Three friends were known throughout their community for one particular habit: whenever they sat together, they argued about who among them was the bravest. Each man insisted that fear had no place in his life. They spoke confidently about dangerous situations and laughed at people who became frightened easily. “If danger ever comes my way, I will face it without hesitation,” one of them would declare. Another would quickly boast that he would never run from anything, no matter how frightening it appeared. The third friend was just as confident, and he often claimed that there was nothing in the world capable of making him afraid.
Their boasting became so frequent that the other two friends eventually decided that words were no longer enough. They wanted to discover what their companion would actually do when faced with something he could not explain. They did not intend to hurt him, but they thought a harmless trick might teach him that claiming to be fearless was much easier than actually remaining calm when frightened.
One day, the three friends went to a quiet place where they could spend some time together without being disturbed. Their conversation soon returned to the subject of courage. Once again, the third friend began boasting about how fearless he was. His companions exchanged a secret glance. They had already decided what they were going to do.
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While their friend was not paying attention, they prepared a simple trick. They found a way to make strange noises that seemed to come from beneath the ground. When everything was ready, they returned to their conversation and waited for the right moment.
A faint sound suddenly came from below them. The boastful friend stopped talking and looked around. “What was that?” he asked. His companions pretended not to know what he meant. They continued sitting calmly as though nothing unusual had happened. A few moments later, the sound came again, louder than before. The man stared at the ground.
“Did you hear that this time?” he asked.
One of his friends shrugged. “Hear what?”
“That noise.”
“I didn’t hear anything,” the man replied.
The sound came once more. This time, there was no mistaking it. The man moved away from the spot where they were sitting. His friends watched him carefully, trying not to laugh.
“Perhaps something is underneath us,” one of them said.
The man’s confidence immediately began to disappear. “Something underneath us?”
“Maybe,” the other replied.
The third friend tried to convince himself that his companions were joking. Only a short while earlier, he had declared that nothing could frighten him. Yet now he was staring at the earth as though it might suddenly open beneath his feet.
“What could possibly be down there?” he asked.
Neither friend answered.
The silence made his imagination even worse. He began thinking of all kinds of terrible possibilities. Perhaps a dangerous creature was hiding beneath the ground. Perhaps something supernatural was trying to emerge. Perhaps the earth itself was becoming dangerous.
Another strange sound came from below.
The man jumped to his feet.
“We have to leave!”
His friends struggled to keep their faces serious. “Why are you running? You said you weren’t afraid of anything.”
“I am not afraid!” he protested. “But something is happening here.”
“What is happening?”
“I don’t know!”
That answer made his friends laugh.
The frightened man looked at them suspiciously. “Why are you laughing?”
One of them finally admitted that there was nothing beneath the earth. The strange noises had been created by the two friends as part of their trick.
For a moment, their companion stood completely silent. He looked at the ground, then at his friends, and finally realised that he had been deceived.
“You tricked me!”
“We only wanted to test your bravery,” one of them replied.
“And what did you discover?”
The man had no answer.
His friends reminded him of all the times he had claimed that nothing could frighten him. They explained that anyone could boast when there was no danger, but genuine courage was different. Courage was not about pretending to be fearless. It was about remaining calm and thinking clearly when something frightening or unfamiliar happened.
The man was embarrassed, but after a while, he began laughing too. He realised that his fear had grown because he had not known what was causing the strange sounds. His imagination had turned something harmless into something terrifying.
The three friends continued talking about the incident, and the man eventually admitted that the experience had taught him a valuable lesson. He no longer wanted to boast that he was completely fearless. He had discovered that fear was a natural reaction, and there was no shame in feeling it. What mattered was how a person responded to it.
The experience also changed the way the three friends thought about their friendship. They still enjoyed teasing one another, but they understood that jokes should not become cruel. Their trick had been harmless, but they recognised that frightening someone too severely could easily turn a joke into something dangerous.
Whenever the boastful friend began talking too confidently about his bravery after that, his companions would remind him of the mysterious sound beneath the earth. He would immediately laugh and tell them that they had already proved their point.
The story became a favourite among those who knew the three friends. People laughed whenever they heard how the man who had claimed to fear nothing had nearly run away from a harmless sound. Yet beneath the humour was a lesson that stayed with them.
Fear often grows when people do not understand what they are facing. The unknown can make an ordinary thing appear dangerous. A sound in the darkness can become a monster in the imagination, and a shadow can become something far more frightening than it really is.
The three friends learned that night that courage was not measured by how loudly someone could boast. It was revealed when that person faced uncertainty and still managed to think clearly.
And the friend who had once been so proud of his bravery became wiser because he had finally experienced the difference between claiming to be fearless and actually knowing how to face fear.
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Moral Lesson
True courage is not about claiming to have no fear. It is about staying calm, thinking clearly and facing frightening situations with wisdom.
Knowledge Check
1. What did the three friends often argue about?
They argued about which of them was the bravest.
2. Why did two of the friends decide to test the third?
They wanted to teach him a lesson because he constantly boasted about being fearless.
3. What did the two friends make their companion believe?
They made him believe that something dangerous was moving beneath the earth.
4. How did the frightened friend react?
He became increasingly frightened and wanted to leave the place immediately.
5. What was actually causing the strange sounds?
The two friends had secretly created the sounds as part of their harmless trick.
6. What did the experience teach the boastful friend?
It taught him that genuine courage is not about boasting or pretending to have no fear, but about remaining calm and thinking clearly when faced with uncertainty.
Source
Adapted from “Frer Torti, Frer Soungoula ek Sousouri,” documented in Kont ek Lezann Volim 3 (1992), Institut Kreol, pp. 61–68.
