Little In-a-Minute
ILLUSTRATING STORY SUSPENSE WHICH APPEALS TO YOUNGEST CHILDREN
The big, yellow Sun smiled down upon them and the Singing Brook hummed pretty little tunes for them to listen to. They were two little boys at play with a whole, long beautiful day ahead.
They looked almost exactly alike, did these two little boys. Bobby wore a wide-brimmed sun hat with a blue band around it, and Dicky wore a wide-brimmed sun hat with a red band around it. Bobby wore a brown linen sailor suit with blue anchors on the collar and Dicky wore a brown linen sailor suit with red anchors on the collar. Bobby had a beautiful toy ship to play with, and Dicky had a beautiful ship, too. As for the ships, they looked just exactly alike. Each beautiful toy ship was painted white and green, and each had a big white sail as wide and pretty as a dove’s wing, and each had a strong little rudder painted red.
Bobby and Dicky had made a make-believe wharf in the Singing Brook of sticks and stones and nice black mud. There, anchored at the wharf, lay the two beautiful toy boats, their white sails flapping and fat with wind. When their strings were loosed from the wharf, the Whispering Wind would carry the two little boats way, way down the Singing Brook to another little make-believe wharf made of sticks and stones and nice black mud that Bobby and Dicky had made farther on.
So the Sun smiled down more happily and the Singing Brook sang a merrier tune than the last one and Bobby and Dicky began to play.
“I am going to load my boat with little green apples, Dicky,” said Bobby. “Perhaps the Old Chipmunk who lives at the foot of the Pine Tree will go aboard and unload them.”
Bobby began gathering small green apples as fast as he could and putting them on the deck of his little ship, but Dicky sat on the bank of the Singing Brook, doing nothing and only watching.
“When are you going to load your ship, Dicky?” Bobby asked as he put in the last apples.
“In a minute,” Dicky answered, but before the minute had gone, Bobby’s ship, its white sail flying, had started down the Singing Brook to the other wharf. Dicky jumped up and loosed his boat from its moorings, but it was very far behind Bobby’s all the way. The two little boys hurried softly between the willow trees that stood along the edge of the Singing Brook. As they came to the other make-believe wharf they saw the Old Chipmunk creep out of his house at the foot of the Pine Tree and go out on the wharf to wait for the little ship to come in. When it came, he unloaded all the cargo of apples and carried them over to his cellar. But when Dicky’s ship came in, so late and so empty, the Old Chipmunk did nothing but smell of it. Then he sat on the end of the make-believe wharf in the sunshine and basked and did not even look at Dicky’s ship again.
“I have thought of something very nice to do, now,” said Bobby as the two little boys carried their ships back again. “We will play that the flowers are children and we will give them a ride in our ships.”
So Bobby picked many little flower children; clovers in pink bonnets and buttercups in wide yellow hats and daisies in gold bonnets with white strings, and he put them all carefully aboard his ship. But Dicky only stood by in the grass and watched.
“When are you going to fill your boat with flowers, Dicky?” Bobby asked as he helped the last flower child aboard.
“In a minute,” Dicky answered, but just then down the Singing Brook came the Whispering Wind. It filled the little white sails and away sailed the two little ships, the flower children aboard Bobby’s fluttering and dancing with the joy of having a boat ride.
The two little boys raced along the bank to watch and they saw a wonderful thing happen. All the way down the Singing Brook, pretty passengers joined the flower children on board Bobby’s ship. A gold butterfly fluttered down to the deck with his yellow and black wings, kissing the clovers beneath their pink bonnets. A shiny black bumble bee tumbled down to the deck with his gold, gossamer wings and began to drone summer stories to the buttercups. A silver dragon fly darted down to the ship with his rainbow tinted wings to mend the white strings of the daisies’ caps which had been torn by the frolicsome Whispering Wind. When Bobby’s ship reached the other wharf it looked like an excursion boat, but, ah, Dicky’s ship was quite empty. There had been no flower children on board to call the butterflies, the bumble bees and the dragon flies.
“I know the nicest play of all, now,” said Bobby after he had helped the flower children from his ship and put their feet in the Singing Brook that they might wade there all the rest of the day and keep cool and fresh and sweet.
“We will take our ships back, Dicky, and have a race.”
“Oh, that will be nice!” Dicky answered, so the two little boys carried the two ships back and launched them, side by side, in the Singing Brook.
“One—two—” began Bobby, but before he said three he heard their mother’s voice floating over the fields and as far as their playground.
“Bobby, Dicky, come home,” their mother called. “Come home, boys, dinner is ready.”
“I’m coming, mother,” Bobby called back, putting his hand to his mouth to make a horn. Then he turned to Dicky who still bent low over the bank of the Singing Brook and still held in his hand the string that was tied to the rudder of his ship.
“In a minute,” Dicky answered. Bobby ran off over the fields, and soon he was out of sight. He knew that there were fat white potatoes and yellow chicken meat and red cherry dumplings for dinner. Now they were hot, but they would be cold if he did not hurry.
Down by the Singing Brook Dicky waited to launch his ship once more. The Whispering Wind filled the sail a third time, and away sailed the beautiful little toy ship, so pretty with its green and white paint, and its rudder that was painted red. Dicky ran along beside it, to see how fast it sailed. Faster and faster sailed Dicky’s ship. It did not stop when it came to the Pine Tree where the Old Chipmunk was busy in his cellar sorting out his apples. It did not stop when it came to the Wading Pool where all the flower children stood, keeping cool and fresh and sweet. On and on sailed the little ship, for the Whispering Wind was taking it a long, long way off to the place where the Singing Brook loses itself in the River and the River goes on down to the Sea.
“Come back. Oh, do come back!” called Dicky to the little ship, but the ship only sailed the faster.
“Please come back!” cried Dicky as his beautiful ship sailed out of sight.
In a minute, the Whispering Wind called back.
But the little ship never came back.
So Dicky went slowly across the field and home to dinner, but when he reached home what do you think had happened?
The fat, white potatoes, the yellow chicken meat and the red cherry dumplings were cold.
Carolyn Sherwin Bailey.
STORIES SELECTED BECAUSE OF THEIR SUSPENSIVE QUALITY
| The Teeny Tiny Lady | In Firelight Stories |
| The Hobyahs | In Firelight Stories |
| Chicken Little | In Firelight Stories |
| The Little Boy Who Found His Fortune | In Firelight Stories |
| The Little Pink Rose | Sara Cone Bryant, in Best Stories to Tell to Children |
| Little Jack Rollaround | Sara Cone Bryant, in Best Stories to Tell to Children |
| Little Black Sambo | Helen Bannerman |
| The Hare and the Hedgehog | Æsop’s Fables |
| The Gradual Fairy | Alice Brown, in The One-Footed Fairy |
| How Johnny Chuck Found the Best Thing in the World | Thornton Burgess, in Old Mother West Wind |
CHAPTER V
STORY CLIMAX
WE have found it helpful to liken the effect that a well-written, well-told story has upon a child’s mind to the appeal that a successful drama makes to an audience. We have discovered that the opening paragraph, the first sentence of a child’s story should have the quality that characterizes the scene disclosed on the stage when the curtain rolls up—compelling interest. Following this curtain raising of the story, there should be a series of pictorial scenes that carry the events that go to make up the story plot, strung upon a slender thread of curiosity, and giving the element of suspense to the story.
Following out this story structure we come, eventually, to the end. The curtain must fall at last before the eyes of the child audience and the closing of the story drama should be as mind stimulating as was its beginning. This is brought about by studying carefully the story climax.
The climax of a story should be a complete surprise to the listener and to the characters in the story, as well.
This quick note of the unexpected coming with compelling suddenness at the end of our story clinches the interest of the plot and makes the story indelible on the child’s mind sheet.
Certain well-known instances of climax as exemplified in child stories will clarify for us its surprise quality.
In one of the older plantation folk tales, Mr. Elephant and Mr. Frog are pictured as being good friends until Mr. Hare taunts them with their dissimilarity in size and says that Mr. Frog has boasted of the fact that Mr. Elephant is his “riding horse.” Then the story continues:
“Mr. Fox and Mr. Tiger and Mr. Lion all followed after Mr. Hare, crying: ‘Oho, oho, Mr. Elephant is little Mr. Frog’s riding horse.’
“Then Mr. Elephant turned around and he said in a very gruff voice to Mr. Frog:
“‘Did you tell them, grandson, that I was your horse?’
“And Mr. Frog said in a high, squeaky voice:—
“‘No, no, grandfather.’
“But all the time Mr. Frog was thinking of a trick to play on Mr. Elephant.
“The next day, Mr. Elephant and Mr. Frog started off for a long walk. Mr. Frog had heard of a place where the swamps were deep and muddy. Mr. Elephant knew a place where the bananas grew ripe and thick. And they spent a pleasant day. On the way home Mr. Frog hopped up close to Mr. Elephant, and he said in his high, squeaky voice:—
“‘Grandfather, I have no strength to walk. Let me get up on your back.’
“‘Climb up, my grandson,’ said Mr. Elephant.
“He put his trunk down for a ladder, and Mr. Frog climbed up. They had not gone very far when Mr. Frog hopped up close to Mr. Elephant’s ear, and he said:—
“‘I am going to fall, grandfather. Give me some small cords from the roadside that I may bind your mouth, and hold myself upon your back.’
“‘I will, grandson,’ said Mr. Elephant.
“So Mr. Elephant stripped some small cords from a birch tree by the roadside, and handed them to Mr. Frog. Then Mr. Frog bound Mr. Elephant’s mouth, and they went on a little farther. It was not long, though, before Mr. Frog spoke again to Mr. Elephant.
“‘Grandfather,’ he said, ‘find me a small green twig that I may fan the mosquitoes from your ears.’
“‘I will, grandson,’ said Mr. Elephant, so he broke a small, green twig from the birch tree, and reached it up to Mr. Frog; and just then they came toward home.
“‘See Mr. Elephant,’ cried Mr. Hare.
“‘See Mr. Elephant,’ cried Mr. Tiger.
“‘See Mr. Elephant,’ cried Mr. Lion, and all the others, ‘Mr. Elephant is Mr. Frog’s horse.’
“Mr. Elephant turned himself about, and he saw Mr. Frog on his back, holding the reins and the whip.
“‘Why, so I am, grandson,’ said Mr. Elephant.
“Then Mr. Frog jumped down to the ground, and he laughed and he laughed until he nearly split his coat, because he had played a trick on Mr. Elephant.”
This quotation serves very well to illustrate perfect story climax. In the beginning of the story, an apparently impossible situation was suggested. To the child listener it seems incredible that an elephant could so far forget his dignity as to serve as the steed of a frog. To the elephant himself, as well, this situation appears to be incompatible with his social status in the jungle. As the story advances, each scene prepares a way for the unexpected dénouement and the climax is found in the surprise to the hearers and to Mr. Elephant as well when the curtain falls upon him unwittingly playing the part of “riding horse” to little Mr. Frog.
Hans Christian Andersen’s inimitable allegory of “The Ugly Duckling” owes a measure, at least, of its popularity to its perfect climax. In the beautiful word pictures of the story we follow its hero, the Ugly Duckling, through his series of perilous and sorrowful adventures, sympathizing with but not anticipating the outcome of them. In no single one of the scenes of the story do we have a hint of the glorious ending of the hero’s journeying. Finally comes a quick, artistic curtain falling:
—“Then he flew toward the beautiful swans. As soon as they saw him they rushed to meet him with outstretched wings.
“‘Kill me!’ said the Ugly Duckling; but as he bent his head, what did he see reflected in the water? It was his own image—not a dark, gray bird, ugly to see—but a graceful swan.
“Then the great swans swam around him and stroked his neck with their beaks for a welcome. Some little children came into the garden.
“‘See,’ they cried, clapping their hands.
“‘A new swan has come and he is more beautiful than the others!’”—
This story climax is perfect, also, because it carries the element of surprise to the story hearers and the story hero, the Ugly Duckling, as well.
It seems to be almost impossible to find many instances of well constructed climax in the short story for children. The story teller must look for climax and in the event of not being able to find it in the story that she selects for telling, it will be necessary for her to make over her story ending that it may be a complete surprise to her listeners, in this way strengthening the plot greatly. Many stories just stop, giving one a feeling of dissatisfaction. There has been no climax to make of the whole a finished picture, complete in its minutest detail of light and shade and forming an unerasable vignette, on the child’s mind.
Climax knots the thread of the narrative.
Certain child stories, however, stand out as illuminating instances of what climax means in deepening the mental appeal for the child, etching the story picture, so to speak. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Great Stone Face,” forms one instance. A careful reading of the story will disclose Hawthorne’s subtle use of suspense, the art of “making his audience wait” for his dénouement. He makes us see the fertile valley beneath the great mountain upon whose side there had been sculptured by Nature, the wonderful stone face. We are carried, breathlessly, along upon the tide of the narrative through the boy Ernest’s longing to bear the image of these beautiful features, the futile attempts of old Gathergold, old Blood-and-Thunder and the others to prove their likeness to the Great Stone Face until we reach our climax in Ernest’s own transformation into the great likeness unsuspected by himself or by us.
It seems to be the great short story writers, only, who have given us really illuminating instances of climax—surprise ending—in stories that will appeal to children in a stimulating way. In Hawthorne’s “Snow Image” the curtain falls upon a surprise situation. Oscar Wilde leaves us unconsolable at his apparent ending of “The Happy Prince.” The little swallow is dead and the Prince has given away his gold and jewels.
“So they pulled down the statue of the Happy Prince who was no longer beautiful and so no longer useful and they melted the statue in the furnace.
“‘What a strange thing!’ said the overseer of the workmen at the foundry. ‘This broken lead heart will not melt in the furnace. We must throw it away!’
“So they threw it on a dust-heap where the dead swallow was also lying.”
But as we hold our breath, the climax is flung gloriously out.
“‘Bring me the two most precious things in the City,’ said God to one of His Angels and the Angel brought him the leaden heart and the dead bird.
“‘You have rightly chosen,’ said God, ‘for in my garden of Paradise this little bird shall sing for evermore, and in my city of gold the Happy Prince shall praise me.’”
In the story of Cosette and her doll in “Les Misérables,” Victor Hugo has given us a complete story vignette with a perfectly developed climax of surprise as Jean Valjean gives to Cosette, the “toad” of Madame Thenardier’s Kitchen, the doll about which she had dreamed. Laura Richard’s short stories for children abound in instances of illuminating climax—no hint of the story ending being given until the curtain falls. Her story of “The Golden Windows” in which a little boy sets out upon a journey to find the windows of gold that he sees beyond the village from his own poor little home and discovers at the end of the day that his own home windows, viewed from a distance are gold and those he has found are gray and dull, is an example of Mrs. Richards’ skilled use of climax to force her story point into the child’s mind.
The mental appeal of climax is a very real and vital one for the consideration of the story teller. Once we fix in our minds the two characteristics of artistic story ending, surprise to the story characters and to the children, and an ending that ties the knot of the narrative, our story curtain will fall, leaving the children a lap farther along in their mental development than they were when the curtain rose.