Feeling that Peter had returned, the Neverland had again wakened into life. In his absence things are usually quiet on the island. The fairies take an hour longer in the morning, the beasts raise their young, the Haida may canoe off to a neighbouring island where the luckier members of their tribe live safely, and for a few days forget their unhappy fates as Peter’s prisoners. Even when pirates and lost boys meet they merely bite their thumbs at each other or pretend not to have noticed their enemies, and go quietly away in the opposite direction. But with the coming of Peter, whose imagination commands all, they are galvanized into action: if you put your ear to the ground now, you would hear the entire island seething with life and conflict, and might feel an unexpected bloodlust surge through you.

It is Peter’s opinion that the Haida and the pirates are nothing more than things he has dreamed up, for when he first arrived on Neverland, they were not on it; they came a little later on. Neverland itself seems nothing more than a waking vision to him, and while the characters might be real within the dream, they do not persist upon waking. Thus he shows no mercy or consideration for them, which is unkind, even for dream-people.

On this evening the chief forces of the island were disposed as follows: the lost boys were out looking for Peter, the pirates were out seeking lost boys, the Haida were also looking for the lost boys, or pirates if this plan did not meet with success, and the beasts were out looking for whatever humans they could find in order to devour. They were going round and round the island, but they did not meet because all were going at the same rate.

All wanted blood except the boys, who liked it as a general rule, but tonight were out primarily to greet their captain. The boys on the island vary in numbers, changing as they are killed or new ones arrive and so on; and when they seem to be growing up, which is against the rules, Peter thins them out himself, which means exactly what it sounds like.

We can’t tell you how many he has thinned, for he has been captain of Neverland a long time, so we will content ourselves by saying “many”. At this time there are seven lost boys, counting the twins as two. Let us pretend to lie here among the bracken and watch them as they steal by in single file, each with his hand on his dagger. They are forbidden by Peter to look in the least like him, and they wear the skins of the bears slain by themselves. When they wish to be particularly sly, they wrap skins around their feet, fur-outward, and leave very little trace of their passage upon the ground.

The first to pass is Tootles, who is brave, but untested. He does not avoid battle, and would in fact love to wet his blade in a fight. However, excitement always seems to occur just when he has stepped off around the corner; by the time that he returns, the others are cleaning their knives (or wounds) and gloating about their successes. This ill luck has made him quite melancholic and he is the humblest of the boys. Poor kind Tootles, there is danger in the air for you to night. Take care lest you accept an ill-starred adventure. Tootles, the fairy Tink, who is bent on mischief this night is looking for a fool, and she thinks you are the stupidest of the boys. ‘Ware Tinker Bell, and ‘ware Wendy if she is crossed.

Would that he could hear us, but we are not really on the island, and he passes by, biting his knuckles absently.

Next comes Nibs, the gay and debonair, ever-cheerful, followed by Slightly, who cuts whistles out of the stands of bamboo and dances ecstatically to his own tunes. Slightly is conceited. He thinks he remembers the days before he was lost to the adult world, with their manners and customs, and this has given him offensive airs. Curly is fourth; trouble likes him, and so often has he had to confess to breaking something or disturbing some delicate plan that now he confesses automatically, whether he has done it or not. Then come the Twins, who cannot be described individually because we should be sure to be describing the wrong one. Peter never quite knew what twins were, and his band were not allowed to know anything he did not know, so these two were always vague about themselves, and did their best to give satisfaction by keeping close together in an apologetic, faceless sort of way.

Bringing up the rear guard is Aff, seventh and last of the lost boys. He is the eldest of them all, and you can be sure Peter watches him, to ensure he does not get too old... He appears a little simple, but savage and unhesitating nonetheless. It is these characteristics that have allowed him to stay so long in Neverland, though he is inclined to be gloomy. Dimly he remembers his father setting out to war in a wooden galley with a dragons’-head on the prow; the ancient Nordic ways have set themselves deep within his bones, and one might say without lying, that he hopes for a glorious battle death, to make his way, long overdue, to Valhalla. Perhaps something in his future will change, to shake this fatalism, but if so, it lies too far ahead to be seen.

The boys vanish in the gloom, and after a pause, but not a long pause, for things go briskly on the island when Peter is here, come the pirates on their track. We hear them before they are seen, and it is always the same dreadful song:

“Avast belay, yo ho, heave to,

A-pirating we go,

And if we’re parted by a shot

We’re sure to meet below!”

In the midst of them, the blackest and largest in that dark setting, reclined Captain Hook, in a rough chariot drawn and propelled by his men, urging them onwards as the driver of a dogsled might drive on his pack, though he used his iron hook instead of a whip to increase their pace.

Sinisterly polite, he had invited Basil Rathbone to stay aboard the JOLLY ROGER, after he had obtained all the information the shipwrecked professor possessed regarding Niamh’s whereabouts.

“Be sure to make yourself comfortable, for I see you are an educated gentleman, and not one to be pressganged into service with the rest of this crew of dogs,” Hook said.

Professor Basil Rathbone saw the threat implicit in Captain Hook’s words, and chose the path of caution.

“Where are you going?”

“To patrol the island,” Hook said, fixing the lace on his collar carefully in the looking glass. It had been knocked askew when they had set off Long Tom.

“Whatever for?”

Hook adjusted his hat to the perfect rakish angle, and accepted a glass of ruddy wine from Smee, who was overseeing the preparations.

“Hunting Haida, and devils in the skins of children.” Downing the glass, he strode out of the cabin. They had locked the door to the captain’s quarters, Basil within, and set off to find battle, for Peter had returned, though they did not yet know it, and the compulsion to roam the island, seeking combat, was upon them.

“Hunting little devils,” murmured Hook to himself, as the rough chariot bounced along the ground. He fondled the hook with his remaining hand, face pale and grim as he recalled, yet again, the loss of his limb.

The fight had been well matched, up until Peter Pan had managed to cut him. Hook had an absolute phobia of seeing his own blood spilt, which persevered no matter how often he had tried to cure himself of it. The moment he had seen his own life’s fluid running down onto the ground, he had frozen in sickened horror.

Only for a single moment, but for a skilled adversary it was long enough, and Peter Pan had severed his right hand, with its long, strong fingers. Rage simmers within him, wanting only an excuse to lash out.

As Skylights pushes past his comrades to join Cecco at the front of the procession, he lurches clumsily against Hook, shoving him accidentally; the hook shoots forth, there is a tearing sound and one screech, then the body is kicked aside, and the pirates pass on in flinching silence. Hook exhales a long gust of smoke; he had not even troubled to take the cigar-holder from his mouth.

On the trail of the pirates, stealing noiselessly down the warpath, which Peter’s ignorance and imagination constrains them to follow, come the Haida, every one of them with eyes peeled for danger. They carry sharpened paddles, war clubs and knives, and bows are slung across their chests. Bringing up the rear, in the place of greatest danger, comes Scar Faced Woman Who Slew the Tiger Hiding in the Lilies, poised for action.

The Haida earn their names through deeds, brave or infamous, and none more than she, for four ragged clawmarks trail down the left side of her face from forehead to chin. The pull of scar tissue gives her a faintly ironic smile, reminiscent of a fur-clad Mona Lisa. Before she bearded the tiger in its lair, she was beautiful, and differently named. The daughter of their tribe’s chief, Scar Faced Woman is their leader here in Neverland. They would have left long since, but something holds them imprisoned here, and so they, too, march around the island, hunting pirates and lost boys. If they capture them alive, they may take them as slaves.

Observe how they pass over fallen twigs without making the slightest noise. The only sound to be heard is their somewhat heavy breathing. The fact is that they are all a little full just now, after being recalled so suddenly from the potlatch at ‘First to Meet the Sunrise’ house, but they will soon recover their digestion. For the moment, however, it constitutes their chief danger.

The Haida disappear as they have come, like shadows, and soon their place is taken by the beasts, a great and motley procession: lions, tigers, bears, and the innumerable smaller savage things that flee from them, clustering around the kills for scraps. Every kind of predatory creature, particularly the man-eaters, live cheek by jowl on the island. Their tongues hang low, for they are hungry tonight.

When they have passed, comes the last figure of all, a gigantic crocodile, her back all armour-plated, stomach a smooth and creamy green, like marble tiles. We shall see for whom she is looking presently.

The crocodile passes, accompanied by a muffled ticking sound, but soon the boys appear again, for the procession must continue indefinitely until one of the parties either stops or changes its pace. Then quickly they will be on top of each other.

All are keeping a sharp lookout in front, but none suspects that the danger may be creeping up from behind. It is something they are not allowed to think of, just like their motivation for circling the island for Peter’s amusement. Were they never to collide in their trekking, the fierce creatures would swiftly starve, for they are man-eaters one and all, feasting upon the bodies of the fallen.

The first posse to fall out of the moving circle was that of the lost boys. They flung themselves down on the grassy sward, close to the entrance of their underground home.

“I do wish Peter would come back,” one said nervously; they muttered their agreement. Though in height and still more in breadth they were all larger than their fearless captain, they were lost without him. In truth, Peter was very small and slight, though in force of personality he was by far the greatest.

“Huh, I am the only one here who isn’t afraid of pirates,” Slightly said, in the tone that made the other boys hate him; some distant sound disturbed him, and he added hastily, “but I wish he would come back, and tell us about his adventures. Also, I wish to hear the end of the Cinderella story.”

They talked of Cinderella, and Tootles was confident that his mother must have been very like her.

It was only in Peter’s absence that they could comfortably speak of mothers, the subject being ridiculed by him as silly. This was considered a little unfair, as he was the only one of the children able to leave the island and observe real mothers at will.

“All I remember about my mother,” Nibs told them, “is that she often argued with and said to my father, ‘Oh, how I wish I had a bank account of my own!’ I don’t know what a bank account is, but I should just love to give my mother one, for she might be happy then.” 

While they talked they heard a distant sound. You or I, not being wild things of the woods, would have heard nothing, but they heard it, and it was the grim song of the pirates, advancing steadily, with Hook riding in their midst. Even so soon after Skylights’ death, they sing again.

“Yo ho, yo ho, the pirate life,

The flag o’ skull and bones,

A merry hour, a hempen rope,

And hey for Davy Jones.”

At once the lost boys—but where are they? They are no longer there. Rabbits could not have disappeared more quickly, or more silently.

With the exception of Nibs, who has darted away to reconnoitre, they are already in their home under the ground, a snug little secret bolthole of which we shall see a good deal in future. But how have they reached it? There is no entrance to be seen, not so much as a large stone, which if rolled away, would disclose the mouth of a cave. Look closely, however, and you may note that there grows a copse of large trees, each with a hole in its hollow trunk which, with a certain degree of twisting, might be made to fit a boy. These are the eight entrances to the home under the ground, for which Hook has been searching in vain these many moons. Will he find it tonight?