r\n[*] Southwestern for “afternoon”\r\n\r\nTom did play hookey, and he had a very good time. He got back home\r\nbarely in season to help Jim, the small colored boy, saw next-day’s wood\r\nand split the kindlings before supper—at least he was there in time\r\nto tell his adventures to Jim while Jim did three-fourths of the work.\r\nTom’s younger brother (or rather half-brother) Sid was already through\r\nwith his part of the work (picking up chips), for he was a quiet boy,\r\nand had no adventurous, trouble-some ways.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG176GDRK7X8GGR8B2DX8VF3","peer_label":"CHAPTER I","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG0K71QZ8KK7RGEGSNTB5534","peer_label":"tom_sawyer.txt","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KFXT0KM64XT6K8W52TDEE0YS","peer_label":"More Classics","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG177B3PG55EKYF908KPZZVA","peer_label":"Chunk 2","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-28T02:34:21.365Z","ts":"2026-01-28T02:34:22.206Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}