LET’S WRITE A SERIAL.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20221, 3 February 1934, Page 26 (Supplement)

LET’S WRITE A SERIAL.

A Very Exciting Quite New Idea.

We’ve written stories and poems and jokes lots of times, and we’ve proved also that we could write really decent plays. So now' we are going to prove we can write a serial quite as exciting as those in the grown-ups’ page. This, however, is to be a co-operative serial, the first instalment of which we give you this week. Each week a prize of 2s 6d will be posted to the Starlet who sends in the best “ follow/On ” of between 400 and 500 words. It will be ever so interesting to see where our story finally gets to, how many unexpected turns and twists it will make in the page. And when it is finished we shall have a real co-opera-tive effort. Entries must be received by Wednesday of each week. Here is the first instalment. You must carry on the same characters, introducing others where you wish. Entries by Wednesday, please; and a postal note for 2s 6d for the winner. A MAORILAND ADVENTURE CHAPTER I. - Les leaned carelessly across the table in the sitting-room, and grabbed at a vase which was about to thrust sweet peas and water over the lilac runner. “ Gee! hasn’t Carl turned out to be a snob?” he said. Hi* sister looked at him quickly. “ Well, you shouldn’t have written him such enthusiastic letters about New Zealand when you knew he was leaving America to stay with us here,” she smiled. “He told you once about some rides on the wild prairies, and in return you gave him a thousand exaggerated views of this country’s wonders. I know it’s a grand and delightful place, but goodness, Les, you created a picture of a sort of South Sea island for Carl—all rustling palms and Robinson Crusoey beaches, forest wildernesses haunted by bloodthirsty Maoris; and then look how you raved to him about ‘ the adventure-packed caves into which the moaning Pacific coldly seeps.’ You certainly did spread yourself when you wrote!” “ This is the South Island, anyway,” Les grumbled, straightening up and frowning. “ And there are palms here —lovely nikaus; there are caves just as I said, too, and marvellous forests and beaches; and there are plenty of Maoris.” “ Listen to old Les bragging about New Zealand again,” someone laughed, and Les and Sally looked up and saw two rather cheeky faces poked through the window.

Nick Gray and his small brother, Peter, had arrived for the evening— Nick to work with Les and Carl, on the wireless set they were making, and Peter to meddle, stare, listen, and serve as an obstacle against which the boys could fling their annoyance when the delicate mechanism became too puzzling to manage. “ Gee,” grinned Les, when the boys were inside, “you must think I’m soft to be always on about New Zealand, but really, when an American cousin looks jolly little Maoriland over with the eye of a snob, it makes me lose my temper. What is it that has disappointed Carl so, Nick; can you think?” “ Well, every time he’s been with me he’s drawled about 4 this dull show ’ and said he wished he could meet the adventures you said he surely would before he’d been here three minutes. But to my mind, Les, Cousin Carl will have to keep on drawling and waiting, because adventures just don’t happen in Maoriland—not this corner of it, anyhow.” Les was about to flash an answer, when Sally, who had been staring out across the paddocks to where a hunched and hideous old man was saddling a horse, suddenly called the boys to the window. “ Look at the Phantom of the Opera fixing his horse,” she said. “ Doesn’t he look queer? And fancy, you can see how ugly he is even from this distance. Look at the trees all flicking their branches about his little hut—so mysterious, isn’t it? —and they say no one knows anything about that old man, but everyone wonders, and says everything about him.” Nick laughed. “If Carl could see that old chap now he might be more hopeful about his adventure. Why do you call him the Phantom of the Opera?” “ Because,” replied Sally, “ that is just who he is like—we saw the picture once, you know. The Phantom was terrifying; his nose was so upturned that it gave him the appearance of a skull, and his bottom teeth were the ones that showed when he grinned. I believe this poor old deformed fellow is quite harmless, though.” “ I can’t help thinking how hopeful he would make your bored cousin, Carl, were he here now.” Nick laughed again, and then the four stood silent for a while listening to the winds sweeping the dust from the pines. “ Carl s going to have his adventure, I think,” said Les softly and deliberately. His eyes were sparkling strangely. “And when it comes I want it to be a real Maoriland adventure—yes, a Maoriland adventure for American cousin. Carl.” i si is @ @ s is @ @ dm s si @ a® ® ® @ @ m