Zoshchenko: An incident. Review of M. Zoshchenko’s story “A Mysterious Incident”
Current page: 1 (book has 3 pages in total)
Sevastyanov Anatoly Alexandrovich
Forest Incidents (Stories)
Anatoly Alexandrovich Sevastyanov
Forest incidents
Stories
The heroes of this book live in the forestry, and the life of animals and birds passes before them, they watch the animals and help them in difficult times.
Boar and briefcase
White raft
Don't break the chain
Who punished whom?
Alien hut
Nettle Lowland
Unusual poacher
Dwarven path
Evidence on the face
Light green thickets
Forest performance
Resourceful grouse
"Empty" forest
Black frost
Unexpected difficulties
Stubborn Hawk
Forest Teremok
New site
Red torches
Small, white
Thanks to the fox
Little discoveries
Longsnout
Inventor
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BOAR AND BRIEFCASE
To get to school, Sashka had to walk more than a kilometer along a forest road, and then take a bus. But to find yourself in the forest, you only had to open the door of the house.
Their small house stood in the forest because their father worked as a ranger in the reserve: he protected animals and birds, set up feeding stations for them, and did everything to keep them out of trouble.
Sashka helped his father and spent all his free time in the forest. His mother called him: “Sashka is a forest man.”
He would not exchange life in a forest house for any other, although sometimes all sorts of troubles happened.
The road along which he walked to school had been recently built and was yellow with fresh sand through the forest. Sashka always looked at new marks on it. Here are deep, forked ruts left in the wet sand by hooves. Sashka imagined how a huge hump-nosed elk stepped out onto the road with long strides, stopped in the middle of it, looked one way and the other, shook himself off and again walked through the spring water. It's not deep for his long legs.
And here are the narrow, sharp tracks of the hare's front paws and the wide, splayed tracks of his hind paws. Narrow and wide footprints gathered in a pile - here the hare was sitting. Sashka imagined how the hare listens, moves his ears, stands up in a column, and looks around.
Sashka also looked around. In the distance, a boar climbed out of a ditch onto the road and walked towards him. There was nowhere to hide - the forest on either side was flooded with spring water.
The boar walked along the road like an owner. The fur is disheveled, the ears stick out, scary and dirty.
Sashka turned and hurried away from him, looking for where he could get to some tree. He was afraid to run: suddenly the boar would rush to catch up, like a cat chasing a mouse.
The beast did not lag behind and, it seemed, was even getting closer.
Sashka left his briefcase on the road: maybe the boar will get scared of the human smell and turn back.
The boar actually slowed down, and Sashka walked away. The water ran out and he ran off the road to the tree.
The boar stood by the briefcase and moved its nose, as if it was sniffing the air.
“Sandwiches!” Sashka remembered. “There are sandwiches for breakfast in the briefcase.”
The boar smelled them, knocked down the briefcase and began to drag it along the sand, giving in with its nose.
- Hey! What are you doing? - Sashka shouted.
The boar was not afraid. It was, of course, one of those that he and his father fed in the winter at the feeding area that was built for them. He crushed the briefcase with his hoof and began to fumble with his snout, trying to get to the sandwiches. Failed. I tried it with my teeth - the briefcase hung on my fang. The boar didn't like this. He shook his head and the briefcase, spinning like a propeller, flew in an arc and splashed into the water.
The boar did not follow him and walked away along the road.
In the evening, Sashka reluctantly copied the exercises into new notebooks and dried the textbooks on the stove.
But at school he happily showed the boys the fang marks on his briefcase.
WHITE RAFT
Father opened the window and woke up Sashka so that he could listen to the hubbub of flying flocks of birds. From the darkness of the spring night came the quacking, whistling, dry chattering of teal, familiar and unfamiliar spring voices and sounds.
Warm weather suddenly arrived and opened the way for the birds to nest.
My father had everything ready for their arrival. It’s not only for starlings that you can make houses in advance. My father also built artificial nesting boxes for wild ducks, so that more of them would remain in the reserve. For goldeneye ducks, I also hung nest boxes in the snow that looked like huge birdhouses. He made small huts for the mallards, in which the birds could hide their nests from prying eyes.
The ducks preferred huts not on the ground, but on small wooden rafts. My father took these floating dwellings by boat away from the shore and tied them to stakes driven into the bottom. There the ducks were not disturbed by either foxes or cows grazing near the water, which could accidentally step on the nest.
One day my father came across a large piece of foam plastic. There is no need to knock together anything - a ready-made raft. The only bad thing is that it is very noticeable, white as snow.
"Won't the ducks be scared?" - thought the father, but still made a strong, low hut on it from branches and dry hay. Reeds laid on top hung over the entrance. It was possible to get into the hut only from the water. If a crow - the most terrible enemy of duck nests - notices where the duck has flown out from, it will not be able to climb into the nest itself. The crow should not sit on the water.
The father towed the white raft behind a small island.
Time has passed. Father and Sashka got into the boat and set sail to see whether the ducks occupied the houses built for them or not.
It was quiet and windless. The sun was shining softly. Young greenery blossomed along the banks. White seagulls flew over the blue water. Near last year's reed thickets a heron stood on one leg.
On the roof of the first goldeneye nest a starling was singing. With a song he announced to everyone that this home belongs only to him.
The hut, built on a hummock surrounded by water, was occupied by a muskrat.
But here and there, ducks also settled in artificial nests. Through binoculars, the father saw a duck in a hut on a white raft. She pressed her head and neck to the hay when she heard rustling on the island.
Hidden. The duck calmed down and straightened the straw in the wall of the nest with its beak. She pulled out dry leaves from the roof of the hut and carefully placed them to the side of herself - camouflaging the nest. She caught flies with her beak when they flew up, and pecked at bugs that crawled along dry twigs. She was busy, not just sitting in the nest.
It was as if a dry tree had split overhead - green lightning ripped through the cloud with a crack. The first thunderstorm of this spring struck. The tops of the trees on the shore swayed from side to side, and lashes of rain swept across the water.
Father and Sashka returned home wet to the skin.
Then it turned out that a thunderstorm broke the rope and the wind took the white raft somewhere.
Only two weeks later, his father accidentally saw him at the end of a long stretch. There were always waves there, and a light foam raft bounced on them like a float.
The father had no doubt - the duck could not stand such shaking. But it turned out that she was sitting in the nest and, together with the raft, was jumping on the waves as if the nest was on the saddle of a galloping horse. Mallard didn't want to leave him.
“With such chatter, all the eggs in the nest will become chatterers,” thought the father. But you can’t move the raft to another place: the duck would immediately fly away and then not find the nest.
In a strong wind, the waves almost overturned the nest and raft. It's amazing how the eggs didn't pop out from under the mallard. Will she endure this violent shaking?
When ducklings began to appear in other nests, father and Sashka swam to the white raft to see how things were going there.
There were shells in the hut - the ducklings had hatched! And nearby the mud was streaked with thin dark stripes - just recently a brood was swimming.
“For so many days and nights it tossed and shook on the waves, but the duck did not leave the house,” the father was surprised. - This is mother! Well done, "rider"! I rode on the waves for almost a month and hatched ducklings.
DON'T BREAK THE CHAIN
The soft greenery of recently blossoming leaves was illuminated by the cool sun. This is not the first day that the cuckoo has been calling. Only in the middle of the day did the bird songs in the forest fade a little, so that they could burst out louder at dawn. The forest is never more joyful and louder than in this spring.
Sashka tried not to make noise with the branches, not to crack the branches. An incomprehensible sound was heard ahead, as if a cart wheel was creaking or an unfamiliar bird was screaming abruptly.
A moose passed through a gap in the trees. She stood next to the elk calf. It was he, dissatisfied with something, shouting in a voice similar to the squeak of a wheel, capricious like a small child.
Sashka carefully moved closer and saw: in the sparse forest grass, with its back to him, was a second elk calf. Looks like he's sleeping.
The moose smelled Sashka and ran away from him. The elk calf stopped screaming and followed her. And the second one moved his ears like a big one. The left ear was directed forward, the right ear backward. He stood on his long stilt legs and saw Sashka. He tilted away from him. It seemed that it was impossible to stand like that, with such an inclination: you would fall. But the elk calf did not fall, because on the other side he supported himself with one leg.
Sashka looked at the elk calf, and he looked at him closely. He moved his seemingly unruly legs and, instead of running away, stepped towards Sashka. He backed away. “Suddenly the moose will return. We must leave.”
The moose calf followed him. Sashka ran. The elk calf did not lag behind, and it was clear that he ran better, even though he was small. I had to shout at him, even take a swing at him. But he did not understand anything and was not afraid.
The father saw a red big-eared elk calf and Sasha near the garden. Hastily put down buckets of water and went to Sashka.
- Where did you get it?
Sashka told.
- Come back quickly! Is it possible to! - And he ran into the forest ahead of Sashka and the elk calf, asking as he went where exactly Sashka found him.
You can’t run through the forest for a long time - you’re tired. Let's walk quickly.
“Let’s keep it for ourselves,” Sashka timidly suggested. - Let him live.
- How can we feed him without milk? What have you done? If he doesn’t meet a moose cow, he will die. You need to be careful in the forest. How many times have I told you!
Sashka remembered these conversations. I remembered how I once found a duck's nest. He parted the grass to get a better look. A crow found a nest in this crumpled grass and destroyed it.
Another time I picked up a chick on the ground. I thought I fell out of the nest. And this was a fledgling whose time had already come to leave the nest. Birds would feed him in the grass. And he died in the house the very next day. Father said then: “Their life is like a chain, one link after another. Then he should sit quietly in the nest, but when he grows up, he should hide in the grass or bushes. You took him from the grass and broke the chain.”
“It wouldn’t work out the same way with a moose calf,” Sashka was afraid.
“You can’t understand elk either,” said the father. – Either they rush to protect the moose calves, or they run away silently. It happens and they don’t come back. These are young ones, probably having their first moose calves.
Finally they came to where Sashka found the elk calf. We agreed to run away as a team in different directions. While the elk calf is trying to figure out who to run after, they will disappear from sight.
And so they did. But when the father went out to the road where they agreed to meet, he saw Sashka again with the elk calf - he was unable to escape.
They took him to his place again. The elk calf stayed closer to Sashka all the time. The father told Sashka to climb onto the tree, and in order to distract the elk calf, he began to run after him. Sashka hid high in the branches, and the calf had to follow his father.
Father did not return home soon. He also had to climb a tree. When the calf was left alone, he immediately went to bed. The father waited for a long time to see if the moose would come. Then, very slowly, so as not to rustle any branches, he descended to the ground and quietly left.
In the evening, they sat with Sashka on the porch of their forest house and talked only about the elk calf.
- Why did he follow me? – asked Sashka.
- Still completely stupid. I overslept my mother. And here you are. So I followed you. At that age, he wouldn’t have to follow anyone, just to keep up.
- Won’t he go looking for a moose out of hunger? He will go somewhere and get lost.
- Who knows? And you can't look. If you go there, you will scare the moose cow or the calf will become attached again...
Two days later, on a forest road, the father found fresh tracks of a moose cow with two elk calves. Whether it was the same elk passing by or another, they never knew. The elk calf was also not there.
WHO PUNISHED WHOM?
On a stick over his shoulder, Sashka carried garlands of red tin cans. He collected them near the river, where tourists stood in the summer.
In a forest clearing, my father had already strung a wire around the plowed ground. Just yesterday they planted potatoes here to dig them up in the fall, put them in the forest cellar, and feed the wild boars in the winter.
But the wild boars did not want to wait so long - at night they walked along the furrows, dug up and ate seed potatoes in many places.
Sashka and his father had to no longer ride the horse, but manually lift it up. And so that the wild boars wouldn’t plow their snouts into the place again, they covered the forest garden with wire and the two of them began hanging cans from it. They put a pebble in each. As soon as you touched the wire, the nearby cans began to rattle. This should scare away the wild boars. But to be sure, the father also wanted to scare them with shots from a gun, to punish them for their nighttime prank.
In the evening we hid in an island of small fir trees. There the broken top, like a bench with legs, rested on its branches. It was comfortable to sit on.
The earth and trees had long been green, and a woodcock flew over the forest as if in early spring. Grunting like a little boar, he flashed over the peaks and disappeared from sight, because the foliage was already thick everywhere.
The hare leisurely jumped along the edge of the clearing, not suspecting that people were looking at him.
At the top of the tree, a tiny bird unfamiliar to Sashka whistled melodiously. Somewhere far beyond the forest, a tractor rumbled barely audibly.
Everything around became darker and quieter. Sashka, craning his neck, peered into the darkness: he wanted to be the first to see the wild boars.
“If they’ve tried potatoes,” the father assured, “they’ll definitely come again.”
The darkness of the night made the forest around the clearing look like a dark blue battlement.
Two black spots appeared, noticeable only because they were moving. Behind them are more spots, smaller ones. Sashka touched his father's hand.
Before reaching the arable land, the animals stopped, sniffled, and snorted. A smaller spot moved forward - a young boar ran towards the potatoes. I touched the wire and the cans rattled. The father immediately raised his gun, and two deafening shots rang out in the silence of the forest. A crash echoed through the thickets.
“They punished me well,” said the father. - Everything is as it should be: cans rattled and then shots were fired. Now, if they decide to approach, the banks will thunder and rush off like a whirlwind.
“They punished me well,” Sashka agreed. - Otherwise, plant potatoes twice. They do it for them, stupid people. Now there is so much food, you can live on grass alone. And in winter there will be nothing to eat,” he reasoned as they walked to the motorcycle.
The headlight illuminated the corridor of the forest road. Sashka looked from behind his father to see if a hare or some other animal would fall into this light.
Ahead there was a wide but shallow puddle. They always passed it without delay - only the water hissed under the wheels. And then suddenly the motorcycle jumped up and bumped into some kind of hole. His father wanted to hold him, but his leg also fell into the hole. All of them - the motorcycle, Sashka, the father - fell into a puddle, so much so that they even tasted the water.
– Where did this get you? – the mother clasped her hands when we arrived home. – Even their hats are covered in mud.
“The boars were punished,” the father laughed. – True, another question: who punished whom better? Some wild boar dug a bath for himself in a puddle in the middle of the road. We also shopped there.
ALIEN HUT
Sashka chose a new area of the forest for himself and went there, as he himself said, on a journey. He was drawn to unfamiliar places. It seemed that there were unafraid animals and birds everywhere, which you could watch continuously all day long.
He crossed the swamp and found himself in a completely unfamiliar forest. Twigs crunched underfoot, and Sashka thought: “Animals throughout the forest have their own alarms. A twig crunched - and everyone who heard it knew that someone was coming. And animals have good hearing.”
Everything around was wild and alien. In your forest, sometimes a familiar stump, sometimes a tree, but here everything is new. Even the trees here were not like that, but mossy, with beards on the branches and black at every step, with splayed roots.
“This is the place! People probably haven’t even been here,” Sashka thought with joy and hidden fear. “I was the first to come here...”
And suddenly all the mystery of the thicket collapsed: Sashka saw a hut. It was poorly made. Big but low. Sashka did not immediately see where the entrance was. Then he found it, parted the branches and froze in surprise: in the hut, on a grass bed, lay little piglets. There were many of them and they seemed dead. Sashka reached out his hand and touched the last piglet. As soon as the fingers touched the striped back, the piglet jumped up and squealed shrilly.
A crash was heard in the thicket... Sashka pulled aside. A disheveled bulk was rushing towards the hut. Without remembering how, Sashka climbed onto the tree. Below, a skinny boar was rushing about, snorting angrily. She looked into her hut-like nest and, catching the smell of a person there, turned sharply, angrily shooting around with her small eyes.
But there was no one nearby...
The boar calmed down, stuck her muzzle into the hut and grunted quietly. Piglets poured out of the hut. The boar walked into a thick, dark green spruce forest. The piglets lined up in single file and followed their mother. Each one copied her movements exactly. The boar stopped - everyone stopped. She turned her head - everyone turned, raised it up, sniffed the air - everyone raised their faces and sniffed too...
After standing, the boar moved on. Sashka’s heart was relieved. He moved for the first time and accidentally touched a branch. The boar stopped abruptly. The boars immediately disappeared. Sashka froze. There was silence all around again... The boar listened for a long time, then grunted barely audibly. The grass around came to life - the wild boars rose up. The mother took them to the spruce forest.
Sashka sat on the tree for a long time. But sometimes you have to get down. He carefully descended to the ground, jumped over the swamp in one breath and ran home.
NETTLE BOTTOM
There was a low spot in the forest where Sashka did not like to go. Cold, gloomy, with thickets of nettles.
As soon as the nettles rose to their full height, the father took the scythe and, until the leaves became coarse, went to mow them. He mowed, and Sashka knitted nettle brooms. The nettle burned my hands even through my mittens. What can you do, you had to prepare these brooms. In winter, wild boars and roe deer ate them well, gray partridges and even black grouse pecked them.
One day, father went home early to check if the wild boars were going to the potatoes, and Sashka stayed behind to finish tying the brooms.
Some animal flashed on the aspen. Hid in a hollow.
"Probably a flying squirrel!" – Sashka was delighted and hid near the aspen tree. I began to wait for this secretive animal, which can fly from tree to tree, to appear from the hollow. Sashka had never seen him do this. I sat under an aspen tree and imagined: “The sun will go down, and a gray muzzle with big eyes will stick out of the hollow. It will listen. Everything is quiet. The flying squirrel will climb to the very top, straighten the flight membrane between its front and hind legs, push off and glide towards the distant aspen.”
The sun hid behind the trees. Dusk crept from the bushes and thick nettles. The flying squirrel is a nocturnal animal, and Sashka expected it to emerge from the hollow along with the twilight.
But now the nettles merged with the bushes in the darkness. Sashka’s neck hurt because his head was tilted up all the time. And the hollow kept turning black, and no one would move in it.
Then the hollow was no longer noticeable. In such darkness you will not see a flying squirrel. What to do? It's scary in the forest at night. Walking home along it is even scarier. The path is not visible. You will get lost and drown in a swamp.
So I looked at the flying squirrel.
Sashka, like a little bunny, curled up into a ball near the aspen tree. He listens to rustling sounds. The night grew thicker, and he huddled closer and closer to the aspen tree...
Suddenly he perked up and craned his neck. They seemed to be shouting... Then closer: “Sa-shaa!” And a light flashed behind the trees.
- I'm here! I'm here! – Sashka shouted to his father and ran into the light of the lantern. I couldn’t even feel if the nettle stung...
They didn’t scold him at home: he himself wouldn’t want to stay overnight in the forest anymore.
But it was such an unlucky place - and during the day, in a nettle lowland, trouble befell Sashka.
This time they came to the lowland to place already dried brooms under the canopy. The work was coming to an end when the alarming screeching of a large bird was heard from the side.
- I’ll go and see who was talking there. - And Sashka ran towards the scream.
The bird squealed in a ditch overgrown with small alder. As soon as the goshawk took a step there, it flew out. He flew over the clearing and landed on a pine tree nearby.
“Why were you yelling there?” – thought Sashka and climbed further to see what he was doing in the thicket.
The same squealing sound was heard underfoot. It turned out that it was not a hawk that was screaming, but a large, already flying buzzard chick. He lay on the ground, his wings and paws spread out among the alder shoots. In such a thicket, the hawk could neither fly with him nor pull him to a clear place. The feathers on the buzzard's back were wrinkled.
Sashka took him by the ends of his wings and lifted him up. The buzzard clung to branches and collected bunches of leaves in its claws.
In the clearing, Sashka examined the bird. There were red scratches on his chest. He wanted to get a better look at them, so he brought the buzzard closer, and he grabbed his lips with his paw and “sewed up” his mouth with his claws!
Mooing in pain, Sashka stretched out his arms and moved the buzzard away so as not to grab it with his other paw. The buzzard did not let go of his lips.
With a wild moo, Sashka ran to his father. He saw him with a bird raised in his hands and shouted in joy and surprise:
- Look, I caught it! How did you get it?
- Mmm-mum! – Sashka mumbled loudly.
Then the father realized who caught whom. He swung through the fence that surrounded the shed, caught his foot on the top pole and fell to the ground. The frightened buzzard unclenched his paw from the roar. Sashka abandoned him. The buzzard flapped its wings, hanging in the air in one place, then, falling on its wing, it flew.
The father shook off the garbage and dirt from his knees and said:
- Interest is interesting, but it would be nice without any troubles... Let's go home and fill the holes with iodine.
UNUSUAL POACHER
From time to time, other people's guns appeared in my father's room, which he took from poachers. There were all sorts of guns: rusty, like scrap iron, and well-maintained, expensive, even with hunting pictures carved directly on the metal.
No matter how many times Sashka asked his father to catch poachers, all he heard was: “You’re too young for this.”
In the summer, Sashka liked to sleep in the barn, on the hay, right under the roof. Below there was a barrel of lightly salted cucumbers. Sashka was lying on the hay and crunching on a cucumber. Suddenly the father came in and suggested:
- Get ready. Can you help catch a poacher?
Sashka quickly pulled on small rubber boots and put on a khaki jacket to make it easier to disguise himself. I didn’t ask where they would go or who they would catch. I thought: “I’ll find out later.”
We walked to familiar places. They stopped and listened. Sashka wanted to be the first to hear some distant poacher's shot. True, at this time there were almost no shots. Even the most notorious poachers did not take up their guns when animals and birds had just had cubs or chicks.
Sashka brought the binoculars to his eyes and looked around the river valley to see if poachers were catching fish with a net somewhere.
Once they were on guard, he wanted to do something special. For example, saving defenseless moose calves from poachers. Or meet one on one with a poacher and without a weapon, by cunning, take his gun away. “If only my father would be surprised,” Sashka dreamed. The only bad thing is that no suitable trick has yet been invented.
– And when we see a poacher, what should I do? – asked Sashka.
- Catch. He will let you in faster than an adult.
Sashka didn’t understand whether his father was joking or not.
“There he is, my dear,” the father perked up. - Do you hear the dog chasing the hare?
Now Sashka also heard the booming bark of a hound dog.
We quickly walked towards the barking.
– Or maybe there are also poachers there along with the dog’s owner? – suggested Sashka.
- There are no people there. The poacher today is the dog himself. What a voice! No wonder they call him Thunder. Yesterday his owner came to see me. He says: “Thunder has escaped again. Help me catch him.”
Sashka looked at his father offendedly:
- You took the poacher to detain, and now catch the dog?
- Yes, he is a real poacher, even a malicious one. At forbidden times, in forbidden places, he chases hares... And the dog is famous. Won first prize at regional competitions. I can't cope with him without you. If he doesn’t come near me, he knows I’ll put him on a chain. And you know how to get along with dogs. Figure out how to catch him.
Sashka thought about it.
The father said that the owner was exhausted with this Thunder. He barely notices - he is already in the forest. And not just anywhere, but in the reserve. Knows where there are more hares. Nothing holds him. First, the dog took off his collar. Then we bought one that you can’t take off. So he tore off the chain and ran away with it. Almost died in the forest: the chain got caught in a root. Well, the shepherd accidentally saw it and unhooked it. After that, they put him in an enclosure made of strong mesh. On the very first night he set up a tunnel. They caught him in the forest again. The floor in the enclosure was made of boards to prevent it from being dug up. So yesterday, like a cat, he climbed up the net and climbed over the top. Now the owner is making the ceiling out of mesh.
A racing hare ran along the edge of the clearing. Sashka quickly stood in that place and listened as the dog barked closer. As soon as Grom jumped out into the clearing, Sashka himself ran in the same direction as the hare.
- Come on, Thunder! Let's! Take him! - he shouted, as if he was at the same time with him and also wanted to catch the hare.
Grom was surprised by such an assistant, barked less often and slowed down, especially since he had been running after this hare for more than an hour.
Sashka stopped and called him. Thunder stopped barking and also stood up. Sashka pulled out the sugar. The dog wagged its tail trustingly...
And in the evening the “poacher”, like an animal in a cage, lay in the enclosure. And even there, for safety, he was tied to a chain.
But Grom looked pleased: he had restored order to the hares in the reserve.
Sashka also did not regret that he had to catch such an unusual poacher.
THE PATH OF THE GNOMES
Sashka stopped in thought. A well-trodden forest path wound at my feet. But it was only as wide as a matchbox. It's like a path of forest gnomes. She walked around trees and bushes. Even the roots on it were scrubbed, like on human paths.
But it was not the gnomes who actually trampled it.
Sashka quietly walked away, climbed onto the tree and began to wait to see if anyone would pass. Everything is clearly visible from above, and mosquitoes do not attack the tree as much.
As soon as I got comfortable, it turned out that an ant “highway” runs along the trunk. Some run up, others down, dragging the prey. Sasha was immediately discovered. They run around the branch, fussing. A whole dozen gathered around the hand. One grabbed his finger and bent his abdomen to his head to inject acid into the wound.
Sashka moved away from the trunk, and they climbed the branches.
I wanted to move to another tree, but I saw someone coming, flashing through the gaps behind the fir trees. It's not clear who. The beast is not a beast, the bird is not a bird, almost white in color. Sashka couldn’t remember who has light fur in the summer. And it doesn't look like a bird. The capercaillie is completely dark. It wasn't a magpie that galloped. It’s small, but there’s someone who’s gone through a lot more. And not the only one, it seems.
It is not clear who was there. And the path is unknown. I even became scared, I wanted to go home. How will you leave? I would like to know who walks such paths.
A pine tree nearby creaks, as if a cow was quietly mooing and calling her calf. The branch on it trembled - the squirrel jumped onto the tree. Red and without ear tufts. She ran up the trunk with a screw to the top branches. The cones there are green, but already large. Scales fell.
"He's nibbling on the green ones!" – Sashka was surprised.
Below, with his red hat pulled back, an aspen boletus stretched out of the grass. As if he also wanted to see who would follow the path.
Sashka began to sweep away the ants with a branch. I've probably been fighting with them for an hour now.
The Christmas trees started flashing again. Now someone was not leaving, but approaching...
And everything became clear: who had passed behind the Christmas trees an hour ago, and who was walking along this path. In broad daylight, four badgers walked along it. In front and behind are large ones, and between them, one after another, are two small ones, half the size of adults. Sashka thought they only wander in the forest at night, but these fat men sometimes walk during the day.
Where he stood by the path, the badgers became wary and turned their heads. Their necks are thick, clumsy in appearance, and curved like snakes.
The little badger was happy to stop, hung on the badger's neck, flirting like a puppy with a dog.
But the adults had no time for games. They sensed a strange smell and ran, taking the badgers away.
From the tree one could see how, one after another, the animals disappeared into a hole, which turned out to be very close. This badger path led to her.
Sashka got down from the tree, hastily took off his shirt and began shaking out the ants. Wherever they went.
But he was pleased - he himself solved the forest riddle.
EVIDENCE ON THE FACE
On the hill the resin on the trees was golden, and in the lowland, behind the blueberry trees, the forest cool still lingered and the grass left wet traces of dew on the boots.
In the baskets of father and Sashka, the caps of boletuses were turning red, chanterelles were turning yellow, and white caps were blushing like the crusts of buns. Sashka collected almost all the mushrooms. I put the fresh ones in a basket, and hung the old ones on tree branches: they would dry out and maybe be useful to the squirrels in the winter. When there was room in the basket, I even took the caps of very old mushrooms. Near the house, I laid out these caps under the trees so that myceliums would form there and new mushrooms would begin to grow, which could be seen right from the window.
But this time there was no place in the basket for old hats.
-Have you ever climbed a tower? – the father suddenly asked. - The castle is not visible there - it doesn’t shine.
Between the trees, a hut rose on four pillars. The steps of a staircase with a railing made of two poles rose steeply to it. The tower stood on the edge of the clearing where in winter my father fed the wild boars.
Since spring, no one had been on the tower: there was no one to count or observe; the wild boars, as soon as the snow melted, foraged for food themselves.
There was no lock on the door.
– Last week there was a castle hanging. “Father put down the basket and went up the steps.
There are no traces inside the tower: no cigarette butts or other debris, and the bench from the window to the wall has been moved away, just as it was left in the spring.
- How did they open the lock? – asked Sashka.
- What a castle this is. Only from the wind. You can open it with any nail. Why lock it up here?.. Were the kids playing around?
Sashka noticed something dark in the grass next to the stairs. At first I didn’t pay attention: “There’s a lot of garbage, some kind of bark.” And he looked more closely: “Cap!”
“No, these are not boys,” said the father, turning the find in his hands. - You see what size it is. And almost new, it doesn’t look like it was abandoned.
My father also noticed that the post at the bottom of the railing was broken.
“You have to have strength to break something like that,” he said. – What happened here? - And suddenly even his face changed.
Sashka also looked into the bush where his father was looking. The butt of a gun lay yellow among the branches and grass.
Having parted the branches, the father took out a single-barrel gun and opened it. There is a brand new red cartridge in the barrel, loaded with buckshot.
It became clear that there was a poacher. But why did he throw the gun, and even a loaded one?
- Maybe the cleaver wounded him? – suggested Sashka. “I went to finish him off, and he rushed at him.” He threw the gun and ran... And lost his cap.
Precedes the cycle “The World of Noon”.
Plot
What would happen if a way out was not found? Should the crew sacrifice themselves and not bring the infection to Earth? For the authors, the answers seem to be clear, but they still leave these questions for the reader.
Publications
The Lomonosov crater mentioned in the story exists on Mars, and was soon discovered on the far side of the Moon and in 1961, that is, a year after the publication of the story, was named in honor of M.V. Lomonosov.
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This is an international collection, with two books from China, one from India, two from Europe, and two from Japan. The books also span over 2,000 years of history. Some of these books are focused on war and military science (Art of War, Book of Five Rings, Hagakure), others are more self-reflective and develop an ethical philosophy (Analects, Meditations), and others still are focused more on politics and ruling (Arthashastra, The Prince). Each of these works provides a unique and historical perspective regarding these topics, and they complement each other in tracing deep insight into the nature of leadership, war, and politics. Affordable PricingClassics Press is committed to making classic works more accessible, and that includes reasonable pricing. Individual works are priced at $2.99 USD for ebooks and $7.99 USD for print books (which includes the same work as a free Kindle ebook). The entire collection Seven Classics on War and Politics is priced at $9.99 USD for the ebook and $24.99 USD for the paperback book (which includes a free kindle ebook). The price is inclusive of VAT. Of course, what can we talk about - we desperately need children. The state cannot exist so smoothly without them. They are our replacement. We rely on them and base our calculations on them. Moreover, adults cannot give up their bourgeois habits so easily. And the kids, maybe, will grow up and definitely even out our lack of culture. So in this regard, we must carry children directly in our arms and blow off the dust from them and blow their noses. Regardless of whether it is our child or a stranger’s child and a stranger to us. But this is just not enough observed in our lives. We remember one rather original event that unfolded before our eyes on the train, before reaching Novorossiysk. Almost all of those who were in this carriage were going to Novorossiysk. And, by the way, in this carriage, among others, there is such a butterfly. Such a young woman with a child. She has a child in her arms. So she goes with him. She goes with him to Novorossiysk. Her husband, perhaps, works there at the factory. So she goes to him. And so she goes to her husband. Everything is as it should be: she has a baby in her arms, a bundle and a basket on the bench. And so she goes in this form to Novorossiysk. She is going to her husband in Novorossiysk. And the little one in her arms is very loud. And he screams and shouts like a catechumen. He seems to be ill. As it turned out, a stomach illness overtook him on the way. Either he ate raw food or drank something, but he got sick on the way. So he yells. In a word - baby. He doesn’t understand what’s what and why his stomach is suffering. How old is he? He is maybe three years old or two years old. Without observing children in private, it is difficult to determine how old this item is. Only he, apparently, is a pioneer. He has this red bib tied around him. And now this little one is traveling with her mother to Novorossiysk. They are going, of course, to Novorossiysk, and, as luck would have it, he gets sick on the way. And due to his illness, he blathers every minute, gets sick and demands attention. And, of course, he doesn’t give his mother any rest or time. She doesn't listen to him for two days. And he can't sleep. And he can’t drink tea. And then, in front of the Lichny station, she, of course, addresses the passengers: “I’m very sorry,” he said, “look after my little one.” I’ll run to the Lichny station, at least eat some soup. My tongue, he says, sticks to my throat. I, he says, well, I just don’t foresee the end. I, he says, am going to Novorossiysk before my husband. Passengers, of course, try not to look where it’s coming from, they turn away, they say, something else: he’s yelling and blathering, and then messing with him! They also think he’ll throw it in. It depends on what kind of mother she is. Another mother will decide on this very easily. And that means they won’t take it. And, by the way, there is only one such citizen riding in the carriage. He is apparently a city dweller. In a cap and in such an international rubberized mackintosh. And, of course, in sandals. He addresses the audience like this: “That is, he says, I’m sick of looking at you.” That is, he says what kind of people you are - I’m just amazed! It is impossible, he says, citizens, to have such an overly indifferent approach. Maybe before our eyes the mother finds it difficult to eat, her little one is too constrained, but here everyone turns his face away from these social affairs. This, well, directly leads to the rejection of socialism! Others say: - Look after the baby! What a tramp he was - delivering advanced speeches in a sleeping car! He says: “And although I am a single person and I want to sleep, and in general it’s not my business, at least, to take on this very thing, I don’t have such insensitivity in the matter of children.” And he takes the little one in his arms, rocks him and amuses him with his finger. Of course, the young woman thanks him very warmly and goes to the Lichny station. She goes to this station to the buffet and doesn’t show up for a long time. The train stops for ten minutes. These ten minutes pass, and the signal is already given. And the duty officer waves his red cap. And she’s not there... And the train is already jerking, and the train is running along the rails, but the young mother is not there. Then various scenes take place in the carriage. Those who openly laugh, who grab the brakes and want to stop the train. And he, who is wearing sandals, sits pale, like a son of a bitch, and doesn’t want to sleep anymore. He holds the baby on his lap and listens to various advice. Well, one, of course, advises giving a telegram for your money, others, on the contrary, say: “Take it to Novorossiysk and hand it over to the GPU. And if they don’t accept the baby there, then adopt as a last resort.” And the little one, meanwhile, blathers, gets sick and doesn’t get away with anything. And then a desperate two hours pass, and the train, of course, stops at a large station. Who in sandals takes his little one and wants to go to the platform in the GPU. Only suddenly a young mother rolls into the carriage. - He says, I’m sorry! As soon as I ate some hot soup, I immediately felt tired, so I went into the next carriage and fell asleep a little. “I haven’t slept for two days,” he says. And she takes her baby and nurses him again. The one in sandals says: - It’s quite sloppy to do this, citizen! But since you slept, then I am in your position. The children are our shift, I don’t mind looking after them. There's a lot of laughter going on in the carriage. And everything ends for the general well-being. A man was walking through the desert. He felt neither hunger nor thirst. He didn't feel any emotion. A dry hot wind picked up sand right from under his feet, throwing handfuls into the traveler's face. Sometimes tumbleweed thorns rushed past, but the man did not notice anything around him. He thought. The wanderer asked himself the same question: “Why is this so? Why did this happen? In the evening, tired, he sat down on a hot stone. And he sat for a long time with his head down. He recalled... A rich house rises in a sunny clearing. Children play next to him. The parents had a fabulous picnic. Everything was there. And sweets, delicious pies, drinks, as well as young lamb meat that needs to be fried over a fire. The fire was lit. We drank juices. A couple of candy wrappers were already lying on the still lush and green grass. Empty bottles appeared near them. The meat is ready, but the fire is still burning for fun. The smoke from it curls so interestingly, as if dancing. Children's games and adult entertainment ended late in the evening. No one remembered the fire. And the barely smoldering flame disappeared only in the morning. Two months later, the friendly family gathered for breakfast at the round table. The TV was turned on. The news surprised, but did not frighten them: “Due to the complete disappearance of earthworms, scientists expect a meager harvest.” Two more months passed. People, meeting on the street, said: “Have you heard the news? In our district, livestock began to die en masse. They say they don't have enough vitamins." Then something unimaginable began. All the trees dried up, hot winds blew... And just six months later, their once thriving town turned into a gloomy gray desert. People scattered in all directions, continuing to litter the area. No one understood that lard was the cause of this disaster. And soon not a single living corner of the Earth remained in the entire area. The traveler woke up from his thoughts. The last thing he heard: “….only a third of the population remained alive. People huddle on a small island off Antarctica. Nobody understands what's happening." The man slowly stood up from the stone and, raising his head, suddenly let out a wild, piercing scream. He shuddered and opened his eyes. I listened. A familiar room, a home, the rustle of trees in the garden. The voices of children could be heard from afar. The sun shone brightly… It's good that it was just a dream. But one vague feeling did not leave the man. He got up and ran. “It’s not too late to fix everything” All the trash was piled up and the fire was extinguished. And the thought flashed through my head: “Everything can end badly if you don’t think about your actions in time.” | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||