Peter Pan
the office again, you and I starve, and our children will be flung into
the streets.”
Even then Mrs. Darling was placid. “Let me try, dear,” she said, and
indeed that was what he had come to ask her to do, and with her nice
cool hands she tied his tie for him, while the children stood around to
see their fate decided. Some men would have resented her being able to
do it so easily, but Mr. Darling had far too fine a nature for that; he
thanked her carelessly, at once forgot his rage, and in another moment
was dancing round the room with Michael on his back.
“How wildly we romped!” says Mrs. Darling now, recalling it.
“Our last romp!” Mr. Darling groaned.
“O George, do you remember Michael suddenly said to me, ‘How did you
get to know me, mother?’”
“I remember!”
“They were rather sweet, don’t you think, George?”
“And they were ours, ours! and now they are gone.”
The romp had ended with the appearance of Nana, and most unluckily Mr.
Darling collided against her, covering his trousers with hairs. They
were not only new trousers, but they were the first he had ever had
with braid on them, and he had had to bite his lip to prevent the tears
coming. Of course Mrs. Darling brushed him, but he began to talk again
about its being a mistake to have a dog for a nurse.
“George, Nana is a treasure.”
“No doubt, but I have an uneasy feeling at times that she looks upon
the children as puppies.”
“Oh no, dear one, I feel sure she knows they have souls.”
“I wonder,” Mr. Darling said thoughtfully, “I wonder.” It was an
opportunity, his wife felt, for telling him about the boy. At first he
pooh-poohed the story, but he became thoughtful when she showed him the
shadow.
“It is nobody I know,” he said, examining it carefully, “but it does
look a scoundrel.”
“We were still discussing it, you remember,” says Mr. Darling, “when
Nana came in with Michael’s medicine. You will never carry the bottle
in your mouth again, Nana, and it is all my fault.”
Strong man though he was, there is no doubt that he had behaved rather
foolishly over the medicine. If he had a weakness, it was for thinking
that all his life he had taken medicine boldly, and so now, when
Michael dodged the spoon in Nana’s mouth, he had said reprovingly, “Be
a man, Michael.”
“Won’t; won’t!” Michael cried naughtily. Mrs. Darling left the room to
get a chocolate for him, and Mr. Darling thought this showed want of
firmness.
“Mother, don’t pamper him,” he called after her. “Michael, when I was
your age I took medicine without a murmur. I said, ‘Thank you, kind
parents, for giving me bottles to make me well.’”
He really thought this was true, and Wendy, who was now in her
night-gown, believed it also, and she said, to encourage Michael, “That
medicine you sometimes take, father, is much nastier, isn’t it?”
“Ever so much nastier,” Mr. Darling said bravely, “and I would take it
now as an example to you, Michael, if I hadn’t lost the bottle.”
He had not exactly lost it; he had climbed in the dead of night to the
top of the wardrobe and hidden it there. What he did not know was that
the faithful Liza had found it, and put it back on his wash-stand.
“I know where it is, father,” Wendy cried, always glad to be of
service. “I’ll bring it,” and she was off before he could stop her.
Immediately his spirits sank in the strangest way.
“John,” he said, shuddering, “it’s most beastly stuff. It’s that nasty,
sticky, sweet kind.”
“It will soon be over, father,” John said cheerily, and then in rushed
Wendy with the medicine in a glass.
“I have been as quick as I could,” she panted.
“You have been wonderfully quick,” her father retorted, with a
vindictive politeness that was quite thrown away upon her. “Michael
first,” he said doggedly.
“Father first,” said Michael, who was of a suspicious nature.
“I shall be sick, you know,” Mr. Darling said threateningly.
“Come on, father,” said John.
“Hold your tongue, John,” his father rapped out.
Wendy was quite puzzled. “I thought you took it quite easily, father.”
“That is not the point,” he retorted. “The point is, that there is more
in my glass than in Michael’s spoon.” His proud heart was nearly
bursting. “And it isn’t fair: I would say it though it were with my
last breath; it isn’t fair.”
“Father, I am waiting,” said Michael coldly.
“It’s all very well to say you are waiting; so am I waiting.”
“Father’s a cowardly custard.”
“So are you a cowardly custard.”
“I’m not frightened.”
“Neither am I frightened.”
“Well, then, take it.”
“Well, then, you take it.”
Wendy had a splendid idea. “Why not both take it at the same time?”
“Certainly,” said Mr. Darling. “Are you ready, Michael?”
Wendy gave the words, one, two, three, and Michael took his medicine,
but Mr. Darling slipped his behind his back.
There was a yell of rage from Michael, and “O father!” Wendy exclaimed.
“What do you mean by ‘O father’?” Mr. Darling demanded. “Stop that row,
Michael. I meant to take mine, but I—I missed it.”
It was dreadful the way all the three were looking at him, just as if
they did not admire him. “Look here, all of you,” he said entreatingly,
as soon as Nana had gone into the bathroom. “I have just thought of a
splendid joke. I shall pour my medicine into Nana’s bowl, and she will
drink it, thinking it is milk!”
It was the colour of milk; but the children did not have their father’s
sense of humour, and they looked at him reproachfully as he poured the
medicine into Nana’s bowl. “What fun!” he said doubtfully, and they did
not dare expose him when Mrs. Darling and Nana returned.
“Nana, good dog,” he said, patting her, “I have put a little milk into
your bowl, Nana.”
Nana wagged her tail, ran to the medicine, and began lapping it. Then
she gave Mr. Darling such a look, not an angry look: she showed him the
great red tear that makes us so sorry for noble dogs, and crept into
her kennel.
Mr. Darling was frightfully ashamed of himself, but he would not give
in. In a horrid silence Mrs. Darling smelt the bowl. “O George,” she
said, “it’s your medicine!”
“It was only a joke,” he roared, while she comforted her boys, and
Wendy hugged Nana. “Much good,” he said bitterly, “my wearing myself to
the bone trying to be funny in this house.”
And still Wendy hugged Nana. “That’s right,” he shouted. “Coddle her!
Nobody coddles me. Oh dear no! I am only the breadwinner, why should I
be coddled—why, why, why!”
“George,” Mrs. Darling entreated him, “not so loud; the servants will
hear you.” Somehow they had got into the way of calling Liza the
servants.
“Let them!” he answered recklessly. “Bring in the whole world. But I
refuse to allow that dog to lord it in my nursery for an hour longer.”
The children wept, and Nana ran to him beseechingly, but he waved her
back. He felt he was a strong man again. “In vain, in vain,” he cried;
“the proper place for you is the yard, and there you go to be tied up
this instant.”
“George, George,” Mrs. Darling whispered, “remember what I told you
about that boy.”
Alas, he would not listen. He was determined to show who was master in
that house, and when commands would not draw Nana from the kennel, he
lured her out of it with honeyed words, and seizing her roughly,
dragged her from the nursery. He was ashamed of himself, and yet he did
it. It was all owing to his too affectionate nature, which craved for
admiration. When he had tied her up in the back-yard, the wretched
father went and sat in the passage, with his knuckles to his eyes.
In the meantime Mrs. Darling had put the children to bed in unwonted
silence and lit their night-lights. They could hear Nana barking, and
John whimpered, “It is because he is chaining her up in the yard,” but
Wendy was wiser.
“That is not Nana’s unhappy bark,” she said, little guessing what was
about to happen; “that is her bark when she smells danger.”
Danger!
“Are you sure, Wendy?”
“Oh, yes.”
Mrs. Darling quivered and went to the window. It was securely fastened.
She looked out, and the night was peppered with stars. They were
crowding round the house, as if curious to see what was to take place
there, but she did not notice this, nor that one or two of the smaller
ones winked at her. Yet a nameless fear clutched at her heart and made
her cry, “Oh, how I wish that I wasn’t going to a party to-night!”
Even Michael, already half asleep, knew that she was perturbed, and he
asked, “Can anything harm us, mother, after the night-lights are lit?”
“Nothing, precious,” she said; “they are the eyes a mother leaves
behind her to guard her children.”
She went from bed to bed singing enchantments over them, and little
Michael flung his arms round her. “Mother,” he cried, “I’m glad of
you.” They were the last words she was to hear from him for a long
time.
No. 27 was only a few yards distant, but there had been a slight fall
of snow, and Father and Mother Darling picked their way over it deftly
not to soil their shoes. They were already the only persons in the
street, and all the stars were watching them. Stars are beautiful, but
they may not take an active part in anything, they must just look on
for ever. It is a punishment put on them for something they did so long
ago that no star now knows what it was. So the older ones have become
glassy-eyed and seldom speak (winking is the star language), but the
little ones still wonder. They are not really friendly to Peter, who
had a mischievous way of stealing up behind them and trying to blow
them out; but they are so fond of fun that they were on his side
to-night, and anxious to get the grown-ups out of the way. So as soon
as the door of 27 closed on Mr. and Mrs. Darling there was a commotion
in the firmament, and the smallest of all the stars in the Milky Way
screamed out:
“Now, Peter!”
Chapter III.
COME AWAY, COME AWAY!
For a moment after Mr. and Mrs. Darling left the house the night-lights
by the beds of the three children continued to burn clearly. They were
awfully nice little night-lights, and one cannot help wishing that they
could have kept awake to see Peter; but Wendy’s light blinked and gave
such a yawn that the other two yawned also, and before they could close
their mouths all the three went out.
There was another light in the room now, a thousand times brighter than
the night-lights, and in the time we have taken to say this, it had
been in all the drawers in the nursery, looking for Peter’s shadow,
rummaged the wardrobe and turned every pocket inside out. It was not
really a light; it made this light by flashing about so quickly, but
when it came to rest for a second you saw it was a fairy, no longer
than your hand, but still growing. It was a girl called Tinker Bell
exquisitely gowned in a skeleton leaf, cut low and square, through
which her figure could be seen to the best advantage. She was slightly
inclined to _embonpoint_.
A moment after the fairy’s entrance the window was blown open by the
breathing of the little stars, and Peter dropped in. He had carried
Tinker Bell part of the way, and his hand was still messy with the
fairy dust.
“Tinker Bell,” he called softly, after making sure that the children
were asleep, “Tink, where are you?” She was in a jug for the moment,
and liking it extremely; she had never been in a jug before.
“Oh, do come out of that jug, and tell me, do you know where they put
my shadow?”
The loveliest tinkle as of golden bells answered him. It is the fairy
language. You ordinary children can never hear it, but if you were to
hear it you would know that you had heard it once before.
Tink said that the shadow was in the big box. She meant the chest of
drawers, and Peter jumped at the drawers, scattering their contents to