The plumber looked at the taps in his bathroom and scrunched his face up in disgust. They were so out of date that he thought it was about time he had something more modern fitted.

Ascending the stairs with his toolbox he thought about having something elegant and chrome and how it would change the mood of his bathroom. Perhaps he could spoil his wife with a gorgeous bubble bath surrounded by scented candles.

As he went to unscrew them a voice echoed out of the faucet. "If you don’t throw me away I will give you gold". Thinking he was hearing things the plumber continued with his work and yet still the voice echoed out of the faucet. Eventually he decided to respond to the voice and asked it what exactly it meant by gold. To his surprise gold started to pour from the faucet like a steady flow of water. Scooping the treasure up in his arms he agreed that he would not replace the taps no matter how much of a bad condition they were rendered in.

Deciding to keep this a secret from his wife he instead bought her lavish gifts with the gold he had received and even a new house with a huge estate. His wife however, was quite dismayed at the fact that he had insisted on bringing their old bath with them.

Countless arguments ensued with the plumber begging his wife never to rip the bathtub out and buy another one for which she could not understand.

Averting her eyes every time she entered the bathroom from the now non-matching bathroom furniture set she began plotting on how to rid herself of this eyesore. She figured that if she waited while he was at work and then dismantled it herself he would be none the wiser. She had seen him installing and un-installing bathroom suites before and was confident that she could make it look as though the bath and faucet had been broken and not dismantled.

Kissing his wife goodbye and wishing him a good day the next morning she set about her plan after having chosen a new bathroom suite weeks beforehand. Her palms grew clammy as she thought of how lavish her new bathroom would look and how she would no longer after make excuses to friends as to why their bath was outdated from the rest of the bathroom suite.

Shortly after starting to dismantle the faucet she heard a voice echoing out "please don’t dismantle me and I’ll make it worth your while". Smiling to herself the woman thought of what great lengths her husband had gone to, to enable him to keep this bath and faucet. Ignoring the pleas and not responding to them she continued to dismantle the bath until it was all in pieces.

Seeing his wife’s work when he returned home the plumber fell to his knees in despair.

"That was a very good joke you played with the tape-recorder". "There was no tape recorder" replied the plumber and showed her the huge stacks of gold that he accrued.

The morale of the story is – what one person likes is totally different to another but marriage is all about tolerating each other’s individual tastes.