Beauty and the, uh ...Beast

Once upon a time, there was a mink farmer* who had three beautiful daughters. The oldest daughter was really great at making the pelts shiny, so she was known as 'Beauty.' The second daughter was especially good at scraping the guts off the pelts, so she was known as 'Stinky.' And the third daughter was particularly good at catching the minks, so she was known as 'Sneaky.'"

One day, the mink farmer noticed he was running out of mink, so he got ready to go into the woods to set traps. The traps he set were special because the minks' feet need to stay in tact for their fur to be valuable. Women who wear fur coats (or who did when it was socially acceptable to do so) think it's extra special to have all four feet still attached. In order to bait these special traps, the farmer used elderberries because everyone knows no mink can resist an elderberry. He went out into the woods to search out elderberries and ALL the elderberries had already been eaten by the mink out in the forest! So the man kept searching and searching.

He came to a castle in the middle of the forest and walked around it. On the far side of the castle, the mink farmer came to a bush full of gorgeously ripe elderberries! He started picking the berries off the bush and putting them in his pouch. After he had picked all the berries he could find, he turned around to leave and what did he see but a beast that had a mink's head! The man was, of course, frightened, especially when the mink beast began to speak.

"Why have you picked all my elderberries? I have waited and waited for those berries to be perfectly ripe and I was going to pick them tomorrow night at the height of the full moon, when they are the best," the mink beast said in a great and scary voice.

"Um... I was picking them to catch mink for my fur trade," the man answered, trembling.

"You are one who catches my mink children for fur? Go home and bring me back of your children so that I may have her pelt. If you do not, I will eat you right here."

The man hightailed it away from the castle and ran all the way home to his daughters. "Daughters, one of you needs to sacrifice herself for the family." He explained about the mink beast and said, "I have to take care of the other two daughters, so one of you needs to go." He really was a very selfish man.

The oldest daughter, Beauty, volunteered to go back to the mink beast thinking that she could appeal to his mercy. Well, she couldn't. The mink beast ate her. The End.

*No animals were hurt in the telling of this story.



I wish I could have transcribed the way Morgan told it. I tried to get the various details, but some of his wording was so exquisite. So here's my attempt to stay true to the feel, at least. Isn't he a born storyteller? :)