Once upon a time there was a poor boy named Jack, who lived with his poor alcoholic mother in a poor house near a poor town. One day, Jack's mother was desperate, so she decided to sell the family cow, to raise money for her booze. She called Jack.
"Jack," she called. He hurried to her side, his old and dirty clothes flapping in the breeze.
"Yes, Mamma?"
She smacked him on the head with her open palm. "You hurry when I call you, simpleton!"
"Yes, Mamma." The boy cowered in fear, as he usually did when his mother was drying out.
Handing him the rope attached to her cow's neck, the woman said, "Jack, now, listen up, boy!" She smacked him again. "You go into town, and you sell this cow, understand. Listen, stupid! This cow ought to fetch enough for a case of white lightnin', you hear? And a box of them cigars I like. You know, the ones as big around as my thumb. If you get cheated, don't bother to come home, you sorry excuse for a son."
"Y-yes, Mamma."
She smacked him again. "Go on, boy!"
His head still spinning from the blows, Jack staggered down the road toward town.
Along the way, Jack met a man dressed in simple, but clean, clothes, puffing on a filterless cigarette. He was dressed all in green, from his hat down to his pointy-toed shoes. Jack could only stare.
"Whassa matter, boy? Ain't you never seen a leprechaun before?"
Jack smiled and, his eyes as big as saucers, exclaimed, "Gosh, no. A real leprechaun?"
"Sure, kid. That's me. Leo the leprechaun." His gaze followed the rope from Jack's hand to the cow. "Whatcha' doin' with the bovine, slugger?"
"Huh?"
"The cow, half-wit, the cow. Where-are-you-taking-the-cow?"
"Oh. Are you a real leprechaun?"
"What, does your brain work slower than mud?" Seeing a blank stare, he continued. "Okay, yeah, kid. Sure. A real leprechaun." He snapped off a branch from a nearby wild plum tree, bearing six or seven plums. "And these are magic beans. Want to trade them for your cow?"
"Gosh. Magic beans?"
"Sure, kid. These are genuine magic beans, or I'm not a real leprechaun."
Struggling to think, Jack slowly said, "Trade ... for the cow? Okay."
Stunned, the man handed Jack the branch, and Jack handed him the cow's leash.
"Thanks, kid." He left with the cow.
"Thank you," Jack gushed. He hurried home.
Arriving at his house, he cried, "Mamma! Mamma!"
She stepped outside and screamed at her son, "I don't see no whiskey, boy! You ain't been gone long enough to go to town, either. What the hell did you do with my cow?"
He rushed up to her, beaming. "Look, Mamma," he said, showing her the branch of plums. "I traded the cow for these magic beans."
She fainted.
When she came to, her face turned beet red. "Jack, give me that branch."
Jack did as he was told.
She snatched it out of his hand and expertly stripped off the plums, leaves, and small twigs in one motion. Grabbing the back of his pants and pulling them to his knees, she used her new switch on Jack's bare bottom, beating until the skin was raw and red, then beating some more. "I'll teach you to trade my cow for some damn plum twig!"
Jack wailed, "Mamma, I already know how to!"
When she was exhausted, she suddenly remembered that she had some "medicinal" whiskey. She guzzled it and passed out.
Battered and bruised, Jack called the welfare people. They brought the sheriff, saw what had happened, and arrested Jack's mother. They took Jack to a doctor, then grudgingly allowed him to stay home alone, after stocking the kitchen with enough food for a week or two.
When all the commotion died down, Jack took the drugs the doctor had prescribed and fell asleep (on his stomach).
Jack awoke to the first rays of morning light. He looked out the window and saw a beanstalk that stretched so high that it disappeared into the clouds. Actually, it was a magic wild plum tree, but Jack thought it was a beanstalk, and no one was around to tell him anything different. So Jack climbed out his window and started climbing his "beanstalk."
Jack climbed until his arms ached, then climbed some more. He reached a spot just below the clouds where several branches met, so he could relax and rest for awhile. Jack snacked on plums, never wondering how plums grew on a beanstalk. He dozed, then resumed his climb. Jack also never wondered why he might climb this beanstalk; he just did.
Within a few short hours, or long ones, if you happened to be climbing a giant plum tree, Jack emerged above the clouds. Looking through the clearest, crispest sky he had ever seen, Jack could see an immense castle, looming in the distance.
Stepping off the plant and onto the cloud, Jack excitedly said to himself, "I've heard about things like this. I'll bet that castle has a giant in it, and a goose that lays golden eggs, and all the good stuff that I need to take home."
Unfortunately, clouds do not possess enough substance to support a human being, a fact that Jack had overlooked. He plunged through the cloud and to the ground below, becoming nothing more than a pool of slime at the base of a crater.
Jack's mother was released from jail for lack of evidence, and she lived a number of years more, surviving on plums and plum wine. She eventually died the same way as Jack, plunging to her death when her hand slipped while picking plums. Not long thereafter, the tree also died.
No one ever realized that a giant did, indeed inhabit the castle Jack saw. One day the giant spied the plum tree.
"Look, Martha," he told his giant wife. "Darn weeds even grow up here in the clouds." He grabbed his weed killer and hopped along some stepping stones to the tree, which he sprayed. Within a few days, it had shriveled and died.
"Dang," he told his wife. "I thought when we moved here, we'd get away from gardening. I hate taking care of a lawn."
"Yes, dear," she said. "Maybe it's the only one."
"I hope so. Dang nuisance, if you ask me."
