Vitalka rushed over to kiss her, and as I was too shy to do the same,
I thumped him between the shoulder-blades to show how thrilled I was.
And then he charged at me like a bull and sat astride me. The
chandelier started clinking and the cuckoo, scared out of its wits,
flopped out fifteen times. And Auntie Valya clutched her head and
shrieked, "Stop it this instant! You're mad savages, not children! I'll
turn you out the house and you can sleep in the yard until you learn to
behave like decent people!"
Chapter Twelve
"Are you really going to the circus?" asked Mum in a strange tone.
"Yes... Why?" I asked.
"Just look at your knees."
I looked down out of the corner of my eye and gave a short sigh.
"Exactly!" she said and then added that I would only get out of the
house with knees like that over her dead body, especially since I was
going to the circus where there would be a large crowd with quite a few
people who knew whose son I was.
When Mum started speaking in that tone to argue was useless.
A minute later I was standing ankle-deep in hot water in a large
wash-basin and groaning piteously as Mum scrubbed my knees with a nylon
net sponge. Just try and scrub off accumulated layers of street dust,
rust form Vitalka's roof, earth from woodland glades, deeply embedded
gritty sand and ingrained green grass stains.
Mother soon grew tired and bad-tempered. And then there was the
basin! It behaved really rottenly. Its bottom was slightly convex and it
kept turning round under me. When mother pressed my left knee, the basin
spun to the left, and when she tackled my right one, it immediately spun
back again.
"Stop twisting!" mother snapped.
"I'm not, it's the basin..."
"Don't argue!" she said threateningly and pressed so hard with the
sponge that I let out a howl like a cat whose tail has been trodden on.
"Maybe I'd better do it myself?" I asked timidly.
"Yourself?!" exclaimed mother. "If you could do anything at all
yourself, I'd be the happiest person in the world."
But when she had finally worn herself out, she handed me the sponge
and stalked out of the kitchen.
My knees stung as if I had been crawling across a red-hot tin roof. I
had to give them a rest and while I was doing so, I decided to see how
many times I could spin round in the basin if I gave a strong push.
I grabbed the edge of the table and spun round.
The basin turned half round, slipped from under me, shot like a
flying saucer diagonally across the kitchen and crashed into the corner,
splashing the wall with water. And I, too went crashing down and struck
the floorboards with an almighty thump.
I got a terrible fright. I imagined Mum bursting into the kitchen
and giving me a rocket. And the circus would be off, of course. So I
started howling in terror and pain.
It was Uncle Seva, who ran in. He grabbed hold of me, pressed me
against his uniform jacket and said in a loud whisper, "My poor little
Oleg! What happened, laddie?"
He had never spoken like that to me before, or perhaps he had but I
had not taken a blind bit of notice. Now, however, I was so terrified,
wet and miserable that I couldn't be huffy especially as at that moment
Mum appeared and exclaimed ominously, "I thought as much!"
"Wait, wait," said Uncle Seva. "What did you think? He's banged
himself so hard, he's crying. Aren't you sorry for him?"
For several seconds mother stared incredulously at me clinging to
Uncle Seva as if he was the only person I had in the world to defend and
protect me. Then, pretending to be annoyed, she said, "Sorry my foot! I
just wonder why nobody is ever sorry for me?"
She started mopping up the water, declaring that all men were
absolutely ridiculous and helpless. And the most amazing thing was that
whenever they did anything foolish, they always came to each other's
rescue, and there was no way of getting at them!
But I could tell she was really pleased for she was fed up with
watching my silent battles against Uncle Seva and now it seemed I was fed
up with them, too.
I gazed shyly into Uncle Seva's face through my wet lashes, and he
smiled at me and I smiled back.
Then he carried me into the next room, sat down on the sofa and
settled me on his knees.
"Did you bang yourself hard?" he asked quietly.
"No... not very," I whispered.
"Feel better now?"
"Yes..."
A large button with an anchor was digging into my rib, but I did not
move away. I felt so good!
Lenka opened her eyes so wide when she caught sight of us that I felt
like sticking my tongue out at her. But I didn't, which was a dignified
and wise thing to do. Instead I looked up slowly and gazed into Uncle
Seva's face, and we both smiled at each other again.
Mum entered the room and began ironing my Sunday suit. Then she
examined my knees. All dirt had been scraped off them, and only some
scabs remained - but you can't scrub them off, can you?
"Get dressed, cry-baby!"
My suit smelt of a hot iron and joy. It was pale blue and as light as
a little silk parachute you can launch from a catapult. And it had gold
buttons, which shone like new coins, shoulder-straps, buckles and a
little embroidered star on its breast pocket. These suits, which looked
like cadet uniforms, were only just coming into fashion at the time, and
Mum had brought this one back from Leningrad with some white knee-length
socks, a dark blue cap. Mum also gave me a pair of squeaky new sandals
which were so springy you felt you simply had to start running about in
them.
The silk tassel of my cap tickling my left brow, I looked cheerfully
at mother, Uncle Seva and Lenka, spun round on one foot, waved to them
all from the doorway and set off to Vitalka's in the best of moods. And
even when two boys on the way called me a show-off, I did not mind.
I thought about Uncle Seva, and felt joy well up in my heart.
And then there was the circus! That was fantastic too!
But life has a way of spoiling things whenever you feel happy.
In the circus entrance the grey-haired old ticket-collector refused
to let us in. After turning the tickets over, and looking at the back
side, he said to Auntie Valya, "Your tickets are for tomorrow's
performance, not today's."
"How's that?" retorted Auntie Valya sternly and indignantly. "Where
does it say so?"
"Here! You see this stamp..."
Auntie Valya started pulling at her lace cuffs and saying, "I just
don't understand it... It must have been the cashier... But I asked
her..."
The old man sighed sympathetically and said, "It can't be helped...
There aren't any tickets left now, and the ticket office is closed."
"How disgraceful," said Auntie Valya and looked guiltily at us. We
were hanging our heads.
People were pressing on us from behind and someone called out,
"''ere, what's up, love? Don't block the way, we've all got to get in!"
"What's the hurry?" the old man suddenly flew up. "You'll all get in.
But they've got to be looked after too."
He looked at us and said, "I can let you in, of course. I
understand... The boys have been looking forward to it... The only
trouble is you'll have to stand because we're fully booked. The kids'll
be all right, but at your age, lady..."
"No, thank you," replied Auntie Valya very drily. "We'll wait till
tomorrow. Come along, boys..."
We made our way out of the circus compound and walked home very
dismally.
"Never mind," said Auntie Valya hesitatingly. "We'll definitely see
it tomorrow."
Tomorrow! But what about today? Everything was going so swimmingly,
and then all of a sudden...
Vitalka was walking along, staring at his feet, winding his silk sash
round his finger and angrily pulling at it.
I was not feeling so sad, though, for I remembered Uncle Seva and
thought about how I would have a good evening at home. So, when we
reached our place I told them I would spend the night at home.
But inside another disappointment awaited me: Mum and Uncle Seva had
invited Auntie Lyuba, our old neighbour, over to look after Lenka while
they went out to the cinema.
Then I thought about how sad Vitalka would be feeling on his own and
decided to take "The Snow Queen" along to his house. So that we read it
aloud. It was my favourite fairy-tale and Vitalka liked it, too, but we
had never read it aloud together before and that would, most likely, be
great fun.
I started hunting for the book on the shelf but it wasn't there!
"Lenka!" I said ominously. "Have you taken "The Snow Queen"?
"Yes..." she stammered.
"Where did you put it?"
"I gave it to a girl to read."
I was so stunned by her cheek that I lost my breath. Lent it to a
girl! My "Snow Queen"!
When I got my breath back, I screwed up my eyes and asked, "Do I let
boys play with your dolls?"
Lenka began blinking faster, obviously about to burst into tears.
"But Mummy... said we shared all the books."
If it had been the day before, I would have put her right on that
score but because of what had happened between Uncle Seva and me, I just
gave her a warning, "If she tears it up or loses it..."
"No, she won't," Lenka promised hastily. Grumbling for appearance's
sake, I got out "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" which would also be
suitable for reading that evening.
"Tell the folks I'm at Vitalka's," I called to Lenka who looked
astounded to have been left off the hook so lightly.
Even now as an adult, I often marvel at the changes trifling
incidents can work in your life. If we hadn't picked up "Tom Sawyer" that
evening probably nothing would have happened.
Everything began quite normally. We settled down on the bed, turned
on the bedside lamp, and opened the book, which we had read many times
over, in the middle...
"There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy's life when he
has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure..." I
read out and stared in amazement at Vitalka and he at me. We were normal
boys - why hadn't we ever thought of this before?
Probably because we did not have a magic carpet then. But on the
carpet we could get to places where there really just might be buried
treasure!
"But where?" I asked.
"In the old house," said Vitalka thoughtfully.
Why, of course! Like in "Tom Sawyer", the old house was an ideal
place! Perhaps its mysterious owners had left some gold coins and guns
behind in the cellar when they were leaving? And the dog was guarding
them? But the dog knew us, didn't it?!
The only trouble was that it was a long way away, and we felt the
itch to go looking soon. Since we had not got to the circus, we could
even start that night.
And then Vitalka said in a conspiratorial whisper, "The belfry..."
Of course! Why hadn't we thought of that before? How was it that we
had never thought of looking inside the belfry where nobody had set foot
for forty whole years?!
Vitalka and I hugged each other in joy and started rolling about and
fell off the bed but, fortunately, landed on the carpet.
But once we'd flopped down, I began to have doubts.
"Treasures are usually buried under ground. But we can only get into
the top part and not the bottom. So what's the good of that?"
"But the clock's up there. Perhaps we'll find the machine-gunner's
skeleton?.."
I shuddered and asked him what the dickens we needed that for!
"Well, you never know... We could take the skull and stick a candle
in it so that its eyes blazed and then hang it up outside Razikov's
window. Just imagine what a lovely surprise he'd get!"
Yes, I could certainly imagine that! But I was not too keen on the
idea of coming face to face with a skeleton in that dark spooky tower.
"Oh, of course there's no skeleton there," Vitalka said to reassure
me. "If there was, it would have crumbled apart and its bones would have
fallen to the ground by now... But the machine-gun's probably still
there. After all, machine-guns are jolly tough... And there're probably
some cartridges left in it too. If we find any, we'll bring them back
here and if anyone tries to get in here, we'll let rip at them
bang-bang-bang-bang!"
"Who on earth'll try and get in there? And if they do, and you let
rip at them just once, you'll get banged yourself so hard you know
where..."
"I was only joking... It's probably broken anyway. But we can still
play with it!"
Of course, playing with a real machine-gun, even a broken one, was
just as good as finding treasure! And quite different from a skeleton...
So that was the end of the argument!
We started preparing for our adventure.
From under our beds we dragged out a skein of rope, some torches and
our weapons box.
It never occurred to us, of course, to change our clothes. I simply
took off my cap so that it didn't get knocked off by the wind and Vitalka
pulled off his sash so that it didn't get caught on anything. Just as
paratroopers stick their weapons down the tops of their boots, I stuffed
mine down my new white socks: a long-barrelled plastic revolver down the
left one and a long knife made from a hack-saw blade down the right.
However, Vitalka made me leave the revolver behind, saying we did not
need a toy as we were off on a serious expedition. My knife on the other
hand, was perfectly all right.
And I knew that myself. Bound with insulating tape, the handle was
sticking out impressively just below my knee and the thin blade lay flat
against my leg and chilled my skin pleasantly. This sensation gave me
confidence and strength to face anything - even a skeleton...
We flew off the roof just before midnight, when Auntie Valya was
already sound asleep.
It was the end of July, and the lightest summer nights were already
over but it was not really dark yet. The sky was bluish-grey and only the
largest stars were visible in the sparkling silvery air. To the east low
clouds were shimmering like quicksilver around a dull-pink moon.
We flew just above the wires, avoiding the black firs and pines and
spiky television aerials. After a while Vitalka grew bored of flying so
low and took the carpet up another hundred metres or so.
A host of little lights began twinkling below us and stretching round
the edge of the town was the light river bend with its little black
ships. Their little coloured lights seemed to exist quite separately
like stars which had fallen there by chance.
And the belfry loomed above the clear water like the tower of a
mysterious castle. In the upper tier's semi-circular embrasures we could
clearly see the outlines of its bells, which from a distance looked like
the little bells hung on fishing-rods.
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