Authors: Chingiz Aitmatov
But when grandpa and I go to the meadow, I don't feel shy.
"Welcome to the summer pastures of our fathers and grandfathers! Is all well with the cattle and the folk? Are the children well?" That's what grandpa says. I only shake hands. Everybody knows grandpa, and he knows everybody. He has his own conversations with the visitors. He asks them questions, and he tells them about our lives. And I don't know what to talk about with the children. But then we start playing hide and seek, or war, and I get so excited I don't want to leave. If only it were summer all the time, then I could always play with the children in the meadow!
While we are playing, the men light fires. Do you think, papa, that the fires light up the whole meadow? They don't. The light is only near the fire, but outside the circle it gets darker than before. And we play war, we hide and attack in the dark, and it's like being in a movie. If you are the commander, everybody obeys you. It's probably nice for a commander to be a commander.
Then the moon comes up over the mountains. It's even more fun to play in the moonlight, but grandpa takes me home. We walk across the meadow, through shrubbery. The sheep lie quietly. The horses are grazing all around. We walk and hear someone start a song—a young shepherd, or maybe an old one. Grandpa stops me: "Listen. You won't often hear such songs." We stand, listening. Grandpa sighs and nods to the song.
Grandpa says that in olden times a khan was captured in battle by another khan. And this other khan said to his captive: "If you wish, you can live with me as my slave. If not, I will fulfill your most cherished desire, and then I'll kill you." The other thought a moment, and said: "I will not live as a slave. Better kill me. But first call here a shepherd from my land, the first you meet." "What do you want him for?" "I want to hear him sing before I die." Grandpa says people would give their lives for a song of their homeland. I'd like to see such people. Do they live in big cities?
But the songs are good to hear. Grandpa says they are ancient songs. "What people they were!" he whispers. "God, what songs they sang . . ." I don't know why, but I get to feel so sorry for grandpa, I love him so much that I want to cry.
In the morning there is already no one in the meadow. The sheep and horses are driven farther up into the mountains for the whole summer. Other herds come after them, from other collective farms. In the daytime they don't stop, they just pass through. But in the evening they stop for the night in the meadow. And then grandpa and I go out to greet them. He likes greeting people, and I learned it from him. Maybe one day I will shake a real prophet's hand in the meadow.
And in the winter Uncle Orozkul and Aunt Bekey go to the city, to the doctor. Some people say the doctor can help, he can give medicines to help a child get born. But grandma always says the best thing is to go to a holy place, way out across the mountains, where cotton grows in the fields. The land is flat there, so flat you'd think there couldn't be any mountains, but there is one—a holy one—Suleiman's Mountain. And if you slaughter a black sheep at its foot and pray to God, then climb the mountain and bow at every step and pray and beg God properly, he may take pity and give you a child. Aunt Bekey wants to go there, to Suleiman's Mountain, but Uncle Orozkul is against it. It's too far. It's too expensive, he says. You can get there only by plane. And then, it is a long way till you get to the plane, and it costs lots of money too . . .
When they go to the city, we remain at the post just by ourselves. We and our neighbors, Uncle Seidakhmat, his wife Guldzhamal, and their little daughter. That's all.
In the evening, when all the chores are done, grandpa tells me tales. The night behind our house is black, black and bitter cold. The wind is raging. Even the highest mountains are frightened on such nights. They huddle closer to our house, to the light in our windows. And somehow, this makes me both afraid and glad. If I were a giant, I'd put on a giant overcoat and come out of the house. I'd tell the mountains loudly: "Don't be frightened, mountains! I am here. The wind, the darkness, the blizzard don't matter. I am not afraid of anything, don't you be afraid either. Stay where you are, don't huddle close together." Then I would walk over the snowdrifts, step across the river, and go into the woods. The trees are also frightened in the woods at night. They're alone, with nobody to say a word to them. They stand there naked, freezing in the cold, with no place to hide. And I would walk in the woods, and pat every tree on the trunk, so it wouldn't be afraid. I think, the trees that don't turn green in spring are those that froze from fright. We chop them down afterward for firewood.
I think about all this while grandpa tells me his tales. He talks for a long time. There are all sorts of tales. Some are funny, especially the one about the boy as big as a thumb who was called Chypalak and who was swallowed by a greedy wolf to his own misfortune. No, he was first eaten by a camel. Chypalak fell asleep under a leaf, and the camel was walking by and swallowed him with the leaf. That's why people say that a camel never knows what it eats. Chypalakbegan to cry and call for help. And so his old parents had to kill the camel to save their Chypalak. And the story with the wolf is even more interesting. He also swallowed Chypalak, because he was stupid. And then he cried bitter tears. The wolf met Chypalak and laughed: "What kind of tiny midge is that under my feet? I'll give one lick, and you'll be gone." But Chypalak said to him: "Don't touch me, wolf, or I'll turn you into a dog." And the wolf laughed again, "Ha, ha, who ever saw a wolf turn into a dog? Now I will eat you just because you are so rude." And he swallowed Chypalak. He swallowed him and forgot all about it. But from that day on he couldn't live a wolf's life anymore. As soon as the wolf would creep up to the sheep, Chypalak would shout in his belly: "Hey, shepherds, wake up! It's I, the gray wolf, creeping up to steal a sheep!" The wolf didn't know what to do. He bit his sides, he rolled on the ground. But Chypalak wouldn't stop. "Hey, shepherds, come quick, give me a good thrashing!" The shepherds would run after the wolf with cudgels, the wolf would run away. And the shepherds followed, wondering: the wolf must have gone crazy—he runs away, and yells, "Catch up with me, brothers, thrash me, don't spare my hide!" The shepherds rolled with laughter, and the wolf would get away. But it didn't do him any good. Wherever he turned, Chypalak would get in his way. Everywhere people chased him and laughed at him. The wolf grew thin with hunger, nothing but skin and bones. He'd click his teeth and whine: "What is this trouble that has fallen on my poor head? Why do I keep calling misfortune on myself? Have I gone daffy with old age and lost my wits?" And Chypalak whispers in his ear: "Run to Tashmat, he has fat sheep! Run to Baimat, his dogs are deaf. Run to Ermat, his shepherds are asleep." And the wolf sits and whimpers: "I won't run anywhere, I'll go and hire myself out somewhere as a dog . . ."
Isn't that a funny story, papa? Grandpa has other stories, too, some sad, some frightening. But my favorite one is about the Horned Mother Deer. Grandpa says that everyone who lives near Issyk-Kul should know it. Not to know it is a sin. Do you know it, papa? Grandpa says it is true, that it really happened a long time ago. He says we are all children of the Horned Mother Deer. You and me and everybody else.
So that's how we live in wintertime. And the winter lasts and lasts. If it weren't for grandpa's tales, I'd get terribly bored.
But spring is fine. When it gets really warm, the shepherds come into the mountains again. And then we're not alone. Only across the river there is nobody else, we are the last. Across the river there is only the forest, and everything that lives in it. That's why we live at the post, to make sure that no one sets a foot inside the forest, that no one breaks a single branch. One day learned people came to visit us. Two women, both wearing pants, a little old man, and a young fellow. The young one was a student. They spent a whole month with us. Collecting leaves and branches. They said there were few forests left in the world like our San-Tash, almost none at all. And every tree should be guarded and watched over.
And I used to think that grandpa just felt sorry for every tree. He gets very upset when Uncle Orozkul lets his friends cut down pines for logs.
3
The white ship was receding. It was no longer possible to make out its smokestacks even through the binoculars. Soon it would disappear from sight. The boy now had to invent the end of his journey on his father's ship. But he could not find the right ending. He could easily imagine himself turning into a fish, swimming down the river to the lake, meeting the white ship and his father. And everything he'd tell his father. But what came after that? He could not work it out. Suppose the shore was already in sight. The ship moved toward the harbor. The sailors prepared to disembark. His father also had to go home. His wife and two children were waiting for him at the dock. But what was he to do? Go with his father? Would he take him along? And if he did, and his wife asked: "Who is this? Where's he from? What do we need him for?" No, it was best not to go . . .
And the white ship moved farther and farther, turning into a scarcely visible dot. The sun was already at the edge of the water. He could see through the binoculars the dazzling, fiery purple surface of the lake.
The ship was gone. It vanished. And the tale of the white ship was over. It was time to go home.
The boy picked up the schoolbag from the ground, pressed the binoculars under his arm, and quickly ran down the mountain, slithering down the slope like a little snake. And the nearer he came to his home, the uneasier his spirit. He would have to answer for the dress that had been chewed up by the calf. Now he could think of nothing but the coming punishment. To keep up his courage, he said to the schoolbag: "Don't be frightened. So they'll give us a scolding. I didn't do it on purpose. I simply didn't know the calf ran off. So they'll cuff me on the ears. I can stand it. And you, if they throw you down on the floor, don't worry. You won't break, you're a schoolbag. Now, if grandma gets her hands on the binoculars, that's a different story. We'll hide them in the barn first, then we'll go home . . ."
And this was what he did. Yet it was frightening to enter the house.
A warning silence came from within. And the yard was as quiet and empty as if all the people had gone away. It turned out that Aunt Bekey had gotten another beating from her husband. And Grandpa Momun had tried again to curb his crazed, drunk son-in-law. Again the old man had to beg and plead, to hang on Orozkul's huge paws, and witness all that shame—the sight of his bruised, disheveled, screaming daughter. And hear his daughter abused in the vilest language in the presence of her own father. Hear her called a barren bitch, a thrice-damned she-ass, and many other words. And listen to his daughter wailing over her fate in the wild voice of a madwoman: "Is it my fault that heaven deprived me of conception? How many women in the world keep bearing young like sheep, and I'm accursed by God. What for? Why must I suffer such a life? It will be better if you kill me, you beast! There—hit me, hit me! . . ."
Old Momun sat brokenly in the corner, still breathing hard. His eyes were closed, and his hands, folded on his knees, were trembling. He was very pale.
Momun glanced at his grandson without saying anything, and his eyes closed wearily again. Grandma was not home. She had gone to make peace between Aunt Bekey and her husband, to clean up the house, pick up the broken dishes. That's what she was like, grandma: when Orozkul was beating his wife, she didn't interfere and kept grandpa back. But after the fight she'd go and try to talk some sense into them, quiet them down. Well, that was something too.
More than anyone else, the boy pitied the old man. On such days he seemed close to death. Benumbed, Momun sat in the corner, never showing his face to anyone. He never told anybody, not a soul, what he was thinking. And he was thinking at these moments that he was old, that he had had a single son, and even he had died in the war. And no one knew him any longer, no one remembered him. If his son had lived, who knows, life might have turned out differently. Momun was also mourning for his dead wife, with whom he had spent a lifetime. But the worst thing of all was that his daughters had found no happiness. The younger, leaving his grandson with him, was now struggling out there with a big family in one room. The older was suffering here with Orozkul. And though he, her old father, was nearby and willing to endure any hardship for her sate, what good was that? The blessing of motherhood was kept and kept from her. It was many years now that she had been with Orozkul, and she was sick to death of living with him, but where was she to go? And what would happen later? Who knows, he might die any day, he was an old man. What would she do then, his unfortunate daughter?
The boy hastily drank some milk from a cup, ate a piece of pancake, and huddled quietly by the window. He did not light the lamp, afraid to disturb his grandfather. Let him sit and think.
The boy was also thinking his own thoughts. He could not understand why Aunt Bekey tried to appease her husband with vodka. He'd hit her with his fist, and she would run and bring him some more. That Aunt Bekey! How many times her husband beat her within an inch of her life, and she forgave him everything. And Grandfather Momun forgave him. Why should they forgive? Such people should not be forgiven. He was a rotten man, a bad man. Who needed him here? They'd be much better off without him.
The boy's embittered imagination conjured up a picture of just punishment for his uncle. All together, they jumped on Orozkul and dragged him, fat, huge, dirty, to the river. There they swung him and threw him into the wildest, most turbulent rapids. And he pleaded for Aunt Bekey's forgiveness, and Grandfather Momun's. For he, of course, could not become a fish.
These thoughts relieved the boy. He even wanted to laugh when he imagined Uncle Orozkul thrashing about in the river, his velvet hat floating next to him.