Jack and the Beans of Immortality

"She’s dead!" exclaimed the adolescent boy standing by the large knurled tree. He was about the same color as its old bark being draped in the musty, faded rags that his father called clothes.

"What makes you think that?" said the smallish fellow that just popped his head around the tree. He was soiled, this fellow, so soiled that he could have been a pile of dirt except that he had arms and walked.

The boy pointed at the headless body of a very old woman propped against the tree trunk. "Cause her body’s here and her head is over there."

The smallish fellow looked at the old woman’s head laying on the ground a few steps away from the body. "Oh, that’s doesn’t meaning anything. She’s a witch." The smallish fellow walked over to the head. "She’s so old that her joints are getting loose." He reached down only a little bit and grabbed the head. "When she goes to sleep, ah." He shrugged his dirt shoulders. "These things happen."

"I found a Witch!" The boy stated, not questioned.

"Yeah, gives a whole different meaning to nodding off doesn’t it?" The smallish fellow gave a muddy laugh. He bounced her head in his hands. "What you doing wandering around in the dark enchanted forest by yourself?"

"Oh, I’m Jack." The boy put out his hand to shake acquaintance.

The smallish fellow shrugged again and looked down at the head that he needed both small hands to hold.

"Oh, yes, uh, my Father sent me out here to find a Witch," Jack pointed first at the headless body and then the head, "and I’m to trade our cow for some magic beans."

The smallish fellow looked behind Jack. There were only trees. "Where’s the cow?"

"Oh, I was to find the Witch first and come back with the cow." Jack also looked behind himself at only trees.

The smallish fellow smiled. "Your dad doesn’t like you much, does he?"

"No, he does . . . doesn’t. . . uh, no, he likes me. . .Why?" Jack was getting confused.

"One of them homing cows, I guess." The smallish fellow said to himself. "So what’s so magic about these beans?" He gave the head a toss up in the air. She was asleep.

"Oh, Father said that if I found these beans I would never grow old or never get sick again." Jack watched the sleeping head rise into the air.

"The ole Beans of Immortality, ay?" The fellow laughed a smile as he gently caught the head.

"Yeah, Em-more-tal-ity. . . That’s the word he used." Jack smiled back.

"Boy, Jack, . . " The fellow shook his own head this time. "Your Dad, didn’t like you too much."

"Just enough!" said Jack smiling in his wit. "What about the magic beans?"

"Oh, those . . . We’re fresh out." The fellow put the witch’s head in her lap. "Used them all up on the turtles and trees. Go home, boy . . . If you can find it? Say Hi to Dad for me."

"But I can’t, without the beans." Jack looked extremely disappointed. Then he brightened with a thought. "I want to ask the Witch herself. Could you wake her up?"

The fellow looked at the long shadow caused by the old tree. "It’s about that time anyway, hand me her head." Jack did. "Thanks, get a good hold on her body. She sometimes moves around quite a bit when I wake her. But I’m warning you, careful about asking her stuff. She is a witch."

"What does that mean?" Jack got a hold of her headless shoulders.

The fellow held the head above the body.