Then he looked up and gave the devil a broad grin.
“Ten out of ten.”
“So I passed the exam?” asked the devil.
“Now, now. Don’t get carried away! You have passed the reading test. Now you must go through to the next room, which belongs to the Good Lord, my father. He will give you the writing test. Off you go!”
“Goodbye, Little Jesus,” said the devil. “And thank you!”
“Goodbye.”
The devil left the room, turned right again and stopped in front of the next door. This door had a silver plaque, on which the following was inscribed:
GOOD LORD
Twenty-four hour opening
Enter without knocking
The devil went in. This second classroom was much like the first, only a good deal smaller. The Good Lord was also sitting at a teacher’s desk. He was a handsome old man in a red cloak with a long white beard and a double halo over his head. The little devil began to speak:
“Good Lord, sir…”
“Pointless, my dear, I know everything. My son has sent you here to take the writing test.”
“Yes, sir…”
“Not a word now. Sit down, we shall do a dictation.”
The little devil sat down at a table. On it were a fountain pen and some paper. He picked up the pen, dipped it in his inkwell and waited.
“Are you ready?” asked the Good Lord. “I’ll begin now.”
The little devil leant over his paper and… didn’t hear a word. After a moment, he looked up again. He saw that the Good Lord was moving his lips, but not making any sound at all.
“Excuse me, Good Lord, sir…”
“I pray you not to interrupt me. What is it?”
“I can’t hear you.”
“Really? In that case, I’ll start again.”
And the Good Lord began once more to move his lips without making any sound at all. Then, since the devil remained motionless where he was, the Lord stopped and reproached him gravely:
“Now, then, what are you waiting for? Don’t you know how to write?”
“I do, I do, but…”
“Fine, so I’ll say it all over for the third time. But if you don’t write anything, you’ll get a zero!”
And he began his silent performance just as before.
“Well, this is just too bad,” the little devil thought to himself, “I’ll have to write something, no matter what.”
And he began to write, with all the care he could muster:
Dear Good Lord,
I am very sorry, for I cannot hear a word of what you’re saying. Nevertheless, since I must write something, I am taking this opportunity to tell you that I love you very much, that I would like to be good so as to stay near you, even if I can only be the lowest of your angels.
LITTLE DEVIL
“Have you finished?” asked the Good Lord.
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, hand it in, then.”
The Good Lord took the sheet of paper, read it, raised his eyebrows and began to chuckle:
“So it turns out to be true, you do know how to write!”
“Have I passed the exams then?”
“Not so fast, young man! The hardest test is still to come. You must go through to the next room, which belongs to my mother, for the maths test. Pay close attention, for my mother is strict. Now, get along with you!”
“Thank you, Good Lord!”
On the third door there was a gold plaque with the following inscription:
VIRGIN MARY
Mother of God
Queen of Heaven
Knock before Entering
The devil gave two small taps. A woman’s voice answered him:
“Enter.”
This room, too, was a classroom, but an absolutely tiny one, minuscule, containing only one table and the teacher’s desk. Naturally, the mother of God was sitting at the desk. She was wearing a long blue dress and had a magnificent, three-tiered halo. The little devil was so nervous that he didn’t dare say a word.
“Sit down,” said the Virgin Mary.
She gave him a sheet of paper, a fountain pen and some coloured pencils, and told him:
“Now, pay attention! Your task is to find a three-figure number that can be divided by three, and that has blue eyes and one leg shorter than the other. I’ll be back in ten minutes. If, in ten minutes’ time, you’ve not found this number, then you’ve failed and we’ll have to send you away.”
And she left the room.
Now the little devil felt really lost. And yet, once again, he did not want to sit and do nothing, so he decided:
“I could still start by looking for three-figure numbers that can be divided by three. That will surely be better than nothing…”
Perhaps you know this already: a number can be divided by three when the total of all its digits added together can itself be divided by three. The little devil began to write down a long list of these three-digit numbers, one after the other:
123, 543, 624, 525, 282, 771, 189, 222, etc.
Then he looked hard at them, while allowing his mind to wander, and all of a sudden, going back to the number 189, he noticed something:
He noticed that number 189 had a belly and a head, and even two legs. The head was the top circle of the 8 and the belly, its bottom circle. As for the two legs, they were the 1 and the 9—and one leg was longer than the other, for the tail of the 9 came down below the line where the 1 ended.
Now the little devil cut his piece of paper into two, and on the blank half he drew a lovely, big number 189, with the 8 a little higher than the other two digits. Now he had only to draw two blue eyes in the 8’s top circle, which he did right away. While he was at it, he added a little red mouth, a small nose and two ears. He had just finished his drawing when the Mother of God came back in:
“Well? Have you found the number?”
She came over, looked at the little devil’s drawing and began to laugh:
“Oh! But this is very nicely done!”
She took the half-sheet of paper between her thumb and index finger, gave it a little shake, and plunk! The number 189 fell out onto the desk, from where it jumped to the ground and ran around, hobbling joyously, and finally ran out by the door, which the Holy Virgin had left open. And nobody was surprised, for you get all sorts in Paradise: people, animals, objects… even numbers!
“You have passed our entrance exams,” said the Virgin Mary. “Now, come with me.”
And she took the little devil with her, first of all to the showers, in order to wash away a few little sins he might still have behind his ears. Then to the clothes depot, where he exchanged his bat-wings for a beautiful pair of swan’s wings. Lastly to the hairdresser, who tried to saw his horns off. But they were too tough, so he made do with setting a brand new, milk-white halo on top of them.
After this, they went back into the courtyard. This time it was crowded, for it was playtime, and the Mother of God introduced the little devil to the other angels.
“Here is a new companion for you,” she said. “He deserves all our respect for reaching us here, for he comes from far away! Please treat him like one of the family.”
There was a murmur of surprise, and one old, pink angel stepped forward:
“Excuse me, Holy Virgin, but this can’t be right! An angel that is red from head to foot, with a pair of horns? Why, this is unheard of!”
“You are a bunch of ninnies, aren’t you?” said the Virgin Mary. “True: you’ve never seen a red angel before. So what? Is this the very first time you are seeing something you have never seen before?”
The other angels burst out laughing and the aged pink angel politely admitted that his comment had been silly.
Now the little devil lives in heaven. And if Paradise were not Paradise, the other angels would be envious of his fine red skin and his black horns.
As for his devil father, when he learnt what had happened, he shook his head:
&n
bsp; “I might have bet this would happen,” he said. “It had to end like this. Thanks to his hopeless, devil-may-care attitude, our son has finished up in God’s hands! Well, it’s just too bad! Let me never hear his name again!”
Now, if ever you take a holiday in Hell, you must take care not to mention the tale of the good little devil. Down there, his story is considered a very bad example for the young ones, and their parents will soon find a way to make you be quiet!
The Love Story of a Potato
There was once a potato—a common potato, such as we see every day—but this one was eaten up with ambition. Her lifelong dream was to become a French fry. And this is probably what would have happened to her, had the youngest boy in the house not stolen her from the kitchen.
As soon as he had his booty safely in his bedroom, the little boy pulled a knife from his pocket and set about carving the potato. He began by giving her two eyes—and at once the potato could see. After which he gave her two ears—and the potato was able to hear. Finally, he gave her a mouth—and the potato was able to speak. Then the boy made her look at herself in a mirror, saying:
“See how beautiful you are!”
“How dreadful!” replied the potato. “I am not the least bit beautiful. I look like a boy! I was much happier before.”
“Fine, okay then!” replied the little boy, annoyed. “If that’s how you see it…”
And he threw the potato in the bin.
Early the next morning, the bin was emptied and, later that day, the potato was dumped along with a great heap of other rubbish, in the middle of the countryside.
“An attractive region,” she said, “and very popular at that! What a collection of fascinating people there are here… Now, who can that be, looking rather like a frying pan?”
It was an old guitar, nearly split in half, with only two strings left intact.
“Hello there, madame,” said the potato. “It seems to me, from your appearance, that you must be a very distinguished person, for you bear a marvellous resemblance to a frying pan!”
“You are very kind,” said the guitar. “I do not know what a frying pan would be, but I thank you all the same. It’s true that I’m not just anybody. My name is Guitar. And yours?”
“Well, my name is Maris Piper. But you can call me Potato for, from today, I shall count you an intimate friend. Because of my beauty, I was selected to become a French fry, and I should have become one had I not suffered the misfortune of being stolen from the kitchen by the youngest boy in the house. What is worse, having stolen me, the scoundrel completely disfigured me with these pairs of eyes and ears and this awful mouth…”
And the potato began to cry.
“Now, now, don’t cry,” said the guitar. “You are still very elegant. And besides, this means you can speak…”
“That’s true,” agreed the potato. “It’s a great consolation. In the end—to finish my story—when I saw what that little monster had done to me, I was furious, and I wrenched the knife right out of his hands, cut off his nose and ran away.”
“Well done, you!” the guitar responded.
“Don’t you think?” said the potato. “But, what about you? How do you come to be here?”
“Well,” replied the guitar, “for many years I was best friends with a handsome young boy, who loved me dearly. He used to bend over me, take me in his arms, caress me, strum me, pluck the strings on my belly while singing such delightful songs to me…”
The guitar sighed, then her voice grew bitter and she went on:
“One day he came back with a strange instrument. This one was also a guitar, but made of metal, and oh so heavy, vulgar and stupid! She took my friend from me, she bewitched him. I am sure he didn’t really love her. He never sang her any tender songs when he picked her up—not one! He used to pluck furiously at her strings and give savage howls and roll about on the ground with her—you would have thought they were fighting! Besides, he didn’t trust her! The plain proof is that he kept her tied up on a leash!”
In fact, what had happened was that the handsome young man had bought an electric guitar, and what our guitar had taken for a leash was in fact the wire that connected the new guitar to the electricity.
“Anyway, however it happened, she stole him from me. After only a few days he only had eyes for her, he no longer looked at me at all. And when I saw that, well, I preferred to leave him…”
The guitar was lying. She had not left of her own accord; her master had thrown her out. But she would never have admitted that.
In any case, the potato hadn’t understood a word.
“What a beautiful story!” she said. “How moving! I’m quite beside myself. I knew we were made to understand each other. Besides, the more I look at you, the more I feel you look like a frying pan!”
But while they were chatting like this, a tramp going by on the high road heard them, stopped and listened harder.
“Now this is no ordinary how-d’ye-do,” he thought. “An old guitar telling her life story to an old potato, and the potato answering. If I can do this right, I’ll be a rich man!”
He found a way into the wasteland, picked up the potato and put her in his pocket, then he grabbed the guitar and took the two friends with him to the next town.
This town had a large central square, and in the square there was a circus. The tramp went and knocked on the circus ringmaster’s door.
“Mista Ringmaster! Mista Ringmaster sir!”
“Hmph? What? Come in! What do you want?”
The tramp stepped into the caravan.
“Mista Ringmaster, I have a talking guitar!”
“Hmph? What? Talking guitar?”
“Yes yes, Mista Ringmaster! And a potato that answers it back!”
“Hmph? What? What is this story? Are you drunk, my friend?”
“No, no, I’m not drunk. Please just listen!”
The tramp put the guitar on the table, then took the potato from his pocket and put them next to each other.
“Now, hop to it. Talk, you two!”
Silence.
“Talk, I tell you!”
More silence. The Ringmaster’s face flushed an angry red.
“Tell me, my friend, did you come here purely to make a fool of me?”
“Of course not, Mista Ringmaster! I’m telling you, they do talk, both of them, to each other. Just now, they’re being difficult so as to annoy me, but…”
“Get out!”
“But when they are alone…”
“I said: get out!”
“But Mista Ringmaster…”
“Hm? What? You haven’t left yet? Very good, I shall throw you out myself!”
The ringmaster caught the tramp by the seat of his pants and—therr-whumpp!—he tossed him out. But at that very moment, he heard a great burst of laughter behind him. Unable to hold her tongue any longer, the potato had just said to the guitar:
“Hey, do you think we fooled him? He he he!”
“And how! We fooled him good and proper!” the guitar was saying. “Ha ha ha!”
The ringmaster whirled around:
“Well I never, how about that! The old drunk was telling the truth. You can talk, both of you!”
Silence.
“Come on,” the ringmaster went on. “There’s no point keeping quiet now. You can’t fool me any longer: I heard you!”
Silence.
“That is a pity!” the ringmaster said then, with a cunning expression. “I had a rather exciting proposal for you. An artistic proposal!”
“Artistic?” asked the guitar.
“Shut up!” hissed the potato.
“But I adore art!”
“Now we’re getting somewhere!” said the ringmaster. “I can see that you’re a sensible pair. And indeed, you will have work, both of you—oh yes you will. You will become stars.”
“I’d rather become a French fry,” objected the potato.
“A French fry? You—with your talent? That
would be a crime! Would you really prefer to be eaten than to be famous?”
“What do you mean, ‘eaten’? Do people eat French fries?” asked the potato.
“Do we eat French fries? Of course we eat them! Why do you think we’re always frying more?”
“Really? I didn’t know!” said the potato. “Well, if that’s how things stand, then fine. I’d rather become a star.”
A week later, all over the town, big yellow posters appeared on which were written:
THE FABULOUS CIRCUS OF WHATSIT
See clowns! See acrobats!
Bareback riders! Trapeze-artists!
See tigers, ponies, elephants, fleas!
And, in their world premiere show:
NOÉMIE, the performing potato
And AGATHE, the guitar who plays herself!
The big top was full on the new show’s first night, for nobody in that part of the world had seen anything like it before.
When their turn came, the band played a military march while the potato and the guitar stepped bravely into the ring. To start with, the potato introduced their number. Then the guitar played a difficult piece by herself. Then the potato sang a song, accompanied by the guitar, who sang a harmony while playing herself at the same time. And then, the potato pretended to sing a wrong note and the guitar pretended to catch her out. The potato pretended to get angry and they both pretended to have a big argument, to the great delight of the audience. Finally, they pretended to make up and be friends again and they sang their last song together.
The potato and the guitar were a huge success. Their act was recorded for radio and for television and, soon, people were talking about it all over the world. Having seen it on the news, the Sultan of Bakofbiyondistan flew over that afternoon in his private jet, to see the ringmaster.
“Hello, Mister Ringmaster.”
“Hello, Mister Sultan. What can I do for you?”
“I should like to marry the potato.”
“The potato? Now, look here, she’s not a person!”
“Very well, I’ll buy her.”
The Good Little Devil and Other Tales Page 8
