“Because it’s written here that the treasure wrote this! But pirates wrote this! A treasure can’t write,” Alex stated authoritatively.
Costa nodded, impressed by his iron logic. Mama woke up; she could not sleep because they were pelting her with sand. She was convinced that once the candy was gone, they would abandon the pit, but nothing of the kind. The pit was so great that it aroused the children’s sportive spirit to make it even deeper. Even Costa was digging. With his right hand he drove the shovel into the wet sand and with his left he knocked on it from above, as if he was hammering in beams.
“What happens when the pit reaches the centre of the earth?” Alex asked.
“Lava spews out!” Peter said. “Don’t even have to reach the centre! Drill about ten kilometres and it may already spew. This is the sea, the continental plates are thin!”
Alex was so happy that he forgot how to breathe, but he did not die, and, after staying completely stunned for about five seconds, asked, “And lava, it’s an explosion?”
“Not quite. But if there’s a volcanic eruption, then yes! Smoke to five kilometres, ash cloud and all that!”
Alex snatched the piece of tile from Vicky and jumped into the pit, and fountains of sand began to fly out from there.
“You’ll have to escape by yourself when lava spews!” Papa warned.
“Doesn’t matter! We’ll pull him out by his shorts!” Vicky promised.
Peter, passing by for the hundredth time, finally broke down. With the shout, “Everybody get out! You’re all digging wrong!” he slipped down into the pit with a hefty board rejected by the sea. Peter plunged it into the wet bottom, dislodged the sand, and the “nippers”, as he called his brothers and sisters, emptied out the sand.
Half an hour later, when the pit had become much deeper and Alex was whining with disappointment because there was no smell of a volcanic eruption, a timid boy in blue shorts, which now and then slipped down, wandered over to them. Then the boy said, “Excuse me! I have a problem!” stopped and pulled up his shorts. Alena immediately dragged the boy into the pit-digging process.
Five minutes later, the boy in the shorts was already indistinguishable from the other seven children. Just as the others, he was running, jostling, and throwing sand out, and they yelled at him the same way when he knocked down the edge of the pit.
Mama even said to Papa that they could take the boy with them. The main thing was that he would wash the dishes after himself. Later as time went by, he would marry Rita. “He’s a rich heir, it would be foolish to let such a boy slip away! Even has his own bucket! And two shovels!” she said.
Mama had barely said it when out of nowhere a determined little woman in dark glasses ran up to her. Evidently, she had gotten sunburned the day before, because her shoulders were red with white stripes from a bathing suit. Her nose was also red and sticking out like a perky thumbtack.
“I heard everything!” she shouted.
“Pardon me?” Mama did not understand.
“You wanted to take my Paul with you and marry him to someone there!”
“It was a joke!” Mama was embarrassed.
“I understand that it’s a joke! But all the same, I want to say, also as a joke, of course, that children aren’t pieces of goods! A lot of children, it’s mass production! You understand it’s impossible to give each child enough attention!”
“Well, and where’s your piece of goods now? Socializing?” Mama asked.
The little woman turned in alarm. Her piece of goods was perfectly happy running among the children and did not want to go anywhere. He wanted to bury Peter, who had taken his bucket, in the sand.
“Come here! Paul! To whom am I talking? Come to me!” Paul did not budge, only pulled his head into his shoulders.
The woman turned beet red. “Not listening? To whom am I talking? Well!”
She leaned over, pulled her son by the hand out of the pit, and began to drag him. Paul resisted. Two trenches remained in the sand from his feet. Papa and Mama felt sorry for him, but they understood that if they got involved now, it would only be worse for Paul.
Sand continued to fly out of the pit after Paul’s departure, but no longer as energetically as before. The children were getting tired. Besides, they were sad that their wealthy heir with a bucket and two shovels had been taken away.
Peter was the first to get tired of digging. He remembered that he was already grown and that it was improper to engage in such nonsense. “Ah-h! The volcano is erupting!” he yelled and, throwing the board away, hastily began to climb out of the pit, which reached the middle of his chest.
Rita, Costa, and Alex climbed out in a panic after him. The pit was already level with their heads. Peter generously helped Rita and Costa out, but said to Alex, “Say goodbye to life!” and pushed him into the volcanic crater. Alex closed his eyes in horror and prepared to be cooked alive, but Papa grabbed him under the arms in time and Alex was happily saved.
“What, are you sick or something to scare your brother?” Mama was outraged. “That’s it! We’re going! Have to put the kids to bed!”
She started to move back, dragging the bogged-down wheels of the stroller, into which a yawning Rita had already climbed, out of the sand. They had not even gotten onto the asphalt and Rita was already asleep. Costa, recalling that this stroller was once his, got in beside Rita and began to push her onto the asphalt with his knees.
“That’s not nice!” Mama said.
“Nice! My stroller!” Costa said, but started to think all the same, and having thought it over, got upset, and being upset, fell asleep. He slept, and his head was lying on Rita’s shoulder, like a pillow.
Alex also fell asleep, but on Papa’s shoulders, upon which he thrust himself, declaring that his legs were tired. Therefore, he was also sleeping, on Papa’s shoulders, with a cheek on top of Papa’s head, and Papa supported him with a hand so that he would not fall backwards.
The fact that all the kids fell asleep was no surprise. They had dug a very big hole after all. Literally to the centre of the earth.
Chapter Nine
Liubov and Pigeons
“Why do you think so?”
“I’ll prove it to you logically, historically, philosophically, geographically, mathematically, politically…”
“Yes I believe. I believe.”
“No, please allow me! Grammatically, dramatically, critically, etc.”
Afanasy Fet.[13] Memories.
Kate went out of the house in the morning. Their neighbour Andrew was sitting on the fence, swinging his legs dangling on their side. A girl with a thoughtful face and a long braid sat next to him on the fence. Kate immediately guessed that this was Andrew’s sister, Nina, whose voice she had heard many times in the neighbouring lot.
“Good morning!” Kate said, stopping about five steps away.
“What’s good about it? A normal June morning,” said Andrew.
“Don’t grumble!” his sister said.
“I’m not. I’m just pointing out. If it were raining, she would also say ‘good’, though it would be ‘wet’.”
“She said it out of politeness!”
“Why say out of politeness what you don’t think?”
The girl with the braid pushed Andrew with her elbow. “Don’t pay him any attention! He wants to be different but can’t, because he’s this way! Climb up to us! You’re Kate?”
Kate climbed the fence and settled down beside the girl. “How do you know that I’m Kate?”
“Well, I know Vicky! We were talking about horses, and she has such wavy hair, right? And your Rita and Alena are still small. So you’re Kate!” the girl spoke seriously and simply at the same time. She did not try to talk down to Kate, who was younger, and Kate was flattered, because she did not often encounter this.
“And you’re Nina?”
“Yes!” the girl shifted the braid behind her back.
“And where’s your Seraphim? He didn’t happen to get lost t
oday?” asked Kate.
“How do you know?” Andrew was surprised.
“Again? And your papa is looking for him?”
“Papa’s working. The season has started.”
“Is your papa the one carrying a monkey on the beach?”
“No, that’s one of his acquaintances. Papa once carried an eagle, but it wasn’t profitable. People are afraid for their children to have pictures taken with an eagle. It would even peck,” Andrew said knowledgeably.
Kate thought for a bit. “Your Seraphim is eight! Why is he lost? He should know the city well!” Kate was surprised.
“He’s lost because he daydreams!” Nina explained. “He needs to remember where he’s going, why he’s going, and that we’re waiting for him at home. Sometimes he goes to school, but his legs carry him to the sea. Or somewhere else. He’s simply lost in thought.”
“But you don’t get lost in thought?” Kate asked Andrew.
“Why would I? I know everything! Seraphim can’t even explain what he’s thinking about! He just thinks and that’s all! Is it really possible to think and not know what you’re thinking about?” Andrew declared with confidence.
Kate looked at Nina, who shrugged, showing that it is difficult to judge whether Andrew knows everything or not, but in general, he and Seraphim are completely different.
“And if Seraphim had a phone so that it would be easier to find him?” Kate suggested.
“Useless. Already bought him three. He either loses them or forgets to charge them!” Andrew said with a sense of superiority.
Then Kate remembered that she had left home in the morning on business and, having apologized, jumped down from the fence.
“Where are you going?” Nina asked.
“To the pet store.”
Kate had become good friends with the “mouse girl” and visited her almost every day, helping her clean the cages. Every time she came, the girl gave her a sign so that Kate would stop near the aquariums and Kate did. The girl, on the run, pushed with her thigh an iron shelf, on which were about twenty cages. The shelf moved a few centimetres with the push, and hundreds of mice, rats, jerboas, and parrots started to run, dig, or fly in a panic. Nevertheless, this did not disturb the girl.
“Now you can move! Now he can’t see, the skunk!” the girl said, shaking her fist at someone invisible, and Kate came out of her hiding place.
The “skunk” was the shop owner, who, having grown a paunch, sat at home, but watched the store through a camera installed on the ceiling. When the girl pushed the shelf, the camera was blocked and the most that the owner could see was two or three parrots. The camera had no microphone and you could say anything you wanted. For example, after selling another guinea pig, you wave at the camera, smile, and wish, “May you fall out of a chair!”
“Mouse girl” did this regularly. And Kate also repeated after her at times, but “mouse girl” put a heavy hand on her shoulder and said solemnly, “This isn’t your war, girlfriend!”
Today Kate had not yet gotten out of Vine Street when Andrew and Nina caught up with her. “Nothing to do anyway! Can we join you?”
Kate replied that she had no objection. They walked along the figure-eight street, and Andrew threw dirt at Lad and Tot, which tried to stick with them in order to pinch something in the city. Stool had disappeared somewhere recently, and it was strange. Sometimes its barking and squealing were heard in the evening, but no one could understand from where.
After being hit by clumps of dirt a few times, Lad and Tot lagged behind by the road. They turned and quietly trotted back. There was no resentment at all in their run. On the contrary, they seemed content to finally take the hint.
“Phew!” Kate said with relief. “I was afraid they’d run into the pet store. I’d really get it then.”
“You leave them on the street!” Andrew advised her.
“You’re simply a genius! Where do you think I’d leave them?! But if someone opens the door, they’ll rush in. Do you know what two stupid dogs would do in a pet store?”
They crossed the street and the yards, making their way along the short path to the pet store. Here Andrew scraped his big toe kicking the curb and became dejected. “Everything will be bad!” he repeated, sitting on the edge and swaying. “Animals will die of old age or distemper, I from blood poisoning, and a car will certainly run down Seraphim. Other people will also die. Some earlier, some later.”
Kate wanted to blurt out something with the request to shut the valve and stop turning on the waterworks, but Nina was Nina not without reason. She sat next to Andrew and put her hand on his shoulder. “Andrew, you’re wrong! They’ll discover immortality!” she said seriously.
“Immortality? That’s even worse!” Andrew declared with confidence.
“Why?”
“There won’t be enough food for all. And the old will go around whining that they’re bored.”
Kate wanted to blurt out that not only the old whines, but Nina imperceptibly nudged her with a finger.
“Fine! But if people will grow wiser?”
“No point in them growing wiser. Better let them be kinder. Though, all the same, the sun will go out and explode in seven billion years.”
“Five!” Nina said.
“No! In seven and two-tenths! I checked. And then eight minutes will pass and Earth will perish. I also checked!” Andrew declared tragically.
“But people will fly to another planet!”
“What can they do on another planet? There will be some methane instead of air. Better perish instantly!” Andrew, groaning, got up from the curb, and, often stopping to look at his toe, trudged after them. He quickly fell behind and Kate was able to talk with Nina, whom she liked more and more with every minute.
“Is he always like this?”
“Yes. He wants to find out everything, to the very foundation. He asked Father Alexander at Sunday school why they can’t invent a pill that would let people always be good. So, you swallow the pill and won’t overeat, won’t lie, won’t be jealous, and so on.”
“And?”
“Father Alexander said that there wouldn’t be any human effort then. No one’s own will. No struggle. Then he asked Andrew to help him colour eggs. Andrew liked it very much. He painted somewhere around four hundred eggs. Wooden eggs. You dip them in paint, they dry, and then you draw on them.”
“Ah-h! And your Seraphim believes in God?” Kate asked.
Nina shrugged. “Don’t know. I didn’t ask. But he sometimes lifts his head and becomes lost in thought for about fifteen minutes. Seems to me that he sees something in the air. They’re quite different and they always fight. Mama says that Andrew is rooted on the ground up to his neck, but Seraphim listens without understanding, and flies and doesn’t land at all.”
“And a dragon flies to our Alena! She fills a basin with water for it!” Kate bragged.
“Ah! Of course, where else would you put water?” Nina said without the slightest surprise, as if they were talking about a fly.
They talked more about something insignificant, and then Nina asked, “Are you friends with all your brothers and sisters?”
“Except Peter. He’s very disgusting. He walks around blowing his nose. Sleeps during the day, goes on the Internet at night,” Kate complained.
“He’s not disgusting. We met recently. He’s okay.” Nina said.
“At your place, everyone’s good! He’s a pain!”
“There aren’t harmful people! I’ve thought about it!” Nina replied seriously. “Every person wants to be loved. Wants attention. The more a person wants to be loved, the more disgustingly he behaves. The more disgustingly he behaves, the more he should be loved. But love properly, so that the habit of disgusting behaviour doesn’t consolidate its grip but rather is shaken off.”
If the habit was shaken off, then Kate was, on the contrary, quite confused. It was too complex for her.
“But if he behaves totally disgustingly? Simply like nausea?
” she asked with annoyance.
“Then he should be loved even more, but this doesn’t always turn out. Andrew here recently also brought Seraphim to tears, declared to him that the neighbours’ kebabs were our cat. Seraphim howled and wailed, and we couldn’t calm him down at all. We told him that it wasn’t the cat, that it was a joke, and he still wouldn’t believe us. Everyone had to run to find the cat. It always disappears for three days.”
They reached the pet store. Andrew did not go inside, because he stated that he hated animals. Actually, as Nina explained, he was just shy. The “mouse girl,” who, incidentally, was called Liuba,[14] waved her hands, asking them to wait outside. Kate was sure that now she would again push the shelf and block the camera, but Liuba jumped out of the store, dashed to a van, opened the back door, and pulled out a big, very dirty cage, which could easily fit a child of Rita’s size. Four pigeons sat shivering, huddled up on a perch in the cage.
“Will you take them? Free, of course!” the “mouse girl” offered.
“Where did they come from?”
“Mamaevka. A grandpa is in the hospital. Stroke. We sold all the pigeons, but these are defective.”
“How are they ‘defective’?”
“Well, there’s something not quite right with them. The experts won’t buy them, but they’re still pigeons anyway. Good pigeons. If you take them, I’ll take you in the car, and then you won’t have to carry them.”
Kate, it goes without saying, immediately wanted the pigeons. “But will my parents let me?”
“Call your mother!”
Kate phoned Mama. On the phone, Mama was yelling at someone, but someone beside her was making excuses and did not want to admit his guilt and say “Sorry!” Although no one explained anything to Kate, she understood in three seconds that Costa had bitten Rita and Mama was resolving the situation.
“No-no-no! No pigeons! This is my firm and final word!” Mama stated. “Not enough for us already, now pigeons! No one gets on my nerves, everybody’s obedient, everyone helps me, washes dishes around the clock, sits with the little ones when they’re asked! Perfect, the best family in the world!”
Mutiny of the Little Sweeties Page 7