When the drunk heard those brief parting words, he stopped, waved his hands clumsily and flopped into the snowdrift. Yura and I laughed.
“Ah, here you are,” Grandpa noticed us. He smiled meekly as he continued tapping his hammer.
Grandpa didn’t like drunks, though he sometimes gave money to the most pathetic of them, out of mercy. But he couldn’t stand the impudent ones. And beggars who sometimes resorted to violence didn’t bother the old shoemaker with the gray beard. They had all heard about his personality and strength.
We were still holding the ill-fated bag in our hands.
“Have you brought it?” Grandpa asked, without looking at the bag. “Thank you. Set it down. I’ll look at it later.”
Yura and I exchanged glances. He hadn’t noticed. Thank God, Grandpa was so busy. He put the hammer aside, took out the shoe knife with the wide blade and began to trim the rubber tap on the heel. That knife, a long strip of metal sharpened at an acute angle and wrapped in friction tape instead of a handle, seemed ugly and scary to me. But Grandpa handled it like a light butter knife. He placed a shoe onto his knee, holding it with his left hand as his right hand moved the knife quickly and easily. Excess pieces of rubber that looked like elegant strips from a deli slicing machine came off the heel. Just put them on toast and you would have a sandwich. Now I understood why Grandpa’s hands were so disfigured. Even though he was very adroit, the knife sometimes slipped off.
Then the grindstone began to turn, and the heel, after moving over it in a semicircle a few times, became perfectly smooth. The shoe was done. Grandpa wiped it with a piece of rag and put it on the shelf. And then an awl and thick thread appeared in his hands. Grandpa turned them above his head like a magician before doing a trick… Yes, his trick was worth showing to spectators. At least, Yura and I dropped our jaws watching how quickly and handsomely Grandpa’s disfigured hands mended the somewhat torn shoe tongue. The awl pricked the leather, raised the thread from underneath and pulled it out with a stitch. The edge of the thread was already in the stitch, the disfigured hands skillfully tied a small knot. Prick, stitch, knot… prick, stitch, knot… Before we realized, Grandpa had cut off the thread, turned the shoe in his hands, nodded and put it aside.
We had heard many times how respectfully people talked about Grandpa Yoskhaim. He was not called a shoemaker, but Master of the Shoemaking Trade. Hardly anyone in Tashkent had been engaged in this trade for almost fifty years. All the residents of the area knew him. They called him either Bobo or by his first name, Yoskhaim-aka. The local authorities, in order to exempt Grandpa from high taxes, registered his booth as a small handicraft business. Even Soviet officials treated this independent person, who never lost his dignity, with respect.
After Grandpa finished his work, he stretched, winced and rubbed his back.
“You’ll massage my back tonight,” he said, at last considering us worthy of a pleasant glance.
Yura and I nodded. We would never neglect Grandpa’s request, particularly after what we had seen today. How could he possibly work there on cold winter days from morning till night, with only his bottom inside the booth where there was a small electric heater? What if there were a snowstorm? Or a rain?
A man with a pair of shoes arrived. We said good-bye and went home.
At about ten in the evening, after Grandpa had had supper and listened to the news, he went to the bedroom. While he was undressing, I went to bring Yura. Two young masseurs solemnly approached Grandpa’s bed. When he saw us, he began to turn onto his belly, groaning. Grandpa hated to display weakness. He never admitted he was ailing, and he only showed that he suffered pain when he had to change the position of his body.
After turning onto his belly, Grandpa ran his hand down the left side of his back and bottom.
“It’s here.”
“All right, we’re about to begin.”
The massage, it must be admitted, was unusual. Grandpa, perhaps, didn’t understand what risk he was taking when he ordered us to climb onto his back with our bare feet and shift from foot to foot on it. Only much later did I learn that experienced masseurs at Turkish bathhouses had been doing that type of massage since ancient times. I also learned about shiatsu, the Japanese massage done by experts, not with their feet but with their hands. They knew very well which spots should be pressed. What could Yura and I possibly know about all those subtleties? We just followed Grandpa’s instructions. Besides, we enjoyed it very much. It was a game and an honorary responsibility at the same time, and such a thing did not happen often.
Yura was the first to climb on top of Grandpa, and he stood a bit up from the spot which, as they used to say in olden times, was losing its noble contour. I followed Yura and climbed onto the left side of Grandpa’s bottom. Yura began walking slowly up the left side of his back, to the shoulders. He didn’t walk, he sneaked, he savored each step, alternately pressing his heel and his toe into Grandpa’s flesh. Then he made another round, and another one, and one more…
“That’s enough,” I said impatiently. “Enough! Let me do it!”
We traded roles.
Grandpa’s back seemed to be made of iron. I was heavier than Yura, the pressure was harder, but it was a springy hard surface under my feet. The bed was swaying slightly and sagging a bit, but Grandpa lay there as if two bits of fluff were rolling over his back. Of course, he could feel us walking around on his back. He felt it and was blissfully happy, encouraging us softly:
“Oh, how good that feels. Oh, well done. Oh, may you always be healthy and happy.” From time to time, he directed our efforts, “Yes, yes… Right there… One more time… Harder.”
Standing like a ballerina on my toes and steadying myself with my palms pressed against the wall, I pushed my toes into Grandpa’s back as hard as I could and shifted from foot to foot. And he didn’t even groan, he didn’t even pretend jokingly that it hurt. He just repeated:
“Oy, well done, well done.”
But even that was not enough for Grandpa. He had enjoyed the massage performed by us stomping on his back in turns, and then he commanded:
“And now – both of you together!”
Yura’s face expressed total delight. And now, the most interesting part was to begin.
Holding each other by the shoulders and crying out with pleasure, we performed something like a tribal dance on the body of a defeated enemy on Grandpa’s back. Apart from everything else, we enjoyed jumping on the back of old Grandpa Yoskhaim because usually we couldn’t even touch him with a finger. And here we did it with our feet.
But still we couldn’t forget, not even for a minute, that Grandpa’s back had been hit with a bullet under the left shoulder blade. That spot was very sensitive and had to be bypassed.
“Why are you shouting? It’s night outside, time to be in bed.”
That was Grandma Lisa. With her hands on her hips, leaning against the doorframe, she looked at us and Grandpa, and her gaze was that of a person who was all too familiar with human weakness, delusions and ingenuities. And to make it clear to all of us, she exclaimed, raising her hands to the sky, “Dev borin!”
Translated into normal language, it meant: Grandpa possessed the health of a giant, an epic hero, “dev borin,” and that’s why he could tolerate everything we had been doing to him. Translated more precisely, it meant that Grandpa only pretended to be ill, that in point of fact, he was as healthy as a bull.
The massage was interrupted. We put on our slippers and headed for the door. Before we reached the door, we heard the powerful snoring of Grandpa, who had fallen asleep instantly.
Grandma, as if her statement had been fully corroborated, raised both hands to the sky and said again, “Dev borin!”