A: The Stone, by Lloyd Alexander, is set in a fantasy world where magic things can happen. The main character in the story is Maibon, who is a kind of farmer. One day, Maibon is driving home in his horse and cart when he sees an old and feeble man walking along the road. He offers to take the old man in his cart but the old man refuses. When Maibon gets home he starts thinking how his tools, his clothes, and he himself are also old and worn-out like the old man. While he is thinking these thoughts he suddenly sees a dwarf at the edge of the field, stuck under a log.

B: The dwarf, called Doli, is very unhappy because he cannot make himself invisible like all the other dwarves in his family. Maibon helps the dwarf to escape and the dwarf rewards him with a wish. Maibon's wish is for a magic stone which can keep him young forever. Maibon's wife is angry at Maibon's wish and says that he has been cheated with the stone. Hearing this, Maibon throws the stone into the fire. But next morning Maibon realizes that his beard hasn't grown, and he knows that the magic stone is working as the dwarf promised. The problem is that nothing else around him is changing either; no eggs are hatching, no wheat is growing, no trees are bearing fruit.

C: Maibon's wife persuades him to get rid of the stone but whatever Maibon does, the stone keeps coming back. Maibon now realizes that the stone has not brought him happiness only boredom and pain. He tries to destroy the stone, which doesn't work. As he is trying to bury it, he sees the dwarf again. The dwarf tells Maibon that he can only get rid of the stone if he really, really wants to. Maibon says he does, throws the stone down on the ground and runs away. When he gets home he sees that everything has started to grow again. He too grows old but is now happy to be so.