not waken them. Even when she heard the sound of muffled oars, though
her heart was in her mouth, she did not waken them. She stood over them
to let them have their sleep out. Was it not brave of Wendy?
It was well for those boys then that there was one among them who could
sniff danger even in his sleep. Peter sprang erect, as wide awake at
once as a dog, and with one warning cry he roused the others.
He stood motionless, one hand to his ear.
Pirates! he cried. The others came closer to him. A strange smile was
playing about his face, and Wendy saw it and shuddered. While that
smile was on his face no one dared address him; all they could do was
to stand ready to obey. The order came sharp and incisive.
Dive!
There was a gleam of legs, and instantly the lagoon seemed deserted.
Marooners Rock stood alone in the forbidding waters as if it were
itself marooned.
The boat drew nearer. It was the pirate dinghy, with three figures in
her, Smee and Starkey, and the third a captive, no other than Tiger
Lily. Her hands and ankles were tied, and she knew what was to be her
fate. She was to be left on the rock to perish, an end to one of her
race more terrible than death by fire or torture, for is it not written
in the book of the tribe that there is no path through water to the
happy hunting-ground? Yet her face was impassive; she was the daughter
of a chief, she must die as a chief s daughter, it is enough.
They had caught her boarding the pirate ship with a knife in her mouth.
No watch was kept on the ship, it being Hook s boast that the wind of
his name guarded the ship for a mile around. Now her fate would help to
guard it also. One more wail would go the round in that wind by night.
In the gloom that they brought with them the two pirates did not see
the rock till they crashed into it.
Luff, you lubber, cried an Irish voice that was Smee s; here s the
rock. Now, then, what we have to do is to hoist the redskin on to it
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