We didn’t know anything about carpets when we sat on the veranda that autumn day. Perhaps, we did understand something, or rather felt it, because we often saw truly beautiful carpets in different houses. For example, at Grandpa Yoskhaim and Grandma Lisa’s, they also had a wonderful Teke carpet on the wall in the living room.
I asked, “Where is that carpet? How come we’ve never seen it at Grandpa Hanan’s?”
“Ah,” Mama said sadly and waved her hand. “It was gone long ago… I told you that I was nine… Once a relative came over. His name was Mordecai. He was rich… The devil only knows why he visited us. He was having dinner and looking at the carpet, “Oh, how beautiful it is, how beautiful.” And he began to nag my father, “Sell it.” Grandpa said, “I can’t. Excuse me for saying no, but I can’t.” Ah, he was such a kind person… Mordecai came over again, with money, and once again asked Grandpa to sell it… and that time he persuaded Grandpa. “If you want it so badly…” Ah, he was sometimes too kind. Someone told them later that it had been Mordecai’s wife who coveted it: how could poor relatives have such a luxurious carpet. Oy, how we cried, how we wept when the carpet was carried out of the house… E, dunyo, dunyoee, bevafo!”
After saying that, Mama clutched her cheeks and began rocking back and forth.
Grandpa Hanan had liked that Tadjik saying, which basically meant “life without happiness.” Mama repeated it often, especially after he passed away. Now, overwhelmed with memories, she was filled with pity and love for her father.
“He was so kind that when someone asked him for something, he would give it away without thinking twice. And he never asked anyone for anything; he didn’t want to humble himself. When he returned ill from combat, he began looking for work. His uncle owned a vegetable booth with a partner. Uncle hired Papa to go to villages to buy dried fruits. Once he was bringing goods, and, as he approached the booth, he overheard his uncle’s partner talking, ‘We divided the bread into two parts before; now, we divide it into three parts.’ Papa entered the booth and said to his uncle, ‘Togoi, I’ve brought the goods.’ Then he turned around and left. He left for good and never went back. And he didn’t take the money Uncle owed him. That’s the kind of person he was,” Mama said proudly.
Mama always told the truth, only the truth. And yet, I noticed that her stories were somehow reminiscent of fairytales, perhaps because the heroes of her stories, our ancestors and relatives, always acted as fairytale characters should. They were courageous, hard-working and very kind. They overcame any obstacles, and they never betrayed anyone. They were infinitely devoted to their families and ready to tolerate any privation for their sake.
That was Grandpa’s trait, devotion to his family, which I saw and felt myself. Once when we talked about Grandpa, Mama revealed a secret to me. She took a handkerchief tied into a little bundle from under some things in the wardrobe. There was something heavy in it. She untied it, and something jangled and glittered in it. I remembered my favorite novels about pirates right away. Inside it were old gold coins with a two-headed eagle on them.
“That was Grandpa’s inheritance,” Mama said. “He left whatever he could for us… He had quite a few of those coins… not whole pots, of course,” she laughed. “We were always poor, but at times we were better off. When things grew particularly hard, Grandpa would sell a coin through reliable people on the black market. One wasn’t even allowed to possess them. If the authorities learned, he would have been put in prison. Thank God, they didn’t find out. You see,” Mama said, jangling the coins, “he was in need but preserved them for us.”
That’s when I remembered another story about an inheritance that I had heard either from Mama or one of the relatives.
My great-grandfather on my father’s side, Nataniel, Grandma Lisa’s father, had been a rich man, a factory owner, before the revolution. As I have already written, his wife, my great-grandmother, left him, taking the children, and he remained in his house in Chinaz. Somehow, it became known and was passed from relative to relative that, when they had begun to requisition valuables after the revolution, Nataniel had walled up a pitcher full of jewels in his house. According to the rumors, the value was incalculable: it allegedly contained gold and diamonds. No one knew for sure whether it was true or not, but they talked about it. There was no one to ask because Great-Grandfather had died.
I thought about Grandpa Hanan, who hadn’t spared anything for his family and had given away whatever he could, as Mama was putting the bundle of jangling coins into the wardrobe. That’s why Mama was so kind. And Nataniel was such a cheapskate. He had walled up his treasures, and no one could benefit from them. Grandma Lisa definitely took after him. She had quite a few pieces of jewelry, including two heavy gold bracelets, called daspona in Bukharian. I had never seen them myself, but Yura and I had once overheard our mothers’ in conversation about dasponas.
There is a custom, observed in Asian countries more strictly than in other places: a mother-in-law gives her daughter-in-law jewelry for the wedding, expensive jewelry, if possible. It happens often before a wedding when the parents of the bride and groom make the arrangements for their children’s marriage. That ceremony is called kandhuri, which means “eating sweets.” Serving sugar is actually a part of the ceremony. I don’t know in which century the ceremony arose. If a mother-in-law doesn’t give her daughter-in-law jewelry during the ceremony, she does it at an engagement party or soon after the wedding. But neither my mama nor Aunt Valya were given any traditional presents by Grandma Lisa at kandhuris, engagement parties or after the wedding. They were never given anything at all.
The stories about the pitcher walled up in one of the houses in Chinaz and about Grandma’s bracelets entertained Yura and me, though we understood that it was nothing but dreams, a game, and that we would never go to Chinaz to dig pits in storage rooms and basements. In a word, Yura and I would never become Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn.
The funniest thing was that the treasures of stingy Great-Grandpa really existed, and they did finally turn up. In the 70s, when old Nataniel’s house was pulled down to clear space for a new building, a bulldozer driver hit a wall, and… the broken pitcher with the valuables came into view. The bulldozer driver turned them in to the authorities and was given his share, but the relatives didn’t get anything.
Ever since that day, I have loved my little carpet that helped Mama remember the Teke carpet. And I remembered to empty the jar. The small carpet lay by my desk for many years, up until the time when we left for America.
Chapter 51. A Merry Night Under the Apricot Tree
It tickled my nose and I sneezed. I felt a tender stroking on my cheeks and neck from time to time. While I was half-asleep, it seemed to me that Grandpa Yoskhaim tickled me with his beard as he adjusted the blanket. It was so nice, so tender… And then I saw in my dream that I was in a warm bathtub filled with soapsuds, and those fluffy suds, their colored bubbles gliding across my face, burst and tickled it.
Someone who was engaged in waking me up grew tired of that entertainment. I jerked from a punch to my side and moaned. I sat up, and someone’s palm covered my mouth, “Sh-sh-sh… Don’t yell, Redhead.”