“This way to the hideout!” Peter called to her, turning back to flash his white pearly teeth at her in a wide, childish grin. His happiness was catching, as if everything he touched couldn’t help but laugh and dance with Peter’s joy. Eleanor felt a slight pang of jealousy that she had never been so free as a child. Always, her governess had insisted on proper behaviour. She couldn’t run and play as she sometimes saw other children – poorer children – doing in the park and in the streets. Her governess, a stern, dark-haired woman who always wore black frocks with collars which came to her heavy chin, would always look disdainfully at the boys and girls who had dirt on their hands and faces, and had taken pride that Eleanor’s hair was always in place, her hands always clean, and her manners always impeccable.
How she had envied them.
She decided this dream must be her chance…if she couldn’t be free to play and get dirty in reality, then perhaps, in this beautiful dream, she could do all the things she wished she could have done…but only for a short while, only before she was to be married…
“Peter, help!” she cried out suddenly when she realised that she was falling, and that no matter how she tried, she couldn’t seem to regain that feeling that made her lighter than air.
Like a flash, Peter flew beneath her, grabbed her about her middle with his skinny arms, and tried to lift her, but Eleanor was too heavy for even Peter’s exclusively happy thoughts, though he was able to slow her fall. They landed in the foliage beneath a great tree with a light ‘thump’ in a tangle of limbs.
“I’ll be right back with help,” Peter assured her. His confidence, too, seemed unshakable.
Eleanor could only nod as he leapt into the air and flew high into the trees again. She took a moment to look around her. The ground was soft, moist, and springy beneath her stocking-clad feet, and the air was fresh and sweet with the scent of honeysuckle on the light breeze which caused the undergrowth, consisting of elephant ears and leafy vines seemingly pouring from the trunks of the trees, to sway gently. High overhead the trees towered, and she could see specks of blue sky where the leaves were thin enough. Then, in the distance, she saw the figure of Peter again, only this time, four more boys were flying, flanking him as if they were geese flocking together.
They dove and rose together, weaving between limbs of trees so closely Eleanor feared they would crash and fall to their deaths. They didn’t though, and soon they landed safely in front of her and Eleanor smiled as she looked down at them. Her governess wouldn’t have approved at all of these Lost Boys.
Peter stepped forward and bowed deeply at the waist. “A rescue party, at your service!” he exclaimed brightly. “This,” he said, sweeping his hand to indicate the left-most of the boys, “is Digger.” Digger smiled at her, tipping his hat, which was fashioned from thin bark made in the shape of a top-hat. His fingers were so grubby she could barely see the skin, and he had a smear of muddy dirt under his nose, which looked rather runny.
“And this is Gaps.” Eleanor puzzled at the name, until the boy smiled…revealing wide gaps where his front teeth should have been. “Hook knocked his teeth out last time we decided to raid the pirates…but that’s okay, Gaps thought it was better because he didn’t like the name he had before.” But what name that was, Eleanor didn’t find out, as Peter went on with the introductions.
There was Toots next…whose naming became immediately apparent…Eleanor couldn’t help but giggle at the flatulent little black-haired boy; her governess wouldn’t have approved of that either! And last, was Flipper. He was the cleanest of the boys; no dirt marred his deeply tan coloured skin. He was the most solemn looking of the children, too. Peter told her that he found the best clams and muscles for them to eat in the lagoon, and understood the Mermaid’s language nearly as well as himself. Eleanor assumed that he must spend enough time swimming that he kept clean that way.
They were all dressed in an odd combination of leaves, feathers, and scraps of clothing that were so far gone with wear and tear, Eleanor couldn’t tell what their original form was.
“Now, to the hideaway!” Peter commanded, and the four boys immediately took to action, each grabbing a limb of Eleanor’s, and Peter grabbing her around her waist. Together, they lifted her into the air, and flew into the canopy of trees. Eleanor shrieked in a combination of fear and delight as she was carried away.
“To the Black Lagoon, Mr Smee,” Hook commanded; his heavily booted feet thumped in the belly of the boat as he stepped into the bow.
“Aye, Captain,” Mr Smee acknowledged as he rowed the longboat around the shore along with three other pirates. Hook watched with his keen blue eyes the place in which Peter and the woman had vanished. He knew they had found another hideout…the one he had discovered long ago had been abandoned, and he had searched far and wide to find the new location, but Neverland, while small, seemed to have endless places to hide. His eyes seemed to take on a red glint, which went unnoticed by his crew, who were too busy rowing and wouldn’t dare look their captain in the eye at the moment.
In years past, Hook would have wished to cut the boy limb from limb and feed him to the crocodile that haunted his worst nightmares. Somehow, he seemed to be able to call up images in his dreams of what that crocodile was like from the inside…burning stomach acid, darkness, and enormous pressure…and it was terrifying.
He saw the flash of sunlight on a fin, and wished he could catch one of those Mermaids. Mysterious creatures, mermaids were; they would know the secret to leave Neverland, but he never could catch them. He still felt flashes of murderous rage and anger regarding his situation, but mostly he felt tired, as if any of the pleasure he had taken from causing pain and terror previously had ceased to matter. Even his leisure pursuits, the harpsichord, his whiskey and Muscat, seemed only to lessen the dullness which life possessed. Some days, it seemed even getting out of bed to hunt down the miscreant Pan and his Lost Boys was too much to even contemplate.
But today, today he had a new hope. With a smirk, he withdrew his pistol from its holster, and poured a measure of powder into the barrel, following that by an iron ball and a small wad of cloth which he tamped down firmly with the rod. He caressed the tooled steel of the barrel of his pistol a moment. Perhaps, today, if he didn’t find a lost boy to shoot, he would practice elsewhere. Shooting his crew was fun, but one couldn’t do that too often, as the crew were needed to run the ship.
Twenty minutes after setting off from the ship, Hook and his pirates were crashing through the jungle. Bill Dukes was hacking away at the undergrowth with an odd swing; his backward hands made most activities awkward for him.
They tramped and hacked, searched and cursed, but couldn’t find the lost boys. They even searched the former hideout, but it was long abandoned; mushrooms and moss grew plentiful around the entrance, and inside, underground, the roots of the tree under which the hideout was situated had completely obscured the former hollow.
Growing angrier by the hour, and frustrated by dusk setting in, he tramped through the forest.
“Pan!” he bellowed to the trees. “Pan! Come and meet me, you cowardly boy! Bring your new friend! Pan!” He stood for several moments, sharp blue eyes watching the trees for any flit of movement, but the only movement was that of the trees and undergrowth swaying gently in the breeze.
Scowling, he turned to his pirates and directed them to go back to the ship. However, Hook himself remained behind. He removed his flashy clothing, hat, and shoes; only his earth-toned trousers and a dark shirt he’d brought remained on. He decided that on the morrow, he would find Pan. In the meantime, he would sit in wait, watching for the boys to make a mistake, thinking that he would be on his ship.
In the low crook of a tree, he made a nest for himself of his clothes. He began to strip off his shirt to take off the harness and hook which grew increasingly uncomfortable through each day, but hesitated, and instead, decided to keep it on, just in case. It wouldn’t do for the boy to come upon him unprepared.
And so, ignoring the pinching upon his stump of a forearm, and the chafing of the straps around his torso, he made himself as comfortable as possible and drifted off to sleep…he thought, just for a moment, that he heard the sound of a clear voice singing a familiar lullaby…and just for a moment, he was reminded of his own childhood; his mother had sung that tune to him as a small boy…
High in the treetops, Eleanor crouched, peering through the boughs which obscured the tree house from view. There was only one way up or down, and that was to fly. The boys had snickered throughout the day as they had spied on the pirates below, who seemed to take it as their mission to destroy everything in their path. Eleanor had watched in horror as the boys dared each other to take increasingly higher risks, seeing how close they could get to the pirates without being discovered. Fortunately, they were never discovered.
She watched Peter closely as, finally, Hook had yelled for him. She saw the eager twitch of Pan’s lithe little muscles, but he’d held back even though he could barely resist the dare.
They dined later that evening on raw oysters brought up by Flipper, and on roasted tubers and mushrooms dug up by Digger. Peter Pan sat back after his meal, and requested a song from Eleanor.
She sang a soft melody to the boys, watching as they grew quiet and introspective. She saw, one by one, that they seemed to be taken elsewhere for a moment…and she saw Gaps, at one point, mouth the words, ‘Mother, Mother, I miss you…’
Eleanor wondered how these boys had come to be lost…had they really fallen out of their perambulators? Were their mothers, perhaps, missing them? Or were they orphans, instead?
She, too, was tired from her long day, and then she realised if she felt so tired, this couldn’t be a dream. She really was in Neverland.
Sorry for the long update time; I’ve been distracted by real life stuff. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed! I really appreciate it! :-)