Letters From My Windmill by Alphonse Daudet (korean novels in english TXT) 📕

Monsieur de Girardin'scartoons. Rumour has it that there are some awful things in it…. Iwas soon to discover the truth of it. The old over-stuffed wallet hadburst open as it fell and the papers inside fell onto the carpet; I hadto collect them one by one….

There was a package of letters written on decorated paper, allbeginning, My dear Daddy, and signed, Céline Bixiou at the Childrenof Mary hospital.

There were old prescriptions for childhood ailments: croup,convulsions, scarlet fever and measles…. (the poor little girl hadn'tmissed out on a single one of them!)

Finally, there was a hidden envelope from which came a two or threecurly, blond hairs, which might have come from the girl's bonnet. Therewas some writing on it in a large, unsteady hand; the handwriting of ablind man:

Céline's hair, cut the 13th May, the day she went to that hell.

That's all there was in Bixiou's wallet.

Let's face it, Parisians, you're all the same; disgust, irony, evillaughter at vicious jokes. And what does it all amount to?…

Céline's hair, cut on the 13th May.

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN BRAIN

To the Lady who wants pleasant stories.

I took your letter, madame, as an invitation to change my ways. I havebeen tempted to shade my little tales a touch too darkly, and Ipromised myself to give you something joyful, wildly joyful, today.

After all, what have I got to be sad about? Here I am living hundredsof kilometres from the fogs of Paris, on a radiantly beautifulhillside, in the land of the tambourine and Muscat wine. Around mywindmill, everything is sunshine and music; I have wind orchestras ofwheatears, bands of blue-tits, and choirs of curlews from morning tomidday. And the cicadas, and the shepherds playing their fifes, and thedark haired young beauties laughing amongst the vines…. To tell thetruth, this is no place for brooding; I'd rather rush rose-colouredpoems and basketsful of spicy stories to you ladies.

And yet—I can't. I am still too near to Paris. Every day, even hereamongst my precious pines, it finds me with its ink-stained fingers ofmisery…. Even as I write, I have just heard the lamentable news ofthe death of poor Charles Barbara, and my windmill is plunged intogrief.

Farewell, curlews and cicadas! I haven't the heart for jollity rightnow… For that reason, madam, instead of the pretty little tale whichI had promised, you will only have yet another melancholy story today.

* * * * *

Once, there was a man with a golden brain; yes, madame, a brain madeentirely from gold. At birth, the doctors thought he wouldn't survivelong, so heavy was his head and so oversized his skull. However, he didlive and he thrived in the sunshine like a lovely olive tree. Exceptthat his huge head went everywhere with him and it was pitiful to seehim bumping into all the furniture as he walked about the house….

All too often, he would fall down. One day, he fell from the top flightof some marble steps and just happened to catch his head on one. Hishead rang like an ingot. It could have killed him, but when he got up,there was nothing wrong except there was a small wound with two orthree traces of congealed gold in his blond locks. That was how hisparents learned that their child had a brain of pure gold.

* * * * *

It was kept a close secret, and the poor little thing himself suspectednothing. Sometimes he would ask why he wasn't allowed to go outside toplay with the other boys in the street.

"Someone would steal from you, my treasure!" his mother told him….Then the little lad, being terrified of being robbed, made no complaintas he went back to playing alone and dragging himself sadly from roomto room….It wasn't until he was eighteen years old that his parentstold him of this monstrous gift from fate. Since they had nurtured himand fed him all his life, they told him that it was about time he paidthem back with some of his gold. The child didn't hesitate; he would doit that right then—but how?

The legend didn't tell him. He pulled out a nut sized piece of goldfrom his skull and placed it proudly onto his mother's lap…. Then,dazzled by the riches within his head, he became maddened by desire anddrunk with power. So, he left the family home, and went out into theworld to squander his treasure.

* * * * *

By the way he was living his life—royally—and spreading his goldaround—lavishly—you would have thought his brain inexhaustible. Andyet it did become exhausted—as could be seen by the dullness in hiseyes and his pinched cheeks.

Finally, one morning, after a night of wild debauchery, the wretchedboy, alone amongst the debris of the festivities and the dimmingchandeliers, became terrified about the enormous hole appearing in hisingot of a brain. It was time to stop. From then on, he was like a newman. The man with the golden brain, went far away to live alone andwork with his hands. He became suspicious and timid like a miser,turning his back on temptation, and trying to forget the fatal richesthat he no longer wanted…. Unfortunately, a friend, who knew of hissecret, had followed him. One night, the poor man was suddenly woken upby an excruciating pain in his head. He jumped up frantically andcaught sight of the friend running away in the moonlight withsomething under his coat…. Another piece of brain had been stolen!…

* * * * *

Some time later, the man with the golden brain fell in love, and thistime, too, it came out very badly….

He fell deeply in love with a petite, blond woman, who loved him a lot,too, but who loved fripperies, white feathers, and pretty, gold-tinged,tassels bobbling along the full length of her boots, even more. In thehands of this cute little creature—half bird, half doll—the goldpieces just melted away at her pleasure. She indulged every known whim,and he could never bring himself to say no to her. He even kept backthe awful truth about his fortune to the very end, for fear ofupsetting her.

—Are we really rich