"Let's build houses for the kittens," proposed Vanya. "We will make them live in different houses, and the cat will pay them visits...." In three cornel's of the kitchen they set up old hat-boxes. But the separation of the family seemed premature; the old cat, preserving on her face her former plaintive and sentimental expression, paid visits to all the boxes and took her children home again.
"The cat is their mother," said Vanya, "but who is their father?"
"Yes, who is their father?" repeated Nina.
"They can't live without a father."
For a long time Vanya and Nina discussed the problem, who should be father of the kittens. In the end their choice fell on a big dark-red horse whose tail had been tom off. He had been cast away in the store-room under the staircase, together with the remnants of other toys that had outlived their generation. They took the horse from the store-room and stood it beside the box.
"Look out!" they warned him. "Stand there and see that they behave themselves."
All this was said and done in a serious manner, and with an expression of solicitude. Outside the box and the kittens, Vanya and Nina would recognise no other world. Their happiness had no bounds. But they were destined to endure moments of unutterable torture. Just before dinner Vanya sat in his father's study, and looked thoughtfully at the table. Near the lamp, across a packet of stamped paper, crawled a kitten. Vanya watched its movements attentively, and occasionally poked it in the snout with a pencil.... Suddenly, as if springing out of the floor, appeared his father.
"What is this?" cried an angry voice.
"It is ... it is a kitten, papa."
"I'll teach you to bring your kittens here, wretched child! Look what you've done! Ruined a whole package of paper!"