Boys -- Juvenile fiction; England -- Juvenile fiction
Mark stepped under the curtain, looked round, and came in again.
“Sky’s clear,” he said. “Only the moon and a little shooting star, a
very little one, a mere flicker just like striking a lucifer when it
doesn’t light.”
“Streak of light on the wall.”
“Yes.”
“No tornado?”
“No.”
“Thirty bells,” said the captain. “Turn in. Lights out.” He blew out
the candle and they made themselves comfortable.
“What’s that?” said Mark in a minute. A corner of the curtain was
lifted, and let the moonlight in on the floor.
“Only Pan.”
Finding he was alone outside, Pan came in and curled up by the chest.
“Good-night.”
“Good-night.”
“Good-night, Pan,” said Bevis, putting out his hand and touching Pan’s
rough neck. Almost before he could bring his hand back again they were
both firm asleep. Quite tired out by such a long, long day of exertion
and change, they fell asleep in a second, without any twilight of
preliminary drowsiness. Change wearies as much as labour; a journey,
for instance, or looking up at rows of pictures in different colours.
They slept like buccaneers or humming-tops, only unconsciously throwing
the covering rug partly off, for the summer night was warm. The
continuance of easterly breezes had caused the atmosphere to become so
dry that there was no mist, and the morning opened clear, still, and
bright.
After a while Pan stretched himself, got up, and went out. He could not
leap the fence, but looking round it found a place where it joined the
cliff, not quite closed up. They knew this, but had forgotten all about
it. Pan pushed his head under, struggled, and scratched, till his
shoulders followed as he lay on his side, and the rest followed easily.
Roaming round, he saw the pot in which the bacon had been boiled still
on the grey ashes of the fire under the teak. The lid was off, thrown
aside, and he ran to the pot, put his paws on the rim, and lapped up the
greasy liquor with a relish.
Loo, the cottage girl, could she have seen, would have envied him, for
she had but a dry crust for breakfast, and would have eagerly dipped it
in. Pan roamed round again, and came back to the hut and waited. In an
hour’s time he went out once more, lapped again, and again returned to
watch the sleepers.
By-and-by he went out the third time and stayed longer. Then he
returned, thrust his head under the curtain and uttered a short bark of
impatient questioning, “Yap!”
“The genie,” said Mark, awaking. He had been dreaming.
“What’s the time?” said Bevis, sitting up in an instant, as if he had
never been asleep. Pan leaped on the bed and barked, delighted to see
them moving.
“Three o’clock,” said Mark. “No; why it’s stopped!”
“It’s late, I know,” said Bevis, who had gone to the doorway and lifted
the curtain. “The sun’s high; it’s eight or nine, or more.”
“I never wound it up,” said Mark, “and--well I never! I’ve left the key
at home.”
“It was my key,” said Bevis. One did for both in fact.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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