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"Captain, let go!" he cried, writhing.
Now for the first time we hear the voice of Hook. It was a black voice. "Put back that pistol first," it
said threateningly.
"It was one of those boys you hate. I could have shot him dead."
"Ay, and the sound would have brought Tiger Lily's redskins upon us. Do you want to lose your
scalp?"
"Shall I after him, Captain," asked pathetic Smee, "and tickle him with Johnny Corkscrew?" Smee
had pleasant names for everything, and his cutlass was Johnny Corkscrew, because he wiggled it in
the wound. One could mention many lovable traits in Smee. For instance, after killing, it was his
spectacles he wiped instead of his weapon.
"Johnny's a silent fellow," he reminded Hook.
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"Not now, Smee," Hook said darkly. "He is only one, and I want to mischief all the seven. Scatter
and look for them."
The pirates disappeared among the trees, and in a moment their Captain and Smee were alone. Hook
heaved a heavy sigh, and I know not why it was, perhaps it was because of the soft beauty of the
evening, but there came over him a desire to confide to his faithful bo'sun the story of his life. He
spoke long and earnestly, but what it was all about Smee, who was rather stupid, did not know in the
least.
Anon [later] he caught the word Peter.
"Most of all," Hook was saying passionately, "I want their captain, Peter Pan. 'Twas he cut off my
arm." He brandished the hook threateningly. "I've waited long to shake his hand with this. Oh, I'll
tear him!"
"And yet," said Smee, "I have often heard you say that hook was worth a score of hands, for
combing the hair and other homely uses."
"Ay," the captain answered, "if I was a mother I would pray to have my children born with this
instead of that," and he cast a look of pride upon his iron hand and one of scorn upon the other. Then
again he frowned.
"Peter flung my arm," he said, wincing, "to a crocodile that happened to be passing by."
"I have often," said Smee, "noticed your strange dread of crocodiles."
"Not of crocodiles," Hook corrected him, "but of that one crocodile." He lowered his voice. "It liked
my arm so much, Smee, that it has followed me ever since, from sea to sea and from land to land,
licking its lips for the rest of me."
"In a way," said Smee, "it's sort of a compliment."
"I want no such compliments," Hook barked petulantly. "I want Peter Pan, who first gave the brute
its taste for me."
He sat down on a large mushroom, and now there was a quiver in his voice. "Smee," he said huskily,
"that crocodile would have had me before this, but by a lucky chance it swallowed a clock which
goes tick tick inside it, and so before it can reach me I hear the tick and bolt." He laughed, but in a
hollow way.
"Some day," said Smee, "the clock will run down, and then he'll get you."
Hook wetted his dry lips. "Ay," he said, "that's the fear that haunts me."
Since sitting down he had felt curiously warm. "Smee," he said, "this seat is hot." He jumped up.
"Odds bobs, hammer and tongs I'm burning."
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They examined the mushroom, which was of a size and solidity unknown on the mainland; they tried
to pull it up, and it came away at once in their hands, for it had no root. Stranger still, smoke began at
once to ascend. The pirates looked at each other. "A chimney!" they both exclaimed.
They had indeed discovered the chimney of the home under the ground. It was the custom of the
boys to stop it with a mushroom when enemies were in the neighbourhood.
Not only smoke came out of it. There came also children's voices, for so safe did the boys feel in
their hiding-place that they were gaily chattering. The pirates listened grimly, and then replaced the
mushroom. They looked around them and noted the holes in the seven trees.
"Did you hear them say Peter Pan's from home?" Smee whispered, fidgeting with Johnny Corkscrew.
Hook nodded. He stood for a long time lost in thought, and at last a curdling smile lit up his swarthy
face. Smee had been waiting for it. "Unrip your plan, captain," he cried eagerly.
"To return to the ship," Hook replied slowly through his teeth, "and cook a large rich cake of a jolly
thickness with green sugar on it. There can be but one room below, for there is but one chimney. The
silly moles had not the sense to see that they did not need a door apiece. That shows they have no
mother. We will leave the cake on the shore of the Mermaids' Lagoon. These boys are always
swimming about there, playing with the mermaids. They will find the cake and they will gobble it
up, because, having no mother, they don't know how dangerous 'tis to eat rich damp cake." He burst
into laughter, not hollow laughter now, but honest laughter. "Aha, they will die."
Smee had listened with growing admiration.
"It's the wickedest, prettiest policy ever I heard of!" he cried, and in their exultation they danced and
sang:
"Avast, belay, when I appear,
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