in the world

Chapter 8

She used her tireless tongue to taunt grandma severely.Listening to her vicious words, I felt sad and wondered how my grandmother could bear it.At times like this, I don't like her.

The young housewife came out of the house and nodded politely to her grandmother:
"Come to the dining room, please, it's all right, please come in!"

The aunt and grandma looked at the back of the grandmother and shouted:

"Wipe the soles of your shoes clean, country people are sloppy!" The host welcomed the grandmother happily:

"Ah, clever Akulina, how are you doing? How is old Kashilin?"

Grandmother smiled sincerely.

"Are you still working diligently?"

"Hey, keep doing this, like a prisoner!"

Grandmother talked with him very affectionately and speculatively, without losing the demeanor of an elder.During the conversation, he also mentioned my mother: "Yes, Varvara Vasilievna ... what a fine woman—somewhat manly!"

His wife interrupted his grandmother and said:
"Do you remember, I gave her a cloak, black silk trimmed with beads?"

"Why don't you remember..."

"That cloak is quite new..."

"Yes," muttered the master. "What cloaks, short shirts, life--what a pain in the ass!"

"What did you say?" she asked him suspiciously.

"Me? Didn't say anything... A good life is easy to live, a good person is easy to die..."

"I don't understand, what do you mean by that?" The housewife became uneasy.Later, she took her grandmother to visit the newborn child.I cleared away the tea utensils that had been used on the table.The master said to me in a low voice in deep thought:

"Your grandmother is such a good mother-in-law!..."

I am deeply grateful for his words.But when I was alone with my grandmother, I said to her very sadly:

"Why did you come here, why did you come here? You know who they are..."

"Oh, Alyosha, I know all about it," she answered, looking at me with a kind smile on her very pretty face.In this way, I feel embarrassed.Of course she can see everything, understand everything, and even know what I'm thinking right now.

She carefully looked back to see if anyone was coming, then put her arms around me, and said kindly:
"I wouldn't have come here if you weren't here, so why should I look for them? Besides, your grandfather is sick, and I wait on him, and I don't work, and the family has no money. . . And my son Mikhail put Sasha is kicked out, and I want to take care of his food and drink. Here you are promised six rubles a year, so I think, you have been here for half a year, and you can give me at least one ruble? . . . " She put her mouth in my ear He said softly: "They asked me to teach you a lesson, to scold you, and they said you wouldn't listen to anyone. My sweetheart, you have to stay here and endure for another two years, until you can stand on your feet , you have to bear it, okay?"

I promised to bear it, and it was hard; I was busy all day long to make ends meet, and this beggar-like dullness oppressed me like a dream.

Sometimes I think: I should run away!But it was damn winter.Every night, the blizzard howls, the wind swirls in the attic, the beams shrink and rattle with the cold—where can one escape?They don't allow me to go out and wander, and I don't have time to wander.In the short days in winter, I spend quickly and unknowingly in the busy housework.But church is a must. I go to all-night mass every Saturday and go to evening prayers on holidays.

I would love to go to church.I like to stand in a wide dark corner and look at the icon wall from afar.It seemed to melt in the candlelight, and became a golden river, flowing on the gray stone altar.The black shadows of the holy images swayed gently, the golden lace of the central door of the holy curtain quivered happily, the candlelight fluttered like golden bees in the blue air, and the heads of women and girls were like flowers. generally.

Everything around me blended harmoniously with the singing of the choir, everything was as strange as a fairy tale, and the whole church was shaking like a cradle in the black emptiness like tar.

Sometimes it seems to me that the church has sunk to the bottom of a deep lake, disappeared from the earth in order to live a special life incomparable.My feeling probably came from the story of Kitezh city told by my grandmother.I often swayed in a daze with the people around me, lured into dreams by the singing of the choir, prayers and people's sighs, reciting a sad story song:
When Easter morning prayers,
A company of accursed Tartars,

like a pack of ferocious dogs
Flooded into the city of Kitezh... O God, O my Lord, O Mother of Mercy!

Bless your slaves,
Let us finish this morning holy book,
Let us finish our prayers in peace!Let not those Tartars defile the holy palace, rape our wives and daughters, torture our young children, and kill our old father-in-law!

my Lord!Please listen!

Our Lady!Please listen!

Hear our prayers,

Hear our cry.

The King of Kings has commanded,

Called Mikhail, the messenger of God: "Go, Mikhail, to the earth,

Go near Kitezh and set off an earthquake,
Let the whole city sink to the bottom of the lake;
So neither rest nor fatigue,

From morning prayer to all night prayer,

The holy liturgy of the church does everything

Forever and ever, forever and ever! "

In those days my head was as full of my grandmother's story songs as a hive is of honey.It seems that I even think things according to the style of her poetry.

I never say prayers in church. ——In front of my grandmother's God, I am ashamed to imitate my grandfather's angry prayers and hymns with crying.I'm sure my grandmother's god wouldn't like this any more than I would like it myself.Moreover, these things are all printed in books, which means that God has long memorized them as well as all literate people.

So I painstakingly craft my prayers in church when a pang of pleasurable mourning is in my breast, or when the sporadic humiliations of the past day prick and disturb me.As long as I think of my own bad fate, I don’t need much effort to make those complaining words into the form of poetry naturally:

God, God, I can't bear it any longer,
Come on, make me a grown-up!
Otherwise, I really feel bad,

Living like this is worse than hanging yourself—God, please forgive me!

You can't learn anything if you want to learn.

That damned old woman, Matrona,
growled at me like a wolf,

There is no point in living any longer!

Until now, I still remember this kind of "prayer poems" in my mind. The things I thought of in my own mind when I was a child have become deep scars, engraved in my heart, and I will never forget them in my life.

It is good in church, where I find as much rest as in woods and moors.This little heart, which had tasted so much sorrow, and was stained by a life of viciousness and brutality, was washed clean in this blinding, ardent dream.

But, only at that time - when the weather is so cold, or when the wind and snow are blowing in the street, it seems that the whole sky freezes, is swept into the snow cloud by the wind, and the ground freezes under the snow, as if it will never When I came back to life, I went to church.

I like the quiet night best, running from one street to another in the city, or walking into a small secluded corner.Sometimes when I run, it seems as if I have wings growing on my back and soar up.There is only one alone, just like the moon in the sky.My own shadow crawled in front of my eyes, covering the glint on the snow, bumping into pillars and fences ridiculously.The watchman was walking in the middle of the street, holding a clapper in his hand, wrapped in a thick and long coat, and a dog beside him, shaking himself.

This clumsy man is like a kennel.The kennel came out of the yard and walked aimlessly on the street, and the helpless dog followed behind it.

Sometimes, when I meet happy young ladies and gentlemen, I think they probably slipped out of the church where the evening mass is held.

Sometimes, from the vents in the bright windows, a peculiar fragrance flows out into the fresh air outside.It was a nice, unfamiliar smell that reminded me of a strange life I didn't know.So I stopped under the window, sniffling my nose and pointing my ears to speculate: What kind of life is this, and what kind of people live in this house?There was an evening mass in the church, and they were still having such a good time, playing a special kind of guitar.Heavy copper strings flowed from the vents.

I was particularly interested in the small one-story house on the corner of the deserted Tikhonov and Martynov Streets.I first saw it on a moonlit night before the week of Maslenitsa, and from the square transom above the window flowed out into the street a stream of warm steam and an unusual sound, as if a The strong and kind man was humming a tune with his lips closed. Although the lyrics could not be heard clearly, the tune seemed familiar and easy to understand.But when I listened to it sideways, I was covered by the annoying string sound, and I couldn't understand it anymore.Sitting on the step-stone, I thought it must be some kind of charming violin sound, because it sounded very uncomfortable.Sometimes the instrument emits such a force that the whole house shakes and the glass rustles.The eaves dripped from the eaves, and tears fell from my eyes.

The watchman quietly walked up to me, pushed me off the steps, and asked:
"What are you doing here?"

"Listen to the music," I said.

"Don't care about that much, get out of here..."

I hurriedly ran around this section of the street, and went back to the original place under the window, but the music had stopped, and there were bursts of laughter from the transom.The sound was so different from the mournful music that I thought I was dreaming.

I went up to the house almost every Saturday night, but only once, in the spring, did I hear the cello for the second time.That time, it was played almost until midnight, and I was beaten when I went back.

Cloaked in the stars on a winter night, walking in the calm streets has made me gain a lot of knowledge.I specially chose the city tip far away from the central area. There are many lights on the streets in the central area. I was afraid of meeting the acquaintance of the master, who would find out that I did not go to the evening mass, but wandered around the streets.Most in the way are the drunks, the police and the whores.But at the end of the city, as long as the windows of the lower rooms are not very cold and the curtains are not drawn, you can look in.

These windows present a colorful scene in front of my eyes.I saw some people praying, some kissing, some fighting, some playing cards, and some talking restlessly and quietly.The silent, fish-like life unfolded in front of me like a diorama.

I caught sight of two women, one very young and one older, at a table in a basement.Opposite them, a middle school student with long hair was sitting, waving a hand while reciting a book to them.The younger one, frowning sternly, leaned back in his chair and listened, and the older, thin, shaggy-haired woman suddenly covered her face with her hands and twitched her shoulders.The middle school student threw the book away.Presently the younger one got up and ran out, and kneeling before the shaggy-haired woman, he began to kiss her hands.

Looking at another window, I saw a tall man with a big beard, put a woman in a red blouse on his lap, and shook her like a child.He stared and opened his mouth wide, as if he was singing something.The woman laughed so hard that her whole body shook, her back was thrown back, and her feet kicked wildly.Then, he straightened the woman's body and sang again, and the woman laughed wildly again.I watched them for a long time, and I didn't leave until I realized that they were going to play like this all night.

Many of these scenes remain in my memory forever.I often went home late because I was out of my mind, which aroused the suspicion of my hosts, and they asked me: "Which church did you go to? Which priest presided over it?"

They all know all the priests in the city, and they all know when to recite and which scriptures to read. It is easy for them to catch me lying.

The God my mother-in-law and daughter-in-law worshiped was my grandfather's hot-tempered God, a God who made people fearful in his presence.They always had the name of this God on their lips, and even when they quarreled, they threatened each other: "Look, God will retaliate, he will call you a hunchback, a bastard..."

On Sunday, the first week of Lent, the old woman was making fritters and they were all burnt, and her face, reddened by the fire, was full of anger, and she shouted loudly:

"Oh, you all go to hell with me..."

Suddenly, she sniffed the frying pan again, sank her face, threw the handle of the pan on the ground, and began to cry:

"Aww, the pot smells like meat, damn it, I didn't burn it off on vegetarian Monday, aww, God!"

She knelt down and prayed with tears and snot all over her nose:

"God, God, forgive me the damn old woman, forgive me for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ! God, don't punish me, the old bastard..."

She fed the fried pancakes to the dog and reheated the frying pan, but when her daughter-in-law quarreled with her, she blamed her for it:
"Even when you're eating vegetarian food, you cook things in a pot of meat oil..."

They draw their God into all household chores, into all corners of their petty lives.Therefore, a poor life seems to have meaning and importance on the surface, as if it is always serving the highest authority.This pull of God into all the trivialities of life suffocates me.I seemed to be being watched secretly, and I often looked around unconsciously.At night a terror surrounded me like a cold cloud.The place of origin of this horror was a corner of the kitchen where a black ikon was kept burning by an ever-burning lamp.

There was a large window beside the shelf, separated by a central pillar.Looking out of the window at the deep, bottomless blue sky.It seemed to me that the house, the kitchen, me—everything seemed to be hanging from the sky, and if there was a violent shock, everything would fall into this big cold, blue hole; passing the stars, falling silently Into the silence of death, like a stone in water.I lay motionless, not daring to even turn over, waiting for the dreadful end.

I don't remember how the horror was cured, but I got cured of it quickly, with the good God of my grandmother, of course.I think I realized then a simple truth: I have done nothing wrong, I have not committed a crime, I do not deserve to be punished, and I am not responsible for the sins of others.

During the daytime when I went to church, I also sneaked out to hang out, especially in the spring, and an irresistible force insisted on not letting me go to church.If they give me two kopeks for wax money, it's my fault.I bought a pair of sheep phalanxes, and spent all my church hours out playing, always making it late to get home.Once I lost all ten kopecks in remembrance of the dead and in buying wafers.I had no choice but to steal someone else's wafer while the custodian was coming down from the altar with a tray.

All I wanted to do was play, and I played like crazy.I played very skillfully, and soon became a famous player in the streets of this area in playing sheep, playing ball, and playing stick games.

During Lent they forced me to fast.So I went to my neighbor, Father Dolimedonte Pokrovski, to receive confession.I think he is a very strict man, and I have committed many crimes against him. I have thrown stones and destroyed the pavilions in his garden, and I have often fought with those children in his family.In short, he may tell me many things that I have done to displease him.I was therefore troubled, and I went to the poor church, and waited for my turn to confess, my heart beating violently.

But Father Dolimedonte greeted me with a kindly reproachful sigh. "Oh, neighbor, well, kneel here! What crime have you committed?"

He put a thick velvet cloth over my head, and the smell of beeswax and frankincense choked my breath, and it was hard to speak, and I didn't feel like talking.

"Do you listen to the adults?"

"Do not listen."

"You say: I am guilty!"

Unconsciously, I blurted out:

"I stole the wafer."

"Why, where did you steal it?" The priest thought for a while and said slowly.

"The Church of the Three Saints, the Church of Our Lady, and the Church of Nicholas have all been stolen..."

"Ah-ah, all the churches stole, boy, it's no good, it's a crime, you know?"

"Understand."

"You said: I'm guilty! It's outrageous. Did you steal it?"

"Sometimes I ate, and sometimes I lost all my money at a goat's crutch, and I didn't have any wafers to take home, so I stole..."

Father Dolimedonte began to murmur.Then he asked a few more questions, and then, suddenly and sternly:

"Have you read the forbidden book?"

Of course, I don't understand this question, so I asked:
"what?"

"Have you read the forbidden books?"

"No, I haven't seen anything..."

"Forgive your sins... get up!"

I looked in wonder at his face, which seemed thoughtful and kind.I'm ashamed, I'm ashamed: when I come to do the confession, the master tells me to tell the truth about everything, which makes me terrified and terrified of the confession.

"I threw stones at your pavilion," I confessed.

The priest raised his head and said:
"This is not good, let's go!"

"I even threw it at a dog..."

"Next!" Father Dorimedonte didn't even look at me, and called the people behind me.

When I came out, I felt cheated, and felt very wronged: I thought confession was terrible, and I was so nervous. I didn’t know there was nothing scary about it, and it was boring!One thing that interested me was asking about books I didn't know.I think of the middle school boy who read to the two girls in the basement, and I think of the "good thing"--he also has a lot of dark, thick books with inexplicable illustrations .

The next day my master gave me fifteen kopecks to go to communion.This year's Easter is very late, the snow has long since melted, the streets have been dry, and the roads are covered with dust. It is a sunny and pleasant day.

By the fence of the church, a group of workers were playing goats wildly. I thought: I still have time to receive communion, so I said to the gamblers:
"Let me join!"

"Join a fee kopek." A pockmarked red-faced man said proudly.

I also proudly say:

"Well, second pair from the left, three kopecks."

"Put the money out!"

So, the gamble begins!

In exchange for fifteen kopecks, I put three kopecks under a pair of mutton phalanges, and whoever knocks out the pair of mutton phalanges takes the money.If it doesn't work, he'll pay me three kopecks.I was lucky: two men took aim at my bet, both missed, and I won six kopecks from two middle-aged men, and my excitement began...

But a gambler said:

"Beware of this brat, don't let him win the money and slip away..."

I got angry and said violently like a drum:
"Nine kopeks for the pair on the left-hand side!"

But this did not attract the attention of those gamblers, only a young man about my age warned:
"Watch out! The fellow is lucky. He's an apprentice in the house of the Cartographer of Starstreet, and I know him!"

A thin workman, who smelled like a furrier, said wryly:

"Is it a kid? Okay..."

He aimed at it with a lead-filled sheep toe bone, knocked out my bet accurately, and bent down to me and asked:
"Are you crying?"

I replied:

"Three kopecks on the right-hand side!"

"I'll knock it out too," boasted the furrier, but he lost.

The banker is limited to three times, and now it's up to me to make other people's bets.I won another four kopecks and a pile of mutton bones.However, when it was my turn to be the banker, I lost all three times and lost all my money.Just then, the day's service was over, the bells rang, and people came out of the church.

"Do you have a wife at home?" the furrier asked, reaching out to grab my hair, but I flinched and ran away.I caught up with a well-dressed young man and politely asked:

"Have you taken Communion?"

"So what if I get it?" He looked at me suspiciously and asked back.

I begged him to tell me how the communion was taken, what the priest said at that time, and what the communion was to do.

The guy raised his face sternly and yelled at me in a threatening voice:
"Don't go to receive Holy Communion, play secretly, are you a heretic? Well, I won't tell you, I told you to peel your skin!"

I ran home expecting them to question me and find out that I hadn't been to Communion.

But the old woman blessed me, and then only asked:
"How much did you give the steward for the candles?"

"Five kopecks," I babbled.

"Give him three kopecks and that's a great favor; leave two kopecks for yourself, fool!"

In spring, new clothes are changed every day, and it is more and more beautiful every day. The tender grass gives the birch green, exuding an intoxicating fragrance.I long to go out into the open, to lie on my back in the warm earth, and listen to the larks.But I was busy brushing and packing my winter clothes into trunks, cutting tobacco leaves, dusting furniture, and dealing with things that were utterly unnecessary and unpleasant to me all day long.

Free time, absolutely nothing to do.Our street is narrow and wet, and there are no pedestrians.It is not allowed to run farther.There were only grumpy, tired earth-workers and disheveled cooks and washerwomen in the yard, who married dogs every night.This is really annoying, humiliating, and almost wants to make yourself blind, so that you can't see anything to be comfortable.

I took scissors and flower paper, ran to the top floor and cut all kinds of paper flowers, and decorated them on the rafters. After all, this was just a boring pastime.I was confused and wanted to go to a place where people were not so sleepy, noisy, complaining to God, blaming and insulting others. . . . On Easter Saturday the iconography of the Vladimir Virgin Mary was received from the Oransky Monastery into the city.The icon will remain in the city until mid-June, making house-to-house visits in the parishes.

It was not a Sunday morning that the icon came to my master's house.I was in the kitchen polishing the brass, and the young housewife shouted in panic from the house: "Go and open the outside door, Our Lady of Oransky has come to our house!" Full of copper polish and brick powder, ran out and opened the gate.The young monk, with a lantern in one hand and a censer in the other, saw me and muttered in a low voice:

"Are you sleeping? Come, help me..."

Two ordinary men carried the heavy shrine and walked up the narrow stairs.I was on the side of the shrine, with my dirty hands and shoulders, supporting them.A group of heavy-bodied monks came up behind them, singing lazily in a low voice:

"Holy Mother, please pray to God for us..."

I thought with sentimental confidence:

"I'm so dirty, if I carry an icon, the Holy Mother will punish me, and my hands will be shriveled..."

The icon stood on two chairs covered with clean sheets in the upper corner of the room.Two monks stood on both sides of the shrine, holding the shrine with their hands.They were both young and beautiful, like a pair of angels, with shining eyes, smiling faces, and fluffy hair.

Prayer was held.

"O Holy Mother of God!" the big priest sang loudly, and he kept touching his fat ears covered by his fluffy hair with his red fingers.

"Supreme Mother of Mercy," sang the monk lazily.

I like Our Lady very much.According to the grandmother, Our Lady planted all flowers on the ground, all joys, all good and beautiful things, to comfort those poor people.So, when it was my turn to kiss her hand, I didn't see how the adults kissed, but I just kissed the face and mouth of the icon tremblingly.

I don't know who pushed me hard and pushed me to the threshold of the corner of the room.I don't remember when, the monk had already returned with the icon on his shoulders.But I distinctly remember sitting on the floor, surrounded by my masters, talking to each other with great fear and apprehension: What will happen to the child?

"Go and talk to the priest, he knows everything," said the master, and then cursed me innocently:
"I'm really ignorant, you can't kiss, don't you know this?...and even went to school..."

For several days, I waited helplessly, not knowing what was going to happen, supported the altar with my dirty hands, and kissed her without knowing what to do. This is not for me, not for me!

But the Holy Mother seems to have forgiven my sins of sincerity and innocence. Maybe her punishment is so light that I don't feel it at all in the large number of punishments given to me by those good people.

Sometimes I deliberately provoke the old woman, hitting her and saying:

"The Holy Mother probably forgot to punish me..."

"You wait," said the old woman slyly. "Just wait and see..."

... When I adorned the attic rafters with pink tea-wraps, tinfoil, leaves, etc., I made up songs to the tune of church hymns and sang whatever came to mind, like the Kalmyks on the road Walking and singing the same:
with a pair of scissors in hand,

Sitting on the top floor.

cut the paper...

I'm sick of it, fool!

If I were a dog--

You can go anywhere,
Poor for being alone,

Hearing scolding all day long:

Be polite and keep quiet, you little beast,
If you are not mature, it will kill you!

The old lady looked at my handiwork, kept shaking her head and laughing:

"If only you could decorate the kitchen like this..."

One day, the master ran up to the attic, saw my handiwork, and exclaimed: "Pishkov, you are so funny, you are so damn good... Do you want to be a juggler? I can't guess you..."

He gave me a silver five-kopeck piece from the time of Nicholas I.

I made a net with thin wire, and hung this silver coin in the most conspicuous place among the colorful decorations, like a medal.

But after a day, the silver coins and the wires were gone.I believe the old woman must have stolen it.

(End of this chapter)