ey know that I play games exactly like real boys?' he asked very
proudly. 'O Maimie, please tell them!' But when he revealed how he
played, by sailing his hoop on the Round Pond, and so on, she was
simply horrified.

'All your ways of playing,' she said with her big eyes on him, 'are
quite, quite wrong, and not in the least like how boys play.'

Poor Peter uttered a little moan at this, and he cried for the first
time for I know not how long. Maimie was extremely sorry for him, and
lent him her handkerchief, but he didn't know in the least what to do
with it, so she showed him, that is to say, she wiped her eyes, and
then gave it back to him, saying, 'Now you do it,' but instead of
wiping his own eyes he wiped hers, and she thought it best to pretend
that this was what she had meant.

She said out of pity for him, 'I shall give you a kiss if you like,'
but though he once knew, he had long forgotten what kisses are, and he
replied, 'Thank you,' and held out his hand, thinking she had offered
to put something into it. This was a great shock to her, but she felt
she could not explain without shaming him, so with charming delicacy
she gave Peter a thimble which happened to be in her pocket, and
pretended that it was a kiss. Poor little boy! he quite believed her,
and to this day he wears it on his finger, though there can be scarcely
any one who needs a thimble so little. You see, though still a tiny
child, it was really years and years since he had seen his mother, and
I dare say the baby who had supplanted him was now a man with whiskers.

But you must not think that Peter Pan was a boy to pity rather than to
admire; if Maimie began by thinking this, she soon found she was very
much mistaken. Her eyes glistened with admiration when he told her of
his adventures, especially of how he went to and fro between the island
and the Gardens in the Thrush's Nest:

'How romantic!' Maimie exclaimed, but this was another unknown word,
and he hung his head thinking she was despising him.

'I suppose Tony would not have done that?' he said very humbly.

'Never, never!' she answered with conviction, 'he would have been
afraid.'

'What is afraid?' asked Peter longingly. He thought it must be some
splendid thing. 'I do wish you would teach me how to be afraid,
Maimie,' he said.

'I believe no one could teach that to you,' she answered adoringly, but
Peter thought she meant that he was stupid. She had told him about
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