The novel opens with Aunt Polly scouring the house in search of her nephew, Tom Sawyer. She finds him in the closet, discovers that his hands are covered with jam, and prepares to give him a whipping. Tom cries out theatrically, “Look behind you!” and when Aunt Polly turns, Tom escapes over the fence. After Tom is gone, Aunt Polly reflects ruefully on Tom’s mischief and how she lets him get away with too much.
Tom comes home at suppertime to help Aunt Polly’s young slave, Jim, chop wood. Tom also wants to tell Jim about his adventures. During supper, Aunt Polly asks Tom leading questions in an attempt to confirm her suspicion that he skipped school that afternoon and went swimming instead. Tom explains his wet hair by saying that he pumped water on his head and shows her that his collar is still sewn from the morning, which means he couldn’t have taken his shirt off to swim. Aunt Polly is satisfied, but Sid, Tom’s half-brother, points out that the shirt thread, which was white in the morning, is now black. Tom has resewn the shirt himself to disguise his delinquency.
Tom goes out of the house furious with Sid, but he soon forgets his anger as he practices a new kind of whistling. While wandering the streets of St. Petersburg, his town, he encounters a newcomer, a boy his own age who appears overdressed and arrogant. Tom and the new arrival exchange insults for a while and then begin wrestling. Tom overcomes his antagonist and eventually chases the newcomer all the way home.
When he returns home in the evening, Tom finds Aunt Polly waiting for him. She notices his dirtied clothes and resolves to make him work the next day, a Saturday, as punishment.
On Saturday morning, Aunt Polly sends Tom out to whitewash the fence. Jim passes by, and Tom tries to get him to do some of the whitewashing in return for a “white alley,” a kind of marble. Jim almost agrees, but Aunt Polly appears and chases him off, leaving Tom alone with his labor.
A little while later, Ben Rogers, another boy Tom’s age, walks by. Tom convinces Ben that whitewashing a fence is great pleasure, and after some bargaining, Ben agrees to give Tom his apple in exchange for the privilege of working on the fence. Over the course of the day, every boy who passes ends up staying to whitewash, and each one gives Tom something in exchange. By the time the fence has three coats, Tom has collected a hoard of miscellaneous treasures. Tom muses that all it takes to make someone want something is to make that thing hard to get.
Summary—Chapter 3: Busy at War and Love
Aunt Polly is pleasantly surprised to find the work done, and she allows Tom to go out in the late afternoon. On his way, he pelts Sid with clods of dirt in revenge for his treachery in the matter of the shirt collar. He then hastens to the town square, where a group of boys are fighting a mock battle. Tom and his friend Joe Harper act as generals. Tom’s army wins the battle.
On his way home for dinner, Tom passes the Thatcher house and catches sight of a beautiful girl. He falls head over heels in love with her. Quickly forgetting his last love, a girl named Amy Lawrence, Tom spends the rest of the afternoon “showing off” on the street. The girl tosses him a flower, and, after some more showing off, Tom reluctantly returns home.
At dinner, Sid breaks the sugar bowl, and Tom is blamed. Tom’s mood changes, and he wanders out after dinner feeling mistreated and melodramatic, imagining how sorry Aunt Polly would be if he turned up dead. Eventually, he finds his way back to the beautiful girl’s house and prepares to die pitifully beneath her window. Just then, a maid opens the window and dumps a pitcher of water on his head. Tom scurries home and goes to bed as Sid watches in silence.
Sunday morning arrives, and Tom prepares for Sunday school with the help of his cousin Mary. As Tom struggles halfheartedly to learn his Bible verses, Mary encourages and entices him with the promise of “something ever so nice.” Tom’s work ethic then improves, and he manages to memorize the verses. Mary gives him a “Barlow” knife as reward. Tom then dresses for church, and he, Mary, and Sid hurry off to Sunday school, which Tom loathes.
Before class begins, Tom trades all the spoils he has gained from his whitewashing scam for tickets. The tickets are given as rewards for well-recited Bible verses, and a student who has memorized two thousand verses and received the appropriate tickets can trade them in for a copy of the Bible, awarded with honor in front of the entire class.
Judge Thatcher, the uncle of Tom’s friend Jeff Thatcher, visits Tom’s class that day. The judge’s family includes his daughter, Becky—the beautiful girl Tom notices the previous afternoon. The class treats the judge as a celebrity—the students, teachers, and superintendent make a great attempt at showing off for him. As usual, Tom is the best show-off—by trading for tickets before class, Tom has accumulated enough to earn a Bible. Mr. Walters, Tom’s Sunday school teacher, is flabbergasted when Tom approaches with the tickets. He knows that Tom has not memorized the appropriate number of verses, but since Tom has the required tickets, and since Mr. Walters is eager to impress Judge Thatcher, the Bible-awarding ceremony proceeds.
The Judge pats Tom on the head and compliments him on his diligence. He gives him the chance to show off his purported knowledge, asking him, “No doubt you know the names of all the twelve disciples. Won’t you tell us the names of the first two that were appointed?” Tom does not know their names, of course, and eventually blurts out the first two names that come to his mind: David and Goliath. The narrator pleads, “Let us draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.”
Summary—Chapter 5: The Pinch-bug and His Prey
After Sunday school comes the church service, which includes a long, tedious sermon. At one point, the minister describes how, at the millennium (the 1000-year period during which Christ will reign over the earth, according to Christianity) the lion and the lamb will lie down together and a little child shall lead them. Tom wishes that he could be that child—as long as the lion were tame.
Bored, Tom takes from his pocket a box containing a “pinchbug,” or a large black beetle. The insect pinches him and slips from his grasp to the middle of the aisle at the same time that a stray poodle wanders into the church. The dog investigates the pinchbug, receives one pinch, circles the insect warily, and then eventually sits on it. The bug latches onto the poodle’s behind, and the unfortunate dog runs yelping through the church until its master flings it out a window. The general laughter disrupts the sermon completely, and Tom goes home happy, despite the loss of his bug.
Summary—Chapter 6: Tom Meets Becky
On Monday morning, Tom feigns a “mortified toe” with the hope of staying home from school. When that ploy fails, he complains of a toothache, but Aunt Polly yanks out the loose tooth and sends him off to school.
On his way to school, Tom encounters Huckleberry Finn, the son of the town drunkard. Huck is “cordially hated and dreaded by all the mothers of the town,” who fear that he will be a bad influence on their children. But every boy, including Tom, admires Huck and envies him for his ability to avoid school and work without fear of punishment. Huck and Tom converse, comparing notes on charms to remove warts. Huck carries with him a dead cat, which he plans to take to the graveyard that night. According to superstition, when the devil comes to take the corpse of a wicked person, the dead cat will follow the corpse, and the warts will follow the cat. Tom agrees to go with Huck to the cemetery that night, trades his yanked tooth for a tick from Huck, and continues on to school.
Tom arrives late, and the schoolmaster demands an explanation. Tom notices an open seat on the girls’ side of the room, next to Becky Thatcher. He decides to get in trouble on purpose, knowing that he will be sent to sit with the girls as punishment. He boldly declares, “I stopped to talk with Huckleberry Finn!” The horrified teacher whips Tom and sends him to the seat next to Becky.
Tom offers Becky a peach and tries to interest her by drawing a picture on his slate. Becky initially shies from Tom’s attentions, but she soon warms to him and promises to stay at school with him during lunch. Becky and Tom introduce themselves, and Tom scrawls “I love you” on his slate. At this point, the teacher collars Tom and drags him back to the boys’ side of the room.
Summary—Chapter 7: Tick-Running and a Heartbreak
The teacher now places Tom next to Joe Harper. After trying to study for a while, Tom gives up and he and Joe play with the tick, each attempting to keep the bug on his side of the desk by harassing it with a pin. They begin arguing midway through the game, and the teacher again appears behind Tom, this time to deliver a tremendous whack to both boys.
During lunch, Tom and Becky sit in the empty schoolroom together, and Tom persuades her to “get engaged” to him—an agreement they render solemn by saying “I love you” and kissing. Tom begins talking excitedly about how much he enjoys being engaged and accidentally reveals that he was previously engaged to Amy Lawrence. Becky begins to cry and says that Tom must still love Amy. Tom denies it, swearing that he loves only Becky, but she cries harder and refuses to accept the brass andiron knob he offers her as a token of his affection. When Tom marches out, Becky realizes that he won’t return that day and becomes even more upset.