“White steamer” Aitmatov in brief
The boy and his grandfather lived on a forest cordon. There were three women on the cordon: grandmother, aunt Bekey – the grandfather’s daughter and the wife of the chief person in the cordon, the policeman Orozkul, and also the wife of the ancillary worker Seydakhmat. Aunt Bekey is the most unhappy woman in the world, because she has no children, and Orozkul is drunk for it. Grandfather Momun was nicknamed the quick Momun. He earned this nickname unchanged with his friendliness, a willingness to always serve. He knew how to work. And his son-in-law, Orozkul, although he was listed as chief, for the most part traveled around the guests. For livestock Momun went, kept the apiary. All my life from morning till night in work, and I did not learn to make me respect myself.
The boy did not remember either his father or his mother. I have never seen them. But I knew that his father was a sailor in Issyk-Kul, and after divorcing his mother left for a distant city.
The
In the evenings, my grandfather told a granddaughter a fairy tale. “… It happened a long time ago, there lived a Kyrgyz tribe on the banks of the Enesay River, the enemy was attacked and killed, only the boy and the girl were left, but then the children fell into the hands of the enemies.” Khan gave them to the Foul Lame Old Woman and ordered the Kyrgyz to finish. But when the Madame Lame the Old Woman had already led them to the bank of Enesai, the maral mother came out of the forest and begged to give her children.
The children grew up and got married. The birth of a woman began, she was tormented. The man was frightened, began to call his mother a deer. And then I heard a loud sound from afar. The horned mother-deer brought on its horns a baby cradle – beshik. And on the bow of the beshik, the silver bell rang. And immediately a woman was born. The firstborn was named after the mother-deer-Bugubai. The Bugu family came from it.
Then one rich man died, and his children decided to install a maral horn on the tomb. Since then there have been no marals in the Issyk-Kul forests. And there were no marals. Mountains have deserted. And when the Horned mother-deer left, she said that she would never return. “
It was autumn again in the mountains. Together with the summer for Orozkul departed the time of visits to shepherds and herdsmen – it was time to pay for the offerings. Together with Momun they dragged two pine logs along the mountains, and that’s why Orozkul was angry with the whole world. He would be able to settle down in the city, they know how to respect a person. Cultural people… And for the fact that he received the gift, then he does not have to carry logs. But in fact the state farm is visited by the police, the inspection – well, they ask how the forest and where. With this thought in Orozkul, anger was boiling over everything and everyone. I wanted to beat my wife, but the house was far away. Then this grandfather saw the marals and almost came to tears, as if he met his brothers.
And when it was very close to the cordon, they finally quarreled with the old man: he all asked for his grandson, the walk of it, to take him out of school. Before it came to that he threw the stuck logs in the river and rode off behind the boy. It did not help even that Orozkul went to his head a couple of times – broke away, spat blood and left.
When the grandfather and the boy returned, they learned that Orozkul had beaten his wife and drove him out of the house, and his grandfather had said he was firing from his job. Bekey howled, cursed her father, and the grandmother itched that she should submit to Orozkul, ask for his forgiveness, or where else would she go in old age? Grandpa is in his hands…
The boy wanted to tell his grandfather that he saw marals in the forest – they returned after all! – Yes, my grandfather was not up to it. And then the boy again went into his imaginary world and begged the mother-deer to bring Orozkul and Bekej a cradle on the horns.
On the cordon, meanwhile, people came for the forest. And while they were pulling out the log and doing other things, Grandfather Momun seeded behind Orozkul, like a faithful dog. Visitors also saw marals – apparently, the animals were not scared, from the reserve.
In the evening the boy saw in the courtyard the cauldron boiling on the fire, from which the meat spirit was emanating. My grandfather stood by the fire and was drunk – the boy had never seen him like this. Drunk Orozkul and one of the visitors, squatting by the shed, shared a huge pile of fresh meat. And under the wall of the shed the boy saw a horned head of a maral. He wanted to run, but his feet did not obey – he stood and looked at the disfigured head of the one that was still yesterday the Horned deer mother.
Soon everyone was seated at the table. The boy was always troubled. He heard the drunken people chomping, gnawing, snoring, devouring the meat of the mother-deer. And then Saidahmat told how he made his grandfather shoot a deer: he intimidated that otherwise Orozkul would expel him.
And the boy decided that he would become a fish and never return to the mountains. He went down to the river. And he stepped right into the water…
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