Rudyard Kipling: The White Cat. The fairy tale of the white cat - Rudyard Kipling

A fur seal was born in the Bering Sea white. Together with his relatives, he goes to the Pacific Ocean. Along the way main character In the story “White Cat” he makes new acquaintances and experiences unforgettable adventures.

Fairy tale White cat read

All this happened many years ago on the island of St. Paul, in a place called Northeast Cape, far, far away in the Bering Sea. The winter wren Limmershin told me this story when the wind nailed him to the rigging of a steamship going to Japan, and I took him to the cabin, warmed him and fed him for several days, so that finally he could fly back to the island of St. Pavel. Limmershin is a strange bird, but he knows how to tell the truth.

The North-Eastern Cape is visited exclusively on business, and the only real business there is with seals, and in the summer months they swim to its shores in hundreds and hundreds of thousands from the cold northern sea. For seals, nowhere in the sea are there such amenities as off the coast of the North-Eastern Cape.

The Sea Catcher knew this very well and, with the onset of spring, rushed to the shores of the North-Eastern Cape and whole month fought there with his comrades for a good place on the shore, closer to the sea. He is already fifteen years old; it was a large gray beast with fur that almost formed a mane on its shoulders and long, vicious fangs. Rising on his front flippers, he rose more than four feet above the ground, and if anyone had dared to weigh him, he would have pulled nearly seven hundred pounds. This cat's entire body was covered with scars, traces of brutal battles, but he was always ready to fight again. The Sea Catcher bowed his head to the side, as if afraid to look his enemy in the eyes, then, like lightning, rushed at him. When the Sea Catcher's large teeth dug into his opponent's neck, he, of course, could break free if he found the strength to do so, but the Sea Catcher did not help him in this regard.

But the Sea Catcher never pursued the defeated: this was against the rules of the Shore. He only wanted to get a place near the sea for his “nursery”. However, due to the fact that forty or fifty thousand seals strived for the same thing every spring, the squealing, splashing, roaring, howling and noise on the shore merged into something terrible.

From a small hill called Hutchinson's Hill, you could see an area of three and a half miles, all covered with fighting; the waves of the surf dotted the heads of the seals, who also hurried to the ground for the sake of fighting. They fought among the coastal stones; fought on the sand; they fought on the worn, smooth basalt stones of the “children”, because they were as stupid and intractable as people. Their wives appeared only in the last days of May or early June; they did not want to be torn to pieces. Young two-, three- and four-year-old seals, who had not yet acquired a household, passed the ranks of the fighting, walked about half a mile into the interior of the island and in whole legions began to play on the sand dunes, destroying everything green that grew out of the ground. They were called bachelors, and perhaps about two or three hundred thousand of these young seals gathered in the North-Eastern Cape alone.

One spring, the Sea Catcher had just finished his forty-fifth battle when Queen, his gentle wife with gentle eyes, came out of the sea, and he grabbed her by the collar, lowered her to his site and said grumpily:

- Late as always! Where have you been?

During those four months that the Sea Catcher remained on the shallows, he did not eat anything, and therefore was usually in a bad mood. The uterus knew that he did not need to answer. She looked around and softly purred:

- How caring you are. You're back in your old place!

- I think I took it! - said the Sea Catcher. - Look at me.

He was all scratched up; blood oozed from his body in twenty places; one of his eyes was almost completely closed, and his sides were in rags.

“Oh, you men, men,” said the Matka, wrapping her back flipper around herself. - Why can’t you be reasonable and calmly take your seats? Really, you might think that you fought with the killer whale Whale Killer.

“Since mid-May, all I did was fight. This year the coast is filled to disgusting levels. I met at least a hundred fur seals from Lucannon Shoal looking for shelter. Why is it that no one wants to stay in their own areas?

“I have often thought that we would be much happier if we settled on Otter Island instead of staying in this densely populated place,” remarked Matka.

- Bah, only young people swim to Otter Island. If we went there, everyone would think we were afraid. We need to take care to maintain decorum, my dear.

The Sea Catcher proudly pulled his head into his shoulders and pretended for several minutes that he was sleeping, and meanwhile all the time he watched to see if he could fight. Now that all the seals and their wives have already gathered on earth, you could hear their noise in the sea several miles from the shore, covering the loud surf of the waves. There were more than a million seals on the shore: old seals, little seals, their mothers and bachelors. They fought, quarreled, screamed, crawled and played; sailed out to sea; crowds and regiments returned to land; lay on every foot of the bank as far as the eye could see; brigades darted about, piercing the fog. It is almost always foggy here, except for those days when it is a short time the sun comes out and gives everything the color of pearls or rainbows.

Queen's cub, Kitten, was born in the midst of the turmoil; he was all head and shoulders and looked with pale, watery blue eyes; everything was as befits a newborn baby. However, there was something in his fur that made Matka look at him very carefully.

“Sea Catcher,” she said after a pause, “our little one will be white.”

– Empty coastal shells and dry algae! – the Sea Catcher snorted. – There has never been a white cat in the world.

“It’s not my fault,” said the Queen, “but now it will be,” and she began to sing a quiet cooing song that all mothers sing to their baby seals: “Don’t swim until you’re six weeks old, or your head will sink into the water.” etc.

Of course, at first the little creature did not understand her words. The cat fussed and played next to his mother and learned to quickly move away when his father fought with another cat and the fighters rolled on the slippery stones with a loud roar. The queen went to the sea for food and fed the calf only every other day; but then he greedily rushed to food and ate as much as he could eat.

Once Kotik went further, deep into the island, and met tens of thousands of his peers there. They played like puppies; They fell asleep on clean sand, woke up, and started fiddling around again. The adults paid them no attention; bachelors stayed in their own area, and therefore the little ones had a lot of time for fun.

Returning from fishing in the deep sea, Matka went straight to the place of their games and began to call Kitty with the voice of a sheep calling her lamb, and waited for him to respond. As soon as she heard his bleat, she moved straight in his direction, hitting the ground hard with her front flippers and pushing the kids with her head, who fell to the right and left of her. Several hundred mothers always looked for their little ones in the place where they played, and the young cats got a fair share from them; but the Matka rightly said to Kitty:

- As long as you're not lying in dirty water and you don’t lose weight, as long as hard grains of sand don’t get into scratches or cuts on your body, as long as you don’t swim in a storm, nothing will happen to you.

Small cats swim no better than small children. When Kotik went to sea for the first time, a wave carried him to such a depth where he could drown; his big head sank into the water; his little hind flippers rose up just as the Queen told him in the lullaby, and if the next wave had not thrown him back, he would have drowned.

After this, he learned to lie in a puddle on the shallows so that the incoming waves covered him and lifted him, at which time he rake in the water with his flippers and watch for large waves that could harm him. For two weeks he learned to work with his flippers and all this time he went in and out of the water; with a cry that sounded like a cough, or grunting, he crawled to the higher shore and slept like a cat on the sand; then he went out to sea again and finally realized that his real element was water.

Now you can imagine how he had fun with his comrades, now diving under the sea walls, now rising to the crest of a water ridge, now coming to the ground amid the hissing of water and flying spray, when a large wall, spinning, ran into the sandbank. Sometimes, standing on his tail, he would scratch his head, just like old seals, or play the game “I am the king of the castle” on the slimy, algae-covered rocks that barely protruded from the water. From time to time, Kotik noticed a thin fin swimming to the shore, similar to the feather of a large shark, and knew that it was a Killer Whale (killer whale), which eats young seals when it can get to them. And Kotik, like an arrow, rushed to the shallows, and the fin slowly moved away.

At the end of October, entire families and packs of seals began to leave the island of St. Paul, heading to the open sea; the fighting over places had ceased, and the bachelors now played wherever they pleased.

“Next year,” his mother told Kotik, “you will be a bachelor; in the meantime, you need to learn how to fish.

They set off across the Pacific Ocean together, Matka showed Kitty how to sleep on his back, pressing his fins to his sides and sticking his nose out of the water. There is no calmer cradle in the world than the long, smooth rolling swells of the Pacific Ocean. When Kitty felt a slight itch all over his skin, the Uterus told him that he was beginning to understand water; that this itching and tingling foretell the onset of bad weather, and that it means he needs to swim with all his might and go far away.

“Soon,” she said, “you will also understand exactly where to swim; for the time being, keep an eye on the Porpoise, the dolphin; he is very smart.

A whole crowd of dolphins dived and rushed, cutting through the water, and little Kitten rushed after them.

- Why do you know where to swim? – he asked breathlessly.

The leader bulged his whitish eyes and dived into the depths.

“I have an itch in my tail, baby,” he said, “and that means there’s a storm behind me.” Forward! When you are south of the Still Water (he meant the equator) and you get an itch in your tail, know that there is a storm ahead of you, and turn north. Forward! I feel that the water here is very dangerous.

This is one of those things that Kitty learned, and he was constantly learning. The uterus said that he should swim for cod and halibut along the underwater shoals, learn to examine the wrecks of ships lying a hundred fathoms under water; slip like a gun bullet into one porthole of a sunken ship and fly out of another, as fish do; dance on the crests of the waves when lightning streaks the sky, and politely wave one of your flippers at the short-tailed albatross and sea falcon flying in the wind; leap three or four feet out of the water like a dolphin, holding its flippers to its sides and curving its tail; do not touch flying fish, because they consist of only bones; at full speed and at a depth of ten fathoms, tear off a tasty piece of the back of a cod with your teeth; never stop and look at a boat or ship, especially a rowboat. Six months later, Kotik did not know about fishing on the open sea there was only that which was not worth knowing; and all this time he never stepped onto land.

But one day, when Kitty was dozing, lying in warm water somewhere not far from the island of Juan Fernandez, he felt the laziness that people feel when spring creeps into their body; at the same time he remembered the glorious solid shores of the North-Eastern Cape, seven thousand miles away, the games of his comrades; the smell of sea grass and the roar of seals during the battle. At that very moment he turned to the north, hastily swam in this direction and soon met dozens of his comrades, who were all hurrying there. They said:

- Hello, Kitty! This year, we bachelors can dance the fire dance among the coastal stones of Lucannon and play on the young grass. But where did you get such fur?

Now Kotik had an almost completely white skin, and although he was proud of it, he only answered:

- Swim faster. My bones yearn for the earth.

Finally they all returned to their native shallows and heard the old seals fighting among themselves in the clouds of fog.

On the first night, Kotik danced a “fire dance” with his peers. IN summer nights the entire expanse of the sea from the North-Eastern Cape to Lucannon is full of fire, and each seal leaves behind itself a trail similar to a strip of burning oil; when he jumps, a fiery splash rises up. And from the waves rushing onto the shore, fiery jets and spinning shiny funnels rush. Then the young bachelors went on to their plots and rolled back and forth in the young greenery, telling each other about what they did when they were at sea. They talked about the Pacific Ocean, as boys talk about the thicket of the forest in which they collected nuts, and if anyone understood the speech of the seals, he would draw such a map of the ocean as has never been seen before.

Three- and four-year-old bachelors rushed from Hutchinson's Hill, shouting:

- Get out of the way, young people! The sea is deep and you don't know everything that's in it. Wait, go around the Horn first. Hey, same year old, where did you get that white fur coat?

“I didn’t take it anywhere,” answered Kotik, “she has grown up!”

Just at that moment when he wanted to overturn the speaker, two black-haired people with flat red faces came out from behind the sand dune, and Kotik, who had never seen a person before, coughed angrily and lowered his head. A few yards away, the bachelors huddled together, looking at them stupidly. Those who came were important personalities: Kerik Buterin, the head of the hunters on this island, and Patalamon, his son. They had come from a small village less than half a mile from the “nurseries” and were now discussing which seals should be driven to the slaughterhouse (seals were driven just like sheep) so that their skins would later be turned into jackets.

“Heh,” said Patalamon, “look at that!” White cat!

Kerik Buterin's face turned white, despite the layer of grease and soot that covered his entire skin (he was an Aleut, and Aleuts are very unkempt).

And the hunter muttered a prayer.

- Don't touch him, Patalamon. There haven't been white cats since... since I was born. Maybe this is the spirit of old man Zakharov. Last year he disappeared during a big storm.

“I won’t go near him,” said Patalamon. - He will bring me misfortune. Do you really think that this is Zakharov? I owed him for several seagull eggs.

“Don’t look at him,” said Kerik. - Turn around this herd of four-year-olds. Today workers are required to skin two hundred. The hunting season is just beginning, and they are not yet accustomed to the work. A hundred is enough. Quicker!

Patalamon crackled his dried seals in front of a flock of bachelors humerus, and the animals stopped, snorting and puffing. Then he approached them and they moved; Kerik directed the bachelors away from the shore, and they did not even try to return to their own. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of other seals watched their comrades being driven away and continued to play. One Kitty asked questions, but no one could tell him anything; the bachelors only knew that for six weeks, or two months, people stole cats every year.

“I’ll follow them,” said Kotik, and his eyes almost jumped out of their sockets as he crawled along the tracks of the herd.

- He's coming for us white cat, Patalamon shouted. – For the first time, the beast goes to the place of slaughter by itself!

- Shh! “Don’t look, don’t turn around,” Kerik answered, “it’s Zakharov’s ghost.” I must talk to the shaman about him.

The site of the slaughter was only half a mile from the usual bachelors' game arena, but Kerik had to spend an hour moving, since he knew that if the seals walked too quickly, they would get hot and, when he began to skin them, they would come off in shreds. So they very slowly passed the Isthmus of the Sea Lion, Webster's house, finally reached the Salt House and disappeared from the sight of the seals who were on the sandbar. The cat walked behind them, gasping, amazed. It seemed to him that he was at the end of the world, but the roar of the “children” sounded with the force of the roar of a train in the tunnel.

So Kerik sat down on the moss, took out a heavy tin watch and allowed the seals to rest for about thirty minutes. The cat heard drops of thickening fog falling from the hunter's hood. But soon ten or twelve people showed up, each bringing an iron-bound club three or four feet long. Kerik pointed to two or three seals from the herd who had been bitten by their comrades or were too excited, and the people who came kicked them aside with their feet shod in heavy walrus skin boots. Then Kerik said: “Begin!”, and those who came began to beat the seals...

Ten minutes later, little Kitten could not recognize any of his friends: their skins were cut from nose to hind flippers, torn off and thrown in a heap on the ground.

That was enough! The cat turned and galloped (a cat can cover a small space at a very fast gallop); he moved back towards the sea, and his small young mustache bristled with horror. At Sea Lion Isthmus, where large sea lions sit on the edge of the surf, he threw his fins over his head, threw himself into the cool water and began to bob, struggling to catch his breath.

- What's happened? - the sea lion said angrily; they usually keep to themselves.

“It’s boring, very boring,” said Kotik. - They kill all the bachelors on all the shallows.

The sea lion looked towards land.

“Nothing,” he said, “your friends, as usual, are making noise about nonsense.” You probably saw how old Kerik killed the herd? He's been stealing cats for thirty years now.

- Yes, this is terrible! - said Kotik.

A wave covered him; He, with a screw blow of his flippers, rose upright and stopped three inches from the jagged cliff.

“Not bad for someone the same age,” remarked the sea lion, who knew how to appreciate a good swimmer. - Probably, from your point of view, a terrible thing is happening, but since you cats return to the same place year after year, it’s no wonder that people found out about it. If you don't find an island for yourself where there are never people, you will always be hijacked.

- Is there such an island in the world? - asked Kotik.

“I’ve been hunting halibut for twenty years and I can’t say that I’ve found it yet.” But listen, apparently you like to talk with creatures that are smarter and better than you; what if you went to the walrus island and talked to the Sea Wizard? Maybe he knows something? Don't jump like that. It's six miles to swim, and if I were you, kid, I'd take a nap first.

The cat found what it was good advice, swam to his own shallows, climbed ashore, fell asleep and slept for half an hour, twitching all over, as all his relatives do. Later he headed to the island of walruses, lying northeast of the North-Eastern Cape. This island consisted of stone platforms and seagull nests. There were herds of walruses resting there.

The cat landed next to the old Sea Wizard, a huge, ugly, spotted, wrinkled walrus of the North Pacific, a beast with a thick neck and long tusks, who is polite only when he sleeps. The Sea Wizard was sleeping at that moment, and his back flippers were half buried in the waves.

- Wake up! - Kitty barked loudly, because the seagulls made a lot of noise.

- Ay! Ho! Hm! What is this? - asked the walrus, hit his neighbor with his fangs and woke him up; he, in turn, hit the next one, and it went on and on until they all woke up and began to look around, only no one noticed Kotik.

- Hey! “It’s me,” said Kotik, swaying like a float in the surf and looking like a small white lump.

- Fine! Well, let me... be fleeced! - said the walrus, and everyone looked at Kotik, as old dozing gentlemen would look at someone who came into their club little boy. The cat at that moment did not want to hear about skinning; He had seen enough of this, and therefore he shouted:

– Is there a place in the world where people never come?

“Look for it yourself,” answered the Sea Wizard, closing his eyes. - Swim. We are busy!

The cat did his dolphin leap in the air and shouted even louder than before:

– Grass eater, shell eater!

He knew that the Sea Wizard had never caught a single fish in his life, but was always tearing out shells, sea moss and sea grass, even though he liked to seem like a terrible creature. It is clear that bluebirds, great skuas, white gulls and fulmars, always wanting to find an opportunity to say something rude to someone, repeated his exclamation, and (as Limmershin told me) for about five minutes you could not have heard a gun shot on the island of walruses. Its entire population screamed and screamed:

- Grass eater! Old man!

And the old walrus tossed and turned from side to side, grunting and coughing.

- Well, will you tell me now? - Kitty asked, completely out of breath.

“Ask the sea cow,” answered the walrus, “if she is still alive; she is able to tell you.

“She is the only creature uglier than the Sea Wizard!” - shouted the great skua, flying under the very nose of the walrus. “She’s even uglier and even more impolite.” Old man!

The cat let the seagulls scream, and he swam to his shore. Then he learned that no one supported his intention to discover something new, quiet place. He was told that people always carried away dozens of young bachelors, that this had long been the custom, and that if he did not like to look at unpleasant things, he should not go to the place of slaughter. After all, no one had ever seen their relatives killed before, and this was the difference between Kotik and his friends. In addition, Kitty had white fur.

- That's it! - said the Sea Catcher, after listening to his son’s story about his adventures. - Grow up, become a big cat like your father, start your own family and then they will leave you alone. In five years you will be able to defend yourself.

Even the meek Mother said:

“You won’t be able to stop this carnage.” Go play in the sea, Kitty.

And Kitty swam away and danced the “fire dance,” but with a great heaviness on his heart.

That autumn he left the shore very early and set off on his journey completely alone; One nagging thought stuck in his head. He will find a sea cow, if only such a creature is in the sea, and will find a calm island with a good, solid coast, where people could not get to the seals. And he began to examine the entire Pacific Ocean from north to south, sailing about three hundred miles a day. More adventures happened to him than can be told; he almost fell into the teeth of a spotted shark and a hammerhead (a genus of shark), met all the incredible villains scurrying in the seas, a heavy polished fish, a comb shell with purple spots, which is attached to one place for hundreds of years and is proud of it, but never saw a sea cow and never found the island he dreamed of so much.

If the shore turned out to be good, solid, with a gentle slope for playing, the smoke of a whale boat was always visible on the horizon, and Kotik knew what this meant. Sometimes he saw traces of seals on the island, realized that they had been killed, and told himself that where people had been once, they would, of course, return again.

Once Kotik was talking with an old broad-tailed albatross and he told him that in terms of peace and quiet there is no place in the world better and calmer than the island of Kergulen.

The cat swam to the indicated place, and a storm with hail, lightning and thunder carried him there to the black evil cliffs, on which he almost crashed to pieces. However, as he set sail, Kotik noticed that even on this gloomy island there once was a “children’s room.” The same thing was repeated on all the islands he visited.

Limmershin gave me a long list of these islands; according to him, Kotik spent five years searching, annually resting for four months in his homeland; at this time the bachelors mocked him and his imaginary islands. He visited the Galapagos, a terrible dry place on the equator, and almost baked himself to death there; sailed to the St. George Islands, to the Orkney Islands, to the Emerald Isle, to the Little Isle of Nachtigall, to Bouvet Island, to the Island of the Holy Cross, even to a tiny piece of land south of the Cape of Good Hope. But the sea population everywhere told him the same thing. In former times, seals came to these islands, but people killed them. Even when Kotik sailed several thousand miles from the Pacific Ocean and ended up in a place called Cap Corientes, he came across several hundred emaciated seals and they told him that people had come to them too.

Kotik's heart almost broke, and, rounding Cape Horn, he headed towards his native shallows; on the way to the north, he came to land, onto an island covered with green trees, and found on it a dying, old, old cat; The cat caught fish for him, told him about his sorrows and said:

“Now I am returning to the North-Eastern Cape and if I am driven away with my comrades to the site of the massacre, I will not care.”

The old cat replied:

- Try again. I am the last of the last brood of Masafuer, and in those days when men were killing us by the hundreds of thousands, it was said on our shallows that in time a white seal would come from the north and lead the Seal People to a quiet place. I am old, and I am not destined to live to see such a day; others will survive. Try again.

And Kitty raised his mustache (they were lovely) and said:

“I am the only white cat ever born on the shore, and I alone, black or white, decided to look for new islands.”

This meeting greatly encouraged him. When Kotik returned home in the summer, the Matka asked him to marry and start a household, since he had become an adult large seal with a wavy white mane on his shoulders, as heavy, big and fierce as the Sea Catcher.

“Give me one more year,” he told her, “remember, mother, because it is the seventh wave that runs into the shallows further than all the others.”

An amazing thing: one of the young brides also decided not to get married this year, and the night before his last departure on the search, Kotik danced a “fire dance” with her along the Lucannon Shoal.

This time he headed west because he was on the trail of a huge school of halibut, and he needed to eat at least a hundred pounds of fish a day to maintain his full strength. The cat chased the halibuts until he got tired, then he curled up and fell asleep in a hollow near a hill on Copper Island. He knew the coast very well, so when, around midnight, he felt his bed of grass swaying slightly, he mentally said:

- Hm, there's a strong tide today.

Turning under the water, he opened his eyes, stretched and, noticing some huge figures that were rummaging with their noses in the shallow water and nibbling on the heavy fringes of algae, he jumped up like a cat.

“I swear by the waves of the Strait of Magellan,” he whispered into his mustache. - Who is this?

The strange animals did not resemble walruses, sea lions, seals, bears, whales, fish, cuttlefish, comb shells, in short, not a single creature that had ever been seen Kitty. They were from twenty to thirty feet long, had no back flippers, had only spade-shaped tails, as if squeezed out of damp skin, and their incredibly ridiculous heads would amaze you with their appearance. So they stopped eating, rose almost vertically, swayed, bowing importantly to each other and waving their flippers, like a fat man waving his arms.

“Ekhem,” said Kotik. - Good hunting?

The large animals bowed to him and waved their flippers; then they started eating again, and Kitty noticed that each of them upper lip was divided into two parts, strange creature could stretch both halves apart, about a foot; then it brought these blades together, and in the cut between them there was a whole bunch of sea grass. Taking the food into its mouth, the monster began to chew it solemnly.

– Strange way nutrition,” said Kotik.

They bowed to him again, and Kitty began to lose patience.

“Very good,” he continued. – If you have an extra joint in your front flippers, you don’t need to show it all the time. I see you bow very gracefully, but I would like to know your name.

The split lips moved and twisted; watery green eyes They stared at Kotik, but there was no answer.

“Well,” said Kitty, “however, you are uglier than the Sea Wizard and have even worse manners!”

At that moment, the memory of what a great skua shouted to him flashed in him when he, then still a young man of the same age, was near the island of walruses. Remembering this, Kotik went under the water: he realized that he had finally met a sea cow.

The sea cows continued to flounder, graze and chew on the grass, and Kitty began to ask them questions in all the dialects he had learned during his travels.

The Sea People have no less of them than people; however, not a single sea cow responded; the fact is that sea cows are not able to speak, they have only six vertebrae in their necks instead of seven, and the sea inhabitants claim that this prevents them from talking even to each other. But, as we know, they have an extra joint in their front flippers and, waving them up, down, and to the sides, they make signs that serve them as something like a clumsy telegraphic code.

By dawn, Kotik's mane bristled, and his patience went where dead crabs go. At this time, the sea cows slowly moved north; from time to time they stopped for absurd conferences, with eternal bows; The cat swam after them, saying to himself: such stupid creatures would have been killed long ago if they had not found some safe island; and what is good enough for a sea cow is good enough for a seal. But still, I would like them to hurry up.

It was a boring time for Kitty. The herd never made more than forty or fifty miles a day; At night, the sea cows stopped to eat and stayed close to the shore during the journey; The cat swam around them, rushed over them, dived under them, but could not speed up their progress, even a little. When the cows moved far north, they began to hold meetings every few hours, still bowing, and Kitty almost bit off all his whiskers from frustration; Finally he noticed that the sea cows were moving along the warm current, and from then on he began to respect them.

One night they plunged into light water - they sank like stones - and for the first time since Kotik recognized them, they swam quickly. He set off after them, and their speed amazed him: he never thought that these clumsy animals could move with such dexterity. So they headed to the coastal cliff, which went into deep water, and entered a dark hole near its foot, twenty fathoms below the surface of the sea. They floated along this dark corridor for a long, long time, and Kitty wanted to breathe in fresh air before he left the tunnel through which strange creatures were leading him.

- My mane! - said Kotik when, gasping for air and puffing, he found himself on the other side of the underground passage. “I had to stay under water for a long time, but it was worth it!”

The sea cows had scattered and lazily nibbled the grass along the edges of the most beautiful shore that Kotick had ever seen. For miles there were stones softly ground by water, suitable for seal “nurseries”; further on there rose a sloping sandy shore, convenient for young people to play; there were rocks on the shore where bachelors could dance, grass in which they could roll, and sand dunes for climbing up and down. But the best thing is, from the smell of water, which does not deceive the cat, Kitty realized that people had never been to this place.

First of all, he made sure that there was a lot of fish; then he swam along the coast and counted the delightful low sandy islands, half-hidden by a beautiful swirling fog. To the north, a series of shoals, rifts and rocks overlooked the sea, which would not have allowed any ship to come closer than six miles to the shore; between the islands and the mainland there was a strip of deep water that approached steep cliffs, and somewhere there, under these rocks, the opening of a tunnel was hidden.

“This is the same North-Eastern Cape, only ten times better,” said Kotik. “Sea cows must be smarter than I thought.” Even if people live nearby, they will not be able to get down from the steep cliffs; from the outside open sea shallows will break any ship into pieces. If there is a safe place anywhere, it is here.

Kotik remembered the young bride who was waiting for him, but no matter how much he wanted to return to his native shores as quickly as possible, he carefully explored the new country in order to answer all the questions of his tribe.

Then Kotik dived, firmly remembered where the entrance to the tunnel was, and rushed through it to the south. No one except a sea cow or a seal could imagine the existence of such a corridor, and even the Cat, looking back at the cliffs, could hardly believe that he had passed under them.

He sailed quickly, but still took six days to return home; when he crawled to the ground above the isthmus of the Sea Lion, first of all he saw his bride waiting for him. From the look in his eyes, she realized that he had finally found the desired island.

However, the bachelors, the Sea Catcher and all the other seals began to mock him when he told them about the place he had found; one of his peers remarked:

“This is all wonderful, Kotik, but, having appeared from nowhere, you cannot order us to leave here.” Remember, we fought over our beds, but you didn’t. You preferred to roam the seas.

The others laughed; a young man the same age as Kotik began to turn his head from side to side. He had just gotten married this year and was putting on a lot of airs.

“I have no reason to fight over a bed,” answered Kitty. “I just want to show you all a completely safe place.” Why fight?

“Oh, if you refuse, I, of course, have nothing more to talk about,” the young cat said, chuckling unkindly.

-Will you come with me if I remain the winner? - asked Kotik, and a green fire lit up in his eyes; he didn't want to fight at all, but the challenge angered him.

“Great,” the young cat answered nonchalantly. - If you win, I will follow you.

Before he had time to change his intentions, Kotik’s head stretched out and his teeth sank into the mocker’s neck. Then Kitty sat down on hind legs, dragged his opponent along the shore, shook him, turned him over on his back and thundered, addressing the others:

- These five years I tried for you, I found an island for you where you will live in safety, but if you don’t rip the heads off your stupid necks, you won’t believe it. Now I will teach you. Beware!

Limmershin told me that never in his life (and Limmershin sees fights of ten thousand large seals every year) that never in his life had he observed anything like an attack by Kotik, who rushed at the largest of the seals, grabbed him by the throat, shook him, beat him , threw until he began to grunt, asking for mercy; he threw him aside and rushed at the next one. You see: Kotik never starved for four months, as the rest of his relatives do, and swimming in the deep sea developed his strength; the main thing is that until now he had never fought. His white mane stood up with anger, his eyes burned, and sharp teeth sparkled. He was wonderful.

The old Sea Catcher saw him flash past him, dragging graying large seals behind him as if they were halibuts, and scattering bachelors in all directions. The Sea Catcher roared and exclaimed:

- Maybe Kotik is crazy, but there is no better fighter on the shore than him! Don't attack me, son, your father is with you at the same time!

The answering roar of the Cat rang out, and the Sea Catcher jumped, raising his mustache and puffing like a steam locomotive; The mother and Kotik's bride curled up, watching their fighters with admiration. A brilliant battle took place, Trapper and Kitty fought until there was at least one cat left who dared to raise his head. When it was all over, they began to move back and forth along the shore with a loud roar.

At night, just at the time when the northern lights, flashing, flickered among the fog, Kotik climbed onto an exposed cliff and looked at the destroyed “children’s” and at the bloodied, wounded seals.

“Now,” he said, “I have given you all a lesson.”

- Oh, my mane! - remarked his father, straightening up with difficulty, because he was terribly bitten. “The killer whale dolphin himself couldn’t have mangled them worse.” I'm proud of you, son: Furthermore, I'm going with you to your island, if such a place exists.

- Hey you fat porpoises, who is coming with me to the sea cow tunnel? Answer, otherwise I’ll start teaching you again! - Kotik thundered.

A murmur ran along the shore, reminiscent of the splashing of the tide.

And Kotik pulled his head into his shoulders and closed his eyes with pride. He was no longer white; he was painted red from head to tail. However, he did not want to squeal, or look at his wounds, or lick them.

A week later, Kotick and his army (about ten thousand bachelors and old cleavers) moved north to the sea cow tunnel. They were led by Kitty. Those who remained in the old place called those who fled away idiots. But the next spring, when the seals met again on the fishing shallows of the Pacific Ocean, Kitty's comrades told the stubborn ones such wonders about the new shores beyond the sea cow tunnel that big number seals left the coast of the North-Eastern Cape.

It is clear that the resettlement was carried out gradually: the seal needs to think about anything for a long time, but year after year, larger and larger herds left the North-Eastern Cape, Lucannon and other dwellings for the calm, protected shores, where the seal spends every summer, becoming a year old years bigger, fatter and stronger, and bachelors play around him in the sea, inaccessible to man.

Rudyard Kipling

WHITE CAT

Fall asleep my son: it’s so sweet to swing

At night there are waves in the hollow!

And the month is still shining, and the waves are still rushing,

And I dream and dream blissful dreams.

The depths of the sea will make you seasick,

You'll sleep through the night to the song of the surf;

Neither reefs nor shallows in such a cradle

You are not in danger - go to sleep my baby!

Kotikova lullaby

Everything that I am about to tell you happened several years ago in a bay called Novovostochnaya, on the northeastern tip of St. Paul Island, which lies far, far away in the Bering Sea. This story was told to me by Limmershin, a winter wren who was blown by the wind into the rigging of a steamship heading to Japan. I took the little king to my cabin, warmed him and fed him until he gained enough strength to fly to his home island, that very island of St. Paul. Limmershin is a strange bird, but you can rely on his words.

People do not enter Novovostochnaya Bay unless necessary, and of all the inhabitants of the sea, only seals constantly need it. In the summer months, hundreds of thousands of seals swim to the island from the cold gray sea and no wonder: after all, the shore bordering the bay was specially designed for seals and cannot be compared with any other place in the world.

Old Cleaver knew this well, every year, wherever spring found him, he, at full speed - like a torpedo boat - rushed to Novostochny and spent a whole month in battles, winning from his neighbors a convenient place for his family - on the coastal cliffs , closer to the water. The cleaver was a huge gray male, fifteen years old, his shoulders were covered with a thick mane, and his teeth were like dog fangs - long and very sharp. When he leaned on his front flippers, his body rose a good four feet above the ground, and his weight - if anyone dared to weigh him - would probably be seven hundred pounds, no less. From head to tail he was decorated with scars - marks of past battles, but at any moment he was ready to get involved in a new fight. He even developed a special combat tactic: at first he tilted his head to the side, as if not daring to look into the eyes of his opponent, and then, with the speed of lightning, he grabbed his neck with a death grip - and then his opponent could only rely on himself if he wanted to save his skin.

However, the Cleaver never pursued the defeated one, because this was strictly prohibited by the Coastal Laws. He only needed to secure the territory gained in battle, but since as summer approached, another forty thousand, or even fifty, of his relatives were doing the same, the roar, growl, howl and roar on the shore were simply terrifying.

From a small hill, which is called Hutchinson's Hill, there was a view of the coastline three and a half miles long, completely dotted with fighting seals, and in the foam of the surf the heads of newcomers flashed here and there, who were in a hurry to get out onto land and take part in the battle as much as they could. They fought in the waves, they fought in the sand, they fought on basalt rocks carved by the sea, because they were just as stubborn and unyielding as people. The females did not appear on the island until the end of May or the beginning of June, fearing that they would be torn to pieces in the heat of battle, and young two-, three- and four-year-old seals - those that had not yet acquired families - were in a hurry to get further through the ranks of the fighters deep into the island and there they frolicked on the sand dunes, leaving not a blade of grass behind. Such cats were called bachelors, and at least two or three hundred thousand of them gathered annually in Novostochny alone.

One fine spring day, when Cleaver had just victoriously completed his forty-fifth battle, his wife Matka swam to the shore - flexible and affectionate, with gentle eyes. The cleaver grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and, without ceremony, placed her in the reclaimed place, growling:

You're always late! Where have you been?

All four months that Cleaver spent on the shore, he, according to the custom of seals, did not eat a single crumb and therefore was in a disgusting mood. Knowing this, Matka did not contradict him. She looked around and purred:

How nice of you to take our place from last year!

Need to think! - Cleaver responded gloomily. - Just look at me!

He was covered from top to bottom with bleeding wounds, one eye was almost closed, and his sides were torn to shreds.

Ah, men, men! - Matka sighed, fanning herself with her right hind flipper. - And why don’t you come to an agreement among yourself? You look like you've been in the teeth of a Killer Whale.

Since mid-May all I have done is fight. This year the coast is obscenely crowded. There are countless local cats, and in addition there are at least a hundred Lucannon cats, and everyone needs to get settled. No, to sit on your rightful shore - everyone is coming here.

“In my opinion, we would be much calmer and more comfortable on Beaver Island,” Matka noted. - Why huddle in such cramped conditions?

You can also say - Beaver Island! What am I, some kind of bachelor? If we go there, they will put us to shame. No, my dear, you have to keep your mark.

And Cleaver pulled his head into his shoulders with dignity and prepared to take a nap, although he never lost his combat readiness for a second. Now that everything married couples were assembled, the roar of the seals echoed for many miles from the coast, covering the most furious storm. According to the most conservative estimates, at least a million heads have accumulated here - old males and young mothers, sucklings and bachelors; and all this diverse population fought, bit, squealed, squeaked and crawled; sometimes they descended into the sea in whole companies and battalions, sometimes they climbed out onto land, covered the shore as far as the eye could see, and made platoon-by-platoon forays into the fog. Novo-Vostochnaya is constantly shrouded in fog; Rarely, rarely will the sun shine through, and then the droplets of moisture will glow like scatterings of pearls, and everything around will flare up with a rainbow shine.

In the midst of all this commotion, Kotik, the son of Matka, was born. Like other newborn cubs, he consisted almost entirely of head and shoulders, and his eyes were light blue and transparent, like water. But his mother immediately noticed his unusual skin.

You know, Cleaver,” she said, having examined the baby properly, “our son will be white.”

The Sea Catcher knew this very well and, with the onset of spring, rushed to the shores of the North-Eastern Cape and fought there with his comrades for a whole month for a good place on the shore, closer to the sea. He is already fifteen years old; it was a large gray beast with fur that almost formed a mane on its shoulders and long, vicious fangs. Rising on his front flippers, he rose more than four feet above the ground, and if anyone had dared to weigh him, he would have pulled nearly seven hundred pounds. This cat's entire body was covered with scars, traces of brutal battles, but he was always ready to fight again. The Sea Catcher bowed his head to the side, as if afraid to look his enemy in the eyes, then, like lightning, rushed at him. When the Sea Catcher's large teeth dug into his opponent's neck, he, of course, could break free if he found the strength to do so, but the Sea Catcher did not help him in this regard.

- Late as always! Where have you been?

- How caring you are. You're back in your old place!

- I think I took it! - said the Sea Catcher. - Look at me.

He was all scratched up; blood oozed from his body in twenty places; one of his eyes was almost completely closed, and his sides were in rags.

“I have often thought that we would be much happier if we settled on Otter Island instead of staying in this densely populated place,” remarked Matka.

- Bah, only young people swim to Otter Island. If we went there, everyone would think we were afraid. We need to take care to maintain decorum, my dear.

The Sea Catcher proudly pulled his head into his shoulders and pretended for several minutes that he was sleeping, and meanwhile all the time he watched to see if he could fight. Now that all the seals and their wives have already gathered on earth, you could hear their noise in the sea several miles from the shore, covering the loud surf of the waves. There were more than a million seals on the shore: old seals, little seals, their mothers and bachelors. They fought, quarreled, screamed, crawled and played; sailed out to sea; crowds and regiments returned to land; lay on every foot of the bank as far as the eye could see; brigades darted about, piercing the fog. It is almost always foggy here, except for those days when the sun comes out for a short time and gives everything the color of pearls or rainbows.

“Sea Catcher,” she said after a pause, “our little one will be white.”

– Empty coastal shells and dry algae! – the Sea Catcher snorted. – There has never been a white cat in the world.

– As long as you don’t lie in dirty water and lose weight, as long as hard grains of sand don’t get into scratches or cuts on your body, as long as you don’t swim in a storm, nothing will happen to you.

“Next year,” his mother told Kotik, “you will be a bachelor; in the meantime, you need to learn how to fish.

“Soon,” she said, “you will also understand exactly where to swim; for the time being, keep an eye on the Porpoise, the dolphin; he is very smart.

A whole crowd of dolphins dived and rushed, cutting through the water, and little Kitten rushed after them.

- Why do you know where to swim? – he asked breathlessly.

The leader bulged his whitish eyes and dived into the depths.

This is one of those things that Kitty learned, and he was constantly learning. The uterus said that he should swim for cod and halibut along the underwater shoals, learn to examine the wrecks of ships lying a hundred fathoms under water; slip like a gun bullet into one porthole of a sunken ship and fly out of another, as fish do; dance on the crests of the waves when lightning streaks the sky, and politely wave one of your flippers at the short-tailed albatross and sea falcon flying in the wind; leap three or four feet out of the water like a dolphin, holding its flippers to its sides and curving its tail; do not touch flying fish, because they consist of only bones; at full speed and at a depth of ten fathoms, tear off a tasty piece of the back of a cod with your teeth; never stop and look at a boat or ship, especially a rowboat. Six months later, Kotik did not know about fishing on the high seas only that which was not worth knowing; and all this time he never stepped onto land.

- Hello, Kitty! This year, we bachelors can dance the fire dance among the coastal stones of Lucannon and play on the young grass. But where did you get such fur?

Now Kotik had an almost completely white skin, and although he was proud of it, he only answered:

- Swim faster. My bones yearn for the earth.

Finally they all returned to their native shallows and heard the old seals fighting among themselves in the clouds of fog.

On the first night, Kotik danced a “fire dance” with his peers. On summer nights the whole expanse of sea from the North-Eastern Cape to Lucannon is full of fire, and each seal leaves behind itself a trail like a strip of burning oil; when he jumps, a fiery splash rises up. And from the waves rushing onto the shore, fiery jets and spinning shiny funnels rush. Then the young bachelors went on to their plots and rolled back and forth in the young greenery, telling each other about what they did when they were at sea. They talked about the Pacific Ocean, as boys talk about the thicket of the forest in which they collected nuts, and if anyone understood the speech of the seals, he would draw such a map of the ocean as has never been seen before.

Three- and four-year-old bachelors rushed from Hutchinson's Hill, shouting:

- Get out of the way, young people! The sea is deep and you don't know everything that's in it. Wait, go around the Horn first. Hey, same year old, where did you get that white fur coat?

“I didn’t take it anywhere,” answered Kotik, “she has grown up!”

“Heh,” said Patalamon, “look at that!” White cat!

Kerik Buterin's face turned white, despite the layer of grease and soot that covered his entire skin (he was an Aleut, and Aleuts are very unkempt).

And the hunter muttered a prayer.

- Don't touch him, Patalamon. There haven't been white cats since... since I was born. Maybe this is the spirit of old man Zakharov. Last year he disappeared during a big storm.

“I won’t go near him,” said Patalamon. - He will bring me misfortune. Do you really think that this is Zakharov? I owed him for several seagull eggs.

Patalamon crackled his dried seal humerus bones in front of the flock of bachelors, and the animals stopped, snorting and puffing. Then he approached them and they moved; Kerik directed the bachelors away from the shore, and they did not even try to return to their own. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of other seals watched their comrades being driven away and continued to play. One Kitty asked questions, but no one could tell him anything; the bachelors only knew that for six weeks, or two months, people stole cats every year.

“I’ll follow them,” said Kotik, and his eyes almost jumped out of their sockets as he crawled along the tracks of the herd.

“The white cat is following us,” Patalamon shouted. – For the first time, the beast goes to the place of slaughter by itself!

- Shh! “Don’t look, don’t turn around,” Kerik answered, “it’s Zakharov’s ghost.” I must talk to the shaman about him.

Ten minutes later, little Kitten could not recognize any of his friends: their skins were cut from nose to hind flippers, torn off and thrown in a heap on the ground.

- What's happened? - the sea lion said angrily; they usually keep to themselves.

“It’s boring, very boring,” said Kotik. - They kill all the bachelors on all the shallows.

The sea lion looked towards land.

“Nothing,” he said, “your friends, as usual, are making noise about nonsense.” You probably saw how old Kerik killed the herd? He's been stealing cats for thirty years now.

- Yes, this is terrible! - said Kotik.

A wave covered him; He, with a screw blow of his flippers, rose upright and stopped three inches from the jagged cliff.

- Is there such an island in the world? - asked Kotik.

The cat found this to be good advice, swam to his own shallows, climbed ashore, fell asleep and slept for half an hour, twitching all over, as all his relatives do. Later he headed to the island of walruses, lying northeast of the North-Eastern Cape. This island consisted of stone platforms and seagull nests. There were herds of walruses resting there.

- Wake up! - Kitty barked loudly, because the seagulls made a lot of noise.

- Hey! “It’s me,” said Kotik, swaying like a float in the surf and looking like a small white lump.

- Fine! Well, let me... be fleeced! - said the walrus, and everyone looked at Kotik, as old dozing gentlemen would look at a little boy who came into their club. The cat at that moment did not want to hear about skinning; He had seen enough of this, and therefore he shouted:

– Is there a place in the world where people never come?

“Look for it yourself,” answered the Sea Wizard, closing his eyes. - Swim. We are busy!

The cat did his dolphin leap in the air and shouted even louder than before:

– Grass eater, shell eater!

- Grass eater! Old man!

And the old walrus tossed and turned from side to side, grunting and coughing.

- Well, will you tell me now? - Kitty asked, completely out of breath.

“Ask the sea cow,” answered the walrus, “if she is still alive; she is able to tell you.

“She is the only creature uglier than the Sea Wizard!” - shouted the great skua, flying under the very nose of the walrus. “She’s even uglier and even more impolite.” Old man!

The cat let the seagulls scream, and he swam to his shore. Then he learned that no one supported his intention to open a new, quiet place. He was told that people always carried away dozens of young bachelors, that this had long been the custom, and that if he did not like to look at unpleasant things, he should not go to the place of slaughter. After all, no one had ever seen their relatives killed before, and this was the difference between Kotik and his friends. In addition, Kitty had white fur.

Even the meek Mother said:

“You won’t be able to stop this carnage.” Go play in the sea, Kitty.

And Kitty swam away and danced the “fire dance,” but with a great heaviness on his heart.

Once Kotik was talking with an old broad-tailed albatross and he told him that in terms of peace and quiet there is no place in the world better and calmer than the island of Kergulen.

“Now I am returning to the North-Eastern Cape and if I am driven away with my comrades to the site of the massacre, I will not care.”

The old cat replied:

And Kitty raised his mustache (they were lovely) and said:

“I am the only white cat ever born on the shore, and I alone, black or white, decided to look for new islands.”

“Give me one more year,” he told her, “remember, mother, because it is the seventh wave that runs into the shallows further than all the others.”

- Hm, there's a strong tide today.

“I swear by the waves of the Strait of Magellan,” he whispered into his mustache. - Who is this?

“Ekhem,” said Kotik. - Good hunting?

The large animals bowed to him and waved their flippers; then they began to eat again, and Kitty noticed that each of them had an upper lip divided into two parts; the strange creature could stretch both halves apart, about a foot; then it brought these blades together, and in the cut between them there was a whole bunch of sea grass. Taking the food into its mouth, the monster began to chew it solemnly.

“It’s a strange way of eating,” said Kotik.

They bowed to him again, and Kitty began to lose patience.

“Very good,” he continued. – If you have an extra joint in your front flippers, you don’t need to show it all the time. I see you bow very gracefully, but I would like to know your name.

The split lips moved and twisted; Watery green eyes stared at Kitty, but there was no answer.

“Well,” said Kitty, “however, you are uglier than the Sea Wizard and have even worse manners!”

The sea cows continued to flounder, graze and chew on the grass, and Kitty began to ask them questions in all the dialects he had learned during his travels.

- My mane! - said Kotik when, gasping for air and puffing, he found himself on the other side of the underground passage. “I had to stay under water for a long time, but it was worth it!”

“This is the same North-Eastern Cape, only ten times better,” said Kotik. “Sea cows must be smarter than I thought.” Even if people live nearby, they will not be able to get down from the steep cliffs; from the side of the open sea, the shoals will break any ship into pieces. If there is a safe place anywhere, it is here.

However, the bachelors, the Sea Catcher and all the other seals began to mock him when he told them about the place he had found; one of his peers remarked:

“This is all wonderful, Kotik, but, having appeared from nowhere, you cannot order us to leave here.” Remember, we fought over our beds, but you didn’t. You preferred to roam the seas.

The others laughed; a young man the same age as Kotik began to turn his head from side to side. He had just gotten married this year and was putting on a lot of airs.

“I have no reason to fight over a bed,” answered Kitty. “I just want to show you all a completely safe place.” Why fight?

“Oh, if you refuse, I, of course, have nothing more to talk about,” the young cat said, chuckling unkindly.

-Will you come with me if I remain the winner? - asked Kotik, and a green fire lit up in his eyes; he didn't want to fight at all, but the challenge angered him.

“Great,” the young cat answered nonchalantly. - If you win, I will follow you.

Before he had time to change his intentions, Kotik’s head stretched out and his teeth sank into the mocker’s neck. Then Kitty sat down on his hind legs, dragged his opponent along the shore, shook him, turned him over on his back and thundered, addressing the others:

The old Sea Catcher saw him flash past him, dragging graying large seals behind him as if they were halibuts, and scattering bachelors in all directions. The Sea Catcher roared and exclaimed:

- Maybe Kotik is crazy, but there is no better fighter on the shore than him! Don't attack me, son, your father is with you at the same time!

“Now,” he said, “I have given you all a lesson.”

- Oh, my mane! - remarked his father, straightening up with difficulty, because he was terribly bitten. “The killer whale dolphin himself couldn’t have mangled them worse.” I'm proud of you, son: moreover, I'm going with you to your island, if such a place exists.

- Hey you fat porpoises, who is coming with me to the sea cow tunnel? Answer, otherwise I’ll start teaching you again! - Kotik thundered.

A murmur ran along the shore, reminiscent of the splashing of the tide.

A week later, Kotick and his army (about ten thousand bachelors and old cleavers) moved north to the sea cow tunnel. They were led by Kitty. Those who remained in the old place called those who fled away idiots. But the next spring, when the seals met again on the fishing shallows of the Pacific Ocean, Kotik's comrades told the stubborn ones such miracles about the new shores beyond the sea cow tunnel that a large number of seals left the shore of the North-Eastern Cape.

White cat

Kipling Rudyard White cat

Rudyard Kipling

WHITE CAT

Fall asleep my son: it’s so sweet to swing

At night there are waves in the hollow!

And the month is still shining, and the waves are still rushing,

And I dream and dream blissful dreams.

The depths of the sea will make you seasick,

You'll sleep through the night to the song of the surf;

Neither reefs nor shallows in such a cradle

You are not in danger - go to sleep my baby!

Kotikova lullaby

You're always late! Where have you been?

How nice of you to take our place from last year!

Need to think! - Cleaver responded gloomily. - Just look at me!

He was covered from top to bottom with bleeding wounds, one eye was almost closed, and his sides were torn to shreds.

Ah, men, men! - Matka sighed, fanning herself with her right hind flipper. - And why don’t you come to an agreement among yourself? You look like you've been in the teeth of a Killer Whale.

“In my opinion, we would be much calmer and more comfortable on Beaver Island,” Matka noted. - Why huddle in such cramped conditions?

You can also say - Beaver Island! What am I, some kind of bachelor? If we go there, they will put us to shame. No, my dear, you have to keep your mark.

And Cleaver pulled his head into his shoulders with dignity and prepared to take a nap, although he never lost his combat readiness for a second. Now that all the married couples were assembled, the roar of the seals echoed for many miles from the coast, covering the most furious storm. According to the most conservative estimates, at least a million heads have accumulated here - old males and young mothers, sucklings and bachelors; and all this diverse population fought, bit, squealed, squeaked and crawled; sometimes they descended into the sea in whole companies and battalions, sometimes they climbed out onto land, covered the shore as far as the eye could see, and made platoon-by-platoon forays into the fog. Novo-Vostochnaya is constantly shrouded in fog; Rarely, rarely will the sun shine through, and then the droplets of moisture will glow like scatterings of pearls, and everything around will flare up with a rainbow shine.

You know, Cleaver,” she said, having examined the baby properly, “our son will be white.”

I swear by dry sea grass and rotten shellfish! - Cleaver snorted, - There have never been white seals in the world.

What can you do, - Matka sighed, - it didn’t happen, but now it will.

And she began to sing and purr a quiet song that all mothers sing to their little cats for the first six weeks:

Swim in the sea, my little one, take your time:

The head will pull to the bottom

Play in the sand

And beware of the waves

Yes, the villain whale at the same time

When you grow up, you won’t be afraid of enemies,

You will float away from any joke:

Until then, be patient

And mine your strength,

Ocean expanses for!

The baby, of course, did not yet understand the words. At first, he only crawled and rolled from side to side, staying close to his mother, but soon he learned not to get tangled under the flippers of adults, especially when his dad started a quarrel with someone and a fight broke out on the slippery coastal rocks. The queen swam out to sea for a long time to get food and fed Kitty only once every two days, but even then he ate his fill and grew by leaps and bounds.

As soon as Kotik got a little stronger, he moved to land further from the shore and joined a company of thousands of his peers.

They immediately became friends: they played together like puppies, after playing enough, they fell asleep on the clean sand, and then started playing again. The old males did not deign to pay attention to them, the young ones kept to themselves, and the kids could frolic as much as they liked.

Returning from the hunt, Matka immediately made her way to the playground and raised her voice, like a sheep calling its lamb. Having waited until Kitty squealed in response, she headed straight towards him, without ceremony crashing into the head of the suckers and scattering them to the right and left. There could be several hundred mothers on the playground at the same time, who were just as decisively wielding their front flippers in search of their offspring, so the young people had to keep their ears open. But Matka explained to Kitty in advance: “If you don’t splash around in dirty water, and don’t get scabies, and don’t bring sand into a fresh abrasion, and don’t decide to swim when there are big waves at sea, you will remain safe and sound.”

Like small children, newborn seals do not know how to swim, but they try to learn as quickly as possible. When our Kitty first dared to step into the water, the oncoming wave picked him up and carried him, and his little head immediately pulled him to the bottom - exactly as his mother sang to him - and his back flippers fluttered in the air; and if the second wave had not thrown him onto land, that would have been the end for him.

After this story, he grew wiser and began to splash and wallow in the coastal puddles, where the waves only gently rolled over him, and at the same time he kept his eyes open to see if the terrible thing was coming soon. a big wave. In two weeks he learned to work with fins, because he worked hard: he dived, surfaced, choked, snorted, then climbed ashore and dozed off on the sand, then went down to the water again - until he finally felt in his element.

And then you can imagine what a fun time began for Kitty and all his peers. They did all sorts of things: they dived under the incoming small waves; and rode on the foamy ridges of the breakers, which carried them ashore with noise and splashing; and stood upright in the water, leaning on their tails and scratching their heads, like old seasoned swimmers; and played tag on the slippery, algae-covered rocks. It also happened that Kotik suddenly noticed a sharp, shark-like fin sliding along the very shore; and then, recognizing the Killer Whale - the one who is not averse to hunting foolish kids - our Kitty flew to land like an arrow, and the fin slowly moved away, as if it had gotten here by pure chance.

In late October, seals began to leave St. Paul Island and swim out to the open sea. Many families united with each other; the battles for beds stopped, and the bachelors now had freedom.

On next year, - the mother said to Kotik, - and you will grow up and become a bachelor; in the meantime, we need to learn to fish.

And Kotik also went sailing across the Pacific Ocean, and Matka showed him how to sleep on his back, with his flippers tucked in and only his nose sticking out. There is no better cradle in the world than the ocean waves, and Kitty slept sweetly on them. One fine day he felt a strange uneasiness - his skin seemed to be twitching and tingling, but his mother explained to him that he was simply beginning to develop a “sense of water” and that such tingling foreshadowed bad weather: That means we need to swim away as quickly as possible.

When you grow up a little more,” she said, “you yourself will know which way to swim, but for now, swim after the dolphin - the Porpoise: they always know which way the wind is blowing.”

A large school of dolphins was just swimming past, and Kotik set off as best he could to catch up with them.

How do you know where to go? - he asked, barely catching his breath.

The leader of the dolphin pod looked at him with a white eye, dived, emerged and answered:

I can smell bad weather with my tail, young man! If your tail is crawling, it means that a storm is approaching from behind. Swim and learn! And if your tail tickles south of Their Water (he meant the Equator), then know that a storm is ahead, and quickly turn around. Swim and learn! But I don’t like the water here!

This was one of many, many lessons that Kitty learned, and he studied very diligently. His mother taught him to hunt cod and halibut, lying in wait for them in shallow places, and to catch sea burbot from its secluded refuge among the seaweed; taught how to dive to great depths and stay under water for a long time, examining sunken ships; showed how fun it is to play there, imitating fish - to dash through the porthole on one side and fly out the other side like a bullet; taught in a thunderstorm, when lightning splits the sky, to dance on the crests of the waves and wave their flippers in greeting to the blunt-tailed Albatrosses and Frigates sweeping over the water; taught her to jump out of the water in the manner of dolphins, tucking her flippers and pushing off with her tail, and fly up three or four feet; taught not to touch flying fish because they are too bony; taught me, at full speed, at a depth of ten fathoms, to tear out the most delicious piece from the back of a cod; and, finally, she taught me not to linger or stare at passing ships, especially boats with rowers. After six months, Kotik knew everything there was to know about the sea, and what he didn’t know was not worth knowing, and during all this time he never set foot on solid ground.

But one fine day, when Kotik was dozing in the warm water not far from the island of Juan Fernandez, he was suddenly overcome by some kind of vague languor - spring often has this effect on people - and he remembered the glorious rolled shore of Novostochny, from which he was separated by seven thousand miles; He remembered joint games and fun, the spicy smell of sea grass, the roar and battles of seals. And at that very moment he turned around and swam north - and swam, and swam tirelessly, and along the way he met dozens of his comrades, and they all swam in the same direction, and they all greeted him, saying:

Hello, Kitty! We are all bachelors now, and we will dance the Fire Dance in the breakers of Lucannon and roll on the young grass. But where did you get such a skin?

Our Kitty's fur was now pure white, and secretly he was very proud of it, but he could not stand comments about his appearance and therefore only repeated:

Let's swim quickly! My bones yearned for solid ground.

And finally they all sailed to their native shores and heard a familiar roar - it was their dads, old seals, as usual, fighting in the fog.

That same night, our Kitty, along with other one-year-old boys, went to dance the Fire Dance. On summer nights, the sea between Lucannon and New East glows with a phosphorescent sheen. A swimming cat leaves a fiery trail behind it, from any jump into the air a whole sheaf of bluish sparks flies up, and the waves set off a real festive fireworks display near the shore. After dancing, everyone moved into the interior of the island, to the rightful bachelor territory, and there they rode to their heart's content on the young sprouts of wild wheat, and told each other about their sea adventures. They talked about the Pacific Ocean the way boys talk about a nearby fishing line, which they climbed up and down, collecting nuts; and if someone overheard and remembered their conversation, he could create such a detailed sea map as oceanographers have never dreamed of.

One day, a group of older bachelors - three and four year olds - rolled down from the Hutchinson Hill.

Get out of the way, you suckers! - they roared. - The sea is vast, what do you understand about it? First, grow up and swim to Cape Horn! Hey you little runt, where did you get such a gorgeous white fur coat?

“I didn’t get it anywhere,” Kotik muttered angrily, “she grew up on her own.”

But just as he was preparing to fly at his offender, two red-faced, black-haired people appeared from behind a high dune, and Kotik, who had never seen a person before, choked and pulled his head into his shoulders. The bachelors took a few steps back and sat down, looking blankly at both newcomers. Meanwhile, one of them was none other than Kiryak Buterin himself, the main hunter of seals on the island of St. Paul, and the second was his son Panteleimon. They lived in a village not far from seal rookeries and, as usual, came to select animals that would be driven to slaughter (because seals are driven like livestock), in order to then make seal coats from their skins.

Look! - said Panteleimon. - White cat!

Kiryak Buterin himself almost turned white from fear - although it was not easy to notice under the layer of grease and soot that covered him flat face: after all, he was an Aleut, and Aleuts are not known for their cleanliness. Just in case, he muttered a prayer.

Don't touch him, Panteleimon! As long as I have lived, I have never seen a white cat. Maybe this is the spirit of old man Zakharov, who drowned last year in a big storm?

God forbid, I won’t come close,” responded Panteleimon. - It wouldn't be a bad thing! Well, how is it really old Zakharov? I still owe him for the tea eggs!

“Don’t look at him,” Kiryak advised. - Cut off that school of four-year-olds from the herd. It would be nice to miss two hundred today, but it’s still early, the guys haven’t gotten their head around it, so for starters there will be hundreds from them. Let's!

Panteleimon rattled a homemade ratchet made of walrus bones in front of the bachelors’ noses, and the animals froze, puffing and puffing. Then he moved straight towards them, and the seals began to retreat, and Kiryak went around them from the rear and directed them into the depths of the island - and everyone obediently hobbled up, not even trying to turn back. They were driven forward in front of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of their own comrades, and they continued to frolic as if nothing had happened. The white cat was the only one who rushed to the elders with questions, but no one could answer him sensibly - everyone insisted that people always come and drive bachelors away to God knows where, and this lasts one and a half to two months a year.

If that’s the case, then I’ll go after them too,” our Kitty announced and set off at full speed to catch up with the school. He was in such a hurry that his eyes almost popped out of their sockets from the tension.

White is catching up with us! - Panteleimon shouted. - Have you ever seen an animal willingly go to slaughter?

Shh! Don’t look back,” Kiryak said. - Sure enough, it’s Zakharov! Don't forget to tell the priest.

It was no more than half a mile to the slaughterhouse, but the journey took a good hour: Kiryak knew that if the animals were driven too quickly, they would “sunburn,” as industrialists put it, the fur would begin to come out, and bald spots would form on the freshly skinned skins. Therefore the procession moved slowly; she passed the Isthmus of the Sea Lions and the Webster House and finally reached the salting shed, from where the seal-strewn shore was no longer visible. Our Kitty was still splashing around in the tail, puffing and wondering. He would have decided that it was already the end of the world here if he had not heard behind him the roar of his relatives in the rookery, similar to the roar of a train in a tunnel. Kiryak sat down on a mossy hummock, pulled out a tin onion clock from his pocket and let the animals cool for half an hour. So they sat opposite each other, and Kotik heard drops of beads knocking on the ground, rolling off Buterin’s hat. Then another dozen and a half people appeared, armed with jerks - three-foot iron-bound clubs; Kiryak pointed out to them the animals that had been “tanned” during the drive or had been bitten by others, and the people threw them aside with the blows of their rough walrus leather boots; and then Kiryak shouted: “Let's go!” - and people with clubs, whoever did their best, beat the seals on the head.

Ten minutes later it was all over: before Kotik’s eyes, his comrades were skinned, the carcasses were ripped open from the nose to the hind flippers, and a pile of bloody skins grew on the ground.

Kitty could no longer bear this. He turned and galloped towards the shore (seals can gallop a short distance very quickly), and his newly grown mustache bristled with horror. Having reached the Isthmus of the Sea Lions, whose inhabitants were basking in the foam of the surf, he rolled head over heels into the water and began to rock in powerless despair, sobbing bitterly and bitterly.

What else happened there? - one of the sea lions addressed him grumpily (usually they keep to themselves and do not interfere in anything).

Boring! Very boring! - Kotik complained. - They kill bachelors! All bachelors are killed!

The Sea Lion turned his head in the direction where the seals' rookeries were located.

Nonsense! - he objected. - Your relatives are making no less noise than before. You probably saw how old Buterin processed some joint? He's been doing this for almost thirty years now.

But this is terrible! - said Kotik, and just then a wave rolled over him; however, he managed to maintain his balance and, with the help of a deft maneuver with his flippers, stopped dead in the water - three inches from the sharp edge of the rock.

Not bad for someone the same age! - the Sea Lion, who knew how to appreciate a good swimmer, remarked approvingly. - Yes, you’re probably right: there’s not much pleasant here; but you cats have yourselves to blame. If you stubbornly return to your old places year after year, people look at you as their rightful prey. Apparently, you were destined to put your head under the baton - unless an island is found for you where people cannot reach.

Is there such an island somewhere? - asked Kitty.

I have been hunting halibut for almost twenty years, but I have never seen deserted islands. However, I see that you are not timid and really like to pester your elders with questions. Sail to Walrus Island and find Steller sea lion there. Maybe you'll hear something useful from him. Wait a minute, don’t rush to swim right away! It’s a good six miles from there, and if I were you, my dear, I’d first crawl ashore and sleep for an hour.

The cat listened to good advice: he swam to his shore, climbed out onto land and slept for half an hour, every now and then shuddering all over his skin - this is a habit of seals. Having woken up, he immediately set off on his way to Walrus Island - that’s the name of a small island that lies northeast of Novovostochny. From time immemorial, seagulls have nested on its rocky ledges, and apart from birds and walruses, there is no one there.

Our Kitty immediately found Steller Sea Lion - a huge, ugly, clumsy Pacific walrus with long fangs, covered with nasty growths and terribly ill-mannered. You can only endure the company of Steller Sea Lion when he is sleeping, and at that moment he was just resting in the sleep of a righteous man, with his hind flippers out of the water.

Hey! Wake up! - Kotik barked as hard as he could - he had to shout over the seagulls.

Ha! Ho! Hm! What's happened? - Sivuch croaked sleepily and, just in case, poked his fangs into the side of his neighbor and woke him up, and he woke up the walrus who was sleeping nearby, and the next one - and so on, so that soon the entire walrus colony woke up and blinked its eyes in bewilderment, but no one noticed.

Hey hey! Here I am! - Kotik shouted, bouncing on the waves like a white ball.

Oh, to be ripped off! - Sivuch said with emphasis, and all the walruses looked at Kotik - exactly as the elderly regulars of a London club, sitting in their chairs to take a nap after dinner, would look at the impudent boy.

Kitty decidedly did not like the expression that Sivuch used: the picture associated with this stood in front of him too vividly. So he got straight to the point and shouted:

Do you know a place for cats where there are no people?

“Go and look,” answered Sivuch, closing his eyes again. “Swim on your way.” We have more important things to do here.

Then our Kitty jumped high into the air and screamed at the top of his lungs.

Slug eater! Slug eater!

He knew that Steller Sea Lion had not caught a single fish in his entire life and fed only on algae and slugs, although he pretended to be an unusually formidable person. Of course, all the birds, how many of them there were on the island - fulmars, and talkers, and hatchets, and mottled gulls, and kittiwake gulls, and glaucous gulls, which you don’t feed with bread, just let them make fun of - every single one of them immediately They picked up this cry, and, according to Limmershin, for about five minutes there was such a commotion on the island that no one would even have heard a cannon shot. The entire feathered population squealed and screamed as loudly as they could: “Slug-eater! Old man!”, and poor Steller Sea Lion groaned and tossed and turned from side to side

Well? Now will you tell me? - Kitty barely exhaled.

“Go ask the Sea Cows,” answered Steller Sea Lion. - If they are still swimming in the sea, they will tell you.

How do I recognize Sea Cows? What are they? - asked Kotik, swimming away from the shore.

Of all the sea inhabitants, they are the most disgusting in appearance! - shouted one particularly impudent Burgomaster Seagull, circling in front of Steller Sea Lion’s very nose. - They are even nastier than Steller sea lion! Even nastier and even more rude! Sta-ri-i-ik!

Accompanied by the piercing cries of the seagulls, Kotik swam back to Novovostochny. But when he shared with his relatives his intention to find an island in the sea where seals could live in safety, he did not find sympathy. Everyone unanimously told him that driving away was a common thing, that it was the way things had been done since ancient times, and that there was no point in meddling with the slaughterhouse since he was so impressionable. True, there was one significant difference, none of the other seals saw their brother being beaten. In addition, as you remember, our Kitty was white.

Old Cleaver, having heard about his son’s adventures, remarked:

It’s better to think about growing up as quickly as possible, becoming big and strong like your father, and starting a family - and no one will lay a finger on you. In five years you will be able to stand up for yourself perfectly.

And even the meek Mother said:

You can't change anything, Kitty. Swim and play.

And Kotik swam into the sea, but even when he danced the Dance of Fire, his heart was sad.

That autumn, he left his native shores among the first and set off on a long journey alone, because a secret thought had lodged in his stubborn head: at all costs, find the Sea Cows, if only they really exist, and with their help find a deserted an island where cats could live in contentment and peace. And he searched the entire Pacific Ocean far and wide, and crossed it from north to south, sailing up to three hundred miles a day. Along the way there were so many adventures with him that nothing could be said in a fairy tale. I can’t even describe with a pen: he barely escaped from the Giant Shark, eluded the Spotted Shark, dodged the Hammerfish, saw all the homeless vagabonds, talkers and idlers plowing the ocean, made acquaintance with important and dignified deep-sea fish, talked with colorful scallop mollusks, which they boast that they are firmly rooted to the seabed and have not moved for hundreds of years; but he never met the Sea Cows, and nowhere did he discover an island that suited his taste.

If the shore was solid and comfortable and at the same time sloping enough to make it easy to climb, then on the horizon you could certainly see the smoke of a whaling ship on which the blubber was drowned, and Kotik already knew what that meant. On many islands he found traces of the presence of his relatives, exterminated by people, and Kotik also knew that, having visited any shore once, people would return there again.

He made friends with an old blunt-tailed albatross, who recommended him the island of Kerguelen, where peace and tranquility always reign; but on the way there, our Kotik fell into a terrible thunderstorm with hail and almost lost his life among the jagged coastal cliffs. Desperately fighting the wind, he finally made his way to the island and saw that seals had once lived on Kerguelen. And this was the case with all the islands he visited.

Limmershin told me all these islands, and the list was long, because Kotik spent five whole years traveling, returning home only for four months, where everyone made fun of him and his non-existent islands. He visited the arid Galapagos Islands, located at the very equator, and was almost baked alive there; he visited the Georgia Islands, the Orkney Islands, the Cape Verde Islands, Little Nightingale Island, Gough Island, Bouvet Island, the Crozet Islands and another tiny nameless island south of the Cape of Good Hope. And everywhere he heard the same story from the inhabitants of the sea: there was a time when there were seals in these places, but people exterminated them all. Even when our traveler, returning from Gough Island, deviated from his course by many thousands of miles and reached Cape Corrientes, he discovered hundreds of three pitiful, mangy seals on the coastal cliffs, and they told him that people had found their way here too.

At this point his heart could not stand it, and he rounded Cape Horn and decided to sail north, home. On the way, he made a stop on a small island, densely overgrown with green trees, and there he came across an old, old cat, living out his life. Our hero began to catch fish for him and told him all his sorrows.

And now,” he said finally, “I decided to return home, and let them drive me to the slaughterhouse: I don’t care anymore.”

“Wait, don’t despair,” advised his new acquaintance. “I am the last of the dead tribe of seals from the island of Masafuera.” A long time ago, when people beat us by the hundreds of thousands, there were rumors along the shores that the day would come when a white seal would sail from the north and save all our people. I am old and will not live to see this day, but maybe others will. Try again!

The cat proudly twirled his mustache (and his mustache grew luxurious) and said:

There is only one white cat in the whole world - that's me; and I am the only cat in the world, it doesn’t matter - white or black, who thought of finding a new island.

Having said this, he again felt a surge of strength; but when he got home, his mother began to beg him to get married that same summer and start a family: after all, Kotik was no longer a bachelor, but a real cleaver. He had grown a thick, wavy white mane and looked as heavy, powerful and fierce as his father.

“Let me wait another year,” Kitty persisted, “I’ll turn seven, and you know that seven is a special number: it’s not for nothing that the seventh wave splashes the furthest onto the shore.”

By a strange coincidence, among Kotik’s acquaintances there was one young lady who also decided to wait a year until marriage; and Kotik danced the Fire Dance with her off the coast of Lucannon the night before he set out on his last journey.

This time he sailed west in pursuit of a large school of halibut, since he now needed at least a hundred pounds of fish a day to maintain his condition. The cat hunted until he was tired, and then he curled up and lay down on his bed, rocking in the hollows of the waves washing Medny Island. He knew the area by heart; so when he was washed aground and gently hit the seaweed at the bottom, he immediately woke up, muttered: “Hmm-hmm, the tide is strong today!”, rolled over, opened his eyes under the water and stretched sweetly. But then, like a cat, he jumped up, and his sleep was suddenly taken away, because very close by, on the shallows, in the thick algae, some utter creatures were grazing and slurping loudly.

Bur-r-runes of Magellan! - Kitty muttered into his mustache. - Who the hell are they?

The creatures really had a strange appearance and did not look like a whale, a shark, a walrus, a seal, a beluga whale, a seal, a stingray, an octopus, or a cuttlefish. They had a spindle-shaped body, twenty or thirty feet long, and instead of hind flippers they had a flat tail, like a spade of wet leather. Their heads were the most ridiculous shape imaginable, and when they looked up from eating, they began to swing on their tails, bowing ceremoniously in all directions and waving their front flippers, like a fat man in a restaurant calling the waiter.

Hm-hm! - said Kotik. - Is the hunt good, dear ones?

Instead of answering, the mysterious creatures continued to nod their heads and wave their flippers, just like the stupid Frog Gatekeeper from Alice in Wonderland. When they began to eat again, Kitty noticed that their upper lips were forked: both halves either diverged to the sides for a full foot, then moved again, capturing a hefty bunch of seaweed, which was then solemnly put into the mouth and chewed noisily.

“You’re eating a bit untidy, gentlemen,” Kotik remarked and, slightly annoyed that his words went unheeded, continued: “Okay, okay, if you have an extra joint in your front flippers, there’s no point in showing off that much.” You know how to bow, but I would like to know your name.

The split lips moved and twitched, the greenish glass eyes looked intently at Kotik, but he still did not receive an answer.

I'll tell you what! - Kotik announced in his hearts. Of all the inhabitants of the sea, you are the most vile to look at! You are even worse than Sivucha! And even more rude!

And suddenly it dawned on him - he remembered what the Burgomaster Seagull had shouted on Walrus Island, and realized that he had finally found the Sea Cows.

While they were grazing at the bottom, snuffling and slurping, Kotik swam closer and began bombarding them with questions in all the sea languages he knew. The inhabitants of the seas, like people, speak different languages, and Kitty has become quite skilled in this matter during his travels. But the Sea Cows were silent for one simple reason: they were speechless. They have only six cervical vertebrae instead of the required seven, and experienced sea inhabitants claim that this is why they are not able to talk even to each other. But in their front flippers, as you already know, there is an extra joint, and thanks to its mobility, Sea Cows can exchange signs that are somewhat reminiscent of a telegraph code.

Poor Kitty fought with them until dawn, until his mane stood on end and his patience burst like the shell of a hermit crab. But by morning, the Sea Cows slowly set off, heading north, every now and then they stopped and began to bow, as if silently conferring, then they swam on, and Kotik swam after them. He reasoned to himself as follows: “If these senseless creatures were able to survive in the ocean, if they were not killed every last one, it means that they found some kind of reliable refuge for themselves, and what is suitable for Sea Cows is also suitable for seals. If only they could swim.” They're a little faster!"

It was not easy for Kotik: the herd of Sea Cows swam only forty to fifty miles a day, stopped at night to feed and stayed close to the shore all the time. The cat did his best - he swam around them, swam above them, swam under them, but he could not stir them up. As they moved north, they stopped more and more often for their silent meetings, and Kotik almost bit off his mustache in frustration, but noticed in time that they were not swimming at random, but were sticking to the warm current - and here for the first time he was imbued with a certain respect for them.

One night they suddenly began to sink sharply, like stones set to the bottom, and swam with unexpected speed. The amazed Kitty rushed to catch up with them - until now it had never occurred to him that Sea Cows were capable of developing such speed. They swam straight to an underwater ridge of rocks that blocked the bottom on the approach to the shore, and one after another began to dive into a black hole at the foot of the ridge, at a depth of twenty fathoms below sea level. Diving after them, Kotik found himself in a dark underwater tunnel - and swam and swam for so long that he began to choke, but just then the tunnel ended, and Kotik, like a cork, jumped to the surface.

I swear by my mane! - he said, taking a sip fresh air and snorting. - It was worth the sweat to get here!

Sea Cows blurred into different sides and now they were milling about, lazily nibbling seaweed, near an island of such beauty that Kitty had never even dreamed of. Smooth, flat stone terraces stretched for many miles along the coast, as if purposely created for fur seal rookeries; behind them, sandy, rolled beaches gently rose inland, on which children could frolic; here was everything you could want - waves to dance on, high grass, to bask on it, dunes to climb on them and slide down. And most importantly, Kotik understood, thanks to his special instinct, which will never deceive a true Cleaver, that no man had ever been in these waters.

First of all, Kotik made sure that everything was in order as far as the fish were concerned, and then he slowly examined coastline and counted all the delightful islands, half hidden by the picturesque swirling fog. To the north, on the seaward side, there was a chain of sandy and rocky shoals providing reliable protection from passing ships that could not come within six miles of the islands. The archipelago was separated from the land by a deep strait; On the opposite bank there were inaccessible sheer cliffs, and under the water, at the foot of these cliffs, there was an entrance to a tunnel.

“Well, just like at our house, only ten times better,” said Kitty. Apparently, the Sea Cows are smarter than I thought. People - even if they came here - would not be able to go down such rocks, and on these wonderful shoals any ship would be shattered into pieces in no time. Yes, if there is a safe place in the ocean, then it is here and nowhere else.

And Kotik suddenly remembered his bride, and he wanted to quickly return to his native shores; but before setting off on the return journey, he once again carefully examined new places in order to tell about them in detail at home.

Then he dived, found and clearly remembered the entrance to the tunnel, and swam as hard as he could to the south. There was nothing to fear: no one except the Sea Cows (and now seals!) would have guessed about the existence of a secret underwater passage. The cat himself, emerging from the opposite side and looking back, could hardly believe that he had swam under these formidable rocks.

It took him six whole days to get to Novovostochny, although he was in a great hurry, and the first person he saw when he came ashore at the Isthmus of the Sea Lions was his bride, who was waiting for him as she had promised; and in his eyes she immediately read that he had finally found his island.

But when he told his brothers about his discovery, both the bachelors, his dad Cleaver, and all the other cats began to make fun of him, and one of his peers announced:

It's very interesting to listen to you. Kitty, but really, you can’t just drop out of the blue and tell us to get ready to go to God knows where. Don’t forget that we shed blood here, getting a place for ourselves, while you walked the seas without worries and troubles. You've never fought before.

At these words, everyone burst out laughing, and the speaker raised his head and smugly shook it from side to side. He had just recently gotten married and was therefore terribly self-important.

That’s right, I didn’t fight, and I don’t need to fight yet,” answered Kotik. I just want to take you to a place where you can all live in safety. What's the use of constant fights?

Well, of course, if you are against fighting, then I will remain silent,” said the newlywed with a nasty laugh.

Will you swim after me if I beat you? - asked Kotik, and his eyes lit up with a green sparkle, because the very thought of a fight was hateful to him.

“He’s coming,” the newlyweds agreed blithely, “If only yours takes it, so be it!”

Before he could finish speaking, our Kitty rushed at him and sank his fangs into his fat scruff. Then he strained himself, dragged his enemy along the sand, shook him thoroughly and threw him to the ground. After this he roared loudly:

I have sailed the seas for five years in a row for your benefit! I have found an island where you will be at peace, but good will not convince you. You need to be taught differently. So beware!

Limmershin told me that in his entire life - and he watches at least ten thousand battles every year - that in his entire bird life he had never seen such a spectacle. The cat rushed headlong into battle. He attacked the largest cleaver that came his way, grabbed him by the throat and beat and thrashed him until he, half strangled, asked for mercy; then he threw him away and moved on to the next one. After all, our Kotik did not observe the annual summer fast, like other cleavers; long-distance sea expeditions helped him maintain excellent athletic shape, and most importantly, he fought for the first time in his life. His luxurious white mane bristled with rage, his eyes burned, his fangs sparkled - in a word, he was magnificent.

Old Cleaver, his father, watched for some time as Kotik, in the heat of battle, tossed elderly gray-haired males into the air like little fish, and scattered bachelors right and left - and finally could not stand it and roared at the top of his lungs:

He may be crazy, but he best fighter in the world! Don't touch your father, my son! Is he with you!

The cat gave an answering war cry, and old Cleaver joined him; his mustache bristled, he puffed like a steam locomotive, and Matka and Kotik’s bride hid in a secluded place and admired the exploits of their overlords. It was a glorious battle! They fought until there was not a single seal left on the shore who dared to raise his head. And then the two of them walked back and forth across the battlefield with a majestic step, filling the beach with a victorious roar.

At night, when reflections of the northern lights broke through the foggy veil. The cat climbed onto a bare rock and looked around at the ruined beds and his wounded, bloody relatives.

I hope,” he said, “my lesson will be of benefit to you.”

I swear by my mane! - responded the old Cleaver, straightening his back with difficulty, because he, too, had been hit hard during the day, - the Killer Whale himself could not have finished them off better. Son, I am proud of you, and I will tell you more - I will sail for you to your island, if, of course, it exists.

Hey you fat guinea pigs! Who's willing to follow me to the Sea Cow Tunnel? Answer, otherwise I’ll come at you again! - Kotik thundered.

And Kitty pulled his head into his shoulders and closed his eyes in satisfaction. True, he was now not white, but red, because he was wounded from head to tail. But, it goes without saying, his pride did not allow him to count or lick his wounds.

A week later, at the head of the first army of migrants (about ten thousand bachelors and old males), Kotick sailed to the Sea Cow tunnel, and those who chose to stay home called them brainless fools. But in the spring, when the fellow countrymen met at the Pacific fish banks, the first settlers told so many wonders about their islands that more and more seals began to leave Novovostochnaya.

Of course, this was not a quick thing, because cats are slow-witted by nature and spend a long time weighing different pros and cons. But every year more and more of them swam away from the shores of Novostochny, Lukannon and neighboring rookeries and moved to happy, reliably protected islands. Our White Cat spends the summer there even now: he keeps growing, getting fatter and gaining strength, and around him bachelors frolic and the sea splashes, not knowing man.

Kipling Rudyard

Kipling Rudyard

White cat