Jasper stared at the gold silently.
Then a strange smile crept across his face.
After Mara left, he sat outside thinking.
“How can a poor old woman give someone gold?”
The next morning, he returned to the street where they had met her.
He waited.
Two days passed.
On the third day, he finally saw her again carrying water.
“Mama, let me help you,” he said quickly.
She studied him carefully but allowed him to carry the bucket.
When they reached her house, Jasper pretended to cry.
“My father is sick. We need money for medicine.”
The woman watched him silently.
“Do I look like someone with money?” she asked calmly.
Jasper kept pretending.
Finally, she pointed behind the house.
“Under the tree is a small pot. Bring it.”
Jasper ran behind the house.
Inside the pot were many gold bars.
His heart raced.
“No one is watching,” he whispered.
For a moment he considered taking everything.
Instead, he carried the pot back.
The woman gave him one bar.
“Keep it for seven days. Don’t touch it.”
But greed filled Jasper’s heart.
When he returned the pot behind the house, he secretly stole three more bars and hid them inside his shirt.
As he walked away, fear flickered inside him.
A few days later, something strange happened.
People saw Jasper wandering the streets barefoot, laughing and talking to himself.
“Gold! I’m rich!” he shouted wildly.
Children ran away from him.
“Isn’t that Jasper?” people whispered.
“What happened to him?”
Mara soon saw him.
“Jasper!” she cried.
His clothes were torn, and his eyes were wild.
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