The novel takes place in Russia in the early 1900s. Factory workers with their families live in the workers' settlement, and the whole life of these people is inextricably linked with the factory: in the morning, with the factory whistle, workers rush to the factory, in the evening it throws them out of its stone bowels; on holidays, when they meet each other, they only talk about the factory, drink a lot, and when drunk they fight. However, the young worker Pavel Vlasov, unexpectedly for his mother Pelageya Nilovna, the widow of a mechanic, suddenly begins to live a different life:
On holidays he goes to town, brings books, reads a lot. To his mother’s perplexed question, Pavel replies: “I want to know the truth and that’s why I read forbidden books; If they are found on me, they will put me in prison.”
After some time, Pavel’s comrades begin to gather in the Vlasovs’ house on Saturday evenings: Andrei Nakhodka, a “crest from Kanev,” as he introduces himself to his mother, who recently arrived in the settlement and entered the factory; several factory - suburban guys whom Nilovna knew before; people come from the city: a young girl Natasha, a teacher who left Moscow from rich parents; Nikolai Ivanovich, who sometimes comes instead of Natasha to work with the workers; a thin and pale young lady Sashenka, like Natasha, left the family: her father is a landowner, a zemstvo chief. Pavel and Sashenka love each other, but they cannot get married: they both believe that married revolutionaries are lost for business - they need to earn a living, buy an apartment, and raise children. Gathering in the Vlasovs’ house, the circle members read books on history, talk about the plight of the workers of the whole earth, about the solidarity of all workers, and often sing songs. At these meetings, the mother hears the word “socialists” for the first time.
His mother really likes Nakhodka, and he fell in love with her too, affectionately calling her “nenko”, saying that she looks like his late adoptive mother, but he doesn’t remember his own mother. After some time, Pavel and his mother invite Andrei to move into their house, and the Little Russian happily agrees.
Leaflets appear at the factory, which talk about workers' strikes in St. Petersburg, about the injustice of the conditions at the factory; leaflets call on workers to unite and fight for their interests. The mother understands that the appearance of these sheets is connected with her son’s work; she is both proud of him and fears for his fate. After some time, gendarmes come to the Vlasovs’ house with a search. The mother is scared, but she tries to suppress her fear. Those who came found nothing: having been warned in advance about the search, Pavel and Andrey took the forbidden books from the house; Nevertheless, Andrei is arrested.
An announcement appears at the factory that the management will deduct a penny from every ruble earned by the workers to drain the swamps surrounding the factory. The workers are dissatisfied with this decision of the management; several older workers come to Pavel for advice. Pavel asks his mother to go to the city to take his note to the newspaper so that the story with the “swamp penny” gets into the nearest issue, and he goes to the factory, where, leading a spontaneous meeting, in the presence of the director, he sets out the workers’ demands for the abolition of the new tax. However, the director orders the workers to resume work, and everyone returns to their places. Pavel is upset, he believes that the people did not believe him, did not follow his truth, because he was young and weak - he was unable to tell this truth. At night the gendarmes appear again and this time they take Pavel away.
A few days later, Yegor Ivanovich comes to Nilovna - one of those who went to meetings with Pavel before his arrest. He tells his mother that, besides Pavel, 48 more factory workers have been arrested, and it would be good to continue delivering leaflets to the factory. The mother volunteers to carry leaflets, for which she asks a friend who sells lunches for workers at the factory to take her on as her assistant. Everyone entering the factory is searched, but the mother successfully smuggles in leaflets and hands them over to the workers.
Finally, Andrei and Pavel leave prison and begin to prepare for the May Day celebration. Pavel is going to carry the banner in front of the column of demonstrators, although he knows that for this he will be sent to prison again. On the morning of May First, Pavel and Andrey do not go to work, but go to the square, where people have already gathered. Pavel, standing under the red banner, declares that today they, members of the Social Democratic Labor Party, openly raise the banner of reason, truth, freedom. “Long live the working people of all countries!” - with this slogan of Pavel, the column led by him moved along the streets of the settlement. However, a chain of soldiers comes out to meet the demonstration, the column is crushed, Pavel and Andrei, who was walking next to him, are arrested. Mechanically picking up a fragment of a staff with a fragment of a banner, torn from the hands of her son by the gendarmes, Nilovna goes home, and in her chest there is a pressing desire to tell everyone that the children are following the truth, they want another, better life, truth for everyone.
A few days later, the mother moves to the city to Nikolai Ivanovich - he promised Pavel and Andrey, if they were arrested, to immediately take her to him. In the city, Nilovna, running the simple household of the lonely Nikolai Ivanovich, begins active underground work:
alone or together with Nicholas's sister Sophia, disguised as either a nun, or a pilgrim pilgrim, or a lace merchant, she travels around the cities and villages of the province, delivering prohibited books, newspapers, and proclamations. She loves this job, she loves talking to people, listening to their stories about life. She sees that the people live half-starved among the enormous riches of the earth. Returning from trips to the city, the mother goes on dates with her son in prison. On one of these dates, she manages to give him a note inviting his comrades to arrange an escape for him and his friends. However, Pavel refuses to escape; Sashenka, who was the initiator of the escape, is most upset by this.
Finally the day of judgment arrives. Only relatives of the defendants are allowed into the courtroom. The mother was expecting something terrible, waiting for an argument, for clarification of the truth, but everything is going calmly: the judges speak indifferently, indistinctly, reluctantly; the witnesses are hasty and colorless. The speeches of the prosecutor and lawyers also do not touch the mother’s heart. But then Paul begins to speak. He is not defending himself - he is explaining why they are not rebels, even though they are being tried as rebels. They are socialists, their slogans are down private property, all means of production are for the people, all power is for the people, labor is obligatory for everyone. They are revolutionaries and will remain so until all their ideas win. Everything the son says is known to the mother, but only here, at the trial, does she feel the strange, captivating power of his faith. But then the judge reads the verdict: all defendants are to be sent to a settlement. Sasha is also waiting for the verdict and is going to declare that she wants to be settled in the same area as Pavel. Her mother promises her to come to them when their children are born - to nurse their grandchildren.
When his mother returns home, Nikolai informs her that it has been decided to publish Pavel’s speech at the trial. The mother volunteers to take her son’s speech to another city for distribution. At the station, she suddenly sees a young man, whose face and attentive gaze seem strangely familiar to her; she remembers that she met him before both in court and near the prison - and she understands: she’s caught. The young man calls the watchman and, pointing at her with his eyes, says something to him. The watchman approaches the mother and reproachfully says: “Thief! It’s already old, but here we go!” "I'm not a thief!" - choked with resentment and indignation, the mother shouts and, snatching packs of proclamations from her suitcase, hands them to the people around her: “This is my son’s speech, yesterday the political ones were tried, he was among them.” The gendarmes push people aside as they approach the mother; one of them grabs her by the throat, not allowing her to speak; she wheezes. Sobs are heard in the crowd.
Let us glorify the woman - Mother, the inexhaustible source of all-conquering life!
M. Gorky All the pride of the world comes from mothers!
M. Gorky The purpose of the lesson: to develop expressive reading skills, the ability to navigate the text, draw conclusions and generalizations. Fostering feelings of patriotism and courage, love for the world around us and kindness, appreciation and gratitude to the older generation, and an active life position.
The hymn to the Mother, with which the 9th tale begins, sounds completely natural: “Let us glorify the woman - the Mother, the inexhaustible source of the all-conquering Life!” This beginning immediately introduces us to an atmosphere of high and great feelings. He brings that high pathos that characterizes the fairy tale as a whole. Not by chance. It is in this fairy tale that the word Mother is written with a capital letter for the first time.
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Preview: "Mother's Heart" Literature lesson in 8th grade on “Tales of Italy”
M. Gorky. Teacher: Simutina Lyudmila Vasilievna Place of work:
Let's glorify the woman - Mother,
inexhaustible source
all-conquering life!
M. Gorky
All the pride in the world comes from mothers!
M. Gorky
The purpose of the lesson : developing expressive reading skills, the ability to navigate the text, draw conclusions and generalizations.Fostering feelings of patriotism and courage, love for the world around us and kindness, appreciation and gratitude to the older generation, and an active life position.
Lesson type: a lesson in mastering new knowledge and comprehensive application of previously acquired knowledge.
Methods: partially – search, observation, expressive reading, comparison different types art, conversation.
Equipment:
- The text of the fairy tales “The Feat of the Mother”, “Mother of the Traitor” is given to each student.
- Presentation.
- Recording of "Ave Maria" by Schubert.
- Literature notebooks with results homework: write out Gorky’s statements about his mother from the texts of fairy tales and think about their content.
During the classes.
- Teacher's opening speech.
In 1906, M. Gorky settled on Capri, a small island in the Bay of Naples. A steamboat runs from the mainland to Capri with rows of benches darkened by the sun, moisture, and time. After 3 hours of travel, he reaches high steep mountains, in a hollow between which he is nestled small village. On the narrow street there are small shops selling colorful beads, straw hats, vegetables, lemons, oranges.
Roses bloom all year round. Every little piece of stone, where there is a little earth and sand, is covered with evergreen vegetation... Lemon groves, cypress trees, palm trees...
Especially a lot of different colors……. Vesuvius smokes in the distance, and the smell of fish and algae comes from the sea. The songs of fishermen are heard.
It was here that Gorky's Tales of Italy were born in 1911-1913.
Why fairy tales? After all, the events depicted in them are quite real. It has long been proven that much of them are “drawn from life” and reflect the facts of reality.
“Tales of Italy” is prefaced by the words of H. H. Andersen: “There are no fairy tales better than those that life itself creates.” Gorky's fairy tales are stories that reveal the “fabulousness” in real life. The main theme is abrupt, sudden changes, unexpected rebirths. One of the researchers of Gorky’s creativity, noting the unique features of “fairy tales...” writes: “Created on a completely realistic basis, “fairy tales” are imbued with that poetry of creation and struggle, that spirit of uplift. Impulse and faith in the inevitable victory of happiness, which is so characteristic of Gorky.”
In all the tales of the Italian cycle, especially in three of them, the theme of motherhood sounds very clearly.
Why does the image of the Mother become the main one in his fairy tales? This question will be one of the main ones in today's lesson.
The topic of motherhood has always worried artists, poets, and writers. The image of the mother as a symbol of eternal truth, beauty, and life affirmation is found in the works of masters of antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance.
Leonardo da Vinci, Santi Raphael, Lucas Cranach...It is from their canvases that the tender, sincere, strong faces of the Mother look at us.
- Preliminary conversation on fairy tales.
The hymn to the Mother, with which the 9th tale begins, sounds completely natural: “Let us glorify the woman - the Mother, the inexhaustible source of the all-conquering Life!” This beginning immediately introduces us to an atmosphere of high and great feelings. He brings that high pathos that characterizes the fairy tale as a whole. Not by chance. It is in this fairy tale that the word Mother is written with a capital letter for the first time.
Why do you think?
(students' answers)
Let's open the notebooks and write down the topic of the lesson: “The Heart of the Mother” (“Tales of Italy” by M. Gorky). Also write down one of the epigraphs of today's lesson.
- Analytical conversation based on a fairy tale.
Let's turn to the plot of the fairy tale "The Mother's Feat".
(student’s brief retelling of the fairy tale)
Note. that the whole fairy tale is based on what is familiar to you literary device, found in other works of Gorky. What kind of reception is this?
(students’ answers – opposition, antithesis)
Yes, already at the very beginning of the tale, two hostile tendencies are opposed - maternal creation and cruel destruction. Life and death.
Who are the representatives of these opposite principles?
(students' answers)
Yes, Mother and Timur play the main role in the conflict.
- Working with text, writing conclusions in a notebook.
In your notebook, draw a table with two columns. Let's try to characterize the two central characters of this fairy tale.
Note. That the opposition of heroes occurs not only on the internal, but also on the external level.
Can you see what Mother and Timur look like?
How does she behave with him, how does she talk?
(Lame (inferiority of the “happy” conqueror --- majesty of the Mother)
What does Mother oppose to Timur, his deadly force? (“What do you say about yourself, woman?”)
(children's answers - the mission of serving life, requires justice, because she is the Mother and serves life).
What convinced Timur? What arguments of the Mother forced Timur to open his heart?
(Mother's Heart. Strength, wisdom, love contained in it).
The poetess L. Tatyanicheva has a wonderful poem (read by a trained student).
They tell me it's too much
I give love to children
What maternal anxiety
ages my life before its time...
Well, what can I answer them -
To hearts as impassive as armor?
The love I gave to my children
Makes me stronger.
Indeed, it was precisely the love for her son that gave the Mother so much strength that shocked even the ruler who had seen it all.
- Working with a dictionary.
All M. Gorky's fairy tales are built on aphorisms, which express the main idea of the work.
What is an aphorism?
The meaning of the word Aphorism according to Ozhegov:
Aphorism - Brief expressivesaying,
containing a generalizinginference
Let's look at the aphorisms you wrote out in your notebook at home and explain them. 1 aphorism “Let us glorify the woman - Mother, the inexhaustible source of all-conquering life.Let us glorify the Woman-Mother in the world, the only force before which Death obediently bows!”
2 aphorism " Without love there is no happiness, without a woman there is no love, without a mother there is neither a poet nor a hero.All the pride in the world comes from mothers!”
3 aphorism “Let us praise the woman-Mother, whose love knows no barriers, whose breasts fed the whole world!Everything beautiful in a person comes from the rays of the sun and from the Mother’s milk...”
The tale ends with a chord that sums up the philosophical results of the developing theme: “We (Mothers) are stronger than Death. We who continually give the world sages, poets, heroes, we who sow in it everything for which it is famous!”
- Analytical conversation on the 11th fairy tale “Mother of the Traitor.”
The 11th tale begins with an aphorism: “You can talk about Mothers endlessly...”
The lines that follow the aphorism depict a city in dire danger of destruction. The picture of life in the besieged city is recreated very accurately. Landscape details give it special expressiveness.
Work with text. The moon is “a lost shield, beaten by the blows of swords.”
Against the backdrop of the tormented, bleeding city is Marianne, the mother of the traitor.
What unites her with all Mothers, with all other citizens?
What does she have in common with the Mother from the previous fairy tale?
(She loves her son very much. Until recently, she looked at her son with pride, as a precious gift to her homeland, as good power, born to help people.)
What new appears in the image of the Mother?
(Understanding responsibility for her son’s betrayal. These mother’s thoughts are expressed in aphorisms: “I am a mother, I love him (my son) and I consider myself guilty that he became like this,” “Mothers hate offensive weapons, recognizing only those that protect life ")
What is the main, climactic scene in the fairy tale?
(conversation between mother and son)
And again, Gorky’s favorite technique is opposition.
Mother (maternal creation) - Son (individual destruction).
A logical continuation of the dialogue between Mother and Timur.
- Summing up the lesson.
Mother convinced Timur of the almighty power of the Mother, who gave the world all its heroes.
In the 11th tale, having appeared to her son as “the embodiment of the city’s misfortunes,” the Mother argues with him about who can be considered a hero...
“A hero is one who creates life in spite of death, who conquers death...”
-What did mother do? (“Man – I did everything I could for my homeland. Mother – I stay with my son.”)
Conclusion. The grief of a mother who has lost her son is immeasurable, this is a terrible punishment, but worse than this punishment is the betrayal of her son - this is the leitmotif of M. Gorky’s fairy tale.
The wonderful Austrian composer Franz Schubert wrote a very beautiful vocal composition glorifying the Mother “Ave, Maria”. Let's listen to her.
(Listening to a piece of music)
- D. z. Write a miniature essay “The Image of the Mother in “Tales of Italy” by M. Gorky.
Studying the chapter-by-chapter summary of Gorky’s novel “Mother,” one can understand why this work was first published in the USA. The author published it only in 1907–1908, it had major changes regarding censorship. Original without changes Russian readers were able to see it after.
In contact with
History of creation
Although work on the work took place in mid-1906, the first sketches were made back in 1903. By mid-October, Gorky moved from America closer to Russia and - to Italy, where he finishes the first edition. The history of the creation of the novel is connected with the close acquaintance of the author and the Sormovo workers. The material for creating the novel “Mother” was the actions taking place at the Sormovo plant in Nizhny Novgorod.
He witnessed the preparations for the May demonstration and the trial of its participants. Close communication with labor collective enterprises in 1901–1902 allowed Gorky to collect material that served basis for creating a novel, where the main character Pavel Vlasov and his friend Andrei Nakhodka experience similar events.
Important! The author's attention is paid to the strength of the protesting oppressed class, called the proletariat. It depicts his struggles in other early works. For example, the play “Bourgeois”, which reveals the image of a worker revolutionary, or “Enemies”, which depicts the events of the first Russian revolution.
Main character's family
The image of Pavel Vlasov in Gorky’s novel “Mother” begins with a description of the hero at the age of 14. The main character's father's name was Mikhail, he was a factory mechanic who was disliked by his colleagues. Rude, grumpy character, reflected in loved ones: his wife and child were periodically beaten. Before his death, coming home from work, he decided to teach his son a lesson, to pull his hair. Pavel grabbed a heavy hammer - his father was afraid to touch the young man. After the incident Mikhail became isolated, and when he died from a hernia, no one was sorry.
After this, Pavel continues to work at the factory. Suddenly he changes, he starts going for walks on holidays, bringing and reading forbidden literature. Mother explains her behavior desire to know the truth, for which they can be sent to hard labor, put in prison.
Every Saturday revolutionaries gather in the hero's house. They read books, sing forbidden songs, characterize the political system, and discuss the lives of workers.
The mother understands that “socialist” is a terrible word, but she sympathizes with her son’s comrades. Nilovna is only 40 years old, but the author describes her as an elderly woman, broken by a difficult hopeless life and a difficult fate.
Plot development
Maxim Gorky in the novel “Mother” revealed Nilovna's motherly love: She becomes closer to her son’s friends, while her relationship with Pavel becomes better. Among the guests visiting the house, the author identifies several:
- Natasha is a young girl from a wealthy family who left her parents and came to work as a teacher;
- Nikolai Ivanovich is a well-read, intelligent man, he can always find interesting topic and tell the workers;
- Sashenka is the daughter of a landowner who left her family for the sake of an idea;
- Andrey Nakhodka is a young man who grew up an orphan.
A retelling of the summary of Gorky's novel "Mother" reveals the life of revolutionaries. Nilovna feels that Pavel and Sashenka love each other However, for the good of the revolution, young people refuse to start a family, as this may distract from an important matter. Andrey Nakhodka understands what motherly love is: the mistress of the house treats him like family. Soon the Vlasovs invite him to live with them, and he agrees.
The promotion of the plot and the next presentation of the image of Pavel Mikhailovich Vlasov in Gorky’s novel “Mother” begins with an episode called "swamp penny". The summary is as follows: the factory management imposes an additional tax on the already small wages of the workers. It will be intended for the development of swamp lands located near the walls of the enterprise. Main character decides to pay attention to this and writes a note in the city newspaper. The traitor's mother is called to take the text to the editor. At this time, he himself is leading a rally taking place at the plant. However, the director calms the crowd from the first word and sends everyone to their jobs. Pavel understands that people do not trust him because young age. At night, the gendarmes take Pavel to prison.
Traitor's Mother
What Gorky’s work “Mother” is about becomes clear from the first chapters. Main issues is to reveal the image and spirit of the workers, fighting against the current government and extortions. After reading the novel, the name of the main character’s mother would hardly have been remembered if not for the subsequent events in which she finds herself in the foreground of the novel’s plot. Gradually analyzing the meaning of the book chapter by chapter, the motivation for the elderly woman’s actions becomes clear: it is maternal love.
Immediately after the arrest, Nilovna’s son’s friend comes to her and asks for help. The fact is that a total of 50 people were arrested, but it is possible to prove non-involvement in the rally only by continuing distributing leaflets. The mother of her traitorous son agrees to carry the papers to the factory. She begins delivering lunches to the factory for the workers, which are prepared by a woman she knows; she takes advantage of the fact that the old woman is not searched. After some time, the main characters, Andrei Nakhodka and Pavel Vlasov, are released.
Attention! In Maxim Gorky’s novel “Mother,” the image of the main characters is depicted in such a way that after leaving prison they are not afraid, but continue to engage in underground activities.
Arrest again
Workers are preparing for the May Day holiday. It is planned to march through the city streets and give a speech at the factory square. Pavel cannot think of anything except that he will lead the procession, carrying the red banner of freedom in his hands.
However, gendarmes and soldiers block the demonstrators' path and disperse the procession. Many end up behind bars, and Vlasov is among them.
Nilovna was present when her son was arrested, she saw everything. The one who wrote “Mother” understood perfectly what was going on in a mother’s heart. The further development of events is characterized by the spontaneous and thoughtless actions of the elderly woman: she picks up a piece of the banner that her only son was carrying and takes it home.
After the events described, the old woman is taken by Nikolai Ivanovich (such conditions were agreed upon in advance between him, Andrei and Pavel). In the mother’s heart there burns a flame of desire for a better life and at the same time resentment for the fate of her son, so she leads active underground activities:
- distributes underground books and magazines;
- talks with people, listens to stories;
- convinces them to join.
Traveling around the province, Nilovna sees how poorly the common people live, unable to take advantage of the enormous riches of their native land. Returning back, the mother hurries to meet Pavel. Friends worry about their best comrade and try to arrange an escape, initiated by Sashenka. The hero refuses help, explaining his actions by his desire to make a speech before the court.
At trial
Maxim Gorky wrote about Pavel's trial as a sad picture of the past tense: the speeches of the lawyer, judge, and prosecutor are perceived as one. The words of Pavel Vlasov sounded loudly and boldly. He did not say words of justification, the young man tried to explain to those present who they were - people of new times. Although they are called rebels, they are socialists. The slogan consists of simple, understandable words:
- Power to the people!
- Means of production for the people!
- Labor is obligatory for all citizens!
The judge reacted negatively to the young revolutionary’s statements and passed a sentence: “All detainees will be sent to a settlement in Siberia.” The mother is skeptical about the verdict for her son, realizing the court's decision only after some time. Nilovna does not believe in the possibility of separation from her only Pavel for many years.
The problems of Gorky’s novel “Mother” affect the last chapters of the work. The court pronounces a verdict: the accused refer to the settlement. Sashenka is going to follow her lover, Nilovna plans to come if her son has grandchildren.
However, while transporting Paul's printed court speech to a nearby town, an elderly woman recognizes in the look young man has familiar features.
He was present in the courthouse, next to the prison. The guy whispers to the watchman, who approaches his mother and calls her a thief. The latter, in turn, calls the accusation a lie, handing out leaflets with her son’s speech to those around her. The gendarme arrives in time and grabs the woman by the throat; in response, wheezing and exclamations are heard from the people who see this spectacle.
Gradually following the chapters, the woman does not realize: from an ordinary mother, whose son is in prison, she has turned into the mother of a traitor. A brief summary of the plot of the work does not allow one to fully plunge into the cycle of problems that have washed over the simple Russian heroine. The problems of Gorky's novel "Mother" affect a wide range of popularity of revolutionary ideas among the working class.
As the depicted object, the author shows the life of an ordinary person becoming a person, capable of thinking and reflecting. The work is a socio-political book that pushes to identify a promising idea of the emergence of a persistent struggle against the oppressive class.
Brief summary of Gorky's novel "Mother"
Analysis of Maxim Gorky's novel "Mother"
Conclusion
Separately, it should be mentioned that the main characters of Gorky’s novel “Mother” were invented after meeting revolutionaries, because of which the author had to emigrate to America. The significance of the novel lies in the fact that the author wrote for millions, he tried to make his works simple and understandable. But, despite this, after the novel was written and published, Gorky was not satisfied with his work, just like many others.
Sultry day, silence; life is frozen in bright peace, the sky tenderly looks at the earth with a blue clear eye, the sun is its fiery pupil.
The sea is smoothly forged from blue metal, the colorful boats of the fishermen are motionless, as if sealed into a semicircle of the bay, bright as the sky. A seagull will fly by, lazily flapping its wings, and the water will show another bird, whiter and more beautiful than the one in the air.
The distance is dying; There, in the fog, a purple island quietly floats - or, heated by the sun, melts, a lonely rock in the middle of the sea, a gentle semi-precious stone in the ring of the Gulf of Naples.
The rocky shore, rugged with ledges, descends to the sea, all curly and lush with the dark foliage of grapes, orange trees, lemons and figs, all in the dull silver of olive foliage. Through the stream of greenery, falling steeply into the sea, golden, red and white flowers smile welcomingly, and yellow and orange fruits remind of the stars on a moonless hot night, when the sky is dark and the air is humid.
There is silence in the sky, sea and soul; I want to hear how all living things silently sing a prayer to the Sun God.
A narrow path winds between the gardens, and along it, quietly descending from stone to stone, a tall woman in a black dress walks towards the sea; it has been faded in the sun to brown spots, and even from a distance its patches are visible. Her head is not covered - the silver of her gray hair glistens; in small rings they shower her high forehead, temples and dark skin of her cheeks; this hair must be impossible to comb smoothly.
Her face is sharp, stern, once you see it, you will remember it forever, there is something deeply ancient in this dry face, and if you meet the direct and dark gaze of her eyes, you involuntarily remember the sultry deserts of the east, Deborah and Judith.
She bows her head and knits something red; the steel of the hook sparkles, a ball of wool is hidden somewhere in the clothes, but it seems that the red thread is coming from this woman’s chest. The path is steep and capricious, you can hear the rustling of stones as they crumble, but this gray-haired woman descends so confidently, as if her feet could see the way.
This is what they say about this person: she is a widow, her husband, a fisherman, soon after the wedding left to fish and did not return, leaving her with a child under her heart.
When the child was born, she began to hide him from people, did not go out into the sun with him to show off her son, as all mothers do, she kept him in a dark corner of her hut, wrapped in rags, and for a long time none of the neighbors saw how built the newborn was - they only saw his large head and huge, motionless eyes on his yellow face. They also noticed that she, healthy and agile, had previously fought against need tirelessly, cheerfully, able to inspire cheerfulness in others, but now she became silent, always thinking about something, frowning and looking at everything through the fog of sadness with a strange look that seemed as if he was asking about something.
It took a little time for everyone to recognize her grief: the child was born a freak, that’s why she hid him, that’s what oppressed her.
Then the neighbors told her that, of course, they understand how shameful it is for a woman to be the mother of a freak; no one except the Madonna knows whether she was justly punished by this cruel insult, but the child is not to blame for anything and she is in vain depriving him of the sun.
She listened to the people and showed them her son - his arms and legs were short, like the fins of a fish, his head, swollen into a huge ball, could barely rest on a thin, flabby neck, and his face looked like an old man’s, all covered in wrinkles, with a couple of dull spots on it. an eye and a large mouth stretched into a dead smile.
The women cried looking at him, the men, wrinkling their faces in disgust, left gloomily; the freak's mother sat on the ground, now hiding her head, now raising it and looking at everyone as if she was silently asking about something that no one understood.
The neighbors made a box for the freak - like a coffin, filled it with wool scraps and rags, put the freak in this soft, hot nest and placed the box in the shade in the yard, secretly hoping that under the sun, which works miracles every day, another miracle would happen.
But time passed, and he remained the same: a huge head, a long body with four powerless appendages; only his smile took on an increasingly definite expression of insatiable greed and his mouth was filled with two rows of sharp, crooked teeth. The short paws learned to grab pieces of bread and almost unerringly dragged them into the big, hot mouth.
He was mute, but when they were eating somewhere close to him and the freak heard the smell of food, he muttered muffledly, opening his mouth and shaking his heavy head, and the cloudy whites of his eyes were covered with a red network of bloody veins.
He ate a lot and as time went on he ate more and more, his mooing became continuous; the mother, without giving up, worked, but often her earnings were insignificant, and sometimes there was none at all. She did not complain and reluctantly - always silently - accepted the help of her neighbors, but when she was not at home, the neighbors, irritated by the mooing, ran into the yard and shoved crusts of bread, vegetables, fruits - everything that could be eaten - into their insatiable mouth.
Soon he will gnaw you all over! - they told her. - Why don’t you give him to a shelter somewhere, to a hospital?
She answered gloomily:
I gave birth to him, and I have to feed him.
She was beautiful, and more than one man sought her love, all to no avail, but to the one she liked more than others, she said:
I can’t be your wife, I’m afraid to give birth to another freak, it would be a shame for you. No, go away!
The man persuaded her, reminded her of the Madonna, who is fair to mothers and considers them her sisters, - the mother of the freak answered him:
I don’t know what I’m guilty of, but I’m punished cruelly.
He begged, cried and raged, then she said:
You can't do what you don't believe in. Go away!
He went somewhere far away, forever.
And so for many years she filled her bottomless, tirelessly chewing mouth, he devoured the fruits of her labors, her blood and life, his head grew and became more and more terrible, like a ball, ready to break away from his powerless, thin neck and fly away, touching the corners of houses , swaying lazily from side to side.
Anyone who looked into the yard involuntarily stopped, amazed, shuddering, unable to understand what he was seeing? Near the wall, overgrown with grapes, on the stones, as if on an altar, there stood a box, and from it this head rose, and, clearly protruding against the background of greenery, a yellow, wrinkled, high-cheeked face attracted the gaze of the passer-by; they stared, crawling out of their sockets and sticking for a long time in the memory of everyone who saw them, dull eyes, a wide, flattened nose trembled, exorbitantly developed cheekbones and jaws moved, flabby lips moved, revealing two rows of predatory teeth, and, as if living their own separate life, large, sensitive, animal ears - this terrible mask was covered by a cap of black hair, curled into small rings, like the hair of a Negro.
Holding in his hand, short and small, like a lizard’s paw, a piece of something edible, the freak tilted his head with the movements of a pecking bird and, tearing off the food with his teeth, loudly chomped and sniffled. Well-fed, looking at people, he always bared his teeth, and his eyes moved to the bridge of his nose, merging into a dull bottomless spot on this half-dead face, the movements of which resembled agony. If he was hungry, he stretched his neck forward and, opening his red mouth, moving his thin snake tongue, mooed demandingly.
Crossing themselves and saying prayers, people walked away, remembering all the bad things they had experienced, all the misfortunes they had experienced in life.
The old blacksmith, a man of gloomy mind, more than once said:
In everyone, this dumb head evoked sad thoughts, feelings that frightened the heart.
The freak's mother was silent, listening to people's words, her hair was quickly turning gray, wrinkles appeared on her face, she had long forgotten how to laugh. People knew that at night she stood motionless at the door, looked at the sky and seemed to be waiting for someone; they said to each other:
What should she expect?
Plant him in the square near the old church! - her neighbors advised her. - There are foreigners walking around there, they won’t refuse to throw him a few copper coins every day.
The mother shuddered in fear, saying:
It will be terrible if people from other countries see it - what will they think of us?
They answered her:
Poverty is everywhere, everyone knows about it!
She shook her head negatively.
But foreigners, driven by boredom, wandered everywhere, looked into all the courtyards and, of course, looked at her too: she was at home, she saw the grimaces of disgust and disgust on the well-fed faces of these idle people, heard them talking about her son, curling their lips and narrowing his eyes. A few words spoken contemptuously, hostilely, and with obvious triumph especially struck her in the heart.
XI
You can talk endlessly about Mothers.
For several weeks now the city had been surrounded by a close ring of enemies clad in iron; At night, fires were lit, and the fire looked out of the black darkness at the walls of the city with many red eyes - they glowed with malicious joy, and this lurking fire evoked gloomy thoughts in the besieged city.
From the walls they saw how the enemy’s noose was shrinking ever closer, how their black shadows flickered around the lights; you could hear the neighing of well-fed horses, you could hear the clink of weapons, loud laughter, you could hear the cheerful songs of people confident in victory - and what is more painful to hear than the laughter and songs of the enemy?
The enemies covered all the streams that fed the city with water, they burned out the vineyards around the walls, trampled the fields, cut down the gardens - the city was open on all sides, and almost every day the guns and muskets of the enemies showered it with cast iron and lead.
Troops of soldiers, battle-weary and half-starved, walked gloomily along the narrow streets of the city; From the windows of the houses poured out the groans of the wounded, the cries of delirium, the prayers of women and the cries of children. They talked depressedly, in a low voice and, stopping each other's speech mid-sentence, listened intently - were the enemies about to attack?
Life became especially unbearable in the evening, when in the silence moans and cries sounded clearer and more abundantly, when blue-black shadows crawled out of the gorges of the distant mountains and, hiding the enemy’s camp, moved towards the half-broken walls, and over the black battlements of the mountains the moon appeared like a lost shield , beaten by blows of swords.
Without expecting help, exhausted by labor and hunger, losing hope every day, people looked in fear at this moon, the sharp teeth of the mountains, the black mouths of the gorges and the noisy camp of the enemies - everything reminded them of death, and not a single star shone comfortingly for them. them.
People were afraid to light lights in the houses, thick darkness filled the streets, and in this darkness, like a fish in the depths of a river, a woman silently flashed, her head wrapped in a black cloak.
People, seeing her, asked each other:
That's her?
And they hid in niches under the gates or, with their heads down, silently ran past her, and the patrol commanders sternly warned her:
Are you on the street again, Monna Marianna? Look, you can be killed, and no one will look for the culprit...
She straightened up and waited, but the patrol passed by, not daring or disdainful to raise a hand against her; armed people walked around her like a corpse, and she remained in the darkness and again quietly, lonelyly walked somewhere, moving from street to street, dumb and black, like the embodiment of the misfortunes of the city, and around, chasing her, sad sounds crawled pitifully: groans , crying, prayers and gloomy talk of soldiers who had lost hope of victory.
A citizen and mother, she thought about her son and homeland: at the head of the people who were destroying the city, stood her son, a cheerful and ruthless handsome man; Until recently, she looked at him with pride, as her precious gift to her homeland, as a good force born by her to help the people of the city - the nest where she herself was born, gave birth to and nurtured him. Hundreds of inextricable threads connected her heart with the ancient stones from which her ancestors built houses and laid the walls of the city, with the ground where the bones of her blood relatives lay, with legends, songs and hopes of people - the heart of the mother of the person closest to him lost and cried: it was like scales, but, weighing the love for his son and the city, he could not understand what was easier, what was heavier.
So she walked the streets at night, and many, not recognizing her, were frightened, mistook the black figure for the personification of death, which was close to everyone, and when they recognized her, they silently walked away from the traitor’s mother.
But one day, in a remote corner, near the city wall, she saw another woman: kneeling near a corpse, motionless, like a piece of earth, she prayed, raising her mournful face to the stars, and on the wall, above her head, the guards were quietly talking and grinding weapons, hitting the stones of the battlements.
The traitor's mother asked:
Brother? - Son. The husband was killed thirteen days ago, and this one was killed today.
And, rising from her knees, the mother of the murdered man humbly said:
Madonna sees everything, knows everything, and I thank her!
For what? - asked the first one, and she answered her:
Now that he honestly died fighting for his homeland, I can say that he aroused fear in me: frivolous, he loved a cheerful life too much, and it was afraid that for this he would betray the city, as did Marianne’s son, the enemy of God and people, the leader of our enemies, damn him, and damn the womb that carried him!..
Covering her face, Marianna walked away, and the next morning she appeared to the defenders of the city and said:
Either kill me because my son has become your enemy, or open the gates for me, I will go to him...
They have replyed:
You are a human being, and your homeland should be dear to you; your son is as much an enemy for you as he is for each of us.
I am a mother, I love him and I consider myself guilty that he is what he has become.
Then they began to consult what to do with her, and decided:
In honor, we cannot kill you for your son’s sin, we know that you could not instill this terrible sin in him, and we can guess how you must suffer. But the city does not need you even as a hostage - your son does not care about you, we think that he has forgotten you, the devil, and - here is your punishment if you find that you deserve it! This seems worse to us than death!
Yes! - she said. - This is worse.
They opened the gates for her, let her out of the city and watched for a long time from the wall as she walked along native land, thickly saturated with the blood shed by her son: she walked slowly, with great difficulty lifting her feet from this ground, bowing to the corpses of the city’s defenders, disgustedly pushing away the broken weapon with her foot - mothers hate offensive weapons, recognizing only those with which life is protected.
It was as if she was carrying a cup full of moisture in her hands under her cloak, and was afraid of spilling it; As she moved away, she became smaller and smaller, and to those who looked at her from the wall, it seemed as if despondency and hopelessness were leaving them with her.
They saw how she stopped halfway and, throwing off the hood of her cloak from her head, looked at the city for a long time, and there, in the enemy camp, they noticed her, alone in the middle of the field, and, slowly, carefully, black figures like her were approaching her .
They came up and asked who she was and where she was going?
Your leader is my son,” she said, and not one of the soldiers doubted this. They walked next to her, praising how smart and brave her son was, she listened to them, proudly raising her head, and was not surprised - this is how her son should be!
And here she is before the man whom she knew nine months before his birth, before the one whom she had never felt outside her heart - in silk and velvet he is before her, and his weapon is in precious stones. Everything is as it should be; This is exactly how she saw him many times in her dreams - rich, famous and loved.
Mother! - he said, kissing her hands. - You came to me, it means you understood me, and tomorrow I will take this damned city!
In which you were born,” she reminded.
Intoxicated by his exploits, maddened by the thirst for even greater glory, he spoke to her with the daring fervor of youth:
I was born into the world and for the world, to amaze it! I spared this city for your sake - it is like a thorn in my foot and prevents me from moving as quickly to glory as I want. But now - tomorrow - I will destroy the nest of stubborn people!
Where every stone knows and remembers you as a child,” she said.
Stones are mute, if a person doesn’t make them speak, let the mountains talk about me, that’s what I want!
But - people? - she asked.
Oh yes, I remember them, mother! And I need them, because only in the memory of people are heroes immortal!
She said:
A hero is one who creates life in spite of death, who conquers death...
No! - he objected. “He who destroys is as glorious as he who builds cities.” Look - we don’t know whether Aeneas or Romulus built Rome, but the name of Alaric and other heroes who destroyed this city is definitely known.
“Who survived all the names,” the mother reminded.
So he spoke to her until sunset, she interrupted his crazy speeches less and less, and her proud head sank lower and lower.
Mother creates, she protects, and to talk about destruction in front of her means to speak against her, but he did not know this and denied the meaning of her life.
Mother is always against death; the hand that introduces death into people's homes is hateful and hostile to Mothers - her son did not see this, blinded by the cold brilliance of glory that kills the heart.
And he did not know that the Mother is an animal as intelligent, merciless as fearless, if it comes to the life that she, the Mother, creates and protects.
She sat bent over, and through the open canvas of the leader’s rich tent she could see the city where she first experienced the sweet trembling of conception and the painful spasms of the birth of a child who now wants to destroy.
The crimson rays of the sun drenched the walls and towers of the city in blood, the glass of the windows shone ominously, the whole city seemed wounded, and the red juice of life flowed through hundreds of wounds; Time passed, and then the city began to turn black, like a corpse, and the stars lit up above it, like funeral candles.
She saw there, in dark houses where they were afraid to light a fire so as not to attract the attention of enemies, on streets full of darkness, the smell of corpses, the suppressed whispers of people awaiting death - she saw everything and everyone; something familiar and dear stood close to her, silently awaiting her decision, and she felt like a mother to all the people of her city.
Clouds descended from the black mountain peaks into the valley and, as if winged horses, flew towards a city doomed to death.
“Perhaps we will fall upon him at night,” said her son, “if the night is dark enough!” It’s inconvenient to kill when the sun is looking into your eyes and the shine of the weapon blinds them - there are always a lot of wrong blows,” he said, examining his sword.
His mother told him:
Come here, lay your head on my chest, rest, remembering how cheerful and kind you were as a child and how everyone loved you...
He obeyed, lay down on her lap and closed his eyes, saying:
I love only fame and you, because you gave birth to me as I am.
What about women? - she asked, leaning over him.
There are a lot of them, they quickly get boring, like everything too sweet.
She asked him for the last time:
And you don't want to have children?
For what? To be killed? Someone like me will kill them, and it will hurt me, and then I will be old and weak to avenge them.
You are beautiful, but barren as lightning,” she said, sighing.
He answered smiling:
Yes, like lightning...
And he dozed off on his mother’s chest like a child.
Then she, covering him with her black cloak, stuck a knife into his heart, and he, shuddering, died immediately - after all, she knew well where her son’s heart beats. And, throwing his corpse from her knees at the feet of the astonished guards, she said towards the city:
Man - I did everything I could for my homeland; Mother - I stay with my son! It’s too late for me to give birth to another, no one needs my life.
And the same knife, still warm from his blood - her blood - she plunged into her chest with a firm hand and also correctly hit her heart - if it hurts, it’s easy to hit.
As if thousands of metal strings are stretched through the dense foliage of olive trees, the wind shakes the hard leaves, they touch the strings, and these light continuous touches fill the air with a hot, intoxicating sound. This is not yet music, but it seems that invisible hands are tuning hundreds of invisible harps, and all the time you are tensely waiting for a moment of silence to come, and then a powerful string hymn to the sun, sky and sea will burst out.
The wind blows, the trees sway and seem to go from the mountain to the sea, shaking their tops. The wave hits the coastal stones evenly and dully; the sea is all in living white spots, as if countless flocks of birds have descended onto its blue plain, they all swim in one direction, disappear, diving into the depths, appear again and ring barely audibly. And, as if carrying them along, two ships, also similar to gray birds, sway on the horizon, raising high three-tiered sails; all this - reminiscent of an old, half-forgotten dream - does not look like life.
By nightfall there will be a strong wind! - says the old fisherman, sitting in the shade of stones, on a small beach dotted with ringing pebbles.
The surf threw fibers of fragrant sea grass - red, golden and green - onto the stones; the grass withers in the sun and hot stones, the salty air is filled with the tart smell of iodine. Curly waves run onto the beach one after another.
The old fisherman looks like a bird - a small, squeezed face, a humped nose and round, apparently very keen eyes, invisible in the dark folds of his skin. The fingers are hooked, inactive and dry.
“Fifty years ago, sir,” says the old man, in tune with the rustling of the waves and the ringing of the cicadas, “there was once such a cheerful and sonorous day, when everyone was laughing and singing. My father was forty, I was sixteen, and I was in love, which is inevitable at sixteen and in good sunshine.
“Let’s go, Guido, for pezzoni,” said the father. - Pezzoni, sir, is a very thin and tasty fish with pink fins, it is also called coral fish because it is found where there are corals, very deep. It is caught while standing at anchor, using a hook with a heavy sinker. Beautiful fish.
And off we went, expecting nothing but good luck. My father was strong man, an experienced fisherman, but shortly before that he was ill - his chest hurt, and his fingers were damaged by rheumatism - a disease of fishermen.
This is a very cunning and evil wind, this one that blows so gently on us from the shore, as if quietly pushing us into the sea - there it approaches you unnoticed and suddenly rushes at you, as if you had insulted it. The barge is immediately torn off and flies with the wind, sometimes upside down, and you are in the water. This happens in one minute, you don’t have time to curse or mention the name of God before you are already spinning around and being driven into the distance. The robber is more honest than this wind. However, people are always more honest than the elements.
Yes, so this wind hit us four kilometers from the coast - very close, as you can see, it hit us unexpectedly, like a coward and a scoundrel.
- “Guido! - said the parent, grabbing the oars with his mutilated hands. - Hold on, Guido! Alive - anchor!
But while I was choosing an anchor, my father was hit in the chest with an oar - the oars were torn out of his hands - he fell to the bottom without memory. I had no time to help him; every second we could have been knocked over. At first, everything was done quickly: when I sat down on the oars, we were already rushing somewhere, surrounded by water dust, the wind tore off the tops of the waves and sprinkled us, like a priest, only with the best zeal and not at all in order to wash away our sins.
- “This is serious, my son! - said the father, coming to his senses and looking towards the shore. “This will last a long time, my dear.”
If you are young, it is not easy to believe in danger, I tried to row, did everything that needs to be done in the water at a dangerous moment, when this wind - the breath of evil devils - kindly digs thousands of graves for you and sings a requiem for free.
“Sit still, Guido,” said the father, grinning and shaking water from his head. - What is the use of picking the sea with matches? Save your strength, otherwise they will wait for you at home in vain.”
Green waves throw our little boat like children throw a ball, look over the sides at us, rise above our heads, roar, shake, we fall into deep holes, climb white ridges - and the shore runs away from us further and further and also dances like our barge . Then my father says to me:
- “You may return to earth, but I won’t!” Listen to what I will tell you about fish and work...”
And he began to tell me everything he knew about the habits of these and other fish - where, when and how to catch them more successfully.
- “Maybe we better pray, father?” - I suggested when I realized that our affairs were bad: we were like a pair of rabbits in a pack of white dogs, grinning at us from everywhere.
- “God sees everything! - he said. - He knows that people created for the earth are dying at sea and that one of them, not hoping for salvation, must pass on to his son what he knows. Work is needed by the earth and people - God understands this...”
And, having told me everything he knew about work, my father began to talk about how to live with people.
- “Is now the time to teach me? - I said. “You didn’t do this on earth!”
- “On earth I have not felt death so close.”
The wind howled like an animal and splashed the waves - my father had to shout for me to hear, and he shouted:
- “Always act as if there is no one better than you and no one worse - this will be true! The nobleman and the fisherman, the priest and the soldier are one body, and you are as necessary a member of it as all the others. Never approach a person thinking that there is more bad in him than good - think that there is more good in him - and so it will be! People give what is asked of them.”
This, of course, was not said right away, but, you know, like a command: we were thrown from wave to wave, and now from below, now from above, through the splashes of water, I heard these words. Much was carried away by the wind before it reached me, much I could not understand - is it time to study, sir, when every minute threatens death! I was scared, it was the first time I had seen the sea so furious and I felt so powerless in it. And I cannot say whether then or after, remembering these hours, I experienced a feeling that is still alive in the memory of my heart.
How I see my parent now: he is sitting at the bottom of the barge, with his sore arms outstretched, clutching the sides with his fingers, his hat has been washed off him, the waves rush on his head and shoulders, now from the right, now from the left, hitting him from behind and in front, he shakes his head, snorts and shouts to me from time to time. Wet, he became small, and his eyes were huge from fear, or maybe from pain. I think - from pain.
- "Listen! - shouted to me. - Hey - do you hear?
Sometimes I answered him:
- “I hear!”
- “Remember - all good things come from man.”
- "OK!" - I answer.
He never spoke to me like that on earth. He was cheerful and kind, but it seemed to me that he was looking at me mockingly and distrustfully, that I was still a child for him. Sometimes this offended me - youth is proud.
His screams tamed my fear, which must be why I remember everything so well.
The old fisherman paused, looked into the white sea, smiled and said with a wink:
Having looked closely at people, I know, sir, that remembering is the same as understanding, and the more you understand, the more good you see - this is so, believe me!
Yes, so - I remember his sweet wet face and huge eyes - they looked at me seriously, with love, and so that I knew then - I was not destined to die on this day. I was afraid, but I knew that I would not die.
Of course, we were upset. Here we are both in boiling water, in foam that blinds us, the waves throw our bodies, hitting them against the keel of the barge. Even earlier we tied everything that could be tied to the banks, we have ropes in our hands, we will not tear ourselves away from our barge as long as we have the strength, but it’s difficult to stay on the water. Several times he or I were thrown onto the keel and immediately washed off. The most important thing here is that you feel dizzy, deaf and blind - your eyes and ears are flooded with water, and you swallow a lot of it.
This lasted a long time - about seven hours, then the wind immediately changed, rushed thickly towards the shore, and we were carried towards the ground. Then I was delighted and shouted:
- “Hold on!”
My father also shouted something, I understood one word:
- “It will break...”
He was thinking about the stones, they were still far away, I didn’t believe him. But he knew the matter better than me - we rushed among the mountains of water, clinging like snails to our nurse, being beaten up by her, already exhausted and numb. This lasted a long time, but when the dark mountains of the coast became visible, everything went with indescribable speed. Swinging, they moved towards us, bent over the water, ready to topple over on our heads, - once, once - the white waves tossed our bodies, our barge crunched like a nut under the heel of a boot, I was torn from it, I saw the broken black ribs of the rocks, sharp , like knives, I see my father’s head high above me, then above these claws of the devils. He was caught about two hours later, with a broken back and a skull smashed to the brain. The wound on the head was huge, part of the brain was washed out of it, but I remember gray, with red veins, pieces in the wound, like marble or foam with blood. He was terribly mutilated, all broken, but his face was clean, calm, and his eyes were well and tightly closed.
I? Yes, I was also pretty beaten up, they dragged me ashore without memory. We were brought to the mainland, beyond Amalfi - a foreign place, but, of course, our own people are also fishermen, such cases do not surprise them, but make them kind: people who lead a dangerous life are always kind!
I think I wasn’t able to tell about my father the way I feel, and what I’ve kept in my heart for fifty-one years requires special words, maybe even a song, but we are simple people, like fish, and we don’t know how to speak as beautifully as you would like! You always feel and know more than you can say.
The whole point is that he, my father, at the hour of death, knowing that he could not avoid it, was not afraid, did not forget about me, his son, and found the strength and time to convey to me everything that he considered important. I lived sixty-seven years and I can say that everything he instilled in me is true!
The old man took off his knitted cap, once red, now brown, took out a pipe from it and, tilting his bare bronze skull, said strongly:
That's right, dear sir! People are the way you want them to be, look at them with kind eyes, and you will feel good, they will too, this will make them even better, and so will you! It's simple!
The wind became stronger, the waves were higher, sharper and whiter; The birds have grown up on the sea, they are sailing more and more hastily into the distance, and two ships with three-tiered sails have already disappeared beyond the blue horizon.
The steep shores of the island are covered in the foam of the waves, the blue water splashes wildly, and the cicadas ring tirelessly and passionately.
XIII
On the day this happened, the sirocco was blowing, a damp wind from Africa - a nasty wind! - he irritates the nerves, brings bad moods, which is why two cab drivers - Giuseppe Cirotta and Luigi Mata - quarreled. The quarrel arose imperceptibly, it was impossible to understand who first caused it, people only saw how Luigi threw himself on Giuseppe’s chest, trying to grab him by the throat, and he, with his head buried in his shoulders, hid his thick red neck and put out his black strong fists.
They were immediately separated and asked:
What's the matter?
Blue with anger, Luigi shouted:
Let this bull repeat in front of everyone what he said about my wife!
Chirotta wanted to leave, he hid his small eyes in the folds of a disdainful grimace and, shaking his round black head, refused to repeat the insult, then Mata said loudly:
He says that he recognized the sweetness of my wife’s caresses!
Hey! - the people said. - This is not a joke, it requires serious attention. Calm down, Luigi! You are a stranger here, your wife is our person, we all knew her as a child, and if you are offended - her guilt falls on all of us - let's be truthful!
We proceeded to Chirotta.
Did you say that?
Well, yes,” he admitted.
And it is true?
Who ever caught me in a lie?
Cirotta is a decent man, a good family man, - things took a very dark turn - people were confused and thoughtful, and Luigi went home and said to Concetta:
I'd like to check out! I don’t want to know you unless you prove that this scoundrel’s words are slander.
She, of course, cried, but - after all, tears do not justify; Luigi pushed her away, and now she was left alone, with a child in her arms, without money or bread.
Women stood up - first of all Katarina, a vegetable seller, a smart fox, a kind of, you know, old bag, tightly stuffed with meat and bones and in some places very wrinkled.
“Signors,” she said, “you have already heard that this concerns the honor of all of you.” This is her prank, inspired by a moonlit night, the fate of two mothers is affected - right? I take Concetta to my place, and she will live with me until the day when we discover the truth.
They did so, and then Katarina and that dry witch Lucia, a screamer whose voice can be heard for three miles, set to work on poor Giuseppe: they called and began to pluck his soul like an old rag:
Well, good fellow, tell me - have you taken her many times, Concetta?
Fat Giuseppe puffed out his cheeks, thought and said:
One day.
“This could have been said without thinking,” Lucia noted out loud, but as if to herself.
Did this happen in the evening, at night, in the morning? - Katarina asked, just like a judge.
Giuseppe, without thinking, chose the evening.
Was it still light?
Yes, said the fool.
So! So you saw her body?
Well, of course!
So tell us what it is!
Then he understood what these questions were for, and opened his mouth, like a sparrow choking on a grain of barley, he understood and muttered, getting so angry that his large ears filled with blood and turned purple.
What, he says, can I say? After all, I didn’t treat her like a doctor!
Do you eat fruits without admiring them? - asked Lucia. - But maybe you still noticed one feature of Concettina? - she asks further and winks at him, like a snake.
“It all happened so quickly,” says Giuseppe, “really, I didn’t notice anything.”
That means you didn’t have it! - said Katarina, “she is a kind old woman, but when necessary, she knows how to be strict.” In a word, they so entangled him in contradictions that the fellow finally lowered his bad head and confessed:
There was nothing, I said it out of spite.
The old women were not surprised by this.
“That’s what we thought,” they said, and, releasing him in peace, they handed the matter over to the judgment of the men.
A day later, our society of workers gathered. Cirotta stood before them, accused of slandering a woman, and old Giacomo Fasca, the blacksmith, said very nicely:
Citizens, comrades, good people! We demand justice for us - we must be fair to each other, let everyone know that we understand high price what we need, and that justice is not an empty word for us, as it is for our masters. Here is a man who slandered a woman, insulted a comrade, destroyed one family and brought grief to another, making his wife suffer from jealousy and shame. We must treat it strictly. What are you offering?
Sixty-seven tongues said unanimously:
Get him out of the commune!
But fifteen thought it was too harsh, and an argument ensued. They shouted desperately - it was about the fate of a person, and not just one: after all, he is married, has three children - what are the fault of his wife and children? He has a house, a vineyard, a pair of horses, four donkeys for foreigners - all this is raised by his hump and costs a lot of work. Poor Giuseppe stood alone in the corner, gloomy, like a devil among children; He sat bent over in a chair, with his head down, and crumpled his hat in his hands, had already torn off the ribbon from it and was gradually tearing off the brim, and the fingers on his hands danced like a violinist’s. And when they asked him, what would he say? - he said, straightening his body with difficulty and getting to his feet:
I ask for mercy! No one is sinless. To drive me away from the land on which I lived for more than thirty years, where my ancestors worked, would not be fair!
The women were also against expulsion, and finally Fasca suggested doing this:
I think, friends, he will be well punished if we make him responsible for supporting Luigi's wife and his child - let him pay her half of what Luigino earned!
They argued a lot, but in the end they settled on this, and Giuseppe Cirotta was very pleased that he got off so cheaply, and this satisfied everyone: the matter did not come either to court or to the knife, but was decided in his own circle. We don’t like it, sir, when our affairs are written in the newspapers in a language in which understandable words rarely stick out, like teeth in an old man’s mouth, or when judges, these strangers to us, who understand life very poorly, talk about us in such a tone as if we savages, and they are God's angels who do not know the taste of wine and fish and who do not touch a woman! We are simple people and look at life simply.
So they decided: Giuseppe Cirotta feeds Luigi Mata’s wife and their child, but the matter did not end there: when Luigino found out that Cirotta’s words were false and his signora was innocent, and learned our verdict, he summoned her to him, writing briefly:
“Come to me and we will live well again. Don’t take a centezim from this man, and if you’ve already taken it, throw it in his eyes! I’m not guilty before you either, how could I have thought that a person lies in such a matter as love!”
And he wrote another letter to Chirotta:
“I have three brothers, and all four of us swore to each other that we would slaughter you like a ram if you ever left the island to land in Sorrento, Castellamare, Toppe or anywhere else. As soon as we find out, we will kill you, remember! This is as true as the fact that the people of your commune are good, honest people. My lady doesn’t need your help, even my pig would refuse your bread. Live without leaving the island until I tell you - you can!”
They say that Cirotta carried this letter to our judge and asked if it was possible to condemn Luigi for threatening him? And it was as if the judge said:
You can, of course, but then his brothers will probably kill you; They'll come here and kill you. I advise - wait! It is better. Anger is not love, it is short-lived...
The judge could have said something like this: he is very kind among us, very clever man and writes good poetry, but I don’t believe that Chirotta went to him and showed him this letter. No, Chirotta is a decent guy after all, he wouldn’t do another tactlessness, because he would be ridiculed for it.
We are simple, working people, sir, we have our own lives, our own concepts and opinions, we have the right to build life as we want and what is best for us.
Socialists? Oh, my friend, a working man will be born a socialist, as I think, and although we do not read books, we hear the truth by the smell - after all, the truth smells strongly and always the same - the sweat of labor!
On the hotel terrace, through the dark green canopy of vines, sunlight pours like golden rain - golden threads stretched in the air. On the gray tiles of the floor and the white tablecloths of the tables lie strange patterns of shadows, and it seems that if you look at them for a long time, you will learn to read them like poetry, you will understand what they are talking about. Bunches of grapes play in the sun like pearls or a strange muddy olivine stone, and in the decanter of water on the table there are blue diamonds.
There is a small lace scarf in the aisle between the tables. Of course, a lady lost him, and she is divinely beautiful - it cannot be otherwise, it is impossible to think otherwise on this quiet day, full of sultry lyricism, a day when everything everyday and boring becomes invisible, as if disappearing from the sun, ashamed of itself.
Silence; only the birds are chirping in the garden, the bees are buzzing over the flowers, and somewhere on the mountain, among the vineyards, a song is sighing hotly: two people sing - a man and a woman, each verse is separated from the other by a minute of silence - this gives the song a special expressiveness, something prayerful .
So the lady slowly ascends from the garden along the wide steps of the marble staircase; this is an old woman, very tall, dark stern face, sternly frowned eyebrows, thin lips stubbornly compressed, as if she had just said: “No!”
On her dry shoulders is a wide and long cape of golden silk, trimmed with lace, like a cloak, White hair small, too tall, her head covered with black lace, in one hand - a red umbrella with a long handle, in the other - a black velvet bag, embroidered with silver. She walks straight through the web of rays, firmly, like a soldier, and knocks the end of her umbrella on the ringing tiles of the floor. In profile, her face is even more stern: her nose is bent, her chin is sharp, and there is a large gray wart on it, her convex forehead hangs heavily over the dark pits where her eyes are hidden in networks of wrinkles. They are hidden so deeply that the old woman seems blind.
Behind her, waddling from side to side like a drake, the square body of a hunchback, with a large, heavily bowed head in a gray soft hat, silently appears on the steps of the stairs. He keeps his hands in his vest pockets, which makes him look even wider and more angular. He is wearing a white suit and white shoes with soft soles. His mouth is painfully open, yellow uneven teeth are visible, a dark mustache, sparse and hard, bristles unpleasantly on his upper lip, he breathes quickly and intensely, his nose trembles, but his mustache does not move. He walks, ugly twisting his short legs, his huge eyes look boringly at the ground. There are many big things on this small body: a large gold ring with a cameo on ring finger left hand, a large gold one, with two rubies, a token at the end of a black ribbon, replacing a watch chain, and in a blue tie, an opal, an unlucky stone, is too large.
And a third figure, slowly, enters the terrace, also an old woman, small and round, with a kind red face, with lively eyes, probably cheerful and talkative.
They walk along the terrace to the hotel door, like people from Gogarth’s paintings: ugly, sad, funny and alien to everything under this sun - it seems that everything fades and dims at the sight of them.
These are Dutch, brother and sister, the children of a diamond merchant and a banker, people of a very strange fate, if you believe what is mockingly told about them.
As a child, the hunchback was quiet, inconspicuous, thoughtful and did not like toys. This did not arouse any special attention to him in anyone except his sister - his father and mother found that this is what a failed person should be, but for the girl, who was four years older than her brother, his character aroused an alarming feeling.
She spent almost all her days with him, trying in every possible way to arouse excitement in him, to make him laugh, she slipped him toys - he stacked them, one on top of the other, building some kind of pyramids, and only very rarely smiled a forced smile, usually looking at his sister , as at everything, - with a sad look from large eyes, as if blinded by something; this look irritated her.
Don't you dare look like that, you'll grow up to be an idiot! - she screamed, stamping her feet, pinched him, beat him, he whimpered, defended his head, throwing his long arms up, but never ran away from her and did not complain about the beatings.
Later, when it seemed to her that he could understand what was already clear to her, she convinced him:
If you are a freak, you must be smart, otherwise everyone will be ashamed of you, dad, mom and everyone! Even people will be ashamed that there is a little freak in such a rich house. In a rich house, everything should be beautiful or smart - do you understand?
Yes,” he said seriously, tilting his large head to the side and looking into her face with the dark gaze of lifeless eyes.
Father and mother admired the girl’s attitude towards her brother, praised her kind heart in front of him, and imperceptibly she became the hunchback’s recognized confidante - she taught him how to use toys, helped him prepare his homework, and read him stories about princes and fairies.
But, as before, he put toys in high piles, as if trying to achieve something, but he studied inattentively and poorly, only the wonders of fairy tales made him smile hesitantly, and one day he asked his sister:
Are princes hunchbacked?
And the knights?
Of course not!
The boy sighed tiredly, and she, putting her hand on his coarse hair, said:
But wise wizards are always hunchbacked.
“That means I’ll be a wizard,” the hunchback obediently remarked, and then, after thinking, he added:
Are fairies always beautiful?
Always.
May be! “I think even more beautiful,” she said honestly.
He was eight years old, and his sister noticed that every time during walks, when they passed or drove past houses under construction, an expression of surprise appeared on the boy’s face, he looked for a long time, intently, at how people were working, and then turned his silent eyes questioningly to her.
Is this interesting to you? - she asked.
Reticent, he replied:
Why?
I don't know.
But one day he explained:
Such small people and bricks - and then huge houses. Is the whole city made like this?
Yes of course.
And our house?
Certainly!
Looking at him, she said decisively:
You'll be a famous architect, that's what!
They bought him a lot of wooden cubes, and from that time on, a passion for construction flared up in him: all day long, sitting on the floor of his room, he silently erected high towers, which fell with a roar. He built them again, and it became so necessary for him that even at the table, during lunch, he tried to build something out of knives, forks and napkin rings. His eyes became more focused and deeper, and his hands came to life and moved continuously, feeling with his fingers every object that he could take.
Now, while walking around the city, he was ready to stand for hours in front of a house under construction, watching how a huge one grows from a small one to the sky; his nostrils trembled, sniffing the dust of brick and the smell of boiling lime, his eyes became sleepy, covered with a film of intense thoughtfulness, and when they told him that it was indecent to stand on the street, he did not hear.
Let's go! - his sister woke him up, tugging at his hand.
He bowed his head and walked, still looking back.
You'll be an architect, right? - she suggested and asked.
One day, after dinner, in the living room, while waiting for coffee, my father started talking about how it was time to give up his toys and start studying seriously, but my sister, in the tone of a person whose intelligence is recognized and who cannot be ignored, asked:
I hope, dad, that you are not thinking of sending him to an educational institution?
Big, shaven, without a mustache, decorated with many sparkling stones, the father said, lighting a cigar:
Why not?
Do you know, why!
Since the conversation was about him, the hunchback quietly left; he walked slowly and heard his sister say:
But everyone will laugh at him!
Oh yes, of course! - said the mother in a thick voice, damp, like the autumn wind.
People like him need to be hidden! - the sister spoke hotly.
Oh yes, there is nothing to be proud of! - said the mother. - How much intelligence is in this head, oh!
“Perhaps you are right,” the father agreed.
No, how much intelligence...
The hunchback returned, stood at the door and said:
I'm not stupid either...
“We’ll see,” said the father, and the mother remarked:
Nobody thinks anything like that...
“You will study at home,” the sister announced, seating him next to her. - You will learn everything an architect needs to know - do you like this?
Yes. You'll see.
What will I see?
What I like.
She was a little taller than him - by half a head - but she obscured everything - both mother and father. At that time she was fifteen years old. He looked like a crab, and she - thin, slender and strong - seemed to him like a fairy, under whose power the whole house and he, the little hunchback, lived.
And so polite, cold people come to him, they explain something, ask, and he indifferently admits to them that he does not understand science, and coldly looks somewhere through the teachers, thinking about his own. It is clear to everyone that his thoughts are directed away from the usual, he says little, but sometimes poses strange questions:
What is done with those who do not want to do anything?
A well-bred teacher, in a black, tightly buttoned frock coat, looking at the same time like a priest and a warrior, answered:
Everything bad you can imagine happens to such people! For example, many of them become socialists.
Thank you! - says the hunchback, - he behaves with teachers correctly and dryly, like an adult. - What is a socialist?
At best, he is a dreamer and a lazy person; in general, he is a moral monster, devoid of the concept of God, property and nation.
The teachers always answered briefly, their answers stuck firmly in my memory, like pavement stones.
Can an old woman also be a moral monster?
Oh, of course, among them...
And - girl?
Yes. This is an innate quality...
Teachers said about him:
He is weak in mathematics, but has a great interest in moral issues...
“You talk a lot,” his sister told him, having learned about his conversations with teachers.
They talk more.
And you don't pray to God enough...
He won't fix my hump...
Ah, that's how you started to think! - she exclaimed in amazement and declared:
I forgive you for this, but forget everything like that, do you hear?
She already wore long dresses, and he was thirteen years old.
From that time on, troubles rained down on her abundantly: almost every time she entered her brother’s workroom, some beams, boards, tools fell at her feet, touching her shoulder, then her head, breaking off her fingers - the hunchback always warned her cry:
Beware!
But he was always late, and she was in pain.
One day, limping, she ran up to him, pale, angry, and shouted in his face:
You're doing this on purpose, you freak! - and hit him on the cheek.
His legs were weak, he fell and, sitting on the floor, quietly, without tears and without offense, he said to her:
How can you think this? You love me, don't you? Do you love me?
She ran away, groaning, then came to explain.
You see, this never happened before...
And this too,” he calmly noted, making a wide circle: in the corners of the room boards and boxes were piled up, everything had a very chaotic appearance, the carpentry and lathe near the walls were littered with wood.
Why did you bring so much of this rubbish? - she asked, looking around with disgust and distrust.
You'll see!
He had already begun to build: he made a house for rabbits and a kennel for a dog, he was inventing a rat trap, - his sister jealously watched his work and at the table proudly told his mother and father about them, - his father, nodding his head approvingly, said:
It all started with little things, and everything always starts like that!
And the mother, hugging her, asked her son:
Do you understand how to appreciate her caring for you?
Yes,” responded the hunchback.
When he made the rat trap, he called his sister to him and, showing her the clumsy structure, said:
This is no longer a toy, and you can take out a patent! Look how simple and strong it is, touch here.
The girl touched, something slammed, and she screamed wildly, and the hunchback, jumping around her, muttered:
Oh, not that one, not that one...
The mother came running and the servants appeared. They broke the rat-catching apparatus, freed the girl’s pinched, blue finger, and carried her away in a faint.
In the evening he was called to his sister, and she asked:
You did this on purpose, you hate me - why?
Shaking his hump, he answered, quietly and calmly:
You just touched with the wrong hand.
You are lying!
But why would I ruin your hands? After all, this is not even the hand with which you hit me...
Look, you freak, you're no smarter than me!..
He agreed:
His angular face was, as always, calm, his eyes looked focused - it was hard to believe that he was angry and could lie.
After that, she began to visit him less often. Her friends visited her - noisy girls in colorful dresses, they ran nicely around the large, somewhat cold and gloomy rooms - paintings, statues, flowers and gilding - everything became warmer with them. Sometimes his sister came with them to his room - they primly held out small fingers with pink nails to him, touching his hand so carefully, as if they were afraid of breaking it. They spoke to him especially meekly and affectionately, with surprise, but without interest, examining the hunchback among his tools, drawings, pieces of wood and shavings. He knew that all the girls called him “inventor,” - this was what his sister instilled in them, - and that they expected something from him in the future that should glorify the name of his father - his sister spoke about this confidently.
He is, of course, ugly, but he is very smart,” she often reminded.
She was nineteen years old, and already had a fiancé, when her father and mother died at sea, while outing on a pleasure yacht, wrecked and sunk by the drunken navigator of an American truck; She was also supposed to go on this walk, but her teeth suddenly hurt.
When the news arrived about the death of her father and mother, she, forgetting her toothache, ran around the room and shouted, raising her hands:
No, no, this can't be!
The hunchback stood at the door, wrapped in a curtain, looked at her carefully and said, shaking his hump:
My father was so round and empty - I don’t understand how he could drown...
Shut up, you don't love anyone! - my sister shouted.
“I just don’t know how to speak kind words,” he said.
The father's corpse was not found, and the mother was killed before she fell into the water - they pulled her out, and she lay in the coffin as dry and brittle as a dead branch of an old tree, as she was during life.
“Now you and I are left alone,” the sister said sternly and sadly to her brother after his mother’s funeral, pushing him away from her with the sharp gaze of her gray eyes. “It will be difficult for us, we don’t know anything and we can lose a lot.” It's such a pity that I can't get married right now!
ABOUT! - exclaimed the hunchback.
What is - oh?
He thought about it and said:
We are alone.
You say it like that, as if something makes you happy!
I'm not happy about anything.
This is also a great pity! You look awfully little like a living person.
In the evenings, her fiancé came - a small, lively man, blond, with a fluffy mustache on his tanned, round face; He laughed all evening without getting tired, and probably could have laughed all day. They were already engaged, and a new house in one of the best streets in the city - the cleanest and quietest. The hunchback had never been to this construction site and did not like to listen when they talked about it. The groom clapped him on the shoulders with a small, plump hand, with rings on it, and said, baring many small teeth:
You should go watch this, huh? How do you think?
He refused for a long time under various pretexts, finally gave in and went with him and his sister, and when the two of them climbed to the top tier of the scaffolding, they fell from there - the groom straight to the ground, working with lime, and his brother caught his dress on the scaffolding, hanging in the air and was removed by masons. He only dislocated his leg and arm, smashed his face, and the groom broke his spine and ripped open his side.
The sister was in convulsions, her hands scratched the ground, raising white dust; she cried for a long time, more than a month, and then she became like her mother - she lost weight, stretched out and began to speak in a damp, cold voice:
You are my misfortune!
He remained silent, lowering his big eyes to the ground. The sister dressed in black, brought her eyebrows into one line and, meeting her brother, clenched her teeth so that her cheekbones stood out at sharp angles, and he tried not to catch her eye and kept drawing up some drawings, lonely, silent. So he lived until he came of age, and from that day an open struggle began between them, to which they devoted their entire lives - a struggle that bound them with strong links of mutual insults and insults.
On the day he came of age, he told her in an older tone:
There are no wise wizards, no good fairies, there are only people, some are evil, others are stupid, and everything that is said about good is a fairy tale! But I want the fairy tale to be reality. Do you remember what you said: “In a rich house, everything should be beautiful or smart”? In a rich city, everything should be beautiful too. I'm buying land outside the city and I'll build a house there for myself and freaks like me, I'll take them out of this city, where it's too hard for them to live, and it's unpleasant for people like you to look at them...
No,” she said, “of course you won’t do that!” This is a crazy idea!
It's your idea.
They argued, restrained and cold, as people who have great hatred for each other argue when they do not need to hide this hatred.
It's decided! - he said.
Not by me,” answered the sister.
He lifted his hump and left, and after a while the sister found out that the land had been purchased and, moreover, diggers were already digging ditches for the foundation, dozens of carts were transporting brick, stone, iron and wood.
Do you still feel like a boy? - she asked. - Do you think this is a game?
He was silent.
Once a week, his sister - dry, slender and proud - went out of town in a small carriage, driving a white horse herself, and, slowly driving past the works, coldly watched how the red meat of the bricks was tied together by the sinews of the iron beams, and the yellow wood lay down in the heavy mass nerve threads. She saw from a distance the figure of her brother, like a crab, he was crawling through the forests, with a cane in his hand, in a crumpled hat, dusty, gray, like a spider; then, at home, she looked intently into his excited face, into his dark eyes - they became softer and clearer.
No,” he said quietly, “I came up with a good idea, equally good for you and for us!” It’s a wonderful thing to build, and it seems to me that I will soon consider myself a happy person...
She asked, mysteriously measuring his ugly body with her eyes:
Happy?
Yes! You know, people who work are completely different from us, they excite special thoughts. How good a mason must feel walking through the streets of the city where he built dozens of houses! There are many socialists among the workers; they are, first of all, sober people, and, truly, they have their own sense of dignity. Sometimes it seems to me that we don’t know our people well...
“You speak strangely,” she remarked.
The hunchback came to life, becoming more and more talkative every day:
In essence, everything is going the way you wanted: here I am becoming a wise wizard, freeing the city from freaks, but you could, if you wanted, be a good fairy! Why don't you answer?
We’ll talk about this later,” she said, playing with the gold watch chain.
One day he spoke in a language completely unfamiliar to her:
Perhaps I am more guilty before you than you are before me...
She was surprised:
I am guilty? In front of you?
Wait! Honestly- I'm not as guilty as you think! After all, I walk poorly, perhaps I pushed him then - but there was no evil intention here, no, believe me! I am much more guilty of wanting to spoil the hand with which you hit me...
Let's leave it at that! - she said.
It seems to me that we need to be kinder! - muttered the hunchback. - I think that goodness is not a fairy tale, it is possible...
The huge building outside the city grew with great speed, spread across the rich earth and rose into the sky, always gray, always threatening rain.
One day a group of official people came to work, they inspected what had been built and, after talking quietly among themselves, they forbade further construction.
You did it! - the hunchback shouted, rushing at his sister and grabbing her by the throat with his long, strong hands, but strangers appeared from somewhere, tore him away from her, and the sister told them:
You see, gentlemen, that he is truly abnormal and care is necessary! This began with him immediately after the death of his father, whom he loved passionately; ask the servants - they all know about his illness. They were silent until recently - they are good people, they value the honor of the house where many of them have lived since childhood. I, too, hid my misfortune - you can’t be proud that your brother is mad...
His face turned blue and his eyes rolled out of his sockets when he listened to this speech, he was speechless and silently scratched his nails at the hands of the people holding him, and she continued:
A ruinous idea with this house, which I intend to give to the city for a psychiatric hospital named after my father...
He screamed, lost consciousness, and was taken away.
The sister continued and completed the construction with the same speed with which he led her, and when the house was completely rebuilt, her brother entered it as the first patient. He spent seven years there - time quite sufficient for him to turn into an idiot; he developed melancholy, and during this time his sister grew old, lost her hopes of being a mother, and when she finally saw that her enemy was killed and would not rise again, she took him into her care.
And so they circle around to the globe back and forth, like blinded birds, they look senselessly and joylessly at everything and see nothing anywhere except themselves.
The blue water seems thick, like butter, and the steamboat's propeller operates softly and almost silently in it. The deck does not tremble under your feet, only the mast, aimed at the clear sky, shakes tensely; the cables sing softly, stretched like strings, but you’ve already gotten used to this trembling, you don’t notice it, and it seems that the steamer, white and slender, like a swan, is motionless on the slippery water. To notice the movement, you need to look overboard: there a greenish wave pushes off from the white sides, wrinkles and runs away in wide soft folds, bending, sparkling like mercury and sleepily murmuring.
Morning, the sea has not yet fully woken up, the pink colors of the sunrise have not faded in the sky, but we have already passed the island of Gorgon - overgrown with forest, a harsh lonely stone, with a round gray tower on top and a crowd of white houses near the sleeping water. Several small boats quickly slipped past the sides of the steamer - these are people from the island going for sardines. The measured splash of long oars and the thin figures of fishermen remain in the memory - they row standing and sway, as if bowing to the sun.
Behind the stern of the steamer there is a wide strip of greenish foam, seagulls flutter lazily over it; sometimes, out of nowhere, a python appears, stretched out like a cigar, flies silently over the water itself and suddenly pierces it like an arrow.
In the distance, the cloudy shores of Liguria rise from the sea - purple mountains; another two or three hours, and the ship will enter the cramped harbor of marble Genoa.
The sun is rising higher and higher, promising a hot day.
Two footmen ran out onto the deck; one is young, thin and nimble, a Neapolitan, with an elusive expression on his moving face, the other is a middle-aged man, gray-haired, black-browed, with silver stubble on his round skull; he has a hooked nose and serious, intelligent eyes. Joking and laughing, they quickly set the table for coffee and ran away, and in their place, in single file, one after another, the passengers slowly crawled out of the cabins: a fat man, with a small head and a swollen face, red-cheeked, but sad and tiredly spreading his plump crimson lips; a man in gray sideburns, tall, somewhat ironed, with inconspicuous eyes and a small button nose on a yellow, flat face; behind them, stumbling over the copper threshold, a round, red-haired man with a paunch, a militantly curled mustache, in a climber's suit and a hat with a green feather, jumped out. All three stood up to the side, the fat one narrowed his eyes sadly and said:
That's how quiet it is, huh?
The man with the sideburns put his hands in his pockets, spread his legs and looked like open scissors. The redhead took out a gold watch, large as the pendulum of a wall clock, looked at it, at the sky and along the deck, then began to whistle, rocking the watch and stamping his foot.
Two ladies appeared - one young, plump, with a porcelain face and tender milky blue eyes, her dark eyebrows seemed drawn on and one was higher than the other; the other is older, pointed-nosed, in a bushy coiffure of faded hair, with a large black mole on her left cheek, with two gold chains around her neck, a lorgnette and many key rings at the waist of her gray dress.
Coffee was served. The young woman silently sat down at the table and began to pour out the black moisture, somehow especially rounding her arms, bare to the elbows. The men approached the table, sat down silently, the fat one took the cup and sighed, saying:
It will be a hot day...
“You’re dripping on your lap,” the older lady remarked.
He bowed his head - his chin and cheeks blurred, resting on his chest - he put the cup on the table, wiped drops of coffee from his gray trousers with a handkerchief and wiped his sweaty face.
Yes! - the red-haired man suddenly spoke loudly, shuffling with his short legs. - Yes Yes! If even the left began to complain about hooliganism, it means...
Wait for the chatter, Ivan! - the older lady interrupted. - Lisa won't come out?
“She doesn’t feel well,” the young woman answered loudly.
But the sea is calm...
Ah, when a woman is in such a position...
The fat man smiled and closed his eyes sweetly.
Dolphins were tumbling overboard, breaking the calm surface of the sea. The man with sideburns looked at them carefully and said:
Dolphins are similar to pigs.
Red responded:
There's a lot of bullshit here.
The colorless lady raised the cup to her nose, sniffed the coffee, and wrinkled her face in disgust.
Disgusting!
And milk, huh? - the fat man supported, blinking in fear.
The lady with the porcelain face sang:
And everything is dirty, dirty! And they all look awfully like Jews...
The red-haired man, choking on words, kept talking about something in the ear of the man with sideburns, as if answering the teacher, knowing the lesson well and being proud of it. His listener was tickled and curious, he gently shook his head from side to side, and on his flat face his mouth gaped like a crack on a dry board. Sometimes he wanted to say something, he began in a strange, furry voice:
In my province...
And without continuing, he again carefully bowed his head to the redhead’s mustache.
The fat man sighed heavily and said:
How are you buzzing, Ivan...
Well - give me coffee!
He moved towards the table, with a creak and a crash, and his interlocutor said significantly:
Ivan has ideas.
“You didn’t get enough sleep,” said the older lady, looking through her lorgnette at the sideburner, who ran his hand over his face and looked at his palm.
It seems to me that I am powdered, but don’t you think so?
Ah, uncle! - exclaimed the young woman. - This is a peculiarity of Italy! Skin gets really dry here!
The older lady asked:
Do you notice, Lydie, how bad their sugar is?
A large man came out onto the deck, wearing a cap of gray curly hair, with a large nose, cheerful eyes and a cigar in his teeth - the footmen standing at the side bowed respectfully to him.
Good afternoon, guys, good afternoon! - Nodding his head favorably, he said in a loud, hoarse voice.
The Russians fell silent, looking sideways at him, and the mustachioed Ivan said in a low voice:
Retired military man, it’s immediately obvious...
Noticing that they were looking at him, the gray-haired man took the cigar out of his mouth and politely bowed to the Russians. The older lady raised her head up and, putting a lorgnette to her nose, looked at him defiantly. swing them in the air. Only the fat man responded to the bow, pressing his chin to his chest - this embarrassed the Italian, he nervously put the cigar in the corner of his mouth and asked the elderly footman in a low voice:
Russians?
Yes, sir! Russian governor with his last name...
What kind faces they always have...
Very good people...
The best of the Slavs, of course...
A little careless, I would say...
Careless? Really?
It seems to me that they are careless towards people.
The fat Russian blushed and, smiling broadly, said quietly:
He's talking about us...
What? - the eldest asked, wrinkling her face in disgust.
The best, he says, are the Slavs,” answered the fat man, giggling.
“They are flattering,” the lady said, and red-haired Ivan hid his watch and, twirling his mustache with both hands, said disdainfully:
They are all amazingly ignorant of us...
“They praise you,” said the fat man, “but you find that this is due to ignorance...
Nonsense! I’m not talking about that, but in general... I myself know that we are the best.
The man with sideburns, who had been carefully watching the dolphins play all the time, sighed and, shaking his head, remarked:
What a stupid fish!
Two more approached the gray-haired Italian: an old man in a black frock coat and glasses, and a long-haired young man, pale, with a high forehead and thick eyebrows; All three of them stood to the side, about five steps from the Russians, the gray-haired man said quietly:
When I see Russians, I remember Messina...
Remember how we met the sailors in Naples? - asked the young man.
Yes! They will not forget this day in their forests!
Have you seen the medal in their honor?
I don't like work.
They’re talking about Messina,” the fat man told his friends.
And - they laugh! - exclaimed the young lady. - Marvelous!
The seagulls caught up with the steamer, one of them, flapping its crooked wings, hung over the side, and the young lady began to throw biscuits to it. The birds, catching pieces, fell overboard and again, screaming greedily, rose into the blue emptiness above the sea. They brought coffee to the Italians, they also began to feed the birds, throwing biscuits up - the lady knitted her eyebrows sternly and said:
Here are the monkeys!
Tolstoy listened to the lively conversation of the Italians and again said:
He is not a military man, but a merchant, talking about trading grain with us and that they could also buy kerosene, timber and coal from us.
“I immediately saw that I was not a military man,” the older lady admitted.
The red-haired man again began to talk about something in the ear of the sideburner, he listened to him and stretched his mouth skeptically, and the Italian young man said, glancing sideways in the direction of the Russians:
What a pity that we know little about this country big people with blue eyes!
The sun is already high and burning strongly, the sea shines dazzlingly, in the distance, on the starboard side, mountains or clouds grow out of the water.
Annette,” says the sideburner, smiling from ear to ear, “listen to what this funny Jean came up with, what a way to destroy the rebels in the villages, it’s very witty!”
And, rocking on his chair, he spoke slowly and boringly, as if translating from a foreign language:
It is necessary, he says, that on the days of fairs, as well as village holidays, the local zemstvo chief should prepare, at the expense of the treasury, stakes and stones, and then he would supply the peasants - also at the expense of the treasury - ten, twenty, fifty - depending on the quantity people - buckets of vodka - nothing more is needed!
I don't understand! - said the older lady. - It's a joke?
No seriously! Just think, ma tante...
The young lady, eyes wide open, shrugged.
What nonsense! Give them vodka from the treasury when they already...
No, wait, Lydia! - the red-haired man cried, jumping up in his chair. The sideburner laughed silently, his mouth wide open and swaying from side to side.
Just think - those hooligans who don’t have time to get drunk will kill each other with stakes and stones - okay?
Why - each other? - asked the fat man.
It's a joke? - the older lady inquired again.
The red-haired man, smoothly spreading his short arms, passionately argued:
When they are tamed by the authorities - the left shouts about cruelty and bestiality, it means that we need to find a way for them to tame themselves - right?
The steamer rocked, the plump lady grabbed the table in fear, the dishes rattled, the older lady, putting her hand on the fat man’s shoulder, asked sternly:
What is it?
We are turning...
The shores rise higher and clearer from the water - hills and mountains, shrouded in darkness, covered with gardens. Gray stones look out from the vineyards, white houses hide in thick clouds of greenery, glass windows sparkle in the sun, and bright spots are already visible to the eye; on the very shore there is a small house nestled among the rocks, its façade faces the sea and is entirely hung with a heavy mass of bright purple flowers, and above, from the stones of the terrace, red geraniums flow in thick streams. The colors are cheerful, the shore seems gentle and hospitable, the soft outlines of the mountains invite you to come into the shade of the gardens.
How cramped everything is here,” the fat man said, sighing; The older lady looked at him implacably, then looked at the shore through her lorgnette and pursed her thin lips tightly, raising her head up.
There are already many dark-skinned people in light suits on deck, they are talking noisily, Russian ladies look at them disdainfully, like queens at their subjects.
How they wave their hands, says the young woman; The fat man, puffing, explains:
This is a property of language, it is poor and requires gestures...
My God! My God! - the eldest sighs deeply, then, after thinking, asks:
What, there are also a lot of museums in Genoa?
It seems like only three,” the fat man answered her.
And this is a cemetery? - asked the young woman. - Campo Santo. And churches, of course.
Are the cab drivers bad, like in Naples?
The redhead and the sideburner got up, went to the side and there they were talking anxiously, interrupting each other.
What does the Italian say? - asks the lady, straightening her bouffant hairstyle. Her elbows are sharp, her ears are large and yellow, like withered leaves. The fat man listens attentively and obediently to the lively story of the curly-haired Italian.
They, ladies and gentlemen, must have a very ancient law prohibiting Jews from visiting Moscow - this is obviously a relic of despotism, you know - Ivan the Terrible! Even in England there are many archaic laws that have not been repealed to this day. Or maybe this Jew was mystifying me, in a word, for some reason he did not have the right to visit Moscow - ancient city kings, shrines...
And here in Rome we have a Jewish mayor, “in Rome, which is older and more sacred than Moscow,” the young man said, grinning.
And deftly beats dad the tailor! - interjected an old man with glasses, loudly clapping his hands.
What is the old man shouting about? - the lady asked, lowering her hands.
This is some kind of nonsense. They speak Neapolitan dialect...
He came to Moscow, he needed shelter, and this Jew goes to a prostitute, signora, there is nowhere else, he said...
Fable! - the old man said decisively and waved his hand away from the narrator.
To tell the truth, I think so too.
She handed him over to the police, but first took money from him, as if he was taking advantage of her...
Nasty! - said the old man. “He’s a man of dirty imagination, that’s all.” I know Russians from university - they are good guys...
The fat Russian, wiping his sweaty face with a handkerchief, said to the ladies, lazily and indifferently:
He tells a Jewish joke.
With such passion! - the young lady grinned, and another remarked:
There is still something boring about these people, with their gestures and noise...
A city grows on the shore; houses rise from behind the hills and, becoming closer to each other, form a continuous wall of buildings, as if carved from ivory and reflecting the sun.
It looks like Yalta,” says the young lady, standing up. - I'll go to Lisa.
Swaying, she slowly carried her large body, wrapped in bluish material, along the deck, and when she caught up with a group of Italians, the gray-haired man interrupted his speech and said quietly:
What beautiful eyes!
Yes,” the old man with glasses shook his head. - This is what Basilida was probably like!
Is Basilida a Byzantine?
I see her as a Slav...
They’re talking about Lydia,” said the fat man.
What? - asked the lady. - Of course, vulgarity?
About her eyes. They praise...
The lady made a grimace.
Sparkling with copper, the steamer gently and quickly pressed closer and closer to the shore, the black walls of the pier became visible, because of them hundreds of masts rose into the sky, here and there bright rags of flags hung motionless, black smoke melted in the air, the smell of oil and coal dust could be heard , the noise of work in the harbor and the complex hum of the big city.
The fat man suddenly laughed.
What are you doing? - asked the lady, narrowing her gray, faded eyes.
The Germans will crush them, by God, you'll see!
What are you happy about?
The sideburner, looking at his feet, asked the red-haired one, loudly and strictly grammatically:
Would you be happy with this surprise or not?
The red-haired man, fiercely twirling his mustache, did not answer.
The steamer became quieter. The muddy green water splashed and sobbed against the white sides, as if complaining; marble houses, high towers, openwork terraces were not reflected in it. The black mouth of the port opened, tightly packed with many ships.
XVII
A man in a light suit, dry and shaven, like an American, sat down at an iron table near the door of the restaurant - he sat down and lazily sang:
Everything around is densely dotted with acacia flowers - white and like gold: the rays of the sun shine everywhere, on the ground and in the sky - the quiet joy of spring. In the middle of the street, small donkeys with furry ears are running, clicking their hooves, heavy horses are walking slowly, people are walking slowly - you can clearly see that every living thing wants to spend as long as possible in the sun, in the air full of the honey smell of flowers.
Again - strikes, riots, right?
He shrugged, smiling softly.
If only it were possible without this...
An old woman in a black dress, stern, like a nun, silently offered the engineer a bouquet of violets, he took two and handed one to his interlocutor, saying thoughtfully:
You, Trama, have such a good brain, and, really, it’s a pity that you are an idealist...
Thank you for the flowers and the compliment. Did you say it's a pity?
Yes! You are, in essence, a poet, and you need to study to become a capable engineer...
Trama, laughing quietly, revealing his white teeth, said:
Oh, that's right! An engineer is a poet, I was convinced of this while working with you...
You are a kind person...
And I thought - why shouldn’t Mr. Engineer become a socialist? A socialist must also be a poet...
They laughed, both looking at each other equally intelligently, surprisingly different, one dry, nervous, worn out, with faded eyes, the other as if forged yesterday and not yet polished.
No, Trama, I would prefer to have my own workshop and about three dozen fellows like you. Wow, we could do something here...
He quietly tapped his fingers on the table and sighed, putting flowers in his buttonhole.
Damn it,” cried Trama, excitedly, “what trifles interfere with living and working...
Is it you who call the history of mankind nonsense, Master Trama? - the engineer asked, smiling subtly; the worker pulled off his hat, waved it and spoke, hotly and vividly:
Uh, what is the history of my ancestors?
Your ancestors? - the engineer asked, emphasizing the first word with an even sharper smile.
Yes, mine! Is this insolence? Let there be insolence! But - why aren’t Giordano Bruno, Vico and Mazzini my ancestors - don’t I live in their world, don’t I take advantage of what their great minds have sown around me?
Ah, in this sense!
Everything that was given to the world by those who departed from it was given to me!
“Of course,” said the engineer, knitting his eyebrows together seriously.
And everything that was done before me - before us - is ore that we must turn into steel - isn’t it?
Why not? It is clear!
After all, you, scientists, like us, workers, live off the work of the minds of the past.
“I don’t argue,” said the engineer, bowing his head; near him stood a boy in gray rags, small, like a ball broken in a game; holding a bouquet of crocuses in his dirty paws, he insistently said:
Take some flowers from me, sir...
I already have...
There are never enough flowers...
Bravo, baby! - said Trama. - Bravo, and give me two...
And when the boy gave him flowers, he raised his hat and suggested to the engineer:
Anything?
Thank you.
Wonderful day, isn't it?
You can feel it even at fifty years old...
He looked around thoughtfully, narrowing his eyes, then sighed.
I think you should feel the game especially strongly spring sun in your veins, this is not only because you are young, but - as I see - the whole world is different for you than for me, right?
“I don’t know,” he said, grinning, “but life is wonderful!”
With your promises? - the engineer asked skeptically, and this question seemed to hurt his interlocutor - putting on his hat, he quickly said:
Life is beautiful with everything I love about it! Damn it, my dear engineer, for me words are not just sounds and letters - when I read a book, see a picture, admire beauty - I feel as if I did it all myself!
Both laughed, one - loudly and openly, as if boasting of his ability to laugh, throwing his head back, sticking out his wide chest, the other - almost silently, with a sobbing laugh, revealing teeth in which gold was stuck, as if he had recently chewed it and forgot to brush the greenish bones of his teeth .
Unless you're rebelling...
Oh, I'm always rebelling...
And, making a serious face, squinting his bottomless black eyes, he asked:
I hope we behaved quite correctly then?
Shrugging his shoulders, the engineer stood up.
Oh yeah. Yes! This story - do you know? - cost the company thirty-seven thousand liras...
It would be more prudent to include them in wages...
Hm! You think badly. Prudence? Each animal has its own.
He extended his dry yellow hand and, when the worker shook it, said:
I still repeat that you should study and study...
Every minute I'm learning...
You would make an engineer with a good imagination.
Eh, fantasy doesn’t stop me from living even now...
Goodbye, stubborn...
The engineer walked under the acacia trees, through the network of sun rays, walking slowly with long, dry legs, carefully pulling his glove over the thin fingers of his right hand - a small, blue-black garcon walked away from the door of the restaurant where he had listened to this conversation, and said to the worker who was rummaging in wallet, taking out copper coins:
Our famous...
He can still stand up for himself! - the worker exclaimed confidently. - He has a lot of fire under his skull...
Where will you speak next time?
There, at the labor exchange. Did you hear me?
Three times, comrade...
Shaking each other's hands firmly, they parted with a smile; one went in the direction opposite to where the engineer had disappeared, the other, humming thoughtfully, began to clear the dishes from the tables.
A group of schoolchildren in white aprons - boys and girls - are marching in the middle of the road, noise and laughter are flying from them in sparks, the front two are loudly blowing trumpets rolled up from paper, acacia trees are quietly showering them with snow of white petals. You always - and in the spring especially greedily - look at children and want to shout after them, cheerfully and loudly:
Hey you people! Long live your future!
From the first pages of the novel we see a factory village in which poor workers lived. The entire area around the factory was permeated with complete poverty. Everything around was dirty and gloomy. From the very early morning, the whistle called everyone to work, and late in the evening everyone returned home tired and hungry. And the work was so hard that the men wanted only one thing - to get drunk and lie down to rest. There was a lot of anger towards these workers, which led them to disgusting acts. This is how day after day passed.
The main character of the work, Nilovna, also lived. She had a son, Pavel, who follows the example of his father. Mikhail got drunk all day long after work, and even got into fights. He insulted everyone, and naturally, he insulted his relatives obscene words. And he did not consider his wife to be a woman at all. But, still, Pavel has not yet completely become the same as the rest of the workers. He stands up for his mother when his father wants to beat her.
Nilovna was not an old woman, but this whole life turned her into a tortured old woman.
Soon his father dies, and Pavel continues to live the same way as everyone else. He buys himself a nice shirt, an accordion and goes to dances, where he always comes from drunk.
But soon, some strange people came to their village and spoke strange speeches. And Paul listened carefully to their words.
Then in holidays he went to the city, began to get interested in literature and bring home books on political topics. Pavel’s speech also changed; he began to address Nilovna politely. And this scared Pelageya. She suspected that something serious was going on with him, but she didn’t understand what it was.
Later, the son tells Pelageya that he wants to know what she is like it's true, oh which revolutionaries tell. He said that he would study, and would tell his comrades new trends about freedom and a good life. But then he warns her that for such sedition he could be sent to hard labor and even shot.
At the end of November, Pavel warned Nilovna that guests would arrive to him. Pelageya greeted them cautiously, but, as it turned out, they were friendly people. The most surprising thing for her was that Nikolai Vesovshchikov joined them, whom everyone avoided and did not even try to talk to. And all this happened because his father was a swindler. A girl named Natasha came there. She came from a wealthy family and from childhood she saw tyranny and arbitrariness in the house. She did not want such an existence for herself or others and joined a workers’ circle.
There was a rumor among the factory workers that suspicious people were gathering in the Vlasovs’ house and talking about something. They tried to find out in different ways, someone asked Pelageya about her son, and sometimes at night they wanted to peek out the window, but, scared, they ran away. Then propaganda papers began to be distributed among the workers; everyone read them, but reacted differently. Some believed in the written text, and there were those who just waved their hand hopelessly.
One day, Maria met Nilovna on the street and whispered to her that many activists had had a search, and another was being prepared in the Vlasovs’ house. That night passed in anticipation and worry, but no one came. However, the gendarmes arrived a month later and began looking for prohibited literature. At the same time, Andrei Nakhodka was present, who could not stand it and began to negotiate with representatives of the law, as a result of which he was arrested. Pavel behaved confidently and calmly.
Workers began to come to Pavel more and more often, whom Vlasov helped with advice in one matter or another, and sometimes sent to the city for advice. After one story at the factory, people began to treat Pavel more respectfully. The essence of the matter was that their owner decided to dry up the swamp, and explained to everyone that this would improve their health, but at the same time, he would deduct a certain amount from their salary. Vlasov was ill that day, and when his comrades came to him, he immediately wrote something on a piece of paper and sent it to the city so that it could be published in the editorial office.
Pavel had been sick for several days, and the factory workers asked him to come to work and explain what was happening. Everyone listened to the young man’s speech in fascination, many already believed in his words. But when they were ordered to disperse, the workers obeyed, and Pavel was taken away by the police.
Soon Nilovna had one of the party workers, who explained to her what needed to be done to get Pavel released from prison. And Pelageya begins to scatter leaflets at the factory, under the guise of an assistant to a woman delivering lunches. And no one could have guessed that the distribution of these pieces of paper was the work of some old woman.
Due to a lack of evidence, Nakhodka and Vlasov are released, but they cannot calm down and organize a rally at a demonstration dedicated to May 1. Pavel gives a fiery speech, holding a red banner in his hands. The speakers were again subject to arrest, and Nilovna retained the banner.
Yegor Ivanovich asks Pelageya to join him in the city, where she and his sister continue the work of their son. She travels around villages and distributes proclamations there.
His mother constantly comes to Pavel in prison, and even gives him a letter where the girl who loves him offers him an escape plan. But he refuses because he wants to make a fiery speech in court.
On the day of the trial, Nilovna was especially anxious, since only her relatives were allowed there. This was done so that the people would not hear why the worker was accused. And Paul, after hearing the verdict, makes a speech where he talks about the goal of his party’s struggle. Reading these lines, the author shows us a man who has studied many books and is well versed in revolutionary theory.
The judge's last word said that all convicts were sent to hard labor. Sasha is ready to follow him, the mother also wants to be close to her son. It is a pity that such words were not heard by the workers, and then Nikolai Ivanovich takes the text he wrote down on paper to the editor to print.
Pavel's mother agrees to take the propaganda leaflets to another city, but they are tracking her down and want to take her to the police. But Nilovna, breaking free from the detective’s hands, scatters all the leaflets on the station platform, explaining that this is the speech of her convicted son. She doesn't have time to finish as one of the policemen squeezes her throat.
The novel teaches us to constantly improve ourselves, gain new knowledge and pass it on to other people. After all, by receiving certain knowledge, a person becomes free. And freedom helps to lead others.
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