Catlantis
Page 8
As for the kind Frenchman, Monsieur Jacques Saussure de Tutu—he, unfortunately, remained asleep on the sidewalk for three whole days until Baguette, who was preoccupied with his new married life, finally remembered about him. But as soon as he remembered, the cat immediately took it upon himself to save Jacques. Baguette asked the white cat Whale for help. Whale used white magic to concoct an antidote for the awful nicatine. The antidote was called catine. A vial of the white aromatic catine was given to Bonehead, who, during his next morning walk, slyly put it under the Frenchman’s nose.
“Oh, mon Dieu! Quelle heure est-il, s’il vous plaît?” mumbled the Frenchman as he awoke.
“How sad,” said Papa Petrov, walking past him. “Look what can happen to a decent person! He certainly picked his poison.”
How does Papa know about the poison? thought Bonehead, sniffing at the man’s hands, which still smelled of croissants.
“No! Bonehead, don’t touch him!” scolded Papa. “Sir, do you need some help?”
“Oh, merci! Un grand merci. Pourquoi pas?” said Jacques.
“He’s not making any sense, the poor man’s really out of it,” said Papa. “I’ll call an ambulance—they’ll take care of him.” Fifteen minutes later an ambulance took Monsieur de Tutu to the hospital. When he was discharged from the hospital a package was waiting for him. Inside he found the reward: a gold medal, a ring with an imitation diamond, one month’s salary and an eternally green cactus. The wise Council of Six determined that the reward ought to be taken away from Noir and the Trash Man and given to the man who actually found Baguette—that is to say, to Monsieur Jacques Saussure de Tutu.
When he had gotten the package, Monsieur de Tutu went straight to the Petrovs. The thing is, Monsieur de Tutu was a decent man and had brought Baguette back from France because it was the right thing to do. He didn’t need a reward for his good deed, so he returned almost everything to the Petrovs. He gave the gold medal back to Vadik, he gave the ring back to Mama and he gave the eternally green cactus back to Polina. The only thing he kept was Papa’s salary. Of course, Monsieur de Tutu would’ve liked to return that as well, but he really needed the money to buy a return ticket to France. Somehow his wallet had mysteriously disappeared while he’d been asleep on the sidewalk for three days.
On his way to the airport Jacques noticed the black cat Noir. Noir hissed at him, his round yellow eyes glistening with hate. Noir was sure that Jacques would immediately run away in fear—since there’s an omen that says black cats bring bad luck. But Monsieur de Tutu wasn’t the least bit scared.
“Oh! A black cat!” exclaimed Jacques, reaching for Noir. “What luck! Come here, kitty-kitty!” Noir narrowly escaped Jacques’s croissant-smelling hands and hid underneath the dumpster in panic. He watched as the strange Frenchman walked around, repeating to himself, “Wow, what luck! To see a purely black cat! I’ve dreamt about this my whole life!”
His strange behavior had a simple explanation: the French have very different omens. According to the French, black cats don’t bring bad luck. On the contrary, they bring incredibly good luck to anyone who happens to see them.
On that fateful day, when the Frenchman was so happy to see Noir, things began to change. The bad omen about black cats began to lose its power—and Noir, his influence. He was no longer the self-appointed boss of all the dumpsters and no one was scared of him anymore—people calmly threw out their trash in the alley and didn’t pay him any attention. And if they did pay him attention, it was only to scratch him behind his ears. Noir wasn’t used to such nice treatment; he began molting, he lost his appetite and slimmed down. Soon, he left the alley, evidently in search of another, more suitable dumpster—one that was near people who didn’t know that black cats weren’t so bad after all. He wasn’t seen around ever again.
About the Trash Man—left without a master, he got bored, became lazy, gained a lot of weight, stopped looking after himself and eventually turned into a giant pile of trash. He was taken away by the garbage truck one day, along with all the other trash.
And finally—after Baguette’s big jump, Mama Petrov insisted that the window be fitted with bars. Papa installed the bars a few months later, but neither Baguette nor his wife Purriana were upset. On the contrary, they were happy with the decision. By that time Purriana had given birth to six beautiful striped ginger kittens, and there’s nothing more dangerous for naive kittens than an open window on the twelfth floor.
“Safety first!” said Mama Petrov to Papa Petrov, looking proudly at the barred windows.
“I can rest easy now,” said Mama Purriana to Papa Baguette.
And the kittens didn’t say anything, because they couldn’t talk yet.
ANNA STAROBINETS is an acclaimed, award-winning Russian novelist, screenwriter, and journalist. Best known as a writer of dystopian and metaphysical novels and short stories, she is also a successful children’s author. Catlantis is her first children’s book to be translated into English.
ANDRZEJ KLIMOWSKI studied at Saint Martin’s School of Art and the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. He is an author of graphic novels and a designer of film and theater posters as well as numerous book covers, including the entire Everyman Collection of P. G. Wodehouse. He is a professor of illustration at the Royal College of Art.
JANE BUGAEVA was born in Russia and emigrated with her family to the United States at the age of six. She translates children’s literature from the Russian and lives in North Carolina with her husband and two cats.