“In the evening the old man put ten pieces of candy on the kitchen table. Nine were normal, but one was poisoned. The candies disappeared in the night. The next morning only the tracks of nine pairs of small shoes led to the sugar bowl… Bunnies, eyes closed, I said!
“The old man put out another piece of poisoned candy. The day passed and there were fewer tracks. He poisoned another piece of candy, and another, and another. So time after time he poisoned the candy, until one day he saw only one track. A row of tracks crossed the dust sadly and led to the window. Nobody came to the sugar bowl anymore.”
Pookar finished the tale, yawned, and looked at the bunnies, certain that they were already asleep. Nothing of the kind. The bunnies were quietly trembling in their mitten beds.
“Te-te…”
“What te-te…? Watch out, or I’ll spank you!”
“Tell us Cinderella, Pookar!” the bunnies timidly asked.
Pookar grimaced. “Well, fine. Remind me.”
“Once upon a time there was Cinderella. The stepmother and her two daughters forced Cinderella to work a lot and did not let her go to the ball at the palace. In the palace lived a prince…” the bunnies prompted.
“Then Cinderella, like our Muffy, wanted to get married. Right?” Pookar interrupted.
“Yes. How do you know?” The bunnies were surprised.
“Always one and the same! Well, listen to the sequel. Cinderella got tired of them taking her for a fool and preventing her from having a good time. She whacked the stepmother on the forehead with the glass slipper. The slipper, naturally, went to pieces. Then Cinderella locked the sisters in the basement and ran to the ball herself. There she quickly married the prince and arranged her own business.”
“What business?” The bunnies were surprised.
“It’s clear what. With the prince. That was the kind of person she was, this Cinderella of yours!” Pookar yawned and looked at Sineus and Truvor in the hope that they, too, were inclined to sleep.
It was not so, however. The bunnies were whimpering softly in their mittens but were not going to sleep. “Olga didn’t tell it this way! Ah-h!”
Pookar became extremely annoyed and jumped up and down on the spot. “Well, what else do you want? You want that I tell you about vampires or Blue Beard?”
“Olga didn’t tell us about them! Ah-h!”
“I’m tired of your Olga and your fairy tales! I’m asking for the last time: will you sleep or not? I’ll give you three minutes! Already two! If you don’t fall asleep, I’ll call Freddy with the saw![3] And he’ll cut you up into pieces!” Pookar threatened.
You can imagine what started here. Pookar had never heard such a loud squeal. Usually Sineus and Truvor would only whine a little bit, but now, what a storm! Pookar nearly went deaf. He darted around the room, not knowing what to do. Lucky for him, Muffin, awakened by the loud crying, came in and calmed the bunnies. At the same time, the cat expressed to Pookar everything she thought of him and even a lot more that she did not. It turned out that, on the whole, the cat did not have a very high opinion of him.
Pookar held his head with his hands. “You meowed out my soul, nasty Muffy! Not on your life! Next time, you tell the fairy tale! This Cinderella of yours is a pain in the neck!”
Chapter Seven
The Cat Muffin Falls In Love
The cat Muffin lived according to an exact schedule. She slept during the day and played with Masha in the evening – jumped into Masha’s arms, snuggled up to Masha, rubbed against Masha’s legs, or graciously amused herself with newspaper crumpled into a ball. She pretended to believe that it was a mouse. There were only two games Muffin could not stand: she did not like it when her tail was pulled or when she was harnessed to a cart. In these cases, Muffin bristled up and began to hiss, and once scratched the disgusting boy Peter, who tried to suck Muffin into the vacuum cleaner.
However, on waking up one morning, Olga found the cat in a strange mood. Muffin was rolling on the floor and heartrendingly bawling some special raucous meow.
“What’s with you? Hurt yourself? A headache? Sprained your foot?” Olga asked sympathetically.
Muffin lifted her head and looked at her blearily. “Oh, it’s you! Good that you came, although, in fact, you could also not have come.”
“Why?” Olga was surprised. “You yourself invited me yesterday! You were so cheerful. What happened? You caught a cold? I warned you not to lie in the draught.”
Muffin sighed. “What cold? Can you keep a secret?”
“I can. I can do a lot of things: sew, wash, cook dinner, clean the apartment…” the doll honestly started to itemize, bending her fingers.
“Yes, yes! Well, I’ll tell you anyway! I’ve fallen in love,” the cat purred despondently.
“You don’t say! With whom?” Olga was pleased for Muffin.
“One of the cats. You don’t know him,” Muffin said.
“And who’s he, this cat?”
“No one… Nothing special…”
“Nothing at all?”
“Absolutely. That’s not the point. I love him.”
Olga shook her curls. “I don’t understand! My head’s all muddled!”
“No wonder. You have nothing there. Some holes for the hair,” Muffin snorted.
Olga was not offended. She was too curious to find out the details of Muffin’s love. Why these details were necessary to her, she did not know, but they were somehow important for the one-and-a-half-year-old doll with blue eyes like all dolls.
“Where did you meet this cat? You’re home all the time,” Olga asked.
Muffin turned over onto her stomach, placed her head on her front paws, and heaved a really deep sigh. “I saw him in the window. He was on a nearby roof serenading.”
“Doing what?”
“Singing serenades. Songs.”
“And he sang well?”
“Couldn’t be worse. Very poorly,” Muffin admitted.
“And you fell in love? You heard this no-need-salt[4] and fell in love?” The doll Olga became all the more interested.
“Have to fall in love with someone. Indeed, it’s spring,” the cat remarked dejectedly.
“And what’s he like, your cat? Good-looking?”
“Nothing of the kind! An ordinary cat of no pedigree. Most likely lives in a dumpster and feeds on fish tails,” Muffin shuddered.
“What did you see in him?”
“I saw nothing in him. NU-THING! I just fell in love! You, doll, are totally stupid!” the cat shouted. Muffin leaped up and began to pace anxiously around the room. She sniffed, jumped up onto the chairs, started to roll on the floor, and scratched the sofa with her claws.
The tidy Olga did not like this love. It was too restless for her taste. “Why are you suffering? Is it really not possible to love quietly? Curl up by the heater and love!” she advised.
“I’m suffering. You really don’t understand that I’m suffering? I just can’t find a place for myself!”
“Can’t you fall in love with someone else? Why him? Because he sang no-need-salt?”
“You don’t understand!” the cat shook her head. “He has nothing to do with it. Even if it wasn’t him on the roof or he wasn’t serenading, I’d still fall in love. It’s spring after all, understand?”
Olga straightened her bow. “Vaguely. It turns out that I should fall in love with Pookar only because now it’s spring?”
Muffin swished her tail. “What are you talking about? You’re too young. And your Pookar is just an immature baby doll. Love, it’s only for adults. Sometimes you simply want to fall in love and you do. So? It’s nothing!”
Then the cat’s face became dreamy again, and Muffin, meowing, began to roll on the floor. “The funny thing is…” she said and stopped rolling. “The funny thing is that this will all pass. I know exactly what will happen. After two or three days. This has happened to me several times before.”
The doll Olga listened carefully to Muffin, thought a little, and smoothed her pinafore. A dreamy and hesitant expression suddenly appeared on her calm face. “Know what… Only don’t laugh! Can I also fall in love with him?” Olga suddenly blurted out.
Muffin, from surprise, even calmed down temporarily. “With whom?”
“Your cat.”