“Oh no,” he replied factiously, turning to see his reflection in the window behind him. “Don't tell me I'm finally starting to look thirty.” He turned back around and winked at Gwen.
“If the story is to be believed,” Gwen began, feeling uncomfortable as she acknowledged her teacher was a figure from Edwardian literature, “you sailed with Captain Hook more than a hundred years ago.”
“Well, I certainly hope the story is believed, for all the work it took to put it in Barrie's head,” Starkey responded. “That wasn't easy you know. It took me long enough just to find someone who could do it justice, let alone convince him it was his idea… but the story needed to be told, and I knew Smee would never peep a word about it to anyone.”
“Smee?”
“He and I were the only ones who made it off the Jolly Rodger alive—I lost track of him sometime after he lost his fortune. He took his plunders and got into banking. He had almost everything invested by the end of the twenties.”
Gwen combed her memory of sophomore history and realized, “Right at the start of the Great Depression.”
“I don't know what happened to him. He was getting on in years. He might have given up the ghost. Banking is a stressful business. No fresh air. No exercise.”
“And teaching is better?” Gwen asked.
“Oh, not really,” Starkey sighed, “but if you live long enough, life starts to take on a cyclical nature. You can't help but return to things out of boredom and nostalgia. I was a teacher long before I ever turned pirate.”
Swirling his wine, Starkey dove into a story. “I started off as an honest sailor when I was your age. I worked on merchant ships, mostly along the Cape Town route, but I'd always had a bookish bent. When my contract came up, I looked for work on land and fell into teaching. After a few years, I got it into my head that it would be exciting to adventure to America and teach there.
“I don't know how far that ship even made it across the Atlantic, or how far off course we must have blown in the horrible storm that found us. It seemed a miracle we survived the squall, but the first thing we saw once the rain cleared was a ship sailing toward us and flying the Jolly Rodger.”
Twill rolled over and gave a slight snore, as if reacting to his father's tale. Starkey lowered his voice before continuing, “And that was how I met James Hook. He started firing at us with cannons that were anachronistic even for the time. Our captain didn't know what to make of that. We weren't equip for naval warfare, so Hook and his crew boarded us in short order. They slaughtered everyone aboard, so by the time they found me hiding among the cargo, their bloodlust was fairly sated.
“Not that Hook would have let me live, but for two things: I knew how to sail, and I had worked as a schoolmaster. Hook had a strange… obsession, I suppose, with good form. He seemed to think if he kept a gentleman like me around, some good form might rub off on him. Surrounded by base pirates and unsophisticated scoundrels, he worried his peer group would demean him. So he put me to work on his crew, and my life took on a great deal of color. The rest, as they say, is literature.”
Once he finished, Gwen became aware of the missing music. In the corner of the room. the old grammaphone continued to spin, but it had reached the end of the record. The charming string quartet had stepped off stage, leaving Gwen and Starkey alone in their dialogue.
“That's an impressive story,” Gwen remarked, uncertain how to react.
“I should hope so,” Starkey replied, picking up his sourdough loaf and tearing into it again. “It's the only one I have.”
Still, it had not answered her question. “Mr. Starkey,” she pressed, “if you've really been alive so long… how?” Neverland stopped children from growing up—maybe it even stopped pirates from aging, too. Still, she didn't understand how someone could retain that magical property away from the island.
“Ah, now that's a secret,” Starkey told her. “But, supposing you flatter me with an impressive story, I suspect I would be liable to answer that question… and whatever other questions you must have rattling in your head.”
“A story?” Gwen asked.
“Certainly,” he replied. “You don't expect me to believe that the student who wrote speeches about stories and debates defending children's literature arrived in Neverland by pure chance. You were brought here as a storyteller, weren't you?”
He had figured her out, and Gwen saw no way to shirk away from his prying curiosity.
“Come now,” he beckoned. “Surely you can spin one of your stories for me. I'd feel cheated if I let a visit with a storyteller slip away without so much as a tiny tale.”
She searched her mind for stories, and of course the story of Margaret May stood out clearest in her memory. She could tell a story to Starkey. “And if I do, you'll teach me what you can about Neverland?”
“It would be my pleasure—I like to think teaching becomes me.”
“Alright then,” Gwen answered, before beginning the tale of Margaret May.
Chapter 11
“Once upon a time, in a time of many kingdoms, there lived an innkeeper who ran an inn between the capitals of two great countries. Far from any city, town, or village, the little inn was one of the few places that travelers could stay in the countryside between the kingdoms of Westera and Eastan. On the edge of a beautiful and uncharted forest, the inn was a tidy and splendid place. The innkeeper had a wife, who could cook and brew beer better than anyone, so their guests always enjoyed good food and good drink. One day, the innkeeper and his
