Death and Money
This
is a very old story. There were three young men. They liked to eat,
and they liked to drink a lot. One day they were in the bar of
the Grand Hotel. Through the window, they saw some men. They had the
body of a dead man.
"What's
that?" said the 1st young man. He said to a child, "Boy,
come here!" The boy came. The young man said, "Who is dead?
Go and ask." The boy went, and came back. "That was one of
your old friends," he said. "He was often here at the Grand
Hotel with you."
"Why
is he dead?"
"I
don't know," said the boy. "Death takes all lives."
"The
boy is right," said the barman. "Death is going to take
your life some day. Perhaps today. Perhaps tomorrow."
"Oh
no," said the 1st young man. "Death is not going to take my
life."
"You
must be ready for Death," said the barman.
The
1st young man said, "Where is Death? I am going to find
him and kill him. Are you coming with me?"
"Yes,"
said his friends.
The
three young men walked up the road. An old man came along the road.
He knocked
the
ground with his stick. "Open for me, Mother," he said to
the ground. "Old man," said the 1st young man. "Why do
you knock the ground with your stick?"
"I
am old. I don't want to live. But Death is never going to take me.
The ground is not going to open for me. I walk along the road and I
say, 'Mother, I want to die. But I can't die."'
"Where
is Death?"
"I
saw him under a tree, up on the mountain there," said the old
man. "Go there, find the
tree,
and Death too."
The
three young men walked up the mountain. They came to the tree. Under
the tree was money, a lot of money. The 1st young man said, "Now
my friends, are we going to take this money? Or are we going to find
Death and kill him?"
"The
money," said his friends.
"Where
are we going to take it?"
"To
my house," said the 2nd young man.
"Not
in daylight," said the 3rd young man.
"People
mustn't see us."
"No,"
said the 1st young man. "We must take it home by night. We want
some beer now, beer and food. Who is going to the town, to buy beer
and food?"
"I
am," said the 2nd young man. "Give me some money."
He
went down the road to the town. The 1st young man said to the 3rd
young man, "Are we going to give him some of this money?"
"No," said the 3rd young man. "How can we kill him?"
"I
have a knife. And you have a knife."
The
2nd young man walked to the town and he said, "I want all the
money. Why not? But how can I get it? They are two and I am one."
Then
he said, "I'm going to kill them." He went to a shop. He
asked for poison. "I want something to kill the rats in my
house," he said to the man in the shop. "They eat all my
food."
"I
have some very good rat-poison," said the man .
The
young man went away with the rat-poison.
He
went to the Grand Hotel. "Three bottles of beer, please,"
he said.
He
put poison in two of the bottles. Then he went back to his friends.
His friends put their arms round him. They killed him with their
knives.
"Now,"
said the 1st young man. "Have some beer. "
They
opened all the bottles of beer. Before night, they were dead. The old
man was right. Death was under the tree.
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