Jack traded the family cow for five beans. His mother threw them out of the window. By morning a green stalk had grown past the clouds, and Jack began to climb.
At the top stood a castle with a door the size of a barn. Inside, a hen named Henrietta sat on a nest of gold. Jack put her under his jacket and ran.
Jack slid down the beanstalk before the sun was high. His mother counted the gold twice. "Now that," she said, "was a fair trade."
But Henrietta laid nothing at all. She would not eat. She sat on the windowsill and looked up at the clouds, and Jack knew what she was listening for.
Jack climbed back up and knocked. "She misses your whistling," he said. So Bramble the giant whistled, and Henrietta laid an egg, and Jack traded three beans for a seat at the table.