WHEN the whole party was finally awake Lucy had to tell her story for the fourth time. The blank silence which followed it was as discouraging as anything could be.
“I can't see anything,” said Peter after he had stared his eyes sore. “Can you, Susan?”
“No, of course I can't,” snapped Susan. “Because there isn't anything to see. She's been dreaming. Do lie down and go to sleep, Lucy.”
“And I do hope,” said Lucy in a tremulous voice, “that you will all come with me. Because—because I'll have to go with him whether anyone else does or not.”
“Don't talk nonsense, Lucy,” said Susan. “Of course you can't go off on your own. Don't let her, Peter. She's being downright naughty.”
“I'll go with her, if she must go,” said Edmund. “She's been right before.”
“I know she has,” said Peter. “And she may have been right this morning. We certainly had no luck going down the gorge. Still—at this hour of the night. And why should Aslan be invisible to us? He never used to be. It's not like him. What does the D.L.F. say?”
“Oh, I say nothing at all,” answered the Dwarf. “If you all go, of course, I'll go with you; and if your party splits up, I'll go with the High King. That's my duty to him and King Caspian. But, if you ask my private opinion, I'm a plain dwarf who doesn't think there's much chance of finding a road by night where you couldn't find one by day. And I have no use for magic lions which are talking lions and don't talk, and friendly lions though they don't do us any good, and whopping big lions though nobody can see them. It's all bilge and beanstalks as far as I can see.”
“He's beating his paw on the ground for us to hurry,” said Lucy. “We must go now. At least I must.”
“You've no right to try to force the rest of us like that. It's four to one and you're the youngest,” said Susan.