Narrative Approach

      Huck Finn would probably be a good card player, one who learns and remembers what cards his opponents hold and takes care to play his own only when the time is right.  He might also not be above tucking a wild card up his sleeve.  That, at least, is what he does in his game with the ferryboat captain.  He begins by learning as much as he can about the man himself, his interests, and his circumstances.  Pretending to be hysterical is a good way of both gaining sympathy and getting his victim to talk.  From him he learns about Hornback and the captain's relationship with him.  Therefore, when play commences and he must tell his tale, he slips Miss Hooker, his wild card, into his hand for later use.  (Her name, incidentally, may have been suggested by his earlier lie, to Judith Loftus, in which he claimed to have walked from Hookerville.)  The jeopardy in which his own family stand is what he plays first, knowing that if it does not motivate the captain to help him for pity he can move on to Plan B.
      Forced to play a bit more, he invents a means for Miss Hooker to have reached the wreck, characterizing her as a spunky and athletic lady in the process (it never hurts to make one's female characters admirable).  Then, with a genius for misdirection, he invents a red herring: Bill Whipple, whose death he laments in the most lugubrious tones.  Whipple, being dead, is completely irrelevant to everything in the story and serves only one clear function: to draw attention away from Miss Hooker.  Her existence has been established, but Huck wishes above all not to give the appearance of being overly concerned with her.   One must always make one's mousetrap appear as inconspicuous and harmless as possible.
      Then it's the captain's turn to play, and he declines to set out without being assured of recompense, and that, of course, causes Huck to reveal Miss Hooker's significance, that she is Hornback's niece, and from there on the captain has been suckered.

Expository Approach

      The key to Huck's lie is, of course, Miss Hooker, but the process by which the lie develops is just as important, for it is only by saying nothing substantive for a considerable time that Huck learns what he needs to manipulate the ferryboat captain.  To buy time, gain sympathy, and encourage babble, he begins in tears and hysteria. This elicits a torrent of information from the captain, among which is a jewel, Hornback.  With this to work with and a name dredged up probably from his earlier lie, that he came from Hookerville to Mrs. Loftus's cottage, he invents his cast of characters.  His own family, of course, must appear to be his principal concern, but he also mentions Miss Hooker, whose identity he keeps secret for later use.  Although she must appear only of marginal interest to him, he wants her to make an impression on the captain, who must remember her when the trap is sprung.  Therefore he enlists the captain's assistance in providing the name of the town she was visiting, and he also makes her appear heroic by telling of how she gamely saved her life by an athletic feat.  However, he knows he must not give the appearance of baiting the trap, so he creates a diversion, the death of Bill Whipple, for which he grieves most piteously, soliciting the captain's pity.  Having reached the crisis in his lie, the moment when he must beg the captain to take action, he has two hooks baited: the pity appeal and the reward appeal, which is as yet invisible.  When the captain declines to rescue the party for Christian charity, Huck without compunction springs his lie about Miss Hooker's local connections, and the captain takes the bait and runs with it.