MUMMY         Now, those beans of yours. They may not be very big, but until I can get to market they're all we have for breakfast. Let's have 'em.

JOE                 (outraged)  But mummy! We can't eat them! The man told me they were magic! 

MUMMY          Rrright. Which man was this? 

JOE                 The man at the market who sold them to me. 

MUMMY         You mean the man who took our best cow Daisy, worth at least £200, and gave you five beans - 

JOE                 Magic beans, mummy. 

MUMMY          - magic beans, in return. 

JOE                 Yep, that's the one. 

MUMMY          And what did he look like, this most generous of men? 

JOE                 (thinking hard) Well, I didn't see him for long. 

MUMMY          (puzzled)  You didn't see him for long? 

JOE                 No. You see he was in such a hurry to get Daisy into a warm, dry barn that he had to leave soon after he gave                          me the beans. 

MUMMY          The magic beans. 

JOE                 That's right, the magic beans. Anyway, he was sort of smallish, darkish, with a longish nose and a biggish hat                          pulled down over his eyes. 

MUMMY          Brownish eyes? 

JOE                 (innocently) That's right! Do you know him, mummy? 

MUMMY          (head in hands)  Oh Lord give me strength. And he was in a big hurry? 

JOE                 Yes, like I said, he wanted to get Daisy somewhere - 

MUMMY          - warm and dry, yes, you told me. And did this super-salesman have any more of these magic beans on him? 

JOE                 No mummy, only those five, that's why we were so lucky! He said he'd been saving them up for years, just                          waiting for the right person to come along. 

MUMMY         Hmm, I bet he had. 

JOE                 Someone honest, trusting and clever! 

MUMMY         That's what he said, did he? 

JOE                 Yes! And that someone was me, mummy! Imagine! 

MUMMY          Hm. Did he have any other beans, this smallish, darkish man, by any chance? 

JOE                 Oh yes, a big  bag of them. But they weren't magic ones! 

MUMMY          No. of course not. (pause) Joe, did you get a look at any of these non-magic beans? 

JOE                 Just a little look, mummy. 

MUMMY          And - let me guess - they looked a bit like the magic ones you brought home. 

JOE                 Well, a bit, I suppose. 

MUMMY          Same colour? 

JOE                 Well… ish. 

MUMMY          Similar size? 

JOE                 Ummm, I suppose they were, yes. 

MUMMY          And the shape wasn't so different? 

JOE                 Now I come to think of it, mummy, they were very nearly the same shape. 

MUMMY          But not quite. 

JOE                 No, not quite, mummy, because they weren't magic beans!