'I hate being afraid,' said Billy angrily. 'Of course I know no true boy is afraid of anything except doing wrong. One of the M.A.'s told me that. But the M.A.'s are afraid too.'
'What of?' Lucy asked, glancing at the terrace below, where already the shadows were lengthening; 'it'll be getting dark soon. I'd much rather know what you're afraid of while it's daylight.'
'What we're afraid of,' said Billy abruptly, 'is the sea. Suppose a great wave came and washed away the castle, and the huts, and the M.A.'s and all of us?'
'But it never has, has it?' Lucy asked.
'No, but everything must have a beginning. I know that's true, because another of the M.A.'s told it me.'
'But why don't you go and live somewhere inland?'
'Because we couldn't live away from the sea. We're islanders, you know; we couldn't bear not to be near the sea. And we'd rather be afraid of it, than not have it to be afraid of. But it upsets the government, because we ought to be happy troops of gentle islanders, and you can't be quite happy if you're afraid. That's why it's one of your deeds to take away our fear.'
'It sounds jolly difficult,' said Philip; 'I shall have to think,' he added desperately. So he lay and thought with Max and Brenda asleep by his side and the parrot preening its bright feathers on the parapet of the tower, while Lucy and the Lord High Islander played cat's cradle with a long thread of seaweed.
'It's supper time,' said Billy at last. 'Have you thought of anything?'
'Not a single thing,' said Philip.