Chapter XXIV

We were on the eighth day of my breakdown in the desert, and I had listened to the merchant's story, drinking the last drop of my supply of water:

"Ah! "I said to the little prince," they are very pretty, your memories, but I have not yet repaired my plane, I have nothing more to drink, and I should also be happy if I could walk gently towards a fountain !

"My friend, the fox," he said.

"My little fellow, it's no longer the fox!"

- Why ?

"Because we're going to die of thirst ..."

He did not understand my reasoning, but he replied:

"It's nice to have a friend, even if we're going to die. I am very glad to have had a friend fox ... "

"He does not measure danger," I said. He never has neither hunger nor thirst. A little sunlight is enough ... »

But he looked at me and answered my thought:

"I'm thirsty too ... look for a well ..."

I made a gesture of weariness: it is absurd to look for a well, at random, in the immensity of the desert. Nevertheless, we set out on the march.

When we had walked for hours, in silence, night fell, and the stars began to light. I saw them as if in a dream, having a little fever, because of my thirst. The words of the little prince danced in my memory:

"Are you thirsty then, too?" I asked him.

But he did not answer my question. He simply says:

"Water can also be good for the heart ..."

I did not understand his answer but I was silent ... I knew that he should not be interrogated.

He was tired. He sat. I sat down beside him. And after a pause he said, "The stars are beautiful, because of a flower that one does not see ..."

I answered "of course" and I looked, without speaking, the folds of sand under the moon.

"The desert is beautiful," he added.

And it was true. I have always loved the desert. It sits on a sand dune. We see nothing. Nothing is heard. And yet something radiates in silence...

"What beautifies the desert," said the little prince, "is that he hides a well somewhere..."

I was surprised to suddenly understand this mysterious radiance of the sand. When I was a little boy I lived in an old house, and legend had it that a treasure was buried there. Of course, no one has ever discovered it, nor perhaps even sought it. But he delighted the whole house. My house hid a secret in the depths of her heart...

"Yes," said I to the little prince, "whether it be the house, the stars or the desert, what makes their beauty invisible!

"I am satisfied," he said, "that you agree with my fox."

As the little prince fell asleep, I took him in my arms, and set off again. I was touched. It seemed to me to carry a fragile treasure. It even seemed to me that there was nothing more fragile on Earth. In the light of the moon I looked at that pale brow, those closed eyes, the locks of hair that trembled in the wind, and I said to myself: "What I see here is only a bark. The most important is invisible ... »

As his half-opened lips were half-smiling, I said to myself: "What moves me so strongly about this little prince asleep is his fidelity to a flower, it is the image of a rose Radiates in him like the flame of a lamp, even when he sleeps ... "And I guessed it even more fragile. It is necessary to protect the lamps: a gust of wind can extinguish them ...

And, walking thus, I discovered the well at dawn.