TANYA GROTTER AND THE MAGICAL DOUBLE BASS
by Dimitriy Yemets
Eksmo, 2002
This unauthorized translation is by Maureen O'Brien.
Chapter 3: The Mysterious Double Bass and Lispy the Rabbit
"Finish the noodle soup from the day before yesterday. It sticks
together a bit, but you can warm it up. Just don't get any ideas
about setting the apartment on fire while you do it," said Aunt Ninel
gloomily.
"Thanks a lot!" blurted Tanya sarcastically. "And why, I'm
interested to know, doesn't Pipa eat it? Or would it sneak out her
ears? With her hairstyle, that'd be pretty cute."
"Be quiet! Or you'll have no breakfast!" roared Aunt Ninel.
Thinking that even the day before yesterday's soup was better than
nothing, Tanya grabbed her fork.
After that drama in the museum there'd been three half-days of
school. The first day was mostly a nightmare, because when Tanya got
back home, they already knew about it all. It seemed that Irina
Vladimirovna and Lenka Mumrikova called at almost the same time and,
chattering away, kept interrupting each other as each reported her own
version. Tanya didn't know precisely what was in those versions, but
they weighed heavily with the Durnevs. Afterwards, they decided that
she'd stolen the sword, but if it wasn't her, it didn't happen without
her help.
"I said you'd end up in jail!" yelled Uncle German, stomping his
feet. Then he grabbed his side and collapsed into a chair. "My heart's
malfunctioning! When I heard about this, I took nine homeopathic pills
instead of seven!" he screeched. "If I die now, it'll be on your
conscience! What a blemish on my deputorial career!"
"German! Your heart's not over there!" whispered Aunt Ninel.
Pipa stuck her head into the kitchen.
"She cooked it all up specially! She scalded me, and got herself on
the field trip...." she chirped up.
For someone mortally scalded she didn't look too bad, except that
her foot was covered with a huge bandage, half a fist's worth. But
that is because she gobbled up too many sweets.
"Shut your mouth!" Tanya yelled at Pipa, not able to bear it. Her
nerves were at their limits; she had gone through too much today. It
seemed to her that inside her thin strings were drawing tight, and now
they were just about to snap.
"How can you talk like that to your sister? And you, Pipa, go! What
you've already taken from this criminal!" said Aunt Ninel, pursing her
lips.
"Oh, fleas! Let her go to her dear papa!" quickly said Pipa.
Tanya jumped up. Suddenly the refrigerator door, which Pipa stood
next to, threw itself open and headed right for Pipa's nose, yes, and
so quickly that there was no time for her to dodge. Uncle German's
little daughter squeaked and grabbed at her nose, which instantly
swelled up to the size of a small plum. Tanya stared at her hands
with surprise. She only thought for an instant about how the door
had immediately opened itself. Unbelievable!
Aunt Ninel and Uncle German stared hard at Tanya, but she was
standing too far from the door to be accused of anything. Pipa, her
voice miserable, rolled around on the ground.
"My nose is broken! Call an ambulance! I need plastic surgery right
away!" she cried out in panic.
Aunt Ninel pried away the hands her daughter was using to cover her
face, and examined Pipa's nose.
"Calm down! No bones broken, but you just need a wash here... And
you, trash, quickmarch to your loggia and don't let me see you!"
Tanya headed off for the loggia and there, sitting on the wide
windowsill wrapped in her blanket, she stopped to solve her math
problems. Everything that had happened today seemed absolutely unreal
to her. Therefore, Tanya decided not to think about this now, but, if
it was possible, to postpone her thoughts until later.
After some time Pipa returned to her room and, sticking her tongue
out at her through the glass, settled at her table. Tanya saw with
pity that her nose had survived. Pipa quickly got rid of her white
plaster.
"Congratulations! Plaster really works for you. You stayed nice for
exactly three pimples, which it got rid of!" said Tanya loudly.
Pipa took a look to see that nobody else was listening. She figured
they were completely deaf and dumb to her activities, As to that, they
weren't talking, and she was in her room, and that Tanya was in the
loggia!
Not turning her attention to Tanya, Pipa took a shoelace with a key
tied to it off her neck, opened the drawer and, reaching for the
picture, stared at it with deeply moved eyes.
Listening, Tanya made out how Uncle German's daughter muttered, "Oh,
if you only knew, so somehow you'd carry me away from this nonsense!
It's a shame that they can't arrest her and put her in jail till she's
14. Imagine -- she acted up in the museum, scalded me by turning
boiling water on me, and herself...."
*Phooey on you! She tells a picture about me! See, the door attack
was too powerful for us, and she had a brain limp without that,*
thought Tanya, and kept on doing her math.
Five minutes later, Pipa stopped to lisp, and holding the picture to
her chest, exclaimed loudly, "Oh, GP! Oh, GP!"
Tanya even dropped her pen. This was the first accident -- when Pipa
called a name while she was near. Who was this G.P.? Among her
acquaintances and classmates there was definitely nobody with those
initials. True, there was Genka Bulonov, but he was G.B., not G.P.
That she'd fall in love with Bulonov...That was impossible to expect
even from Pipa. So, then, there must be someone else to find.
What's GP mean? Gova Pupsikov? Gunya Perets? Tanya kept guessing,
but then she suddenly recalled that she had more important business
than thinking about that nonsense. What business of hers was it if the
Very Good Deputy's stupid daughter was in love with some Grisha
Ponchikova? Was it a small thing if what was behind the events of the
odd events of the past day still had no explanation? Mr. Durnev's
dream...the refrigerator door...the clinging leaf...the Russian
borzoi...the disappearing golden sword....
The longer Tanya reflected on all this, the more strongly the knot
of questions tightened. Fair enough; the leaf could have been carried
by the wind, and stuck to the glass because it was wet. The
refrigerator might have opened itself, or, let's say Uncle German
might have touched it with his elbow when he grabbed in terror at his
heart, figuring to feign an infarction. The borzoi...hmm...the
borzoi...well, let's say she joined up with the bus because she was
lost, and Tanya looked like her owner. What did it matter if it came
into the head of a dog? Well, and how about the sword, then? Why did
it disappear a few minutes after the little girl looked at it, and
what did the chief guard's words mean? "Either you explain to me what
it was on the film, or I don't envy you."
What was recorded on the film? Not this disgusting monster who
appeared in Uncle German's dreams? For some reason, each time Tanya
thought about the old woman, her head began to whirl frighteningly.
*****
On Thursday Tanya returned to school earlier than usual. The
students in the upper grades, dashing to the new piano, accidentally
pushed it onto the feet of the music teacher who was bustling about.
They canceled Music, and their whole class was sent home right after
third period.
Opening the door with her keys, Tanya suddenly realized that she was
completely alone.
Uncle German was in session with his committee, where they were
discussing an extremely important question about giving all hundredyear-old pensioners a pair of mountain skis (like the time Uncle
German acquired a desk which was never used), Aunt Ninel was going to
the supermarket in the car, and Pipa had instead gone out with Lenka
Mumrikova and her toady friends glued like fish to The Russian Bistro.
Tanya knew that Pipa, as usual, stopped to buy each of them ice cream
and blinis with chocolate; and for this they stayed to suck up, listen
to her spellbound and laugh at all of her jokes.
After what happened in the museum, a great number of her classmates
in general stopped to observe Tanya or whispered behind her back. But
only one, Genka Bulonov, continuously watched her in all the lessons,
and while changing classes constantly appeared before her eyes
emitting nightmarish sounds neither yawn nor sigh. After that, him
calling her 'daring' cracked in on her ears. Anyway, that's what Tanya
thought he'd said time after time. Once, though next to nobody was
bigger than he, Bulon came up to her and, coughing, bashfully called,
"Grotter!"
"What's with you, Bulon?"
Genka timidly glanced arounds, and then secretly whispered into her
ear, "Let's rob a bank! I've dreamt of that, too!"
"A what?" Not believing her own ears, Tanya stared at Bulonov. Here
this silent straw mattress turned out to be nursing ideas like that,
when he couldn't even throw balls in phys ed because if they bounced
off anything they'd smack him in the forehead.
Bulon impatiently awaited an answer.
"We'll rob it, we'll rob it! The main thing is, don't be nervous.
They've got lots of money. We'll collect it by force," Tanya soothed
him.
Genka swallowed nervously, continuing to devour her eyes
grovelingly. He looked like a hungry mutt waiting for her to drop some
chops.
"And what do I do?" he asked.
"Make their ears pop! You've got a hood with slits cut out for your
eyes?"
Bulon hung his head.
"No hood?...." pressed Tanya. "That's bad! And no machine gun?"
"Ee-eh-ah-eh...not at present."
"What are you going to rob the bank with, a teapot? Get out of here,
Bulon. When you get something -- then come to me!"
Remembering now how silly Bulonov's face looked, Tanya burst out
laughing and quickly shook off her jacket. Who knew how much time
she'd have alone, without the Durnevs? She couldn't take too many
minutes, if she wanted to replenish her supplies.
She pulled a pair of yogurts from the refrigerator, sawed off a
decent slice of sausage with a knife, and slipped an orange into her
pocket. She wondered, would Aunt Ninel notice? She doubted it. Aunt
Ninel's fridge was groaning with junk food, and today she'd also be
bringing back half a carload. Besides food, she'd surely bought two
dozen magazines on fitness and aerobics, as well as some thick books
like _How to Drop 40 Kilograms in 10 Days_. Tanya remembered herself
how much Aunt Ninel had dreamed of losing weight all her life, but for
some reason only Uncle German lost any. Nothing helped Aunt Ninel,
though twice a week she also organized herself to starve for half an
hour.
1.5 Kilometers growled with hatred at Tanya from under the table. If
she as much as looked at something, the dog told on her without fail.
Not restraining herself, the little girl stomped her feet and
exclaimed, "Oo-ooh!" The old pepperpot almost choked on her own
barking with indignation; and done with barking, then lapped up water
from her bowl.
"Drink and don't gurgle, or that tail will fall off!" Tanya advised
her.
Eliminating all traces of her presence from the kitchen, she set in
motion a bit of a beautiful fish that had been broken in Pipa's room,
which was covered from floor to ceiling with stuffed toys. Up by
Pipa's forehead alone seven pieces were stacked, not counting the
bear, cat, dwarf and giraffe. Uncle German's business partners gave
her great numbers of them, when it didn't grab his fancy to give her
something more worthwhile. They knew that Pipa kicked their toys'
legs, ran them over with her bicycle, and now and then even
disembowled them with a knife. It seemed with such a relationship
that she might give something to Tanya, but such things could not even
come near Pipa's head.
Carefully stepping across the photoalbums (fifty pimply Pipa faces
in each) and computer game disks scattered on the floor, Tanya made
her way to her own loggia. She knew perfectly well that Pipa couldn't
stand her to move any disk a centimeter, or leaf through the pages of
one of Pipa's magazines; she'd have frightful hysterics, and rolling
on the ground, would cry out that Tanya'd nosed through her things.
And not just Pipa's eyes would sweep the place -- each evening she
spent hours fixing threads a certain distance between one toy and
another, or gluing tiny secret hairs to the table drawer.
Inside the loggia, Tanya opened the wooden closet door and pulled out
the double bass case. The little girl always liked this moment: the
case slid out with a quiet creaking like a good-natured complaint,
greeting her.
"Hello, old groaner!" Tanya said to it.
It was very pleasant to the touch -- warm, leathery, rough. Even in
winter it was never cold, and Tanya always warmed her hands on it. In
the past, when Pipa insulted her terribly or Aunt Ninel gave her a
casual box on the ears, Tanya had huddled inside the case, turning
there and lying down, swallowing her tears. And the case guarded her.
Or it only seemed to her, that it protected her. When Tanya was five
years old, Aunt Ninel tried to drag her out of the case, to punish her
for accidentally breaking a cup. Without any warning, the lid
unexpectedly slammed shut with a bang that caught Aunt Ninel's hand,
so that for two weeks she had it in a sling. Yes, and she also had
decided not to throw the case out, though a hundred times she'd
threatened it.
Tanya flicked open the small ancient lock and, raising the lid,
slipped her hands into the case. Her fingers usually glided under the
trim, in that not large but original hiding place where she concealed
her diary -- not the school one, easily accessible to all her teachers
and nosed through by Uncle German -- but the personal one, to which
she confided all her secrets and troubles.
Suddenly the little girl cried out and pulled back her hands.
Instead of the diary, her palms ran across something sticky and
stretchy. With an effort, Tanya recognized her notebook under this
gunk, looking so bad that nobody else would have known it. Just as
damaged was all of the case's satin lining. Throwing open the other
closet, Tanya saw that her few belongings looked no better -- slippery
and dripping, they didn't hang but literally flowed from the rack.
Tanya's stomach clenched. Afraid that she'd tear them out, she
slammed the closet shut. In the first instant she'd decided that
Pipa'd done this dirty trick to her, but even Uncle German's pimply
daughter, with all her hate for her, wouldn't have tried to ruin her
belongings. At maximum, she'd cut them with a razor, squeeze half a
tube of toothpaste into her pockets, or smear her blanket with
ketchup. Her inventiveness never struck on anything greater. She'd
sooner have her mournful fits get her stuck in a knot.
"Who did this? Who?" groaned Tanya.
Her eyes squinched up. A lump rose her throat. This was her beloved
diary, in which she trusted her very innermost secrets, to begin with
-- not even counting the double bass case and her things, all
belonging to her personally!
"If I find who did this -- I'll cut him!" exclaimed Tanya in fury.
Suddenly, in the closet someone giggled loathsomely. It sounded
almost like someone scraping one sheet of emeryboard against another.
The little girl tossed her head, and instantly someone threw down on
her forehead a foul, stinking wad of paper, which she dimly guessed
was the last page of her own diary.
"H-ho! Her cut into me, h-ho! Cutting me, cutting, h-ho! Nobody ever
has cut Agukh!"
Off Tanya's shoulder rebounded a repulsive, not too large creature
with a fat body coated with hard greasy hair. He had a crumpledy head
with a wrinkly forehead, short curved legs with grabby fingers, and a
long bare pink tail like a rat's. He was disgusting in every way. He
didn't even have elbows on his arms. When the creature, vilely
giggling, threw open his enormous mouth filled with tiny teeth, the
bottom part of his head stayed in place, and the upper part -- the
nose and forehead, right up to the mold that covered the top of his
head -- leaned backward like it was on hinges. On top of his horrible
head were disgusting ugly yellowish horns: the right one straight as a
dewdrop, and the left small and undeveloped, folding over slightly
forward and to one side.
Holding onto Tanya's shoulder, he pushed off of her forcefully, and
with his head completely smashed to pieces the window leading into
Pipa's room. Leaving slippery, muddy tracks on the parquet floor, the
creature climbed up on the Durnev's daughter's desk and in an instant
had trashed the whole mountain of magazines and textbooks, biting off
the heads of her precious collection of dolls as he went.
"Bad-ly it will go for you, bad-ly!" it spat, looking insolently at
Tanya with its disgusting eyes. "Better give it over yourself, the
thing you like, or you'll die in horrible fits! You'll stay dead in
the Dead Vulture!"
"I don't understand what you want!"
"You don't want to give it back? H-ho!" The loathsome mouth opened
with a crack, as it bit through the telephone receiver like a dry nut.
"You don't want to? This will be you!"
"Give back what?" exclaimed the little girl, barely not crying from
loathing and horror.
"You give back -- you know what! You know everything, Grotter!" said
Agukh, getting angry.
His thin hand reached for the monitor of Pipa's computer, on which
she ran all three hundred of her game disks. It was a thin liquid-crystal
monitor -- a present from Aunt Ninel when Pipa managed to get a 4 for
the year in botany. Pipa presented this as her greatest achievement,
though when the botany teacher had given out grades, she'd just asked
one question: "The sea star -- is it a plant or not?" Those who
answered "Not" got a 5, and all the rest got a 4.
"Don't drop it! Don't touch the monitor!" exclaimed Tanya with
horror, thinking of what Pipa'd do if he took it apart.
"You're afraid? So it'll be for you! H-ho! Give this up or be
quartered! They'll take off your skin, boil you in a red hot sow!"
hideously giggled the monstrosity.
Seizing the monitor by the cord, he carried it to the edge of the
table and pushed it off. Inside the monitor, something quietly popped.
"H-ho! Agukh teaches you! So it will be with all the Grotters! If
you only knew how Leopold begged the mistress not to kill you!
Pathetic sc-scaredycat!"
As soon as she heard her father's name, Tanya jumped back,
gobsmacked.
"Not true! My papa's alive!" cried she.
"Sc-scaredycat! Sc-scaredycat! Sc-scaredycat! He and his wife Sofya,
the stupid hen, all afraid of the mistress!"
A red veil of anger covered Tanya's eyes. She got carried away when
someone spoke this way about her parents -- especially this vile,
tricky being with a rat tail and piddly horns.
"Well, and get out of here, you drifter!" she exclaimed, and
grabbing from the windowsill a cactus in a flowerpot, she threw it at
the vile creature with all her strength. The pot hit him right in the
belly, knocking him down onto the table, and the next instant, the
somersaulting cactus' needles stuck right into its soft face.
Squealing horribly, the drifter threw himself under the bed, and
leaning out from there, yelled angrily, "Nightmares ravins eks! I
curse you! Nobody treats Agukh that way! You don't know what kind of
trouble you've invited on yourself! Remember: you don't give it backk, you die-ie! You die like dogs-s-s, in terrible torture! So she said
herself, the mistress!" Threatening Tanya with his fist, the horned
character slipped into the hallway and vanished.
Tanya grabbed some rags. The tracks which the being left didn't come
off, and trying to scour them off just made them eat deeper into the
parquet and the veneer.
When Mr. Durnev himself returned, it looked as though Tanya had
dropped dead tired onto Pipa's bed. That usually would have created a
scandal if he'd seen her there, yes, only...only he'd done so much
already, he barely looked into the room. Now nothing.
Tanya's cheeks burned. Who was this nasty wanderer? What did he know
about her parents -- and he did know, that was for sure. What about
the 'mistress' he mentioned? What had he searched for in the empty
apartment? Why nibble up her diary? Just one thing could be said -the monstrosity did not reveal himself of his own will. He had been
sent by someone in a very decisive mood, someone figuring Tanya might
hide something of hers in the case. At that, what he searched for must
be a hundred times more valuable than the contents of Uncle German's
safe, Aunt Ninel's antique porcelain or all of Pipa's old junk he
could have taken instead. In spite of the whole thing being extremely
bad and that she didn't expect anything good, Tanya smiled
involuntarily and knocked curled fingers on her forehead.
"It's hollow under that roof, hollow!" said she.
What had made them all go out of their minds? Yes, and who was she,
finally, that around her all this deviltry would go on? Did she really
have some property beside what was hidden in the double bass case, and
a few nasty rags?
True, this case was obviously very old, but really much less ancient
than that golden sword from the museum, and quickly she recalled how
she with delight had pressed close to the glass, looking at the
blade's mysterious symbols. She particularly remembered it was like
the imprint of birds' feet on wet sand. It still seemed to her that
she'd seen something similar once before...and not only had seen, but
also... touched it.
Tanya had barely thought about this 'touching' before instantly
there rose before her eyes a small dim plaque, which she always
pressed with two fingers -- with long and index -- and after she
pulled it herself. She remembered! That was the clasp on her case!
Tanya flung herself onto the loggia. and going down on her knees,
turned the double bass case onto its side. Here was a deep fold in the
warm leather, and here also was the clasp with exactly those symbols
-- three thin lines upward and one down.
And more -- Tanya herself did not know what forced her to do so -she carefully traced all four lines with her little finger, and
placing her fingers in a small hollow in the very center, turned it
exactly half a revolution. She squeezed it for a minute, two...
Nothing happened. The same dreary fall day, the same roof of the
apartment house next door. Feeling horribly disappointed, Tanya
performed these manipulations another time -- only now, outlining the
contours of the bird tracks, she started in the central claw... Again,
nothing...But what if, in the beginning, she touched the hollow, and
then outlined with her fingers all four lines of the tracks?...No,
useless.
With each minute, Tanya felt all the more powerful dejection. And
with that she decided that nothing unusual had happened in too long.
Well, a plaque and a plaque. It was necessary to imagine a little less
and to know her own place. And time for her imagination to think a
moment about what she would say to Uncle German and Aunt Ninel, when
they discovered the destruction in the apartment.
"Well, and that to you! You don't want me, and you aren't needed!"
exclaimed Tanya, and with a regrettable slam of the case's lid, she
clicked the lock shut with her fingernails.
She didn't have time to feel the slight pain in her nails and barely
even heard the sound of that click, as something elusive rushed past
through the air. This reminded her most of a golden whirlwind suddenly
bursting open the small inside window of the loggia. Irresistably and
energetically, the whirlwind playfully plucked every piece of paper
from its place, upset the flowerpot, tattered notebook pages, and then
descended right into the center of the case, taking the shape of an
old double bass with four thick strings: gold, silver, copper and
iron. The case fit the instrument so perfectly that no doubt remained
-- this was its case.
Next to the double bass lay a small bow, which was almost two times
shorter than the bass itself.
Tanya's heart beat four times faster. Not resolved to touch the
instrument, she pointed at it wildly. Then, gathering courage, Tanya
carefully reached out her hand to pick up the bow, but not waiting, it
hopped into her palm. Between the bow and its string was held a small
document on birchbark. Unfolding it, Tanya analyzed with difficulty
the old letters' flourishes.
____________________________________________________________________
Theophilus Grotter's Magical Double Bass
USER'S MANUAL
This magical double bass was created by the famous magician
Theophilus Grotter in the middle of the 17th century and was used by
him for the flight on Bald Mountain, and also for fine magics. As for
quality, the material used was deck planks from Noah's Ark; and inside
the fingerboard floor is placed a String of Seventeen Hanged Men, made
from hair plucked any time when they were to execute the innocent.
The double bass enables one to accomplish practically any magical
act connected with transformation, telepathy, levitation, telekinesis,
incantations, banishment of the undead or dismissal of damage.
However, its main purpose -- high velocity flight.
WARNING
1. Don't sit on the double bass before you have mastered all its
magical functions and studied _The Twelve Rules of Bewitched Flight
for White Mages_, edited by Cain Frogman and Jezudi Toadstoolenko
(Tower Publishers, Babylon, 7000 BC).
2. During repairs of the double bass or in case of accident, do not
use spare parts from a divebomber vacuum cleaner, VTOL mop, electric
toothbrush helicopter, disappearing chair or juicer-vampire.
3. In case of transportation by dragon of the double bass, go out of
your way to use every degree of fire safety. In particular, only carry
the instrument inside its fireproof case, protected by not less than
an ordinary fire extinguisher incantation. At the time of
transportation, the dragon itself must put on a flame-quenching
muzzle.
4. Do not lose the bow! Without it, you lose the ability to operate
the double bass.
5. Do not permit tightening or slackening of strings -- this could
lead to unpredictable consequences.
6. We remind you that this double bass is an instrument designed
exclusively for White magic! In case of use of Black magic in dire
need and to stay intact, instrument might lose magical power.
7. Do not yank around the double bass. Do not whip undead with the
bow. Avoid collision with solid objects! Violation of this writing may
lead to a crack in the instrument and the release of a powerful curse
contained in the String of Seventeen Hanged Men.
8. During flight, take special care. Do not gain momentum over the
speed of sound! Do not go over 10,000 meters. This may lead to icing
up the strings and an instrument crash, as occurred to the magician
Lycurgus Zapuplenni and his flying guitar.
9. Do leave the double bass in suspicious places; do abandon it in
places of mass settlements of undead (deserted graveyards, swamps,
areas of fallen timber, deserts). Do not be overprotective with antihijacking incantations.
These instructions were copied by Koshchei the Undying, Printer.
Address: Bald Mountain, Drowned Man Prospect, Grave 7.
Tug on the dead cat's tail to enter.
___________________________________________________________________
Tanya dropped the birchbark. In her eyes orange and red spots
began to twirl an insane waltz -- not pages -- not a quill pen -not the sarcastic features of an undead creature. Fearing to fall,
she stretched out her hands to the closet, which answered her with
an ungrateful squeak. She was stunned, scared, ecstatic all at once.
Now she became absolutely convinced that somewhere nearby,
separated from her by only a thin wall, existed another world -a world full of mysteries and secrets, a world of enchantment. And
she, Tanya Grotter, a total orphan, in some mysterious way was
involved in this world. The strings of the magical double bass
hummed consolingly.
*Oh, Mama! One of my ancestors was the magician who made this
instrument! And I, then, also...no, it couldn't be,* thought Tanya.
It stopped her breath; tears rolled from her eyes. Swallowing
them, Tanya pressed her palm to the resonant side of the double
bass. She could hardly believe that it really existed and was
afraid that now she had it, it would disappear, as presents always
disappeared, stolen from her in the night after New Year's. The
Durnevs never gave her anything, except that Uncle German once
presented her with half a kilo of stony taffy and smelly fish. Pipa
had added from herself an old broom made of sticks, which very soon
was returned to her on her nose, with interest. Well, and the
yelping there was then! Tanya was locked in the bathroom with the
lights off, all day.
But now Tanya was not here to recall old wrongs.
It was possible that among her ancestors were magicians! Why had
today not happened until now, so that the Durnevs wouldn't call her
the daughter of a criminal! It was coming out that all of that was
a lie, up to the last word! Tanya didn't have time to comprehend it
all, as suddenly she heard a brittle squeak from a furious voice.
"A-ah! Here is where you are, you trash! And what's all this, then??"
Tanya turned, frightened. For an instant it seemed to her that she
now again caught sight of that same shortlegged dwarf creature which
damaged everything. But this turned out to be not the dwarf, but
something far worse....
*****
In the door, pale blue with rage, resembling nothing but a
graveyard bed-rested vampire, stood Uncle German. Tanya let a moment
slip by when he came into the room. If his constituents had seen him
now, they wouldn't exactly have supposed that these malice-contorted
features belonged to the Very Good Deputy, friend of children and
shut-ins, and unselfish donor of old worn clothes and canned goods
expired only a few short years back.
"Who conducted this pogrom? I ask you!" hissed Uncle German. "What
happened in our apartment? I ask you! Either you, you rotten girl,
tell it all yourself, or I don't know what I won't ask...that is,
what I won't do! I'll count up to five...."
"I don't know. There was some sort of dwarf here...by the way,
they call him Agukh, if you're interested," exclaimed Tanya
nervously. She never before had seen Uncle German in such a rabid
state. Steam almost poured from his ears. To Tanya, it even seemed
that she detected the not very nice smell of molten earwax.
"Two...." said Mr. Durnev in an icy voice. Just from his nastiness
of character, he skipped "One."
"It's true, I'm not tricking you...I came back from school, and
this dwarf...that is, I mean to say, this monster...."
"Three. You can't win with me! Where did you take this enormous
guitar from, or what is the meaning of this disgrace? Who did you
steal it from?"
"This is no guitar; this is...."
"I don't intend to tolerate these pranks! Even my angelic patience
does come to an end! Tomorrow you'll find yourself in a children's home,
and then in juvenile hall...Four...."
Tanya nestled the double bass against herself. She was in terror,
but even blind with horror, for some reason she giggled unthinkingly.
A thought suddenly came to her that it would be funny if Uncle German
really said, "Four for a little string...four for thread." This grin
made Uncle German totally not himself.
"ACH SO! Five!" Uncle German shrieked, and stepped forward.
Before Tanya had time to guess what he intended to do, a slap hit
her cheek. Tanya yelled, not so much from pain as from humiliation.
Uncle German had never hit her before, only hissed, made insults, and
locked her into the bathroom or the loggia. It seemed to her as if his
soul was venting some stinking drug.
But Uncle German, completely enraged, had already raised his hand
for a new blow. Dodging, Tanya blocked with the double bass. Durnev's
slap fell on the instrument. Apparently, the magical double bass was
not accustomed to such treatment. The strings buzzed indignantly and
low, as if they warned Durnev not to do anything foolish. Not paying
this any attention, Durnev grabbed the fingerboard with fury and
began to tear the double bass from Tanya.
"Well, and hand it over quickly! I tell you this! We'll give it to
the militia -- let them find out who you made off with it from,
you thief! Where's the telephone? And you broke the telephone, too!!"
Tanya grabbed hold of the double bass hard and didn't let go,
though Uncle German was much stronger and he shook her, along with
the instrument, from side to side, hitting her back against the
frame of the loggia and the closet.
By accident the little girl's hand found one of the prickly tuning
pegs regulating the stretch of the string. At this moment Durnev
harshly yanked, and Tanya turned the peg. The straining string droned
low and bass. At that instant it seemed to Tanya that she'd been
deafened. The panes in the frame began to tremble menacingly. Losing
her balance, Tanya fell on her back along with the instrument.
Suddenly Uncle German, looming over her, froze. His darkened face,
like something softening, became kinder and found a nearly idiotic
expression. For some time his pupils went round and round in their
orbits, and then he purposefully scratched the bridge of his nose.
His upper lip began to crawl upwards, baring fairly long front teeth.
Finally, searching wildly around for a direction, Uncle German's
eyes stared intently at Tanya -- first from the right, then from the
left. Uncle German bobbed up and down in place from surprise and
giggled stupidly.
"Hee-hee! What a stwange day!" said he in a very thin, squeaky
voice.
Tanya frightenedly oh'd. In another second she oh'd a second time,
because Uncle German suddenly leaned over and sniffed around the
double bass, even gently nibbling it to test it with his teeth.
"Wittle giww, what aw you doing heah? Aw you gadewing fwowahs?
Wet's get acquainted. I'm Wispy the Wabbit," chirped he.
Tanya mumbled something, but Uncle German didn't listen to her. He
had already hopped into the room, drawing up his hands exactly like
the paws of a rabbit. Jumping adroitly onto the straight rug at Pipa's
table, Uncle German brought it down. With the table tumbled onto the
bed, he toppled bookshelves, tore up the closet door, and then,
going down on all fours, began to gnaw the legs of the chair.
Swallowing a few bits of veneer, Uncle German capriciously made a
face. The dachshund 1.5 Kilometers burst into bubbling senile barking,
hanging onto his pants leg. At any other time, Durnev would have shed
a few sentimental tears because his doggie was playing. Now he kicked
the dachshund so hard that 1.5 Kilometers rolled out into the hallway
with great speed.
"Us wabbits have howwibbwy stwong back wegs! Wit dem we can
give a hawdy kick!" he boasted, gnawing the broken-off chair legs.
"Phooey, dese tastewess wooden wegs! I can't stand dis bawk; my
teeth huwt fwom it. You don't have cawwots or cabbages?"
Not answering, Tanya continued, stricken, to examine him closely.
This was obviously no rabbit to be easily pleased. His off-white
eyebrows knitted together on his narrow forehead.
"What, can't you heaw, giwl? You don't know wabbit wanguage? I
said 'cawwots', no?"
"They're...in kitchen...in vegetable drawer...." mumbled Tanya.
"Thank you, wittle giwl! You wewe thinking I'm stupid, thought I
wouldn't wecognize that? I know vewy weww!" said Uncle German with
a conspiratorial look and hopped away, shaking the ground with his
size 47 feet. "Not hawdwy! You can't twick me! You Wed Widing Hood!"
he exclaimed, shaking a forgiving finger at her.
The next few minutes she heard in the kitchen his characteristic
voice; Durnev -- the pseudo-rabbit Lispy -- had discovered the 'cawwots'
and now rushed to gobble them along with the bag. At any rate, he
periodically added the rustling of a paper bag to the crunch of
chewing carrots.
Tanya carefully moved out from under the double bass, examining
it with a mixture of terror and delight. She didn't doubt many
minutes that it was implicated in Uncle German's sudden daze. Because
in that instant, when she turned the tuning peg, Durnev also had
imagined himself to be the rabbit Lispy.
Remembering about the warning on the birchbark, Tanya hastily
loosened the tension of the string and checked if a crack had
appeared on the fingerboard. No, luckily the double bass was not
injured, if you didn't count the small scratches left by Uncle
German's feet.
In the door, keys ground. Guessing that this must either be Pipa
or Aunt Ninel, Tanya hurriedly hid the double bass inside its case
and slid it into the closet. In the apartment already were unleashed
booming jumps -- this was the rabbit Lispy hopping to greet his family.
And when for minutes in the hallway was heard the horrible howls
of Aunt Ninel and Pipa, Tanya guessed that he'd met them.
"You're not Wittle Wed Widing Hood! You're Gwanny Fatso, and
_you're_ hew daughtew! Don't touch me! I'ww kick! I have a stwong
back weg!" deafeningly declared Uncle German, running away from them
through the whole apartment.
------------------------------------------------------------------Lenka Mumrikova: Our ol' buddy Lena. Lenka's a diminutive.
double bass terminology:
http://www.playmusic.org/string/more/morebass.html has a nice
diagram of all the parts. Interestingly, in Russian the fingerboard
is called "grif", the same word used for "vulture" or "griffin".
(Probably a different etymology, though, unless it's from the old
Russian analogy of musicians' fingers as being birdlike.)
birchbark: Commonly used instead of paper in Russian medieval times.
A large number of Viking/Rus birchbark letters have been discovered,
including some with children's doodles.
pogrom: That's the word the writer used. Perhaps a comment on Russian
history that horrible massacres are the Russian equivalent of rooms that
look like tornadoes hit them.
Lispy: The rabbit's name is Syusyukalka, from syusyukat', a Russian
lisp in which one pronounces 'sh' as 's' and 'ch' as 'ts'. Presumably
Lispy lisps because of his big buck teeth. I was unable to reproduce
this pattern in English without sounding fakey, so I turned to Elmer
Fudd. I wonder if Mr. Durnev owns a dacha and a yacht....
Red Riding Hood: Krasnaya Shapochka (Red Cap) is the Russian equivalent of
Little Red Riding Hood. It's also the name of a Russian Linux release. ;)
Apparently, Red Cap is a little trickier than the English version.
http://www.sunbirds.com/lacquer/box/992040
http://www.etaoin.com/sbks00.htm
Granny Fatso: Babka-Tolstun'ya (and her daughter), presumably Russian
fairy tale characters whom Aunt Ninel and Pipa resemble. I haven't found
them yet.