N teffi humorous stories 8 14 years old. Read taffy, stories

Nadezhda Aleksandrovna Teffi (Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, Buchinskaya by her husband) is a poetess, memoirist, critic, publicist, but above all, one of the most famous satirical writers Silver Age, competing with Averchenko himself. After the revolution, Teffi emigrated, but in exile her extraordinary talent blossomed even brighter. It was there that many classic stories Teffi, from a very unexpected side, depicting the life and customs of the "Russian Diaspora" ...

The collection includes Teffi's stories of different years, written both at home and in Europe. Before the reader passes a real gallery of funny, bright characters, in many of which real contemporaries of the writer are guessed - people of art and politicians, famous" socialites"and patrons, revolutionaries and their opponents.

taffy
humorous stories

... For laughter is joy, and therefore in itself is good.

Spinoza. "Ethics", part IV.

Position XLV, scholia II.

Cursed

Leshka has been numb for a long time right leg, but he did not dare to change his position and listened eagerly. It was completely dark in the corridor, and through narrow gap half-open door, only a brightly lit piece of the wall above cooker. A large dark circle surmounted by two horns hovered on the wall. Lyoshka guessed that this circle was nothing more than a shadow from his aunt's head with the ends of the scarf sticking up.

The aunt had come to visit Leshka, whom she had identified only a week ago as "boys for room service," and was now in serious negotiations with the cook who had patronized her. The negotiations were of an unpleasantly disturbing nature, the aunt was very agitated, and the horns on the wall rose and fell steeply, as if some unseen beast butted their invisible opponents.

It was assumed that Lyoshka washes galoshes in the front. But, as you know, a person proposes, but God disposes, and Lyoshka, with a rag in his hands, was eavesdropping outside the door.

“I understood from the very beginning that he was a bungler,” the cook sang in a rich voice. - How many times I tell him: if you, guy, are not a fool, keep your eyes open. Don't do shit, but keep your eyes open. Because - Dunyashka scrubs. And he does not lead with his ear. This morning again the lady shouted - she didn’t interfere in the stove and closed it with a firebrand.

The horns on the wall are agitated, and the aunt groans like an aeolian harp:

"Where can I go with him?" Mavra Semyonovna! I bought him boots, not to eat, not to eat, I gave him five rubles. For a jacket for alteration, a tailor, not a drink, not eaten, ripped off six hryvnias ...

- No other way than to send home.

- Cute! The road, no food, no food, four roubles, dear!

Lyoshka, forgetting all the precautions, sighs outside the door. He doesn't want to go home. His father promised that he would bring down seven skins from him, and Leshka knows from experience how unpleasant it is.

“Well, it’s still too early to howl,” the cook sings again. “So far, no one is chasing him. The lady only threatened... But the tenant, Pyotr Dmitritch, is very protective. Right up the mountain for Leshka. Enough of you, says Marya Vasilievna, he says he is not a fool, Leshka. He, he says, is a uniform adeot, and there is nothing to scold him. Just a mountain for Leshka.

Well, God bless him...

- And with us, what the tenant says is sacred. Because he is a well-read person, he pays carefully ...

- And Dunya is good! - the aunt twisted her horns. - I don’t understand such a people - to let a sneak on a boy ...

- True! True. This morning I say to her: "Go open the doors, Dunyasha," affectionately, as if kindly. So she will snort me in the face: "I, grit, you are not a doorman, open it yourself!" And I drank it all to her. How to open doors, so you, I say, are not a porter, but how to kiss a janitor on the stairs, so you are all a doorman ...

- Lord have mercy! From these years to everything, dospying. The girl is young, to live and live. One salary, no pity, no...

- Me, what? I told her directly: how to open the doors, so you are not a doorman. She, you see, is not a doorman! And how to accept gifts from the janitor, so she is the doorman. Yes, tenant lipstick ...

Trrrr…” the electric bell crackled.

- Leshka-a! Leshka-a! cried the cook. - Oh, you, fail! Dunyasha was sent away, but he doesn’t even listen with his ear.

Lyoshka held his breath, pressed himself against the wall and stood quietly until an angry cook swam past him, angrily rattling starched skirts.

“No, pipes,” thought Lyoshka, “I won’t go to the village. I’m not a fool, I want to, I’ll serve so quickly.

And, having waited for the return of the cook, he went with resolute steps into the rooms.

"Be, grit, in front of your eyes. And what kind of eyes will I be when no one is ever at home."

He went into the front. Hey! The coat hangs - the tenant of the house.

He rushed to the kitchen and, snatching the poker from the dumbfounded cook, rushed back into the rooms, quickly threw open the door to the lodger's quarters, and went to stir in the stove.

The tenant was not alone. With him was a young lady, in a jacket and under a veil. Both shuddered and straightened up when Lyoshka entered.

"I'm not a fool," Leshka thought, poking his poker at the burning firewood.

Firewood crackled, the poker rattled, sparks flew in all directions. The tenant and the lady were tensely silent. Finally, Lyoshka headed for the exit, but at the very door he stopped and began to anxiously examine the damp spot on the floor, then turned his eyes to the guest's legs and, seeing galoshes on them, shook his head reproachfully.

We recently devoted an essay to the very colorful figure of A. V. Rumanov.

About 30 years ago, he "shocked" the St. Petersburg salons with a "filigree Christ."

Later, in the same salons, Rumanov dropped his soft, rumbling almost baritone voice:

Teffi is meek ... She is meek, - Taffy ...

And he said to her:

Taffy, you are meek.

In the northern skies of the Neva capital, the star of a talented poetess, feuilletonist and, now this will be a revelation for many, was already shining, the author of charming, gentle and completely original songs.

Taffy herself performed them in a small but pleasant voice to the accompaniment of her own guitar.

So you see her - Taffy ...

Wrapped up in a warm, fur-trimmed cozy dressing gown, her legs comfortably tucked up, she sits with a guitar on her knees in a deep armchair by the fireplace, casting warm, quivering reflections ...

Clever gray cat's eyes look unblinkingly into the blazing flames of the fireplace and the guitar rings:

gnaw angry cats

At evil people in hearts

My feet are dancing

In red heels...

Taffy loved red shoes.

It has already been printed. They talked about her. She was looking for cooperation.

Again Rumanov, shorn with a beaver hedgehog.

On the Caucasian mineral waters, he created a large resort newspaper and attracted the best St. Petersburg "forces".

One of the first visits - to her, "meek Taffy."

I invite you to Essentuki for two or three months. How?

And without waiting for an answer, Rumanov somehow imperceptibly and deftly put a few brand new credit cards with portraits of Catherine the Great on the table like a fan.

This is an advance!

Take it away! I love rainbows in the sky, not on my desk, came the reply.

Romanov did not lose his head. Like a conjurer, he instantly took out a heavy suede bag from somewhere and poured a jingling, sparkling stream of gold coins onto the table.

Nadezhda Alexandrovna thoughtfully poured these coins through her fingers, like a child playing with sand.

A few days later she left for Essentuki and there immediately raised the circulation of the resort newspaper.

It was a long, long time ago, but still...

Time puts a seal - they say.

Both time and the press are extremely lenient towards Teffi. Here in Paris, she is almost the same as she was with a guitar by the fireplace in red shoes and a fur-trimmed dressing gown.

BUT smart looking eyes with a cat's gray yellowness and in a cat's frame - exactly the same.

Talking about current politics:

What do you say, Nadezhda Alexandrovna, about the "League of the Nation", about its acceptance into its bosom Soviet Russia or rather the Soviet government?

First a smile, then two dimples near the corners of the mouth. For a long time, the familiar dimples that resurrected St. Petersburg ...

What can I say? I'm not a politician, but a humorist. Only one thing: Everyone has a painfully ironic attitude towards the "League of the Nation", and therefore, what is the price of whether it recognizes someone or does not recognize it. And, really, nothing has changed and will not change from the fact that she adorned Litvinov's bald patch with her laurels with his, Litvinov's, not quite "Roman profile." A farce, albeit a tragicomic one, but a farce nonetheless...

Having done away with the League of Nations and Litvinov, we move on to the amnesty declared by the Bolsheviks.

Is it true that they announced it? - Taffy hesitated? - The Bolsheviks, at least, keep silent on this subject. I think this amnesty is like a mirage in the desert. Yes, yes, the disbelieving, exhausted emigration, perhaps, invented this amnesty itself and grabs at it... The Muslims say: "The drowning man is ready to grab hold of the snake."

What can you say about modern Germany?

And here's what I'll say: I had a story "Demonic Woman". He got lucky. A collection of my works under this general title was published in Poland. On the German"Demonic Woman" was also printed. And now I find out: some cheeky young German, take it and place this story under your own name. I was used to being reprinted without a fee, but not used to having someone else's name under my stories. Friends advised to call the young, promising plagiarist to order. They also advised to contact Prof. Luther ... It seems that at the University of Leipzig he occupies a chair ... A chair - now I'll tell you what. Yes, Slavic literature. I wrote him more in order to reassure my friends.

To great surprise, Professor Luther responded. But how! With what fervor! A whole thing has come up. Found a promising young man, lathered his head well, threatened: something else like that, and within Germany no one would ever print a single line of it. The fee for the "Demonic Woman" was awarded in my favor. The young man wrote me a letter of repentance on several pages. Not only that, but the venerable Professor Luther himself apologized to me for him. The corporation apologized German writers and journalists. In the end, she herself felt ashamed, why did she make this mess? ...

And now, having done away with Germany. two words about reprints, in general. A big Russian newspaper in New York got into the habit of "decorating" its cellars with my feuilletons from Vozrozhdeniye. I applied for the protection of my copyright to the Canadian Society of Russian Journalists. Thanks to them, they took care of me, but there is no sense from this! In response to threats to sue, the newspaper in question continues to use my feuilletons and the number of reprinted stories has reached an impressive figure of 33. Alas, my likeable Canadian colleagues do not have the authority of the touching and all-powerful Professor Luther.

I knew it! No "real" interview is complete without it. What am I working on? Frankly, without concealing, I am writing an emigrant novel, where, although under pseudonyms, but very transparently, I bring out a whole phalanx of living people, pillars of emigration of a wide variety of professions and social positions. Will I spare my friends? Maybe yes, maybe no. Don't know. I once had something similar with Chateaubriand. He also announced the publication of the same portrait novel. The alarmed friends immediately organized themselves into a society, the purpose of which was to create a money fund named after Chateaubriand. Something like a propitiatory sacrifice to a formidable, punishing deity ... Would have nothing against it, - Taffy adds with a smile - and I - absolutely nothing - against such a friendly fund in favor of me, a sinner. However, isn't it time to end? I'm afraid that I'll take a lot of space in the magazine "For You"!

It turns out, something good, no longer “For you”, but “For me”. So what else? Beginning authors overwhelm me. From everywhere their works are sent with a request to be printed. And in order for the request to be valid, they dedicate all their stories to me. They think that Teffi, delighted with such attention, will immediately rush to the appropriate editorial offices and, with a Browning in hand, force young authors to print, at least in anticipation of the publication of flattering dedications. I take this opportunity to inform all my ardent correspondents that I am, well, not at all conceited! True, not bad stories come across, but most often my youth writes about what they do not know. And what he knows, he is silent about it. For example, an author from Morocco sent me a story… Who would you think? About the Eskimos! In the Eskimo life, although I don’t particularly passion, however, I immediately sensed that something was wrong.

From novice writers we move on to our Parisian professionals.

Tell me, - I ask - Nadezhda Alexandrovna, how to explain such a squabble among our brother? It would seem equally destitute? Why?

Angry cats gnaw

In evil people, in the hearts ...

What memory do you have! - Taffy was amazed and sparks flared in the cat's eyes. - Why? Everyone is exhausted, there is no more strength to endure ...

"What a blessing to be wild man! thought Katyusha, pushing her way through the bushes of the monastery forest. “Here, I’m wandering where, perhaps, a human foot has never set foot before. I feel with all my body, with all my soul, how I belong to this earth. And she probably feels me as her own. Too bad I can't walk barefoot - it hurts too much. Damned ancestors! They spoiled my soles with culture.

The sky turned pink through the thin pines. How wonderful!

She lifted her freckled nose enthusiastically and recited:

And resin and strawberries

Smells like an old forest.

But the old forest immediately ended near the state-owned house of the chief engineer.

Katyusha stopped. There was something going on in the lawn. Something extraordinary. Myself Chief Engineer, his assistant, a young doctor, and five other people - you can’t make out who from behind - gathered in a circle, bent down, some even squatted down, and someone suddenly roared offendedly, and everyone burst out laughing.

Who are they laughing at? That's right, some fool, deaf-mute.

It was scary and a little disgusting.

But the people are familiar. You can come up. It's just embarrassing that she's so disheveled. And the dress on the shoulder is torn with thorns. But, fortunately, he is not here. So, it will do without grumbling. (“He” is the husband.)

And again something roared, growled without words.

Katyusha came up.

The chief engineer raised his head, saw Katyusha, nodded to her:

- Katerina Vladimirovna! Come here! Look what a monster Nicholas brought.

Nikolai, the forest watchman—Katyusha knew him—was standing aside and smiling, covering his mouth with his fingers out of politeness.

The young doctor moved away, and in the center of the circle Katyusha saw a small fat bear cub. Around his neck was a piece of rope with a piece of wood tied to it. The little bear shook the block from side to side, caught it with its paw, and suddenly started to run skipping. And then the bar hit him on the sides, and the bear cub roared and menacingly raised its paw. This made the people around him laugh.

“Wait,” shouted the assistant engineer, “I’ll blow smoke up his nose, wait…”

But at this time, someone poked the bear cub with a stick. He turned angrily and, raising his paw, funny, terribly formidable, but not at all terrible, went to the offender.

Katyusha was confused. She herself did not understand how to be, and how she relates to this story.

“Wait a minute,” someone shouted, “Fifi is going to meet the bear. Skip Fifi.

Fifi, a poodle from a neighboring estate, small, lean, smartly cut like a lion, with mustaches and bracelets on his paws, entered the circle.

The bear, tired and offended, sat down and thought. The poodle, dapper with its paws, came up, sniffed the bear from the side, from the tail, from the muzzle, went around again, sniffed from the other side - the bear looked askance, but did not move. The poodle, dancing, had just aimed to sniff the ears of the bear, when he suddenly swung and bang the poodle in the face. He, not so much from the force of the blow, but from surprise, turned over in the air, squealed and started to run away.

Everyone cackled. Even the watchman Nikolai, forgetting politeness, threw back his head and rumbled at the top of his lungs.

And then Katyusha "found herself."

“Darling,” jumped the chief engineer. - Katerina Vladimirovna! Katyushenka! Why are you crying? Such an adult lady, and suddenly because of a bear cub ... Yes, no one offends him. The Lord is with you! Don't cry, or I'll cry myself!

“Ardalyon Ilyich,” murmured Katyusha, wiping her cheek with the tattered sleeve of her dress, “forgive me, but I can’t, when-ah-ah ...

“You are vainly walking in the heat without a hat,” said the young doctor instructively.

- Leave you! Katyusha shouted angrily at him. - Ardalyon Ilyich, my dear, give it to me if it is nobody's. I beg you.

- What are you, my dove! Yes, there is something to talk about! Nikolay, - he turned to the forest watchman, - you will take the bear cub to the Gordatskys, you know, to the justice of the peace. Here you go. Go quietly home.

Katyusha sighed with a trembling sigh. She looked around, wanted to explain her behavior - but there was no one to explain. Everyone dispersed.

At home, Katyusha had an angry husband, an angry cook and maid Nastya, her own man. Katyusha was afraid of the cook, fawning over her, calling her "Glafira, you." She called her "lady, you" and clearly despised her.

Nastya understood everything.

Nastya had a boy brother Nikolai and a gray cat. The boy was called the Cat, and the cat was called the Pawn.

Among people, Nastya was considered a fool and was called Nastya fat-footed.

The cook reacted negatively to the bear. Nastyuha, Cat and Pawn - enthusiastically. The angry husband was away.

- You understand, Nastya, this is a forest child. Do you understand?

And Nastya, and the boy Koshka, and the cat Pawn blinked knowing eyes.

- Give him something to eat. He will sleep with me. The teddy bear was cooked semolina porridge. He climbed into it with all four paws, ate, grumbled, then huddled under a chair and fell asleep. They pulled him out, dried him, and laid him on the bed next to Katyusha.

Katyusha looked with emotion at the paw that covered the bear's muzzle, at the furry ear. And there was no one in the world at that moment dearer and closer to her.

“I love you,” she said, and softly kissed her paw.

- I am no longer young, that is, not the first youth. I'll be eighteen soon... "Oh, how in our declining years we love more tenderly and more superstitiously..."

The bear woke up at half past three in the morning. He grabbed Katyushina's leg with his paws and began to suck it. Tickling, painful. Katyusha with difficulty freed her leg. The bear roared offendedly, walked across the bed, reached Katyusha's shoulder, sucked. Katyusha squealed, fought back. The bear was completely offended and began to descend from the bed. He stretched out a thick paw, began to carefully grope for the floor. He broke, flopped, roared, got up and ran, throwing up his ass, into the dining room. Dishes rattled a second later.

It was he who climbed onto the table, caught his paws and pulled off the entire tablecloth with dishes together.

Nastya ran up to the roar.

Lock him up, right?

- It is forbidden! Katyusha cried out in despair. “A forest child must not be tortured.

Books rumbled in the office, the inkwell rang.

The forest child, a fat lump, felled everything he touched, and was offended that things fell, roared and ran away, throwing up his tailless back.

Katyusha, pale, with whitened eyes, with a blue mouth, rushed about the house in horror.

“I’ll just lock him up for an hour,” Nastya decided, “while you sleep.” Then we'll release it.

Katyusha agreed.

In the evening the angry husband returned. I found Katyusha in bed, exhausted, found out about bear pranks, forbade letting the bear into the rooms, and the forest child passed into the jurisdiction of Nastya, Koshka and the cat Peshka.

Then it turned out that the bear was not a bear, but a she-bear, and Katyusha was terribly disappointed.

- The bear is a fabulous, wonderful beast. And the bear is just somehow even stupid.

The bear cub lived in Nastya's little room, slept with her on the same bed. Sometimes at night they heard shouts from Nastya's little room:

- Masha, stop it! Here I am falling apart. There is no abyss for you!

Sometimes Katyusha asked:

- Well, how is the bear?

Nastya made a plaintive face; I was afraid that Masha would not be kicked out.

- Bear? He treats me like a mother. He understands everything, no worse than a cow. This is such a bear that you will not find it during the day with fire.

Katyusha was pleased that everyone was praising the beast, but there was no longer any interest in him. First, the bear. Secondly, he grew up a lot, stopped being funny and entertaining. And he became cunning. Once they hear - chickens beat in the chicken coop and cluck in a voice that is not their own, but for some reason the door is closed - which never happened during the day. Run and open. Bear! He climbed in, locked the door behind him and caught chickens. And after all, he perfectly understands that the case is illegal, because when they caught him, his face became very embarrassed and ashamed.

After that, Katya's angry husband said that keeping such an animal in the house, in which bloodthirsty instincts had woken up, was quite dangerous. Someone advised to give it to the mill, to the landowner Ampov. They have long wanted to have a bear to sit on a chain.

Wrote to the landowner.

In response to the letter, Madame Ampova herself arrived - a poetic, tender lady, all iridescent and flowing. Scarves of some kind always fluttered around her, frills rustled, chains rang. She didn't speak, she recited.

- Dear animal! Give it to me. He will sit on the chain free and proud, the chain is long, it will not interfere with him. We will feed him flour. I won't charge you dearly for flour, but, of course, you will have to pay for half a year in advance.

The lady chirped so tenderly that Katyusha, although she was very surprised that she would have to pay for the food of the bear she was giving, could not find an answer, and only scaredly asked how much she should pay.

The boy Koshka was instructed to deliver the bear. The cat harnessed the beast to the sleigh and rolled.

“As soon as he saw the forest, and as soon as he ran, his spirit was busy, he could barely turn it,” said Koshka.

Nastya was crying.

A month later, she ran to take a look - the Ampovs' estate was six miles from the city.

"Sit down," she cried. - He recognized me, but as soon as he rushed, he didn’t break the chain. After all, I ... after all, I was instead of a uterus for him. He sucked my entire shoulder...

Ampova sent a bill for flour with a letter in which she poured out her tenderness for the bear:

"Dear little animal. I admire him every day and treat him with sugar.

Then Katyusha went abroad with her husband for two months.

They returned and a few days later received a scented note from the Ampovs.

"Glad you're finally back," she wrote on lilac paper. - I honestly keep for you the legs from our Mishka. The hams came out great. We smoked at home. Come right in time for dinner. We are wonderful. Lilies of the valley are blooming, and all nature seems to be singing the song of beauty. Wonderful nights...»

- God! - Katyusha froze all over. - They ate it.

I remembered the "forest child", small, clumsy, funny and ferocious, how he put all four paws in semolina and how she told him at night: "I love you." And she remembered his furry ear, and how no one in the world was closer and dearer to her.

"Dangerous Beast!" But he didn’t eat us, but we did!

She went to Nastya, wanted to tell her, but did not dare.

She looked into Nastya's nook, saw the bed, narrow, small, where the forest animal lived, where he slept next to Nastya, and "revered her for the uterus", dear, warm, completely his own.

"Come right in time for dinner..."

No. She did not dare to tell this to Nastya.

Autumn is mushroom season.
Spring is toothy.
In autumn they go to the forest for mushrooms.
In the spring - to the dentist for teeth.
Why this is so, I do not know, but it is true.
That is, I don’t know about teeth, I know about mushrooms. But why do you see bandaged cheeks every spring on people who are completely unsuitable for this species: cabbies, officers, cafeteria singers, tram conductors, wrestlers, athletes, racing horses, tenors, and infants?
Is it because, as the poet aptly put it, “the first frame is exposed” and it blows from everywhere?
In any case, this is not such a trifle as it seems, and recently I was convinced that strong impression leaves this dental time in a person and how acutely the very memory of it is experienced.
I once went to the good old friends for a light. I found the whole family at the table, obviously, they had just had breakfast. (I used the expression “at the light” here, because I understood long ago what it means simply without an invitation, and you can go to the “light” at ten o’clock in the morning and at night, when all the lamps are out.)
All were assembled. A mother, a married daughter, a son with his wife, a maiden daughter, a student in love, a granddaughter, a high school student and a country acquaintance.
I have never seen this calm bourgeois family in such a strange state. Everyone's eyes burned with a sort of morbid excitement, their faces became blotchy.
I knew right away that something had happened. Otherwise, why would everyone be in the gathering, why would the son and wife, who usually came only for a minute, sit and worry.
That's right, some kind of family scandal, and I did not ask.
I was seated, hastily splashed tea, and all eyes were fixed on the master's son.
"Well, I'm going on," he said.
A brown face with a bushy wart peeked out from behind the door: it was the old nurse who was listening too.
- Well, so, he put on the tongs a second time. Pains of hell! I roar like a beluga, I jerk my legs, and he pulls. In a word, everything is as it should be. Finally, you know, pulled out ...
“I’ll tell you after you,” the young lady suddenly interrupts.
- And I would like ... A few words, - says the student in love.
“Wait, you can’t do it all at once,” the mother stops.
The son waited a moment with dignity and continued:
- ... Pulled out, looked at the tooth, scraped and said: "Sorry, this is not the same one again!" And climbs back into the mouth for the third tooth! No, you think! I say: “Dear sir! If you…"
- Lord have mercy! groans the nurse behind the door. “Just let them go…
- And the dentist says to me: “What are you afraid of?” - the country acquaintance suddenly broke. “There is something to be afraid of! Just before you, I removed all forty-eight teeth of one patient!” But I was not at a loss and said: “Sorry, why so many? It must have been a cow, not a patient!” Haha!
“And there are no cows,” the schoolboy poked his head. - A cow is a mammal. Now I will tell. In our class…
- Shh! Shh! - hissed around. - Do not interrupt. Your turn then.
“He was offended,” the narrator continued, “and now I think so that he removed ten of the patient’s teeth, and the patient himself removed the rest! .. Ha ha!
- Now my turn! shouted the high school student. - Why am I always the last one?
- It's a dental bandit! - the country acquaintance triumphed, pleased with his story.
“And last year I asked the dentist how long his filling would last,” the young lady got worried, “and he says: “Five years, but we don’t need our teeth to survive us.” I say: “Am I really going to die in five years?” I was terribly surprised. And he pouted: "This question is not directly related to my specialty."
- Just let them go! - the nanny gets excited behind the door.
The maid enters, collects the dishes, but cannot leave. She stops as if spellbound, with a tray in her hands.

Blushing and pale. It is evident that she also has a lot to tell, but she does not dare.
A friend of mine pulled out his tooth. It hurt terribly! – said the student in love.
- Found something to tell! - the high school student jumped up and down. – Very interesting, you think! Now my turn! In our cla…
“My brother wanted to pull a tooth,” Bonna began. He is advised that a dentist lives across the stairs. He went and called. The dentist himself opened the door for him. He sees that the gentleman is very handsome, so it’s not even scary to tear a tooth. Says to the master: "Please, I beg you, pull out my tooth." He says: “Well, I would love to, but I have nothing. Does it hurt a lot?" The brother says: “It hurts a lot; tear straight with tongs." - "Well, except with tongs!" I went, looked, brought some tongs, big ones. My brother opened his mouth, but the tongs didn't fit. The brother got angry: “What are you,” he says, “a dentist when you don’t even have tools?” And he was so surprised. “Yes, I am,” he says, “not a dentist at all! I am an engineer". - "So how do you climb a tooth to tear if you are an engineer?" “Yes, I am,” he says, “and I don’t climb. You yourself came to me. I thought you knew that I was an engineer, and just asking for help in a human way. And I’m kind, well…”
“But the fershal tore me,” the nanny suddenly exclaimed with inspiration. - He was such a scoundrel! He grabbed it with a tong, and in one minute he pulled it out. I didn't even have time to breathe. “Give it,” she says, “an old woman, fifty kopecks.” Turned once - and fifty kopecks. “Smart,” I say. “I didn’t even have time to breathe!” And he answered me: “Well, you,” he says, “want me to drag you four hours across the floor for a tooth for your fifty dollars? You are greedy,” he says, “everyone, and rather ashamed!”
- By God, it's true! the maid suddenly shrieked, finding that the transition from nurse to her was not too insulting for the masters. “By God, this is all true. They are live-bearers! My brother went to pull a tooth, and the doctor said to him: “You have four roots on this tooth, they are all intertwined and adhered to the eye. I can’t take less than three rubles for this tooth.” And where do we pay three rubles? We are poor people! So the brother thought, and he says: “I don’t have such money with me, but you can pull out this tooth for me today for one and a half rubles. In a month I will receive a payment from the owner, then you will make it to the end. So no! Didn't agree! Give him everything at once!
- Scandal! - suddenly remembered, looking at the clock, a summer friend. - Three hours! I'm late for work!
- Three? My God, and we are in Tsarskoye! the son and wife jumped up.
– Ah! I didn't feed Baby! - the daughter fussed.
And they all dispersed, heated, pleasantly tired.
But I went home very unhappy. The fact is that I myself really wanted to tell one dental story. Yes, I was not offered.
“They sit,” I think, “with their close, close-knit bourgeois circle, like Arabs by the fire, telling their tales. Do they think about a stranger? Of course, I don't really care, but still I am a guest. Indelicate on their part."
Of course I don't care. However, I still want to tell...
It was in a remote provincial town, where there was no mention of dentists. I had a toothache, and they sent me to a private doctor who, according to rumors, understood something about teeth.
Came. The doctor was dull, lop-eared, and so thin that he could only be seen in profile.
- Tooth? This is terrible! Well, show me! I showed.
- Does it hurt? How strange! Such a beautiful tooth! So, does it hurt? Well, it's terrible! Such a tooth! Downright amazing!
He went up to the table with a businesslike step, found some long pin, probably from his wife's hat.
- Open your mouth!
He quickly bent down and poked me with a pin in the tongue. Then he carefully dried the pin and examined it, as if it were a valuable tool that could come in handy more than once, so as not to deteriorate.
“Excuse me, ma'am, that's all I can do for you.
I silently looked at him and I myself felt how round my eyes became. He furrowed his eyebrows dejectedly.
Sorry, I'm not an expert! I do what I can!
* * *
That's what I told.

Agility of hands

On the doors of a small wooden booth, in which on Sundays local youth danced and played charity performances, there was a long red poster:
“Specially passing through, at the request of the public, a session of the grandiose fakir from black and white magic.
The most amazing tricks, such as: burning a handkerchief in front of your eyes, extracting a silver ruble from the nose of the most respectable public, and so on, contrary to nature.
A sad head peeped out of the side window and sold tickets.
It has been raining since morning. The trees in the garden around the booth got wet, swollen, and drenched in gray fine rain obediently, without shaking off.
At the very entrance, a large puddle was bubbling and gurgling. Tickets were sold for only three rubles.
It began to get dark.
The sad head sighed, disappeared, and a shabby little gentleman of indeterminate age crawled out of the door.
Holding his overcoat by the collar with both hands, he lifted his head and looked at the sky from all sides.
- Not a single hole! Everything is grey! A burnout in Timashev, a burnout in Shchigry, a burnout in Dmitriev... A burnout in Oboyan, a burnout in Kursk... And where is not a burnout? Where, I ask, is it not a burnout? I sent a ticket of honor to the judge, sent it to the head, sent it to the chief police officer ... sent it to everyone. I'm going to turn on the lights.
He glanced at the poster and couldn't tear himself away.
What else do they need? An abscess in the head or what?
By eight o'clock they began to gather.
Either no one came to places of honor, or servants were sent. Some drunks came to the standing places and immediately began to threaten that they would demand money back.
By half past ten it turned out that no one else would come. And those who were sitting were cursing so loudly and definitely that it became dangerous to delay it any longer.
The magician put on a long frock coat, which became wider with each tour, sighed, crossed himself, took a box with mysterious accessories and went on stage.
For a few seconds he stood silently and thought:
“The collection is four rubles, the kerosene is six hryvnias, that’s still nothing, but the room is eight rubles, so that’s what! Golovin's son is in a place of honor - let him. But how will I leave and what will I eat, I ask you.
And why is it empty? I myself would pour the crowd on such a program.
- Bravo! yelled one of the drunks. The magician woke up. He lit a candle on the table and said:
- Dear audience! Let me preface you with a preface. What you will see here is not anything miraculous or witchcraft that is against our Orthodox religion and is even prohibited by the police. This doesn't even happen in the world. Not! Far from it! What you will see here is nothing but the dexterity and agility of the hands. I give you my word of honor that there will be no mysterious witchcraft here. You will now see an extraordinary appearance hard boiled egg in a completely empty handkerchief.
He rummaged through the box and pulled out a colorful handkerchief folded into a ball. His hands shook slightly.
“Let me assure you that the handkerchief is completely empty. Here I am shaking it out.
He shook out the handkerchief and stretched it out with his hands. “In the morning, one kopeck bun and tea without sugar,” he thought. “What about tomorrow?”
“You can make sure,” he repeated, “that there is no egg here.
The audience stirred and whispered. Someone snorted. And suddenly one of the drunks buzzed:
- You eat! Here is an egg.
- Where? What? - the magician was confused.
- And tied to a scarf on a string.
“From the other side,” shouted the voices. - Shines on a candle.
The embarrassed magician turned over the handkerchief. Indeed, an egg hung on a string.
- Oh you! Someone spoke in a friendly way. - You would go behind a candle, that would be imperceptible. And you got ahead! Yes, brother, you can't.
The magician was pale and smiled wryly.
“It really is,” he said. - I, however, warned that this is not witchcraft, but only the agility of the hands. Excuse me, gentlemen…” His voice trembled and stopped.
- Okay! Okay!
- Nothing here!
- Move on!
“Now let’s move on to the next amazing phenomenon, which will seem even more amazing to you.

Let someone from the most respectable audience lend his handkerchief.
The public was shy.
Many had already taken it out, but after looking carefully, they hurried to put it in their pockets.
Then the magician went up to Golovin's son and held out his trembling hand.
“I could, of course, have my handkerchief, as it is perfectly safe, but you might think that I changed something.
Golovin's son gave him his handkerchief, and the magician unfolded it, shook it and stretched it out.
- Please make sure! A complete scarf. Golovin's son proudly looked at the audience.
- Now look. This scarf is magical. So I roll it up with a tube, now I bring it to a candle and light it. Lit. Burnt out the whole corner. See?
The audience craned their necks.
- Right! the drunk shouted. - Smells burnt.
- And now I will count to three and - the handkerchief will be whole again.
- Once! Two! Three!! Please take a look! He proudly and deftly straightened his handkerchief.
- Ah!
- Ah! the audience gasped.
There was a huge burnt hole in the middle of the scarf.
- However! - said Golovin's son and snuffled his nose.
The magician pressed the handkerchief to his chest and suddenly burst into tears.
- Lord! Most respectable pu ... No collection! .. Rain in the morning ... did not eat ... did not eat - a penny for a bun!
- Why, we're nothing! God is with you! the audience screamed.
- Kill us beasts! The Lord is with you.
But the magician was sobbing and wiping his nose with a magic handkerchief.
- Four rubles fee ... room - eight rubles ... vo-o-o-eight ... o-o-o-o ...
Some woman sighed.
- Yes, you are full! Oh my God! Soul turned out! shouted all around.
A head in an oilcloth hood poked through the door.
- What is it? Go home!
Everyone got up anyway. They left. They splashed through the puddles, were silent, sighed.
“And what can I tell you, brothers,” one of the drunks suddenly said clearly and loudly.
Everyone even paused.
- What can I tell you! After all, the scoundrel people have gone away. He will take money from you, he will turn your soul out. BUT?
- Inflate! - someone hooted in the mist.
- Exactly what to inflate. Aida! Who is with us? One, two ... Well, march! Without any conscience, the people ... I also paid the money not stolen ... Well, we'll show them! Zhzhiva.

Exam

Three days were given to prepare for the exam in geography. Manichka spent two of them trying on a new corset with a real planchette. On the third day in the evening I sat down to study.
She opened the book, unfolded the map and - immediately realized that she knew absolutely nothing. No rivers, no mountains, no cities, no seas, no bays, no bays, no bays, no isthmuses - absolutely nothing.
And there were many of them, and each thing was famous for something.
The Indian Sea was famous for its typhoon, Vyazma for its gingerbread, the Pampas for its forests, the Llanos for its steppes, Venice for its canals, and China for respect for its ancestors.
Everything was famous!
A good slavushka sits at home, and a thin one runs around the world - and even the Pinsk swamps were famous for fevers.
Perhaps Manichka would have had time to cram the names, but she would never be able to cope with fame.
- Lord, let your servant Mary pass the geography exam!
And she wrote on the margins of the card: “Lord, give! Lord, give! Lord, give!”
Three times.
Then I thought: I will write twelve times “Lord, give me”, then I will pass the exam.
She wrote twelve times, but, already finishing the last word, she convicted herself:
– Aha! I'm glad I finished it to the end. No, mother! If you want to pass the exam, then write twelve more times, or better, all twenty.
She took out a notebook, since there was little space on the margins of the map, and sat down to write. Wrote and spoke:
“Do you imagine that if you write twenty times, you will still pass the exam?” No, my dear, write fifty times! Maybe then something will come out. Fifty? Glad you'll be done soon! BUT? A hundred times, and not a word less ...
The pen cracks and blots.
Manichka refuses supper and tea. She has no time. Her cheeks are burning, she is shaking all over from her hasty, feverish work.
At three o'clock in the morning, having filled two notebooks and a gag, she fell asleep over the table.

* * *
Dumb and sleepy, she entered the classroom.
Everyone was already assembled and shared their excitement with each other.
“My heart stops for half an hour every minute!” said the first student, rolling her eyes.
The tickets were already on the table. The most inexperienced eye could instantly divide them into four varieties: tickets bent into a tube, a boat, corners up and corners down.
But the dark personalities from the last benches, who concocted this cunning thing, found that it was still not enough, and circled around the table, straightening the tickets so that it was more visible.
- Manya Kuksina! they shouted. What kind of tickets did you memorize? BUT? Here, notice it properly: with a boat - these are the first five numbers, and with a tube the next five, and with corners ...
But Manichka did not listen to the end. She thought sadly that all this scientific technique was not created for her, who had not memorized a single ticket, and said proudly:
- It's a shame to cheat like that! You need to study for yourself, not for grades.
The teacher came in, sat down, indifferently collected all the tickets and, neatly spreading them, shuffled them. A quiet groan went through the classroom. They got excited and swayed like rye in the wind.
- Mrs. Kuksina! Please come here. Manichka took the ticket and read it. The climate of Germany. American nature. Cities of North America…
- Please, Mrs. Kuksina. What do you know about the climate in Germany?
Manichka looked at him with such a look, as if she wanted to say: “Why are you torturing animals?” - and gasping for breath, she murmured:
- The climate of Germany is famous for the fact that there is not much difference between the climate of the north and the climate of the south, because Germany, the south, the north ...
The teacher raised one eyebrow and carefully looked at Manichka's mouth.
- Yes, sir! I thought and added:
– You know nothing about the climate of Germany, Mrs. Kuksina. Tell us what you know about the nature of America?
Manichka, as if subdued unfair treatment teacher to her knowledge, lowered her head and meekly answered:
America is famous for the Pampas.
The teacher was silent, and Manichka, after waiting a minute, added in a barely audible voice:
- And the Pampas Llanos.
The teacher sighed noisily, as if he had woken up, and said with feeling:
- Sit down, Mrs. Kuksina.

* * *
The next exam was in history.
The cool lady warned sternly:
- Look, Kuksina! You will not be given two re-examinations. Prepare as you should according to history, otherwise you will stay for the second year! What a shame!
All the next day Manichka was depressed. I wanted to have fun and bought ten servings of pistachio from the ice cream man, and in the evening I took castor oil against my will.
But the next day - the last before the exams - I lay on the couch, reading Marlitt's Second Wife, to rest my head, overworked by geography.
In the evening, she sat down at Ilovaisky and timidly wrote ten times in a row: “Lord, give ...”
She smiled bitterly and said:
- Ten times! God really needs ten times! That would write a hundred and fifty times, it would be another matter!
At six o'clock in the morning an aunt from the next room heard Manichka talking to herself in two tones.
One tone groaned:
- I can't do it anymore! Uh, I can't! Another scoffed:
– Aha! Can not! You can’t write “Lord, give me” a thousand six hundred times, and pass the exam - that’s what you want! So give it to you! For this write two hundred thousand times! There is nothing! There is nothing!
The frightened aunt drove Manichka to sleep.
- Can not be so. You also need to grind in moderation. You will overwork - you will not think of anything to answer tomorrow.
There is an old painting in the classroom.
Frightened whispers and excitement, and the heart of the first student, stopping every minute for three hours, and tickets walking around the table on four legs, and the teacher shuffling them indifferently.
Manichka sits and, waiting for her fate, writes on the cover of an old notebook: "Lord, give."
If only she had time to write exactly six hundred times, and she would brilliantly stand it!
- Mrs. Kuksina Maria!
No, I didn't!
The teacher is angry, sarcastic, asks everyone not for tickets, but at random.
- What do you know about the wars of Anna Ioannovna, Mrs. Kuksina, and about their consequences?
Something dawned in Manichka's tired head:
- Anna Ioannovna's life was fraught ... Anna Ioannovna was fraught ... Anna Ioannovna's wars were fraught with ...
She paused, gasping for breath, and said more, as if remembering at last what she needed:
- The consequences for Anna Ioannovna were fraught ...
And she fell silent.
The teacher took the beard in his palm and pressed it to his nose.
Manichka watched this operation with all her heart, and her eyes said: “Why are you torturing animals?”
“Will you tell me now, Mrs. Kuksina,” the teacher asked ingratiatingly, “why the Orleans maiden was nicknamed Orleans?”
Manichka felt that this was the last question, a question that fraught consequences". He carried the correct answer with him: a bicycle promised by his aunt for moving to the next class, and eternal friendship with Lisa Bekina, from whom, having failed, she would have to part. Liza has already survived and will cross safely.
- Well, sir? the teacher hurried, apparently burning with curiosity to hear Manichka's answer. Why is she called Orleans?
Manichka mentally vowed never to eat sweets or be rude. She looked at the icon, cleared her throat, and answered firmly, looking the teacher straight in the eye:
Because she was a girl.

My first Tolstoy

I remember.
I'm nine years old.
I read Tolstoy's "Childhood" and "Adolescence". I read and reread.
Everything about this book is familiar to me.
Volodya, Nikolenka, Lyubochka - they all live with me, they all look so much like me, like my sisters and brothers. And their grandmother’s house in Moscow is our Moscow house, and when I read about the living room, sofa or classroom, I don’t even need to imagine anything - these are all our rooms.
Natalya Savvishna - I also know her well - this is our old woman Avdotya Matveevna, my grandmother's former serf. She also has a chest with pictures pasted on the lid. Only she is not as kind as Natalya Savvishna. She is a curmudgeon. The older brother even recited about her: “And he didn’t want to bless anything in all of nature.”
But all the same, the resemblance is so great that when I read the lines about Natalya Savvishna, I always clearly see the figure of Avdotya Matveyevna.
All their own, all relatives.
And even the grandmother, looking with questioningly stern eyes from under the frill of her cap, and the bottle of cologne on the table by her chair - it's all the same, all native.
The only stranger is the tutor St-Jerome, and I hate him along with Nikolenka. Yes, how I hate it! Longer and stronger, it seems, than he himself, because he eventually reconciled and forgave, and I continued all my life. "Childhood" and "Adolescence" entered my childhood and adolescence and merged with it organically, as if I had not read, but simply lived through them.
But in the history of my soul, in its first flowering, another work of Tolstoy, War and Peace, pierced like a red arrow.

I remember.
I'm thirteen.
Every evening, to the detriment of the assigned lessons, I read and re-read the same book - "War and Peace".
I am in love with Prince Andrei Bolkonsky. I hate Natasha, firstly, because I'm jealous, and secondly, because she cheated on him.
“You know,” I say to my sister, “Tolstoy, in my opinion, wrote about her incorrectly. Nobody could like her. Judge for yourself - her braid was "sparse and not long", her lips were swollen. No, I don't think I liked her at all. And he was going to marry her just out of pity.
Then I didn’t like why Prince Andrei squealed when he got angry. I thought that Tolstoy also wrote it wrong. I knew for sure that the prince did not squeal.
Every evening I read War and Peace.
Those hours were painful when I approached the death of Prince Andrei.
It seems to me that I always hoped a little for a miracle. I must have hoped, because every time the same despair seized me when he died.
At night, lying in bed, I saved him. I made him throw himself on the ground with the others when the grenade exploded. Why didn't a single soldier think of pushing him? I would have guessed, I would have pushed.
Then she sent all the best modern doctors and surgeons to him.
Every week I read how he dies, and hoped and believed in a miracle that maybe this time he would not die.
No. Died! Died!
A living person dies once, but this one dies forever, forever.
And my heart groaned, and I could not prepare lessons. And in the morning ... You yourself know what happens in the morning to a person who has not prepared a lesson!
And finally, I've thought of it. She decided to go to Tolstoy and ask him to save Prince Andrei. Even if he marries him to Natasha, I’m even going for this, even for this! - just don't die!
She asked the governess if the author could change something in an already printed work. She replied that it seemed possible that the authors sometimes make corrections for the new edition.
I consulted with my sister. She said that you must definitely go to the writer with his card and ask him to sign, otherwise he won’t even talk, and in general they don’t talk to minors.
It was very creepy.
Gradually found out where Tolstoy lives. They said different things - that in Khamovniki, that he seemed to have left Moscow, that he was leaving the other day.
Bought a portrait. I began to think about what I would say. I was afraid not to cry. She hid her intention from her family - they would ridicule her.
Finally made up my mind. Some relatives arrived, a fuss arose in the house - the time was convenient. I said old nanny so that she would take me "to a friend for lessons", and went.
Tolstoy was at home. Those few minutes that I had to wait in the hall were too short for me to escape, and it was embarrassing in front of the nurse.
I remember a plump young lady walking past me, singing something. This utterly confused me. It goes so simply, and even sings and is not afraid. I thought that in Tolstoy's house everyone was tiptoeing and talking in whispers.
Finally, he. He was shorter than I expected. He looked at the nurse, at me. I held out the card and, pronouncing the “l” instead of the “r” out of fear, murmured:
- Here, they asked me to sign the photo.
He immediately took it from me and went into another room.
Then I realized that I couldn’t ask for anything, I wouldn’t dare to tell anything, and that I was so disgraced, perished forever in his eyes, with my “flirting” and “photography”, that only God would give me to clean up the best.
He came back and handed over the card. I curtsied.
“What about you, old lady?” he asked the nurse.
- Nothing, I'm with the young lady.

That's all.
She remembered in bed “flying” and “photography” and cried into the pillow.
In the class I had a rival, Yulenka Arsheva. She, too, was in love with Prince Andrei, but so violently that the whole class knew about it. She also scolded Natasha Rostov and also did not believe that the prince squealed.
I carefully concealed my feelings and, when Arsheva began to rage, I tried to stay away and not listen, so as not to give myself away.
And once in a literature lesson, analyzing some literary types, the teacher mentioned Prince Bolkonsky. The whole class, as one person, turned to Arshevoy. She sat red-faced, smiling tensely, and her ears were so engorged with blood that they even swelled up.
Their names were connected, their romance was marked by ridicule, curiosity, condemnation, interest - all the attitude that society always reacts to every novel.
And I, alone, with my secret "illegal" feeling, alone did not smile, did not greet, and did not even dare to look at Arsheva.
In the evening I sat down to read about his death. I read and no longer hoped and did not believe in a miracle.
I read it with anguish and suffering, but did not grumble. She lowered her head obediently, kissed the book and closed it.
- There was a life, outlived and ended.

funny in sad

During civil war there were many amusing episodes that were not recorded anywhere and by anyone.
Of course, they will not go down in history, but over time they will either be completely forgotten, or they will be embellished with such inventions that they will lose all truth and interest.
History will mark big faces, big facts and events. On such and such a date, he will say, such and such a city was taken by such and such a general with heavy battles and losses. The tactics of the offensive, defense, the surrender of the city, the panic of the inhabitants, some individual cases of atrocities will be described - but the events will not convey the color, taste, "living body". In the little amusing or tragic tales of ingenuous eyewitnesses, sometimes the real physiognomies of events, lively and warm, show through.
I remember it was in the newspapers that General Shkuro with a small detachment took the village occupied by the Bolsheviks.
That's how they write.
And they talk about it like this:
In the village occupied by the Bolsheviks, rumors had been circulating for several days about the approach of General Shkuro. The population was worried, the commissars, locking themselves with a key and hanging the windows, packed their suitcases and hurriedly left "on a business trip."
And then one fine morning with a boom, leaning over on a saddle, a Cossack flew along the main street. flew by, on at full speed he reined in his horse at the headman's house and, waving a whip over his head, shouted:
- Everything was ready! Half an hour later the general enters the village.
He shouted, turned his horse and was like that. Only the dust swirled, and the stones clicked.

Instantly all the streets were swept with a broom. Not a soul. Chickens and those were removed. Shutters, doors slammed shut. Locked up, sitting, silent. The old woman lit the Thursday candle before the icons.
- God bless you!
And the village authorities, stealthily, made their way along the walls, gathered together, and talked among themselves: how will they serve bread and salt to the general, is it possible to use the same towel with which the Bolsheviks were greeted, or awkwardly.
Thought - decided that okay.
- You don’t say hello to every sneeze.
Hooves snapped.
- It's coming! Rides!
— What is it?
The general is going himself, a friend, with an orderly. He drives slowly, speaks angrily to the orderly about something. Either he is dissatisfied, or he gives strict orders.
The authorities ran out, frightened. The general barely looks at them. Immediately he locked himself in the room allotted to him, laid out the cards, poked with pins, cracked with a pen - he fought.
Suddenly, a Cossack is down the street again. The same shaggy, hardened, scary, like the one that jumped first.
The general heard, opened the window, asked:
— What else?
The horse dances under the Cossack, the Cossack reports from the horse - so they say and so, the cavalry is worried, wants to enter the village.
The general furrowed his brows.
- It is forbidden! Let her stay where she was. To let her into the village - all the good will be plundered - she is very embittered.
The Cossack galloped - only sparks from under the hooves. And the general again for his plans.
A quarter of an hour later another Cossack from the other side. The same shaggy, just as scary - as if the same. Straight to the general.
The artillery is worried. Wants to enter the village.
The general got angry. Screams throughout the village.
"You can't let them in here!" They will burn down all the houses, so embittered. Let them wait behind the forest.
The Cossack did not have time to hide from the eyes - the third rolls from the third side. He is just as shaggy, and it seems to the frightened villagers that he is the same one, which one cannot imagine with fear.
No, not the same one. Twisting around the village, swearing, hastily looking for the general, does not know where.
- Scouts want to go to the village.
Oret General:
— Do not dare. They will crumble the whole village, they are so embittered. I order the inhabitants to immediately hand over all the weapons they have - otherwise I can't vouch for anything!
The inhabitants dragged their weapons, hurry, cross themselves. They put it on carts. The Cossack and the orderly themselves took them away.
Behind them, important step, unhurried, went out and the general calmed down the artillery. He left, and he was. Only the next day did the inhabitants learn that the general had come only with two Cossacks, that the messenger did not seem to be afraid, but really was one and the same, and that the general had neither cavalry, nor artillery, nor scouts of any kind.
And this whole story, discolored and bloodless, was printed with the words:
"General Shkuro with a small detachment took the village occupied by the Bolsheviks."

* * *
I also recall the story of how "the schoolboys trembled."
It was in the Caucasus.
A detachment of high school students of the valiant Caucasian gymnasiums had to hold back the Bolsheviks until the arrival of the Cossacks.
The high school students held back. They fought like Leonids of Sparta according to the precepts of Ilovaisky. Famously!
Suddenly, in the heat of battle, they hear a wild whistle from somewhere on the mountain. They turned around and trembled.
From above, from the mountain, as something falls down, but you can’t make out what. Either people on horseback, or just horses without people. Peaks at the ready, manes fluttering, arms and legs dangling, stirrups clicking ... There is only one horse, the saddle is empty, one leg sticks out of it and the peak is shaking on the side. Hop! a leg twitched, a shaggy Cossack emerged from under the belly of the horse, and how he squealed, how he hooted! Squeal, clang, howl, whistle.
— Cherrty!
The schoolboys trembled and scatter. Only the Spartan heels flashed.
- What are you, what a shame! - reproached them later. - After all, it is our Cossacks who came to your aid.
“God be with them—it’s very scary. They fought with the enemy, but they could not stand the ally.
* * *
I still remember funny story about the "Kharkov trick".
Shortly before the capture of Kharkov by volunteers, a new photo, so loyal that she posted announcements everywhere: “Communists have a 50 percent discount. Comrade commissars are removed with love for free.
Of course, it is flattering for anyone to be filmed for nothing, and even with love!
The commissars put on new jackets, yellow boots to the stomach, belts, tourniquets, revolvers, in a word, everything that is necessary for the commissar aesthetics, and went to shoot.
“With pleasure,” the photo said. - Just be kind enough to show a document that you are really commissars. And then, you yourself understand, it is desirable for many to withdraw for free ...
The commissioners, of course, showed the documents, the photographer noted the names and positions of the customers in the book and took them with love.
Volunteers seized the city unexpectedly. Few of the Bolsheviks managed to get away. The rest changed from red to protective and began to wait for favorable times.
Suddenly - fuck! Arrest after arrest. And all the best and best of all repainted!
- How did you know?
- How from where? Yes, we have our own photography here. Here - all your documents are written down, and photos are attached. These portraits were used to search for you.
The Bolsheviks were very embarrassed, however, they paid tribute to the enemies.
- Clever-oh! So far, we haven't even thought about it.
We are going through a difficult and terrible time. But life, life itself, still laughs as much as it cries.
She something that!

Cursed

Leshka's right leg was numb for a long time, but he did not dare to change his position and listened eagerly. It was completely dark in the corridor, and through the narrow slit of the half-open door one could see only a brightly lit piece of the wall above the kitchen stove. A large dark circle surmounted by two horns hovered on the wall. Lyoshka guessed that this circle was nothing more than a shadow from his aunt's head with the ends of the scarf sticking up.
The aunt had come to visit Lyoshka, whom she had identified only a week ago as "boys for room service," and was now in serious negotiations with the cook who had patronized her. The negotiations were of an unpleasantly disturbing nature, the aunt was very agitated, and the horns on the wall rose and fell steeply, as if some unseen beast butted their invisible opponents.
The conversation was in full voice, but in pathetic places it fell to a whisper, loud and whistling.
It was assumed that Lyoshka washes galoshes in the front. But, as you know, a person proposes, but God disposes, and Lyoshka, with a rag in his hands, was eavesdropping outside the door.
“I understood from the very beginning that he was a bungler,” the cook sang in a rich voice. - How many times I tell him: if you, guy, are not a fool, keep your eyes open. Don't do shit, but keep your eyes open. Because - Dunyashka scrubs. And he does not lead with his ear. This morning again the lady shouted - she didn’t interfere in the stove and closed it with a firebrand.

The horns on the wall are agitated, and the aunt groans like an aeolian harp:
"Where can I go with him?" Mavra Semyonovna! I bought him boots, not to eat, not to eat, I gave him five rubles. For a jacket for alteration, a tailor, not a drink, not eaten, ripped off six hryvnias ...
- No other way than to send home.
- Cute! The road, no food, no food, four roubles, dear!
Lyoshka, forgetting all the precautions, sighs outside the door. He doesn't want to go home. His father promised that he would bring down seven skins from him, and Leshka knows from experience how unpleasant it is.
“Well, it’s still too early to howl,” the cook sings again. “So far, no one is chasing him. The lady only threatened... But the tenant, Pyotr Dmitritch, is very protective. Right up the mountain for Leshka. Enough of you, says Marya Vasilievna, he says he is not a fool, Leshka. He, he says, is a uniform adeot, and there is nothing to scold him. Just a mountain for Leshka.
Well, God bless him...
- And with us, what the tenant says is sacred. Because he is a well-read person, he pays carefully ...
- And Dunya is good! - the aunt twisted her horns. - I don’t understand such a people - to let a sneak on a boy ...
- True! True. This morning I say to her: “Go open the doors, Dunyasha,” affectionately, as if in a kind way. So she snorts in my face: “I, grit, you are not a doorman, open it yourself!” And I drank it all to her. How to open doors, so you, I say, are not a porter, but how to kiss a janitor on the stairs, so you are all a doorman ...
- Lord have mercy! From these years to everything, dospying. The girl is young, to live and live. One salary, no pity, no...
- Me, what? I told her directly: how to open the doors, so you are not a doorman. She, you see, is not a doorman! And how to accept gifts from the janitor, so she is the doorman. Yes, tenant lipstick ...
Trrrr…” the electric bell crackled.
- Leshka-a! Leshka-a! cried the cook. - Oh, you, fail! Dunyasha was sent away, but he doesn’t even listen with his ear.
Lyoshka held his breath, pressed himself against the wall and stood quietly until an angry cook swam past him, angrily rattling starched skirts.
“No, pipes,” Leshka thought, “I won’t go to the village. I'm not a fool guy, I want to, I'll curry favor so quickly. Don't rub me, not like that."
And, having waited for the return of the cook, he went with resolute steps into the rooms.
“Be, grit, in front of your eyes. And in what eyes will I be when no one is ever at home.
He went into the front. Hey! The coat hangs - the tenant of the house.
He rushed to the kitchen and, snatching the poker from the dumbfounded cook, rushed back into the rooms, quickly threw open the door to the lodger's quarters, and went to stir in the stove.
The tenant was not alone. With him was a young lady, in a jacket and under a veil. Both shuddered and straightened up when Lyoshka entered.
"I'm not a fool," Leshka thought, jabbing a poker at the burning firewood. “I’ll wet those eyes.” I’m not a parasite - I’m all in business, all in business! .. "
Firewood crackled, the poker rattled, sparks flew in all directions. The tenant and the lady were tensely silent. Finally, Lyoshka headed for the exit, but at the very door he stopped and began to anxiously examine the damp spot on the floor, then turned his eyes to the guest's legs and, seeing galoshes on them, shook his head reproachfully.
“Here,” he said reproachfully, “they inherited it!” And then the hostess will scold me.
The guest blushed and looked at the tenant in bewilderment.
“All right, all right, go on,” he soothed embarrassedly.
And Lyoshka left, but not for long. He found a rag and returned to mop the floor.
He found the tenant and guest silently bent over the table and immersed in the contemplation of the tablecloth.
“Look, they stared,” Leshka thought, “they must have noticed the spot. They think I don't understand! Found the fool! I understand. I work like a horse!”
And, going up to the pensive couple, he diligently wiped the tablecloth under the very nose of the tenant.
- What are you? - he was afraid.
- Like what? I can't live without my eyes. Dunyashka, slash, knows only a sneak, and she is not a janitor to look after order ... A janitor on the stairs ...
- Go away! Moron!
But the young lady, frightened, grabbed the tenant by the hand and began to whisper something.
- He will understand ... - Lyoshka heard, - servants ... gossip ...
The lady had tears of embarrassment in her eyes, and she said to Leshka in a trembling voice:
“Nothing, nothing, boy… You don’t have to close the doors when you go…”
The tenant smiled contemptuously and shrugged his shoulders.
Lyoshka left, but, having reached the front, he remembered that the lady asked not to lock the doors, and, returning, opened it.
The lodger bounced off his lady like a bullet.
“An eccentric,” Leshka thought, leaving. “It’s light in the room, and he gets scared!”
Lyoshka went into the hall, looked in the mirror, tried on the tenant's hat. Then he went into the dark dining room and scratched the cupboard door with his nails.
“Look, damn unsalted!” You're here all day, like a horse, work, and she only knows the closet locks.
I decided to go again to stir in the stove. The door to the tenant's room was closed again. Lyoshka was surprised, but he entered.

The tenant sat quietly next to the lady, but his tie was on one side, and he looked at Leshka with such a look that he only clicked his tongue:
“What are you looking at! I myself know that I am not a parasite, I do not sit idly by.”
The coals are stirred, and Lyoshka leaves, threatening that he will soon return to close the stove. A quiet half-groan-half-sigh was his answer.
Lyoshka went and got bored: you can’t think of any more work. I looked into the lady's bedroom. It was quiet there. The lamp was glowing in front of the icon. It smelled of perfume. Lyoshka climbed onto a chair, looked at the faceted pink lamp for a long time, devoutly crossed himself, then dipped his finger into it and oiled his hair over his forehead. Then he went to the dressing table and sniffed each bottle in turn.
- Eh, what's here! No matter how hard you work, if not in front of your eyes, they don’t count for anything. At least break your forehead.
He wandered sadly into the hallway. In the dim living room something squeaked under his feet, then a curtain fluttered from below, followed by another ...
"Cat! he thought. - Look, look, again to the tenant in the room, again the lady will be furious, like the other day. You're joking!.. "
Joyful and animated, he ran into the cherished room.
- I am the damned one! I'll show you how to roam! I'll turn your face on the tail! ..
There was no face on the tenant.
"You're out of your mind, you wretched idiot!" he shouted. - Who are you scolding?
“Hey, vile, just give me an indulgence, so after that you won’t survive,” Leshka tried. “You can’t let her into the rooms!” From her only a scandal! ..
The lady, with trembling hands, straightened her hat that had fallen to the back of her head.
"He's kind of crazy, this boy," she whispered, frightened and embarrassed.
- Get out, you damned one! - and Lyoshka finally, to everyone's reassurance, dragged the cat out from under the sofa.
“Lord,” the tenant pleaded, “will you leave here at last?”
- Look, damn it, it scratches! She cannot be kept in the rooms. She was yesterday in the living room under the curtain ...
And Lyoshka long and detailed, not concealing a single detail, not sparing fire and colors, described to the astonished listeners all the dishonorable behavior of a terrible cat.
His story was heard in silence. The lady bent down and kept looking for something under the table, and the tenant, somehow strangely pressing Leshkin's shoulder, forced the narrator out of the room and closed the door.
“I’m a smart guy,” Leshka whispered, releasing the cat onto the back stairs. - Smart and hard worker. I'm going to turn on the oven now.
This time the tenant did not hear Leshka's steps: he was kneeling in front of the lady and, bowing his head low to her legs, froze without moving. And the lady closed her eyes and her whole face cringed, as if looking at the sun ...
"What is he doing there? Lesha was surprised. - Like chewing on a button on her shoe! Not ... apparently, he dropped something. I'll go look for…”
He approached and bent down so quickly that the tenant, who suddenly perked up, hit him painfully with his forehead right on the brow.
The lady jumped up all confused. Lyoshka climbed under a chair, searched under the table and stood up, spreading his arms.
- There is nothing there.
- What are you looking for? What do you finally need from us? shouted the lodger in an unnaturally thin voice, and blushed all over.
- I thought they dropped something ... It will disappear again, like a brooch from that lady, from a black one, who goes to drink tea with you ... The third day, as I was leaving, I, grit, Lyosha, lost the brooch, - he turned directly to the lady , who suddenly began to listen to him very carefully, even opened her mouth, and her eyes became completely round.
- Well, I went behind the screen on the table and found it. And yesterday I forgot the brooch again, but it wasn’t I who cleaned it, but Dunyashka, - that’s the brooch, therefore, the end ...
- So it's true! the lady suddenly cried out in a strange voice and grabbed the tenant by the sleeve. - So it's true! truth!
“Honest to God, it’s true,” Lyoshka reassured her. - Dunyashka stole, slash. If it wasn't for me, she would steal everything. I clean everything like a horse ... by God, like a dog ...
But they didn't listen to him. The lady soon ran into the anteroom, the lodger behind her, and both hid behind the front door.
Lyoshka went into the kitchen, where, going to bed in an old chest without a top, he said to the cook with a mysterious air:
- Tomorrow, slash the lid.
- Well! she was surprised with joy. - What did they say?
- If I say, it has become, I know.
The next day, Leshka was kicked out.

penitential

The old nanny, living at rest in the general's family, came from confession.
She sat for a moment in her corner and was offended: the gentlemen were having dinner, there was a smell of something tasty, and there was a quick clatter of the maid serving the table.
- Pah! Passionate not Passionate, they don't care. Just to feed your womb. Reluctantly you sin, God forgive me!
She got out, chewed, thought, and went into the passage room. Sat on a chest.
The maid passed by, surprised.
- And why are you sitting here, nanny? Exactly a doll! By God - exactly a doll!
- Think what you say! the nanny snapped. - Such days, and she swears. Is it shown to swear on such days. There was a man at confession, and, looking at you, you will have time to get dirty before communion.
The maid was scared.
- Guilty, nanny! Congratulations, confession.
- "Congratulations!" Today is congratulations! Nowadays they strive, as it were, to offend and reproach a person. Just now their liquor spilled. Who knows what she spilled. You won't be smarter than God either. And the little young lady says: “That’s right, the nanny spilled it!” From such years and such words.
- Surprising even, nanny! So small and already everyone knows!
- Noneshnye children, mother, worse than obstetricians! Here they are, noneshnie children. Me, what! I don't judge. I was out of confession, now I'm up to tomorrow I won’t take a sip of poppy dew, let alone ... And you say - congratulations. There is an old lady in the fourth week of fasting; I say to Sonya: "Congratulate the grandmother." And she snorts: “Here it is! very necessary!" And I say: “Grandma must be respected! The grandmother will die, she can deprive her of her inheritance. Yes, if I had some kind of woman, yes, every day I would have found something to congratulate. FROM Good morning, grandma! Yes, good weather! Yes, Happy Holidays! Yes, with callous name days! Have a happy bite! Me, what! I don't judge. Tomorrow I'm going to take communion, I'm only saying that it's not good and rather shameful.
- You should rest, nanny! the maid fawned.
“I’ll stretch my legs, I’ll lie down in the coffin. I'm resting. You will have time to rejoice. I would have long been out of the world, but here I am not given to you. The young bone on the teeth crunches, and the old one across the throat becomes. Don't swallow.
- And what are you, nanny! And everyone is just looking at you, as if to respect.
- No, don't talk to me about respecters. It’s your respecters, but no one respected me even from my youth, so it’s too late for me to be ashamed in my old age. You'd better go and ask the coachman where he drove the lady the other day ... Ask that.
- Oh, and what are you, nanny! the maid whispered, and even squatted down in front of the old woman. - Where did he take it? I'm, by God, no one ...
- Don't worry. To swear is a sin! For swearing, you know how God will punish! And he took me to a place where they show men moving. They move and sing. They spread the sheet, and they move along it. The little lady told me. By herself, you see, it’s not enough, so she was lucky with the girl. I would have found out myself, I would have taken a good twig and driven it along Zakharyevskaya! There's just no one to say. Does the current people understand sneak. Nowadays, everyone only cares about himself. Ugh! Whatever you remember, you will sin! Lord forgive me!
“The master is a busy man, of course, it’s hard for them to see through everything,” the maid sang modestly lowering her eyes. “They are nice people.
- I know your master! I know from childhood! If I didn't go to communion tomorrow, I would tell you about your master! Since childhood! People are going to mass - ours has not yet slept. People from the church are coming - our teas and coffees are drinking. And as soon as the Holy Mother dragged him to the general, a couch potato, a parasite, I can’t imagine! I already think: he stole this rank for himself! Wherever there is, but stole! There's just no one to try! And I've been thinking for a long time that I stole it. They think: the nanny is an old fool, everything is possible with her! It's stupid, maybe stupid. Yes, not everyone should be smart, someone needs to be stupid.
The maid glanced frightened at the door.
- Our business, nanny, official. God be with him! Let it go! We don't understand. Will you go to church early in the morning?
“I might not go to bed at all. I want to be the first to go to church. So that all rubbish does not climb ahead of people.

Every cricket know your hearth.
- Who is climbing something?
- Yes, the old woman is alone here. Icy, what keeps the soul. Before everyone else, God forgive me, the bastard will come to the church, and after everyone else will leave. Kazhinny time will stop everyone. And Hosha would sit down for a minute! All of us old women are surprised. No matter how strong you are, while the clock is reading, you will sit down a little. And this echida is not otherwise than on purpose. Is it a static thing to survive so much! One old woman almost burned her handkerchief with a candle. And it's a shame it didn't catch on. Don't stare! Why stare! Is indicated to stare. I’ll come tomorrow before everyone else and stop it, so I suppose it will ease the force. I can't see her! Today I am on my knees, and I myself look at her. Echida you, I think, echida! To burst your water bubble! It's a sin, and there's nothing you can do about it.
- Nothing, nanny, now that you have confessed, all the sins of the priest were forgiven. Now your darling is pure and innocent.
- Yes, damn it! Let go! This is a sin, but I must say: this priest confessed me badly. That's when they went to the monastery with the aunt and the princess, so you can say that he confessed. Already he tortured me, tortured, reproached, reproached, imposed three penances! All asked. He asked if the princess was thinking of renting out the meadows. Well, I repented, said I don't know. And entot alive soon. What is wrong? Yes, I say, father, what sins I have. The oldest ones. I love coffee and quarrel with servants. “And special ones,” he says, “no?” And what are the special ones? Each person has his own special sin. That's what. And instead of trying and shaming him, he took and read the leave. That's all for you! Somehow he took the money. I suppose I didn’t give up, that I don’t have any special ones! Ugh, sorry sir! Remember, you are wrong! Save and have mercy. Why are you sitting here? It would be better to go and think: “How am I living like this, and everything is not going well?” You are young girl! There's a crow's nest curled on her head! Have you thought about the days. On such days, let yourself be allowed. And nowhere from you, shameless ones, there is no passage! Having confessed, I came, let me - I thought - I'll sit quietly. Tomorrow, after all, go to communion. No. And then she got there. She came, did all sorts of dirty tricks, whichever is worse. Damn bastard, God forgive me. Look, I went with what force! Not long, mother! I know everything! Give me time, I'll drink everything to the lady! - Go to rest. God forgive me, who else will be attached!

Insider

Fyodor Ivanovich received a remark in the service and returned home in a very bad spirit. To relieve his soul, he began to hire a cab from Gostiny Dvor to the Petrograd side for fifteen kopecks.
The driver answered shortly, but forcefully. Started interesting conversation, all of the various wishes. Suddenly someone pulled Fyodor Ivanych by the sleeve. He turned around.
In front of him stood an unfamiliar thin brunette with a gloomy animated face, such as a person who has just lost his wallet, and quickly, but monotonously said:
– But we are already here! Did I want to go here? Well, what can I do when she dragged me? For a lousy five hundred roubles, to have a man led like a ram on a rope, I'll tell you, you have to have despair in your voice!
Fyodor Ivanovich was at first angry, then surprised.
"Who it? What climbs?
“Excuse me, sir,” he said, “I have no honor…
But the stranger did not let him finish.
“Well, I already know in advance what you will say!” So I'll tell you straight out that I couldn't stop at your place because you didn't leave me your address. Well, who to ask? Samuelson's? So Samuilson will say that he did not see you in the eyes.
“I don’t know any Samuilson,” answered Fyodor Ivanovich. - And I beg you...
“Well, since you want him to tell me your address even when you don't know each other. And Mankina bought a carpet, so they already imagine ... Well, what is a carpet? I'm asking you!
“Be kind, sir,” Fyodor Ivanovich bothered to interject, “leave me alone!”
The stranger looked at him, sighed, and spoke, as quickly and monotonously as before:
- Well, then I must tell you that I did get married. She is such a mug, for all Shavli! They said about her that the eye was glass, so this, it should be noted, is true. They said that it has a crooked side, so this is also true. They also said that the character ... So it's so true! Can you tell me when he got married? So let me tell you, it's been a long time. Let me count: September... October... um... November... yes, November. So I've been married for five days now. He suffered there for two days, and two days on the road ... And who is to blame? So you will be surprised! Nightingale!
Fyodor Ivanovich really seemed surprised. The narrator was triumphant.
- Nightingale! Abramson told me: “Why don’t you buy a pharmacy for yourself? So you buy a pharmacy. Well, who doesn't want to own a pharmacy? I'm asking you. Show me the fool! And Soloveichik said: “Let's go to Madame Tselkovnik, she has a daughter, so this is a daughter! Has a dowry of three thousand. You will have money for a pharmacy. I was so delighted... well, I think to myself, let it be there, if everything was already bad, it might be a little more! I went to Mogilev, shot at a large pharmacy ... What are you looking at? Well, not exactly shooting, but only aiming for himself. Looked after. But Madame Tselkovnik does not give money and hides her daughter. I gave myself a lousy five hundred rubles deposit. I took. Who won't take a deposit? I'm asking you! Show me the fool And Shelkin took me to the Khasins, they have five thousand real money for their daughter. Khasins are doing a ball, there are many guests ... they dance so intelligently. And Soloveichik jumps above all. I think to myself: I’d rather take five thousand and shoot Karfunkel’s pharmacy in the square itself. Well, Soloveichik says: “Money? Does the Khasins have money? Let me not have money like they have!” You will say why I believed Soloveichik? Ouch! You must know that he has two shops and a loan; it's not you and me. Noble!! Well, to put it bluntly, he did marry Madmazelle Hasina, and I married the Tselkovnik. So she also ordered to take herself to Petrograd at my expense! Seen it? By God, it's such a mug that I can't forget it! I was walking along the Bolshoi just now, I wanted to shoot at a pharmacy. Well, what is there! Here I met you, it's so nice that your man.
- Yes, please, finally! roared Fyodor Ivanovich. “After all, we don’t know you!
Soloveitchik's victim raised his eyebrows in surprise.
- We? Are we not familiar? Well, you amaze me to death! Allow me! Did you go to Shavli last summer? Aha! We went! Did you go with the land surveyor to look at the forest? Aha! So I'll tell you that you went to the watchmaker Magaziner, and near the door one gentleman warned you that Magaziner had gone to eat. Well, that same gentleman was me, huh! Well?

In stereo-photo-cinema-matoscopo-bio-phono and so on. - column

- Please, mister explainer, do not mix up the coils again, as on that occasion.
- What is it at that time? I do not understand.
- And the fact that Wilhelm and the descent of an armadillo were depicted on the screen, and you natural history about some butterfly pollen. Big troubles can come out, not to mention the fact that I don’t want to pay money for nothing. You are an excellent speaker, I do not argue, and you know your business perfectly, but sometimes you need to look at the screen.
“I can't stand with my back to the audience. It's the machinist's blockhead that's confusing it - tell him.
You can squint your eyes so you can see. In a word, be careful. Its time to begin.
Dzz…” the lantern hissed. The explainer cleared his throat and, standing with his back to the screen, turned his inspired face straight up to the light.
Gracious sovereigns and gracious sovereigns! he began. - Before you is the most venerable river of North America, the so-called Amazon, for the predilection of the beautiful ladies there for horseback riding. The Amazon rolls its majestic waves day and night, forming waterfalls, sources and tributaries, under the splash of which various events. Bushes, trees, sand and other varieties of nature border its picturesque shores.
Now one moment... And here we are at the gloomy ruins of the Colosseum. Horror covers members and attracts attention. Here the mighty tyrant demonstrated his cruelty. (Hm… change, or something, not a century!..) Well, now, as if by magic, we are transported to marvelous Greece and stop in front of the statue of St. Cyprida, which has been striking for many centuries with the grace of posture. (Well?) And here is the most venerable city of Venice, exceeding in its beauties the play of the most experienced consideration.
Zzz…
Here are the excavations of Pompeii. The corpse of a dog and two lovers, whose pose proves to the astonished spectators that our ancestors knew how to love as well as our descendants.
Dzzz ... (Huh? Leave me alone! I know it myself.)
Now let's make a temporary digression into the realm of natural history. Here is a picture that can be observed with the help of a miracle microscope, the pride of the twentieth century. He shows the smallest anatomists invisible to the eye, a flea the size of an elephant and an infusoria in a piece of cheese. There are many inexplicable things in nature, and people, without suspecting it, carry entire worlds under the nail of any of their fingers.
Now let's look at Vesuvius: what could be more majestic than this erupting picture of nature ... (What? And what do I care! It's my own fault. I didn't confuse the coils. Put on the next one! Nature in its generous diversity ... (Why Vesuvius, when I started talking about fish? Hold on to one thing. Get better! I’ll get better for you!) southern sky. Another wave of the magic wand (how long will you dig?) ... and here we are on the shores of Naples, the most wonderful city in the world. A thousand times right proverb (do not interrupt!), Saying: "Who did not drink water from Naples, he did not drink anything." (What? Fossil? Who told you! Change the coil, damn you! ..) The surroundings of this respected city are also beautiful. Here we have Pygmalion, brought to life with the help of his inspiration (Like a pig? Why a pig? You always climb into the wrong box! Put it aside!) hmm ... a marvelous marble sculpture that he carved with his own hands (Again! Yes, I told you, put it in You think that if you show a pig with its tail forward, then it will already be Pygmalion) made of the finest marble. There are many wonders of nature, but the wonders of art do not get any worse.
Zzz…

And here is the second example of the marvelous creativity of unknown hands - Venus de Milo, venerated by all. Having ranked her beauty among the gods, she, nevertheless, reveals modesty (so I said ... Why correct! You need to take it off and put it aside. You can’t be a pig when I talk about another coil!), Which shows the modesty inherent to the ancient Greeks, even at the highest rungs of the public ladder ... (and you are your own! This is just some kind of cross on my life!) stairs. And here is one more moment ... from this group of an unknown cutter, we are thrown into the vast steppe of our great and formidable father ... (if you want to show your pig twelve times in a row, then it is better to make an intermission, because the public may demand money back. Everyone has paid and has the right to demand. I'm telling you, it's better to turn off the lamp. What? Mr. Director will figure out who!). And now, gracious sovereigns and gracious empresses, let's take a break for ten minutes, after which we will again embark on our distant wanderings around the wide world, which are so developing mental capacity and spiritual properties of our nature, despite the fact that we accomplish them, sitting on comfortable chairs. (You fool! You, you fool!) So, goodbye to the island of Celebes among the local customs and amazing environment.

Resort

The season is dying.
Summer residents are dispersing, baths and baths are being closed.
In the Kurhaus, talk about railway, about the steamers, about the imminent departure.
Ladies go shopping, buy souvenirs: painted wooden vases, Finnish knives and aprons.
- How much does "Mitya Maxa" cost? the lady asks the snub-nosed, white-eyed shopkeeper.
“Colma mark,” he replies.
“Colma… um… colma how much is that?” the lady asks her companion.
“Three… I think three.
How much for our money?
“Three times thirty-seven…um…three times three is nine, but three times seven…doesn’t multiply…”
“Tedious life in Finland,” complains the first. - All day long you just go and transfer from a mark to a ruble, and from a meter to an arshin, and from a kilometer to a verst, and from a kilogram to a pood. The head is spinning. I suffered all summer, but if you ask, I still don’t know how many arshins, that is, marks, are in a kilogram.
//— * * * —//
The young pharmacist's assistant feels the withering of life the hardest of all.
Every Thursday he danced mad Hungarian women in the kursaal with young rheumatic women taking mud baths.
Every morning he ran to the pier and bought himself a fresh flower in his buttonhole.
The flowers were brought by the local fishermen right on the boats, along with the fish, and these gifts of nature kindly exchanged aromas along the way. Therefore, in the restaurant of the Kurgauz, pike was often served, reeking of left-handed, and the pink carnation on the chest of the pharmacist was fragrant with Baltic herring.
Oh unforgettable dance evenings to the sounds of the city orchestra: violin, trumpet and drum!
Sitting on benches and chairs along the walls are mothers, aunts, who have already lost the courage to show their grace in public, and younger sisters who have not yet dared.
There is a dance schedule hanging on the wall.
The trumpet blew, the violin screeched, the drum beat.
- It looks like a polka? one of the sitting mothers guesses.
- Oh no, mommy, quadrille! A new quadrille, says my sister.
“Don’t dangle your legs and don’t twitch your nose,” the aunt intervenes. - This is not a quadrille, but a mazurka.
The steward, a long-legged student, a Swede, thinks for a moment, but after a quick glance at the schedule, boldly shouts:
— Valsons!

And now the young assistant to the pharmacist, languidly bowing, embraces the dense camp of the lady being treated for rheumatism in her hand, and begins to smoothly rotate her around the room. The scarlet carnation between their noses smells like perch.
- Pas d'espagne! - red and wet, shouts the manager, and his head is shaking from the effort.
A schoolboy jumps out, small, fat, in a bubbling canvas blouse. In front of him, holding his hand, stamps his feet the elderly governess of one of the doctors. The schoolboy feels like a real Spaniard, clicks his tongue, and the governess gloomily steps on him, like a bull on a bullfighter.
The little cadet, tugging at his blouse, suddenly bowed his head in front of one of the aunts. She took this as an invitation and began to dance. To the horror of the little cadet, the aunt showed a purely Spanish passion and indefatigability in dancing. She writhed, tapped her heels, and sent bacchanal smiles to her tiny beau.
The apothecary's assistant used to make such pretzels with his long legs that the old colonel, who was watching the dancing at the door, was even offended.
- If only they could put soldiers to rest, they would stop being outrageous.
The manager again copes with the schedule and calls everyone to the Hungarian.
Passions flare up. Gender, age, social position - everything fades and drowns in the echoing tramp of feet, squeals and the roar of the orchestra.
Here is a female doctor in a hygienic hood rushing about with a twelve-year-old thin-legged croquetist, here are two young ladies - one for a gentleman, here is a ten-year-old girl with a gray-haired Swede; here is a strange person in velvet shoes and a pair of canvas kicks, embracing a medical student.
Exactly at one in the morning the orchestra falls silent instantly. In vain do the dancers, dangling their feet in the air, raised for the "pas de zephyr", beg to play at least another five minutes. The musicians gloomily roll up their notes and slide down from the choirs. They silently pass by the audience, and many wonder aloud how these three people were able to make such a terrible noise.
//— * * * —//
The next morning, a languid apothecary's apprentice, smiling enigmatically, crushes chalk and mint in a mortar.
The door opens. She is. Lady suffering from rheumatism in her hand.
“Bitte… Marienbad…” she babbles, but her eyes say, “Do you remember?”
– Artificial or natural? he asks quietly, and his eyes answer: “I remember! I remember!"
“Ten penny absorbent cotton,” she sighs (“You see how hard it is to get out of here”).
He takes out the cotton, wraps it up, and slowly smothers it with oppoponax.
In his buttonhole he has a withered yesterday's carnation. No new flowers arrived today.
Autumn.

Instead of politics

Const. Erberg

Sat down to dinner.
The head of the family, a retired captain, with a drooping, as if wet mustache and round, surprised eyes, looked around with an air as if he had just been pulled out of the water and he still could not recover. However, this was his usual appearance, and none of the family was embarrassed by this.
Looking with mute amazement at his wife, at his daughter, at the tenant who rented a room from them with dinner and kerosene, he tucked a napkin into his collar and asked:
- And where is Petka?
“God knows where they wallow,” answered the wife. - You can’t drive you to the gymnasium with a stick, and you can’t lure you home with a roll. Spoils somewhere with the boys.
The lodger chuckled and put in a word:
Yes, it's all politics. There are various rallies. Where adults go, there they go.
“Oh no, my dear,” the captain bulged his eyes. “Thanks be to God, this is over. No talking, no chatter. It's over, sir. Now you need to do business, and not wag your tongue. Of course, I'm retired now, but I'm not sitting idle either. Here I will come up with some invention, take a patent and sell it, to the shame of Russia, somewhere abroad.
- And what do you want to invent?
– Yes, I still don’t know. I'll invent something. Lord, how many things have not been invented yet! Well, for example, let’s say, I’ll invent some kind of machine so that every morning, at the appointed hour, it gently wakes me up.

He twisted the handle in the evening, and she herself would wake me up. BUT?
“Daddy,” said the daughter, “but it's just an alarm clock.
The captain was surprised and fell silent.
“Yes, you are indeed right,” the lodger remarked tactfully. - From politics, we all had a ringing in our heads. Now you feel how the thought is resting.
A red-cheeked third grader flew into the room, smacked his mother's cheek as he walked, and shouted loudly:
- Tell me: why is the anthem-Asia, and not the anthem-Africa.
- Lord have mercy! Crazy! Where does it take you! Why are you late for dinner? Out and the soup is cold.
- I don't want soup. Why not an African anthem?
- Well, give me a plate: I'll put a cutlet for you.
- Why is the cat-summer, and not the cat-winter? the schoolboy asked in a matter-of-fact manner and handed over the plate.
“He must have been whipped today,” my father guessed.
- Why did you flog, and not we flogged? - stuffing a piece of bread into his mouth, the schoolboy muttered.
- No, have you seen the fool? – the surprised captain was indignant.
//— * * * —//
- Why is it white and chicken, and not black and rooster? the schoolboy asked, holding out his plate for a second helping.
– What-oh? If only he would be ashamed of his father and mother?! ..
- Petya, stop, Petya! – suddenly shouted sister. - Tell me, why do they say d-believe, and not say d-doubt? BUT?
The schoolboy thought for a moment and, looking up at his sister, answered:
- And why pan-coupons, and not boor-coupons!
The tenant chuckled.
“Hud-coupons… Don’t you think, Ivan Stepanych, that this is amusing?” Hum-coupons!..
But the captain was completely taken aback.
- Sonechka! he said plaintively to his wife. - Throw this ... Petya from the table! Please, for my sake.
“Well, you can’t do it yourself, can you?” Petya, do you hear? Daddy orders you to leave the table. March to your room! Can't get sweet!

The high school student pouted.
- I'm not doing anything bad ... our whole class says so ... Well, I alone take the rap for everyone! ..
- Nothing, nothing! It says go out. If you don’t know how to behave at the table, then sit at your place!
The schoolboy got up, tugged at his jacket, and, drawing his head into his shoulders, went to the door.
Having met the maid with a dish of almond jelly, he sobbed and, swallowing his tears, said:
- It's mean - to treat relatives like that ... It's not my fault ... Why is it guilty, and not beer?! ..
Everyone was silent for a few minutes. Then the daughter said:
“I can tell you why I'm guilty, not beer-clapper.
- Oh, stop it, at least you! her mother waved at her. Thank God it's not small...
The captain was silent, moving his eyebrows, surprised and whispering something.
– Ha-ha! It's wonderful, - exulted the tenant. - And I also came up with: why I live-earth, and not dead-earth. BUT? It's in French, you know. Zhivuzem. It means "I love you". I know languages ​​a little, that is, as much as every secular person is supposed to. Of course, I'm not a linguist...
– Ha-ha-ha! - the daughter was flooded. - And why is Dubrovin, and not aspen, the same? ..
The mother suddenly thought. Her face became tense and attentive, as if she were listening to something.
- Wait, Sasha! Wait a minute. How is it ... I forgot again ...
She stared at the ceiling and blinked her eyes.
- Oh yes! Why Satan... no... why the devil... no, not like that!...
The captain stared at her in horror.
– What are you barking about?
- Wait! Wait! Do not interrupt. Yes! Why do they say to draw and not to devil?
- Oh, mom! Mother! Ha ha ha! And why "dad-kidney", and not ...
Get out, Alexandra! Be silent! - the captain shouted and jumped out from behind the table.

//— * * * —//
The tenant did not sleep for a long time. He tossed and turned and kept thinking about what he would ask tomorrow. The young lady sent him two notes from the maid in the evening. One at nine o'clock: "Why hug-mother, and not hug-father?" Another - at eleven: "Why a shirt-ashka, and not ninety-nine kopecks-ashka?"
To both he answered in a suitable tone and now he was tormented, thinking out what to treat the young lady with tomorrow.
“Why…why…” he whispered half asleep.
Suddenly, someone softly knocked on the door.
No one answered, but the knock was repeated.
The tenant got up, wrapped himself in a blanket.
- Ai-ai! What a prank! he laughed quietly, unlocking the doors, and suddenly jumped back.
In front of him, still fully dressed, stood the captain with a candle in his hands. His astonished face was pale, and an unaccustomed intense thought drew round his eyebrows.
“Guilty,” he said. “I won’t bother… I’ll take a minute… I’ve thought of…”
- What? What? Invention? Really?
- I thought: why black-nile, and black-some other river? No... it was somehow different for me... it turned out better... But it's my fault... Maybe I disturbed... So - I couldn't sleep, - I looked into the light...
He chuckled wryly, scoffed, and quickly walked away.

New circular

Evel Khasin stood on the shore and watched his son pull the ferry through a narrow, overgrown river.
There was a cart on the ferry, a dejected horse and a dejected peasant.
Doubt stirred in Evel's soul.
- Did you take money from him in advance? he called to his son.
The son replied. Evel did not hear and wanted to ask again, but suddenly he heard hurried steps along the way. He turned around. His daughter ran straight to him, obviously with some amazing news. She was crying, waving her arms, crouching, clutching her head.
- Oh, papa! Rides! Oh what do we do now!
– Who is going?
- Oh, mister officer! ..
Evel clasped his hands, looked up inquiringly, but, not finding any sign in the sky, shook his head reproachfully and started running towards the house.
- Ginda! he shouted in the hallway. - Is it true?
“Oh, really,” a sobbing voice answered from behind the curtain.
- On Thursday I ran into, three days have passed since Thursday. Only three days. Why didn't you tell him?
“Reported, already shifted,” sobbed the voice of Ginda. - I put the cereals, cut the lard of the shmatok, the chicken with the crest ...
- Maybe you forgot the bulb?
- And poured the bulb ...
A girl ran into the house.
- Oh, papa! Rides! Oh close!
“Maybe he came on horseback,” says Evel, and hope trembles in his voice.
- Not! Came on a junk. He tied the horse to the fence, he himself goes to the hut.

Someone knocked on the window.
- Hey! Evel Khasin, ferryman!
Evel made an amiable face and ran out into the street.
“And how we surprised ourselves…” he began.
But the sergeant was preoccupied and immediately set to work.
– Are you the ferryman Evel Khasin?
“Well, then, mister constable, you should know…
- What is known there? the constable snapped, as if some unpleasant hints seemed to him. “Nothing can be known to us in the face of the authorities. So a new circular came out. A Jew, that is, who has an unsympathetic distribution in the surrounding nature and dangerously excites the inhabitants, that means, f-fu! Clothed with power to the cap. Understood? Since I consider you pleasant and I don’t see disorder in you, live. I don't care - live.
- Mister Superintendent! Do I ever...
- Shut up! I must now watch. Twice a week I will run over and inquire with the surrounding residents. If anyone that and so on - my reprisal is short. Left shoulder forward! Ma-arsh! Understood?
- How can you not understand! I may have figured it out a long time ago.
“You can go if you need to take care of something. I'm smoking a pipe here. I don't have time either. Vasto here thirty people, but all in different ends. And I'm alone. A day is not enough to visit everyone.
Evel drew his head into his shoulders, sighed, and went into the hut.
- Ginda! Bring what you need, put it in a junk bag. They are in a hurry.

//— * * * —//
- Oh, Evel! Get up soon! Can't you hear the calls? Or your heart is broken. Well, I'll wake him up. Do you know who our Chaim is pulling on the ferry? Mister stavogo! Stanovoy is being pulled by our Chaim, carrying trouble on a rope straight to our house.
Evel jumped up, pale and disheveled. He looked at the ceiling, thought, shook his head.
- This, Ginda, you are already lying.
- Let him ride like I'm lying! Ginda sobbed.
Then he suddenly understood, rushed about, rushed to the window.
- Dvoska! Drive the boar to hell. Drive fast! Fix the doors!
- Oh, drive the boar! Ginda thought too. - Oh, Dvoska, drive, fix the doors.
It was just about time.
A fat bailiff was getting out of the britzka.
- Taki in the chaise! Evel whispered with anguish. - Not on horseback! .. Ginda, go to the pantry, take out the goose ...
Ginda sobbed and reached into her pocket for her keys. And Evel was already bowing and speaking in the most amiable voice:
- Your Excellency! And how surprised we were...
– Surprised? What are you, Jew, surprised? Did the constable read the new circular to you?
- Officers, sir, read, sir ...
- K-scum! Got it…” He thought for a moment. “Well, then, it is entirely up to you to behave in such a way as to sit still. You rent a ferry, you have an income, you should cherish it. There you have a garden ... If you start to breed sedition, you will fly to hell. If you are not pleasing to the authorities and to the people in general... Don't you plant cabbage? I need cabbage. Twenty heads of cabbage ... Terenty, go and choose - he has a garden over there. He still lousy palm off. Everyone should be pleasant and completely safe. Understood? If someone notices a dangerous inclination in you, threatening to corrupt the morals of the civilian population and seduce into seditious activities in violation of state principles and spread ... What kind of girl is this? Daughter? Let him go and nibble peas. I need a lot ... and the spread of an unpleasant impression due to any physical, moral or other properties ... Do you keep pigs? How not? And what's that? Whose footprints are these? Yours, right? Get out and punka behind the barn. Pig?
- Your Excellency! May I be as rich as it is a pig! Your…
– What are you lying about! Stunned! Who are you talking to?! Who are you lying to? Scoundrel! The raven will not collect bones! .. Open the pun. I want to buy a pig from you.
- Your High Excellency! I didn't lie. God sees! It's not a pig! It is a boar...
- B-bold! Tell Terenty to wrap it around with a rope. Can be tied at the back. And what a skinny boar. Scoundrels! They keep cattle, but they eat the swill. Okay, don't whine! I'm not angry ... Money for me.

//— * * * —//
For two days Evel was shaking with a fever.
On the third day I went out to bask in the sun. Ginda came up. They began to talk about the boar, to remember what it was like.
“He, perhaps, weighed eight pounds ...” Evel sighed.
“Maybe nine—or nine and a half. Everything can be. Why not?
- I would sell it in the city for ten rubles, so we would have a herring for every Sabbath and the money would be hidden.
- And I would have slaughtered him, tai would have salted him. Mr. constable would have had enough for a long time. Now what can I give? They don't like cucumbers...
“I would sell it and pay the rent. Sorry boar. Was good. And it's a shame to cut.
- It's a pity! Ginda agreed. - Good.
But Evel no longer listened to her. He was all alert, and his hair stood on end.
- Calls...
“Calls…” Ginda repeated in a groaning whisper.
- This is himself...
- Myself…
Evel this time did not raise his eyes to the sky. What is there to ask, since you already know.
The trio was heading straight for them.
Before the horses had time to stop, something buzzed and growled in the carriage ... Evel rushed forward.
- Scammers! Yes, I'll pulverize you, merrz ... Do you understand the circular?
“Oh, I understand,” Yevel howled. - Mr. constable explained, Mr. His Excellency the bailiff explained ... I understand! Your Excellency! I wish I didn't understand the way I understand!
– Shut up! Did you clarify the circular?
- Oh, how explained! Everything was explained to the last boar ...
– What-oh? What do you allow yourself? Yes, you know that if I want, so from you wet place won't stay. Go change me twenty roubles. Alive! Paper behind me.
- Your lofty shine ...
The fixer barked. Evel bent his knees and, staggering, trudged into the hut.
Ginda was already sitting there, tearing open the lining at the hem of her dress.
Evel sat down beside him and waited.
A wad of dirty rags came out of the lining. Trembling fingers unwrapped it, spilling the contents onto his lap.

- Only seventeen rubles and eighty-seven kopecks ... It will kill you!
- There is still cabbage left ... Maybe they eat cabbage ...
Evel raised his eyes to the ceiling and spoke softly.
- Good God! Good and just God! Make them eat cabbage!..

Fashion Lawyer

There were few people in the court that day. There was no interesting meeting.
Three young lads in blouses languished and sighed on the benches behind the fence. There are several students and young ladies in the public places, two reporters in the corner.
Next in line was the case of Semyon Rubashkin. He was charged, as the protocol said, "for spreading disturbing rumors about the dissolution of the First Duma" in a newspaper article.
The accused was already in the hall and was walking in front of the public with his wife and three friends. Everyone was animated, a little excited by the unusual situation, chatting and joking.
- If only they would start sooner, - said Rubashkin, - hungry as a dog.
“And from here we’ll have breakfast straight to Vienna,” my wife dreamed.
- Ha! ha! ha! That's how they hide him in prison, here you will have breakfast, - friends joked.
“It’s better to go to Siberia,” the wife flirted, “for an eternal settlement.” Then I will marry someone else.
The friends cackled in unison and clapped Rubashkin on the shoulder.
A stout gentleman in a tailcoat entered the hall and, nodding arrogantly to the accused, sat down at the music stand and began to select papers from his briefcase.
- Who else is this? the wife asked.
Yes, this is my lawyer.

- Advocate? friends were surprised. - Yes, you're crazy! For such a stupid case, take a lawyer! Yes, my friend, chickens laugh. What will he do? He has nothing to say! The court will directly direct to termination.
- Yes, I, in fact, was not going to invite him. He himself offered his services. And he doesn't take money. We, he says, undertake such cases out of principle. The fee only offends us. Well, of course, I did not insist. Why insult him?
“Insulting is not good,” the wife agreed.
On the other hand, what's stopping me? Well, chat for five minutes. And maybe even more beneficial. Who knows them? They will think up some fine there, and he will settle the matter.
“Y-yes, it’s true,” the friends agreed.
The lawyer stood up, straightened his sideburns, frowned, and went up to Rubashkin.
“I have considered your case,” he said, and added gloomily: “Be of good cheer.
Then he returned to his seat.
- Freak! friends yelled.
“Damn,” Rubashkin shook his head in concern. - Smells like shit.

//— * * * —//
- Please stand up! Judgment is coming! shouted the bailiff.
The accused sat behind his fence and from there nodded to his wife and friends, smiling proudly and embarrassed, as if he had received a vulgar compliment.
- Hero! one of his friends whispered to his wife.
- Orthodox! meanwhile the accused cheerfully replied to the chairman's question.
– Do you recognize yourself as the author of the article signed with the initials S. R.?
- I admit it.
What else do you have to say about this case?
“Nothing,” Rubashkin was surprised.
But then the lawyer jumped out.
His face turned purple, his eyes popped out, his neck bulged. It looked like he was choking on a lamb bone.
- Gentlemen of the judge! he exclaimed. - Yes, this is him in front of you, this is Semyon Rubashkin. He is the author of an article and a spreader of rumors about the dissolution of the first Duma, an article signed with only two letters, but these letters are S. R. Why two, you ask. Why not three, I ask. Why did he, gentle and devoted son, not put the name of his father? Is it because he needed only two letters S. and R.? Is he not a representative of a formidable and powerful party?
Judge Lord! Do you really admit the idea that my client is just a modest newspaper scribbler who uttered an unfortunate phrase in an unsuccessful article? No, judges! You have no right to insult him, which may be hidden power, so to speak, the core, I would say, the emotional essence of our great revolutionary movement.
His guilt is negligible, you say. Not! I will exclaim. Not! I protest.
The chairman called the bailiff and asked to clear the hall from the public.
The lawyer took a sip of water and continued:
– You need heroes in white hats! You do not recognize modest workers who do not rush forward with a cry of "hands up!", but who secretly and namelessly lead a mighty movement. Was there a white hat on the leader of the Moscow bank robbery? But was there a white hat on the head of the one who sobbed with joy on the day of the murder of the von der ... However, I am authorized by my client only within certain limits. But even within these limits, I can do a lot.
The chairman asked to close the doors and remove the witnesses.
“Do you think a year in prison will make a rabbit out of this lion for you?”
He turned and for a few moments pointed with his hand at Rubashkin's bewildered, perspiring face. Then, pretending that he could hardly tear himself away from the majestic spectacle, he continued:
- Not! Never! He will sit down like a lion and come out like a hundred-headed hydra! He will wrap himself like a boa constrictor around his stunned enemy, and the bones of administrative arbitrariness will crunch plaintively on his mighty teeth.
Have you prepared Siberia for him? But judges! I won't tell you anything. I will only ask you: where is Gershuni? Gershuni, exiled by you to Siberia?
And why? Could prison, exile, penal servitude, torture (which, by the way, were not applied to my client for some reason), could all these horrors wrest from his proud lips even a word of confession or even one of the names of a thousand of his accomplices?
No, Semyon Rubashkin is not like that! He will proudly ascend the scaffold, he will proudly put aside his executioner, and saying to the priest: “I don’t need consolation!” - he will put a noose around his proud neck.
Judge Lord! I already see this noble image on the pages of the Past, next to my article about the last minutes of this great wrestler, whom the hundred-mouthed rumor will make legendary hero Russian revolution.
I will also exclaim last words, which he will say already with a bag on his head: “Let the vile perish ...”
The chairman deprived the defender of the floor.
The defender obeyed, asking only to accept his statement that his trustee, Semyon Rubashkin, absolutely refuses to sign the request for pardon.

//— * * * —//
The court, without leaving for a meeting, immediately changed the article and sentenced the tradesman Semyon Rubashkin to the deprivation of all rights of state and death penalty through hanging.
The defendant, unconscious, was carried out of the courtroom.
//— * * * —//
In the canteen of the court, the youth gave the lawyer a noisy ovation.
He smiled affably, bowed, shook hands.
Then, after eating sausages and drinking a glass of beer, he asked the court chronicler to send him proofs of his defense speech.
“I don’t like typos,” he said.
//— * * * —//
In the corridor he was stopped by a gentleman with a contorted face and pale lips. It was one of Rubashkin's friends.
//— * * * —//
“Is it all over!” No hope?
The lawyer smiled grimly.
- What can you do! Nightmare of Russian reality!..

Nadezhda Alexandrovna Teffi (Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, Buchinskaya by her husband) is a poetess, memoirist, critic, publicist, but above all, one of the most famous satirical writers of the Silver Age, competing with Averchenko himself. After the revolution, Teffi emigrated, but in exile her outstanding talent blossomed even brighter. It was there that many of Teffi's classic stories were written, from a very unexpected side, depicting the life and customs of the "Russian Diaspora" ...

The collection includes Teffi's stories of different years, written both at home and in Europe. Before the reader passes a real gallery of funny, bright characters, in many of which real contemporaries of the writer are guessed - people of art and politicians, famous "socialites" and patrons, revolutionaries and their opponents.

taffy
humorous stories

... For laughter is joy, and therefore in itself is good.

Spinoza. "Ethics", part IV.

Position XLV, scholia II.

Cursed

Leshka's right leg was numb for a long time, but he did not dare to change his position and listened eagerly. It was completely dark in the corridor, and through the narrow slit of the half-open door one could see only a brightly lit piece of the wall above the kitchen stove. A large dark circle surmounted by two horns hovered on the wall. Lyoshka guessed that this circle was nothing more than a shadow from his aunt's head with the ends of the scarf sticking up.

The aunt had come to visit Leshka, whom she had identified only a week ago as "boys for room service," and was now in serious negotiations with the cook who had patronized her. The negotiations were of an unpleasantly disturbing nature, the aunt was very agitated, and the horns on the wall rose and fell steeply, as if some unseen beast butted their invisible opponents.

It was assumed that Lyoshka washes galoshes in the front. But, as you know, a person proposes, but God disposes, and Lyoshka, with a rag in his hands, was eavesdropping outside the door.

“I understood from the very beginning that he was a bungler,” the cook sang in a rich voice. - How many times I tell him: if you, guy, are not a fool, keep your eyes open. Don't do shit, but keep your eyes open. Because - Dunyashka scrubs. And he does not lead with his ear. This morning again the lady shouted - she didn’t interfere in the stove and closed it with a firebrand.

The horns on the wall are agitated, and the aunt groans like an aeolian harp:

"Where can I go with him?" Mavra Semyonovna! I bought him boots, not to eat, not to eat, I gave him five rubles. For a jacket for alteration, a tailor, not a drink, not eaten, ripped off six hryvnias ...

- No other way than to send home.

- Cute! The road, no food, no food, four roubles, dear!

Lyoshka, forgetting all the precautions, sighs outside the door. He doesn't want to go home. His father promised that he would bring down seven skins from him, and Leshka knows from experience how unpleasant it is.

“Well, it’s still too early to howl,” the cook sings again. “So far, no one is chasing him. The lady only threatened... But the tenant, Pyotr Dmitritch, is very protective. Right up the mountain for Leshka. Enough of you, says Marya Vasilievna, he says he is not a fool, Leshka. He, he says, is a uniform adeot, and there is nothing to scold him. Just a mountain for Leshka.

Well, God bless him...

- And with us, what the tenant says is sacred. Because he is a well-read person, he pays carefully ...

- And Dunya is good! - the aunt twisted her horns. - I don’t understand such a people - to let a sneak on a boy ...

- True! True. This morning I say to her: "Go open the doors, Dunyasha," affectionately, as if kindly. So she will snort me in the face: "I, grit, you are not a doorman, open it yourself!" And I drank it all to her. How to open doors, so you, I say, are not a porter, but how to kiss a janitor on the stairs, so you are all a doorman ...

- Lord have mercy! From these years to everything, dospying. The girl is young, to live and live. One salary, no pity, no...

- Me, what? I told her directly: how to open the doors, so you are not a doorman. She, you see, is not a doorman! And how to accept gifts from the janitor, so she is the doorman. Yes, tenant lipstick ...

Trrrr…” the electric bell crackled.

- Leshka-a! Leshka-a! cried the cook. - Oh, you, fail! Dunyasha was sent away, but he doesn’t even listen with his ear.

Lyoshka held his breath, pressed himself against the wall and stood quietly until an angry cook swam past him, angrily rattling starched skirts.

“No, pipes,” thought Lyoshka, “I won’t go to the village. I’m not a fool, I want to, I’ll serve so quickly.

And, having waited for the return of the cook, he went with resolute steps into the rooms.

"Be, grit, in front of your eyes. And what kind of eyes will I be when no one is ever at home."

He went into the front. Hey! The coat hangs - the tenant of the house.

He rushed to the kitchen and, snatching the poker from the dumbfounded cook, rushed back into the rooms, quickly threw open the door to the lodger's quarters, and went to stir in the stove.

The tenant was not alone. With him was a young lady, in a jacket and under a veil. Both shuddered and straightened up when Lyoshka entered.

"I'm not a fool," Leshka thought, poking his poker at the burning firewood.

Firewood crackled, the poker rattled, sparks flew in all directions. The tenant and the lady were tensely silent. Finally, Lyoshka headed for the exit, but at the very door he stopped and began to anxiously examine the damp spot on the floor, then turned his eyes to the guest's legs and, seeing galoshes on them, shook his head reproachfully.