James Matthew Barrie - The Complete Works of J. M. Barrie (With Illustrations)

TOOTLES (leaping to his death if necessary). I am just Tootles and nobody minds me, but the first who does not behave to Wendy I will blood him severely. (PETER returns.)

PETER (with awful serenity). Wendy, I told the braves to guide you through the wood as flying tires you so. Then Tinker Bell will take you across the sea. (A shrill tinkle from the boudoir probably means 'and drop her into it.')

NIBS (fingering the curtain which he is not allowed to open). Tink, you are to get up and take Wendy on a journey. (Star-eyed) She says she won't!

PETER (taking a step toward that chamber). If you don'tget up, Tink, and dress at once—— She is getting up!

WENDY (quivering now that the time to depart has come). Dear ones, if you will all come with me I feel almost sure I can get my father and mother to adopt you.

(There is joy at this, not that they want parents, but novelty is their religion.)

NIBS. But won't they think us rather a handful?

WENDY (a swift reckoner). Oh no, it will only mean having a few beds in the drawing-room; they can be hidden behind screens on first Thursdays.

(Everything depends on PETER.)

OMNES. Peter, may we go?

PETER (carelessly through the pipes to which he is giving a finishing touch). All right.

(They scurry off to dress for the adventure.)

WENDY (insinuatingly). Get your clothes, Peter.

PETER (skipping about and playing fairy music on his pipes, the only music he knows). I am not going with you,Wendy.

WENDY. Yes, Peter!

PETER. No.

(The lost ones run back gaily, each carrying a stick witha bundle on the end of it.)

WENDY. Peter isn't coming!

(All the faces go blank.)

JOHN (even JOHN). Peter not coming!

TOOTLES (overthrown). Why, Peter?

PETER (his pipes more riotous than ever). I just want always to be a little boy and to have fun.

(There is a general fear that they are perhaps making the mistake of their lives.)

Now then, no fuss, no blubbering. (With dreadful cynicism) I hope you will like your mothers! Are you ready, Tink? Then lead the way.

(TINK darts up any tree, but she is the only one. Theair above is suddenly rent with shrieks and the clash of steel. Though they cannot see, the boys know that HOOKand his crew are upon the Indians. Mouths open andremain open, all in mute appeal to PETER. He is theonly boy on his feet now, a sword in his hand, the samehe slew Barbicue with; and in his eye is the lust of battle.

We can watch the carnage that is invisible to the children. HOOK has basely broken the two laws of Indian warfare, which are that the redskins should attack first, and that it should be at dawn. They have known the pirate whereabouts since, early in the night, one of SMEE'S fingers crackled. The brushwood has closed behind their scouts as silently as the sand on the mole; for hours they have imitated the lonely call of the coyote; no stratagem has been overlooked, but alas, they have trusted to the pale-face's honour to await an attack at dawn, when his courage is known to be at the lowest ebb. HOOK falls upon them pell-mell, and one cannot withhold a reluctani admiration for the wit that conceived so subtle a scheme and the fell genius with which it is carried out. If the braves would rise quickly they might still have time to scalp, but this they are forbidden to do by the traditions of their race, for it is written that they must never express surprise in the presence of the pale-face. For a brief space they remain recumbent, not a muscle moving, as if the foe were here by invitation. Thus perish the flower of the Piccaninnies, though not unavenged, for with LEAN WOLF fall ALF MASON and CANARY ROBB, while other pirates to bite dust are BLACK GILMOUR and ALAN HERB, that same HERB who is still remembered at Manaos for playing skittles with the mate of the Switch for each other's heads. CHAY TURLEY, who laughed with the wrong side of his mouth (having no other), is tomahawked by PANTHER, who eventually cuts a way through the shambles with TIGER LILY and a remnant of the tribe.

This onslaught passes and is gone like a fierce wind. The victors wipe their cutlasses, and squint, ferret-eyed, at their leader. He remains, as ever, aloof in spirit and in substance. He signs to them to descend the trees, for he is convinced that PAN is down there, and though he has smoked the bees it is the honey he wants. There is something in PETER that at all times goads this extraordinary man to frenzy; it is the boy's cockiness, which disturbs HOOK like an insect. If you have seen a lion in a cage futilely pursuing a sparrow you will know what is meant. The pirates try to do their captain's bidding, but the apertures prove to be not wide enough for them; he cannot even ram them down with a pole. He steals to the mouth of a tree and listens.)

PETER (prematurely). All is over!

WENDY. But who has won?

PETER. Hst! If the Indians have won they will beat the tom-tom; it is always their signal of victory.

(HOOK licks his lips at this and signs to SMEE, who is sitting on it, to hold up the tom-tom. He beats upon it with his claw, and listens for results.)

TOOTLES. The tom-tom!

PETER (sheathing his sword). An Indian victory!

(The cheers from below are music to the black hearts above.)

You are quite safe now, Wendy. Boys, good-bye. (He resumes his pipes.)

WENDY. Peter, you will remember about changing your flannels, won't you?'

PETER. Oh, all right!

WENDY. And this is your medicine.

(She puts something into a shell and leaves it on a ledge between two of the trees. It is only water, but she measures it out in drops.)

PETER. I won't forget.

WENDY. Peter, what are you to me?

PETER (through the pipes). Your son, Wendy.

WENDY. Oh, good-bye!

(The travellers start upon their journey, little witting that HOOK has issued his silent orders: a man to the mouth of each tree, and a row of men between the trees and the little house. As the children squeeze up they are plucked from their trees, trussed, thrown like bales of cotton from one pirate to another, and so piled up in the little house. The only one treated differently is WENDY, whom HOOK escorts to the house on his arm with hateful politeness. He signs to his dogs to be gone, and they depart through the wood, carrying the little house with its strange merchandise and singing their ribald song. The chimney of the little house emits a jet of smoke fitfully, as if not sure what it ought to do just now.

HOOK and PETER are now, as it were, alone on the island. Below, PETER is on the bed, asleep, no weapon near him; above, HOOK, armed to the teeth, is searching noiselessly for some tree down which the nastiness of him can descend. Don't be too much alarmed by this; it is precisely the situation PETER would have chosen; indeed if the whole thing were pretend——. One of his arms droops over the edge of the bed, a leg is arched, and the mouth is not so tightly closed that we cannot see the little pearls. He is dreaming, and in his dreams he is always in pursuit of a boy who was never here, nor anywhere: the only boy who could beat him.

HOOK finds the tree. It is the one set apart for SLIGHTLY who being addicted when hot to the drinking of water has swelled in consequence and surreptitiously scooped his tree for easier descent and egress. Down this the pirate wriggles a passage. In the aperture below his face emerges and goes green as he glares at the sleeping child. Does no feeling of compassion disturb his sombre breast? The man is not wholly evil: he has a Thesaurus in his cabin, and is no mean performer on the flute. What really warps him is a presentiment that he is about to fail. This is not unconnected with a beatific smile on the face of the sleeper, whom he cannot reach owing to being stuck at the foot of the tree. He, however, sees the medicine shell within easy reach, and to WENDY'S draught he adds from a bottle five drops of poison distilled when he was weeping from the red in his eye. The expression on PETER'S face merely implies that something heavenly is going on. HOOK worms his way upwards, and winding his cloak around him, as if to conceal his person from the night of which he is the blackest part, he stalks moodily toward the lagoon.