Once upon a time, there lived an old man and an old woman in a certain village of Japan. One night, it was raining heavily and they could not sleep. So, they started talking. The old man said, “A leak in an old house is something to be afraid of even more than a tiger-wolf.” By chance, a tiger-wolf was standing outside the door and overheard this. He thought, ‘Oh, there is something called a leak which is more dangerous than I am. Now, I will have to search for it.’ At that very moment, a thief was about to break into the house. Thinking that the tiger-wolf was a horse, he climbed onto his back. ‘This is terrible. Now, I am caught by that dangerous leak-in-an-old house,’ thought the tiger-wolf. Quick as lightning, he jumped up and ran away.
The Monkey and the Thief
The tiger-wolf shook off the thief, and the thief fell into a dry well by the side of the road. A monkey who was passing by came there and asked the tiger-wolf, “What are you up to?” “There is a monster called a leak-in-an-old-house hiding in this well,” answered the tiger-wolf. “Is there any such monster called a leak-in-an-old-house? If there is, I’ll find it out for you,” said the monkey. The monkey, who is anyway nosey, let his tail down into the dry well and felt around. The thief who was hiding at the bottom of the dry well grabbed the monkey’s tail firmly. The monkey was startled. He tried to pull his tail up. He pulled it so hard that it snapped off at its base.
