To Kill a Mockingbird
Harper Lee

PART ONE

CHAPTER 6

On the last night of Dill's summer visit, he and Jem come up with their most daring game yet. They are going to sneak up onto the Radley porch after dark and peek through a window. Against her better judgment, Scout decides to go along.

Jem goes first, and he has just crawled across the porch to one of the windows when, suddenly, Scout sees the shadow of a man fall across the porch. The three children run for their lives, and as they flee a blast from a shotgun pierces the air. In their hurry to get away, Jem's trousers get caught on a wire fence. He jumps out of them and runs for his life.

The whole neighborhood knows within minutes that Nathan Radley, Boo's older brother, has taken a shot at an intruder on his back porch. Nevertheless, Jem and Dill think that they have fooled Atticus with their explanation that Jem lost his pants to Dill in a game of strip poker! To get away with this explanation, however, Jem will have to get his trousers back. In the middle of the night, trembling with fear, Jem slips out of the house and retrieves the trousers from the Radley's fence.

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