Once Upon a Time - Short Stories

Author:
Clive Williams
Updated:
Dec 10, 2017 5:25 PM EST

Once Upon a Time The Village Caught a Leprechaun

It was near bedtime for Sally and Tim. There father would always make them a nice warm cup of chocolate tea just before bedtime. It was like a weekend bedtime tradition. Sally and Tim looked forward for this warm cup of chocolate tea every Saturday night and of course, one of daddy's "Once Upon a Time" bedtime stories. The chocolate tea was ready, and so was Sally and Tim. Both looking bright eyed at their dad in anticipation of the wonderful tale to be told. There dad looked at them, smiled and began is engaging story.

Have you ever been to Ireland? Their father asked?

The kids chuckled and answered. "No Dad, we are only 9 and 7 and you have never brought us."

"Oh, just 8 and 6 you say?"

The kids laughed and sally replied, "Daddy, you know our age, stop being silly."

"Well, OK, if you want to get old quick that's your choice. Now let's get on with this story shall we?"

In a small rural village in Ireland, there was a small town with a population of just over 500 People. Everyone knew each other and were really good friends. This little village was not the richest town in Ireland as most of the workers were simple fishermen who lived pretty simple lives. All the children in the village went to the same school. All the mothers and Fathers went to the same church, actually it was the only church in BogotVille. One day a wealthy realtor came and saw how beautiful the land was which Bogotville was built on. He fell in love with the land and decided he wanted the entire land for himself. Many of these poor fisher folk worked tirelessly to pay the mortgage on their houses which were home to them for decades. Most owed the bank enormous amount of money on their loans and were struggling to pay. So the realtor approached the bank to buy the entire land and made them an offer the bank could not refuse.

The Bank then served notice to all the citizens of Bogotville telling them to pay off their loan or face eviction. The residents of BogotVille became worried as they did not have the money to pay off the loans and the bank would surely evict them from their homes. They called a meeting in the town hall trying to come up with ideas on how to raise a whopping one million dollars to save their home. Then suddenly one resident Mr. Pickles shouted, “Why not catch a leprechaun and get his pot of Gold? That certainly is worth much more than a million. We could buy our homes from the bank and have a nice stash for retirement?” There was an eerie silence in the room for five seconds. Everyone was staring at Mr. Pickles and then they started to chatter among themselves.

“That’s a pretty good idea Mr. Pickles. “ Said O’Brian. “But how do we catch those sneaky little boogers anyway? I have not seen a Leprechaun in almost over 10 years.”

“Well, I know how we can catch one. “ Said Mr. Pickles. “Leprechauns visit a garden deep in the woods at least once a week to feast on the overflowing honey bark of the honey tree. It keeps them quite young and honey I hear boost the leprechaun’s power. We could set a leprechaun trap to capture a Leprechaun. Then when we catch him, he will have to grant us three wishes or give up his pot of gold. Any which way, once we catch that little booger. We can save our homes and drive that wealthy realtor out of our noses."

So three of the village wisest decided that they would build a Leprechaun’s trap. It was not going to be anything ingenious. The trap was simply a net covered with dried leaves and sprinkled with fake gold coins. Leprechauns simply cannot resist gold and once the magical creature steps in to get the gold. The net would close in the leprechaun and lift him off the ground where he cannot escape the net. So off the three went to catch a leprechaun. They set their trap and hid behind a very large three waiting for the greedy leprechaun to fall for the fake gold and get caught. They did not have to wait too long. After an hour hiding and falling asleep behind the large tree. They suddenly heard a whistling in the forest and a weird voice singing a weird but catchy song. It went like this;

“Leprechaun eats, leprechaun sleeps, leprechaun grows old

But no one will ever touch my pot of gold

Leprechaun charms and leprechaun wishes

All not as good as me gold in me dishes

Pot of Gold, Pot of Gold, at the end of tha rainbow

Fill my goblet with riches and make these shiny coins glow."

“What’s this? What’s this? Let me out of this net. Who set this? Who’s there?” The Leprechaun asked. The three men ran out from behind the tree and quickly threw a large bag over the net and secured the Leprechaun and quickly took it to their village. Soon everyone heard about the creatures capture and they all gathered in the village hall to see the Leprechaun. The men then slowly removed the sack from the net and the Leprechaun began to shout out again. “Let me go, Let me out, why did your capture me?”

“We are quite sorry Mr. Leprechaun, said Mrs Doris. “But the bank is about to take our home and leave us homeless if we all don’t pay them a large amount of money. We need your pot of Gold so we can pay the bank and keep our homes. Not only that, they are selling the land to a rich developer who will later bulldoze your own forest to build large buildings to make money.” The Leprechaun chuckled, chuckled again, then chuckled even more and then burst out into laughter that echoed from the east of Ireland to the west.

The Leprechaun began to speak, “So, so you all think that there really is a large pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and leprechauns know how to get it right?” This time he was rolling on the ground still in the net and laughing. My good old Irish folks, Leprechauns Gold is a fallacy. There is no pot of gold, there is no three wishes to be granted if you catch a leprechaun. All that was a rumor started by you folks centuries ago and my ancestors kept that rumor because it brought us gold. You see, leprechauns are broke, we had no gold. We ran with the gold at the end of the rainbows theory because people thought that if they set magical traps and placed real gold coins in them, they would catch a greedy leprechaun who would grant three wishes and give them his pot of gold. Leprechauns get gold when you humans leave gold coins out to catch us. We simply collect those coins and place them in large goblets. Now, if you really wanted a creature that has plenty of gold, talk to dwarves. They are miners and have some of the shiniest things which they get from the mines.

I am truly sorry. I have no gold, no wishes to grant so therefore I cannot help. Now, be good citizens of your country and let a poor leprechaun go. The Citizens looked at each other with astonishment. "Could this really be true? Or is this little miser trying to trick us? asked one citizen. Now that we know this Leprechaun wont help us, what will we do next? Mr. Goblemacker will buy these lands from the bank and we will be thrown out of our homes."

"Wait, did you just say Mr. Goblemacker? Is it the same Mr.Goblemacker the very rich realtor? asked the leprechaun.

"Yes, that same one. Well, we might as well begin to pack our bags because there is nothing else we can do. No one will lend us poor folks a million dollars to save our homes." Said Mr. O'Brien.

"I will lend you the money!" The Leprechaun shouted.

"What? I thought you said you did not have a pot of gold?" ask Mr.O'Brien.

"I don't have a pot of gold at the end of any rainbow, but i did accumulate a lot of money from you greedy humans who always leave a few gold coins to catch us. My great grandparents, grand father and grandmother's coins all passed down to me. I can lend you town folks the money. As long as you get that nasty Mr. Goblemacker away from this land. I don't like him very much as he stole a complete generation of Leprechaun artifacts from us and sold them to make money. He then captured one of my great great great very great grandmother and made her his kitchen slave. My great great great very great grandmother never saw her husband again and died cooking potato soap."

"So how does Mr. Goblemacker stay so young? Shouldn't he be at least 500 years old by now since he was around when your ancient grandmother was still alive?" asked O'Brien.

"Yes, he is also stole a rejuvenation formula from us Leprechauns which is now lost due to pillage by humans. He used that formula to stay young but now the magic is dieing he is growing old. He is a bad person and I want to help you get rid of him from our lands."

"Well, it's a deal! We will pay you back the money you loan us Mr. Leprechaun. When will we get the gold?"

The leprechaun then pulled out a contract which was pre-written except for the amount of money to be loaned. The citizens all read the contract which seemed pretty reasonable and they all signed to the agreements. All the Leprechaun asked for was not to be hunted anymore by townsfolk, 0% Interest rate on the money he was lending them and a weekly supply of strawberry Apple pies. They freed the Leprechaun and he promised them he would come back the next day with the gold coins and he kept true to his word. The citizens paid off the bank loans and gave Mr. Goblemacker the boot out of their beautiful village. From that day forward, the citizens of that small village and the Leprechauns became very good friends, all looking out for each other and enjoying their beautiful country Ireland.