“Alas, husband!” she cried one night, “I have no pleasure in feasting that you cannot share.”
“In truth, this is no life!” angrily exclaimed Anselm. “To sit at a banquet one may not taste with a wife who cannot see one’s jokes. I can bear it no longer. Why should not I seek this strange woman and make the same bargain? If husband and wife may not share their jokes, they must at least share their dinner. Tell me quickly where I may find this ‘Bargain House.’”
Jasmine told her husband the way through the deep, dark forest, and early the next morning he set forth in search of the mysterious building. An hour’s walking brought him within sight of just such a house as his wife had described. It moved nearer, sped three times around him and then stood still. As he stared at it, the door slowly opened, the gentle, commanding voice bade him enter, and there stood the tall, smiling woman of his wife’s description.
“Good morning, Anselm,” she said, in the voice that was soft like the fall of snow. “Would you have a purse that shall always bear a thousand guineas?”
“Indeed I would!” cried Anselm. “Have you one for me?”
“Yes, if you consent to my terms.”
“What is it that you want? My Sense of Humour? Of what use is it to me now? I will gladly part with it.”
“No,” said the woman. “’Tis not your Sense of Humour I require of you, it is your Sense of Beauty.”
“Take what you will from me,” cried Anselm. “I care not so I have one of those wondrous purses.”
“Listen first, Anselm,” said the woman, and solemnly, as she had warned Jasmine, so she warned him that the magic money could be spent on none save himself, and that the sense he sold could be bought back only by the owner of such another purse.