Chapter XIII
The fourth planet was that of the businessman. This man was so busy that he did not even raise his head at the arrival of the little prince.
"Good morning," said the latter. Your cigarette is extinguished.
- Three and two are five. Five and seven twelve. Twelve and three. Hello. Fifteen and ninety-two. Twenty-two and six-eight. No time to turn it back on. Twenty-six and five thirty-one. Phew! So it's five hundred one million six hundred twenty-two thousand seven hundred and thirty-one.
"Five hundred million of what?"
- Hey? You're still here ? Five hundred a million ... I do not know ... I have so much work! I am serious, I do not amuse myself with nonsense! Two and five ...
- Five hundred million of what? "Repeated the little prince, who, in his life, had never renounced a question once he had asked it.
The businessman raised his head:
"For the past fifty-four years I have lived on this planet, I have only been disturbed three times. The first time it was twenty-two years ago, by a cockchart that had fallen, God knows where. He spread a terrible noise, and I made four errors in an addition. The second time, eleven years ago, was a crisis of rheumatism. I lack exercise. I do not have time to stroll. I'm serious. The third time ... here it is! So I said five hundred million ...
- Millions of what? "
The businessman understood that there was no hope of peace:
"Millions of these little things that one sees sometimes in the sky.
- Flies ?
- But no, little things that shine.
- Bees ?
- But no. Little golden things that make the idlers laugh. But I am serious! I do not have time to daydream.
"Ah! stars ?
- That's right. Stars.
"And what do you do with five hundred million stars?"
- Five hundred and one million six hundred and twenty-two thousand seven hundred and thirty-one. I am serious, I am precise.
"And what do you do with these stars?"
- What do I do with it?
- Yes.
- Nothing. I own them.
- You got the stars?
- Yes.
"But I've already seen a king who-"
- Kings do not possess. They "reign" over. It is very different.
"And what is the use of possessing the stars?"
- It's good for me to be rich.
"And what does it cost you to be rich?"
- To buy other stars, if someone finds them. "
"That one," said the little prince to himself, "he reasoned a little like my drunkard. "
However, he asked further questions:
"How can one possess the stars?"
- Who are they? Riposta, grumpy, businessman.
- I do not know. To no one.
"Then they belong to me, for I thought of it first."
- That's enough ?
- Of course. When you find a diamond that belongs to no one, it is yours. When you find an island that belongs to no one, it is yours. When you have an idea first, you patent it: it is yours. And I possess the stars, since no one before me thought of possessing them.
"That is true," said the little prince. And what do you do with it?
- I deal with them. I count them and recount them, says the businessman. It's difficult. But I'm a serious man! "
The little prince was not satisfied yet.
"If I have a scarf, I can put it around my neck and take it away." I, if I possess a flower, can pluck my flower and carry it away. But you can not pick the stars!
"No, but I can put them in a bank."
- What does it mean ?
"That means I write on a little paper the number of my stars. And then I lock this paper in a drawer.
- And that's all ?
- That's enough ! "
"It's amusing," thought the little prince. It's pretty poetic. But it is not very serious. "
The little prince had very different ideas about the serious things of the ideas of the grown-up.
"I," he said again, "have a flower that I water every day. I have three volcanoes that I shake every week. For I also sweep away the extinct one. We never know. It is useful to my volcanoes, and it is useful to my flower, that I possess them. But you are not useful to the stars ... "
The businessman opened his mouth but found no answer, and the little prince left.
"The grown-ups are definitely quite extraordinary," he said simply to himself during the journey.