Belov is the usual summary. Vasily Belov - a common thing

IN AND. BELOV
USUAL BUSINESS
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter one 1. Direct move 2. Matchmakers 3. Union of Earth and Water 4. Hot love
Chapter Two
1. Children 2. Babkin's fairy tales 3. Morning of Ivan Afrikanovich 4. Wife Katerina
Chapter Three
on logs
Chapter Four
1. And hay came 2. Figures 3. What happened next 4. Mitka acts 5. To the fullest
Chapter Five
1. Free Cossack 2. Last swath 3. Three hours deadline
Chapter Six
Rogulin's life
Chapter Seven
1. Windy. It's so windy... 2. Usual business 3. Sorochiny
CHAPTER ONE
1. DIRECT STROKE
- Parme-en? Where is my Parmenko? And here he is, Parmenko. Frozen? Freeze, boy, freeze. You are a fool, Parmeno. My Parmenko is silent. Here, let's go home. Do you want to go home? You are Parmen, Parmen...
Ivan Afrikanovich barely untied the frozen reins.
- Were you standing? Stood. Waiting for Ivan Afrikanovich?
Waiting, tell me. And what did Ivan Afrikanovich do? And I, Parmesha, drank a little, drank, my friend, don't judge me. Yes, don't judge me. And what, is it impossible for a Russian person to drink? No, you tell me, can a Russian person have a drink? Especially if at first he was frozen to the guts in the wind, then he got hungry to the very bones? Well, we, therefore, drank on the scoundrel. Yes. And Mishka says to me: "Why, Ivan Afrikanovich, from just one nostril corroded. Come on," he says, "another one." All of us, Parmenushko, walk under the herb, don't scold me. Yes, honey, don't scold me. But where did it all start from? And let's go, Parmesha, from this morning, when you and I took the empty dishes to hand over. Loaded and shipped.
The saleswoman gritted me: "Bring, Ivan Afrikanovich, the dishes, and you will bring back the goods. Only, grit, do not lose the invoice." And when did Drynov lose the invoice? Ivan Afrikanovich did not lose the invoice. "Out," I say, "Parmen won't let me lie, he didn't lose the invoice." Have we brought the dishes with you? They brought it! Did we give it up, whore? Passed!
Dropped off and received all items! So why can't you and I have a drink? We can have a drink, by God, we can. You, then, are standing at the selp, at the high porch, and Mishka and I. Bear. This Bear is for all Bears Bear. I tell you. It's business as usual. “Come on,” he says, “Ivan Afrikanovich, on a bet, I won’t,” grit, “if I don’t sip all the wine from the dish with bread.” I say: “What are you, Mishka, a rogue. You are, - I say, - a rogue! Well, who slurps wine with bread with a spoon? - something, with a spoon, like a prison, slurp. - "And here, - he says, - let's argue." - "Come on!" Me, Parmesha, this secret has dismantled. "What," Mishka asks me, "what," he asks, "are you going to argue?" I say that if you drink slowly, then I put another white-eyed one, and if you lose, duck with you. Well, he took a dish from the watchman. Bread crumbled from half a dish.
"Lei, - he says. - A big dish, malirovannoe." Well, I ate the whole bottle of white in this dish. The bosses, how they got it right here, these purveyors and the chairman of the selp, Vasily Trifonovich himself, look, calmed down, that means. And what would you say, Parmenushko, if this dog, this Mishka, sipped all this crumble with a spoon? Slurps yes quacks, slurps yes. quacks. He drank, the devil, and even licked the spoon dry. Well, it’s true, he just wanted to light a cigarette, he tore off the newspaper from me, I gave him a face and it took him away; it is clear that he was pressed here. He jumped out from behind the table and out into the street.
They kicked him, the rogue, out of the hut. The selp has a high porch, how it will burp from the porch! Well, yes, you were standing here at the porch, you saw him, mazurika. He comes back, there is no blood in his face, but he laughed! We have a conflict with him. All opinions are divided in half:
who says that I lost a bet, and who says that Mishka could not stand the word. And Vasily Trifonovich, the chairman of the selpa, took my side and said:
"Your took it, Ivan Afrikanovich. Because, of course, he drank it, but he couldn't keep it in his gut." I say to Mishka: "Okay, the fool is with you! Let's buy in half. So that no one would be offended." What? What are you, Parmen? Why did you get up? Ah, come on, come on. I, too, will sprinkle with you for company. For the company, then it is, Parmesha, always ... Whoa!
Parmen? Who are they talking to? Whoa! So you didn't wait for me, did you go? I'm the reins of you now. Whoa!
You will know Ivan Afrikanovich! Look you! Well, stand like a human, where do I have these ... buttons, something ... Yes, kh, hmm.
We do not have long to walk, But only until the ninth.
Stay, dear, make rich.
Now let's go, go with nuts, gallop with hats ...
Ivan Afrikanovich put on his mittens and again sat down on the logs loaded with Selpov goods. Without prodding, the gelding pulled off the runners that were sticking to the snow, he dragged the heavy cart, occasionally snorted and twitched his ears, listening to the owner.
- Yes, brother Parmenko. Look how things turned out for Mishka and me. After all, they got drunk. We got drunk.
He went to the club to the girls, there are more girls here at the village, some in the bakery, some at the post office, so he went to the girls. And the girls are all fat-footed, good, not like in our village, we all parted. The entire first grade for marriages was sorted out, only one second and third remained. It's business as usual. I say: "Let's go, Misha, go home" - no, I went to the girls. Well, it's understandable, we, too, Parmesha, were young, it's now that all the deadlines have passed for us and the juices have flowed out, it's a familiar thing, yes ... And what do you think, Parmenenko, will we get from a woman? It will, by golly, it will, that's for sure! Well, her woman's business is like that, she also needs to make a discount, a woman, a discount, Parmenko. After all, how many robes does she have? And she has them, these clients, beware, she also has no honey, a woman, after all, there are eight of them ... Ali is nine? No, Parmen, it's like eight... And with this one, which... Well, this one, what... which has something in its belly... Nine? Al eight? Hmm... So, like this:
Anatoshka is my second, Tanya is the first. Vaska was after Anatoshka, on the first of May she gave birth, as I remember now, after Vaska Katyushka, after Katyushka Mishka. After, that is.
Bear. P-p-wait, where is Grishka? I forgot Grishka, who is he after? Vaska after Anatoshka, was born on the first of May, after Vaska Grishka, after Grishka ... Well, take away the goblin, how much you have accumulated! Mishka, then, followed Katyushka, Volodya also followed Mishka, and Marusya, that smaller one, was born in the midst of turmoil ... And who was in front of Katyushka? So, so, Antoshka is my second, Tanka is the first. Vaska was born on the first of May, Grishka ... Oh, fool with him, everyone will grow up!
We won't have long to walk ... But only until nine ...
Wait, Parmenko, here we need to slowly, so as not to tumble.
Ivan Afrikanovich got down on the road. He supported the cart and pulled the reins with such seriousness that the gelding somehow even condescendingly, deliberately for Ivan Afrikanovich, slowed down. Someone, but Parmen, was well aware of this whole road ... - Well, like that, come on, it seems like we passed a bridge, - the driver would say. .. But I still remember you, Parmenko. After all, you were still sucking a tit at the uterus, that's how I remember you. And I remember your uterus, they called it Button, it was so small and round, they drove the deceased little head onto a sausage, a uterus. I used to go on it for hay at Shrove Tuesday, on old haystacks, the road was all through a stump-deck, so she, your uterus, is like a lizard with a cart, somewhere crawling, where lope, so obedient was in the shafts. Not like you are now. After all, you, a fool, did not plow, and in a cart you did not go further than a selpa, after all, you only carry wine and bosses, you have a life like that of Christ in your bosom. How do I still remember you? Well, sure thing, you got it too. Do you remember how seed peas were transported, and you twisted out of the shaft! But how did we put you, scoundrel, with the whole world out of the ditch on your feet? But I still remember you in a smart way, - it used to be, you ran across the bridge, all festive, and your hooves rattled and rattled, and you didn’t have any worries then. Now what? Well, you carry plenty of wine, well, they feed you there, give you water, and then what? Here they will hand you over for sausage too, they can at any moment, but what about you? It's okay, you'll go like a little one. That's what you say, grandma. Baba, she, of course, is a woman. Only my woman is not like that, she will give a duster to anyone you like. And to me, neither with a drunk. She won't lay a finger on me when she's drunk, because she knows Ivan Afrikanovich, they've lived a century. Here, if I drank, don’t say a word to me and don’t fall under my arm, my hand will catch up with soot to anyone. Am I right, Parmen? That's it, that's for sure I'm saying, it's like in a pharmacy, I'll catch up with soot. What?
We don't have long to walk, But only until de...
I say that Drinova who will squeeze? Nobody will squeeze Drynov. Drynov himself will pinch anyone he likes. Where? Where are you going, you old fool, are you turning back? After all, you are not turning back on that road! After all, you and I have lived a century, and you understand where you are going? This is your way home, isn't it? This is your road not home, but to the clearing. I've been here a hundred times, I'll...
What? I trust you, I trust you! Do you know the road better than me? You, scoundrel, wanted the reins? N-on!
N-na, here you are, if so! Go where they tell you, don't defend your pryntsyp! What were you looking at? Well? That's it, fool, go where you know!
We don't have long to walk, Yh, only until ...
Ivan Afrikanovich whipped the gelding and yawned conciliatoryly:
- Look, Parmenko, how exhausted I am. You and I will roll home now, we will hand over the goods, we will put the samovar. I'll unharness you or tell the woman, and you, fool, will go home to the stable. Are you a fool, Parmenko?
So I say that you are a fool, even though you are a smart gelding, but a fool. You don't understand anything in life. You wanted to turn off onto another road, but I restored you. Have I restored you to the right path, or have I not restored you? That's it! And we won't have long to walk... You fool, why did you stop again?
Whenever you stop. Don't you want to go home?
You will taste more reins from me, if! You can see the village, we will hand over the goods, we will put on the samovar, now what is it for us, now everything is for us yesterday before dinner. You're a fool, Parmenko, you're a fool, you don't feel like going home. Over there and the village nearby, over there and the Mishkin tractor. What? What kind of village is this? It doesn't look like our village. Well. By God, not that village. There is a general store, but there is no general store in ours, that's for sure, but here there is a general store. There and the porch is high. After all, Parmenko, we seem to be loading goods here, right? Hm. Right word, here. Parmen you, Parmen!
There is no sense in you, look where you brought me. That's where it took us. Parmen? Well, now we'll go home with you. Here, here, wrap it up, father! After all, how else do I remember you? After all, you were still twitching your uterus with your lips... You and I are quick... By morning we will be at home, as in a pharmacy... Now we, Parmesha, are going straight ahead. Yes this...
Straight ... Business as usual.
2. Matchmakers
Ivan Afrikanovich lit a cigarette, and the gelding, without stopping at the Selpov porch, turned back. He industriously and pliantly dragged loaded firewood with Ivan Afrikanovich in addition, singing the same recruiting ditty.
The red big moon rose over the forest. She rolled along the spruce tops, accompanying a lonely cart creaking with wrappers.
The snow had hardened by nightfall. In the silence, the smell of freezing moisture that had melted during the day and night wafted vigorously and widely.
Ivan Afrikanovich was now silent. He sobered up and, like a sleeping rooster, bowed his head. At first he was a little ashamed in front of Parmen for his oversight, but soon he forgot about this guilt, as if not on purpose, and everything again settled in its place.
The gelding, feeling a man behind him, stomped and stomped along the hardened road. The small field is over. Before Sosnovka, where half the road was, there was still a small wood, which greeted the cart with magical silence, but Ivan Afrikanovich did not even stir.
An attack of talkativeness, as if on cue, was replaced by a deep and silent indifference. Now Ivan Afrikanovich did not even think, he only breathed and listened. But neither the creaking of the wrapper nor the snorting of the gelding touched his consciousness.
From this non-existence he was brought out by someone's very close steps. Someone was catching up with him, and he shivered, woke up.
- Hey! -Ivan Afrikanovich called out. -Mishka, or what?
- Well!
- I can hear someone running. What, you see, they didn’t leave to spend the night?
The bear, angry, plopped down on the logs, the gelding did not even stop. Ivan Afrikanovich, feeling his own cunning, looked at the guy. Mishka, pulling down the collar of his quilted jacket, was lighting a cigarette.
- Whom did you grab today? - Ivan Afrikanovich asked. - Not the one that walks in boots?
- Well, all of them on ...
- What sort of thing?
- "Zootechnik in hysterics"! - Mishka mimicked someone. Fools putty. I saw such intelligence!
“Don’t tell me,” Ivan Afrikanovich said soberly, “the girls are vigorous.
Both were silent for a long time. The moon turned yellow and became less high towards midnight, the bushes dozed quietly and the wrapping creaked, the indefatigable Parmen stomped and stomped, and Ivan Afrikanovich seemed to be pondering something intently. Sosnovka, a small village that stood in the middle of the road, was half an hour away. Ivan Afrikanovich asked:
- Do you know Nyushka Sosnovskaya?
- What Nyushka?
- Yes, Nyushka something ...
- Nyushka, Nyushka ... - The guy spat and rolled over to the other side.
- What are you, right ... - Ivan Afrikanovich shook his head. - And you forget about these scientists! Since our brother is illiterate, there is nothing to duck. Spit it, that's all. It's business as usual.
- Ivan Afrikanovich, and Ivan Afrikanovich? - Mishka suddenly turned around. - But this bottle has not been opened for me.
- Yah! What "this"?
- Well, the one that you bet me something. - Mishka pulled out a bottle from his pants pocket. - Here we are now warmed up.
- It seems to be from the neck ... uncomfortable in front of the people, and so. Maybe we won't, Misha?
- Why is it inconvenient there! - The bear has already opened the vessel. - You seem to be loading gingerbread?
- There is.
- Let's open the box and take two for a snack.
- Not good, boy.
- Yes, I'll tell the saleswoman tomorrow, what are you afraid of? - The bear tore off the plywood of the box with an ax, took out two gingerbread.
We drank. It was already quiet, but the renewed hop made the cold night brighter, suddenly the creaking wrapping, and the steps of the gelding - everything acquired meaning and declared itself, and the moon no longer seemed to Ivan Afrikanovich malicious and indifferent.
“I’ll tell you, Misha, so I’ll tell you this.” Ivan Afrikanovich hastily chewed the gingerbread. Take Nyushka...
The mouse listened. Ivan Afrikanovich, not knowing whether he pleased the guy with his words, grunted.
- Of course it's a matter of diploma too, it's ... not superfluous in a girl.
And you, too, are not a thin guy, what can I say ... Yes. This means ... what to say ...
They finished drinking, and Mishka threw an empty vessel far into the bushes, asked:
- What Nyushka were you talking about? About pine?
- Well! - Ivan Afrikanovich was delighted. - That's really a girl, and beautiful and robotic. And take the legs that are cut down.
She and my woman were recently at a rally, and they grabbed the best one there. And she has these letters, all the walls are hung.
- With a thorn.
- Chevo?
- With a thorn, I say, this Nyushka.
- So what? What is a thorn to you? This thorn is visible, only if you look from the front, and from the side, and if from the left, you can’t even see any thorn. Sternum, but nogito, the girl is like a barge. Where against Nyushka these livestock specialists. There the livestock specialist once came to the yard, and Kurov looked and said: "Good girl, she just left her legs at home." There is no, means, legs something almost. Like sticks. And Nyushka is going out, it's a pleasure to look at. All the piers are in letters and stamps, and in the house there is one with a uterus. And here you want, now we will turn? Even now I'm getting married!
- And what do you think, I'm squeezing? - said Mishka.
- I'm telling you seriously.
- And I'm out of my mind!
- Mishk! Yes, I... yes, we... we are with you, you know? You know Ivan Afrikanovich! Yes, we, we... Parmen?!
Ivan Afrikanovich hit the gelding with the reins, once, twice. Parmen reluctantly turned around, but it was already downhill, the logs rolled. The gelding involuntarily had to switch to a trot, and a minute later the excited buddies, younger, with a ditty, rolled into Sosnovka:
Darling, don't guess, I fell in love - don't throw it away.
Hold on to the old mind - Love the mazurik me.
Sosnovka slept in an unbearable sleep. Not a single dog barked at the appearance of the cart; houses, sparse, like farmsteads, twinkled with moonlit windows. Ivan Afrikanovich hastily put the gelding at the woodpile, threw the last senzo from the cart.
- You, Misha, that's what, you can rely on me, keep quiet yourself. This is not the first time for me, I have known Stepanovna, the uterus, for a long time, after all, my aunt is a cousin. It doesn't hurt, are we drunk?
- I need to get some more...
- Wh! Silence for the time being! .. Stepanovna? - Ivan Afrikanovich cautiously tapped on the gate. - And Stepanovna?
A fire was soon lit in the hut. Then someone went out into the hallway and unlocked the gate.
- Who is this midnighter? She just lay down on the stove. - An old woman in a sweatshirt and felt boots opened the gate. - Like Ivan Afrikanovich.
- Great, Stepanovna! - Ivan Afrikanovich was invigorated, pounding his legs.
- Come on, Afrikanovich, where did you go? And who is with you, not Michael?
- He, he.
In the hut, it really was red from certificates of honor and diplomas, a lamp was burning, a large bleached stove and a fence covered with wallpaper divided the hut into two parts. The knee of the samovar pipe hung on a carnation by the hearth, next to it were two tongs, a shovel and a stewer for coals, the samovar itself stood, apparently, in a cupboard.
“Are you going to spend the night, or how?” Stepanovna asked, and put out the samovar.
- No, we're on a straight line ... We'll warm ourselves and go home. - Ivan Afrikanovich took off his hat and put his furry mittens in it. - Nyushka is somewhere, sleeping, or what?
- What sleeping! Two cows should be about to calve, duck ran away in the evening. What is it like to live?
- A good! - said Ivan Afrikanovich.
- Well, okay, if it's good. Has the hostess given birth yet?
- Yes, it should.
- And I just climbed onto the stove, I think Nyushka knocks, we rarely lock the gate.
The samovar roared. The old woman pulled out a bottle from the cupboard.
She brought a pirogue, and Ivan Afrikanovich coughed, hiding his satisfaction, scratching his pants on his knee.
- And you, Michael, are all bachelors? I would marry, and drink less wine, said Stepanovna.
- That's for sure! - Mishka, laughing, slapped her on the shoulder. - I drink a lot of wine, Stepanovna. After all, today I’ve drunk up to what, what a disaster! Trouble!
Mishka shook his head in sad amusement.
- Take your son-in-law while...
Ivan Afrikanovich kicked Mishka with a felt boot under the table, but Mishka did not let up:
- Will you give your daughter for me, or what?
- Yes, with Christ! - the grandmother laughed. - Take it, if it goes, even now take it.
Ivan Afrikanovich had no choice but to get involved in the business; he was already shouting loudly, to the whole hut, to Stepanovna and Mishka:
Well, that's exactly what I'm saying! The girl, Nyushka, has a hand... A diploma of some... Mish? I tell you exactly!
Stepanovna? You know me! Ivan Afrikanovich did something bad to whom? BUT? In a serious way! .. I tell him, we’ll come to Sosnovka now, right? He tells me... Nyushka! Come on out here, Nyushka! Now I'm going to the farm, I'll bring Nyushka. Stepanovna? Wh!
However, Ivan Afrikanovich did not have to follow Nyushka. The gates banged, and Nyushka herself appeared on the threshold.
-Annushka! -Ivan Afrikanovich with a full pile stood up to meet her. -Annie! Second cousin! Yes, we ... yes we ... we ... Yes, there is no such girl in the whole district! After all, there is no such girl? Some letters ... Wh! Mish? Pour everyone. I say that there is no better girl! And Mishka? Is Mishka a bad guy? After all, Anyuta, we are after you ... it means that this is the very thing, we are wooing.
- What? - Nyushka, in dung boots and in a sweatshirt smelling of silage, stood in the middle of the hut and, narrowing her eyes, looked at the matchmakers. Then she rushed behind the partition, quickly jumped out of there with a grip: - Bring it, goblin!
May your spirit be gone, unfortunate drunkards! Carry it, goblin, until you gouge out your eyes! Goblin carry you where you came from!
Ivan Afrikanovich backed away in bewilderment towards the door, not forgetting, however, to grab his hat and mittens, and the old woman tried to stop her daughter:
Anna, are you out of your mind?
Nyushka roared, grabbed Ivan Afrikanovich by the collar:
- Go, empty mug! Go where you came from, soton! The matchmaker is out! Yes, I to you...
Before Ivan Afrikanovich had time to wake up, Nyushka pushed him hard, and he found himself on the floor, behind the doors; in the same way Mishka ended up in the hallway.
Then she jumped out into the corridor, already without a grip. Even more unceremoniously and finally pushed the matchmakers out into the street and slammed the gate...
There was a roar in the house. Nyushka, crying, threw anything on the floor, screamed all over in tears and rushed around the hut and cursed the whole wide world.
- Well, well! .. - said Mishka, feeling his elbow.
And Ivan Afrikanovich chuckled in confusion.
He barely got up, at first on all fours, then, leaning on his hands, straightened his knees for a long time, straightened up with difficulty:
- Hm! That's because ... Bes, not a girl. Spit in the ear and freeze. Parmen? Where is Parmen?
There was no parmen at the woodpile. Ivan Afrikanovich forgot to tie the gelding on, and he had been stomping home for a long time, stomping alone, under the white moon along the quiet road, and the wrapping creaked lonely in the night fields.
3. UNION OF EARTH AND WATER
In the morning the weather changed, it began to snow, the wind rose.
The whole neighborhood knew all the details and colorful additions about Mishka Petrov's matchmaking: word of mouth worked flawlessly, even in such a blizzard.
The store opened at ten o'clock, the women were waiting for the bread to be baked and discussed the news with relish:
- They say, first with a grip, and then she raked a knife from the table and with a knife on the peasants!
- Oh, oh, what about the old woman?
- What about the old woman? She, they say, beats the old woman every day.
- Oh, women, completeness, what a useless thing to say. Nyushka did not touch her uterus with her finger. No, together with their uterus, they smashed some kind of bay about Nyushka.
- What to say, there was no girl more humble.
- Has the horse come?
- She came alone, no men, no waybill.
- They say that they spent the night in the bathhouse in Sosnovskaya.
- Dorval to wine something!
- Ready to pour both ways.
- Is the product intact, however?
- They brought the Prenikovs, but they say that the fenders broke off two samovars, the gelding himself wandered into the stable, the logs turned somersaults.
- Oh, oh, Ivan Afrikanovich cannot pay off!
- And all the wine, wine, girls, there was no good fellow to overcome wine!
- Yes, if not wine, we know, wine!
- How many troubles from him, white-eyed, how much trouble!
More and more customers came. The brigadier turned around, did not buy anything, hustled and left, the tractor drivers came in for a smoke. And the whole conversation revolved again around Mishka and Ivan Afrikanovich.
Ivan Afrikanovich was seen early in the morning, how he fled from somewhere, how he went into the house and "as if he threw himself around the hut, because yesterday, while he was going to the general store, his wife, Katerina, was taken to the hospital to give birth, his wife was gone, and as if If he had told his mother-in-law, the old woman Yevstolya, that, they say, anyway, he, Ivan Afrikanovich, would be crushed, that he was worse than any orphan without Katerina. to her son Mitka in Severodvinsk, they say, she made a lot of money, shook the cradle at night, that you, they say, would only hug Katerina and that she, Yevstolya, would not stay a day longer and would go to Mitka.
There is no end to the gossip of women ... The saleswoman went to the stable, to write an act, instructing the women to keep an eye on the counter, and there was a noise in the store, the women talked all at once, felt sorry for Ivan Afrikanovich and scolded Mishka. At that very moment, Mishka himself burst into the store, drunk since yesterday, without a hat.
Who is so cute, I have a Duck Bear, Will never bring Lampaseyu 1 surplus! -
he sang and shook his head.
- Hello, hello, Michael.
- What's funny?
- Ah...
- Didn't you bring your bride?
- No, women, it didn't work out.
- Does your head hurt?
- It hurts, women, - the guy admitted and sat down on the seizure. No, not a craft ... - Mishka shook his head.
- And where did you put your friend, the matchmaker? - as if the women were seriously asking.
- Oh, don't talk! Matchmaker-from duck ... - Bear laughed for a long time on the step and coughed from this. - Oh, women! After all, we, like these ... as saboteurs ...
- Didn't take it?
- Exposed! With this grip ... Even now my elbow hurts, as she shugs, we are a rocket from the ladder. How the wind blew us away! Oh, women! You better not say...
__________________________ 1 Lampasey - vernacular: sweets, from the word "monpensier".
The bear started laughing and coughing again, but the women did not back down:
- Duck all of a sudden, didn’t they knock?
- What you! We and that battle-behind the eyes. Woke up, what to do? The gelding went home, we are standing in the cold. I'm talking:
"Let's go, Ivan Afrikanovich, we'll find a bathhouse, and we'll somehow get around until morning. I thought I'd spend the night on the feather bed with Nyushka, but everything turned a hundred degrees." Come on, find a bath.
- Whose bath is it? Theirs?
- Well! Still warm, and one and a half gangs of water. I say, come on, Ivan Afrikanovich, since the matter of matchmaking did not work out, let's at least wash ourselves in the mother-in-law's bath.
- Oh, soton! Oh, gli-ko, you are a demon! - the women, laughing, clapped their hands.
- "... Take off, - I say, - Ivan Afrikanovich, shirt, we will wash away sins." And he stubbornly, force shows:
there is no washcloth, that is not. "I," he says, "is known in Moscow in three houses. I," he says, "did not drink tea without sugar, I will not, like a deserter, wash in someone else's bathhouse. Yes, and the heat," he says, "no." And I, the women, took a ladle, splashed it on the stove. It’s true, there’s no use in the heater, all the same, I think it’s not me if I don’t wash myself in the mother-in-law’s bath! Here Ivan Afrikanovich also has nowhere to go, I look, he is undressing.
- Washed up?
- Well! Without soap, really, but good. They wrapped themselves, lay down on the top shelf-jack. Is it bad? Fistulas, soul, through the nose. I used to spend the night in the Collective Farmer's House, but there the bugs gnawed me to the point of blood, and here is a free bed. I can only hear that Ivan Afrikanovich does not sleep with me. "What?" I ask. “Ah,” he says, “do you know this ... how is it ... Do you know Verkutozaozerskaya? It hurts,” she says, “she’s a good girl.”
I say: “Go, Ivan Afrikanovich, you know where! What am I to you, what kind of almshouse? He says to me: “So what? I say: "I don't need these bros..."
- No, Misha, Verka is not your bride either.
- Well! I'm telling Ivan Afrikanovich ... At that time, boxes of goods and two new mutilated samovars wrapped in paper were dragged into the store.
The women switched to goods, what and how, and Mishka, left out of work, fell silent.
- Are you going to trade preniki?
- Oh, women, if only they brought pretzels, pretzels at least once ...
The saleswoman flatly refused to sell new goods without an invoice, the witnesses signed an act about broken samovars and about the presence of boxes, and Mishka continued to tell:
- "Will you," I say, "sleep today, al won't you?" I hear snoring. I woke up in the morning, I looked, there was no Ivan Afrikanovich. One is on the shelf. Looks like he woke me up, woke me up and ran away in the cold, retreated. I sleep a lot with a hangover. I sat down, women, I wanted to smoke. I look, my pants are not my own - you see, they washed and mixed up their pants. “Okay, I think, at least they are,” he smoked out of the dressing room, it seemed like he couldn’t see anyone, but along the backs, in the backyards, I think, at least to leave the village alive.
- Well, you should look: maybe the invoice is in Ivan Afrikanovich's pants.
The bear began to fumble in his pockets.
- No, this is not a craft ... Newspaper, pouch, matches here. And here's another note. Well! Exactly, invoice.
The bear began to read the invoice, and the saleswoman checked the goods.
- "Mint gingerbread, forty kilos each, Tula samovars, white, thirty-three eighty pieces, Othello chocolate, do you have it?
- Yes, there is!
- "Lake goose, Lisa-Patrikeevna ..." Wait, what kind of fox is this? Ah, toys... "Repr... reproduction of "Union of Earth and Water", is there?
- Here.
- Well, at least to see what kind of union it is. - Mishka tore off the wrapper from the picture and clicked his tongue with joy: - Honest mother! Baba, just look what we have brought! We didn't go in vain. Two fifty total!
The women both looked and spat, cursed:
the picture depicted a naked woman.
- Oh, oh, take it away, goblin, which they won’t draw. Already naked women began to carry! What will happen next?
- Mikhail, but she looks like Nyushka.
- Well! Exactly!
- Take it and hang it over the bed, you don’t even need to get married.
- Yes, I'd rather add thirty kopecks ...
- He, oh, boobs!
- And the little girl is drawn out.
- And what is this one drinking from a horn?
- Dudit!
- It hurts the frame is good. On the wall for a patre.
- I would have bought it because of the frame, by God, I bought it.
The picture was bought "for Patreta". At the request of the mistress of the picture, Mishka tore Rubens out of the frame, rolled him up into a tube.
But Ivan Afrikanovich never showed up.
They brought bread from the bakery, mint gingerbread was also used. The women untied the knots, unbuttoned the pins. The boy, sent for Ivan Afrikanovich, soon ran up and said that Ivan Afrikanovich was not at home, and no one knew where he had gone, and that Yevstol’s grandmother was rocking the cradle, sprinkled Grishka’s trousers and scolded Ivan Afrikanovich as a muddler. And that as if Grishka, waiting for his pants, sits on the stove and cries.
4. HOT LOVE
Nothing could be seen beyond the village, only a white snowstorm was smoking.
Clubs of prickly snow clung to the cock's and extinguished each other, new clubs were born, spinning, wandering in their crowd, confusing heaven and earth. It looks like the last time winter was raging. The wind did not whistle or weep, but roared with an even, infinitely wide noise. From all sides, both from below and above, thick wind curtains flapped and were torn into whips.
Ivan Afrikanovich was not very warmly dressed and only said: "Oh, what a disaster, oh, what a disaster!" He himself did not know whether it was said aloud or only in his mind, because if he had spoken aloud, the voice would still not be heard. Feeling the road with an alder stick, leaning against his shoulder and slicing through the rushing air with his shoulder, he walked with difficulty towards the forest. Sometimes the wind was breathtaking. Then Ivan Afrikanovich, like a drowning man, turned his head, looking for a comfortable position to inhale the air, and felt how his knees were weakening while holding his breath. He knew that in the forest the roads were better and the wind was quieter. He walked very slowly and with his eyes closed. When the stick went deep into the snow, he took two steps to the left, then four to the right, if there was no road to the left.
Windy cold has long blown out the remnants of yesterday's hangover. “Oh, Katerina, Katerina…” Ivan Afrikanovich said mentally.
He grieved for real. After he ran from the Sosnovskaya bathhouse and did not find his wife at home, he, not listening to his mother-in-law, rushed after Katerina. "The devil is with him, with the gelding, and with the goods, they will sort it out! And what a foolish field you are, Ivan Afrikanovich! Got drunk yesterday, spent the night in a bathhouse. And at that time Katerina was taken away to give birth, strangers were taken away, and he, a foolish field, spent the night bathhouse. There is no one to beat, no one to whip." So thought Ivan Afrikanovich and gradually calmed down.
The fussy and stupid riot in the soul was replaced by anxiety and pity for Katerina. He ran through Sosnovka and did not even remember the night incident.
Rather, sooner. “Katerina. They took me away to give birth, the ninth in a row, everything is small and small. Baba has been aching on the farm for six years. You can say that he waters and feeds the whole horde. Every month it’s forty or fifty rubles, and he, Ivan Afrikanovich, what? Nothing , with a gulkin's nose, ten and fifteen rubles. Well, it's true, he catches fish and sells something for furs. But it's all unreliable ... "
Ivan Afrikanovich remembered how, when he was still single, he saw off Katerina from parties. He came from the war, there was no living place, his leg was lame, and he danced with a lame leg.
Learned. Maybe because of this, the leg began to recover, that it danced, gave development ... Katerina was fat, soft. Even now she’s still fine, but if she dresses up and drinks a stack ... But when is she supposed to dress up? Eight children, the ninth is on the way. Rub the snot on your fist until it grows. The mother-in-law, of course, helps out, shakes the cradle, races around the stove, without the mother-in-law there would also be a khan. Evstol's mother-in-law is also an old woman. Although every day he is going to Mitka in Severodvinsk, but nothing. For the fifth year he says that he will go to Mitka ...
Ivan Afrikanovich could not forget her only one insult.
It’s not that he couldn’t, it’s just like a splinter in the finger, that case affects, especially when you drink. True, the mother-in-law, perhaps, is not to blame, the dead mother is more to blame, but both were kind, what to say.
It happened on a beer holiday, a successful day.
Ivan Afrikanovich, and then Vanka Drynov, was visiting Nyushka's mother - Stepanovna, after all, was a great-aunt by her father. Nyushka was Katerina's best friend. Together they danced and saw off, together they tore the bird cherry. And now Katerina is approaching the ninth, and Nyushka is about forty and still in girls. “The second cousin withered, apparently, she couldn’t take care of it,” thought Ivan Afrikanovich.
At that time, Ivan Afrikanovich came to Sosnovka with a firm decision to marry off Katerina with a self-propelled gun.
Nyushka helped him as best she could. Katerina told the groom through her that she would go any night, she would not look at the uterus and would not be afraid of talking. The house at Yevstolya and Katerina's stood just opposite Nyushkin, now Sosnovka has thinned out and this house has long been gone, but then there was a big house at any price. Ivan Afrikanovich sat at a party, drank tart wort and looked at Yevstol'in's house, and his heart was young and anxious. Youth rolled away like a golden ring - where did everything go? Three accordions played at once, cheerful girls sang in the dark. The guys started fights on the street, and the girls and women pulled them away, and they escaped from the women's hands, but they escaped just enough so that they could not escape for real ...
Ivan Afrikanovich with Nyushka then went out into the street.
New chrome boots and sergeant's breeches sat well and tight on him, jingled on his jacket and pulled on the floor of the order. Nyushka, proud of her second cousin, walked arm in arm with him. In the August darkness and merry turmoil they searched for Katerina for a long time and would not have found her if she had not gone to dance and sang: this voice in Ivan Afrikanovich is ringing even now in his ears. Ivan Afrikanovich danced twice, walked around the village with the girls, and in the morning took them away from Sosnovka. Nyushka went with them for fun. He remembers how, as if in jest, she sang a ditty, going out into a dark, but still warm field, smelling of rye straw and dry earthen dust:
Don't go, girlfriend, to get married, Like my little head, Four brothers-in-law are better than one sister-in-law.
But Ivan Afrikanovich had neither brothers nor sisters, Katerina had nothing to fear from sisters-in-law and brother-in-law.
It turned out differently: the then still living mother predicted the wrong bride to Ivan Afrikanovich, Katerina was disliked by her. They came to the village already in the morning, the mother, angry, opened the gate. In the hut, the girls sat on a bench, and Ivan Afrikanovich was already taking off his shoes, for him, a front-line soldier, everything was clear and precise. The mother either rattles with a damper, then runs out into the passage, groans and groans. I went out to the story, there is a gate just on the Sosnovskaya side, on the bride's village. She ran into the hut, threw up her hands: "Oh, mother girls, Sosnovka is on fire!" Nyushka and Katerina rushed out of the hut headlong, the gate behind them slammed shut on the latch. While Ivan Afrikanovich was putting on his boot, his mother also closed the gate with a hook. "It's not true, Vanka, don't run, they've gone, and thank God," she said calmly.
He almost knocked out the collar, got confused with the latch for a long time.
I ran out into the street: in the August night darkness was piling up, no Sosnovka was burning, and the girls were no longer there ...
After that, Ivan Afrikanovich could not marry for two years, and married the third. On a silent girl from distant lakeside places. She fell asleep on his arm immediately, soulless, like an unheated furnace ... They had a cold love: children were not born. The mother said that they had been spoiled, played a joke on, and a year later the wife herself went to her lakeside places, got married and, as Ivan Afrikanovich heard, gave birth to four children with another.
"Yes, they had a cold love with her, that's for sure.
Here with Katerina, love is hot ... "
Ivan Afrikanovich wooed her again; it was here that Evstolya, the current mother-in-law, became stubborn. She put a ban on her daughter: if you don’t go, that’s all, there’s nothing, they say, to bully them, we are no worse than them, in our family we were all workers. The case dragged on. At the wedding, the mother-in-law did not drink, did not eat, sat on the bench, as if a arshin had been swallowed, and now Ivan Afrikanovich still remembers this insult. No, what an insult there, so many years have passed. He has a passionate love with Katerina:
she will go to the field, to the farm, as if he will take out his soul.
"Oh, Katerina, Katerina! .. - Ivan Afrikanovich almost fled, the excitement again grew somewhere in the very inside, near the heart. - I'll take the dove home, carry it in my arms.
There is nothing for her there and toil. At home she will give birth no worse ... I will shake the straw on the farm, carry water ... I will decide the drink, I will not take wine in my mouth, if only everything is fine, if only ... "
The blizzard in the field sang again, the wind cut hot cheeks with snow. Ivan Afrikanovich ran out into the corner, the hospital and the general store office were within easy reach.
He did not remember how he ran to the hospital porch ...
* * *
- Ivan Afrikanovich? And Ivan Afrikanovich? - The paramedic opened the door to the corridor, looked behind the stove. Ivan Afrikanovich was nowhere to be found. - Comrade Drynov!
"Where did he go?" she thought.
She decided that Drynov left without waiting for his wife's birth. Just in case, she opened the pantry, where the cleaner put firewood, and laughed. Ivan Afrikanovich slept on logs: he was ashamed even to put an old hospital sheepskin coat under his head. He had not slept for two nights and had hardly eaten anything, and on the third day he got sick and fell asleep on the logs.
- Comrade Drynov, - the paramedic touched his sleeve, - your son was born at night, get up.
Ivan Afrikanovich jumped up at the same second. He did not even have time to be ashamed that he climbed into the pantry and fell asleep, the paramedic stood and scolded him:
- You would at least put a sheepskin coat on!
- Honey, yes, I ... I'll catch fish for you. Dove, I...
I... Is everything okay, at least?
- Everything, everything.
- I'll catch fish for you. Would you let them go home?
- It is forbidden. Let him lie down for two days. - The paramedic gave him a dressing gown. What will you call your son?
- Yes, no matter how! Let them go. As you say, I'll call it, let go, dear! I have them on chunochka, on a sled, that is ... We, this, will get there on the sly.
Katerina came out of the ward and only glanced slightly at Ivan Afrikanovich. She also began to beg to be released.
- What should I do here? And you sit down! she turned to her husband. Left the house, the guys alone with the old woman.
- Katerina, are you ... is everything okay?
- When did you come home from home, today? Katerina asked sternly, not answering.
- Well! - Ivan Afrikanovich winked at the paramedic, so that she would not give out, not let it slip.
- And it came unexpectedly.
- Why, how, this is the most ... Where is the guy? Again, probably all in your breed.
Katerina, as if ashamed of her own smile, said shyly:
- Again.
The paramedic looked and looked and went, and Ivan Afrikanovich followed her, his wife too, and both again began to persuade her to let her go. The paramedic at first did not want to listen, then waved it off:
- Okay, go ahead. Just don't go to work for a week or so. In no case.
... Soon Ivan Afrikanovich went out with his wife and child to the street. The baby, wrapped in a blanket and in the same hospital sheepskin coat, he put on a sled taken from a familiar aunt.
After the recent blizzard, the road has already been rolled up.
The weather warmed up, there was no wind, the sun was hot in the spring.
- What shall we call the guy? - Ivan Afrikanovich asked when they approached the village council. - Maybe Ivan? Though not in my breed, but I would be Ivan.
- Come on and Ivan, - Katerina sighed.
- Let's. It's business as usual.
- Go to the village council, write down the guy, but ask for benefits, and they will give you without me, and I will go. I'll wait for you in Sosnovka, we'll drink tea at Nyushka's. Yes, don't drink money.
- Well! What are you? I'll catch up with you, don't hurry, go a little!
Ivan Afrikanovich carefully straightened the sheepskin coat with the child and hurriedly went to the village council.
Katerina took her son home on a sled. She went to Sosnovka to Nyushka. Stepanovna warmed up the samovar, they talked for a long time about all their affairs, but Ivan Afrikanovich was not there.
He came running upset when Katerina was already leaving with the child on the porch. Stepanovna and Nyushka also went out into the street.
- Great, Stepanovna, great, Anyuta.
- They would have come in, and even spent the night, - said Stepanovna, while Nyushka and Katerina were packing the sheepskin coat with the child.
- No, what an overnight stay ... Fifty-four rubles ... with kopecks ... deducted from the allowance.
- Maybe you can take the samovars and fix them? Stepanovna asked. By God, take the samovars! Sasha Pyatak is soldering kranty-ti in the forge. We also need a samovar, and you can take another one for yourself.
- And that's right! I'll take it and fix it. How are you, Katherine?
- Oh, goblin! -Katerina shook her head. - Why was it to let one horse go?
Ivan Afrikanovich drooped, fell silent, Stepanovna and Nyushka stood at the gate and left, and they moved along the road.
It was really hot, for the first time the sky was blue in spring, and the pines gilded by the sun were quietly warming themselves on the mountain, above the spring. In this place, not far from Sosnovka, Katerina and Ivan Afrikanovich himself always took a drink, drank spring water even in winter.
We rested and just stopped to sit for a minute.
The newborn was sleeping peacefully and deeply in his sled. The pines, pierced through by the sun, also slept, slept deeply and gratifyingly, the snowy fields were unbearably bright white everywhere.
Katerina and Ivan Afrikanovich, without saying a word, stopped at the spring, sat down on the sled. They were silent.
Suddenly Katerina turned to her husband with a smile:
- You, Ivanushko, what? Upset, I see, spit, okay. Ek, just think, samovars, and don't think anything.
- But how, girl, fifty rubles, is it a joke ...
The spring was not large and not a striker, it made its way from the inside of a pine bush not at all impudently. In the summer it was all overgrown with grass, sandy, quietly flowing water onto the main road. In winter, the wind swept the snow aside here, only slightly covered it, as if for warmth, and it did not freeze. The water was so transparent that it seemed that it did not exist at all, this water.
Ivan Afrikanovich wanted to light a cigarette and, together with the pouch, pulled out of his pocket a piece of paper that had been handed to him in the village council. It was written in pencil under carbon paper.
"ACT We, the undersigned, have drawn up this act. In that, on the one hand, the general store office in the person of the seller, on the other hand, the carrier Drynov Ivan Afrikanovich, with three witnesses. Afrikanovich was carrying goods from the general store warehouse and the horse came without him, and where was the aforementioned so-called.
Drynov I. Af. this is not known, but according to the invoice, all the goods turned out to be in cash. Only a horse with goods, due to night time, went into the stable and overturned the firewood, while Comrade Drynov was sleeping in the Sosnovskaya bathhouse and two samovars from firewood fell down. These samovars in the amount of 54 rubles. 84 kop. received a defect, namely: their cranes broke off and on one side there was a badly crumpled side.
The other samovar was not damaged except for the crane.
The rest of the goods were accepted according to the invoice in safety, only Comrade Drynov did not appear for delivery, in which this act was drawn up.
CHAPTER TWO
1. KIDS
He felt good, this six-week-old man. Yes, he lived in the world for only six weeks. Except for those nine months, of course. He didn't care about anything. Nine months and six weeks ago it didn't exist.
Six weeks had passed since the moment the umbilical cord broke and the mother's blood stopped feeding his little body. And now he had his own heart, all his own. At birth, he proclaimed himself with a cry. Even then he felt hard and soft, then warm and cold, light and dark. Soon he began to distinguish colors. Little by little the sounds also took on their differences for him. But the strongest feeling was the feeling of hunger. It did not stop even when he, having had enough of his mother's milk, smiled at the white snow. Even in sleep, the need for saturation did not disappear.
And here he was lying in the cradle, and he felt good, although he was aware of this only in one body. There was not even a shadow of the abstract, non-physical consciousness of this "good".
For some reason, the legs moved by themselves, back and forth, the fingers on the hands, too, themselves, then clenched into a fist, then spread out. He still had no difference between sleeping and not sleeping. In the dream, he lived the same way as before. And the transition from sleep to non-sleep did not exist for him.
The cradle swayed slightly. If he had been a little bigger, he would have heard that grandmother's hands smell of smoke. He would have seen the huge cracked ceiling, and the roar of the older, one and a half year old Volodya would have brought him out of his contemplatively happy indifference.
“You are a demon, Volodya, a pure demon,” Grandma Yevstolya said affectionately. “Aren’t you ashamed?
Volodya roared in her arms.
He, this one and a half year old Volodya, had a struggle with his younger six-week-old brother. The fight for the cradle. He, Volodya, was still rocking in the cradle when his younger brother, who had just been born, took his place in it.
Volodya was already walking on his own feet, he spoke a lot of words, he called his grandmother mom and dad dad, and he was still rocking in the cradle. When he was evicted for the first time, at first, as if condescendingly, he gave way to the cradle. But a minute later he was amazed at this obvious injustice, roared with a good obscenity and swearing.
He still wanted to go to the cradle. He also wanted his mother to be by his side, and this anguish, the pain of not having his mother by his side, poured out by itself into a thirst to take possession of the cradle.
Grandmother tucked up the blanket, moved the little one to one end, and laid Volodya in the other.
The cradle was big. Volodya immediately calmed down, and the little one did not care who to lie with. Volodya reached for the pacifier. He had long been supposed to give up on the pacifier, but he still could not wean from it. The grandmother smeared the pacifier with mustard, said that the dog had dragged the pacifier away, but it was all in vain: Volodya did not part with the rubber pacifier.
Volodya lay in the cradle contented and reassured.
The new creature was moving somewhere at his feet, but he was getting used to this restlessness. But Volodya wanted the cradle to sway, for the eyes to creak as usual.
He thought, looking at the sunbeam reflected on the wall by the glass of the chest of drawers.
He already knew all the sounds of his native hut. Especially the sound of the door. His heart sank with anguish when a grandmother with a bucket left the hut and disappeared. Then he became unbearably sad. Tears were ready to splash, and lips themselves formed a bitter horseshoe.
Long, eerie seconds lasted. He could no longer hold back his tears. This scream would have just escaped from the compressed neck, but suddenly the door would open and grandmother Evstolya, alive, real, would appear in the hut and, without looking at the children, hurried to the stove. Joy and relief at once extinguished Volodya's loneliness, the accumulated cry and tears were swallowed. This was repeated many times until the grandmother finished dressing up. He couldn't get used to it. The longing for the always absent mother sharpened his heart, and when the grandmother left, he was completely unbearable. Rocking the cradle didn't even help.
Marusya, the elder sister of the two brothers lying in the cradle, went up to the cradle and rattled it with a rattle. She was four years old, she knew every knot in the cradle better than Volodya, and sometimes she also really wanted to go to the cradle ...
- Shake them, Marusya, - said the grandmother, - shake them, good girl. Here, here, for the rope. Good girl! When they grow up, they give you a ride in a car.
Marusya gently rocked the cradle. Outside the window the snow was white and the sun was shining. Mom went through this snow.
Marusya was still sleeping, but her mother had left. And no dad. Marusya was silent all the time, and no one knew what she was thinking. She was born just at the time when the current cow Rogul was still a heifer and there was no milk, and because of this Marusya grew quietly and kept thinking and thinking, but no one knew what she was thinking.
Grandma Yevstolya put the samovar on.
- Mom will come now, we will drink tea. We'll wake up Grishka and Vaska, and Katyushka and Mishka are probably tired of sleeping too.
The mention of his mother was reflected on Marusya's face with a long, astonished, anxious smile. She seemed to remember that she had a mother, and she lit up with joy, exhaled admiringly:
- Mammy?
“Mammushka will come,” Grandmother Evstolya confirmed. “That’s how she milks cows, so she will come.”
The girl looked thoughtfully and distantly into the street again.
Mishka and Vaska, the twins, both six years old, both woke up at once and made a fuss. Then for a long time they also put on their identical trousers: each time someone put on his trousers back to front and walked around like that all day. Their four felt boots were not paired, mixed: the guys took a long time and noisily chose them from a pile of other felt boots that were drying on the stove. Finally, the boots were taken out and put on. It was cold in the barn where the brothers had slept, and it smelled of frozen hay. Shivering from the cold, the guys strained, each wanted to splash further than the other.
“I’ll show you, I’ll kick your ears!” they heard the voice of Grandma Yevstolya.
The grandmother went out with a bucket to the cow. Mishka and Vaska ran into the hut. Morning inexplicable delight permeated them both through and through and died away somewhere at the very tailbones. They wanted to either squeal or fly, but the cold forced them to quickly get out of the hut. I wonder if Katyushka is up or still sleeping? She tells them to wash every time, such a boss. Asleep. They, without saying a word, silently, easily convinced themselves that they forgot to wash.
I wanted to eat. From behind the partition there was a smell of fried potatoes, and a samovar rustled near the hearth. Vaska touched the samovar with his finger, and Mishka touched it, Mishka blew on his finger, and Vaska blew.
Why is Volodya roaring again? He woke up Katyushka and Grishka, roaring.
Looking at Volodya, Marusya also blinked her little eyes.
Mishka and Vaska went up to the cradle. Volodya roars. And this new one does not roar. Vaska and Mishka had no interest in hanging around the cradle; without waiting for food, they put on their hats, took off their little coats from the carnations, and went out into the street ...
Katyushka jumped out of bed and immediately took Volodka in her arms. Volodya calmed down. Grishka, the lazy sleepyhead, didn't want to get up. Katyushka learned her lessons yesterday, but Grishka put it off until today, and here he was, unable to overcome his laziness, and his soul ached because of the unlearned lessons. Of course, you still have to do something written, and write an exercise, and solve examples. Here's the oral...
It’s good for Vaska and Mishka, they don’t go to school. Still, Grishka had to get up, he was already at the third. And Katyushka studied at the fourth, she saw everything - how Grishka lived and what he did, she saw, and Grishka could not rest from her. And now she reassured Volodya, and like a teacher, take this, do this, seated him at the table and orders examples to decide, but when to decide something? There the grandmother is already carrying the samovar on the table.
...So the morning began in the family of Ivan Afrikanovich.
Typical April morning. Gradually everyone was fed, everyone was clothed. Katyushka and Grishka went to school.
Vaska and Mishka ran off again to walk around the village, Marusya, in large, oversized felt boots, was also taken away for a walk to another hut. Only Volodya and the little one were left at home. They slept in the cradle, and the eyes creaked slightly, and Grandmother Yevstolya churned sour cream in a pot with a whorl. The clock was ticking in the hut, a mouse was scratching under the floorboard. But before Grandma Yevstolya had time to come to her senses from the morning rigmarole, Marusya, then Mishka and Vaska, again showed up at the house. And another six associates.
We already had time to freeze, dragged snow, and walked a little.
- Oh, trouble, however! Evstolya took turns wiping her cold, wet noses with them. Where did you stay? Like Poshekhontsy, like Poshekhontsy! Here Poshekhontsy-ti used to be disheveled too. They ate food, but they did not know how to live.
- Baba, a fairy tale, a woman, a fairy tale! - Vaska jumped on one leg, pulled Babkin's hem.
- Duck you what today, Poshekhonskaya al about a cat with a rooster?
Everyone stopped together at Poshekhonskaya.
2. BABKIN'S TALES
“It was a long time ago, the woman was still a girl,” Grandmother Yevstolya began quietly, slowly, quietly. “Vaska, don’t turn around!” And you, Mishka, again grinded the button. Already I to you!
In a large village, in a swampy region, there lived gloomy peasants, one word - Poshekhontsy, and everything was going wrong with those peasants. And the village started up big, and the women heated the stoves all at different times. One will flood in the morning, the other in the afternoon, and the other in the dark night. Fire it up, sit by the window, and let's make pancakes. While the pancakes are going around, the stove will heat up, the woman will suddenly melt in a row. Until suddenly the row melts, the pancakes will take and turn sour. So they toiled, cordial.
Grandmother Evstolya told all this in passing. But at last she wiped the table, took a scourer of sour cream from the kitchen, and sat down on a bench. Some of the children had already forgotten to close their mouths, and now they were fussing. But as soon as she began to tell, and everyone immediately calmed down.
“Robeteshechka ran without pants, girls and robots didn’t know how to dance. And old men and old women loved to sniff tobacco. They loved it so much that they sniffed it out, to the last penny. Yes, they taught the young. But tobacco must be transported from afar, many miles away. They unloaded, blessing, convoy. And how did they do it? Clever Pavel helped out the whole thing.
"We must," he says, "we all go together. Because it's better for everyone together." He said, and ordered all the peasants to be ready for tomorrow, so that the horses were fed, so that there were new wrappers. And the reins are tied, which burst. Here the Poshekhons lay down to sleep. By the night the sky had cleared up, the frost had chilled everything. Poshekhontsy huddled on the floor. In the morning, Pavel walks around: "Harness up, robots!" The most economic and sensible was this Pavel. Poshekhontsy stirred, scratched themselves. In one hut, a brother says to another brother: "It's still early to get up, it's dark outside too." Another brother says: "No, you have to get up, get out and Paul tells you to get up." What to do? We decided to go to the neighbor's brothers and find out: it's time to get up or not yet. They woke up the neighbors, there were four of them.
Neighborhood brothers say: "Perhaps, robyata, it's still early to get up, it's dark outside." Everyone stood in the middle of the street and argued. Some people say: you have to get up, others that you get up early. One of them says: "Here we are, let's ask again in this house." They woke up another house, there were six of them, and again they cannot come to an agreement: some say it's early, some shout: "We must get up!" They all huddled together in one region, the whole region was awakened, they raised a noise, there is more than enough of this cry. And they don't know what to do. And the smart Pavel wakes up the peasants at the other end: "Harness up, robots, you have to go for tobacco!" Well, there is nothing to do, in that region the peasants began to get up. One man, his name was Martin, and he says: "Mother, mother, where are the trousers?" I forgot where the trousers are. We found his trousers, he needs to wear them.
Martyn tells his brother that all the brothers lived together, the Poshekhonians never shared. Martyn says: "You, Petruha, keep your trousers, and I will jump into them from the blankets." Petruha took his trousers and held them down, while Martyn jumped and hit with only one foot. Climbed again on the floor, suddenly jumped in a row. How long, how short, but both legs got into trousers.
And at that end there is still a cry, like at a fair.
The opinions of the peasants were divided; some say, you need to get up, others shout that it’s early. While they were arguing, the stars all went out, it’s good that at least there was no fight. Pavel first harnessed his mare, rode out onto the road, and others dressed up after him. Began to harness Lukyan with Fedula.
Fedula says to Lukyan: "You, brother Lukyan, hold on tight to the collar, and I'll ride the mare into him." Lukyan is holding the yoke, and Fedula is pushing the mare into the yoke, here is pushing.
Fedula was sweating all over, but the mare kept passing by. The mare was sick of it, took Fedula as she kicked, knocked out all the teeth in Fedula's mouth.
Evstolya stopped because the children laughed unfriendly. Only Marusya, barely smiling, sat quietly on the bench. The grandmother stroked her on the crown, continued:
- Go. And we left too late, we got together for a long time. They go, all around is an open field, but is the day long in winter? We drove one portage, the Poshekhonians decided to spend the night. They were allowed to spend the night in this village. And it was Christmas time, the local robyata spoiled at night. Someone's woodpile will be rolled out, someone's pipe will be plugged with a cap, or even the gate will be frozen with water. They saw the Poshekhon convoy. The horses were unharnessed, and everyone was shafted through the fences and pushed through and harnessed again. In the morning, the Poshekhontsy drove on, but the carts couldn’t move either here or there, they couldn’t move. Gardens and gates crack, the owners jumped out. They began to thresh the Poshekhonians: is that really the point?
All the spinners were broken, all the gates were dragged away by the Poshekhons on the shafts. Barely alive, the Poshekhonians left the village, even the sensible Pavel got a headshot.
Well, somehow and somehow we drove another day, it began to get dark all of a sudden, we asked to spend the night again. Martyn says to Pavel: "Now we need to unharness the horses so that there will not be such a massacre as yesterday." We watered the horses, gave us some hay, drank boiling water ourselves, and went to bed. And the local peasants walked back from the conversation in the evening, and turned the wood shafts over in the opposite direction.
In the morning, Pavel raised the convoy while it was still dark. As they stood with wooden shafts in the wrong direction, so the Poshekhons harnessed them, and so they went with Christ. They drive day and night, they pass one village, dragged past, satisfied, they will soon arrive at the place, they will buy tobacco and return it to the women for warm stoves. The road was good. Poshekhontsy drove up to a large village. Martin and says:
"Lukyan, and Lukyan, the bathhouse looks like yours, it also has no roof." - "No, Martyn," Lukyan says, "my bathhouse has a gate to the right, but at this gate they look to the left. This bathhouse is not like mine." - "And there, like Pavlova, the woman went for water," Fedula makes a noise, "and the sundress is exactly the same!" - "Don't lie!" Pavel, it's our village! By God, ours, it just turned over! But, it seems, I'm Pavel, too?" It's Pavel ek who says yes behind his ears and feels. He is Paul or not Paul. I forgot, you see, that he is. As soon as I left home, I forgot. That's how smart Pavel was, let alone talk about those. And there is nothing to say about those.
Grandmother Yevstolya vigorously whipped up thick sour cream with a whorl. The guys, opening their eyes, listened to the peasants of the Poshekhons. They still did not understand everything, but they listened to the grandmother with interest.
- Here you are, Vaska, like that Poshekhonets, you see, again your pants are not dressed like that. Say more?
- Say, say! - stirred, smiled, changed places.
Grandmother added sour cream to the pot, and again he creaked monotonously in the hut.
They didn't grow anything. Rye was not sown, only turnips. Nettles, so that they would not grow near houses, were watered with vegetable oil - who taught them that, God knows. Whoever said anything, they did it, these Poshekhonians were completely unanswered.

End of free trial.

business as usual

Still drank. And then Ivan Afrikanovich decides to woo Mishka his second cousin, forty-year-old Nyushka, a livestock specialist. True, she has a thorn, but if you look from the left side, you can’t see it ... Nyushka chases her friends away with her grip, and they have to spend the night in a bathhouse.

And just at this time, the ninth, Ivan, will be born to Ivan Afrikanovich's wife Katerina. And Katerina, although the paramedic forbade her strictly, after giving birth - immediately to work, seriously ill. And Katerina recalls how, on Peter's Day, Ivan with a lively wench from their village, Dasha Putanka, and then, when Katerina forgave him, joyfully exchanged the Bible inherited from his grandfather for an "accordion" - to amuse his wife. And now Dasha does not want to take care of the calves, so Katerina has to work for her too (otherwise you will not be able to feed the family). Exhausted by work and illness, Katerina suddenly faints. She is taken to the hospital. Hypertension, stroke. And only more than two weeks later she returns home.

And Ivan Afrikanovich also recalls the accordion: he had not even managed to learn how to play the bass, as it was taken away for arrears.

Vasily Ivanovich Belov

"The Usual Business"

And just at this time, the ninth, Ivan, will be born to Ivan Afrikanovich's wife Katerina. And Katerina, although the paramedic forbade her strictly, after giving birth - immediately to work, seriously ill. And Katerina recalls how on Peter's Day Ivan spied with a lively woman from their village, Dasha Putanka, and then, when Katerina forgave him, to celebrate, he exchanged the Bible inherited from his grandfather for an "accordion" - to amuse his wife. And now Dasha doesn’t want to take care of the calves, so Katerina has to work for her too (otherwise you won’t be able to feed her family). Exhausted by work and illness, Katerina suddenly faints. She is taken to the hospital. Hypertension, stroke. And only more than two weeks later she returns home.

And Ivan Afrikanovich also recalls the accordion: he had not even managed to learn how to play the bass, as it was taken away for arrears.

It's hay time. Ivan Afrikanovich in the forest, secretly, seven miles from the village, mows at night. If you don’t mow three haystacks, there is nothing to feed the cow: ten percent of the hay mowed on the collective farm is enough for a month at most. One night, Ivan Afrikanovich takes his young son Grishka with him, and then, out of stupidity, he tells the district commissioner that he went with his father to mow in the forest at night. They threaten Ivan Afrikanovich with a lawsuit: after all, he is a deputy of the village council, and then the same commissioner demands to “prompt” who else mows in the forest at night, write a list ... For this, he promises not to “socialize” Drynov’s personal haystacks. Ivan Afrikanovich agrees with the neighbor's chairman and, together with Katerina, goes to the forest to mow someone else's territory at night.

At this time, Mitka Polyakov, Katerina's brother, comes to their village from Murmansk without a penny of money. A week had not passed before he got the whole village drunk, barked at the authorities, Mishke betrothed Dasha Putanka, and provided the cow with hay. And everything seems to be similar. Dasha Putanka gives Mishka a love potion to drink, and then he vomits for a long time, and a day later, at Mitka's instigation, they go to the village council and sign. Soon, Dasha rips off a reproduction of Rubens' painting "Union of Earth and Water" from Mishka's tractor (it depicts a naked woman, by all accounts, the spitting image of Nyushka) and burns the "picture" in the oven out of jealousy. In response, the bear almost throws Dashka, who is washing herself in the bathhouse, with a tractor right into the river. As a result, the tractor was damaged, and illegally cut hay was found in the attic of the bathhouse. At the same time, they begin to look for hay from everyone in the village, and Ivan Afrikanovich's turn comes. It's business as usual.

Mitka is summoned to the police, to the district (for complicity in damaging a tractor and for hay), but by mistake, fifteen days are given not to him, but to another Polyakov, also from Sosnovka (there is half the village of the Polyakovs). Mishka is serving his fifteen days right in his village, on the job, getting drunk in the evenings with a sergeant assigned to him.

After all the secretly mowed hay is taken from Ivan Afrikanovich, Mitka convinces him to leave the village and go to the Arctic to work. Drynov does not want to leave his native place, but if you listen to Mitka, then there is no other way out ... And Ivan Afrikanovich decides. The chairman does not want to give him a certificate, according to which he can get a passport, but in despair Drynov threatens him with a poker, and the chairman suddenly droops: “Even if everyone scatter ...”

Now Ivan Afrikanovich is a free Cossack. He says goodbye to Katerina and suddenly shrinks from pain, pity and love for her. And, without saying anything, pushes her away, as if from the shore into the pool.

And Katerina, after his departure, has to mow alone. There, during the mowing, the second blow overtakes her. Barely alive, they bring her home. And you can’t go to the hospital in such a state - he dies, they won’t take him.

And Ivan Afrikanovich returns to his native village. Ran into. And he tells a slightly familiar guy from a distant lakeside village how it was with Mitka, but he was selling onions and didn’t have time to jump on the train, but he still had all the tickets. They dropped off Ivan Afrikanovich and demanded that he go back to the village within three hours, and they would send a fine to the collective farm, but they didn’t say how to go, if nothing. And suddenly - the train approached and Mitya got off it. So here Ivan Afrikanovich prayed: “I don’t need anything, just let me go home.” They sold the bow, bought a return ticket, and finally Drinov went home.

And the guy, in response to the story, reports the news: in the village of Ivan Afrikanovich, the woman died, there are many children left. The guy leaves, and Drynov suddenly falls on the road, clutches his head with his hands and rolls into a roadside ditch. He thumps his fist into the meadow, gnaws at the ground ...

Rogulya, the cow of Ivan Afrikanovich, recalls his life, as if wondering at her, the shaggy sun, warmth. She was always indifferent to herself, and her timeless, immense contemplation was very rarely disturbed. The mother of Katerina Yevstolya comes, cries over her bucket and tells all the children to hug Rogulya, to say goodbye. Drynov asks Mishka to slaughter the cow, but he can't do it himself. The meat is promised to be taken to the dining room. Ivan Afrikanovich sorts out Rogulin's giblets, and tears drip on his bloody fingers.

The children of Ivan Afrikanovich, Mitka and Vaska, are sent to an orphanage,

Antoshka is at the school. Mitka writes to send Katyushka to him in Murmansk, only it hurts too little. Grishka and Marusya and two babies remain. And that is difficult: Evstolya is old, her hands have become thin. She recalls how, before her death, Katerina, already without memory, called her husband: “Ivan, it’s windy, oh, Ivan, how windy!”

After the death of his wife, Ivan Afrikanovich does not want to live. He walks overgrown, scary and smokes bitter Selpovsky tobacco. And Nyushka takes care of his children.

Ivan Afrikanovich goes into the forest (looking for aspen for a new boat) and suddenly sees Katerina's scarf on a branch. Swallowing her tears, she inhales the bitter, familiar smell of her hair... We must go. Go. Gradually, he realizes that he is lost. And without bread in the forest skiff. He thinks a lot about death, weakens more and more, and only on the third day, when he is already crawling on all fours, he suddenly hears a tractor rumble. And Mishka, who saved his friend, at first thinks that Ivan Afrikanovich is drunk, but he doesn’t understand anything. It's business as usual.

... Two days later, on the fortieth day after Katerina's death, Ivan Afrikanovich, sitting on his wife's grave, tells her about the children, says that it is bad for him without her, that he will go to her. And he asks to wait ... "My dear, my bright ... I brought you mountain ash ... "

He's shaking all over. Grief plasts him on the cold, not overgrown with grass earth. And no one sees it.

Drunk Ivan Afrikanovich Drynov is driving with products from the general store for his shop. It was decently drunk, therefore, having mixed up the turn, it moves to a strange village. Now he won't arrive home before morning... It's business as usual. Drynov begins to woo his 40-year-old sister Nyusha to Mishka, a tractor driver, who has arrived. As a result, they sleep in the bath.

Drynov's wife, Katerina, gives birth to their ninth son. She immediately runs away to feed the calves, since Dasha Putanka has ceased to take care of them. Katerina recalls how her husband once fornicated with Dasha, but was forgiven by his wise wife. The work exhausted her ailing body, and Katerina fainted. She recovered from hypertension only after half a month.

The hay season is coming. It is necessary to mow three stacks of hay for Ivan Afrikanovich's cow. He does it secretly at night, because he is a deputy of the village council. One day his son Grishka got in touch with him. As a result, they were going to start a criminal case against Ivan Afrikanovich. With the consent of the chairman, the husband and wife mow hay in an outside area.

Soon the brother of Katerina Mitka arrives. Having drunk the whole village, he mowed hay for the cow, and betrothed Mishka to Dashka Putanka. Soon they will get married. The couple are arguing. Dasha burns a painting by Rubens, jealous of Nyusha, Mishka demolishes the bathhouse with a tractor. And in the attic of the bathhouse there is hay mowed illegally. They check everyone in the village, as a result of which hay is taken away from Ivan Afrikanovich ... It's a common thing.

Mitka manages to escape punishment for complicity, and Mishka is serving his 15 days under house arrest. Ivan Afrikanovich decides to go to work in the Arctic to avoid a trial. He receives his passport and prepares to leave. He understands that it is hard for him to say goodbye to his beloved wife. To feed the children, she mows the grass alone. Overwork leads to the death of the mother of nine children.

On the way home, Drynov communicates with a fellow traveler who tells him terrible news. He is grieving the death of his wife Catherine.

Evstolya, the mother of the deceased Katerina, and Ivan Afrikanovich decide to slaughter the cow Rogulya. He is unable to kill her on his own, asks Mishka for help. Meat is sold in the canteen. Few men's tears flow down Drynov's cheeks when he butchers his wet nurse Rogulya.

Drynov's two sons end up in an orphanage, the eldest is sent to a school, Katyusha was sent to his uncle Mitya in Murmansk. The head of the family is raising four small children. Unfortunately, Evstolya is already old, and she is not able to help raise the children. She told her son-in-law about the last minutes of her daughter's life, as she called her Ivan.

Life is not sweet to Drynov without his beloved wife, he fell into depression. His sister, Nyusha, takes care of the children. Looking out in the forest for logs for a new boat, the protagonist sees Katerina's handkerchief. He smells like his own wife. It's time to leave, but Ivan Afrikanovich does not remember the way home. There was no food with him, he barely got to the field where the tractor was working. There, Mishka had already saved him, at first believing that his comrade drank it. It's business as usual.

Forty days after Katerina's death, her husband comes to the grave and talks about the achievements of the children. How he can't bear to live without her. He lies on the cold ground, shaking all over. No one can help him cope with grief.

And just at this time, the ninth, Ivan, will be born to Ivan Afrikanovich's wife Katerina. And Katerina, although the paramedic forbade her strictly, after giving birth - immediately to work, seriously ill. And Katerina recalls how on Peter's Day Ivan spied with a lively woman from their village, Dasha Putanka, and then, when Katerina forgave him, to celebrate, he exchanged the Bible inherited from his grandfather for an "accordion" - to amuse his wife. And now Dasha does not want to take care of the calves, so Katerina has to work for her too (otherwise you will not be able to feed the family). Exhausted by work and illness, Katerina suddenly faints. She is taken to the hospital. Hypertension, stroke. And only more than two weeks later she returns home.

And Ivan Afrikanovich also recalls the accordion: he had not even managed to learn how to play the bass, as it was taken away for arrears.

And Ivan Afrikanovich returns to his native village. Ran into. And he tells a slightly familiar guy from a distant lakeside village how they went with Mitka, but he was selling onions and didn’t have time to jump on the train, but he still had all the tickets. They dropped off Ivan Afrikanovich and demanded that he go back to the village within three hours, and they would send a fine, they say, to the collective farm, but they didn’t say how to go, if nothing. And suddenly - the train approached and Mitka got off it. So here Ivan Afrikanovich prayed: “I don’t need anything, just let me go home.” They sold the bow, bought a return ticket, and finally Drinov went home.

Rogulya, the cow of Ivan Afrikanovich, recalls his life, as if wondering at her, the shaggy sun, warmth. She was always indifferent to herself, and her timeless, immense contemplation was very rarely disturbed. The mother of Katerina Yevstolya comes, cries over her pail and tells all the children to hug Rogulya and say goodbye. Drynov asks Mishka to slaughter the cow, but he can't do it himself. The meat is promised to be taken to the dining room. Ivan Afrikanovich sorts out Rogulin's giblets, and tears drip on his bloody fingers.

The children of Ivan Afrikanovich, Mitka and Vaska, are sent to an orphanage,

Antoshka - at the school. Mitka writes to send Katyushka to him in Murmansk, only it hurts too little. Grishka and Marusya and two babies remain. And that is difficult: Evstolya is old, her hands have become thin. She recalls how, before her death, Katerina, already without memory, called her husband: “Ivan, it’s windy, oh, Ivan, how windy!”

After the death of his wife, Ivan Afrikanovich does not want to live. He walks overgrown, scary and smokes bitter Selpovsky tobacco. And Nyushka takes care of his children.

Ivan Afrikanovich goes into the forest (looking for aspen for a new boat) and suddenly sees Katerina's scarf on a branch. Swallowing her tears, she inhales the bitter, familiar smell of her hair... We must go. Go. Gradually, he realizes that he is lost. And without bread in the forest skiff. He thinks a lot about death, weakens more and more, and only on the third day, when he is already crawling on all fours, he suddenly hears a tractor roar. And Mishka, who saved his friend, at first thinks that Ivan Afrikanovich is drunk, but he doesn’t understand anything. It's business as usual.

... Two days later, on the fortieth day after Katerina's death, Ivan Afrikanovich, sitting on his wife's grave, tells her about the children, says that it is bad for him without her, that he will go to her. And he asks you to wait ... “My dear, my bright ... I brought you mountain ash ...”

He's shaking all over. Grief plasts him on the cold, not overgrown with grass earth. And no one sees it.

A peasant Ivan Afrikanovich Drynov rides on wood. He got drunk with the tractor driver Mishka Petrov and now he is talking to the gelding Parmyon. He is carrying goods from the general store for the store, but he drove drunk to the wrong village, which means that he only went home - in the morning ... It's a common thing. And at night, the same Mishka catches up with Ivan Afrikanovich on the way. They drank more. And then Ivan Afrikanovich decides to woo Mishka his second cousin, forty-year-old Nyushka, a livestock specialist. True, she has a thorn, but if you look from the left side, you can’t see it ... Nyushka drives her friends away with a grip, and they have to spend the night in a bathhouse. And just at this time, the ninth, Ivan, will be born to Ivan Afrikanovich's wife Katerina. And Katerina, although the paramedic forbade her strictly, after giving birth - immediately to work, seriously ill. And Katerina recalls how on Peter's Day Ivan spied with a lively woman from their village, Dasha Putanka, and then, when Katerina forgave him, to celebrate, he exchanged the Bible inherited from his grandfather for an "accordion" - to amuse his wife. And now Dasha does not want to take care of the calves, so Katerina has to work for her too (otherwise you will not be able to feed the family). Exhausted by work and illness, Katerina suddenly faints. She is taken to the hospital. Hypertension, stroke. And only more than two weeks later she returns home. And Ivan Afrikanovich also recalls the accordion: he had not even managed to learn how to play the bass, as it was taken away for arrears. It's hay time. Ivan Afrikanovich in the forest, secretly, seven miles from the village, mows at night. If you don’t mow three haystacks, there is nothing to feed the cow: ten percent of the hay mowed on the collective farm is enough for a month at most. One night, Ivan Afrikanovich takes his young son Grishka with him, and then, out of stupidity, he tells the district commissioner that he went with his father to mow in the forest at night. They threaten Ivan Afrikanovich with a lawsuit: after all, he is a deputy of the village council, and then the same commissioner demands to “prompt” who else mows in the forest at night, write a list ... For this, he promises not to “socialize” Drynov’s personal haystacks. Ivan Afrikanovich agrees with the neighbor's chairman and, together with Katerina, goes to the forest to mow someone else's territory at night. At this time, Mitka Polyakov, Katerina's brother, comes to their village from Murmansk without a penny of money. A week had not passed before he got the whole village drunk, barked at the authorities, Mishke betrothed Dasha Putanka, and provided the cow with hay. And everything seems to be similar. Dasha Putanka gives Mishka a love potion to drink, and then he vomits for a long time, and a day later, at Mitka's instigation, they go to the village council and sign. Soon, Dasha rips off a reproduction of Rubens' painting "Union of Earth and Water" from Mishka's tractor (it depicts a naked woman, by all accounts, the spitting image of Nyushka) and burns the "picture" in the oven out of jealousy. In response, the bear almost throws Dashka, who is washing herself in the bathhouse, with a tractor right into the river. As a result, the tractor was damaged, and illegally cut hay was found in the attic of the bathhouse. At the same time, they begin to look for hay from everyone in the village, and Ivan Afrikanovich's turn comes. It's business as usual. Mitka is summoned to the police, to the district (for complicity in damaging a tractor and for hay), but by mistake, fifteen days are given not to him, but to another Polyakov, also from Sosnovka (there is half the village of the Polyakovs). Mishka is serving his fifteen days right in his village, on the job, getting drunk in the evenings with a sergeant assigned to him. After all the secretly mowed hay is taken from Ivan Afrikanovich, Mitka convinces him to leave the village and go to the Arctic to work. Drynov does not want to leave his native place, but if you listen to Mitka, then there is no other way out ... And Ivan Afrikanovich decides. The chairman does not want to give him a certificate, according to which he can get a passport, but in despair Drynov threatens him with a poker, and the chairman suddenly droops: “Though everyone scatter ...” Now Ivan Afrikanovich is a free Cossack. He says goodbye to Katerina and suddenly shrinks from pain, pity and love for her. And, without saying anything, pushes her away, as if from the shore into the pool. And Katerina, after his departure, has to mow alone. There, during the mowing, the second blow overtakes her. Barely alive, they bring her home. And you can’t go to the hospital in such a state - he will die, they won’t take him. And Ivan Afrikanovich returns to his native village. Ran into. And he tells a slightly familiar guy from a distant lakeside village how they went with Mitka, but he was selling onions and didn’t have time to jump on the train, but he still had all the tickets. They dropped off Ivan Afrikanovich and demanded that he go back to the village within three hours, and they would send a fine, they say, to the collective farm, but they didn’t say how to go, if nothing. And suddenly - the train approached and Mitka got off it. So here Ivan Afrikanovich prayed: “I don’t need anything, just let me go home.” They sold the bow, bought a return ticket, and finally Drinov went home. And the guy, in response to the story, reports the news: in the village of Ivan Afrikanovich, the woman died, there are many children left. The guy leaves, and Drynov suddenly falls on the road, clutches his head with his hands and rolls into a roadside ditch. He thumps his fist into the meadow, gnaws the ground ... Rogulya, Ivan Afrikanovich's cow, recalls his life, as if surprised by it, the shaggy sun, warmth. She was always indifferent to herself, and her timeless, immense contemplation was very rarely disturbed. The mother of Katerina Yevstolya comes, cries over her pail and tells all the children to hug Rogulya and say goodbye. Drynov asks Mishka to slaughter the cow, but he can't do it himself. The meat is promised to be taken to the dining room. Ivan Afrikanovich sorts out Rogulin's giblets, and tears drip on his bloody fingers. The children of Ivan Afrikanovich, Mitka and Vaska, are sent to an orphanage, Antoshka to a school. Mitka writes to send Katyushka to him in Murmansk, only it hurts too little. Grishka and Marusya and two babies remain. And that is difficult: Evstolya is old, her hands have become thin. She recalls how, before her death, Katerina, already without memory, called her husband: “Ivan, it’s windy, oh, Ivan, how windy!” After the death of his wife, Ivan Afrikanovich does not want to live. He walks overgrown, scary and smokes bitter Selpovsky tobacco. And Nyushka takes care of his children. Ivan Afrikanovich goes into the forest (looking for aspen for a new boat) and suddenly sees Katerina's scarf on a branch. Swallowing her tears, she inhales the bitter, familiar smell of her hair... We must go. Go. Gradually, he realizes that he is lost. And without bread in the forest skiff. He thinks a lot about death, weakens more and more, and only on the third day, when he is already crawling on all fours, he suddenly hears a tractor roar. And Mishka, who saved his friend, at first thinks that Ivan Afrikanovich is drunk, but he doesn’t understand anything. It's business as usual. ... Two days later, on the fortieth day after Katerina's death, Ivan Afrikanovich, sitting on his wife's grave, tells her about the children, says that it is bad for him without her, that he will go to her. And he asks to wait ... “My dear, my bright ... I brought you mountain ash ...” He is trembling all over. Grief plasts him on the cold, not overgrown with grass earth. And no one sees it.

"The Usual Business"

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