Peter and the Shadow Thieves Read Free Page B

legendary and feared pirate nickname: Black Stache.
    “East-nor’east, Cap’n!” shouted the lookout. “Coming down the mountain!”
    The fort was made of fel ed palm trees, vines, and nameless barbed and spiked plants, lashed together into an ugly but surprisingly sturdy wal , which enclosed a half dozen huts and lean-tos. On one corner of this wal , high up, was the lookout’s perch: a lonely palm tree, its fronds turning brown. Black Stache stepped through the massive double-door gate, the only break in the wal ed compound. He abruptly halted, a look of concern crossing his usual y fearsome face.
    “Is that…that creature around?” he cal ed up to the lookout, trying to keep the tremor out of his voice.
    The lookout scanned the area around the fort.
    “No, Cap’n,” he said. “It’s gone, least for now.”
    Confident again, Black Stache strode into the clearing in front of the fort and looked up toward the mountain, squinting in the blazing sunlight.
    “Smee!” he shouted. “My glass!”
    “Aye, Cap’n!” came the response. “Here it…OW!”
    First Mate Smee—a short, baggy man in short, baggy pants—tripped hard over the doorsil , as he had a dozen times a day since the fort had been erected. He sprawled in the dirt, the spyglass flying from his hand and rol ing to the feet of Black Stache, who looked down at it, then back at Smee.
    “Smee,” he said, more wearily than angrily, “you are a supreme idjit.”
    “Aye, Cap’n,” said Smee, scrambling to his feet. He picked up the spyglass and handed it to Black Stache, who took it with his right hand and, turning to the mountain, held it to his right eye.
    “Focus!” he said.
    Smee scuttled alongside the captain and slowly turned the lens piece of the spyglass—a task that Black Stache had not yet learned to perform for himself with the hook he wore in place of his left hand. The hook was a nasty-looking semicircle of shining steel fashioned from a dagger by one of Black Stache’s handier crewmen, and bound to the captain’s wrist stump by a stout leather strap. It was sharp as a razor, so sharp that Black Stache had several times cut himself in unfortunate places by absentmindedly scratching.
    Smee had offered to dul the hook, but Black Stache liked it gleaming sharp—liked the nervousness he saw in the eyes of his men when he thrust it toward them. Black Stache was coming to believe that, despite the inconveniences, a man like him—a man whose authority depended on the fear he created in others—was better off with a hook than a hand.
    He had even grown secretly fond of the name his crew had taken to cal ing him when they thought he could not hear. Yes, the name had first come from the boy, the hated, cursed boy. But despite that, Black Stache had come to like the sound of it. Captain Hook. A name to fear.
    “Avast focusing,” he growled, shoving Smee away. “There he is, the little bugger.”
    With a steady hand gained from years at sea, Captain Hook kept the glass trained on the form of the boy swooping down the side of the mountain, skimming the tops of the jungle trees. As the boy drew nearer, Hook could see that he carried something dark and round in his hand—a coconut, perhaps, or a piece of rock. He knew what was coming—of late, the boy had taken to raiding the pirate encampment almost daily.
    “Smee!” Hook snarled. “Fetch my pistol!”
    “Aye, Cap’n,” said Smee, running to the doorway. “OW!” he added, tripping into the fort.
    “Hurry, you idjit!” shouted Hook.
    “Got it, Cap’n,” said Smee, re-emerging from the fort. “OW!”
    As he tripped, the pistol flew forward, past Hook; it hit the ground and went off, emitting a puff of smoke and a sad little sound: phut. The pistol bal dribbled out the end.
    Hook picked up the pistol. “Smee,” he said, in the calm, reasonable tone he used only when he was very close to kil ing somebody. “Do we have any more gunpowder? Any dry gunpowder?”
    “No,