Short Fiction, Aleksandr Kuprin [the speed reading book txt] 📗

then Lodishkin smiled, seemingly in some confusion.

“Eh, grandfather Lodishkin, you know everything?” teased Sergey.

“Ye‑s brother, we’ve been nicely fooled, haven’t we,” said the old organ grinder, nodding his head. “A nasty bit of a boy, however.⁠ ⁠… How they’ll bring up such a creature, the Lord only knows. Yes, if you please, twenty-five men and women standing around him, dancing dances for his sake. Well, if he’d been in my power, I’d have taught him a lesson. ‘Give me the dog,’ says he. What then? If he asks for the moon out of the sky, give him that also, I suppose. Come here, Arto, come here, my little doggie doggie. Well, and what money we’ve taken today⁠—astonishing!”

“Better than money,” continued Sergey, “one lady gave us clothes, another a whole rouble. And doesn’t grandfather Lodishkin know everything in advance?”

“You be quiet,” growled the old man good-naturedly. “Don’t you remember how you ran from the porter? I thought I should never catch you up. A serious man, that porter!”

Leaving the villas, the wandering troupe stepped downward by a steep and winding path to the sea. At this point the mountains, retiring from the shore, left a beautiful level beach covered with tiny pebbles, which lisped and chattered as the waves turned them over. Two hundred yards out to sea dolphins turned somersaults, showing for moments their curved and glimmering backs. Away on the horizon of the wide blue sea, standing as it were on a lovely velvet ribbon of dark purple, were the sails of fishing boats, tinted to a rose colour by the sunlight.

“Here we shall bathe, grandfather Lodishkin,” said Sergey decisively. And he took off his trousers as he walked, jumping from one leg to the other to do so. “Let me help you to take off the organ.”

He swiftly undressed, smacking his sunburnt body with the palms of his hands, ran down to the waves, took a handful of foam to throw over his shoulders, and jumped into the sea.

Grandfather undressed without hurry. Shielding his eyes from the sun with his hands, and wrinkling his brows, he looked at Sergey and grinned knowingly.

“He’s not bad; the boy is growing,” thought Lodishkin to himself. “Plenty of bones⁠—all his ribs showing; but all the same, he’ll be a strong fellow.”

“Hey, Serozhska, don’t you get going too far. A sea pig’ll drag you off!”

“If so, I’ll catch it by the tail,” cried Sergey from a distance.

Grandfather stood a long time in the sunshine, feeling himself under his armpits. He went down to the water very cautiously, and before going right in, carefully wetted his bald red crown and the sunken sides of his body. He was yellow, wizened and feeble, his feet were astonishingly thin, and his back, with sharp protruding shoulder-blades, was humped by the long carrying of the organ.

“Look, grandfather Lodishkin!” cried Sergey, and he turned a somersault in the water.

Grandfather, who had now gone into the water up to his middle, sat down with a murmur of pleasure, and cried out to Sergey:

“Now, don’t you play about, piggy. Mind what I tell you or I’ll give it you.”

Arto barked unceasingly, and jumped about the shore. He was very much upset to see the boy swimming out so far. “What’s the use of showing off one’s bravery?” worried the poodle. “Isn’t there the earth, and isn’t that good enough to go on, and much calmer?”

He went into the water two or three times himself, and lapped the waves with his tongue. But he didn’t like the salt water, and was afraid of the little waves rolling over the pebbles towards him. He jumped back to dry sand, and at once set himself to bark at Sergey. “Why these silly, silly tricks? Why not come and sit down on the beach by the side of the old man? Dear, dear, what a lot of anxiety that boy does give us!”

“Hey, Serozha, time to come out, anyway. You’ve had enough,” cried the old man.

“In a minute, grandfather Lodishkin,” the boy cried back. “Just look how I do the steamboat. U-u-u-ukh!”

At last he swam in to the shore, but, before dressing, he caught Arto in his arms, and returning with him to the water’s edge, flung him as far as he could. The dog at once swam back, leaving above the surface of the water his nostrils and floating ears alone, and snorting loudly and offendedly. Reaching dry sand, he shook his whole body violently, and clouds of water flew on the old man and on Sergey.

“Serozha, boy, look, surely that’s for us!” said Lodishkin suddenly, staring upwards towards the cliff.

Along the downward path they saw that same gloomy-looking yard porter in the rose-coloured blouse with the speckled pattern, waving his arms and crying out to them, though they could not make out what he was saying, the same fellow who, a quarter of an hour ago, had driven the vagabond troupe from the villa.

“What does he want?” asked grandfather mistrustfully.

IV

The porter continued to cry, and at the same time to leap awkwardly down the steep path, the sleeves of his blouse trembling in the wind and the body of it blown out like a sail.

“O-ho-ho! Wait, you three!”

“There’s no finishing with these people,” growled Lodishkin angrily. “It’s Artoshka they’re after again.”

“Grandfather, what d’you say? Let’s pitch into him!” proposed Sergey bravely.

“You be quiet! Don’t be rash! But what sort of people can they be? God forgive us.⁠ ⁠…”

“I say, this is what you’ve got to do⁠ ⁠… ,” began the panting porter from afar. “You’ll sell that dog. Eh, what? There’s no peace with the little master. Roars like a calf: ‘Give me, give me the dog.⁠ ⁠…’ The mistress has sent. ‘Buy it,’ says she, ‘however much you have to pay.’ ”

“Now that’s pretty stupid on your mistress’s part,” cried Lodishkin angrily, for he felt considerably more sure of himself here on the shore than he did in somebody else’s garden. “And I should like to ask how can she be my mistress?