Listening to Grandfather’s story, Ryabchik, a shaggy dog with burrs stuck to his muzzle, yawned loudly. I gave him an angry nudge in the side, but far from taking offence, Ryabchik nuzzled up looking to be patted and licking me with his hot tongue. Ryabchik had only a few broken teeth left in his mouth. Last autumn, as we were leaving Gorodishche, he bit down on one of the wheels – he wanted to stop our carriage – and broke all his teeth.
Oh, Grandfather Maxim Grigorievich! I owe some of my excessive impressionability and romanticism to him. They turned my youth into a series of collisions with reality. This caused me suffering, but still I knew my grandfather was right, and that a life based on soberness and common sense might be good for others, but for me would be burdensome and fruitless. ‘One man’s meat is another man’s poison,’ Grandfather liked to say. Maybe that’s why my grandfather could not get along with my grandmother or, more accurately, hid from her. Her Turkish blood did not give her one attractive trait, except for her beautiful yet formidable physical appearance.
My grandmother was a tyrant and a nag. She smoked at least a pound of the strongest tobacco a day in her small, scorching-hot pipes. She ran the household, and her black eyes noticed the slightest disorder in the house. On holidays she’d put on a satin dress fringed with black lace, go out and sit on the small earthen mound by the house, smoke her pipe, and watch the rapid waters of the Ros. Now and then, deep in thought, she’d let out a loud laugh, but no one ever dared to ask what she was laughing at.
The only thing we liked about her was a hard, pink bar that looked like soap. She kept it hidden in her chest of drawers. Once in a while she’d proudly take it out and let us smell it. The bar gave off the faintest smell of roses. My father told me that a valley near Kazanlak, Grandmother’s hometown, was called the ‘Valley of Roses’, and that this miraculous bar was impregnated with attar of roses from there. A Valley of Roses! The words alone stirred my imagination. I could not understand how such poetic places could produce a soul as stern as my grandmother.
3
Carp
Stuck in Gorodishche after the death of my father, I recalled my early childhood, those times when we, happy and carefree, would come to stay for the summer from Kiev. Mother and Father were young then, and Grandfather and his Turkish wife were still alive. I was still just a little boy and loved to make up all kinds of fanciful tales.
The train from Kiev arrived in Belaya Tserkov in the evening. Father hurried out into the station square to hire one of the garrulous drivers. We reached Gorodishche in the middle of the night. Half asleep I heard the tiresome jangling of the springs, then the noise of the water near the mill, and the barking of dogs. The horses snorted. The wattle fences creaked softly. The endless stars shone in the sky, and out of the damp darkness came the smell of weeds. Aunt Dozia carried me, half asleep, into the warm cottage with its coloured rugs spread out over the floor. The cottage smelled of warm milk. I opened my eyes for a moment and saw in front of me the rich embroidery on Aunt Dozia’s snow-white sleeves.
The hot sun beating against the white walls woke me in the morning. Red and yellow hollyhocks swayed outside the open window. A nasturtium peeped inside the room; a furry bee had crawled into the flower and become stuck. I froze and watched as it angrily struggled to back its way out and fly off. Soft, bright waves of light reflected from the river rippled endlessly across the ceiling. The river rushed noisily nearby. Then I heard funny Uncle Ilko’s voice: ‘Well, as usual, the sun’s barely up, but the parade’s already begun! Dozia, put the cakes and the cherry brandy on the table!’
I jumped out of bed and ran barefoot to the window. A line of old men in large straw hats, tapping the ground with their knotty sticks, the medals on their brown tunics clanking and glistening in the sun, was slowly making its way over the causeway from the other side of the river. These venerable elders from the neighbouring village of Pilipchi had come to welcome us upon our successful arrival. Leading the way with the copper badge of his office hanging from his neck was the pock-marked Mayor Trofim.
The cottage sprang to life. Aunt Dozia tossed a cloth over the table, sending a rush of air through the room. Mama hurriedly piled cakes on the plates and sliced sausage. Father pulled the corks from the bottles of homemade cherry brandy, while Uncle Ilko set out the sturdy glass tumblers. Then Aunt Dozia and Mama ran off to change and Father and Uncle Ilko went out onto the porch to meet the elders who were approaching, as solemnly and inevitably as fate itself.
At last the elders arrived, and, after silently exchanging kisses with my father and uncle, they sat down on the low stone ledge amid a chorus of heavy sighs. Then Mayor Trofim, once he had cleared his throat, uttered his traditional greeting: ‘I have the distinct honour of welcoming you, Georgy Maximovich, most respectfully to our quiet corner of the country.’
‘Thank you!’ said my father.
‘Yes-s-s!’ the elders replied immediately, sighing with relief. ‘Yes, of course, as it should be.’
‘Yes-s-s!’ repeated Trofim, peering through the window at the sparkling bottles on the table.
‘That’s the way it is,’ added an old soldier from the era of Tsar Nicholas I with a crooked nose.
‘Quite naturally,’ chimed in a small, curious old man by the name of Nedolya. He was the father of twelve daughters, but in his old age he had forgotten most of their names and could only remember five of them by counting on his fingers: Hannah, Parasya, Gorpyna, Olesya, Frosya … And then here the old man would get confused and have to start all over again.
‘Yes, indeed!’ the elders said and then fell silent for a time.
At this point Grandfather Maxim Grigorievich came out of the cottage. The elders got up and bowed down low. Grandfather bowed in return. After yet another round of loud sighs, the old men sat back down, grunted and stared silently at the ground. Finally, Uncle Ilko, having read some mysterious signs imperceptible to the rest of us that the meal was now ready, said: ‘Well, my good men, thank you for this conversation. And now let us partake of what God has provided us.’
Mama, in a fine summer dress, greeted the men inside. Each of them kissed her hand, and, as was the custom, she kissed theirs, wrinkled and brown, in return. Beautiful Aunt Dozia, rosy-cheeked and prematurely grey, wearing a blue dress and a shawl embroidered with crimson flowers, bowed at the waist.
After the first glass of the syrupy cherry brandy, Nedolya, tortured with curiosity, began asking his questions. He was bewildered by the things we had brought with us from Kiev and, pointing at each one, asked: ‘What’s this here? What’s it for? What do you say it’s called?’
Father then explained to him – this here is a brass steam iron, and this is an ice cream maker, and over there on the commode, that’s a folding mirror.
Nedolya shook his head with amazement: ‘There’s a tool for everything!’
‘Yes, of course, so there is!’ the elders agreed as they drank up.
Summer came into its own at Gorodishche – hot summers with terrifying thunderstorms, rustling trees, currents of cool river water, fishing outings, blackberry picking, and the sweet sensation of carefree days filled with surprises.