1Once there was a young man named Jack.
2He lived with his mother on a small farm at the foot of the Foggy Mountains.
3Jack and his mother were very poor.
4Their only way of making money was selling the milk from their cow, Bess.
5One morning, Jack's mother woke him up early.
6It was still dark outside.
7She was crying.
8"Jack, wake up!"
9"Go to the market today and sell our cow, Bess."
10"But why?" asked Jack, yawning.
11"We need money to fix our house."
12"There are holes in the roof."
13"The windows are broken."
14"For heaven's sake, we've no front door."
15"Winter is coming soon."
16"If we don't fix the house,"
17"the cold will kill us!"
18Jack packed his bag and fetched Bess from the barn.
19As he was walking out the gate, he heard his mother shout:
20"She is worth at least five gold coins!"
21"Don't sell her for less!"
22When Jack was half way to the market,
23he met an old man.
24"Good morning, my boy!" said the old man.
25"Where are you going today?"
26"Good morning, sir," replied Jack.
27"I'm going to the market to sell my cow."
28"Her name is Bess."
29"She is a beautiful cow," said the man.
30"I will buy Bess"
31"and I will give you a very good deal!"
32"How much will you pay for her?
33"I won't take less than five gold coins!" said Jack.
34"I don't have five gold coins," whispered the man.
35"But I have these five black beans!"
36"These beans are magic beans!"
37"They are worth more than gold!"
38"If you take these beans"
39"you will be richer than the richest man in the world."
40Jack thought about his mother.
41He thought about how happy she would be if they were rich.
42They could fix the roof, the windows, and the front door.
43Maybe they could buy a new cow!
44"Okay," said Jack.
45"You've got a deal."
46"Give me the beans!"
47Jack was very excited.
48He ran home and showed his mother the beans.
49But instead of being happy, she was furious.
50"You foolish boy!"
51"You traded our only cow for a handful of beans?!"
52She took the beans and threw them out the window.
53Then she sat down beside the fire and cried.
54Jack was devastated.
55He shut himself in his bedroom.
56He felt so stupid.
57They no longer had a cow,
58and now they were poorer than before.
59What a disaster!
60And it was all his fault!
61...
62The next morning when Jack opened the curtains,
63he saw something very strange.
64In the same place where his mother had thrown the beans,
65there was a giant, green beanstalk.
66It stretched from the ground, up, up, up...
67all the way to the clouds.
68"The beans really are magic!" whispered Jack.
69"The old man was telling the truth!"
70Jack's mother was still asleep,
71so Jack decided to climb the beanstalk
72to look for the riches the old man had described.
73"Just five gold coins," thought Jack.
74"That's all I need to make my mother happy."
75Jack climbed up, up, up,
76higher and higher into the clouds.
77When he reached the top, he was very hungry.
78He saw a castle in the distance.
79"Maybe I can find something to eat in that castle..." he thought.
80Jack walked up to the door of the castle and knocked twice.
81Knock knock!
82A giantess opened the door.
83She was as big as a house,
84but she had a warm smile and gentle eyes.
85"Excuse me, Mrs. Giant," said Jack.
86"Could you please give me something to eat?"
87"I am so hungry!"
88"Oh you poor boy!" said the giantess.
89She could see that Jack was very thin.
90"Of course! Come in! Come in!"
91The kind giantess gave Jack some vegetable stew.
92He was enjoying it so much that he didn't notice when the kitchen table started to shake.
93Stomp... Stomp... Stomp...
94Loud footsteps echoed down the hallway.
95"Oh dear," whispered the giantess.
96"That is my husband!"
97"He is home from work!"
98"He doesn't like humans!"
99"Quick! Hide!"
100Jack hid in the pantry.
101The giant stomped into the kitchen and sniffed the air.
102"FEE FI FO FUM!...
103Hello my beautiful wife!
104Wait! Do I smell a human man?
105"Yuck! where is he?"
106"Good evening, my darling husband," replied the giantess.
107"There is nobody here."
108"You smell the vegetable stew, nothing more."
109"Good," grunted the giant.
110"I hate humans."
111He sat down at the table in the kitchen.
112The giant took a small sack of gold coins out of his pocket and counted them.
113One... Two... Three... Four... Five gold coins.
114Jack watched from inside the pantry.
115"Five gold coins!" thought Jack.
116"If I had that money, I could fix our house!"
117When the two giants left the room,
118Jack stole the five gold coins and slipped them into his bag.
119"This is all I need!" thought Jack.
120But then Jack remembered that his family no longer had a cow.
121Without a cow, they would surely starve.
122He decided to stay and look for other treasures.
123He followed the giant into the living room and hid under the couch.
124The giant went to the cupboard and pulled out a golden hen.
125"Hello, my beautiful hen!"
126"Lay, please!" said the giant,
127and the hen laid a golden egg.
128Jack watched from under the couch.
129"A hen that lays golden eggs!" whispered Jack.
130"If I had that hen, I could buy 50 cows!"
131When the giant left the room,
132Jack crawled out from under the couch.
133He went to the cupboard, took the hen, and put it in his bag.
134"This is all I need... " thought Jack.
135But then Jack thought about what the old man had promised.
136Jack imagined being richer than the richest man in the world.
137He decided to see what other treasures he could find.
138He followed the giant into the bedroom, and hid under the bed.
139There was a golden harp standing in a corner of the room.
140"Hello, my beautiful harp."
141"Play, please!" said the giant.
142The harp began playing music with no one touching the strings.
143...
144"Wow! A magic harp!" whispered Jack.
145"That harp would make me rich and famous!"
146When the giant fell asleep,
147Jack crawled out from under the bed.
148He took the magic harp and put it in his bag.
149But this time Jack was less lucky.
150The magic harp screamed,
151"Help me, master! A human is stealing me!"
152The giant woke up and saw Jack with the magic harp, the golden hen, and his gold coins.
153"Stop, thief!"
154The giant chased Jack out of the bedroom,
155down the hallway, through the kitchen, and out the front door.
156But Jack was smaller and faster than the giant.
157Jack reached the beanstalk first and slid down.
158He arrived at the ground with all his treasures.
159The giant reached the top of the beanstalk and looked down.
160He was afraid of heights.
161He slowly climbed down.
162"Be careful my husband!"
163shouted the giantess from the castle.
164"Humans can be dangerous!"
165Jack saw the giant coming down the beanstalk.
166So he ran into his house and grabbed an axe.
167He chopped the beanstalk.
168Whack! Whack! Whack!
169Suddenly, the beanstalk snapped.
170The giant came tumbling down from the sky.
171He fell down, down, down, and landed far away,
172on the other side of the Foggy Mountains.
173Thud!
174For a moment everything was silent.
175Then Jack heard a strange sound from far away.
176"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooo!"
177It was the giant.
178The beanstalk had fallen,
179and now he had no way to get back up to his castle in the clouds.
180The giant yelled so loudly that the clouds shook and turned gray.
181Then somewhere up in the sky,
182Jack heard Mrs. Giant start to cry.
183Her tears fell through the clouds in tiny drops and soaked the earth.
184After that, Jack and his mother lived a very comfortable life.
185The golden hen made Jack a millionaire.
186The magic harp made him famous.
187Jack married a rich and famous woman and together they had ten children.
188But Jack was never truly happy.
189Every time the wind blew,
190Jack heard the giant calling for his wife.
191And every time it rained,
192he felt the giant wife's tears falling on him.
193Jack felt sad and guilty.
194One day, when Jack was very old,
195he decided that he didn't want to be sad any more.
196He opened a box on his mantelpiece
197and pulled out one last shrivelled magic bean.
198If he could find the giant, he could grow another beanstalk.
199Then the giant could climb back up to his castle in the clouds.
200If he could find the giant, he could also apologize for being so greedy.
201Jack packed his bag and walked into the Foggy Mountains.
202Did Jack find the giant?
203Did he grow a new beanstalk with the last magic bean?
204Nobody knows.
205But people say, if you listen closely during a thunderstorm,
206you can hear the rumbling sound of two giants
207dancing together in the clouds.