POSTCARD II: The true story of Van Gogh's ear

I Liked this exercise so much I did it twice. The second time I actually sent myself this postcard from Paris after visiting Van Gough's Montmartre apartment.

Write a short story on a postcard (or three by five card). Notice that if you're going to manage conflict, crisis, and resolution in this small space, you'll have to introduce the conflict immediately.

Here is what I wrote:

He had gotten into a fight with his roommate. Gaugin always had a knife and this time he used it. Everyone was drunk on Rue Le pic that night. One of the dancers had even cracked her ankle knocking a hat off of some Parisian's head. "Il a un tete comme un boite," La Goulue gurgled when his head withstood the blow. Gaugin had laughed out loud and the blockhead punched him and sent him home drunk, hurt and angry to Van Gogh where he presently started a fight. When he drew blood he stepped back, "Mon Dieux!" He shouted, pointing and began to cry. The police were wagging up from the square and they both knew Gaugin would go to prison for sure this time so Van Gough, himself half-erased with absinthe, stuffed his severed earlobe into an envelope and sent it off to his whore in the South, a sure way to hide the evidence.