Brothers Strugatsky Monday starts on Saturday. Amazing properties of thiotimoline

Very briefly, the 1960s. Traveling by car, a young programmer gives a ride to two employees of the Institute of Witchcraft and Wizardry, with the help of which he gets into the mysterious and funny world of magic.

History first. The fuss around the sofa

Leningrad programmer Alexander Privalov travels by car during his vacation and heads to the city of Solovets, where he has a meeting scheduled. On the way, he picks up two employees of NIICHAVO (Research Institute of Witchcraft and Magic) and brings them to Solovets, where they arrange for him to spend the night in the museum of the institute - IZNAKURNOZH (Hut on chicken legs). Little by little, Privalov begins to notice unusual phenomena - the similarity of the museum caretaker, Naina Kievna Gorynych, with Baba Yaga, a talking mirror, a huge cat reciting fairy tales and songs, a mermaid on a tree and a flip book in which the content changes all the time. In the morning, Privalov catches a wish-fulfilling pike from a well. He thinks that all these unusual things must fit into some kind of system.

Walking around the city during the day, he finds an irreplaceable nickel and begins to experiment with it, buying various things with it. This experiment is interrupted by the police. Privalov ends up in the department, where he is forced to compensate for the damage, and the nickel is confiscated and exchanged for a regular one. At the same time, the policemen are not at all surprised by this strange object.

Returning to IZNAKURNOZH to rest, Privalov discovers the loss of the sofa, which was in place in the morning. Then strange personalities come to Privalov one after another, who demonstrate incredible abilities: they fly, become invisible, pass through walls, and at the same time, for some reason, they are interested in the disappeared sofa. In the meantime, Privalov learns that in fact the sofa is a magical translator of reality. He was kidnapped by one of the institute's employees, Viktor Korneev, for research work, since it was not possible to officially reclaim him from the museum due to the bureaucracy of the administrator Modest Matveyevich Kamnoedov. In the morning, the scandal with the kidnapping of the sofa becomes uncontrollable, and Roman Oira-Oira comes to the aid of Privalov, whom he threw to the city. He persuades the programmer to go to work at NIICHAVO. Privalov agrees - what is happening interested him.

The second story. Vanity

The second part takes place about six months after the first.

On New Year's Eve, Alexander Privalov, head of the NIICHAVO computer center, remains on duty at the institute. He accepts keys from all heads of departments. Before him passes a series of bright characters - magicians Fyodor Simeonovich Kivrin and Cristobal Khozevich Junta, hacks and opportunists Merlin and Ambruazovich Vybegallo, director of the institute Janus Poluektovich Nevstruev, who exists simultaneously in two incarnations - as an administrator A-Janus and as a scientist U-Janus, and other. Then Privalov makes a detour of the institute, starting with the vivarium located in the basement of the building, where magical and mythological creatures are kept, through the floors of the departments of Linear happiness, the Meaning of life, Absolute knowledge, Predictions and prophecies, Defense magic, Eternal youth, Universal transformations. The detour ends in the laboratory of Vitka Korneev, who is still working. Privalov is trying to expel Korneev from the laboratory, but he cannot cope with a practicing magician who is passionate about his research. Leaving Korneev's laboratory, he discovers that the institute is full of employees who, instead of celebrating the New Year at home, prefer to return to their laboratories. The motto of these people was "Monday begins on Saturday", and they saw the meaning of their lives in work and knowledge of the unknown. Having met the New Year, they continued their research.

At this time, in the laboratory of Professor Vibegallo, "hatched" from the autoclave "a model of a man unsatisfied with the stomach." The model, a copy of Professor Vibegallo, can only devour everything edible. Employees gather in Vibegallo's laboratory, and the professor himself appears, accompanied by correspondents. According to Vibegallo's theory, the path to the development and spiritual growth of a person lies through the satisfaction of material needs, and this model is an intermediate stage on the way to creating a model of the Ideal Man, "a fully satisfied person." The model successfully demonstrates that, satisfying its gastric needs, it is able to eat a lot - the further, the more. In the end, the model bursts from gluttony, pelting Vibegallo and the correspondents with the contents of their digestive organs. The employees disperse.

Privalov reflects on what is happening for a while, then falls asleep. When he wakes up, he tries to magically make himself breakfast, but instead he witnesses a meeting with the director of the institute, where they discuss how dangerous the next model could be. Professor Vibegallo wants to test it right at the institute, while other experienced magicians insist on field tests a few kilometers from the city. After a heated argument, the director of the institute, Janus Poluektovich Nevstruev, decides to conduct tests at the test site, since "the experiment will be accompanied by significant destruction." Nevstruev also makes "preliminary thanks" to Roman Oyre-Oyre for his "resourcefulness and courage."

Privalov manages to attend the test. The “Completely Satisfied Man Model” had the ability to satisfy all of her material needs through magic. After leaving the autoclave, the model takes to itself all the material values that it can reach with its magical abilities (including the things of people who are nearby), and then tries to collapse the space. The cataclysm is prevented by Roman Oira-Oira, who throws a bottle with a genie at the Ideal Consumer, and the genie that breaks free destroys the Vibegallo model.

History the third. Every fuss

The computer "Aldan", on which Privalov works, broke down. While it is being repaired, Privalov travels around the institute and finds himself in the Department of Absolute Knowledge, where at that moment a machine invented by Louis Sedlov is being demonstrated, on which you can get into a fictional past or a fictional future.

He goes to Roman Oyre-Oyre and sees a dead parrot in the laboratory, lying in a cup. The director of the institute, Janus Poluektovich, comes, calls the parrot Photonchik, burns his corpse in the oven, scatters the ashes in the wind and leaves. Roman Oira-Oira is surprised, because the day before he found a burnt green feather in the stove. Where it came from, if the parrot was burned today, and there were no other green parrots nearby, remains a mystery.

The next day, Privalov, together with the witch Stella, composes poems for a wall newspaper and suddenly sees that same green parrot enter the room. He flies, but he doesn't look very healthy. Other employees come and ask where this parrot came from. Then everyone gets to work, but suddenly they see that the parrot is lying dead. On his paw - a ring with numbers and the inscription "Photon". The same thing was on the paw of the parrot, which yesterday lay dead in a cup. Nobody understands what's going on. The artist Drozd accidentally puts a parrot in a cup.

The next day, the computers are fixed, and Privalov gets to work. Roman calls him and informs him that the parrot is no longer in the cup, and no one has seen him. Privalov is surprised, but then, absorbed in work, he stops thinking about it. A little later, Roman calls again and asks him to come. When Privalov arrives, he sees a live green parrot with a ring on its paw.

The parrot responds to the words of the NIICHAVO staff in other words, but it is not possible to establish a semantic connection between them. Then they begin to call the parrot the names of those gathered, he briefly characterizes each one: rude, old, primitive, etc. The employees do not understand where he got such information from.

It occurs to friends that this mysterious parrot belongs to director Janus Poluektovich, a person even more mysterious. This person, one in two faces, never appears in public at midnight, and after midnight he cannot remember what happened before it. In addition, Janus Poluektovich accurately predicts the future.

In the end, scientists guess that countermotion is possible here: the flow of time in the opposite direction to the generally accepted one. If the parrot was a counter-motor, then it can be alive today, died yesterday and was put in a cup, the day before yesterday it was found in a cup by Janus and burned, and the day before, a burnt feather was left in the stove, which Roman found.

The novel tries to explain the case of the Tunguska meteorite based on the concept of contramotion: it was not a meteorite, but a spaceship, and the aliens in it were contramotes and lived, by the standards of ordinary people, from the future to the past.

The mystery of Janus Poluektovich has been solved. He existed in the person of A-Janus and was engaged in science until he came to the idea of contramotion and understood how to put it into practice. And in the year, which is still a distant future for the NIICHAVO employees living now, he turned himself and his parrot Photon into contra-winders, began to live backwards along the time line, and now every midnight passes from tomorrow to today. In the form of A-Janus, he lives like all ordinary people, from the past to the future, and in the form of U-Janus, from the future to the past. At the same time, both incarnations of Janus Poluektovich remain one person and are combined in time and space.

During lunch, Privalov meets U-Janus, and having plucked up courage, asks if it is possible to visit him tomorrow morning. U-Janus replies that tomorrow morning Privalov will be called to Kitezhgrad, so it will not be possible to enter. Then he adds: “... Try to understand, Alexander Ivanovich, that there is no single future for everyone. There are many of them, and each of your actions creates some of them ... "

A. Strugatsky, B. Strugatsky.

Monday starts on Saturday

Tale-tale for scientists of younger age

But what is strange, what is most incomprehensible of all, is how authors can take such plots, I confess, this is completely incomprehensible, that’s for sure ... no, no, I don’t understand at all.

N.V. Gogol

STORY ONE: THE FUSION AROUND THE SOFA

Chapter one

Teacher: Children, write down the sentence:

"The fish was sitting on a tree."

Student: Do fish sit in trees?

Teacher: Well... It was a crazy fish.

School joke

I was approaching my destination. Around me, clinging to the road itself, the forest was green, occasionally giving way to clearings overgrown with yellow sedge. The sun had been setting for an hour now, still could not set and hung low over the horizon. The car rolled along a narrow road covered with crisp gravel. I threw large stones under the wheel, and each time empty canisters clanged and rumbled in the trunk.

On the right, two people came out of the forest, stepped onto the side of the road and stopped, looking in my direction. One of them raised his hand. I let off the gas as I looked at them. They were, it seemed to me, hunters, young people, maybe a little older than me. I liked their faces and I stopped. The one who raised his hand stuck his swarthy hook-nosed face into the car and asked smiling:

- You will not give us a lift to Solovets?

The second, with a red beard and no mustache, was also smiling, peering over his shoulder. On the positive side, they were nice people.

“Come on, sit down,” I said. - One forward, the other back, otherwise I have junk there, in the back seat.

- Benefactor! - the hawk-nosed one said delightedly, took the gun from his shoulder and sat down next to me.

The bearded man, looking hesitantly through the back door, said:

“May I be here for a little bit?”

I leaned over the back and helped him clear the space occupied by the sleeping bag and the rolled-up tent. He sat down delicately, placing the gun between his knees.

“Close the door better,” I said.

Everything went on as usual. The car started off. The hawk-nosed man turned back and spoke animatedly about the fact that it was much more pleasant to ride in a car than to walk. The bearded man vaguely agreed and slammed and slammed the door. “Pick up your raincoat,” I advised, looking at him in the rearview mirror. “Your coat is pinched.” Five minutes later, everything finally settled down. I asked: “Ten kilometers to Solovets?” “Yes,” answered the hawk-nosed one. - Or a little more. The road, however, is unimportant - for trucks. “The road is quite decent,” I objected. “I was promised that I would not pass at all.” “You can drive along this road even in autumn.” - "Here - perhaps, but here from Korobets - unpaved." “This year the summer is dry, everything has dried up.” - "Under Zatonya, they say, it's raining," the bearded man in the back seat remarked. "Who is speaking?" asked the hawk-nosed one. Merlin speaks. For some reason they laughed. I pulled out cigarettes, lit a cigarette and offered them a treat. “The factory of Clara Zetkin,” said the hawk-nosed man, looking at the pack. Are you from Leningrad? - "Yes". - "Are you traveling?" “I'm traveling,” I said. “Are you from here?” “Indigenous,” said the hawk-nosed one. "I'm from Murmansk," the bearded man said. “For Leningrad, probably, Solovets and Murmansk are one and the same: the North,” said the hawk-nosed one. "No, why not," I said politely. “Are you going to stop in Solovets?” the hook-nosed one asked. “Of course,” I said. “I am going to Solovets.” “Do you have relatives or friends there?” “No,” I said. I'll just wait guys. They go along the coast, and Solovets is our rendezvous point.”

Ahead, I saw a large scattering of stones, slowed down and said: "Hold on tight." The car shook and jumped. Hook-nosed bruised his nose on the barrel of a gun. The engine roared, stones hit the bottom. "Poor car," said the hawk-nosed one. "What to do..." I said. “Not everyone would drive down such a road in their car.” “I would go,” I said. The spill is over. “Ah, so this is not your car,” the hook-nosed one guessed. “Well, how do I get a car! It's a rental." “Understood,” said the hawk-nosed one, disappointedly, it seemed to me. I felt hurt. “What’s the point of buying a car to drive on asphalt? Where there is asphalt, there is nothing interesting, and where it is interesting, there is no asphalt.” “Yes, of course,” the hook-nosed man agreed politely. “It’s stupid, in my opinion, to make an idol out of a car,” I said. “Stupid,” said the bearded man. But not everyone thinks so. We talked about cars and came to the conclusion that if you really buy anything, it's GAZ-69, but, unfortunately, they are not sold. Then the hawk-nosed one asked: “Where do you work?” I replied. “Colossal! exclaimed the hunchback. - Programmer! We need a programmer. Listen, leave your institute and come to us!” “What do you have?” “What do we have?” asked the hawk-nosed one, turning around. "Aldan-3," said the bearded one. “Rich car,” I said. “And does it work well?” - “Yes, how can I tell you ...” - “Understood,” I said. “Actually, it has not yet been debugged,” said the bearded one. - Stay with us, debug ... "-" And we will arrange the translation for you in no time, "- added the hook-nosed one. "What are you doing?" I asked. “Like all science,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Human happiness.” “Understood,” I said. “Something with space?” “And with space, too,” said the hawk-nosed one. “They don’t look for good from good,” I said. “A capital city and a decent salary,” the bearded man said in a low voice, but I heard him. “No need,” I said. “You don’t have to measure for money.” “No, I was joking,” said the bearded man. “He's joking like that,” said the hawk-nosed one. “More interesting than ours, you will not be anywhere.” - "Why do you think so?" - "Sure". “I'm not sure.” The hawk-nosed chuckled. “We will talk about this again,” he said. “Will you stay in Solovets for a long time?” “Two days maximum.” “We’ll talk on the second day.” The bearded one said: “Personally, I see the finger of fate in this - they were walking through the forest and met a programmer. I think you are doomed." “Do you really need a programmer?” I asked. "We desperately need a programmer." “I'll talk to the guys,” I promised. “I know those who are dissatisfied.” “We don't need just any programmer,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Programmers are a scarce people, they are spoiled, but we need an unspoilt one.” "Yeah, it's harder," I said. The hawk-nosed one began to bend his fingers: “We need a programmer: a - not spoiled, be - a volunteer, tse - to agree to live in a hostel ..." - "De," the bearded man picked up, "one hundred and twenty rubles." “What about wings? I asked. “Or, shall we say, lights around the head?” One in a thousand!" “We only need one,” said the hawk-nosed one. “And if there are only nine hundred of them?” “Nine-tenths agree.”

Teacher: Children, write down the sentence: "The fish was sitting on a tree."

Student: Do fish sit on trees?

Teacher: Well... It was a crazy fish.

School joke

- You will not give us a lift to Solovets?

The second, with a red beard and no mustache, was also smiling, peering over his shoulder. On the positive side, they were nice people.

"Let's sit down," I said. - One forward, the other back, otherwise I have junk there, in the back seat.

- Benefactor! - the hawk-nosed one said delightedly, took the gun from his shoulder and sat down next to me.

The bearded man, looking hesitantly through the back door, said:

“Can I have a little of that here?”

I leaned over the back and helped him clear the space occupied by the sleeping bag and the rolled-up tent. He sat down delicately, placing the gun between his knees.

“Close the door better,” I said.

Everything went on as usual. The car started off. The hawk-nosed man turned back and spoke animatedly about the fact that it was much more pleasant to ride in a car than to walk. The bearded man vaguely agreed and slammed and slammed the door. “Pick up your raincoat,” I advised, looking at him in the rearview mirror. “Your coat is pinched.” Five minutes later, everything finally settled down. I asked: “Ten kilometers to Solovets?” “Yes,” answered the hawk-nosed one. - Or a little more. The road, however, is unimportant - for trucks. “The road is quite decent,” I objected. “I was promised that I would not pass at all.” “You can drive along this road even in autumn.” - "Here - perhaps, but here from Korobets - unpaved." “This year the summer is dry, everything has dried up.” - "Under Zatonya, they say, it's raining," the bearded man in the back seat remarked. "Who is speaking?" asked the hawk-nosed one. Merlin speaks. For some reason they laughed. I pulled out cigarettes, lit a cigarette and offered them a treat. “The factory of Clara Zetkin,” said the hawk-nosed man, looking at the pack. Are you from Leningrad? - "Yes". - "Are you traveling?" “I'm traveling,” I said. “Are you from here?” “Indigenous,” said the hawk-nosed one. "I'm from Murmansk," the bearded man said. “For Leningrad, probably, Solovets and Murmansk are one and the same: the North,” said the hawk-nosed one. "No, why not," I said politely. “Are you going to stop in Solovets?” asked the hawk-nosed one. “Of course,” I said. “I am going to Solovets.” “Do you have relatives or friends there?” “No,” I said. I'll just wait guys. They go along the coast, and Solovets is our rendezvous point.”

Ahead, I saw a large scattering of stones, slowed down and said: "Hold on tight." The car shook and jumped. Hook-nosed bruised his nose on the barrel of a gun. The engine roared, stones hit the bottom. "Poor car," said the hawk-nosed one. “What to do…” I said. “Not everyone would drive down such a road in their car.” “I would go,” I said. The spill is over. “Ah, so this is not your car,” the hook-nosed one guessed. “Well, how do I get a car! It's a rental." “Understood,” said the hawk-nosed one, disappointedly, it seemed to me. I felt hurt. “What’s the point of buying a car to drive on asphalt? Where there is asphalt, there is nothing interesting, and where it is interesting, there is no asphalt.” “Yes, of course,” the hook-nosed man agreed politely. “It’s stupid, in my opinion, to make an idol out of a car,” I said. “Stupid,” said the bearded man. But not everyone thinks so. We talked about cars and came to the conclusion that if we were to buy anything, it would be the GAZ-69, an all-terrain vehicle, but, unfortunately, they are not sold. Then the hawk-nosed one asked: “Where do you work?” I replied. “Colossal! exclaimed the hunchback. - Programmer! We need a programmer. Listen, leave your institute and come to us!” “What do you have?” “What do we have?” asked the hawk-nosed one, turning around. "Aldan-3," said the bearded one. “Rich car,” I said. “And does it work well?” - "Yes, how can I tell you ..." - "Understood," - I said. “Actually, it has not yet been debugged,” said the bearded one. - Stay with us, debug ... "-" And we will arrange the translation for you in no time, "- added the hook-nosed one. "What are you doing?" I asked. “Like all science,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Human happiness.” “Understood,” I said. “Something with space?” “And with space, too,” said the hawk-nosed one. “They don’t look for good from good,” I said. “A capital city and a decent salary,” the bearded man said in a low voice, but I heard him. “No need,” I said. “You don’t have to measure for money.” “No, I was joking,” said the bearded man. “He's joking like that,” said the hawk-nosed one. “More interesting than ours, you will not be anywhere.” - "Why do you think so?" - "Sure". “I'm not sure.” The hawk-nosed chuckled. “We will talk about this again,” he said. “Will you stay in Solovets for a long time?” “Two days maximum.” “We’ll talk on the second day.” The bearded one said: “Personally, I see the finger of fate in this - they were walking through the forest and met a programmer. I think you are doomed." “Do you really need a programmer?” I asked. "We desperately need a programmer." “I'll talk to the guys,” I promised. “I know those who are dissatisfied.” “We don't need just any programmer,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Programmers are a scarce people, they are spoiled, but we need an unspoilt one.” "Yeah, it's harder," I said. The hook-nosed one began to bend his fingers: “We need a programmer: a - not spoiled, be - a volunteer, tse - to agree to live in a hostel ... " - "De," the bearded man picked up, "for one hundred and twenty rubles." “What about wings? I asked. “Or, shall we say, lights around the head?” One in a thousand!" “We only need one,” said the hawk-nosed one. “And if there are only nine hundred of them?” “Nine-tenths agree.”

The forest parted, we crossed the bridge and rolled between the potato fields. "Nine o'clock," said the hawk-nosed one. “Where are you going to spend the night?” “I'll sleep in the car. What time are your stores open until? “Our shops are already closed,” said the hawk-nosed one. “It is possible in a hostel,” said the bearded one. “I have an empty bed in my room.” “You can’t drive up to the hostel,” said the hawk-nosed man thoughtfully. “Yes, perhaps,” said the bearded man, and for some reason laughed. “The car can be parked near the police,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Yes, this is nonsense,” said the bearded man. - I'm talking nonsense, and you follow me. How will he get into the hostel? “Y-yeah, hell,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Really, if you don’t work for a day, you forget about all these things.” “Maybe transgress it?” “Well, well,” said the hawk-nosed one. This is not your sofa. And you are not Cristobal Junta, and neither am I ... "

“Don't worry,” I said. I'll sleep in the car, not the first time.

I suddenly felt like sleeping on sheets. I've been sleeping in a sleeping bag for four nights now.

“Listen,” said the hook-nosed one, “ho-ho!” Out of the knife!

- Correctly! exclaimed the bearded man. - On Lukomorye it!

"By God, I'll sleep in the car," I said.

“You will spend the night in the house,” said the hawk-nosed one, “on relatively clean linen. We must thank you somehow...

“It’s not a fifty kopeck for you to poke,” said the bearded one.

We entered the city. Ancient strong fences stretched out, powerful log cabins made of giant blackened logs, with narrow windows, with carved platbands, with wooden cockerels on the roofs. I came across several dirty brick buildings with iron doors, the sight of which brought the semi-familiar word "storage" out of my memory. The street was straight and wide and was called Mira Avenue. Ahead, closer to the center, one could see two-story cinder-block houses with open little gardens.

“Next alley to the right,” said the hawk-nosed one.

I turned on the turn signal, braked and turned right. The road here was overgrown with grass, but a brand new "Zaporozhets" stood crouching at some gate. House numbers hung over the gates, and the numbers were barely visible on the rusty tin of the signs. The lane was elegantly called: “St. Lukomorye. It was narrow and sandwiched between heavy old fences, probably built back in the days when Swedish and Norwegian pirates roamed here.

“Stop,” said the hawk-nosed one. I braked and he bumped his nose against the barrel of the gun again. “Now that’s it,” he said, rubbing his nose. - You wait for me, and I'll go and arrange everything.

“Really, it’s not worth it,” I said for the last time.

- No talking. Volodya, keep him at gunpoint.

Hook-nosed got out of the car and, bending down, squeezed through the low gate. You couldn't see the house behind the tall gray fence. The gates were absolutely phenomenal, as in a locomotive depot, on rusty iron hinges weighing a pound. I read the signs with amazement. There were three. On the left collar, a solid blue signboard with silver letters sternly gleamed with thick glass:

NIICHAVO

hut on chicken legs

monument of Solovetsky antiquity

A rusty tin plate hung on top of the right collar: “St. Lukomorye, d. No. 13, N.K. Gorynych ”, and under it flaunted a piece of plywood with an inscription in ink at random:

CAT DOES NOT WORK

Administration

- What CAT? I asked. – Committee of Defense Technology?

The bearded man chuckled.

"You don't have to worry," he said. “It’s funny here, but everything will be all right.

I got out of the car and began to wipe the windshield. Above my head they were suddenly imported. I looked. On the gates, making himself comfortable, a gigantic - I have never seen such a - black and gray, streaked, cat. Sitting down, he looked at me with his yellow eyes full and indifferent. “Kiss-kiss-kiss,” I said mechanically. The cat politely and coldly opened its toothy mouth, made a hoarse throaty sound, and then turned away and began to look inside the yard. From there, behind the fence, the hawk-nosed voice said:

- Vasily, my friend, let me disturb you.

The bolt screeched. The cat got up and silently disappeared into the yard. The gate swayed heavily, a terrifying creak and crack was heard, and the left gate slowly opened. The hawk-nosed face, red from exertion, appeared.

- Benefactor! he called. - Come on in!

I got back in the car and drove slowly into the yard. The courtyard was vast, in the back stood a house made of thick logs, and in front of the house was a squat, immense oak tree, wide, dense, with a dense crown obscuring the roof. From the gate to the house, skirting the oak, there was a path lined with stone slabs. To the right of the path there was a vegetable garden, and to the left, in the middle of the lawn, there was a log cabin with a well, black from antiquity and covered with moss.

I parked the car on the side, turned off the engine and got out. The bearded Volodya also got out and, leaning his gun against the side, began to fit the backpack.

“Here you are at home,” he said.

Hook-nosed with a creak and crackling shut the gate, while I, feeling rather awkward, looked around, not knowing what to do.

- And here is the hostess! cried the bearded man. - How are you, grandma, Naina is the light of Kievna!

The owner must have been over a hundred. She walked towards us slowly, leaning on a knotted stick, dragging her feet in felt boots with galoshes. Her face was dark brown; from a continuous mass of wrinkles, a nose protruded forward and downward, crooked and sharp as a scimitar, and the eyes were pale, dull, as if covered with thorns.

“Hello, hello, granddaughters,” she said in an unexpectedly sonorous bass. - This means that there will be a new programmer? Hello father, welcome!

I bowed, knowing that I needed to keep quiet. The grandmother's head, over a black downy scarf tied under her chin, was covered with a cheerful nylon scarf with multi-colored images of the Atomium and inscriptions in different languages: "International Exhibition in Brussels." A sparse gray stubble protruded from his chin and under his nose. The grandmother was dressed in a padded sleeveless jacket and a black cloth dress.

- In this way, Naina Kievna! said the hawk-nosed one, coming up and wiping the rust from his palms. - We need to arrange for our new employee for two nights. Let me introduce you... mmm...

“But don’t,” said the old woman, examining me intently. - I see it myself. Privalov Alexander Ivanovich, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-eighth, male, Russian, member of the Komsomol, no, no, did not participate, was not, does not have, but it will be for you, diamond, a long journey and interest in a government house, but you should be afraid, diamond, you need a red-haired, unkind person, but gild the handle, yakhontovy ...

- Hmm! the hawk-nosed one said loudly, and the grandmother broke off. There was an awkward silence.

- You can just call Sasha ... - I squeezed out a pre-prepared phrase.

“And where do I put it?” Grandma asked.

“In the storeroom, of course,” the hook-nosed man said somewhat irritably.

- And who will answer?

“Naina Kievna!” the hawk-nosed man roared like a provincial tragedian, grabbed the old woman by the arm and dragged her to the house. You could hear them arguing: “After all, we agreed! ..” - “... And if he removes something? ..” - “Be quiet! It's a programmer, right? Komsomolets! Scientist! .. "-" And if he pokes? .. "

I shyly turned to Volodya. Volodya giggled.

“It’s kind of awkward,” I said.

Don't worry, everything will be fine...

He wanted to say something else, but then the grandmother yelled wildly: “A sofa, a sofa! ..” I shuddered and said:

“You know, I should probably go, huh?

- Out of the question! Volodya said decisively. - Everything will be all right. It’s just that the grandmother needs a bribe, and Roman and I don’t have cash.

“I will pay,” I said. Now I really wanted to leave: I can't stand these so-called worldly conflicts.

Volodya shook his head.

- Nothing like this. He's already on his way. Everything is good.

Hook-nosed Roman came up to us, took my hand and said:

- Well, everything worked out. Went.

“Listen, it’s uncomfortable somehow,” I said. She doesn't have to, after all...

But we were already on our way home.

“I have to, I have to,” Roman said.

We rounded the oak tree and reached the back porch. Roman pushed open the leatherette door, and we found ourselves in a hallway, spacious and clean, but poorly lit. The old woman was waiting for us, her hands folded on her stomach and her lips pursed. When she saw us, she boomed vindictively:

- And a receipt to immediately! .. So, they say, and so: they supposedly accepted this and that from such and such, which handed over the above to the undersigned ...

Roman howled softly, and we entered the room allotted to me. It was a cool room with one window, hung with a cotton curtain. Roman said in a tense voice:

- Relax and make yourself at home.

The old woman from the hall immediately inquired jealously:

“But they don’t click their teeth?”

Roman, without turning around, barked:

- Don't chirp! They tell you there are no teeth.

- Then let's go, write a receipt ...

Roman raised his eyebrows, rolled his eyes, bared his teeth and shook his head, but went out anyway. I looked around. There was little furniture in the room. By the window stood a massive table, covered with a shabby gray fringed tablecloth, in front of the table was a rickety stool. Near the bare log wall there was a large sofa, on the other wall, covered with wallpaper of various sizes, there was a hanger with some kind of junk (quilted jackets, fur coats that came out, tattered caps and earflaps). A large Russian stove, shining with fresh whitewash, protruded into the room, and opposite in the corner hung a large, dim mirror in a shabby frame. The floor was scraped and covered with striped rugs.

Behind the wall they muttered in two voices: the old woman bassed on one note, Roman's voice rose and fell. “Tablecloth, inventory number two hundred and forty-five ...” - “You still write down every floorboard! ..” - “Dinner table ...” - “Will you also write down the oven? ..” - “Order is needed ... Sofa ...”

I went to the window and drew back the curtain. There was an oak tree outside the window, nothing else was visible. I began to look at the oak. It was apparently a very ancient plant. The bark on it was gray and somehow dead, and the monstrous roots that crawled out of the ground were covered with red and white lichen. “And also write down the oak!” Roman said behind the wall. There was a plump, greasy book on the windowsill; I leafed through it thoughtlessly, stepped away from the window, and sat down on the sofa. And now I want to sleep. I thought that today I had been driving for fourteen hours, that it was not worth it, perhaps, to be in such a hurry, that my back hurts, and everything is confused in my head, that I don’t give a damn about this boring old woman, and soon it would all be over and could lay down and sleep...

- Well, - said Roman, appearing on the threshold. - The formalities are over. He waved his hand, fingers splayed and smeared with ink. - Our fingers are tired: we wrote, we wrote ... Go to bed. We leave, and you calmly go to bed. What are you doing tomorrow?

"I'm waiting," I answered languidly.

- Here. And near the post office.

“You won’t leave tomorrow, will you?”

- Tomorrow is unlikely ... Most likely - the day after tomorrow.

"Then we'll see each other again." Our love is ahead. He smiled, waved his hand and left. I idly thought that I should have seen him off and said goodbye to Volodya, and lay down. Just then an old woman entered the room. I wake up. The old woman looked at me for some time.

“I’m afraid, father, that you’ll start to bark your teeth,” she said with concern.

“I won’t poke,” I said wearily. - I'm going to sleep.

- And lie down and sleep ... Just pay the money and sleep ...

I reached into my back pocket for my wallet.

- How much?

The old woman raised her eyes to the ceiling.

- We'll put a ruble for the room ... Fifty dollars for bed linen - it's mine, not state-owned. For two nights it comes out three rubles ... And how much from the bounty you will throw - for anxiety, then - I don’t know ...

I handed her a five.

“So far, a ruble from generosity,” I said. - And it will be seen there.

The old woman quickly grabbed the money and walked away, muttering something about change. She was gone for a long time, and I already wanted to give up on both change and linen, but she returned and laid a handful of dirty coppers on the table.

“Here’s your change, father,” she said. - Exactly a ruble, you can not count.

“I won’t count,” I said. - What about underwear?

- I'll make a bed now. You go out into the yard, take a walk, and I will make a bed.

I went out, pulling out cigarettes as I went. The sun finally set, and the white night came. Somewhere dogs were barking. I sat down under an oak tree on a bench that had grown into the ground, lit a cigarette and began to look at the pale starless sky. A cat appeared noiselessly from somewhere, looked at me with fluorescent eyes, then quickly climbed up the oak tree and disappeared into the dark foliage. I immediately forgot about him and shuddered when he fussed somewhere upstairs. Debris fell on my head. “Damn you…” I said aloud and began to dust myself off. I was extremely anxious to sleep. An old woman came out of the house, not noticing me, wandered to the well. I understood this to mean that the bed was ready, and returned to the room.

The bad old lady made a bed for me on the floor. Well, no, I thought, locked the door on the latch, dragged the bed onto the sofa and began to undress. A gloomy light fell from the window, a cat bustled noisily on the oak. I shook my head, shaking the debris out of my hair. It was strange garbage, unexpected: large dry fish scales. It will be a good sleep, I thought, I fell on the pillow and immediately fell asleep.

Check out one curious work called "Monday begins on Saturday." You will learn a summary of it by reading this article. The authors of the work - Arkady and Boris Strugatsky - wrote it in 1964. The genre of the story is "Monday begins on Saturday." The summary is divided into three stories. It begins, like the work itself, with the following events.

The fuss around the sofa (first story)

Alexander Privalov, a programmer from Leningrad, travels by car during his vacation. He goes to the city of Solovets, where he has one meeting scheduled. Privalov picks up on the way two employees from the organization of the Research Institute of Witchcraft and Magic (NIICHAVO) and brings them to Solovets. Here they arrange for him to spend the night in the institute's museum - the Hut on Chicken Legs (IZNAKURNOZH).

Privalov gradually begins to notice various strange phenomena. For example, he is struck by the similarity with Baba Yaga of Naina Kievna Gorynych, the museum curator. He sees a talking tree, a mermaid on it, a huge cat that recites songs and fairy tales, and a flip book with ever-changing content. Privalov catches a pike from a well in the morning. She grants wishes. As you probably already understood, the genre of this work is a fantastic humorous story. The protagonist thinks that everything unusual must obey some kind of system.

The story of the unchangeable penny

The Strugatsky brothers describe further a strange story that happened to the main character. He finds, walking around the city during the day, an irreplaceable nickel. Privalov begins to experiment with him. He buys various things for him. The police interrupt this experiment. Privalov is taken to the department, forced to pay damages. And the unchangeable penny is confiscated and given in exchange for the usual one. At the same time, the policemen are not at all surprised by such a strange object.

Lost sofa

Privalov, returning to IZNAKURNOZH to rest, discovers that the sofa, which had been standing in place in the morning, has disappeared. Then strange personalities come to him one after another, demonstrating amazing abilities. They become invisible, fly, pass through walls and for some reason are interested in the missing sofa. Privalov finds out in passing that this piece of furniture is in fact a magical translator of reality. It was kidnapped by Viktor Korneev, an employee of the institute, for his research work, since the sofa could not be officially reclaimed from the museum due to the bureaucracy of Modest Matveevich Kamnoedov, the administrator. The kidnapping scandal in the morning becomes unmanageable. Privalov comes to the aid of the one whom he threw up to the city - Roman Oira-Oira. He persuades him to enter NIICHAVO to work as a programmer. Privalov agrees - he was interested in what was happening.

Vanity of Vanities (second story)

Approximately six months after the events described in the first part, the action of the second part unfolds. Alexander Privalov, who is now in charge of the computer center at NIICHAVO, remains on duty at the institute on New Year's Eve. He accepts the keys from the heads of departments. A series of bright characters created by the Strugatsky brothers passes before him - the magicians Junta Cristobal Khozevich and Kivrin Fedor Simeonovich, opportunists and hacks Vibegallo Amvrosy Ambrouazovich and Merlin, director of the institute Nevstruev Janus Poluektovich, who simultaneously exists in two incarnations - as a scientist U-Yanus and as administrator A-Janus, and others.

Privalov starts bypassing the institute from the vivarium building located in the basement. It contains mythological and magical creatures. Then he goes through the floors of the calves of Universal Transformations, Eternal Youth, Defensive Magic, Predictions and Prophecies, Absolute Knowledge, Meaning of Life, Linear Happiness. The round in the laboratory of the still working Vitka Korneev is coming to an end. Privalov is trying to kick him out of the room, but he cannot cope with the practicing magician who is passionate about research. He discovers, after leaving Vitka's laboratory, that there are many employees at the institute who preferred to return to their place of service instead of celebrating the New Year at home. All these people had one motto: "Monday begins on Saturday." The summary of its meaning is as follows: they saw the purpose of their life in the knowledge of the unknown and in work. Having met the New Year, all these people returned to their studies.

Model of an unsatisfied gastrointestinal person

In the laboratory of Professor Vibegallo, at that time, a model of a gastrically unsatisfied person "hatched" from an autoclave. This is a copy of the professor, capable only of devouring everything that is edible. Employees gather in Vibegallo's lab. Further, the Strugatsky brothers, accompanied by correspondents and the professor himself, are described (“Monday begins on Saturday”). According to his theory, the path to spiritual growth and development of the personality lies, first of all, through the satisfaction of its material needs. The presented model is an intermediate stage on the way to the creation of a fully satisfied model. She successfully demonstrates her ability to eat a lot, more and more. The model, in the end, bursts from gluttony, while throwing the contents of the digestive organs at the correspondents and Vibegallo. Everyone disperses.

Field test decision

For some time, Privalov ponders what is happening, then falls asleep. Further, the following events are described in the work by the Strugatsky brothers ("Monday begins on Saturday"). After waking up, Privalov tries to create breakfast for himself with the help of magic, but instead becomes a witness to a meeting taking place at the director of the institute. It discusses the question of the danger of the following model. Vibegallo wants to test it at the institute, while other experienced magicians offer to conduct field tests a few kilometers from the city. Nevstruev Janus Poluektovich, director of the institute, after a heated argument, decides to conduct them at the test site, since significant destruction will accompany the experiment. Nevstruev gives Roman Oyre-Oyre "preliminary thanks" for his courage and resourcefulness.

Testing the Ideal Human Model

Privalov is present at the test. The Model of the Ideal Man has the ability to satisfy all material needs with the help of magic. She, leaving the autoclave, transfers all those in the area of action of her magical abilities (including the things of people nearby) to herself, after which she tries to collapse the space. The novel Oira-Oira prevents the cataclysm. He throws the genie bottle at the Ideal Consumer. The genie, breaking free, destroys the model.

All the fuss (third story)

We turn to the presentation of the third story, which was described in the work of the Strugatskys ("Monday begins on Saturday"). The computer "Aldan" broke down - the machine on which the main character works. While it is being repaired, Privalov is walking around the institute. He falls into one department (Absolute Knowledge), in which at that time the machine invented by Louis Sedlov is being demonstrated. On it you can get into a fictional future or a fictional past.

Privalov goes to the future

Privalov's journey into the future is an interesting episode that the Strugatskys included in their work. "Monday starts on Saturday" thus acquired a truly epic scope. Privalov goes to the future, agreeing to the experiment. He first sees a strange world with inhabitants similar to ancient human ancestors. Then Privalov finds himself among people who are the same as his contemporaries, outwardly. However, in their world, spaceship travel to distant planets is already taking place. After that, Privalov finds himself in the era of returns. In it, people who flew away to distant stars and planets returned to Earth. He notices that the Iron Wall exists in this world and learns that the World of Future Fear is behind it. Once behind the Wall, Privalov sees war, murder and blood.

Privalov comes to Oira-Oira and sees a dead parrot in the laboratory, lying in a cup. Janus Poluektovich, the director of the institute, came up and called this parrot Photonchik. He burns his corpse in the furnace, scatters the ashes in the wind and leaves. Roman is surprised because he found a green, burnt feather in the stove the day before. How it could appear, if only today a parrot was burned, and there were no others of the same color nearby, remains a mystery.

Privalov the next day composes poems for the wall newspaper with the witch Stella. Suddenly, he sees the same green parrot enter the room. He flies, but he doesn't look very healthy. Other employees show up. They wonder where this parrot came from. Then everyone gets to work, but suddenly they notice that the parrot is lying dead. The inscription "Photon" and a ring with numbers can be seen on his paw. It was the same on the paw of the parrot, which was lying dead in a cup yesterday. Everyone is perplexed. The artist Drozd accidentally puts a parrot in a cup.

The computer is fixed the next day. The main character starts his work. Then Roman calls him and says that the parrot is no longer in the cup and no one has seen him. The protagonist is surprised, but then, absorbed in work, stops thinking about it. Roman calls again a little later and asks Privalov to come. When he arrives, he discovers a live green parrot with a ring on its paw.

The parrot responds to the words of the employees in other words. It is not possible to establish a semantic connection between them. Then the parrot is called the names of those present, and he briefly characterizes everyone: primitive, old, rude, etc. The employees cannot understand how he knows all this.

Who is Janus Poluektovich really?

We are approaching a curious finale, which concludes the book "Monday begins on Saturday." Friends come up with the idea that the parrot belongs to Janus Poluektovich, an even more mysterious person. This one in two never appears in public at twelve o'clock at night. He also cannot remember after midnight what happened before it. Janus Poluektovich, moreover, accurately predicts the future.

Scientists eventually guess that contramotion is possible here, in other words, the flow of time in the opposite direction to the generally accepted direction. If the parrot was a contra-motor, then it can be alive today, but yesterday, after death, it was put in a cup. The day before yesterday it was burned by Janus when he found it. And the day before, a charred feather found by Roman was left in the stove.

The novel tries to explain what happened to the concept of contramotion. It was actually a spaceship. The aliens who were in it were counterfeiters. They lived from the future to the past, by the standards of ordinary people.

Two incarnations of Janus Poluektovich

Scientists have unraveled the mystery of Janus Poluektovich. He was engaged in science in the person of A-Janus until he discovered the idea of contramotion. Then he realized how to put it into practice. And in a year that is still a distant future for the employees of NIICHAVO living now, he turned himself, as well as Photon, his parrot, into contra-motors. After that, he began to live on the ruler of time back. And now every midnight the director switches to today from tomorrow. He lives in the form of A-Janus, like ordinary people, that is, from the past to the future, but in the form of Y-Janus, on the contrary, from the future to the past. Both incarnations remain the same person. They are combined in space and time.

Meeting with U-Janus

Privalov meets U-Janus during lunch. He asks, plucking up courage, if it is possible to visit him tomorrow morning. He replies that Privalov will be called to Kitezhgrad tomorrow morning, therefore, it will not work. He then adds that there is no future that is the same for everyone. There are many of them, and every human act creates one of them.

This concludes the story "Monday begins on Saturday." The summary, as you understand, conveys only its main events in a general way. After reading the text of the work, you will learn many interesting details.

"Monday starts on Saturday" reviews from most readers are positive. Fans of this work will especially like it. The stories of the Strugatsky brothers are very exciting and interesting, and this one is no exception. Creativity of writers today is very popular. Perhaps with full confidence we can say that one of the most famous stories is "Monday begins on Saturday." Quotes from this work, and especially its title, can often be heard from the lips of fantasy lovers.

A brilliant book by Russian science fiction writers, which has become a bestseller for many years and a reference book for all scientists in Russia. Sparkling amazing humor stories ml.n.sotr. Alexander Privalov was brought up by more than one generation of Russian scientists and charged with the light magic of the 60s by the thoughts and aspirations of many young warriors of science.

The book contains illustrations.

But what is strangest, what is most incomprehensible of all, is how authors can take such plots, I confess, this is completely incomprehensible, that’s for sure ... no, no, I don’t understand at all. N. V. Gogol

Story one

THE FUSION AROUND THE SOFA

Chapter one

Teacher: Children, write down the sentence: "The fish was sitting on a tree."

Student: Do fish sit on trees?

Teacher: Well... It was a crazy fish.

School joke

Will you give us a lift to Solovets?

The second, with a red beard and no mustache, was also smiling, peering over his shoulder. On the positive side, they were nice people.

Let's sit down, I said. - One forward, the other back, otherwise I have junk there, in the back seat.

Benefactor! - the hook-nosed one said delightedly, took off his gun from his shoulder and sat down next to me.

The bearded man, looking hesitantly through the back door, said:

Can I have a little of that here?

I leaned over the back and helped him clear the space occupied by the sleeping bag and the rolled-up tent. He sat down delicately, placing the gun between his knees.

Close the door, I said.

Everything went on as usual. The car started off. The hawk-nosed man turned back and spoke animatedly about the fact that it is much more pleasant to ride in a passenger car than to walk. The bearded man indistinctly agreed and kept slamming and slamming the door. “Pick up the raincoat,” I advised, looking at him in the rearview mirror. “Your coat is pinched.” Five minutes later, everything finally settled down. I asked: “Ten kilometers to Solovets?” "Yes," answered the hawk-nosed one. - Or a little more. The road, however, is unimportant - for trucks. “The road is quite decent,” I objected. “I was promised that I would not pass at all.” “You can drive along this road even in autumn.” - "Here - perhaps, but here from Korobets - unpaved." - "This year the summer is dry, everything dried up." - "Under Zatonya, they say it's raining," the bearded man in the back seat remarked. "Who is speaking?" asked the hook-nosed one. Merlin speaks. For some reason they laughed. I pulled out cigarettes, lit a cigarette and offered them a treat. “The factory of Clara Zetkin,” said the hawk-nosed one, looking at the pack. - Are you from Leningrad? - "Yes". - "Are you traveling?" "I'm traveling," I said. - Are you from here? “Indigenous,” said the hook-nosed one. "I'm from Murmansk," the bearded man said. “For Leningrad, probably, Solovets and Murmansk are one and the same: the North,” said the hawk-nosed one. "No, why not," I said politely. “Are you going to stop in Solovets?” asked the hook-nosed one. “Of course,” I said. - I'm going to Solovets. “Do you have relatives or friends there?” “No,” I said. I'll just wait guys. They go along the coast, and our Solovets is a rendezvous point.

Ahead, I saw a large scattering of stones, slowed down and said: "Hold on tight." The car shook and jumped. Hook-nosed bruised his nose on the barrel of a gun. The engine roared, stones hit the bottom. "Poor car," said the hook-nosed one. “What to do…” I said. “Not everyone would drive down such a road in their car.” “I would go,” I said. The spill is over. “Ah, so this is not your car,” the hook-nosed one guessed. “Well, how do I get a car! It's a rental." - "Understood," said the hook-nosed one, as it seemed to me, disappointedly. I felt hurt. “What’s the point of buying a car to drive on asphalt? Where there is asphalt, there is nothing interesting, and where it is interesting, there is no asphalt.” "Yes, of course," the hook-nosed man agreed politely. "It's stupid, in my opinion, to make an idol out of a car," I said. “Stupid,” said the bearded man. But not everyone thinks so. We talked about cars and came to the conclusion that if we were to buy anything, it would be the GAZ-69, an all-terrain vehicle, but, unfortunately, they are not sold. Then the hawk-nosed one asked: “Where do you work?” I replied. “Colossal! exclaimed the hawk-nosed one. - Programmer! We need a programmer. Listen, leave your institute and come to us!” - "What do you have?" - "What do we have?" asked the hook-nosed one, turning around. "Aldan-3," said the bearded one. “Rich car,” I said. “And does it work well?” - “Yes, how can I tell you ...” - “Understood,” I said. “Actually, it has not yet been debugged,” said the bearded one. - Stay with us, debug ... "-" And we will arrange the translation for you in no time, "- added the hook-nosed one. "What are you doing?" I asked. “Like all science,” said the hawk-nosed one. - Human happiness. “Understood,” I said. "Something with space?" - "And with space too," said the hook-nosed one. “They don’t look for good from good,” I said. “A capital city and a decent salary,” the bearded man said softly, but I heard. “No need,” I said. “You don’t have to measure for money.” “No, I was joking,” said the bearded man. “He is joking like that,” said the hawk-nosed one. “More interesting than ours, you will not be anywhere.” - "Why do you think so?" - "Sure". - "I'm not sure." The hawk-nosed chuckled. “We will talk about this again,” he said. “Will you stay in Solovets for a long time?” - Two days maximum. - "We'll talk on the second day." The bearded one said: “Personally, I see the finger of fate in this - we were walking through the forest and met a programmer. I think you are doomed." - "Do you really need a programmer?" I asked. "We desperately need a programmer." "I'll talk to the guys," I promised. “I know those who are dissatisfied.” “We don't need just any programmer,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Programmers are a scarce people, they are spoiled, but we need an unspoilt one.” "Yeah, it's harder," I said. The hook-nosed one began to bend his fingers: “We need a programmer: a - not spoiled, be - a volunteer, tse - to agree to live in a hostel ... " - "De," the bearded man picked up, "for one hundred and twenty rubles." “What about the wings? I asked. - Or, say, lights around the head? One in a thousand!" “But we only need one,” said the hawk-nosed one. “And if there are only nine hundred of them?” “Nine-tenths agree.”

The forest parted, we crossed the bridge and rolled between the potato fields. "Nine o'clock," said the hawk-nosed one. - Where are you going to spend the night? - I'll sleep in the car. What time are your stores open until? “Our stores are already closed,” said the hawk-nosed one. “It is possible in a hostel,” said the bearded one. “I have an empty bed in my room.” - "You can't drive up to the hostel," said the hawk-nosed man thoughtfully. “Yes, perhaps,” said the bearded man, and for some reason laughed. “The car can be parked near the police,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Yes, this is nonsense,” said the bearded man. - I'm talking nonsense, and you follow me. How will he get into the hostel? “Y-yes, hell,” said the hawk-nosed one. “Really, if you don’t work for a day, you forget about all these things.” - "Or maybe transgress it?" “Well, well,” said the hawk-nosed one. - This is not your sofa. And you are not Cristobal Junta, and neither am I ... "

Don't worry, I said. - I'll spend the night in the car, not the first time.

I suddenly felt like sleeping on sheets. I've been sleeping in a sleeping bag for four nights now.

Listen, - said the hook-nosed one, - ho-ho! Out of the knife!

Correctly! exclaimed the bearded man. - On Lukomorye it!

By God, I'll sleep in the car, - I said.

You will spend the night in the house, - said the hook-nosed one, - on relatively clean linen. We must thank you somehow...

Don't give you fifty kopecks, - said the bearded man.

Next alley to the right,” said the hawk-nosed one.

I turned on the turn signal, braked and turned right. The road here was overgrown with grass, but a brand new "Zaporozhets" stood crouching at some gate. House numbers hung over the gates, and the numbers were barely visible on the rusty tin of the signs. The lane was elegantly called: “St. Lukomorye. It was not wide and was sandwiched between heavy old fences, probably built back in the days when Swedish and Norwegian pirates roamed here.

Stop, said the hawk-nosed one. I braked and he bumped his nose against the barrel of the gun again. - Now so, - he said, rubbing his nose. - You wait for me, and I'll go and arrange everything.

You really shouldn't," I said for the last time.

No talking. Volodya, keep him at gunpoint.

NIICHAVO Hut on chicken legs Monument of Solovetsky antiquity

A rusty tin plate hung on top of the right collar: “St. Lukomorye, d. No. 13, N. K. Gorynych ”, and under it flaunted a piece of plywood with an inscription in ink at random:

CAT NOT WORKING Administration

What CAT? I asked. - Defense Engineering Committee?

The bearded man chuckled.

You, most importantly, do not worry, - he said. - It's funny here, but everything will be all right.

I got out of the car and began to wipe the windshield. Above my head they were suddenly imported. I looked. A gigantic - I have never seen such a - black-gray, with divorces, was anointed on the gate, making himself comfortable. Sitting down, he looked at me with his yellow eyes full and indifferent. “Kiss-kiss-kiss,” I said mechanically. The cat politely and coldly opened its toothy mouth, made a hoarse throaty sound, and then turned away and began to look inside the yard. From there, from behind the fence, the voice of the hawk-nosed one said:

Vasily, my friend, let me disturb you.

Benefactor! he called. - Come on in!

I got back in the car and drove slowly into the yard. The yard was vast, at the back stood a house made of thick logs, and in front of the house was a squat, immense oak tree, wide, dense, with a dense crown obscuring the roof. From the gate to the house, skirting the oak, there was a path lined with stone slabs. To the right of the path there was a vegetable garden, and to the left, in the middle of the lawn, there was a well frame with a gate, black from antiquity and covered with moss.

I parked the car on the side, turned off the engine and got out. The bearded Volodya also got out and, leaning his gun against the side, began to adjust the backpack.

Here you are at home,” he said.

Hook-nosed with a creak and crackling shut the gate, while I, feeling rather awkward, looked around, not knowing what to do.

And here is the hostess! cried the bearded man. - Are you healthy, grandma, Naina is the light of Kievna!

The owner must have been over a hundred. She walked towards us slowly, leaning on a knotted stick, dragging her feet in felt boots with galoshes. Her face was dark brown; from a continuous mass of wrinkles, a nose protruded forward and downward, crooked and sharp, like a scimitar, and the eyes were pale, dull, as if covered with thorns.

Hello, hello, granddaughters, - she said in an unexpectedly sonorous bass. - This means that there will be a new programmer? Hello father, welcome!

In this way, Naina Kievna! - said the hook-nosed one, coming up and wiping the rust from his palms. - It is necessary to arrange our new employee for two nights. Let me introduce you... mmm...

But don’t,” said the old woman, looking at me intently. - I see it myself. Privalov Alexander Ivanovich, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-eighth, male, Russian, member of the Komsomol, no, no, did not participate, was not, does not have, but it will be for you, diamond, a long journey and interest in a government house, but you should be afraid, diamond, you need a red-haired, unkind person, but gild the handle, yakhontovy ...

Hmm! said the hawk-nosed one loudly, and the grandmother broke off. There was an awkward silence.

You can just call Sasha ... - I squeezed out a pre-prepared phrase.

And where will I put it? - inquired the grandmother.

In the storeroom, of course, - the hawk-nosed one said somewhat irritably.

And who will answer?

Naina Kievna! .. - the hawk-nosed roared like a provincial tragedian, grabbed the old woman by the arm and dragged her to the house. You could hear them arguing: “After all, we agreed! ..” - “... And if he removes something? ..” - “Be quiet! It's a programmer, right? Komsomolets! Scientist! .. "-" And if he pokes? .. "

I shyly turned to Volodya. Volodya giggled.

Kinda awkward, I said.

Don't worry - everything will be fine ...

He wanted to say something else, but then the grandmother yelled wildly: “A sofa, a sofa! ..” I shuddered and said:

You know, I should probably go, huh?

Out of the question! Volodya said decisively. - It'll all work out. It’s just that the grandmother needs a bribe, and Roman and I don’t have cash.

I will pay, I said. Now I really wanted to leave: I can't stand these so-called worldly conflicts.

Volodya shook his head.

Nothing like this. He's already on his way. Everything is good.

Hook-nosed Roman came up to us, took my hand and said:

Well, everything worked out. Went.

Listen, it's uncomfortable somehow, - I said. She doesn't have to...

But we were already on our way home.

I have to, I have to, - Roman kept saying.

We rounded the oak tree and reached the back porch. Roman pushed open the leatherette-lined door, and we found ourselves in the hallway, spacious and clean, but dimly lit. The old woman was waiting for us, her hands folded on her stomach and her lips pursed. When she saw us, she boomed vindictively:

And a receipt for it right now! .. So, they say, and so: they supposedly accepted this and that from such and such, which handed over the above to the undersigned ...

Roman howled softly, and we entered the room allotted to me. It was a cool room with one window, hung with a cotton curtain. Roman said in a tense voice:

Settle in and make yourself at home.

The old woman from the hall immediately inquired jealously:

And they don't bark their teeth?

Roman, without turning around, barked:

They don't chirp! They tell you there are no teeth.

Then let's go, write a receipt ...

Roman raised his eyebrows, rolled his eyes, bared his teeth and shook his head, but went out anyway. I looked around. There was little furniture in the room. By the window stood a massive table covered with a shabby gray fringed tablecloth, in front of the table was a rickety stool. Near the bare log wall there was a large sofa, on the other wall, covered with wallpaper of various sizes, there was a hanger with some kind of junk (quilted jackets, fur coats that came out, tattered caps and earflaps). A large Russian stove, shining with fresh whitewash, protruded into the room, and opposite in the corner hung a large, dim mirror in a shabby frame. The floor was scraped and covered with striped rugs.

I went to the window and drew back the curtain. There was an oak tree outside the window, nothing else was visible. I began to look at the oak. It was apparently a very ancient plant. The bark on it was gray and somehow dead, and the monstrous roots that crawled out of the ground were covered with red and white lichen. “And write down another oak!” Roman said behind the wall. There was a plump, greasy book on the windowsill; I flipped it thoughtlessly, stepped away from the window, and sat down on the sofa. And now I want to sleep. I thought that I had been driving for fourteen hours today, that it was not worth it, perhaps, to be in such a hurry, that my back hurts, and everything is confused in my head, that I don’t give a damn about this boring old woman, and soon it would all be over and could lay down and sleep...

Well, - said Roman, appearing on the threshold. - The formalities are over. He waved his hand, fingers splayed and smeared with ink. - Our fingers are tired: we wrote, we wrote ... Go to bed. We leave, and you calmly go to bed. What are you doing tomorrow?

I'm waiting, - I answered languidly.

Here. And near the post office.

You probably won't leave tomorrow, will you?

Tomorrow is unlikely ... Most likely - the day after tomorrow.

Then we'll see you again. Our love is ahead. He smiled, waved his hand and left. I lazily thought that it would be necessary to see him off and say goodbye to Volodya, and lay down. Just then an old woman entered the room. I wake up. The old woman looked at me for some time.

I'm afraid, father, that you'll start to bark your teeth, - she said with concern.

I'm not going to poke, - I said wearily. - I'm going to sleep.

And lie down and sleep ... Just pay the money and sleep ...

I reached into my back pocket for my wallet.

How much?

The old woman raised her eyes to the ceiling.

We put a ruble for the room ... Fifty dollars for bed linen - it's mine, not state-owned. For two nights it comes out three rubles ... And how much of the bounty you will throw - for anxiety, then - I don’t know ...

I handed her a five.

From generosity until the ruble, - I said. - And we'll see.

Here's your change, father, - she said. - Exactly a ruble, you can not count.

I won't count, I said. - What about underwear?

I'll make a bed now. You go out into the yard, take a walk, and I will make a bed.

I went out, pulling out cigarettes as I went. The sun finally set, and the white night came. Somewhere dogs were barking. I sat down under an oak tree on a bench that had grown into the ground, lit a cigarette and began to look at the pale, starless sky. A cat appeared noiselessly from somewhere, looked at me with fluorescent eyes, then quickly climbed up the oak tree and disappeared into the dark foliage. I immediately forgot about him and shuddered when he was brought somewhere upstairs. Debris fell on my head. "To you…" - I said aloud and began to dust myself off. I was extremely anxious to sleep. An old woman came out of the house, not noticing me, wandered to the well. I understood this to mean that the bed was ready, and returned to the room.

Chapter Two

I woke up in the middle of the night because they were talking in the room. The two were talking in barely audible whispers. The voices were very similar, but one was a little choked and hoarse, and the other betrayed extreme irritation.

Don't wheeze, he whispered, irritated. - Can you not wheeze?

I can, - the strangled man answered and suffocated.

Yes, you quieter ... - hissed annoyed.

Khripunets, - explained strangled. “Smoker's morning cough…” He suffocated again.

Get out of here, - said annoyed.

Yes, he is still sleeping...

Who is he? Where did it fall from?

How do I know?

That's a shame ... Well, just phenomenally unlucky.

Again, the neighbors can not sleep, I thought awake. I imagined that I was at home. My neighbors at home are two physicist brothers who love to work at night. By two in the morning they run out of cigarettes, and then they climb into my room and begin to fumble, banging furniture and arguing.

I grabbed a pillow and threw it into the void. Something crashed down with a noise, and it became quiet.

Give back the pillow, I said, and get out. Cigarettes on the table.

The sound of my own voice woke me completely. I sat down. The dogs barked despondently, behind the wall an old woman snored menacingly. I finally remembered where I was. There was no one in the room. In the twilight light, I saw my pillow on the floor and the junk that had fallen from the hanger. The grandmother will tear off her head, I thought, and jumped up. The floor was cold and I stepped onto the rugs. Grandma stopped snoring. I froze. The floorboards crackled, something crunched and rustled in the corners. Grandmother whistled deafeningly and began to snore again. I picked up the pillow and threw it on the sofa. The junk smelled of dog. The hanger fell off the nail and hung sideways. I corrected it and began to pick up junk. I had scarcely hung up the last coat, when the hanger broke off and, shuffling against the wallpaper, hung again on one nail. Grandma stopped snoring, and I broke out in a cold sweat. Somewhere nearby, a rooster crowed. Into your soup, I thought with hatred. The old woman behind the wall began to spin, the springs creaked and clicked. I waited on one leg. In the courtyard, someone said quietly: "It's time to sleep, we've been sitting too long today." The voice was young, feminine. “Sleep like that,” another voice said. A long yawn was heard. "Won't you splash around again today?" - “Something cold. Come on guys." It became quiet. Grandmother growled and grumbled, and I cautiously returned to the sofa. I'll get up early in the morning and fix everything properly...

I lay down on my right side, pulled the blanket over my ear, closed my eyes and suddenly realized that I didn’t feel like sleeping at all - I wanted to eat. Ayyyyyyy, I thought. It was necessary to urgently take action, and I took them.

Here, let's say, is a system of two integral equations of the type of stellar statistics equations; both unknown functions are under the integral. Of course, one can only solve numerically, say, at BESM... I remembered our BESM. Custard color control panel. Zhenya puts a bundle of newspaper on this panel and slowly unfolds it. "What do you have?" - "I have with cheese and sausage." With Polish half-smoked, circles. “Hey, you need to get married! I have cutlets, with garlic, homemade. And pickles." No, two cucumbers ... Four cutlets and, for good measure, four strong pickles. And four slices of bread and butter...

I threw back the covers and sat up. Maybe there is something left in the car? No, everything that was there, I ate. There was a cookbook for Valka's mother, who lives in Lezhnev. How is it there ... Pikan sauce. Half a glass of vinegar, two onions ... and pepper. Served with meat dishes ... As I remember now: with small steaks. What meanness, I thought, not just to steaks, but to ma-a-scarlet steaks. I jumped up and ran to the window. The night air smelled distinctly of ma-a-scarlet steaks. From somewhere in the bowels of the subconscious surfaced: “He was served the usual dishes in taverns, such as: sour cabbage soup, brains with peas, pickled cucumber (I took a sip) and the eternal puff sweet pie ...” I would be distracted, I thought, and took the book from the windowsill . It was Alexei Tolstoy, Gloomy Morning. I opened at random. “Makhno, having broken a sardine key, pulled out a mother-of-pearl knife with fifty blades from his pocket and continued to wield it, opening tins of pineapples (bad business, I thought), French pate, with lobsters, from which the room smelled sharply.” I carefully put the book down and sat down at the table on a stool. There was suddenly a delicious, pungent smell in the room: it must have smelled like lobster. I began to wonder why I had never tasted lobster until now. Or, say, oysters. In Dickens's, everyone eats oysters, wields folding knives, cuts off thick slices of bread, spreads it with butter ... I began to nervously smooth the tablecloth. There were stains on the tablecloth. They ate a lot and deliciously. Ate lobsters and brains with peas. They ate small steaks with pican sauce. Large and medium steaks were also eaten. They puffed full, satisfactorily clicked their teeth ... There was nothing for me to puff, and I began to poke my teeth.

I must have done it loudly and hungry, because the old woman behind the wall creaked the bed, muttered angrily, rattled something, and suddenly came into my room. She was wearing a long gray shirt, and in her hands she carried a plate, and the real, not fantastic, aroma of food immediately spread in the room. The old woman smiled. She set the plate right in front of me and sweetly boomed:

Have a bite, father, Alexander Ivanovich. Eat what God sent, sent with me ...

What are you, what are you, Naina Kievna, - I muttered, - why did you bother yourself so much ...

But somewhere in my hand I already had a fork with a bone handle, and I began to eat, and my grandmother stood nearby, nodding and saying:

Eat, father, eat in good health ...

I ate everything. It was a hot potato with ghee.

Naina Kievna, - I said earnestly, - you saved me from starvation.

Ate? - said Naina Kievna somehow unfriendly.

Ate great. Thank you very much! You cannot imagine...

What can not be imagined here, - she interrupted already completely irritated. - Ate, I say? Well, give me a plate here ... A plate, I say, come on!

By ... please, - I said.

- "Please, please" ... Feed you here for please ...

I can pay,” I said, getting angry.

- "Pay, pay" ... - She went to the door. What if they don't pay for it at all? And there was nothing to lie ...

So how is it to lie?

And so lie! He said himself that you won’t poke ... - She fell silent and disappeared behind the door.

What is she? I thought. Some strange grandmother ... Maybe she noticed the hanger? She could be heard creaking with springs, tossing and turning on the bed and grumbling with displeasure. Then she sang softly to some barbaric motive: “I’ll ride, lie down, after eating Ivashkin’s meat ...” A cold night blew from the window. I shivered, got up to return to the sofa, and then it dawned on me that I had locked the door before going to bed. Confused, I went to the door and stretched out my hand to check the latch, but as soon as my fingers touched the cold iron, everything swam before my eyes. It turned out that I was lying on the couch, with my nose buried in a pillow, and I was feeling the cold log of the wall with my fingers.

For some time I lay dying, until I realized that somewhere nearby an old woman was snoring, and they were talking in the room. Someone instructively spoke in an undertone:

The elephant is the largest animal of all living on earth. It has a large piece of meat on its snout, which is called a trunk because it is empty and stretched out like a pipe. He stretches and bends it in all sorts of ways and uses it instead of a hand...

Cold with curiosity, I cautiously turned to my right side. The room was still empty. The voice continued even more instructively:

Wine used in moderation is very good for the stomach; but when you drink too much of it, it produces vapors that degrade a person to the level of senseless beasts. You have sometimes seen drunkards and still remember the just disgust you had for them...

I jumped up and swung my legs off the couch. The voice is silent. It seemed to me that they were talking from somewhere behind the wall. Everything in the room was the same, even the hanger, to my surprise, hung in place. And, to my surprise, I was very hungry again.

Tincture ex vitro antimony, - suddenly proclaimed a voice. I started. - Magiftherium antimon angelis salae. Bafilia oleum vitry antimonia alexiterium antimoniale! - I heard a distinct chuckle. - That's what nonsense! - said the voice and continued with a howl: - Soon these eyes, still opened, will no longer see the sun, but do not let it close without a gracious notice of my forgiveness and bliss ... This is the “Spirit or Moral Thoughts of the Glorious Jung, extracted from his nightly reflections ". Sold in St. Petersburg and Riga in Sveshnikov's bookstores for two rubles in a folder. - Someone sobbed. - Also nonsense, - said the voice and said with an expression:

Ranks, beauty, wealth,
All the pleasures of this life
Flying, weakening, disappearing,
This is decay, and happiness is false!
Infections gnaw at the heart
And glory cannot be kept ...

Where is this crap from? I asked. I didn't expect an answer. I was sure that I was dreaming.

Sayings from the Upanishads, the voice readily answered.

What is the Upanishad? - I wasn't sure I was dreaming anymore.

I got up and tiptoed over to the mirror. I didn't see my reflection. The cloudy glass reflected the curtain, the corner of the stove, and many things in general. But I wasn't in it.

Who is speaking? I asked, peering behind the mirror. There was a lot of dust and dead spiders behind the mirror. Then I pressed my left eye with my index finger. It was an old rule for recognizing hallucinations, which I read in the fascinating book by V. V. Bitner "To believe or not to believe?". It is enough to press a finger on the eyeball, and all real objects - unlike hallucinations - will split in two. The mirror split in two, and my reflection appeared in it - a sleepy, anxious physiognomy. It blew down my legs. Cursing my fingers, I went to the window and looked out.

There was no one outside the window, not even an oak tree. I rubbed my eyes and looked again. I distinctly saw in front of me a mossy well log house with a gate, a gate and my car at the gate. I'm still asleep, I thought calmly. My gaze fell on the windowsill, on the disheveled book. In the last dream, it was the third volume of the Pain, now on the cover I read: “P. I. Karpov. Creativity of the mentally ill and its influence on the development of science, art and technology. Teeth chattering from the chill, I leafed through the book and looked through the colored inserts. Then I read "Verse #2":

In the circle of clouds high
black-winged sparrow
Trembling and lonely
Soars quickly above the ground.
He flies at night
Illuminated by moonlight,
And, dismayed by nothing,
He sees everything below him.
Proud, predatory, furious
And flying like a shadow
Eyes glow like day.

The floor suddenly swayed under my feet. There was a piercing lingering creak, then, like the rumble of a distant earthquake, there was a roaring: “Ko-o… Ko-o… Ko-o…” The hut shook like a boat on the waves. The yard outside the window shifted to the side, and a gigantic chicken leg crawled out from under the window and stuck its claws into the ground, made deep furrows in the grass and disappeared again. The floor tilted steeply, I felt that I was falling, grabbed something soft with my hands, hit my side and head and fell off the sofa. I lay on the rugs, clutching the pillow that had fallen with me. The room was completely light. Outside the window, someone was clearing his throat.

Well, well…” said a well-placed male voice. - In some there was a kingdom, in some state there lived a king, by name ... mne-eh ... well, in the end, it doesn’t matter. Let's say, me-e... Poluekt... He had three sons, princes. The first one… me-uh… The third one was a fool, but the first one?..

Bending down like a soldier under fire, I crept up to the window and looked out. The oak was there. With his back to him, the cat Vasily stood on his hind legs in deep thought. He had a water lily in his teeth. The cat looked at his feet and pulled: “Mne-uh…” Then he shook his head, put his front paws behind his back and, slightly stooping, like an assistant professor Dubino-Knyazhitsky at a lecture, walked with a smooth step away from the oak.

Good… - said the cat through his teeth. - There used to be a king and a queen. The king, the queen had one son… Mne-eh… Fool, of course…

The cat spat out the flower in annoyance and rubbed his forehead, grimacing all over.

A desperate situation, he said. - After all, I remember something! “Ha ha ha! There will be something to eat: a horse for lunch, well done for dinner ... ”Where would it come from? And Ivan, you yourself understand - a fool, replies: "Oh, you filthy monster, not catching a white swan, but eat!" Then, of course - a red-hot arrow, all three heads off, Ivan takes out three hearts and brings, cretin, home to his mother ... What a present! The cat laughed sardonically, then sighed. - There is another disease - sclerosis - he said.

He sighed again, turned back to the oak and sang: “Quack, quack, my little children! Quack, quack, pigeons! I… mne-uh… I soldered you with a tear… or rather, soldered you…” He sighed for the third time and walked silently for a while. Coming up with the oak, he suddenly yelled unmusically: “I didn’t eat up the sweet cous! ..”

He suddenly had a massive harp in his paws - I didn’t even notice where he got them. He desperately hit them with his paw and, clinging to the strings with his claws, yelled even louder, as if trying to drown out the music:

Dass im tannwald finster east,
Das macht das holts,
Das… meh… mein shatz… or katz?..

He fell silent and walked for some time, silently tapping on the strings. Then, softly, hesitantly, he sang:

Oh, I'm in the same garden,
I'll tell you the whole truth:
Oto so
Dig poppy.

He returned to the oak, leaned his harp against it, and scratched behind his ear with his back foot.

Work, work, work, he said. - Only work!

He put his paws behind his back again and walked to the left of the oak, muttering:

It dawned on me, O great king, that in the glorious city of Baghdad there lived a tailor, by the name of ... - He got on all fours, arched his back and hissed angrily. - These names are especially disgusting for me! Abu... Ali... Someone ibn someone... W-well, let's say Poluekt. Poluekt ibn… mne-uh… Poluektovich… I still don’t remember what happened to this tailor. Well, the dog is with him, let's start another ...

I lay on my stomach on the windowsill and, sighing, watched the ill-fated Vasily wander around the oak, now to the right, then to the left, muttering, clearing his throat, howling, moaning, getting on all fours from tension - in a word, he suffers unspeakably. The range of his knowledge was enormous. He did not know a single fairy tale and a single song more than half, but they were Russian, Ukrainian, West Slavic, German, English, in my opinion, even Japanese, Chinese and African fairy tales, legends, parables, ballads, songs, romances, ditties and chants. Sclerosis infuriated him, several times he threw himself on the trunk of an oak tree and tore the bark with his claws, he hissed and spat, and at the same time his eyes burned like those of the devil, and his fluffy tail, thick as a log, now looked at the zenith, then convulsively twitched, then whipped him on the sides. But the only song he sang to the end was "Chizhik-Pyzhik", and the only fairy tale that he coherently told was "The House That Jack Built" in Marshak's translation, and even then with some cuts. Gradually - apparently from fatigue - his speech acquired an increasingly distinct cat accent. “And in the poly, poly,” he sang, “the plow itself is walking, a ... mne-e ... a ... mne-a-a-u! .. The Lord himself walk ... Or brode? .. ”In the end, he was completely exhausted, sat on his tail and sat like that for some time, bowing his head. Then he meowed softly, sadly, took the harp under his arm and slowly hobbled along the dewy grass on three legs.

I climbed off the windowsill and dropped the book. I clearly remembered that the last time it was "The Work of the Mentally Ill", I was sure that this book had fallen on the floor. But I picked it up and put it on the windowsill with A. Swenson's and O. Wendel's Crime Disclosure. I stupidly opened it, ran through a few paragraphs at random, and at once it seemed to me that a strangled man was hanging on an oak tree. I cautiously raised my eyes. A wet, silver-green shark's tail hung from the bottom branch of an oak tree. The tail swayed heavily in the morning breeze.

I shied away and hit the back of my head on something hard. The telephone rang loudly. I looked around. I was lying across the sofa, the blanket had slipped from me to the floor, the morning sun was beating through the window through the oak leaves.

Chapter Three

It occurred to me that the usual interview with a devil or a wizard could be successfully replaced by a clever use of the principles of science.

H. G. Wells

Phone rang. I rubbed my eyes, looked out the window (the oak was in place), looked at the hanger (the hanger was also in place). Phone rang. Behind the wall, the old woman's room was quiet. Then I jumped to the floor, opened the door (the latch was in place) and went out into the hallway. Phone rang. It stood on a shelf above a large barrel - a very modern apparatus of white plastic, such I saw only in the cinema and in the office of our director. I picked up the phone.

Who is this? asked a piercing female voice.

And who do you need?

Is that Iznakurnizh?

I say, is this a hut on kurnog or not? Who is speaking?

Yes, I said. - Hut. Who do you need?

Let's.

Write it down.

One minute, I said. - I'll take a pencil and paper.

I brought a notebook and a collet pencil.

Listen to you.

Telephone message number two hundred and six, - said a female voice. - Citizen Gorynych Naina Kievna ...

- “You are hereby ... invited to ... arrive today ... on the twenty-seventh of July ... this year ... at midnight ... for the annual republican rally ...” Recorded?

Recorded.

- “The first meeting ... will take place ... on Bald Mountain. Dress uniform. Use of mechanical transport ... at your own expense. Signature… head of the office… Ha… Um… Viy.”

Viy! Ha Em Wii.

I do not understand.

Viy! Hron Monadovich! What, you don't know the head of the office?

I don't know, I said. - Spell it out.

Devilry! Okay, spell it out: Werewolf - Incubus - Ibicus short ... Recorded?

Looks like he did, I said. - It turned out - Viy.

Do you have polyps? I do not understand!

Vladimir! Ivan! Ivan short!

So. Repeat phone call.

I repeated.

Correctly. Passed Onuchkin. Who accepted?

Privalov.

Greetings, Privalov! How long have you been serving?

Dogs serve, - I said angrily. - I work.

Well, well, work. We'll meet at the retreat.

There were horns. I hung up the phone and returned to the room. The morning was cool, I hurriedly did my exercises and got dressed. What was happening seemed to me extremely curious. The telephone message was strangely associated in my mind with the events of the night, although I had no idea how. However, some ideas had already occurred to me, and my imagination was excited.

Everything that I happened to be a witness here was not completely unfamiliar to me, I read something about such cases somewhere and now I remembered that the behavior of people who fell into similar circumstances always seemed to me extraordinarily, irritatingly absurd. Instead of making full use of the exciting prospects opened up for them by a happy accident, they became frightened, tried to return to the ordinary. Some hero even conjured readers to stay away from the veil that separates our world from the unknown, frightening them with spiritual and physical injuries. I did not yet know how events would unfold, but I was already ready to plunge into them with enthusiasm.

Wandering around the room in search of a ladle or mug, I continued to reason. These fearful people, I thought, are like some experimental scientists, very stubborn, very industrious, but completely unimaginative and therefore very cautious. When they get a non-trivial result, they shy away from it, hastily explain it by the impurity of the experiment, and in fact move away from the new one, because they got too used to the old, comfortably laid within the limits of an authoritative theory ... I have already considered some experiments with a flip book (it is still lay on the windowsill and was now Aldridge's "Last Exile"), with a talking mirror and a chirp. I had a few questions for the cat Vasily, and the mermaid living on the oak was of some interest, although at times it seemed to me that I did dream about her. I have nothing against mermaids, but I can't imagine how they can climb trees... though, on the other hand, scales...?

I found a ladle on a tub under the telephone, but there was no water in the tub, and I went to the well. The sun has already risen quite high. Somewhere cars were buzzing, a police whistle was heard, a helicopter sailed in the sky with a solid rumble. I went to the well and, with satisfaction, having found a crumpled tin pail on a chain, began to unwind the gate. The tub, tapping against the walls, went into the black depths. There was a splash, the chain stretched. I turned the gate and looked at my Moskvich. The car had a tired, dusty look, the windshield was smeared with midges that had smashed to smithereens on it. It will be necessary to add water to the radiator, I thought. And generally speaking…

The tub seemed very heavy to me. When I put it on the log house, a huge pike head popped out of the water, green and all kind of mossy. I jumped back.

Will you drag me to the market again? - strongly okay, said the pike. I was dumbfounded silent. - Give me peace, you insatiable! How much can I? .. I’ll calm down a little, I’ll try to rest and take a nap - tashshit! I’m not young anymore, I’ll be older than you ... my gills are also not in order ...

It was very strange to watch her speak. Just like a pike in a puppet theater, it opened and closed its toothy mouth with might and main in an unpleasant discrepancy with the sounds being uttered. She uttered the last phrase with a convulsive clenching of her jaw.

And the air is bad for me,” she continued. - I'm going to die, what are you going to do? It's all your stinginess, woman and foolishness... You save everything, but you don't know what you save for... On the last reform, how burned out, huh? That's it! And Catherine's? Pasted the chests! And kerenki-ta, kerenki! After all, the stove was heated with cores ...

You see,” I said, recovering a little.

Oh who is it? - scared pike.

I... I'm here by chance... I intended to wash a little.

Wash up! And I thought - again the old woman. I don't see it, it's old. Yes, and the refractive index in the air, they say, is completely different. I ordered air glasses for myself, but I lost them, I can’t find them ... And who will you be?

Tourist, I said shortly.

Ah, a tourist ... And I thought - again a grandmother. What is she doing to me! He catches me, drags me to the market and sells me there, supposedly in his ear. Well, what is left for me? Of course, you say to the buyer: so and so, let me go to the little kids - although what kind of little kids I have there - not kids that are already alive, but grandfathers. You will let me go, and I will serve you, just say "at the behest of the pike, according to my, they say, desire." Well, they let go. Some out of fear, others out of kindness, and some out of greed ... You swim in the river, you swim - it's cold, rheumatism, you climb back into the well, and the old woman with the tub is right there again ... - The pike hid in the water, gurgled and leaned out again. - Well, what are you going to ask, soldier? Only something simpler, otherwise they ask for some kind of TVs, transistors ... One was completely stunned: “Fulfill, he says, for me the annual plan at the sawmill.” My years are not the same - sawing firewood ...

Yep, I said. - A TV you, so you still can?

No, - the pike honestly admitted. - I can't TV. And this ... combine with a player can’t either. I don't believe in them. You are something faster. Boots, let's say, runners or a cap of invisibility ... Huh?

The hope that arose in me to get away today from the Moskvich grease went out.

Don't worry, I said. - I don't need anything. I will let you go now.

And well, - calmly said the pike. - I love such people. Just now, too ... He bought me at the market of some kind, I promised him the royal daughter. I'm floating on the river, I'm ashamed, of course, I have nowhere to put my eyes. Well, I went blind and entered the net. Tashshat. Again, I think I'll have to lie. And what does he do? He grabs me across my teeth, so I can't open my mouth. Well, I think it's over, they'll cook it. An no. He pinches my fin with something and throws it back into the river. In! - The pike leaned out of the tub and put out a fin, caught at the base with a metal clip. On the clip I read: “This copy is launched in Nightingale River 1854. Deliver to E.I.V. Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg. “Don’t tell the old woman,” the pike warned. - With a fin will tear off. She is greedy, mean.

"What should I ask her?" I thought feverishly.

How do you do your miracles?

What are these miracles?

Well… wish fulfillment…

Ah, is it? How I do it… Trained from childhood, so I do it. How do I know how I do it ... Goldfish did it even better, but all the same died. You can't escape fate.

It seemed to me that the pike sighed.

From old age? I asked.

What there from an old age! She was young, strong ... They threw a depth bomb at her, a serviceman. And they let her belly up, and some kind of underwater ship happened nearby, also sank. She would have paid off, but they didn’t ask her, they saw her and immediately with a bomb ... That's how it happens. She paused. So are you letting me go or what? Something stuffy, there will be a thunderstorm ...

Of course, of course, - I said, starting up. - How about you - to leave or in a tub? ..

Drop it, soldier, drop it.

I carefully put my hands into the tub and took out the pike - there were eight kilograms in it. The pike muttered: “Well, if there is a self-assembly tablecloth or, say, a magic carpet, then I will be here ... They won’t disappear behind me ...” - “Goodbye,” I said and unclenched my hands. There was a noisy splash.

For some time I stood looking at my palms, stained with greenery. I had some strange feeling. From time to time, like a gust of wind, the consciousness came that I was sitting in the room on the sofa, but as soon as I shook my head, I again found myself at the well. Then it passed. I washed my face with excellent ice water, filled the radiator and shaved. The old woman did not show up. I was hungry, and I had to go to the city to the post office, where, perhaps, the guys were already waiting for me. I locked the car and went out the gate.

I walked leisurely along Lukomorye Street, thrusting my hands into the pockets of my gray GDR jacket and looking down at my feet. In the back pocket of my favorite jeans, streaked with "lightning", the old woman's coppers jingled. I was wondering. The skinny pamphlets of the Knowledge Society taught me to think that animals are not capable of talking. Fairy tales from childhood convinced me otherwise. Of course, I agreed with the pamphlets, because I had never seen talking animals in my life. Even parrots. I used to know a parrot that could roar like a tiger, but he couldn't do it like a human. And now - a pike, a cat Vasily and even a mirror. However, inanimate objects just talk often. And, by the way, this consideration would never have occurred to, say, my great-grandfather. From his great-grandfather's point of view, a talking cat is a far less fantastic thing than a polished wooden box that wheezes, howls, plays music and speaks many languages. With a cat, too, more or less clear. But how does a pike talk? Pike don't have lungs. It's right. True, she must have a swim bladder, the function of which, as I know, is not yet completely clear to ichthyologists. My ichthyologist friend Zhenya Skoromakhov even believes that this function is completely unclear, and when I try to argue with arguments from the brochures of the Knowledge Society, Zhenya growls and spits. It completely loses its inherent gift of human speech ... I have the impression that we still know very little about the capabilities of animals. It has only recently been discovered that fish and marine animals exchange signals underwater. Very interesting write about dolphins. Or, say, the monkey Raphael. I saw it myself. True, she does not know how to talk, but she has developed a reflex: green light - banana, red light - electric shock. And everything was fine until they turned on the red and green lights at the same time. Then Raphael behaved in the same way as Zhenya, for example. He was terribly offended. He rushed to the window where the experimenter was sitting, and began, screeching and growling, spitting into this window. And in general, there is a joke - one monkey says to another: “Do you know what a conditioned reflex is? This is when the bell rings, and all these quasi-monkeys in white coats will run to us with bananas and sweets. Of course, all this is extremely difficult. The terminology has not been developed. When under these conditions you try to resolve issues related to the psyche and potentialities of animals, you feel completely powerless. But, on the other hand, when you are given, say, the same system of integral equations such as stellar statistics with unknown functions under the integral, then your health is not better. And so the main thing is to think. Like Pascal: "Let's learn to think well - this is the basic principle of morality."

I went out to Mira Avenue and stopped, attracted by an unusual sight. A man was walking along the pavement with children's flags in his hands. Behind him, ten paces away, with a strained roar, a large white MAZ slowly crawled along with a giant smoking trailer in the form of a silver tank. The word “flammable” was written on the tank, to the right and left of it, red fire engines, bristling with fire extinguishers, rolled just as slowly. From time to time, some new sound intervened in the even roar of the engine, unpleasantly chilling the heart, and then yellow tongues of flame burst out of the hatches of the tank. The faces of the firefighters under their hooded helmets were courageous and stern. Children were running around the cavalcade in a cloud. They shrieked piercingly: “Tilili-tilili, and the dragon was taken!” Adult passers-by cautiously pressed against the fences. A clear desire was written on their faces to protect their clothes from possible damage.

They took the darling, - the familiar creaky bass said over my ear.

I turned around. Behind me stood Naina Kievna, saddened, with a purse filled with blue packets of granulated sugar.

Take it, she repeated. - Every Friday they carry ...

Where? I asked.

To the landfill, father. Everyone is experimenting... There is nothing else for them to do.

And who was taken, Naina Kievna?

That is, how is it - whom? You don't see it yourself, do you?

She turned and walked away, but I caught up with her.

Naina Kievna, a telephone message has been handed over to you.

Who is this from?

From Ha Em Via.

What about?

You have some kind of meeting today, - I said, looking at her intently. - On Bald Mountain. The dress code is dress code.

The old woman was clearly delighted.

Really? - she said. - That's good, then! .. And where is the telephone message?

In the hallway on the phone.

Does it say anything about membership fees? she asked, lowering her voice.

In what sense?

Well, what, they say, it is necessary to pay off the debt with one thousand seven hundred ... - She fell silent.

No, I said. - Nothing like that was said.

Well, good. And what about transport? Will they deliver a car or what?

Let me bring you a wallet, - I suggested.

The old woman recoiled.

Why are you doing this? she asked suspiciously. - You leave it - I don’t like it ... I’ll give him a wallet! .. Young, yes, apparently, from the early ones ...

I don't like old women, I thought.

So what about transport? she repeated.

At my own expense,” I said gloomily.

Ah, hoarders! groaned the old woman. - They took the broom to the museum, the stupa is not being repaired, the fees are charged at five rubles for banknotes, and for Lysaya Gora at their own expense! The bill is not small, father, but while the taxi is waiting ...

Muttering and coughing, she turned away from me and walked away. I rubbed my hands and also went my own way. My assumptions were justified. The knot of astonishing events tightened ever tighter. And I'm ashamed to admit it, but it seemed to me now more interesting than even modeling a reflex arc.

Prospekt Mira was already empty. At the crossroads, a flock of children was spinning - they were playing, in my opinion, siskin. When they saw me, they abandoned the game and began to approach. Anticipating something bad, I hurriedly passed them and moved towards the center. Behind me there was a strangled enthusiastic exclamation: "Dandy!" I quickened my pace. "Dandy!" yelled several voices at once. I almost ran. Behind them squealed: “Style-yeah! Thin-legged! Papa’s “Victory”!..” Passers-by looked at me sympathetically. In such situations, it is best to dive somewhere. I dived into the nearest store, which turned out to be a grocery store, walked along the counters, made sure that there was sugar, the choice of sausages and sweets was not rich, but the choice of so-called fish products exceeded all expectations. There was such salmon and such salmon! .. I drank a glass of sparkling water and looked out into the street. There were no boys. Then I left the store and moved on. Soon storehouses and log huts-redoubts ran out, modern two-story houses with open gardens went. Babies were scurrying about in the squares, elderly women were knitting something warm, and elderly men were playing dominoes.

In the center of the city was a vast square, surrounded by two - and three-story buildings. The area was paved, in the middle there was a green garden. Above the greenery rose a large red shield with the inscription "Honor Board" and several smaller shields with diagrams and diagrams. I found the post office here, on the square. We agreed with the guys that the first one who arrives in the city will leave a note with his coordinates until the call. There was no note, and I left a letter in which I gave my address and explained how to get to the hut on curnogi. Then I decided to have breakfast.

Walking around the square, I found: a cinema where "Kozara" was on; a bookstore closed for inventory; City Council, in front of which stood several thoroughly dusted "gaziks"; hotel "Cold Sea" - as usual, without vacancies; two kiosks with soda water and ice cream; shop (manufactured goods) No. 2 and shop (household goods) No. 18; dining room No. 11, which opens at twelve o'clock, and buffet No. 3, closed without explanation. Then I found the city police station, near the open doors of which I talked with a very young policeman with the rank of sergeant, who explained to me where the gas station was and what the road to Lezhnev was. "Where is your car?" the policeman inquired, looking around the square. “From acquaintances,” I replied. “Ah, with friends ...” - said the policeman significantly. I think he took note of me. I bowed timidly.

Next to the three-story building of Solrybsnabprompotrebsoyuz FCU, I finally found a small tidy tea house No. 16/27. The tearoom was good. There were not very many people, they really drank tea and talked about understandable things: that under Korobets, finally, the bridge collapsed and now you have to wade; that the traffic police post had already been removed from the fifteenth kilometer for a week; that “a spark is a beast, it will kill an elephant, but it doesn’t grab a shish ...” There was a smell of gasoline and fried fish. People not busy with conversations were staring at my jeans, and I was glad that I had a professional stain behind me - the day before yesterday I sat down very successfully on a syringe with grease.

I took a full plate of fried fish, three glasses of tea and three sandwiches with balyk, paid off with a bunch of old woman's coppers ("I was standing on the porch ..." - the barmaid grumbled), settled in a secluded corner and started eating, with pleasure watching these hoarse-voiced, smoky people. It was nice to see how tanned, independent, wiry they were, who had seen everything, how they eat with appetite, smoke with appetite, talk with appetite. They used the respite to the last drop before long hours of bumpy boring road, red-hot closeness of the cabin, dust and sun. If I hadn’t been a programmer, I would definitely have become a driver and would have worked not on a shabby car, and not even on a bus, but on some kind of cargo monster, so that I had to climb a ladder into the cab, and change the wheel with the help of small crane.

At the next table sat two young men who did not look like chauffeurs, and therefore at first I did not pay attention to them. The same, however, as they did to me. But when I was finishing my second glass of tea, the word “sofa” flew up to me. Then one of them said: “... And then it is not clear why it exists at all, this Iznakurnozh ...” - and I began to listen. Unfortunately, they spoke quietly, and I was sitting with my back to them, so it was hard to hear. But the voices seemed familiar to me: “… no theses… just a sofa…”, “… so hairy?..”, “… a sofa… the sixteenth degree…”, “… with transgression only fourteen orders…”, “… it is easier to model the translator… ”, “... you never know who is giggling! ..”, “... I’ll give you a razor ...”, “... we can’t live without a sofa ...”. Then one of them snorted, so familiar that I immediately remembered tonight and turned around, but they were already walking towards the exit - two hefty guys with steep shoulders and athletic nape. For some time I still saw them through the window, they crossed the square, went around the garden and disappeared behind the diagrams. I finished my tea, finished my sandwiches and went out too. Their sofa, you see, worries me, I thought. The mermaid doesn't care about them. The talking cat does not interest them. And without a sofa, you see, they can’t ... I tried to remember what kind of sofa I have there, but I couldn’t remember anything special. A sofa is like a sofa. Good sofa. Convenient. Only a strange reality is dreaming on him.

Now it would be nice to go home and take care of all these couch affairs closely. Experiment with a flip book, talk frankly with the cat Vasily and see if there is anything else interesting in the hut on chicken legs. But at home, my Moskvich was waiting for me and the need to do both EU and MOT. It was still possible to reconcile with EU, this is just Daily Care, all sorts of shaking out rugs and washing the body with a jet of water under pressure, which washing, however, can be replaced if necessary by watering from a garden watering can or bucket. But here is THAT… On a hot day, a clean person is afraid to think about THAT. Because THAT is nothing but Maintenance, and maintenance consists in lying under a car with an oil syringe in my hands and gradually transferring the contents of the syringe both into cap oilers and onto my face. It is hot and stuffy under the car, and its bottom, covered with a thick layer of dried mud ... In short, I did not really want to go home.

Chapter Four

Who allowed himself this devilish joke? Grab him and tear off his mask so that we know who we should hang on the fortress wall in the morning!

E. A. Po

I bought the day before yesterday's Pravda, drank sparkling water and settled down on a bench in the garden, in the shade of the Hall of Fame. It was eleven o'clock. I carefully looked through the newspaper. It took seven minutes. Then I read an article about hydroponics, a feuilleton about thieves from Kansk, and a long letter from the workers of a chemical plant to the editor. It only took twenty-two minutes. Why not go to the movies, I thought. But I have already seen "Kozara" - once in the cinema and once on TV. Then I decided to have a drink of water, folded the newspaper and got up. Of all the old woman's copper in my pocket, I only had one nickel left. Drink up, I decided, drank water with syrup, got a penny of change and bought a box of matches in a nearby stall. There was absolutely nothing else for me to do in the city center. And I went where my eyes look - into a narrow street between store No. 2 and dining room No. 11.

There were almost no passers-by on the street. I was overtaken by a big dusty truck with a rattling trailer. The driver, poking his elbow and head out the window, looked wearily at the cobblestone pavement. The street, descending, turned sharply to the right, at the turn next to the pavement the barrel of an old cast-iron cannon stuck out of the ground, its muzzle was clogged with earth and cigarette butts. Soon the street ended with a cliff to the river. I sat on the edge of the cliff and admired the scenery, then crossed to the other side and wandered back.

I wonder where that truck went? I suddenly thought. There was no drop off. I began to look around, looking for a gate along the sides of the street, and then I discovered a small, but very strange house, squeezed between two gloomy brick storehouses. The windows of its lower floor were taken away with iron rods and half covered with chalk. There were no doors in the house at all. I noticed this right away because the sign, which is usually placed next to the gate or next to the entrance, hung here right between the two windows. The sign read: "AN USSR NIICHAVO". I moved to the middle of the street: yes, two floors with ten windows and not a single door. And on the right and left, close, storehouses. NICHAVO, I thought. Research Institute… FAQ? In the sense - what? Extremely Automated Armed Guards? Black Associations of Eastern Oceania? The hut on kurnogs, I thought, is a museum of this very NIICHAVO. My fellow travelers are probably from here too. And those in the tearoom, too... A flock of crows rose from the roof of the building and circled over the street with a croak. I turned and walked back to the square.

We are all naive materialists, I thought. And we are all rationalists. We want everything to be immediately explained rationalistically, that is, reduced to a handful of already known facts. And none of us has a penny of dialectics. It never occurs to anyone that between the known facts and some new phenomenon there may lie a sea of the unknown, and then we declare the new phenomenon to be supernatural and, therefore, impossible. For example, how would the master of Montesquieu receive a message about the resurrection of a dead man forty-five minutes after a registered cardiac arrest? I would probably take it with hostility. So to speak, in baguettes. I would declare it obscurantism and priesthood. If only he hadn't dismissed such a message at all. And if this happened before his eyes, he would be in an unusually difficult position. As I am now, only I'm more used to it. And he would either have to consider this resurrection a scam, or renounce his own sensations, or even renounce materialism. Most likely, he would consider the resurrection a scam. But until the end of his life, the memory of this clever trick would irritate his thought, like a speck in the eye ... But we are children of another age. We have seen everything: a live dog's head sewn to the back of another live dog; and an artificial kidney the size of a closet; and a dead iron hand controlled by living nerves; and people who can casually remark: “It was already after I died the first time…” Yes, in our time, Montesquieu would not have many chances to remain a materialist. And here we are, and nothing! True, sometimes it is difficult - when a random wind suddenly brings to us across the ocean of the unknown strange petals from the boundless continents of the unknown. And this happens especially often when you find something that you are not looking for. Soon amazing animals will appear in zoological museums, the first animals from Mars or Venus. Yes, of course, we will stare at them and slap our thighs, but we have been waiting for these animals for a long time, we are well prepared for their appearance. We would be much more amazed and disappointed if these animals did not appear or if they turned out to be similar to our cats and dogs. As a rule, the science in which we believe (and often blindly) prepares us in advance and for a long time for the coming miracles, and the psychological shock occurs in us only when we are faced with the unpredictable - some kind of hole in the fourth dimension, or biological radio communication, or a living planet... Or, say, a hut on chicken legs... But hook-nosed Roman was right: they have very, very, very interesting things here...

I went out into the square and stopped in front of a soda kiosk. I knew for sure that I didn’t have any change, and I knew that I would have to exchange paper, and I was already preparing an ingratiating smile, because soda sellers hate to change paper money, when I suddenly found a nickel in my jeans pocket. I was surprised and delighted, but overjoyed. I drank sparkling water with syrup, received a wet change and talked to the saleswoman about the weather. Then I resolutely headed home in order to quickly finish with EU and TO and engage in rational-dialectical explanations. I put the kopeck in my pocket and stopped, discovering that there was another nickel in the same pocket. I took it out and examined it. The nickel was slightly damp, it was written "5 kopecks 1961", and the number "6" was hushed up with a shallow chip. Maybe even then I would not have paid attention to this little incident, if it were not for that same instantaneous feeling that is already familiar to me - as if I were simultaneously standing on Prospekt Mira and sitting on the sofa, staring blankly at the coat rack. And just like before, when I shook my head, the feeling disappeared.

For some time I walked slowly, absently tossing and catching a nickel (it fell on my palm all the time “tails”), and tried to concentrate. Then I saw the grocery store where I had escaped from the boys in the morning, and I went in there. Holding a nickel with two fingers, I went straight to the counter where they sold juices and water, and without any pleasure drank a glass without syrup. Then, holding the change in my fist, I stepped aside and checked my pocket.

It was the very case when psychological shock does not occur. Rather, I would be surprised if there was no nickel in my pocket. But it was there, wet, 1961, with a chip on the number "6". I was pushed and asked if I was awake. Turns out I was standing in line at the checkout. I said I was awake and knocked out a check for three boxes of matches. Standing in line for matches, I found that the nickel was in my pocket. I was completely calm. After receiving three boxes, I left the store, returned to the square and began to experiment.

The experiment took me about an hour. During this hour I walked around the square ten times, swollen with water, matchboxes and newspapers, got acquainted with all the sellers and saleswomen and came to a number of interesting conclusions. The nickel comes back if they get paid. If you just throw it, drop it, lose it, it will remain where it fell. The nickel is returned to the pocket at the moment when the change passes from the hands of the seller to the hands of the buyer. If you keep your hand in one pocket, the nickel appears in the other. In a pocket fastened with a zipper, it never appears. If you keep your hands in both pockets and take change with your elbow, then a nickel can appear anywhere on the body (in my case, it was found in a boot). The disappearance of a nickel from a plate with copper on the counter cannot be noticed: among other copper, the nickel is immediately lost, and there is no movement in the plate at the moment the nickel goes into the pocket.

So, we were dealing with the so-called fiat penny in the process of its functioning. By itself, the fact of immutability did not interest me very much. My imagination was first of all shocked by the possibility of extra-spatial movement of a material body. It was quite clear to me that the mysterious transfer of a nickel from a seller to a buyer was nothing more than a special case of the notorious null transport, well known to science fiction fans also under pseudonyms: hypertransition, repatular jump, the Tarantoga phenomenon ... The opening prospects were dazzling.

I didn't have any appliances. An ordinary laboratory minimum thermometer could give a lot, but I didn’t even have one. I was forced to limit myself to purely visual subjective observations. I began my last circle around the square by setting myself the following task: “Putting a nickel next to a plate for change and, if possible, preventing the seller from mixing it with the rest of the money before handing over the change, visually trace the process of moving a nickel in space, at the same time trying to at least qualitatively determine change in air temperature near the proposed transition trajectory”. However, the experiment was interrupted at the very beginning.

When I approached the saleswoman Manya, the same young policeman with the rank of sergeant was already waiting for me.

I looked at him searchingly, foreboding something bad.

I'll ask for documents, citizen, - said the policeman, saluting and looking past me.

What's the matter? I asked, taking out my passport.

And I'll ask for a nickel, - said the policeman, accepting the passport.

I silently gave him a penny. Mania looked at me with angry eyes. The policeman looked at the nickel and, uttering with satisfaction: "Aha ...", opened the passport. He studied the passport as a bibliophile studies a rare incunabula. I patiently waited. The crowd slowly grew around. The crowd expressed different opinions about me.

We'll have to go through, - said the policeman at last.

We passed. While we were passing, several versions of my difficult biography were created in the crowd accompanying me and a number of reasons were formulated that caused the investigation to begin before everyone's eyes.

In the department, the sergeant handed over a nickel and a passport to the lieutenant on duty. He examined the penny and invited me to sit down. I sat down. The lieutenant casually said: “Hand over the change,” and also delved into the study of the passport. I took the coppers out of my pocket. “Recalculate, Kovalyov,” the lieutenant said and, putting down his passport, began to look into my eyes.

Did you buy a lot? - he asked.

A lot, I replied.

Hand over too, - said the lieutenant.

I laid out on the table in front of him four issues of the day before yesterday's Pravda, three issues of the local newspaper Rybak, two issues of the Literaturnaya Gazeta, eight boxes of matches, six pieces of Golden Key toffees, and a discounted brush for cleaning the stove.

I can’t hand over the water,” I said dryly. - Five glasses with syrup and four without syrup.

I began to understand what was the matter, and I was extremely embarrassed and dreary at the thought that I would have to justify myself.

Seventy-four kopecks, Comrade Lieutenant, - reported young Kovalev.

The lieutenant contemplated thoughtfully a pile of newspapers and matchboxes.

Have fun or what? he asked me.

Or what, I said grimly.

Careless, said the lieutenant. - Careless, citizen. Tell me.

I told. At the end of the story, I convincingly asked the lieutenant not to consider my actions as an attempt to save money for the Zaporozhets. My ears were on fire. The lieutenant chuckled.

And why not consider it? he inquired. - There were cases when they accumulated.

I shrugged.

I assure you, such a thought could not have crossed my mind... That is, what I am saying is that it could not, it really did not occur!..

The lieutenant was silent for a long time. Young Kovalev took my passport and began to examine it again.

It’s even somehow strange to assume ... - I said bewildered. - Completely crazy idea ... Save a penny ... - I shrugged again. - Then it’s better, as they say, to stand on the porch ...

We are fighting begging,” the lieutenant said significantly.

Well, right, well, naturally ... I just don’t understand what I have to do with it, and ... - I caught myself shrugging my shoulders a lot, and promised myself not to do this again.

The lieutenant was silent again for an exhaustingly long time, looking at the nickel.

We'll have to draw up a protocol, - he said at last.

I shrugged.

Please, of course… although… - I didn't know what, actually, "although".

For some time the lieutenant looked at me, waiting for the continuation. But I was just thinking about which article of the criminal code my actions fit under, and then he pulled a sheet of paper towards him and began to write.

Young Kovalev returned to his post. The lieutenant scratched his pen and often dipped it into the inkwell with a clatter. I sat, stupidly looking at the posters hung on the walls, and languidly thought that in my place Lomonosov, say, would have grabbed his passport and jumped out the window. What, in fact, is the point? I thought. The bottom line is that a person does not consider himself guilty. In this sense, I am not guilty. But guilt seems to be objective and subjective. And the fact remains: all this copper in the amount of seventy-four kopecks is legally the result of theft, carried out with the help of technical means, which is the fiat nickel ...

Read and sign, - said the lieutenant.

I've read. From the protocol it was clear that I, the undersigned Privalov A.I., in an unknown way came into possession of the current model of an unchangeable penny sample GOST 718-62 and abused it; that I, the undersigned A. I. Privalov, affirm that I carried out my actions for the purpose of a scientific experiment without any selfish intentions; that I am ready to compensate the losses caused to the state in the amount of one ruble fifty-five kopecks; that, finally, in accordance with the decision of the Solovetsky City Council of March 22, 1959, I handed over the indicated current model of the unchangeable nickel to the duty officer of the department, Lieutenant Sergienko U.U. I signed up.

The lieutenant checked my signature with the signature in the passport, once again carefully counted the coppers, called somewhere to clarify the cost of toffees and a primus brush, wrote out a receipt and gave it to me along with five kopecks in circulating coinage. Returning newspapers, matches, sweets and a brush, he said:

And you, by your own admission, drank the water. Total from you eighty-one kopecks.

With enormous relief, I paid. The lieutenant, after carefully scrolling through again, returned my passport to me.

You can go, citizen Privalov, - he said. - Continue to be more careful. Are you staying in Solovets for a long time?

I'm leaving tomorrow, I said.

See you tomorrow and be careful.

Oh, I'll try, - I said, hiding my passport. Then, obeying an impulse, he asked, lowering his voice: - Tell me, Comrade Lieutenant, is it not strange for you here in Solovets?

The lieutenant was already looking at some papers.

I've been here a long time," he said absently. - Used to.

Chapter Five

Do you yourself believe in ghosts? one of the listeners asked the lecturer.

Of course not, - the lecturer answered and slowly melted into the air.

True story

Until the evening I tried to be very careful. Right from the office, I went home to Lukomorye and there immediately crawled under the car. It was really hot. A menacing black cloud slowly crept in from the west. While I was lying under the car and dousing myself with oil, the old woman Naina Kievna, who suddenly became very affectionate and amiable, drove up to me twice so that I could take her to Lysaya Gora. “They say, father, it’s harmful for a car to stand,” she cooed creakingly, looking under the front bumper. They say it's good for her to ride. And I would have paid, do not hesitate ... ”I didn’t want to go to Bald Mountain. Firstly, the guys could arrive at any minute. Secondly, the old woman in her cooing modification was even more unpleasant to me than in her grumpy one. Further, as it turned out, it was ninety miles to Lysaya Gora in one direction, and when I asked my grandmother about the quality of the road, she happily announced that I should not worry - the road is smooth, and in which case she, the grandmother, will push the car herself. (“Don’t look, father, that I’m old, I’m still very strong.”) After the first unsuccessful attack, the old woman temporarily retreated and went into the hut. Then the cat Vasily came under my car. For a minute he carefully watched my hands, and then said in an undertone, but clearly: “I do not advise, citizen ... me-uh ... I do not advise. They’ll eat it,” after which he immediately left, shaking his tail. I wanted to be very careful, and therefore, when the grandmother went on the attack for the second time, I asked fifty rubles from her in order to put an end to everything at once. She immediately pulled away, looking at me with respect.

I did the EU and MOT, with the greatest care went to refuel at the gas station, dined in canteen number 11 and once again underwent a document check by the vigilant Kovalev. To clear my conscience, I asked him what the road was to Lysaya Gora. The young sergeant looked at me with great disbelief and said: “The road? What are you talking about, citizen? What is the road there? There is no road there." I returned home in the pouring rain.

The old woman left. Vasily the cat has disappeared. In the well, someone sang in two voices, and it was eerie and dreary. Soon the downpour was replaced by a dull fine rain. It became dark.

I climbed into my room and tried to experiment with a flip book. However, something stuck in her. Maybe I did something wrong or the weather influenced, but as it was, it remained F. F. Kuzmin's “Practical Exercises in Syntax and Punctuation”, no matter how much I contrived. It was absolutely impossible to read such a book, and I tried my luck with a mirror. But the mirror reflected anything, and was silent. Then I lay down on the sofa and began to lie down.

From boredom and the sound of rain, I was already starting to doze off when the phone suddenly rang. I went into the hallway and picked up the phone.

The tube was silent and crackling.

Hello, - I said and blew into the phone. - Press the button.

There was no answer.

Knock on the machine, I advised. The tube was silent. I blew again, pulled the cord and said: - Call back from another machine.

Then in the tube they rudely inquired:

Is this Alexander?

Yes. - I was surprised.

Why don't you answer?

I answer. Who is it?

It's Petrovsky that worries you. Go to the pickling shop and tell the foreman to give me a call.

Which master?

Well, who do you have today?

Don't know…

What do you mean I don't know? Is this Alexander?

Listen, citizen, I said. - What number are you calling?

Seventy-two… Is that seventy-two?

I did not know.

Apparently not, I said.

What do you say that you are Alexander?

I really am Alexander!

Ugh!.. Is this a plant?

No, I said. - This is museum.

Ah… Then I apologize. Masters, so you can not call ...

I hung up. For a while I stood looking around the hallway. There were five doors in the hallway: to my room, to the yard, to my grandmother's room, to the toilet, and another one, upholstered in iron, with a huge padlock. Boring, I thought. Alone. And the light bulb is dim, dusty... Dragging my feet, I returned to my room and stopped on the threshold.

There was no sofa.

Everything else was completely the same: the table, and the stove, and the mirror, and the hanger, and the stool. And the book lay on the windowsill exactly where I had left it. And on the floor, where there used to be a sofa, there was only a very dusty, littered rectangle. Then I saw the bed linen neatly folded under the hanger.

There was a sofa here just now,” I said aloud. - I lay on it.

Something has changed in the house. The room was filled with an indistinct noise. Someone was talking, music was heard, somewhere they were laughing, coughing, shuffling their feet. A vague shadow blocked the light of the bulb for a moment, and the floorboards creaked loudly. Then suddenly there was a smell of a pharmacy, and a cold smell hit my face. I backed off. And immediately someone knocked sharply and distinctly on the outer door. The noises subsided instantly. Looking back at the place where the sofa used to be, I went out into the hall again and opened the door.

In front of me in the fine rain stood a short, graceful man in a short, cream-coloured cloak of perfect cleanliness with the collar turned up. He took off his hat and said with dignity:

I beg your pardon, Alexander Ivanovich. Could you give me five minutes to talk?

Of course, I said confused. - Come in...

I saw this man for the first time in my life, and the thought flashed through my mind whether he was connected with the local police. The stranger stepped into the hallway and made a motion to go straight into my room. I got in his way. I don't know why I did it - probably because I didn't want to ask questions about the dust and debris on the floor.

Excuse me, - I murmured, - maybe here? .. Otherwise, I have a mess. And nowhere to sit...

The stranger shook his head sharply.

How - nowhere? he said softly. - And the sofa?

For a minute we silently looked into each other's eyes.

Mmmm ... What is a sofa? - I asked for some reason in a whisper.

The stranger lowered his eyelids.

Ah, how is it? he said slowly. - Understand. It's a pity. Well, sorry...

He nodded politely, put on his hat, and walked resolutely to the toilet door.

Where are you going? I shouted. - You're not there!

The stranger, without turning around, muttered: “Ah, it doesn’t matter,” and disappeared through the door. I automatically turned on the light for him, stood a little, listening, then tore open the door. There was no one in the toilet. I carefully pulled out a cigarette and lit it. Sofa, I thought. What's with the sofa? Never heard any tales about sofas. There was a flying carpet. There was a self-assembly tablecloth. There were: a hat of invisibility, walking boots, gusli-samogudy. There was a miracle mirror. And there was no miracle sofa. They sit or lie on sofas, a sofa is something durable, very ordinary ... Indeed, what fantasy could be inspired by a sofa? ..

When I returned to the room, I immediately saw the Little Man. He sat on the stove under the ceiling, crouched in a very uncomfortable position. He had a wrinkled, unshaven face and gray hairy ears.

Hello, I said wearily.

The Little Man twisted his long lips in pain.

Good evening, he said. - Excuse me, please, brought me here - I don’t understand how ... I’m talking about the sofa.

As for the sofa, you are late, - I said, sitting down at the table.

I see, - the Little Man said quietly and turned awkwardly. The lime fell.

I smoked, looking at him thoughtfully. The Little Man peered down uncertainly.

Can I help you? I asked, making a move.

No, thanks, - said the Little Man dejectedly. - I'm better on my own...

Dirty in chalk, he crept to the edge of the couch and, awkwardly pushing off, dived head first. I sank inside, but he hung in the air and began to slowly descend, convulsively spreading his arms and legs. It wasn't very aesthetic, but it was fun. Landing on all fours, he immediately stood up and wiped his wet face with his sleeve.

He’s become quite an old man,” he said hoarsely. - About a hundred years ago, or, say, under Gonzast, for such a descent they would have deprived me of my diploma, rest assured, Alexander Ivanovich.

What did you finish? I inquired, lighting a second cigarette.

He didn't listen to me. Sitting down on a stool opposite, he continued mournfully:

I used to levitate like Zex And now, excuse me, I can not remove the vegetation on my ears. It's so messy... But what if there's no talent? A huge number of temptations around, all kinds of degrees, titles, laureate awards, but there is no talent! Many of us grow old. This, of course, does not concern Coryphaeus. Gian Giacomo, Cristobal Junta, Giuseppe Balsamo, or, say, Comrade Fyodor Simeonovich Kivrin ... No traces of vegetation! He looked triumphantly at me. - No-one! Smooth skin, elegance, slimness…

Allow me, I said. - You said - Giuseppe Balsamo ... But this is the same as Count Cagliostro! And according to Tolstoy, the count was fat and very unpleasant in appearance ...

The Little Man looked at me with regret and smiled indulgently.

You are simply not up to date, Alexander Ivanovich, - he said. - Count Cagliostro is not at all the same as the great Balsamo. It's… how shall I put it… It's not a very successful copy of him. Balsamo in his youth matrixed himself. He was extraordinarily, extraordinarily talented, but you know how it is done in youth ... Faster, funnier - blunder, and so it will do ... Yes, sir ... Never say that Balsamo and Cagliostro are one and the same. It might get awkward.

I felt uncomfortable.

Yes, I said. - Of course, I'm not an expert. But ... Forgive me for the indiscreet question, but what does the sofa have to do with it? Who needed it?

The Little Man shuddered.

Unforgivable arrogance,” he said loudly and stood up. - I made a mistake and I am ready to confess with all determination. When such giants ... And then there are arrogant boys ... - He began to bow, pressing his pale paws to his heart. - I beg your pardon, Alexander Ivanovich, I disturbed you so much ... Once again I strongly apologize and leave you immediately. He approached the stove and looked up fearfully. “Old me, Alexander Ivanovich,” he said, sighing heavily. - Old...

Or maybe it would be more convenient for you ... through ... uh ... Then a comrade came in front of you, so he took advantage of it.

And, my friend, it was Cristobal Junta! What does he need to seep through the sewers for a dozen leagues ... - The Little Man waved his hand mournfully. - We are simpler ... Did he take the sofa with him or did he transgress?

I-I don't know, I said. - The thing is, he was late too.

The Little Man, dumbfounded, pinched the hair on his right ear.

Late? He? Incredible ... However, how can we judge this? Goodbye, Alexander Ivanovich, forgive me generously.

He pushed through the wall with visible effort and disappeared. I threw the cigarette butt into the trash on the floor. Hey sofa! This is not a talking cat. This is something more impressive - some kind of drama. Maybe even a drama of ideas. But, perhaps, more ... latecomers will come. Surely they will come. I looked at the trash. Where did I see a broom?

Broom stood next to the tub under the telephone. I began to sweep up dust and debris, and suddenly something caught on the broom heavily and rolled out into the middle of the room. I looked. It was a shiny oblong cylinder the size of an index finger. I touched it with a broom. The cylinder rocked, something crackled dryly, and the room smelled of ozone. I dropped the broom and raised the top hat. It was smooth, highly polished, and warm to the touch. I flicked my fingernail at it, and it crackled again. I turned it to inspect it from the end, and in the same second I felt that the floor was moving away from under my feet. Everything turned upside down before my eyes. I hit something painfully with my heels, then with my shoulder and top of my head, dropped my top hat and fell. I was pretty dumbfounded and did not immediately realize that I was lying in a narrow gap between the stove and the wall. The bulb above my head swayed, and looking up, I was amazed to see the ribbed marks of my boots on the ceiling. Grunting, I climbed out of the gap and examined the soles. There was chalk on the soles.

However, I thought out loud. - Do not seep into the sewer! ..

I looked around for the cylinder. He stood, touching the floor with the edge of the end, in a position that excludes any possibility of balance. I cautiously approached and knelt beside him. The cylinder crackled softly and swayed. I looked at him for a long time, stretching my neck, then blew on him. The cylinder swayed more strongly, leaned over, and then behind me there was a hoarse scream and the smell of wind. I looked around and sat down on the floor. On the stove, a gigantic vulture with a bare neck and a sinister curved beak neatly folded its wings.

Hello, I said. I was convinced that the vulture was talking.

The vulture, bowing his head, looked at me with one eye and immediately became like a chicken. I waved my hand in greeting. The vulture opened its beak, but did not speak. He raised his wing and began to search under his arm, clicking his beak. The cylinder wobbled and rattled. The vulture stopped looking, pulled his head into his shoulders and covered his eyes with a yellow film. Trying not to turn my back on him, I finished cleaning and threw the trash out into the rainy darkness outside the door. Then I returned to the room.

The vulture was asleep, it smelled of ozone. I looked at my watch: it was twenty past one. I stood a little over the cylinder, thinking about the law of conservation of energy, and at the same time of matter. It is unlikely that vultures condense out of nothing. If this vulture originated here, in Solovets, then some kind of vulture (not necessarily this one) disappeared in the Caucasus or where they are found there. I estimated the transference energy and cautiously looked at the cylinder. Better not touch it, I thought. It is better to cover it with something and let it stand. I brought a ladle from the hallway, carefully aimed and, without breathing, covered the cylinder with it. Then I sat down on a stool, lit a cigarette and waited for something else. The vulture snorted distinctly. In the light of the lamp, his feathers shone with copper, huge claws dug into the lime. The smell of rot slowly spread from him.

You shouldn't have done it, Alexander Ivanovich, - said a pleasant male voice.

What exactly? I asked, looking at the mirror.

I mean umklidet...

It wasn't the mirror that spoke. Someone else spoke.

I don't know what you're talking about, I said. There was no one in the room, and I felt annoyed.

That's why I covered it ... Yes, you come in, comrade, otherwise it's very uncomfortable to talk like that.

Right in front of me slowly condensed a pale, very correct person in a perfectly fitting gray suit. Tilting his head somewhat to one side, he inquired with the most refined courtesy:

I dare to hope that I have not troubled you too much?

Not at all, I said, getting up. - Please, sit down and make yourself at home. Would you like a seagull?

Thank you, - said the stranger and sat down opposite me, tucking up his trousers with a graceful gesture. - As for tea, I beg your pardon, Alexander Ivanovich, I just had supper.

For some time he looked into my eyes with a secular smile. I smiled too.

You're probably talking about the sofa? - I said. - Sofa, alas, no. I'm so sorry and I don't even know...

The stranger threw up his hands.

What nonsense! - he said. - How much noise because of some, excuse me, nonsense, in which no one really believes ... Judge for yourself, Alexander Ivanovich, arrange squabbles, ugly movie chases, disturb people because of the mythical - I'm not afraid of this words, - namely the mythical White Thesis ... Every sober-minded person considers the sofa as a universal translator, somewhat cumbersome, but very solid and stable in work. And all the more ridiculous are the old ignoramuses talking about the White Thesis... No, I don't even want to talk about this couch.

As you please,” I said, concentrating all my worldliness in this phrase. - Let's talk about something else.

Superstitions… Prejudices…” the stranger said absently. - Sloth of the mind and envy, envy, envy overgrown with hair ... - He interrupted himself. - Excuse me, Alexander Ivanovich, but I would still dare to ask your permission to remove this ladle. Unfortunately, iron is practically opaque for a hyperfield, and an increase in the strength of a hyperfield in a small volume...

I raised my hands.

For God's sake, whatever you want! Take away the ladle... Take away even this very... mind... mind... this magic wand... - Here I stopped, surprised to find that the ladle was no more. The cylinder stood in a pool of liquid that looked like colored mercury. The liquid quickly evaporated.

It will be better that way, I assure you,” said the stranger. - As for your generous offer to remove the umklidet, I, unfortunately, cannot use it. This is already a matter of morality and ethics, a matter of honor, if you like... Conventions are so strong! I take the liberty of advising you not to touch the umklidet again. I see you hurt yourself, and this eagle... I think you feel... uh... some amber...

Yes, I said with feeling. - It stinks bad. Like in a monkey house.

We looked at the eagle. The vulture, fluffed up, dozed off.

The art of controlling the umklidet, said the stranger, is a complex and subtle art. In no case should you be upset or reproach yourself. The umklidet management course takes eight semesters and requires a thorough knowledge of quantum alchemy. As a programmer, you probably would have mastered the electronic level umklidet, the so-called UEU-17, without much difficulty ... But the quantum umklidet ... hyperfields ... transgressive incarnations ... the generalized Lomonosov-Lavoisier law ... - He shrugged guiltily.

What are you talking about! I said hastily. - I'm not pretending... Of course, I'm absolutely unprepared.

Then I caught myself and offered him a cigarette.

Thank you, said the stranger. - I do not use, to my great regret.

Then, wiggling my fingers out of courtesy, I inquired—I didn’t ask, I just inquired:

May I not be allowed to know to what I owe the pleasantness of our meeting?

The stranger lowered his eyes.

I'm afraid to sound indiscreet," he said, "but, alas, I must confess that I've been here for quite some time now. I would not like to name names, but I think even you, no matter how far you are from all this, Alexander Ivanovich, it is clear that some unhealthy fuss has arisen around the sofa, a scandal is brewing, the atmosphere is heating up, tension is growing. In such an environment, mistakes are inevitable, extremely undesirable accidents ... We will not go far for examples. Someone - I repeat, I would not like to name names, especially since this is an employee worthy of all respect, and speaking of respect, I mean, if not manners, then great talent and dedication - and so, someone, hurrying and nervous, umklidet loses here, and umklidet becomes the center of the sphere of events in which a person is involved, who is completely uninvolved in them ... - He bowed in my direction. - And in such cases, it is absolutely necessary to influence somehow neutralizing harmful influences ... - He looked significantly at the prints of boots on the ceiling. Then he smiled at me. - But I would not like to seem like an abstract altruist. Of course, all these events are of great interest to me as a specialist and as an administrator ... However, I do not intend to interfere with you any longer, and since you have told me that you will no longer experiment with umklidet, I will ask your permission to bow out.

He got up.

What are you! I cried. - Do not leave! I am so pleased to talk with you, I have a thousand questions for you! ..

I greatly appreciate your delicacy, Alexander Ivanovich, but you are tired, you need to rest ...

Not at all! I retorted hotly. - Vice versa!

Alexander Ivanovich, - said the stranger, smiling affectionately and looking intently into my eyes. But you are really tired. And you really want to relax.

And then I felt like I was really falling asleep. My eyes drooped. I didn't want to talk anymore. I didn't want anything more. I was terribly sleepy.

It was exceptionally nice to meet you,” said the stranger in a low voice.

I saw how he began to turn pale, turn pale and slowly disappeared into the air, leaving behind a slight smell of expensive cologne. I somehow spread the mattress on the floor, poked my face into the pillow and instantly fell asleep.

I was awakened by the flapping of wings and an unpleasant scream. There was a strange bluish twilight in the room. The eagle on the stove rustled, yelled vilely and beat its wings on the ceiling. I sat down and looked around. In the middle of the room floated a hefty fellow in sweatpants and a loose striped Hawaiian shirt. He hovered over the cylinder and, without touching it, smoothly waved his huge bony paws.

What's the matter? I asked.

The kid glanced at me from under his shoulder and turned away.

I don’t hear an answer, I said angrily. I still really wanted to sleep.

Quiet, you mortal, - the kid said hoarsely. He stopped his passes and picked up the cylinder from the floor. His voice sounded familiar to me.

Hey buddy! I said threateningly. - Put this thing back and clear the room.

The kid was looking at me, jutting out his jaw. I pushed back the sheet and stood up.

Well, put the umklidet down! I said out loud.

The kid sank to the floor and, firmly resting his feet, took a stance. The room became much brighter, although the bulb was not on.

Baby, - said the kid, - you need to sleep at night. Better lie down.

The guy was clearly not a fool to fight. However, I do too.

Can we go outside? - I suggested businesslike, pulling up my shorts.

Someone suddenly said with an expression:

- “Having directed your thoughts to the Higher Self, free from lust and selfishness, healed from spiritual fever, fight, Arjuna!”

I started. The guy winced too.

It's a mirror, I said mechanically.

I know it myself,” the kid grumbled.

Put down the umklidet, I demanded.

Why are you yelling like a sick elephant? - said the guy. - Is he yours?

Or maybe yours?

Here it dawned on me.

So you dragged the sofa too?

Don't mind your own business," he advised.

Give me the sofa, I said. - He has a receipt.

Go to hell! - said the kid, looking around.

And then two more appeared in the room: a thin one and a fat one, both in striped pajamas, similar to the prisoners of Sing Sing.

Korneev! yelled the fat one. - So you're stealing the sofa?! What a disgrace!

Go, all of you ... - said the kid.

You are a brute! shouted the fat one. - You must be chased! I'll file a report on you!

Well, serve it, - said Korneev gloomily. - Do what you love.

Don't you dare talk to me like that! You are a boy! You are cheeky! You forgot umklidet here! The young man could have been hurt!

I've already been hurt," I intervened. - There is no sofa, I sleep like a dog, every night I talk ... This stinky eagle ...

The fat man immediately turned to me.

An unheard-of violation of discipline, he said. - You should complain... And you should be ashamed! He turned back to Korneev.

Korneev sullenly stuffed the umklidet into his cheek. The skinny man suddenly asked quietly and menacingly:

Have you filmed Thesis, Korneev?

The kid smiled grimly.

Yes, there is no Thesis there, - he said. - What are you all up to? If you don't want us to steal a sofa - give us another translator ...

Have you read the order not to withdraw items from the store? - menacingly inquired skinny.

Korneev put his hands in his pockets and stared up at the ceiling.

Do you know the decision of the Academic Council? - inquired skinny.

I, comrade Demin, know that Monday begins on Saturday, - said Korneev sullenly.

Don't spread demagogy, - said the skinny one. - Immediately return the sofa and do not dare to come back here again.

I will not return the sofa, - said Korneev. - We'll finish the experiment - we'll return it.

Tolstoy made an ugly scene. “Arbitrariness! .. - he squealed. - Hooliganism! .. ”Grif yelled excitedly again. Korneev, without taking his hands out of his pockets, turned his back and stepped through the wall. The fat man rushed after him, shouting: “No, you will return the sofa!” Skinny told me:

This is a misunderstanding. We will take steps to ensure it doesn't happen again.

He nodded and also moved towards the wall.

Wait! I cried. - Eagle! Take the eagle! Along with the scent!

Skinny, already halfway into the wall, turned around and beckoned the eagle with his finger. The vulture noisily fell off the stove and was pulled under his nail. Skinny disappeared. The blue light slowly faded into darkness, and the rain drummed against the window again. I turned on the light and looked around the room. Everything in the room was as before, only deep scratches from the claws of a vulture gaped on the stove, and on the ceiling the ribbed marks of my boots were wildly and absurdly dark.

The clear oil in a cow, - the mirror said with idiotic profundity, - does not contribute to its nutrition, but it provides the best nutrition when processed in the proper way.

I turned off the light and lay down. The floor was hard and cold. I will have tomorrow from the old woman, I thought.

Chapter Six

No, - he said in response to the insistent question of my eyes, - I am not a member of the club, I am a ghost.

Okay, but that doesn't give you the right to walk around the club.

H. G. Wells

In the morning it turned out that the sofa was in place. I wasn't surprised. I just thought that somehow the old woman got her way: the sofa is in one corner, and I am lying in the other. As I made my bed and did my exercises, I thought that there was probably some limit to the capacity for surprise. Apparently, I have stepped far beyond this limit. I even experienced some fatigue. I tried to imagine something that might strike me now, but my imagination was lacking. I really didn't like that, because I can't stand people who can't be surprised. True, I was far from the psychology of "think of it," rather, my state resembled the state of Alice in Wonderland: I was like in a dream and accepted and was ready to take any miracle for granted, requiring a more detailed reaction than simple gaping of the mouth and clapping eyes.

I was still exercising when a door slammed in the hallway, heels shuffled and clattered, someone coughed, something rattled and fell, and an authoritative voice called: “Comrade Gorynych!” The old woman did not answer, and in the hallway they began to talk: “What is this door? .. Ah, I understand. And this? “This is the entrance to the museum.” - “And here? .. What is it - everything is locked, locks ...” - “A very economic woman, Janus Poluektovich. And this is a phone." - “Where is the famous sofa? In the museum?" - "Not. There should be a reserve here."

The door of my room flung open, and on the threshold appeared a tall, thin old man with magnificent snow-white gray hair, black-browed and black mustache, with deep black eyes. Seeing me (I was standing in my shorts, arms to the sides, feet shoulder-width apart), he paused and said in a sonorous voice:

To the right and left of him other faces peered into the room. I said, "I'm sorry," and ran to my jeans. However, they paid no attention to me. Four people entered the room and crowded around the sofa. I knew two: the gloomy Korneev, unshaven, with red eyes, still in the same frivolous Hawaiian, and swarthy, hook-nosed Roman, who winked at me, made an incomprehensible sign with his hand and immediately turned away. I did not know the gray-haired one. Nor did I know a stout, tall man in a black suit, shining from the back, and with broad masterly movements.

Is this sofa? asked the shiny man.

This is not a sofa, - said Korneev sullenly. - It's a translator.

For me, this is a sofa, - said the shiny one, looking into the notebook. - The sofa is soft, one and a half, inventory number eleven twenty-three. He leaned over and touched. - Here you have it wet, Korneev, dragged in the rain. Now consider: the springs are rusted, the skin is rotten.

The value of this item, - as it seemed to me, the hawk-nosed Roman mockingly said, - lies not in the sheathing and not even in the springs, which are not there.

You stop this, Roman Petrovich, - offered the shiny one with dignity. - You don't defend your Korneev to me. The sofa passes through my museum and should be there ...

This is a device, - said Korneev hopelessly. - Working with him...

I don't know that," said the shiny one. - I don't know what kind of work with a sofa is. I also have a sofa at home, and I know how people work on it.

We know that too,” Roman said softly.

You will stop this, - said the shiny one, turning to him. - You are not here in a pub, you are here in an institution. What do you actually mean?

I mean it's not a sofa, Roman said. - Or, in a form accessible to you, this is not quite a sofa. This is a device that has the appearance of a sofa.

I would ask you to stop these hints, - the shiny one said resolutely. - About the accessible form and all that. Let's each do our part. My job is to stop squandering, and I'm stopping it.

Yes, the grey-haired man said loudly. It immediately became quiet. - I talked with Cristobal Hozevich and Fedor Simeonovich. They believe that this sofa-translator is only a museum value. At one time it belonged to King Rudolf II, so its historical value is undeniable. In addition, two years ago, if my memory serves me right, we already ordered a serial translator ... Who ordered it, do you remember, Modest Matveyevich?

Just a minute, - said the shiny Modest Matveyevich and began quickly leafing through the notebook. - Just a minute... The two-way translator TDH-80E of the Kitezhgrad plant... At the request of Comrade Balsamo.

Balsamo works on it around the clock, - Roman said.

Yes, yes, - said the gray-haired. - I remember. There was a report on the TDH study. Indeed, the selectivity curve is not smooth ... Yes. And this… er… sofa?

Manual labor, Roman said quickly. - Reliable. Designs by Leo Ben Bezalel. Ben Bezalel has been collecting and debugging it for three hundred years ...

Here! - said the shiny Modest Matveyevich. - That's how it should work! The old man did everything himself.

The mirror suddenly coughed and said:

All of them rejuvenated after spending an hour in the water, and came out of it as beautiful, pink, young and healthy, strong and cheerful as they were at twenty.

Exactly, - said Modest Matveyevich. The mirror spoke in the voice of a gray-haired man.

The gray-haired man grimaced in annoyance.

Let's not decide this issue now, - he said.

And when? asked the rude Korneev.

Friday at the Academic Council.

We cannot squander relics, - put in Modest Matveyevich.

And what are we going to do? asked the rude Korneev.

The mirror murmured in a menacing sepulchral voice:

I myself saw how, having picked up black dresses,
Canidia walked barefoot, bare-haired, howling,
With her and Sagan, older in years, and both pale.
They looked terrible. Here they began the earth with their nails
Both dig and tear the black with the teeth of a lamb ...

The gray-haired man, wrinkled all over, went up to the mirror, put his hand into it up to his shoulder and clicked something. The mirror was silent.

Yes, the grey-haired man said. - We will also decide on the issue of your group at the council. And you ... - It was evident from his face that he forgot the name and patronymic of Korneev, - for the time being, you refrain ... er ... from visiting the museum.

With these words, he left the room. Through the door

We achieved our goal, - said Korneev through his teeth, looking at Modest Matveyevich.

I won't let you squander it, - he answered shortly, thrusting a notebook into his inner pocket.

Squander! Korneev said. - You don't care about any of this. You are worried about reporting. It is reluctant to enter an extra column.

You will stop this, - said the adamant Modest Matveyevich. “We will still appoint a commission and see if the relic is damaged…”

Inventory number eleven twenty-three, - Roman added in an undertone.

In such an acceptance, - Modest Matveyevich said majestically, turned and saw me. - What are you doing here? he inquired. - Why are you sleeping here?

I…” I began.

You slept on the couch, - Modest announced in an icy tone, piercing me with the eyes of a counterintelligence officer. - Do you know what this device is?

No, I said. - That is now known, of course.

Modest Matveevich! exclaimed the hook-nosed Roman. - This is our new programmer, Sasha Privalov!

Why is he sleeping here? Why not in a hostel?

He's not enlisted yet," Roman said, hugging my waist.

Especially!

So, let him sleep outside? Korneev asked angrily.

You stop it, - said Modest. - There is a hostel, there is a hotel, and here is a museum, a state institution. If everyone sleeps in museums… Where are you from?

From Leningrad, - I said gloomily.

What if I come to Leningrad and go to sleep in the Hermitage?

Please,” I said with a shrug.

Roman kept holding me by the waist.

Modest Matveyevich, you are absolutely right, it is a mess, but today he will spend the night with me.

This is another matter. This please, - magnanimously allowed Modest. He looked around the room with a masterly look, saw prints on the ceiling and immediately looked at my feet. Luckily I was barefoot. - In such an acceptance, - he said, straightened the junk on the hanger and went out.

D-club, - squeezed out Korneev. - Stump. He sat down on the sofa and shook his head. - Well, to hell with them all. Tonight, I'll take it down again.

Take it easy, Roman said softly. - It's OK. We're just a little unlucky. Have you noticed what kind of Janus it is?

Well? - said Korneev hopelessly.

This is A-Janus.

Korneev raised his head.

And what's the difference?

Huge, - said Roman and winked. - Because U-Janus flew to Moscow. And in particular - about this sofa. Understood, plunderer of museum valuables?

Listen, you save me, - said Korneev, and for the first time I saw him smile.

The thing is, Sasha, - said Roman, turning to me, - that we have an ideal director. He is one in two. There is A-Janus Poluektovich and U-Janus Poluektovich. U-Janus is a prominent scientist of international class. As for A-Janus, he is a rather ordinary administrator.

Twins? I asked carefully.

No, it's the same person. Only he is one in two faces.

Clearly, - I said and began to put on my shoes.

It's okay, Sasha, you'll find out everything soon, - said Roman encouragingly.

I raised my head.

I.e?

We need a programmer, - Roman said heartily.

I really need a programmer, - said Korneev, brightening up.

Everyone needs a programmer,” I said, returning to my boots. - And I ask without hypnosis and all sorts of enchanted places.

He already guesses, - said Roman.

Korneev wanted to say something, but shouts broke out outside the window.

This is not our penny! shouted Modest.

And whose penny is this?

I don't know whose penny it is! This is none of my business! It's your job to catch counterfeiters, comrade sergeant!..

Pyatak was confiscated from a certain Privalov, who lives here with you, in Iznakurnozh! ..

Oh, at Privalov's? I immediately thought he was a thief!

Well, well, Modest Matveyevich! ..

No, sorry, Janus Poluektovich! You can't leave it like this! Comrade sergeant, let's go!.. He's in the house... Janus Poluektovich, stand by the window so he doesn't jump out! I'll prove! I will not allow to cast a shadow on Comrade Gorynych! ..

I feel bad inside. But Roman had already assessed the situation. He grabbed a greasy cap from the hanger and pulled it over my ears.

It was a very strange feeling. Everything remained in place, everything except me. But Roman did not let me get enough of new experiences.

It's an invisibility cap," he hissed. - Step aside and shut up.

I tiptoed back to the corner and sat under the mirror. At the same moment, an excited Modest burst into the room, dragging the young sergeant Kovalev by the sleeve.

Where is he? yelled Modest, looking around.

Here, - said Roman, pointing to the sofa.

I ask, where is this your ... programmer?

What programmer? Roman was surprised.

You stop it, - said Modest. - There was a programmer here. He was wearing trousers and no shoes.

Ah, that's what you mean, - said Roman. - But we were joking, Modest Matveyevich. There was no programmer here. It was just ... - He made some movement with his hands, and a man in a T-shirt and jeans appeared in the middle of the room. I saw him from the back and I can’t say anything about him, but young Kovalev shook his head and said:

No, it is not him.

Modest circled the ghost, muttering:

T-shirt... pants... no shoes... He! It is he.

The ghost is gone.

No, it's not the same, - said Sergeant Kovalev. - He was young, without a beard ...

Without a beard? - repeated Modest. He was very embarrassed.

Without a beard, - confirmed Kovalev.

M-yes ... - said Modest. I think he had a beard...

So I am handing you a summons, - said young Kovalev and handed Modest a piece of government-issued paper. - And you yourself deal with your Privalov and your Gorynych ...

And I tell you that this is not our penny! shouted Modest. - I don’t say anything about Privalov, maybe there is no Privalov at all as such ... But Comrade Gorynych is our employee! ..

Young Kovalev, pressing his hands to his chest, tried to say something.

I want it sorted out immediately! yelled Modest. - Stop it for me, comrade militia! This agenda casts a shadow on the entire team! I demand that you make sure!

I have an order ... - Kovalev began, but Modest shouted: “You will stop this! I insist!" - rushed at him and dragged him out of the room.

I took him to the museum,” said Roman. - Sasha, where are you? Take off your cap, let's go see...

Maybe it's better not to shoot? - I said.

Shoot, shoot, - said Roman. You are now a phantom. Now no one believes in you - neither the administration, nor the police ...

Korneev said:

Well, I went to bed. Sasha, you come after dinner. Take a look at our fleet of cars and in general ...

I took off my cap.

Stop it, I said. - I'm on vacation.

Let's go, let's go, - said Roman.

In the hallway, Modest, clutching the sergeant with one hand, was unlocking a powerful padlock with the other. “Now I’ll show you our penny! he shouted. - Everything is credited ... Everything is in place. - “Yes, I don’t say anything,” Kovalev weakly defended himself. “I'm only saying that there may be more than one nickel…” Modest opened the door, and we all entered a vast room.

It was quite a decent museum - with stands, diagrams, showcases, mock-ups and dummies. The general view most of all resembled a museum of criminology: a lot of photographs and unappetizing exhibits. Modest immediately dragged the sergeant somewhere behind the stands, and there they both hummed like a barrel: “Here is our penny ...” - “But I don’t say anything ...” - “Comrade Gorynych ...” - “And I have an order !. . "-" You stop this for me! .. "

Curiosity, curiosity, Sasha, - said Roman, made a grand gesture and sat down in an armchair at the entrance.

I went along the wall. I wasn't surprised at anything. I was just very interested. “Water is alive. Efficiency 52%. Permissible sediment 0.3 "(an old rectangular bottle of water, the cork is filled with colored wax). "Scheme of industrial extraction of living water". "Layout of a live-water distillation cube". "Veshkovsky-Traubenbach's love potion" (pharmaceutical jar with poisonous yellow ointment). “Ordinary corrupted blood” (sealed ampoule with a black liquid) ... A sign hung over this entire stand: “Active chemical agents. XII - XVIII centuries. There were many more bottles, jars, retorts, ampoules, test tubes, working and non-working models of sublimation, distillation and thickening plants, but I went further.

“Treasure sword” (a very rusty two-handed sword with a wavy blade, chained to an iron rack, the display case is carefully sealed). “The right eye (working) tooth of Count Dracula of the Transdanubian” (I am not Cuvier, but, judging by this tooth, Count Dracula of the Transdanubian was a very strange and unpleasant person). “The trace is ordinary and the trace is taken out. Gypsum castings” (traces, in my opinion, did not differ from each other, but one casting had a crack). “Stupa on the launch pad. IX century” (powerful structure made of gray porous cast iron)… “Serpent Gorynych, skeleton, 1/25 nat. led." (similar to the skeleton of a diplodocus with three necks)… “Scheme of operation of the fire-breathing gland of the middle head”… “Gravigen walking boots, working model” (very large rubber boots)… “Gravity-protective flying carpet. The current model ”(carpet about one and a half by one and a half with a Circassian hugging a young Circassian woman against the backdrop of tribal mountains) ...

I reached the stand "Development of the Philosopher's Stone Idea" when Sergeant Kovalev and Modest Matveyevich reappeared in the hall. Apparently, they never managed to get off the ground. "You will stop this," Modest said languidly. “I have an order,” Kovalev answered just as languidly. “Our nickel is in place ...” - “Let the old woman come and testify ...” - “What do you think we are, counterfeiters? ..” - “But I didn’t say that ...” - “Shadow on the whole team ... - “Let's figure it out ...” Kovalev didn’t notice me, but Modest stopped, looked dully from head to toe, and then looked up, languidly read aloud: “Go-munku-lus laboratory, general view,” and went on.

I followed him, feeling bad. Roman was waiting for us at the door.

Well, how? - he asked.

Disgrace, - languidly said Modest. - Bureaucrats.

I have an order, - Sergeant Kovalev stubbornly repeated already from the hallway.

Well, come out, Roman Petrovich, come out, - said Modest, jingling his keys.

The novel is out. I tried to follow him, but Modest stopped me.

I'm sorry, he said. - Where are you?

Go to the place, go to the place.

To what place?

Well, where are you standing? Excuse me, are you ... ham-munculs? So stay where you are...

Portal for the student. Self-training

History first. The fuss around the sofa

The second story. Vanity

History the third. Every fuss

NIICHAVO

hut on chicken legs

monument of Solovetsky antiquity

CAT DOES NOT WORK

Administration

The fuss around the sofa (first story)

The story of the unchangeable penny

Lost sofa

Vanity of Vanities (second story)

Model of an unsatisfied gastrointestinal person

Field test decision

Testing the Ideal Human Model

All the fuss (third story)

Privalov goes to the future

Who is Janus Poluektovich really?

Two incarnations of Janus Poluektovich

Meeting with U-Janus

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