“No, and we must have come on it if it stops on the island,” said Bevis. “We have been all round so many times. Or does it go to and fro—do lions swim?”
“He would have no need to,” said Mark. “I mean not after he had swum over here, he wouldn’t go away for us—he could lie in the bushes.”
“Perhaps we have gone close by it without knowing,” said Bevis. “There’s the ‘wait-a-bit thorns.’”
They had never been through the thicket of blackthorn.
“Pan never barked though. He’s been all round the island with us.”
“Perhaps he was afraid—like he was just now.”
“Ah, yes, very likely.”
“And we hit him too to keep him quiet, not to startle the kangaroos.”
“Or the water-fowl—so we did: we may have gone close by it without knowing.”
“In the ‘wait-a-bits’ or the hazel.”