‘Now!’ Ernie cried, clapping his hands and dancing a little jig on the grass. ‘Now we got ourselves a real live swan all over again! Didn’t I tell you I was a magic man? Didn’t I tell you I was goin’ to do a magic trick and make this dead swan come alive and go flyin’ all over the sky? Didn’t I tell you that?’
Peter stood there in the sunshine beside the lake on this beautiful May morning, the enormous, limp and slightly bloodied wings dangling grotesquely at his sides. ‘Have you finished?’ he said.
‘Swans don’t talk,’ Ernie said. ‘Keep your flippin’ beak shut! And save your energy, laddie, because you’re goin’ to need all the strength and energy you got when it comes to flyin’ round in the sky.’ Ernie picked up his gun from the ground, then he grabbed Peter by the back of the neck with his free hand and said, ‘March!’
They marched along the bank of the lake until they came to a tall and graceful willow tree. There they halted. The tree was a weeping willow, and the long branches hung down from a great height and almost touched the surface of the lake.
‘And now the magic swan is goin’ to show us a bit of magic flyin’,’ Ernie announced. ‘So what you’re goin’ to do, Mister Swan, is to climb up to the very top of this tree, and when you get there you’re goin’ to spread out your wings like a clever little swannee-swan-swan and you’re goin’ to take off!’
‘Fantastic!’ cried Raymond. ‘Terrific! I like it very much!’
‘So do I,’ Ernie said. ‘Because now we’re goin’ to find out just exactly ’ow clever this clever little swannee-swan-swan really is. ’Ee’s terribly clever at school, we all know that, and ’ee’s top of the class and everything else that’s lovely, but let’s see just exactly ’ow clever ’ee is when ’ee’s at the top of the tree! Right, Mister Swan?’ He gave Peter a push towards the tree.
How much further could this madness go? Peter wondered. He was beginning to feel a little mad himself, as though nothing was real any more and none of it was actually happening. But the thought of being high up in the tree and out of reach of these hooligans at last was something that appealed to him greatly. When he was up there, he could stay up there. He doubted very much if they would bother to come up after him. And even if they did, he could surely climb away from them along a thin limb that would not take the weight of two people.
The tree was a fairly easy one to climb, with several low branches to give him a start up. He began climbing. The huge white wings dangling from his arms kept getting in the way, but it didn’t matter. What mattered now to Peter was that every inch upward was another inch away from his tormentors below. He had never been a great one for tree-climbing and he wasn’t especially good at it, but nothing in the world was going to stop him from getting to the top of this one. And once he was there, he thought it unlikely they would even be able to see him because of the leaves.
‘Higher!’ shouted Ernie’s voice. ‘Keep goin’!’
Peter kept going, and eventually he arrived at a point where it was impossible to go higher. His feet were now standing on a branch that was about as thick as a person’s wrist, and this particular branch reached far out over the lake and then curved gracefully downward. All the branches above him were very thin and whippy, but the one he was holding on to with his hands was quite strong enough for the purpose. He stood there, resting after the climb. He looked down for the first time. He was very high up, at least fifty feet. But he couldn’t see the two boys. They were no longer standing at the base of the tree. Was it possible they had gone away at last?
‘All right, Mister Swan!’ came the dreaded voice of Ernie. ‘Now listen carefully!’
The two of them had walked some distance away from the tree to a point where they had a clear view of the small boy at the top. Looking down at them now, Peter realized how very sparse and slender the leaves of a willow tree were. They gave him almost no cover at all.
‘Listen carefully, Mister Swan!’ the voice was shouting. ‘Start walking out along that branch you’re standin’ on! Keep goin’ till you’re right over the nice muddy water! Then you take off!’