The Greatest Works of J. M. Barrie: 90+ Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). James Matthew Barrie

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СКАЧАТЬ No, let us break it to her gently.

      (She slips between the sheets of her bed; and the others, seeing the idea at once, get into their beds. Then when the music stops they cover their heads. There are now three distinct bumps in the beds. MRS. DARLING sees the bumps as soon as she comes in, but she does not believe she sees them.)

      MRS. DARLING. I see them in their beds so often in my dreams that I seem still to see them when I am awake! I'll not look again. (She sits down and turns away her face from the bump, though of course they are still reflected in her mind.) So often their silver voices call me, my little children whom I'll see no more.

      (Silver voices is a good one, especially about JOHN; but the heads pop up.)

      WENDY (perhaps rather silvery). Mother!

      MRS. DARLING (without moving). That is Wendy.

      JOHN, (quite gruff). Mother!

      MRS. DARLING. Now it is John.

      MICHAEL (no better than a squeak). Mother!

      MRS. DARLING. Now Michael. And when they call I stretch out my arms to them, but they never come, they never come!

      (This time, however, they come, and there is joy once more in the Darling household. The little boy who is crouching at the window sees the joke of the bumps in the beds, but cannot understand what all the rest of the fuss is about.

      The scene changes from the inside of the house to the outside, and we see MR. DARLING romping in at the door, with the lost boys hanging gaily to his coat-tails. Some may conclude that WENDY has told them to wait outside until she explains the situation to her mother, who has then sent MR. DARLING down to tell them that they are adopted. Of course they could have flown in by the window like a covey of birds, but they think it better fun to enter by a door. There is a moment's trouble about SLIGHTLY, who somehow gets shut out. Fortunately LIZA finds him.)

      LIZA. What is the matter, boy?

      SLIGHTLY. They have all got a mother except me.

      LIZA (starting back). Is your name Slightly?

      SLIGHTLY. Yes'm.

      LIZA. Then I am your mother.

      SLIGHTLY. How do you know?

      LIZA (the good-natured creature). I feel it in my bones.

      (They go into the house and there is none hazier now than SLIGHTLY, unless it be NANA as she passes with the importance of a nurse who will never have another day off. WENDY looks out at the nursery window and sees a friend below, who is hovering in the air knocking off tall hats with his feet. The wearers don't see him. They are too old. You can't see PETER if you are old. They think he is a draught at the corner.

      WENDY. Peter!

      PETER (looking up casually). Hullo, Wendy.

      (She flies down to him, to the horror of her mother, who rushes to the window.)

      WENDY (making a last attempt). You don't feel you would like to say anything to my parents, Peter, about a very sweet subject?

      PETER. No, Wendy.

      WENDY. About me, Peter?

      PETER. No. (He gets out his pipes, which she knows is a very bad sign. She appeals with her arms to MRS. DARLING, who is probably thinking that these children will all need to be tied to their beds at night.)

      MRS. DARLING (from the window). Peter, where are you? Let me adopt you too.

      (She is the loveliest age for a woman, but too old to see PETER clearly.)

      PETER. Would you send me to school?

      MRS. DARLING (obligingly). Yes.

      PETER. And then to an office?

      MRS. DARLING. I suppose so.

      PETER. Soon I should be a man?

      MRS. DARLING. Very soon.

      PETER (passionately). I don't want to go to school and learn solemn things. No one is going to catch me, lady, and make me a man. I want always to be a little boy and to have fun.

      (So perhaps he thinks, but it is only his greatest pretend.)

      MRS. DARLING (shivering every time WENDY pursues him in the air). Where are you to live, Peter?

      PETER. In the house we built for Wendy. The fairies are to put it high up among the tree-tops where they sleep at night.

      WENDY (rapturously). To think of it!

      MRS. DARLING. I thought all the fairies were dead.

      WENDY (almost reprovingly). No indeed! Their mothers drop the babies into the Never birds' nests, all mixed up with the eggs, and the mauve fairies are boys and the white ones are girls, and there are some colours who don't know what they are. The row the children and the birds make at bath time is positively deafening.

      PETER. I throw things at them.

      WENDY. You will be rather lonely in the evenings, Peter.

      PETER. I shall have Tink.

      WENDY (flying up to the window). Mother, may I go?

      MRS. DARLING (gripping her for ever). Certainly not. I have got you home again, and I mean to keep you.

      WENDY. But he does so need a mother.

      MRS. DARLING. So do you, my love.

      PETER. Oh, all right.

      MRS. DARLING (magnanimously). But, Peter, I shall let her go to you once a year for a week to do your spring cleaning.

      (WENDY revels in this, but PETER, who has no notion what a spring cleaning is, waves a rather careless thanks.)

      MRS. DARLING. Say good-night, Wendy.

      WENDY. I couldn't go down just for a minute?

      MRS. DARLING. No.

      WENDY. Good-night, Peter!

      PETER. Good-night, Wendy!

      WENDY. Peter, you won't forget me, will you, before spring-cleaning time comes?

      (There is no answer, for he is already soaring high. For a moment after he is gone we still hear the pipes. MRS. DARLING closes and bars the window.)

      We are dreaming now of the Never Land a year later. It is bed-time on the island, and the blind goes up to the whispers of the lovely Never music. The blue haze that makes the wood below magical by day comes up to the tree-tops to sleep, and through it we see numberless nests all lit up, fairies and birds quarrelling for possession, others flying around just for the fun of the thing and perhaps making bets about where the little house will appear to-night. It always comes and snuggles on some СКАЧАТЬ