The Tale of Three Servants

It was in this state of affairs that there came a quiet, but persistent knock at the front door. The oldest servant answered, and nodding his head up and down, led the village banker to the study, where the master was holed up.

Standing in front of a lackluster flame in the fireplace, the master of the house, long ill with fever and weary of life, met the slim visitor dressed in a three-piece suit. The banker, seeing the frailty of his friend, gently reminded him that he owed the sum of five million dollars to the bank. The old master nodded his head and said he had received the bank’s correspondence, but in his sorrow, had simply forgotten. He apologized profusely to the banker and promised to make payment forthwith out of the cash in his vault, located in the basement of the mansion. Satisfied with his response, the banker thanked the master for his time and promptly left the premises, but not before he shot a sneer at the youngest servant, with whom he had bitter quarrel over a Guernsey cow that had died under the youngest servant’s care.

As the banker left the mansion, he looked to his right and observed an old broken window next to the entryway. He lingered in the front, looking at curiously. The wheels in the banker’s head were still turning when the youngest servant angrily shooed him off the front porch. Then, with a huff, the youngest servant slammed the front door and continued on with his chores.

The master in his worn flannel pajamas and velvet robe, sighing from the cares of life, grabbed a cane and hobbled into the great hall for this year’s payment ceremony. But as he handed the same amount of money to each servant that he had for the last fifty years, he had an idea. A rare flash of enthusiasm crossed his face.

Generously, he offered each of his faithful servants a deal. He would give them each one-third of his estate upon his death, but only if each of the servants agreed to give the master their estate if they were to die before him. For, as the master instructed, “there is a price for everything in this life.”

Each of the three servants jumped at the chance to receive a portion of their master’s wealth, and eagerly agreed to the terms of the deal. They each imagined a day not far off when they would become rich – masters of their own estates.

“Finally,” the oldest servant said, “I will be free of the heavy burden on my shoulders – this nagging debt that consumes my every waking thought.”

“Finally,” the second servant said, “I will be able to marry my sweetheart and provide a proper home and life for her.”

“Finally,” the youngest servant said, “I will be able to leave this village and see the world outside.”

That night, the servants performed their nightly duties with a cheerfulness they hadn’t possessed in years. The oldest servant set the table; the second servant prepared the master’s favorite meal of roast duck and bread pudding with wild blueberries (a desert, which the master and servant’s all agreed, was to die for); and the youngest servant delivered the meal to the master. But when the young servant arrived in the banquet hall that evening, he found the master asleep in his chair at the head of the long table. As it was not uncommon for the master to have a short nap before supper, the third servant quietly set down the plates of food, then slipped out of the room and shut the door behind him.

Later that night, as the second servant was preparing for bed, he peered through a slit in his bedroom curtains and out his second story window. To his surprise, he saw the banker standing near the front entryway in the shadows – next to the broken window. When the second servant pulled back the curtains to get a better look, the light from his room shined down on the banker and alerted him that someone was watching. Suddenly, the banker put his phone back into his jacket pocket and sprinted away from the house. The second servant thought the whole thing strange, but decided not to tell the others until morning – after all, he had seen the banker lurking around the mansion previously at odd times, and nothing had come of it. He turned off his lamp and settled in to his warm bed for the night.