‘I am hungry and want something to eat better than that nasty porridge
that I had for supper. So I am going to kill one of those goats, and
as you are a good cook you must boil the flesh for me.’ The rabbit
nodded, and Gudu disappeared behind a rock, but soon returned dragging
the dead goat with him. The two then set about skinning it, after
which they stuffed the skin with dried leaves, so that no one would
have guessed it was not alive, and set it up in the middle of a lump of
bushes, which kept it firm on its feet. While he was doing this, Isuro
collected sticks for a fire, and when it was kindled, Gudu hastened to
another hut to steal a pot which he filled with water from the river,
and, planting two branches in the ground, they hung the pot with the
meat in it over the fire.
‘It will not be fit to eat for two hours at least,’ said Gudu, ‘so we
can both have a nap.’ And he stretched himself out on the ground, and
pretended to fall fast asleep, but, in reality, he was only waiting
till it was safe to take all the meat for himself. ‘Surely I hear him
snore,’ he thought; and he stole to the place where Isuro was lying on
a pile of wood, but the rabbit’s eyes were wide open.
‘How tiresome,’ muttered Gudu, as he went back to his place; and after
waiting a little longer he got up, and peeped again, but still the
rabbit’s pink eyes stared widely. If Gudu had only known, Isuro was
asleep all the time; but this he never guessed, and by-and- bye he grew
so tired with watching that he went to sleep himself. Soon after,
Isuro woke up, and he too felt hungry, so he crept softly to the pot
and ate all the meat, while he tied the bones together and hung them in
Gudu’s fur. After that he went back to the wood-pile and slept again.
In the morning the mother of Gudu’s betrothed came out to milk her
goats, and on going to the bushes where the largest one seemed
entangled, she found out the trick. She made such lament that the
people of the village came running, and Gudu and Isuro jumped up also,
and pretended to be as surprised and interested as the rest. But they
must have looked guilty after all, for suddenly an old man pointed to
them, and cried:
‘Those are thieves.’ And at the sound of his voice the big Gudu
trembled all over.
‘How dare you say such things? I defy you to prove it,’ answered Isuro
boldly. And he danced forward, and turned head over heels, and shook
himself before them all.
‘I spoke hastily; you are innocent,’ said the old man; ‘but now let the
baboon do likewise.’ And when Gudu began to jump the goat’s bones
rattled and the people cried: ‘It is Gudu who is the goat-slayer!’ But
Gudu answered:
‘Nay, I did not kill your goat; it was Isuro, and he ate the meat, and
hung the bones round my neck. So it is he who should die!’ And the
people looked at each other, for they knew not what to believe. At
length one man said:
‘Let them both die, but they may choose their own deaths.’
Then Isuro answered:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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