Peter and Mollie were a brother and sister who loved a bit of adventure. One rainy afternoon, they wandered into a small, dusty shop crammed with old things nobody seemed to want. In the darkest corner stood a strange wooden chair with a carved back and four sturdy legs. The children liked it at once. Using the last of their pocket money, they paid a few shillings and asked the shopkeeper to have the chair sent home. Back at the house, they carried the chair up to their playroom. That was when the extraordinary thing happened. Small, bright red wings began to sprout from the four legs of the chair, quite by themselves. Before the children could quite believe their eyes, the chair rose gently off the floor and hovered in the air, as if inviting them to climb on. Peter and Mollie scrambled onto the seat and held on tightly. The chair sailed out of the open window and up into the sky. They had bought, they realised with a rush of delight, a magic wishing-chair — a chair that would take them anywhere they wished. From that moment on, their ordinary summer holiday was over. They were going to have adventures.