Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Chapter 7 Summary

  • Huck falls asleep holding the gun and is woken by his father; he lies and says he was guarding against a robber in the night.
  • Pap, in the midst of one extraordinary hangover, doesn't remember the night before anyway, so it's all good.
  • Outside, Huck sees the river rising and knows it's June. He implies that he's starting to miss town.
  • As luck would have it, he finds a drift-canoe coming down the river (that is, a canoe with no one in it, for those of you who don't speak Huck).
  • He hides it away for later.
  • Back at home, Pap gathers up some lumber and takes it to town to sell for money (read: whiskey). While he's gone, Huck gathers up supplies and leaves through the hole he sawed in the back of the cabin.
  • Then he does what every normal boy dreams about at least once in his childhood: he fakes his own death.
  • He beats down the door to the cabin and spreads pig's blood everywhere to make the cabin look like a robbery/murder-scene.
  • Then it's into the canoe and out on the river in the pitch black darkness.
  • In the nail-biting scene that follows, Huck has to lie down still in his canoe as his father paddles by right next to him.
  • Because of the darkness and also possibly his stupidity, Pap is oblivious to the empty canoe less than six inches from his path.
  • Once he is out of danger's way, Huck chills out in his canoe, smokes a pipe, looks at the stars, and eavesdrops on the nearby ferry full of men. It's all very picturesque and beautiful.
  • He then paddles out to the uninhabited Jackson's Island, an all-inclusive resort destination in the middle of the river.