"And who are the two noble portly figures accompanying her, now
grown to man's estate? Can they be John and Michael? They are!"

"Oh!"

"`See, dear brothers,' says Wendy pointing upwards, `there is
the window still standing open. Ah, now we are rewarded for our
sublime faith in a mother's love.' So up they flew to their
mummy and daddy, and pen cannot describe the happy scene, over
which we draw a veil."

That was the story, and they were as pleased with it as the
fair narrator herself. Everything just as it should be, you see.
Off we skip like the most heartless things in the world, which is
what children are, but so attractive; and we have an entirely
selfish time, and then when we have need of special attention we
nobly return for it, confident that we shall be rewarded instead
of smacked.

So great indeed was their faith in a mother's love that they
felt they could afford to be callous for a bit longer.

But there was one there who knew better, and when Wendy
finished he uttered a hollow groan.

"What is it, Peter?" she cried, running to him, thinking he was
ill. She felt him solicitously, lower down than his chest.
"Where is it, Peter?"

"It isn't that kind of pain," Peter replied darkly.

"Then what kind is it?"