On the edge of the village of Toyama, almost right next to the forest, lived an old man and an old woman. One autumn evening they sat and warmed themselves by the stove. The rain was pattering on the roof, the house was cold and damp. -Who are you afraid of most in the world? - the old woman asked the old man. The old man thought and answered:
- Of course, a tiger. There is no one in the world more terrible than a tiger! The old woman shook her head: “That’s right, the tiger is a terrible beast.” It attacks sheep, cows and even horses. But you and I don’t have any cattle, so why should we, poor people, be afraid of a tiger? No, I'm much more afraid of yamori, they're so nasty and slippery. Look, there’s one already crawling!
And the old woman pointed to the ceiling: Yamori, a small gray lizard, was slowly crawling along the ceiling.
And at this time a tiger was hiding outside the window. It was a young, stupid tiger. He crept along the walls and wanted to get into the house to eat the old man and the old woman.
A tiger's hearing is acute. Standing under the window, he heard that the old woman was afraid of Yamori more than anything in the world.
The tiger was offended. “What kind of yamori is this? Until now I thought that there was no one more terrible than me. But it turns out that yamori is even more terrible. I would like to look at this beast,” the tiger said to himself.
And he thought about what kind of muzzle, what kind of fangs and paws a yamori should have, which people fear more than the tiger itself. In the darkness, he imagined the most terrible monsters that a young and stupid tiger could imagine at night, in the rain, under someone else’s window. And the tiger became scared. It seemed to him that Yamori was about to jump out of the house and attack him.
Suddenly the old man in the house shouted: “Oh, he’s crawling!” Then the poor tiger trembled with horror and began to run as fast as he could, as fast as old, smart tigers never run.
Only having reached the forest itself, the tiger ran more quietly. “Well, now Yamori is far from me, and I am far from Yamori,” thought the tiger. He had almost calmed down and was about to rest, when suddenly he trembled again with fear: something jumped on his back.
“Yamori!” - thought the tiger. In fact, it was not a yamori, but a man, a village horse thief. He had been standing under a tree at the edge of the forest for a long time and was looking to see if a loose horse was wandering somewhere nearby.
And suddenly he saw that someone was running towards the edge of the forest on four legs. The thief’s eyes were filled with greed: it seemed to him that it was a foal. The horse thief contrived to jump on the tiger's back and grab his neck.
But the tiger, out of fear, could not make out who had jumped on him, and he could not see what was happening on his back. The tiger became even more frightened and began to run a second time, and as fast as old, smart tigers never run.
The horse thief could barely stay on the tiger's back. Never before had he seen a foal run so fast. The horse thief got scared and grabbed the neck of his “foal” even tighter.
And it seemed to the tiger that it was the terrible Yamori who had sunk his claws into him. He ran even faster. And the faster he ran, the tighter the horse thief clung to his neck, and the tighter the horse thief clung to his neck, the faster the tiger ran. So, scaring each other, they rushed into the depths of the forest.
The tiger knew that there was a mountain in the forest, and under the mountain there was a deep hole. He ran to this hole.
“I need to throw Yamori into the hole! If I don’t throw him away, he’ll eat me,” thought the tiger. Finally he ran to the very edge of the pit and shook his head as hard as he could. From the shock, the horse thief unclenched his hands, somersaulted and flew upside down into the pit.
Just then the tiger caught his breath and slowly trudged away. He was very tired that evening. His tail drooped, his muzzle drooped, and everything that was on his muzzle also drooped - his mustache and eyebrows, but his nose did not droop: a tiger’s nose is flat and therefore cannot hang.
Not far from the pit, a monkey was sitting on a tree. As the tiger ran past her, she pointed at him and laughed.
- Why are you laughing? - asked the tiger offended. - You look very funny! What's wrong with you? - Oh, what's wrong with me! I just saw Yamori! - said the tiger. - What is this - yamori? - asked the monkey. - This is a terrible monster! It rushed at me and jumped on my back. But I wasn't afraid. I ran to the pit and threw the monster to the bottom.
The monkey bared his teeth and laughed even louder: “Oh, you fool, you fool!” I saw who you threw into the pit. It was not a yamori at all, but a human.
The tiger got angry: “Monkey, you are speaking impudently. Prove that it was not a Yamori, but a man!” “What is there to prove?” Go to the pit yourself and look! The tiger shuddered. He really didn't want to return to the pit. But it was impossible to refuse - it was a shame in front of the monkey. He stood still and shifted from foot to foot, and since he had four legs, this went on for a very long time. The monkey looked at him and laughed again:
- What a coward you are! Let's go together. The monkey climbed down from the tree and bravely walked towards the hole. There was nothing to be done, the tiger had to follow the monkey. But he did not reach the pit itself, but stopped not far from the edge, hid behind a tree and began to wait for what would happen.
The monkey approached the hole and bent down. “Well, what’s there?” - asked the tiger from behind the tree. “I don’t know.” It's dark in the pit, you can't see anything. How can you figure out who is sitting in the hole?
The monkey thought about it. “Oh, I came up with an idea!” Let me lower the tail there and feel it. But I must say that this happened a long time ago. Monkeys were not the same then as they are now. They had a long, long tail, so long that the monkey could freely throw it over his shoulder and wrap it around his neck several times, like a scarf.
The monkey lowered such a long tail into the hole. And in the hole a horse thief was floundering. He tried to climb up the sheer earthen wall, but each time the ground collapsed and he fell to the bottom.
And suddenly he saw some kind of long rope being lowered into the hole. “Finally, they came to my aid!” — the horse thief rejoiced. He jumped, grabbed the monkey’s tail tightly with both hands and hung on it.
The monkey immediately felt that someone had grabbed his tail. She got scared and pulled her tail up, but she couldn’t pull it out, because the horse thief was heavy and was holding onto the tail tightly.
The monkey pulled, pulled, tugged, tugged, but never pulled out its tail. Only her face turned red from the effort. And the horse thief heard her groaning and thought:
“This is how good people are trying to pull me out! If only I don’t fall!” He thought this and grabbed his tail even tighter. The monkey screamed in pain. The tiger heard her squeal, carefully looked out from behind the trunk and saw that the monkey was rushing along the edge of the pit, twitching with all his might, but could not move away from the pit.
“What a disaster!” thought the tiger. “Apparently, Yamori caught the monkey by the tail. Now he will climb up the tail and jump out!”
The tiger closed his eyes in fear and began to run for the third time, and as fast as old, smart tigers never run.
And the monkey didn’t even notice how he ran away. For the last time she gathered all her strength and pulled out her tail. But then its long tail broke off and fell to the bottom, and the monkey was left with only the very root of its tail.
From then on, the monkey's tail was short and his face red.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru