mt that the Neverland had come
too near and that a strange boy had broken through from it. He did not
alarm her, for she thought she had seen him before in the faces of many
women who have no children. Perhaps he is to be found in the faces of
some mothers also. But in her dream he had rent the film that obscures
the Neverland, and she saw Wendy and John and Michael peeping through
the gap.

The dream by itself would have been a trifle, but while she was
dreaming the window of the nursery blew open, and a boy did drop on the
floor. He was accompanied by a strange light, no bigger than your fist,
which darted about the room like a living thing; and I think it must
have been this light that wakened Mrs. Darling.

She started up with a cry, and saw the boy, and somehow she knew at once
that he was Peter Pan. If you or I or Wendy had been there we should
have seen that he was very like Mrs. Darling's kiss. He was a lovely
boy, clad in skeleton leaves and the juices that ooze out of trees; but
the most entrancing thing about him was that he had all his first teeth.
When he saw she was a grown-up, he gnashed the little pearls at her.

CHAPTER II

THE SHADOW

Mrs. Darling screamed, and, as if in answer to a bell, the door opened,
and Nana entered, returned from her evening out. She growled and sprang
at the boy, who leapt lightly through the window. Again Mrs. Darling
screamed, this time in distress for him, for she thought he was killed,
and she ran down into the street to look for his little body, but it was
not there; and she looked up, and in the black night she could see
nothing but what she thought was a shooting star.

She returned to the nursery, and found Nana with something in her mouth,
which proved to be the boy's shadow. As he leapt at the window Nana had
closed it quickly, too late to catch him, but his shadow had not had
time to get out; slam went the window and snapped it off.

You may be sure Mrs. Darling examined the shadow carefully, but it was
quite the ordinary kind.

Nana had no doubt of what was the best thing to do with this shadow. She
hung it out at the window, meaning 'He is sure to come back for it; let
us put it where he can get it easily without disturbing the children.'

But unfortunately Mrs. Darling could not leave it hanging out at the
window; it looked so like the washing and lowered the whole tone of the
house. She thought of showing it to Mr. Darling, but he was totting up