<P> Pap forcibly moves Huck to his isolated cabin in the woods along the Illinois shoreline . Because of Pap's drunken violence and imprisonment of Huck inside the cabin, Huck, during one of his father's absences, elaborately fakes his own death, escapes from the cabin, and sets off downriver . He settles comfortably, on Jackson's Island . Here, Huck reunites with Jim, Miss Watson's slave . Jim has also run away after he overheard Miss Watson planning to sell him "down the river" to presumably more brutal owners . Jim plans to make his way to the town of Cairo in Illinois, a free state, so that he can later buy the rest of his enslaved family's freedom . At first, Huck is conflicted about the sin and crime of supporting a runaway slave, but as the two talk in depth and bond over their mutually held superstitions, Huck emotionally connects with Jim, who increasingly becomes Huck's close friend and guardian . After heavy flooding on the river, the two find a raft (which they keep) as well as an entire house floating on the river (Chapter 9: "The House of Death Floats By"). Entering the house to seek loot, Jim finds the naked body of a dead man lying on the floor, shot in the back . He prevents Huck from viewing the corpse . </P> <P> To find out the latest news in town, Huck dresses as a girl and enters the house of Judith Loftus, a woman new to the area . Huck learns from her about the news of his own supposed murder; Pap was initially blamed, but since Jim ran away he is also a suspect and a reward for Jim's capture has initiated a manhunt . Mrs. Loftus becomes increasingly suspicious that Huck is a boy, finally proving it by a series of tests . Once he is exposed, she nevertheless allows him to leave her home without commotion, not realizing that he is the allegedly murdered boy they have just been discussing . Huck returns to Jim to tell him the news and that a search party is coming to Jackson's Island that very night . The two hastily load up the raft and depart . </P> <P> After a while, Huck and Jim come across a grounded steamship . Searching it, they stumble upon two thieves discussing murdering a third, but they flee before being noticed . They are later separated in a fog, making Jim intensely anxious, and when they reunite, Huck tricks Jim into thinking he dreamed the entire incident . Jim is not deceived for long, and is deeply hurt that his friend should have teased him so mercilessly . Huck becomes remorseful and apologizes to Jim, though his conscience troubles him about humbling himself to a black man . </P> <P> Traveling onward, Huck and Jim's raft is struck by a passing steamship, again separating the two . Huck is given shelter on the Kentucky side of the river by the Grangerfords, an "aristocratic" family . He befriends Buck Grangerford, a boy about his age, and learns that the Grangerfords are engaged in a 30 - year blood feud against another family, the Shepherdsons . The Grangerfords and Shepherdsons go to the same church, which ironically preaches brotherly love . The vendetta finally comes to a head when Buck's older sister elopes with a member of the Shepherdson clan . In the resulting conflict, all the Grangerford males from this branch of the family are shot and killed, including Buck, whose horrific murder Huck witnesses . He is immensely relieved to be reunited with Jim, who has since recovered and repaired the raft . </P>

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