The fox found out that only women and children were left in the plague, and came to them. The women cooked fatty deer meat and ate it. The fox saw this and laughed:
- Why do you eat meat? Why don't you eat sweet fish?
- We would, but we don’t have any fish. Where can I get it?
- Ho! I know one river. It's full of fish. Will you come with me? If you agree, let's go!
“Let’s go, let’s go!” the women rejoiced.
“Okay,” said the fox, “I’ll take you to the fish.” But do you have any flour in your turks?
- Why do you need flour, fox?
- Yes, without flour it’s hard to catch fish in the river. If you want to catch fish, take a tursuk of flour, put it in the boat, and let’s go quickly. We must hurry before the fishing ends. Now the fish are spawning.
The fox hurried the women so that they could swim away from the plague before the men returned home.
The women took their last sack of flour, put the fox in a birch bark boat and sailed up the river.
“It’s not close to the mouth of the fish river,” says the fox. “You swim, and I’ll sleep a little.” Along the way you will meet different rivers, so you wake me up and ask. Yes, you better be careful not to drive us past the fish river.
Women row and row with oars and look along the banks. And the fox lay down near the tursuk, covered herself with a fur kumalanchik (rug), pretended to be asleep and began to eat flour.
“Fox!” the women wake her up. “Look, there’s a river!”
- This is the Echelgo River - “Didn’t start.” Swim on. The women swim further. We saw the mouth again.
- Fox, are you sleeping? Look, there's a river.
- This is the Gachalga River - “It reduced it a little.” Swim, the women are rowing, they are in a hurry. They want to get and eat fish. We saw the third river. Wake up the fox:
- Fox, isn’t this the fish river?
The fox is sleeping soundly.
- Fox! Isn't this the fish river? We are sailing through it.
“Swim,” the fox answers sleepily. - This is the Adalga River - “It doesn’t matter.”
Women sweat, and the fox eats flour. He snorts as if he were sleeping.
- Eh! Fox, there will be a fourth river soon. Is there fish in it? Look.
In order not to show her mouth in flour, the fox looked out from under the kumalan with one eye and said:
— You’re driving quietly. This is the river Kaltalga - "Half". The women are rowing, rushing to get to the fishing spot, and the fox is in a hurry to eat the flour. Far away, beyond Yelanya, the fifth river appeared. The women say to the fox:
- We see a river. Isn't that where our fish is?
- No! We will soon reach the fish river. This river Kherelge - “Remains at the bottom.” Swim on.
They are floating. The fox licks the flour in the tursuk. The women saw the river again and shouted to the fox:
- Fox, look at the river. What river is this? Is there fish in it? We want to eat, we are tired of rowing.
- This is the river Manalga - “Conchila”. We will fish in it. Get ready to go out. Moor to the shore.
The women moored to the shore. A fox jumped out of the boat onto the shore and said:
“Something’s wrong with my stomach.” Just wait, I’ll run into the forest. If I'm away for a long time, go fishing alone. Set up nets, or you can use a fishing rod. I left you some tursuk for fish.
The fox ran away, and the women were left without flour and without fish.
Women don’t like foxes for this, and foxes are afraid of women like fire. Once they caught a woman's fox and drove her up a tree. She asks them:
-Don't light the trees!
The women lit the tree. The fox jumped through the fire and got burned, and from then on she turned red. Previously, all foxes were only black.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru