There were two beardless deceivers: one was Datua, and the other was Petrikela. One day, Datua the beardless deceiver took a large bag, filled it with moss, put some wool on top and carried it to Imereti to sell. As soon as he reached the Suram Pass and admired the view of the beautiful Imereti, Petrikela, a beardless deceiver, appeared in front of him, carrying on his back a large sack full of nut shells, only covered with nuts on top.
“Hello,” said Datua the beardless deceiver.
- Be healthy! - answered Petrikela the beardless deceiver.
- Where are you coming from and where are you going?
— From Imereti to Kartli; I'm bringing nuts to sell. Where are you heading from?
“And I, brother, am from Kartli to Imereti, bringing wool for sale.” Only this is what I will offer you, if you agree. What good is it for us to walk back and forth, we’ll just wear out the kala-manas, not to mention the fatigue. Come on, let's exchange the goods: you take my wool, return to your place in Imereti and sell it, and I will take your nuts, return to Kartli and sell it there.
- Very good, brother. It’s better to return home, what’s the use of dragging around in vain? Come on, take off your bag.
So the two beardless deceivers exchanged their bags and went their separate ways.
As soon as the mountain separated them, they immediately began to untie their bags. What did you see? That they deceived each other.
After some time they met again, exchanged greetings, and Datua said:
“I thought only I knew how to deceive, but you, I swear by the sun, turned out to be no worse.”
- Why are you surprised? If you know something, why shouldn’t I?
- So let's buddy up,
- Come on!
- You know what? Let's hire ourselves as farm laborers somewhere together.
“Have it your way, brother, we’ll hire ourselves together.”
The beardless deceivers decided on this and went to look for a place. Whether they searched a lot or a little, they finally learned that one woman was looking for two farm laborers. We came to her. The woman told them:
- I have a cow and this house. One of you will take the cow to the pasture and take with him a pipe, chonguri and dayra, since my cow loves to dance. The other one will clean here. He will sweep, clean everything, and throw the rubbish into the neighbor's yard. If you agree and can do all this, stay and work.
- We can’t, we agree! - they answered.
The next day, Petrikela the beardless deceiver stayed at home to work, and Datua took bread, dayra, pipe, chonguri and went to graze the cow.
Petrikel swept the entire yard and began throwing rubbish to the neighbors. But they saw it, rushed to Petrikele and beat him mercilessly: “This is what it means to throw rubbish into our yard.”
Beaten and covered in bruises, Petrikela the beardless deceiver dragged himself to the barn and fell onto the bed, barely alive.
Datua the beardless deceiver fared no better: as soon as the cow came out into the field, she began to run, and she ran all day, still skipping. In the evening she ran home, and the barely alive Datua, the beardless deceiver, came running after her. He was so exhausted from all this running around that he didn’t even eat his bread. As soon as Datua entered the barn, he saw Petrickela, the beardless deceiver, lying there and groaning.
- What’s wrong with you, brother, are you sick?
- How sick! Why would I be sick?
- Why are you lying there?
“Yes, I swept the yard and just started throwing rubbish at the neighbors, when they saw me, rushed to me, invited me into the house and welcomed me so warmly - they completely fed me and gave me a drink. The Kakhetian food makes me so dizzy that I can barely live. How did you spend your time?
“I had a lot of fun too, brother.” He played the daira, struck the strings of the chonguri with his fingers, and whistled on the pipe. How the cow started dancing, how she began to dance a wonderful, light cartul! People gathered: women, men. They surrounded us, and how everyone was having fun! In my joy I forgot to eat, so I brought the whole bread back.
“Well, if that’s the case, brother, tomorrow I’ll go with the cow, and you have a nice walk here with the neighbors.”
-Have it your way! - answered Datua the beardless deceiver.
The next day, the same thing happened to Petrichela, the beardless deceiver, as happened to Datua - until the evening he ran after the cow without memory. Meanwhile, Datua the beardless deceiver was so beaten by his neighbors that the unfortunate man could barely drag himself to the barn.
That night they held a council: “If we don’t run away from here, we’ll either die from hunger or from running around, and there’s no point in talking about beatings.”
They decided to escape, but the old woman locked the barn from the outside at night, and this made it very difficult to carry out their plan.
“Let’s slaughter the damned cow,” said Petrikela, “let’s put it in a sack, then let one of us give the other one, who will go up, climb out through the chimney hole and lower the rope.” And the other one will first serve the meat in a bag, then he will climb the rope.
“Very good,” said Datua.
They decided, they dumped the cow, slaughtered it, skinned it and cut it into pieces.
- Go, Petrikela, come on, lend your back, help me pull myself up. Now I’ll pick up the meat and get you out too.
I exposed Petrikel's back. Datua the beardless deceiver climbed onto the roof and lowered a rope into the barn. Petrikela tied the rope tightly to the edge of the bag, put a couple of pieces of meat in it, climbed in himself and shouted:
- Take the meat and quickly lower the rope back down.
Datua the beardless deceiver pulled the bag up, threw it on his back and rushed away. I ran quite a bit, got tired and wanted to rest. He threw the bag off his back and threw it on the ground.
- Hush, you slacker, don’t hurt yourself! - Petrickela the beardless deceiver shouted, getting out of the bag.
- You yourself are a slacker, you beat off my entire lower back.
- Judge for yourself, brother, can you blame me? Let us not betray each other, neither in sorrow nor in joy, then our affairs will go well and neither the lower back nor the heart will ache,” said Petrikela the beardless deceiver.
After that, they stopped deceiving each other and lived like brothers, in love and friendship.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru