Huckleberry Finished Read Online Free PDF

having lured customers back to whatever theater or museum employed them. A few stragglers might get tired of gambling or run out of money and decide to see the attractions that Hannibal offered, but for the most part everybody who was going to town was already there.
    The more I thought about it, the more I believed that the most likely explanation was that Webster had gotten off the boat without me seeing him. His cabin looked like he had cleaned it out and left. I didn’t know why he claimed that Vince Mallory’s cabin was his. Maybe he had planned to pull some sort of angry stunt but later changed his mind. I doubted that he could have been wandering around the off-limits areas on the riverboat for this long without being caught by some of the crew. In that case, they would have turned him over to Logan Rafferty, who would have sent for me.
    So when I thought about it like that, it seemed obvious that Webster must have gotten off the boat. If I could just prove that, then I could relax and enjoy the rest of the tour, provided that no more problems cropped up.
    There couldn’t be that many rental car agencies in Hannibal, I told myself as I headed down the stairs to the main deck. All I had to do was find the one where Ben Webster had picked up a car to drive back to St. Louis.
    I left the boat, walked off the dock, and headed up Center Street. When I got to Main I found myself at the Hannibal Trolley Company, which operated sightseeing trolleys around the town. I thought they might be able to tell me where the nearest car rental agencies were, or at least have a phone book I could look at.
    The folks at the trolley company were friendly. No surprise there, in a town that catered so much to the tourist trade. The lady working at the counter pointed me to the car rental places, adding, “But why rent a car when our trolleys can take you anywhere in Hannibal you want to go?”
    I told her I was just looking for some information and headed for the nearest car rental agency.
    It took me the better part of an hour to hike around Hannibal to all the places where Ben Webster could have rented a car. My frustration grew right along with the tired ache in my legs. The folks at the agencies were all cooperative—they could have refused to answer my questions, after all—but none of them recalled renting a car to anybody who looked like Webster that afternoon, and his name didn’t show up in their records.
    So if he wasn’t on the boat and he hadn’t rented a car to drive back to St. Louis, where was he?
    I pondered that question as I started retracing my steps toward the river. My route took me past the Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum, at the corner of Main and Hill streets. Hill Street, as you might guess, was kind of steep. The narrow, two-story white frame building where Sam Clemens had grown up faced the street with an old stone building sitting hard against it on the left side. A sign identified the stone building as the Mark Twain Museum and Gift Shop. Across the street sat another white frame structure known as the Becky Thatcher House. I knew from my research for the tour that young Sam Clemens’s childhood playmate Laura Hawkins, later immortalized in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer under the name Becky Thatcher, had lived there.
    That was interesting, but it didn’t help me find out where Ben Webster had gone. Maybe he was wandering around Hannibal trying to see some of the sights, at least, before renting a car and heading back to St. Louis. I started into the boyhood home, thinking how ironic it would be if I ran smack-dab into Webster after searching for him all over the boat and hiking over half of downtown Hannibal.
    I didn’t see Ben Webster anywhere in the house, but the Kramers were there. Louise greeted me with a smile. Eddie just grunted and gave me a curt nod.
    â€œThis is all so fascinating,” Louise gushed. “I just love Mark Twain, don’t