A Sequel to The Greedy Innkeeper

The greedy innkeeper could do nothing but returned home very dejectedly. On her way home, she quickly drew a lesson from her previous voracious deed and realized that it was very foolish and immoral of her to take things that belong to others and she decided to act as an honest innkeeper from then on and treat everyone equally and with integrity.

Then on one cool autumn day two months later, a young man came to the small mountain inn. He was very handsome and rode on a beautiful white horse.

After he came into the lobby of the inn and met the innkeeper, he flashed a sincere smile and handed her a fat pocket of cash over a cup of warm jasmine tea the innkeeper offered him. The innkeeper was taken by a surprise at once and refused to accept the money uncompromisingly.

But the young man insisted her to receive it and explained that he was the eldest son of the old rich man who stayed in her inn two months ago, and his dad later remembered he forgot to pay the room bill so he asked his son, the young man to came back and pay the money back. What’s more, his dad offered her a large sum of cash for a free trip around Japan for her compensation and to thank her for the most delicious ginger bud tempura soup his father had ever tasted in his entire life and one of the few good night’s sleeps without any nightmare in the mountain inn.

The greedy innkeeper gladly accepted the money gift at last and started to make her plan for the wonderful tour later that day. (≈285 words)

附录：The Greedy Innkeeper

Once upon a time, in a beautiful mountain inn, there was a greedy old innkeeper who was always thinking about money.

One day, a rich man stopped at the inn. The innkeeper looked at the guest’s fat money belt and she thought, “Oh, if only all that money could be mine!” The rich man requested the most expensive room at the inn, and he went up to his room to dress for dinner.

Now, all around the inn there grew beautiful Japanese ginger plants. Many people say that eating buds of ginger makes a person forgetful. This gave the innkeeper an idea.

“This evening for dinner I’ll serve ginger bud（花蕾） tempura（天妇罗）!” she thought. “Then, when the rich man leaves in the morning, he’ll be forgetful and leave his money belt behind!” She ran into the kitchen and started cooking up the most delicious ginger bud tempura she had ever made.

Soon, the rich man descended the stairs and requested dinner. The innkeeper could hardly contain her delight as she served him dish after diss of ginger buds. “Delicious!” said the rich man. When dinner was finished, he went to bed happy and full of ginger buds.

In the morning, the innkeeper saw the rich man off at the front door. As soon as he was out of sight, she raced up to his room. She looked all over the room for the money belt, but she couldn’t find it. Suddenly, she noticed a piece of paper on the floor. It was the rich man’s bill. He had forgotten to pay it! She ran down the stairs, out the front door, and up the road until she was out of breath, but the rich man was already far, far away. (≈302 words)