Yo ho, yo ho, the frisky cat, You walks along it so, Till it goes down and you goes down To tooral looral lo!
(The brave children try to stem this monstrous torrent by breaking into the National Anthem.)
STARKEY (paling). I don't like it, messmates!
HOOK. Stow that, Starkey. Do you boys want a touch of the cat before you walk the plank? (He is more pitiless than ever now that he believes he has a charmed life.) Fetch the cat, Jukes; it is in the cabin.
JUKES. Ay, ay, sir. (It is one of his commonest remarks, and is only recorded now because he never makes another. The stage direction 'Exit JUKES' has in this case a special significance. But only the children know that some one is awaiting this unfortunate in the cabin, and HOOK tramples them down as he resumes his ditty:)
Yo ho, yo ho, the scratching cat Its tails are nine you know, And when they're writ upon your back, You 're fit to——
(The last words will ever remain a matter of conjecture, for from the dark cabin comes a curdling screech which wails through the ship and dies away. It is followed by a sound, almost more eerie in the circumstances, that can only be likened to the crowing of a cock.)
HOOK. What was that?
SLIGHTLY (solemnly). Two!
(CECCO swings into the cabin, and in a moment returns, livid.)
HOOK (with an effort). What is the matter with Bill Jukes, you dog?
CECCO. The matter with him is he is dead——stabbed.
PIRATES. Bill Jukes dead!
CECCO. The cabin is as black as a pit, but there is something terrible in there: the thing you heard a-crowing.
HOOK (slowly). Cecco, go back and fetch me out that doodle-doo.
CECCO (unstrung). No, Captain, no. (He supplicates on his knees, but his master advances on him implacably.)
HOOK (in his most syrupy voice). Did you say you would go, Cecco?
(CECCO goes. All listen. There is one screech, one crow.)
SLIGHTLY (as if he were a bell tolling). Three!
HOOK. 'Sdeath and oddsfish, who is to bring me out that doodle-doo?
(No one steps forward.)
STARKEY (injudiciously). Wait till Cecco comes out.
(The black looks of some others encourage him.)
HOOK. I think I heard you volunteer, Starkey.
STARKEY (emphatically). No, by thunder!
HOOK (in that syrupy voice which might be more engaging when accompanied by his flute). My hook thinks you did. Iwonder if it would not be advisable, Starkey, to humour the hook?
STARKEY. I'll swing before I go in there.
HOOK (gleaming). Is it mutiny? Starkey is ringleader.Shake hands, Starkey.
(STARKEY recoils from the claw. It follows him till he leaps overboard.)
Did any other gentleman say mutiny?
(They indicate that they did not even know the late STARKEY.)
SLIGHTLY. Four!
HOOK. I will bring out that doodle-doo myself.
(He raises a blunderbuss but casts it from him with a menacing gesture which means that he has more faith in the claw. With a lighted lantern in his hand he enters the cabin. Not a sound is to be heard now on the ship, unless it be SLIGHTLY wetting his lips to say 'Five.' HOOK staggers out.)
HOOK (unsteadily). Something blew out the light.
MULLINS (with dark meaning). Some—thing?
NOODLER. What of Cecco?
HOOK. He is as dead as Jukes.
(They are superstitious like all sailors, and MULLINS has planted a dire conception in their minds.)
COOKSON. They do say as the surest sign a ship's accurst is when there is one aboard more than can be accounted for.
NOODLER. I 've heard he allus boards the pirate craft at last. (With dreadful significance) Has he a tail, Captain?
MULLINS. They say that when he comes it is in the likenessof the wickedest man aboard.
COOKSON (clinching it). Has he a hook, Captain?
(Knives and pistols come to hand, and there is a general cry 'The ship is doomed!' But it is not his dogs that can frighten JAS HOOK. Hearing something like a cheer from the boys he wheels round, and his face brings them to their knees.)
HOOK. So you like it, do you! By Caius and Balbus, bullies, here is a notion: open the cabin door and drive them in. Let them fight the doodle-doo for their lives. If they kill him we are so much the better; if he kills them we are none the worse.
(This masterly stroke restores their confidence; and the boys, affecting fear, are driven into the cabin. Desperadoes though the pirates are, some of them have been boys themselves, and all turn their backs to the cabin and listen, with arms outstretched to it as if to ward off the horrors that are being enacted there.
Relieved by Peter of their manacles, and armed with such weapons as they can lay their hands on, the boys steal out softly as snowflakes, and under their captain's hushed order find hiding-places on the poop. He releasesWENDY; and now it would be easy for them all to fly away, but it is to be HOOK or him this time. He signs to her to join the others, and with awful grimness folding her cloak around him, the hood over his head, he takes her place by the mast, and crows.)
MULLINS. The doodle-doo has killed them all!
SEVERAL. The ship 's bewitched.
(They are snapping at HOOK again.)
HOOK. I 've thought it out, lads; there is a Jonah aboard.
SEVERAL (advancing upon him). Ay, a man with a hook.
(If he were to withdraw one step their knives would be in him, but he does not flinch.)
HOOK (temporising). No, lads, no, it is the girl. Never was luck on a pirate ship wi' a woman aboard. We'll right the ship when she has gone.'
MULLINS (lowering his cutlass). It's worth trying.
HOOK. Throw the girl overboard.
MULLINS (jeering). There is none can save you now, missy.
PETER. There is one.
MULLINS. Who is that?
PETER (casting off the cloak). Peter Pan, the avenger!
(He continues standing there to let the effect sink in.)
HOOK (throwing out a suggestion). Cleave him to the brisket.
(But he has a sinking that this boy has no brisket?)
NOODLER. The ship 's accurst!
PETER. Down, boys, and at them!
(The boys leap from their concealment and the clash of arms resounds through the vessel. Man to man the pirates are the stronger, but they are unnerved by the suddenness of the onslaught and they scatter, thus enabling their opponents to hunt in couples and choose their quarry. Some are hurled into the lagoon; others are dragged from dark recesses. There is no boy whose weapon is not reeking save SLIGHTLY, who runs about with a lantern, counting, ever counting.)
WENDY (meeting MICHAEL in a moment's lull). Oh,Michael, stay with me, protect me!
MICHAEL (reeling). Wendy, I've killed a pirate!
WENDY. It's awful, awful.
MICHAEL. No, it isn't, I like it, I like it.
(He