Kabanata Kabanata 4 · THE FLIGHT

. THE FLIGHT

“Second to the right, and straight on till morning.”

That, Peter had told Wendy, was the way to the Neverland; but even

birds, carrying maps and consulting them at windy corners, could not

have sighted it with these instructions. Peter, you see, just said

anything that came into his head.

At first his companions trusted him implicitly, and so great were the

delights of flying that they wasted time circling round church spires

or any other tall objects on the way that took their fancy.

John and Michael raced, Michael getting a start.

They recalled with contempt that not so long ago they had thought

themselves fine fellows for being able to fly round a room.

Not long ago. But how long ago? They were flying over the sea before

this thought began to disturb Wendy seriously. John thought it was

their second sea and their third night.

Sometimes it was dark and sometimes light, and now they were very cold

and again too warm. Did they really feel hungry at times, or were they

merely pretending, because Peter had such a jolly new way of feeding

them? His way was to pursue birds who had food in their mouths suitable

for humans and snatch it from them; then the birds would follow and

snatch it back; and they would all go chasing each other gaily for

miles, parting at last with mutual expressions of good-will. But Wendy

noticed with gentle concern that Peter did not seem to know that this

was rather an odd way of getting your bread and butter, nor even that

there are other ways.

Certainly they did not pretend to be sleepy, they were sleepy; and that

was a danger, for the moment they popped off, down they fell. The awful

thing was that Peter thought this funny.

“There he goes again!” he would cry gleefully, as Michael suddenly

dropped like a stone.

“Save him, save him!” cried Wendy, looking with horror at the cruel sea

far below. Eventually Peter would dive through the air, and catch

Michael just before he could strike the sea, and it was lovely the way

he did it; but he always waited till the last moment, and you felt it

was his cleverness that interested him and not the saving of human

life. Also he was fond of variety, and the sport that engrossed him one

moment would suddenly cease to engage him, so there was always the

possibility that the next time you fell he would let you go.

He could sleep in the air without falling, by merely lying on his back

and floating, but this was, partly at least, because he was so light

that if you got behind him and blew he went faster.

“Do be more polite to him,” Wendy whispered to John, when they were

playing “Follow my Leader.”

“Then tell him to stop showing off,” said John.

When playing Follow my Leader, Peter would fly close to the water and

touch each shark’s tail in passing, just as in the street you may run

your finger along an iron railing. They could not follow him in this

with much success, so perhaps it was rather like showing off,

especially as he kept looking behind to see how many tails they missed.

“You must be nice to him,” Wendy impressed on her brothers. “What could

we do if he were to leave us!”

“We could go back,” Michael said.

“How could we ever find our way back without him?”

“Well, then, we could go on,” said John.

“That is the awful thing, John. We should have to go on, for we don’t

know how to stop.”

This was true, Peter had forgotten to show them how to stop.

John said that if the worst came to the worst, all they had to do was

to go straight on, for the world was round, and so in time they must

come back to their own window.

“And who is to get food for us, John?”

“I nipped a bit out of that eagle’s mouth pretty neatly, Wendy.”

“After the twentieth try,” Wendy reminded him. “And even though we

became good at picking up food, see how we bump against clouds and

things if he is not near to give us a hand.”

Indeed they were constantly bumping. They could now fly strongly,

though they still kicked far too much; but if they saw a cloud in front

of them, the more they tried to avoid it, the more certainly did they

bump into it. If Nana had been with them, she would have had a bandage

round Michael’s forehead by this time.

Peter was not with them for the moment, and they felt rather lonely up

there by themselves. He could go so much faster than they that he would

suddenly shoot out of sight, to have some adventure in which they had

no share. He would come down laughing over something fearfully funny he

had been saying to a star, but he had already forgotten what it was, or

he would come up with mermaid scales still sticking to him, and yet not

be able to say for certain what had been happening. It was really

rather irritating to children who had never seen a mermaid.

“And if he forgets them so quickly,” Wendy argued, “how can we expect

that he will go on remembering us?”

Indeed, sometimes when he returned he did not remember them, at least

not well. Wendy was sure of it. She saw recognition come into his eyes

as he was about to pass them the time of day and go on; once even she

had to call him by name.

“I’m Wendy,” she said agitatedly.

He was very sorry. “I say, Wendy,” he whispered to her, “always if you

see me forgetting you, just keep on saying ‘I’m Wendy,’ and then I’ll

remember.”

Of course this was rather unsatisfactory. However, to make amends he

showed them how to lie out flat on a strong wind that was going their

way, and this was such a pleasant change that they tried it several

times and found that they could sleep thus with security. Indeed they

would have slept longer, but Peter tired quickly of sleeping, and soon

he would cry in his captain voice, “We get off here.” So with

occasional tiffs, but on the whole rollicking, they drew near the

Neverland; for after many moons they did reach it, and, what is more,

they had been going pretty straight all the time, not perhaps so much

owing to the guidance of Peter or Tink as because the island was

looking for them. It is only thus that any one may sight those magic

shores.

“There it is,” said Peter calmly.

“Where, where?”

“Where all the arrows are pointing.”

Indeed a million golden arrows were pointing it out to the children,

all directed by their friend the sun, who wanted them to be sure of

their way before leaving them for the night.

Wendy and John and Michael stood on tip-toe in the air to get their

first sight of the island. Strange to say, they all recognized it at

once, and until fear fell upon them they hailed it, not as something

long dreamt of and seen at last, but as a familiar friend to whom they

were returning home for the holidays.

“John, there’s the lagoon.”

“Wendy, look at the turtles burying their eggs in the sand.”

“I say, John, I see your flamingo with the broken leg!”

“Look, Michael, there’s your cave!”

“John, what’s that in the brushwood?”

“It’s a wolf with her whelps. Wendy, I do believe that’s your little

whelp!”

“There’s my boat, John, with her sides stove in!”

“No, it isn’t. Why, we burned your boat.”

“That’s her, at any rate. I say, John, I see the smoke of the redskin

camp!”

“Where? Show me, and I’ll tell you by the way smoke curls whether they

are on the war-path.”

“There, just across the Mysterious River.”

“I see now. Yes, they are on the war-path right enough.”

Peter was a little annoyed with them for knowing so much, but if he

wanted to lord it over them his triumph was at hand, for have I not

told you that anon fear fell upon them?

It came as the arrows went, leaving the island in gloom.

In the old days at home the Neverland had always begun to look a little

dark and threatening by bedtime. Then unexplored patches arose in it

and spread, black shadows moved about in them, the roar of the beasts

of prey was quite different now, and above all, you lost the certainty

that you would win. You were quite glad that the night-lights were on.

You even liked Nana to say that this was just the mantelpiece over

here, and that the Neverland was all make-believe.

Of course the Neverland had been make-believe in those days, but it was

real now, and there were no night-lights, and it was getting darker

every moment, and where was Nana?

They had been flying apart, but they huddled close to Peter now. His

careless manner had gone at last, his eyes were sparkling, and a tingle

went through them every time they touched his body. They were now over

the fearsome island, flying so low that sometimes a tree grazed their

feet. Nothing horrid was visible in the air, yet their progress had

become slow and laboured, exactly as if they were pushing their way

through hostile forces. Sometimes they hung in the air until Peter had

beaten on it with his fists.

“They don’t want us to land,” he explained.

“Who are they?” Wendy whispered, shuddering.

But he could not or would not say. Tinker Bell had been asleep on his

shoulder, but now he wakened her and sent her on in front.

Sometimes he poised himself in the air, listening intently, with his

hand to his ear, and again he would stare down with eyes so bright that

they seemed to bore two holes to earth. Having done these things, he

went on again.

His courage was almost appalling. “Would you like an adventure now,” he

said casually to John, “or would you like to have your tea first?”

Wendy said “tea first” quickly, and Michael pressed her hand in

gratitude, but the braver John hesitated.

“What kind of adventure?” he asked cautiously.

“There’s a pirate asleep in the pampas just beneath us,” Peter told

him. “If you like, we’ll go down and kill him.”

“I don’t see him,” John said after a long pause.

“I do.”

“Suppose,” John said, a little huskily, “he were to wake up.”

Peter spoke indignantly. “You don’t think I would kill him while he was

sleeping! I would wake him first, and then kill him. That’s the way I

always do.”

“I say! Do you kill many?”

“Tons.”

John said “How ripping,” but decided to have tea first. He asked if

there were many pirates on the island just now, and Peter said he had

never known so many.

“Who is captain now?”

“Hook,” answered Peter, and his face became very stern as he said that

hated word.

“Jas. Hook?”

“Ay.”

Then indeed Michael began to cry, and even John could speak in gulps

only, for they knew Hook’s reputation.

“He was Blackbeard’s bo’sun,” John whispered huskily. “He is the worst

of them all. He is the only man of whom Barbecue was afraid.”

“That’s him,” said Peter.

“What is he like? Is he big?”

“He is not so big as he was.”

“How do you mean?”

“I cut off a bit of him.”

“You!”

“Yes, me,” said Peter sharply.

“I wasn’t meaning to be disrespectful.”

“Oh, all right.”

“But, I say, what bit?”

“His right hand.”

“Then he can’t fight now?”

“Oh, can’t he just!”

“Left-hander?”

“He has an iron hook instead of a right hand, and he claws with it.”

“Claws!”

“I say, John,” said Peter.

“Yes.”

“Say, ‘Ay, ay, sir.’”

“Ay, ay, sir.”

“There is one thing,” Peter continued, “that every boy who serves under

me has to promise, and so must you.”

John paled.

“It is this, if we meet Hook in open fight, you must leave him to me.”

“I promise,” John said loyally.

For the moment they were feeling less eerie, because Tink was flying

with them, and in her light they could distinguish each other.

Unfortunately she could not fly so slowly as they, and so she had to go

round and round them in a circle in which they moved as in a halo.

Wendy quite liked it, until Peter pointed out the drawbacks.

“She tells me,” he said, “that the pirates sighted us before the

darkness came, and got Long Tom out.”

“The big gun?”

“Yes. And of course they must see her light, and if they guess we are

near it they are sure to let fly.”

“Wendy!”

“John!”

“Michael!”

“Tell her to go away at once, Peter,” the three cried simultaneously,

but he refused.

“She thinks we have lost the way,” he replied stiffly, “and she is

rather frightened. You don’t think I would send her away all by herself

when she is frightened!”

For a moment the circle of light was broken, and something gave Peter a

loving little pinch.

“Then tell her,” Wendy begged, “to put out her light.”

“She can’t put it out. That is about the only thing fairies can’t do.

It just goes out of itself when she falls asleep, same as the stars.”

“Then tell her to sleep at once,” John almost ordered.

“She can’t sleep except when she’s sleepy. It is the only other thing

fairies can’t do.”

“Seems to me,” growled John, “these are the only two things worth

doing.”

Here he got a pinch, but not a loving one.

“If only one of us had a pocket,” Peter said, “we could carry her in

it.” However, they had set off in such a hurry that there was not a

pocket between the four of them.

He had a happy idea. John’s hat!

Tink agreed to travel by hat if it was carried in the hand. John

carried it, though she had hoped to be carried by Peter. Presently

Wendy took the hat, because John said it struck against his knee as he

flew; and this, as we shall see, led to mischief, for Tinker Bell hated

to be under an obligation to Wendy.

In the black topper the light was completely hidden, and they flew on

in silence. It was the stillest silence they had ever known, broken

once by a distant lapping, which Peter explained was the wild beasts

drinking at the ford, and again by a rasping sound that might have been

the branches of trees rubbing together, but he said it was the redskins

sharpening their knives.

Even these noises ceased. To Michael the loneliness was dreadful. “If

only something would make a sound!” he cried.

As if in answer to his request, the air was rent by the most tremendous

crash he had ever heard. The pirates had fired Long Tom at them.

The roar of it echoed through the mountains, and the echoes seemed to

cry savagely, “Where are they, where are they, where are they?”

Thus sharply did the terrified three learn the difference between an

island of make-believe and the same island come true.

When at last the heavens were steady again, John and Michael found

themselves alone in the darkness. John was treading the air

mechanically, and Michael without knowing how to float was floating.

“Are you shot?” John whispered tremulously.

“I haven’t tried yet,” Michael whispered back.

We know now that no one had been hit. Peter, however, had been carried

by the wind of the shot far out to sea, while Wendy was blown upwards

with no companion but Tinker Bell.

It would have been well for Wendy if at that moment she had dropped the

hat.

I don’t know whether the idea came suddenly to Tink, or whether she had

planned it on the way, but she at once popped out of the hat and began

to lure Wendy to her destruction.

Tink was not all bad; or, rather, she was all bad just now, but, on the

other hand, sometimes she was all good. Fairies have to be one thing or

the other, because being so small they unfortunately have room for one

feeling only at a time. They are, however, allowed to change, only it

must be a complete change. At present she was full of jealousy of

Wendy. What she said in her lovely tinkle Wendy could not of course

understand, and I believe some of it was bad words, but it sounded

kind, and she flew back and forward, plainly meaning “Follow me, and

all will be well.”

What else could poor Wendy do? She called to Peter and John and

Michael, and got only mocking echoes in reply. She did not yet know

that Tink hated her with the fierce hatred of a very woman. And so,

bewildered, and now staggering in her flight, she followed Tink to her

doom.