In Lord of the Flies what does Maurice pretends to do?

During the meeting in chapter 5 the littlun Percival Wemys Madison was asked to tell the assembled boys about the beast. Percival began to cry and once he started he would not stop, then the rest of the littluns began to join him. Maurice distracted them by pretending to fall off the springy log, which the boys called the twister. He clowned badly and rubbed his rump but he made the littluns laugh and as a result they were eventually able to persuade Percival to speak.