no! We’ll manage somehow! Roaming at night isn’t something for a girl. Besides, you have big feet and you stomp. And watch you don’t eat all the candy; I know you, send us off as you have your eyes on them,” said Pookar.
Olga flared up and pounced on him. “Oh, you bad baby doll! Some day you’ll bug me and I’ll rip all your ears off! Then let Masha sew them back on!”
Pookar spat sullenly. “With threads?” he said.
“With threads.”
“The ears?”
“The ears.”
Pookar looked at her for a long time and then shook his head. “Phooey, doll, what sickly fantasies you have!” he said.
Then Pookar climbed onto the cat, and Muffin crept out stealthily from under the bed.
You, of course, notice how terrible a room becomes at night. The most familiar things look sinister. A shirt on the back of a chair flutters and resembles a person, who came in for no known reason, found a seat, and sits and looks at you for some reason. The light outside the window casting sinister shadows on the walls? The rustling in the closet?
Muffin and Pookar were also afraid at first and they immediately wanted to turn back. However, after watching closely, they saw that the room looked calm and sleepy. On the bed, curled up under a blanket, Masha was sleeping and having good dreams. The fishes were sleeping in the aquarium on the table. The flowers were sleeping in the pots on the windowsill. Life is indeed not so terrible if you examine it.
The cat Muffin leaped onto the desk with the grace of a truck transporting scrap metal. She was a domestic cat and consequently rather clumsy. Still, it was good that no one woke up.
Once on the desk, Pookar climbed down from the cat, picked up the kettle, and began to get water from the aquarium. He also accidentally scooped up a couple of fish and had to put them back.
“Push their way in here, how brash! No shame, no conscience! Just like me!” Pookar grumbled. One would think that he did not come to the fishes with a kettle, but they to him.
The cat Muffin jumped down from the desk, managing not to spill the water, and they were both in the box with the toys a minute later. Everybody sat at the table and started to have tea with cake. Olga had made the cake on the play stove earlier during the day, but hid it so that Pookar would not find it. Muffin did not have cake, in order to keep her figure. She declared that one needed to be careful with cakes, and that one of the cats she knew had put on so much weight that she got stuck in the doorway.
The centre of the cake with a single candle because the bunnies were only a year old, went to Sineus and Truvor. They swelled up like a balloon and blew out the candle for luck. Everyone pulled the bunnies’ ears and gave them gifts. The cat Muffin gave them carrots, Pookar a fat book of Russian fairy tales. Olga had made for the bunnies warm knitted hats with openings for the ears.
Then everyone was again busy with the cake. It turned out to be surprisingly tasty.
“I approve, doll! This time you’ve clearly managed something edible by accident,” Pookar praised Olga. “Only you dumped too many calories in there.”
“No calories there! Only flour, sugar, eggs, and nothing more,” Olga took offence.
“Wait a minute! Let’s find out… You say that there are no calories but I feel that there are. It means they squeezed in there on the sly when you turned away.”
Sineus and Truvor started to tremble. “Oh! We’re scared!”
“Admit it, Pookar! You just made up those calories!” Olga was mad. She could not stand it when they questioned her culinary skill.
Pookar narrowed his eyes. “Made it up?! What is Masha’s mama struggling with, then? What is it she’s scared of like fire?”
“She’s scared of calories. What else if not calories!” Muffin stopped washing for a moment.
Pookar stared triumphantly at Olga and bent over the cake. “Listen, bunnies! Work them big ears. Something’s scratching in there. It’s all of them, calories! They’re going to war!”
The doll Olga blinked her blue eyes. “Oh! What will happen to us now?”
“That’s just it,” Pookar threw up his hands. “Well, so be it, I’ll save you from the evil of calories. They don’t scare courageous me. I’ll eat the whole cake by myself.”
Pookar was already stretching his hands to the cake, but Muffin said, “Don’t believe him, little fools! He tricked you. Calories aren’t dangerous for slim little kids, but Masha’s mama can do perfectly well without them. Otherwise, soon only the handkerchiefs from her whole wardrobe will fit her.”
Chapter Two
A Big Trip Around a Small Apartment
Pookar loved to discover new corners of the apartment, the ones which none of the toys had wandered to earlier. He was not one that could sit in one place for three days or even three minutes. He had to be constantly running somewhere, arranging something, exploring something. In short, this was the most restless baby boy doll in the world.
One spring morning, when Masha had gone to school and her parents to work, the doll Olga was teaching the bunnies Sineus and Truvor the alphabet. Olga herself already knew the alphabet and could write all of the letters except W.
“This is the letter A,” Olga showed them. “It looks like A… Understand? This is the letter U, it looks like U.” Olga was a born teacher.
“And the letter D looks like D?” the bunnies asked.
“I think so,” the doll answered after some hesitation. “Say what you like, but education doesn’t pass you by without a trace.”
The lid of a box moved aside and Pookar appeared in full field dress. He was dressed in a sheepskin coat buttoned up to the chin and on his head was a pot. He was holding a bottle-opener in his hands, in case he met jars of jam along the way.
“Hello, hello!” he shouted to the bunnies.
“Hi, Pookar! Where are you going?” the bunnies responded.
“I’m going on a hike. I’m thinking of exploring a couple of new continents and finding out along the way where these greedy people hide their candies.”
“How interesting! We’re coming with you,” Sineus and Truvor exclaimed.
“But we’re learning the alphabet,” Olga objected.
“Great discoveries won’t wait while you learn some letters. No time to lose. Humanity suffers!” Pookar declared. He had a determined look. The pot on his head looked like a knight’s helmet. The hero was so eager towards a feat. Even Olga was fascinated, let alone the bunnies!
They decided to set off on the journey without delay and all together. If great discoveries could not wait, then the discoverer could even less so. Pookar was consumed with impatience, shifting from foot to foot and itching for adventures.
As for Olga, despite being seized by all the excitement, she managed to make a couple of dozen sandwiches for the road. Olga was a smart girl doll and knew that brave heroes
