Страница 13 из 17
Bab-Yagun touched Tanya’s shoulder. “Tan, they’re calling you from that table there!” he said.
“Me? Who?” Tanya was astonished. She raised her head and saw that Lukerya-Feathers-on-the-Head was beckoning her. She got up and, smiling just in case, approached the old woman.
“You don’t say, what a dark complexion! Would Theophilus Grotter be your grandfather?” Lukerya asked.
“Yes.”
“Indeed, I knew the old guy… A lion among all the fine fellows, here only his nature was so nasty to the point of collapse!”
“Faber est suae quisque fortunae (Every man is the architect of his own destiny. (Appius Claudius Caecus))!” Flaring up a spark, the ring said.
Lukerya-Feathers-on-the-Head burst out laughing; the unique yellow tooth began to jump in her mouth, showing up in the most improbable places: first on top, then below, then completely disappearing somewhere under the hooked nose. “I recognize the dear by the gait, and the old grouser by the ring in Latin…” said the old woman. “So, that means you’re Tanya? I’ve heard much about your exploits. Manage to learn?”
“Manage,” answered Tanya. Questions about studies always irritated her terribly. And not because she learned badly. Quite the opposite. Simply there was some obligation in this question. It seemed to Tanya that they posed it in ignorance, that they would ask a teenager and then forget the answer in five minutes. She promised herself that when she had quite enough of it, she would also ask the adults, “Manage work?” “Yes!” “Please continue in the same fighting spirit!”
“Distressing without parents, perhaps?” Lukerya asked.
“Never better!” Tanya said with a challenge. To be an orphan is doubly distressing. It is not enough that you are deprived of the people closest to you, but you are also forced to answer idiotic questions and to listen to feigned sympathies.
The old woman gave her a penetrating look. “What do you know, proud! Right, never bare your soul to everyone. You only have to do that and they’ll spit on it! Pity! I know what I’m talking about,” encouragingly said Lukerya. She took out a wooden snuffbox with the portrait of some old man (for a moment the thought flickered in Tanya: and what if this is The Ancient One?) and opened it. From the snuffbox jumped out a tiny black cat and, growing bigger on the run, it dashed to tease Sardanapal’s gold sphinx, which was too big and could in no way get under the table.
Lukerya-Feathers-on-the-Head sniffed the tobacco. “Don’t think, Tanya, that I simply called you over in order to delve with my callous finger in your wound. I want to give you a gift. Perhaps, you don’t often receive gifts. Here it is! They’ll be useful to you yet!” The old woman did not let out sparks, did not utter incantations, but suddenly a towel and a wooden comb appeared by themselves in her hands.
“Thanks, but I’ll not take them,” said Tanya.
“Take, don’t refuse! Obviously not stolen, I present my own!” Lukerya ordered.
While Tanya was having some doubts whether she should accept the gift, Sardanapal’s gold sphinx began to roar and jumped at the cat. The table, at which sat Zhikin, Parroteva, Liza Zalizina, and several first year magicians, toppled over. The cat, having jumped out from under it, rushed to Lukerya. Behind it on its heels, blazing with fury, rushed the sphinx. Lukerya-Feathers-on-the-Head stamped with her bone foot. The cat, growing smaller on the run, jumped into her snuffbox and disappeared. The repeatedly fooled sphinx travelled by with its feet on the flagstones and made off with nothing. While the thunder-struck Tanya was coming to, the old lady thrust the comb and towel into her hands, slammed shut the snuffbox, and leisurely walked away.
Tanya had barely returned to Vanka and Bab-Yagun when a concerned Yagge, short of breath, ran up to her. “What did Lukerya-Feathers-on-the-Head say to you?” she whispered.
“Nothing. First about my grandfather, then gave me a towel and a comb as presents. Should I not have taken them?”
Yagge sighed. It seemed to Tanya with relief, “Why not? Not without reason people say: they give – take, they hit – run. Lukerya is not an unkind old woman but a soothsayer. Aside from her, there remain no such soothsayers in the world already. What she says, so it will happen. Not along, not across, but right into the heart with a word! She told you nothing? Recall!”
Tanya honestly thought. “No, likely nothing much… Yagge, but how does she conjure without a ring, without incantations?”
“But that’s how she does it. All real witches conjure only this way, from the heart… A ring is but a magic wand, perhaps made for fools. Where can the fools develop a heart and amass kindness in themselves in hundreds of years – they took the wand, hooked on the ring, and made a mess of things… If Lukerya said nothing to you, you know it’s for the best,” Yagge said and went away.
But in Tanya’s memory, as always with delay, floated up the words of the witch. “They’ll be useful to you yet!” Lukerya said, giving her the comb and the towel. Only is it worthwhile to consider this prediction? Perhaps the old woman only wanted to say that she will comb her hair with the comb, and even the towel will come in handy? And was it not a strange story with the cat, that the sphinx attacked precisely the minute when she had already turned down the gift? Here, crack your brain. Not life, but continuous riddles.
In the evening, after the satisfied witch-gra
Chapter 4
Rabid Rodeo
Uncle Herman looked out the window and twitched with loathing. Nature was in midday high spirits and grandeur. Aspen fluff was twirling in the air. Pigeons were strolling along the sticky roofs of garages. Such a spectacle would move anyone else but Uncle Herman sensed nothing except the strongest irritation. In recent days, bright sunlight for some reason caused a sharp pain in his eyes. Even along the corridors of the Duma, he walked around in dark glasses like a Mafioso in hiding.
Someone to the right of the best deputy delicately gave a cough. Durnev lowered the blinds. Aunt Ninel, dressed in the expansible robe of a retired geisha, was holding a little tray in her hands. “Herman dear, your lace socks and red checked handkerchief,” she a
Uncle Herman grimaced and pointedly kicked the tray. “How often have I told you that I don’t wear lace socks anymore!!! I need black leather pants and a whip!” he bellowed.
“Herman, my dear, but they won’t let you into Duma with a whip! Neither leather pants!” his spouse softly objected.
Understanding that Aunt Ninel was right, Durnev deflated like a balloon, and obediently put on the lace socks. “You’re right, Ninel. It has become completely impossible to be involved in politics. Imagine, some wise guy made handrails out of aspen in Duma. I got a splinter and the wound still hasn’t healed after two weeks!” he said unhappily.
“A nightmare, simply a nightmare!” Aunt Ninel began to nod sympathetically.
Approximately in half an hour Durnev, almost under compulsion decked out in a completely decent, greyish-brown suit, was ready for the Duma. After presenting a victory kiss on her husband’s pale forehead, Aunt Ninel with relief escorted him from the apartment. Forlornly shaking her head, she set off for the kitchen. A substantial part of her life flowed exactly there, among smoked turkey, pineapples, and small packages of donuts.