MYSTRY GULLY

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22111, 5 June 1937, Page 7 (Supplement)

MYSTRY GULLY

Here is the first chapter of our new adventure serial, written by ’Mate Seantist, author of “The Haunted Pa” and “TJte Midnight Aviator.” CHAPTER I A Strange Decision “You don’t mean to tell me Uncle Bill has bought Tiki Farm?” gasped Guy Leighton. He looked up at his two sisters incredulously, as if expecting an immediate contradiction. “It must be true,” said Alison, ruefully. “He told Bev. and me just after we had helped Mrs Macdonald to wash up the tea dishes.” She perched herself on the edge of the chintz-covered window seat, and embraced her long, sunburnt legs. “1 can’t imagine why he has done it. But then one never can tell what an antiquarian is thinking about.” “It won’t mean we’ll have to leave here, will it?” The query came from Beverley, age 10, who was 18 months younger than her sister. “I’m not a mind reader!” retorted Alison, a trifle impatiently. Beverley had a habit of asking disconcerting questions.

“I refuse to believe it,” cried Guy, closing his book of adventure stories with an emphatic bang. Why, that old red farmhouse hasnt been lived in for donkeys’ years!” “There’s a story connected with Tiki Farm about a man called Michael Jenkins. He broke one of the Maori laws in the old days, and mysteriously disappeared from “j 16 valley,” Alison said, thoughtfully. “But, of course, that all happened long before any of us were born.” “The place is a perfect wreck,’ Guy burst out scathingly. I doubt if we could get in, the undergrowth is so high. Swaggers used to sleep there. But practically all the windows have gone now, and they probably find a shed more comfortable” , ~ .. . “It’s so gloomy standing all that •distance off the road,” put in Beverley. “And there’s that deep gully behind the house—.” She shuddered involuntarily. “Just think of leaving dear old Tumble Inn to live there for six weeks,” Alison sighed, mournfully. They contemplated the prospect in silence, their faces betraying the fact that they were not in the least attracted by the mental picture of the prospective holiday house. “It’s all just too bad, isn’t it!” Mr Stapleton stood on the threshold of the small living room, regarding his nieces and nephew in mock sympathy. “Looking at the three of you, one would think some hatchetfaced mortgagor had threatened to drive us from our ancestral home.” He was a tall, thin man with a slight tendency to stoop. His mouth had a humorous twist to it, and when he was amused his grey eyes twinkled in friendly fashion. Mr Stapleton had won considerable renown as an antiquarian. He wrote special articles for many New Zealand newspapers, and had in his possession a valuable collection of Maori curios. During the absence of their father who was chief engineer on a large passenger ship, s.s. Mahina, Guy and his sisters spent their school vacations at Tumble Inn homestead. Their mother had died when Beverley was a baby.

“But, Uncle Bill, whatever made you—” protested Guy. "Buy such a ramshackle, forsaken hole?” Mr Stapleton took the words out of his nephew’s, mouth. “Well, I quite expected that question. But I’m not going to answer it just now. However, this I can tell you. Tumble Inn has been let for a month to a retired farmer and his wife from Auckland. Mrs Macdonald has already received instructions to prepare for removal to Tiki Farm. We shall take up residence there at the end of /the week. And, by the way, I am expecting an old friend and his son to join us later. Garry Kippin will be about your age, I think, Guy. It must be more than 14 years since I crossed to Wellington to be the boy’s godfather.” Guy, Alison, and Beverley stared at him speechlessly. This, certainly, was more than they had expected. And, of course, it had to happen when they had just arrived from boarding school! There would be no tennis court at Tiki I)arm. Weeds, instead of passion-fruit vines, would, nod in at their bedroom windows. “Hum! I thought by the look on Uncle’s face when we met him at

the station that he had something up his sleeve,” said Alison, as soon as Mr Stapleton had left the room. ‘‘Rubbish! His face never betrays his thoughts,” snapped Guy. .“Looks as if we’re in for a pretty feeble time of it,” remarked Beverley. “School’s bad enough, but a holiday at Tiki Farm promises to be duller still.” “Perhaps Garry Kippin will help to liven things up,” suggested Guy more hopefully, his interest aroused by the prospect of meeting a companion of his own age and sex. “I wonder what Mrs Mac. has to say,” was Alison’s only comment. They found Mrs Macdonald, Mr Stapleton’s Scottish housekeeper, in the kitchen, pounding away with unusual vigour at some mixture in a pudding basin. “It’s my opinion your uncle’s gone clean daft,” was her caustic criticism when she had discussed the news with the children. (“Daft,” by the way, is the Scotch word for crazy, as you would probably have guessed had you heard it voiced by Mrs Mac.) “If he had told me he was going to get married, I couldn't have been more taken aback. Your uncle certainly gets some queer notions.

But,” she sighed, “what can you expect from a man who Sits until 3 o’clock ill the morning waiting for inspiration to describe a Maori wish bone?” She shook the mixing spoon in disgust. “Did you know Mr Michael Jenkins?” asked Beverley. "Tut, child, I’m not Mrs Methuselah!” retorted Mrs Macdonald, Indignantly. “I’ve heard it said he was an Englishman who came to New Zealand in the late 'forties. Down near Tiki Farm there, he built a shack that was burnt to the ground by that bloodthirsty scoundrel, Te Raup—. The next syllable always reminds me of the big rubber company.” “Te Raupkraha!” supplied Guy, rieadily. “I remember seeing his burial place at Otaki when ! was out cycling with some other chaps.” "Yes, that’s the name!” continued Mrs Macdonald. “Well, Mr Jenkins evidently’had some grit, for he had the impudence to elope with : a •Maori belle belonging to the tribe that lived, in those days, round Kaiapoi.” ' “That would be the Ngaitahu tribe,” interrupted Alison. Naturally interested in history, she had ac-

quired from long conversation with her uncle, an extensive knowledge of such tribal data. And if she were invariably bottom of her class in mathematics, Alison always made up the deficit in history. Possibly this accounted for the close bond of understanding which existed between Mr Stapleton and his eldest neice. "As a result he made enemies of the leading men of the tribe,” went on Mrs Macdonald. "One of the tohungas declared the site of Tiki Farm tapu. And everything ended in the mysterious disappearance of Jenkins.” “What happened to Mrs Jenkins?” Beverley wanted to know. "Oh, she went back to her own people,”* replied Uncle Bill’s housekeeper; “Some folk think she betrayed him, but that’s probably hearsay.” "Then who built Tiki Farmhouse?” Guy inquired. “Didn’t you say Te Rauparaha burnt down Jenkins’s shack?” ' “Some years later a man arrived in these parts who claimed to be a relation of Jenkins. They say he was rather a queer chap. Perhaps he built the house as a kind of memorial, for as soon as it was

finished he 16ft again. If you want to find out any more you’ll have to ask Dublin Dan. He’s always ready for a gossip.” Mrs Macdonald sniffed contemptuously. Dublin Dan or Mr Daniel Tarrant, the name by which he was known only to the postmaster, was for the greater part of the day, to be found in the garden. One of the celebrities of the valley, he could spin a better yarn, and take longer in the telling of it than anyone else. But on this particular evening the three children were not in the mood to pursue him. Instead, they strolled out on to the veranda, and unconsciously their thoughts and eyes turned in the direction of their new holiday home. The setting sun had spilled big pools- of golden light under the regiment of young pines that marched up the shoulder of the opposite hill. From the western corner of the veranda they could see the topmost sails of the windmill at Tiki Farm. “I’ve always wanted a real adventure,” sajd Beverley, hugging the veranda post sentimentally. "Perr haps we shall find one in Mystery ‘Gully!” ' WILL BEVERLEY’S WISH COME TRUE? ANOTHER CHAPTER NEXT WEEK. Plaza Birthday Competition If your birthday is next week you may enter for the Birthday Puzzle. Tickets for the Plaza will be awarded girls, and boys sending in the correct, solution. Mark your letter "Birthday Competition” and send it to Lady Gay enclosing a stamped addressed envelope for your ticket. A halfpenny stamp will do. Plaza coupons must be posted with stamped and addressed envelopes enclosed, or tickets can be called for on Tuesday. They can be collected on Tuesdays only.