PART ONE
To my true partner in life – to my dear Maka
DEAR LAND
(From Burkut’s first notebook)
My Land! You were my cradle And now you are beloved forever
We saw the light here and here we flew the coop.
***
It’s not so long ago that I was a child, and now I’m eighteen! As our great poet Abai said,
It seems to have happened just yesterday,
But on turning back you can see it was long ago.
Eighteen is not that much, though. But even these few years have not been wasted. Since early babyhood, events have been leaving their disorderly, sometimes inextricable as they could seem as first thought traces, like the ones which appear on the white, clean newly fallen snow in the morning. But as soon as you look closer, you can read a lot of amazing stories in the countless trails, which steppe dwellers have left on the snow.
So what I see when peering at the short life I’ve lived is far from being a disorderly mass of events and impressions. Pictures of my childhood, events which I witnessed and which are now gone forever, and people whom I knew rise in my memories.
I want to write the story of my life, the way I can with my energy and skill. It’s not only the pictures of life that I tried to bring back, but also the process of thoughts and feelings connected with these events rising within me.
I hope that these notes can somehow be helpful to people.
DEAR LAND
Dear reader, you cannot possibly meet a person who doesn’t love his or her motherland. And everyone believes his or her own love for the motherland to be the strongest, and every single way of loving it is different from the others, as there is nothing more beautiful than the place where one was born and grew up.
In my motherland, there’s no mountains, no forest, no sea. My land is the smooth plain of Turgai. Plain stretching to the horizon. One can only find a few rocky tuffets in the monotonous spacious steppe. It looks like they were meant for those who have lost their way in the sea of the Turgai Plain.
Sometimes, the tuffets look like a small mountain chain overlooking the plain.
Out aul is situated in the foot of a chain like this, not far from the pass called Kyzbek, which means girl’s body. A little higher than the Kyzbel, there are two large rocky brows, which people call Kyzemshek, Girl’s Breasts.
Indeed, the silhouette of the rocky tuffet resembles a girl lying from a distance. It looks like a sound from above or aside once drew her attention, and she froze there forever, as if an evil wizard had turned her into a stone.
A hilarious little creek called Konyrau, which means a bell, runs down the Kyzbel. In spring, when the sun begins to warm the ground and the snow melts, this feeble creek spates, and there’s no fording it. But in the hot months of summer, no more than a subtle trickle of water is left. Due to the Konyrau, the biggest lake in the area, the Sarykopa, the Yellow Reeds, never dries out, while what remains of the rest by summer is mere salt blots.
I was born in one of the nomad auld , in late autumn of year 1909. I was given the name of our aul – Burkut.
I will never forget the long wanders. They’d put us, babies, into a wooden chest carried by a camel, and tie us down inside.
Most probably, the Kazakhs adopted the tradition of swallows. Swallows build their nests on the top of crutches. You can find a crutch like this in the yard of every winter hut. To prevent the nestlings from falling out, swallows tie one of their legs down to the nest with a fiber till they can fly.
My parents had me under their wing, just like birds do to their nestlings. I didn’t quite enjoy such care, anyway, as soon as I started walking, I came to hate the chest, so I’d howl desperately every time they put me into it.
Once I couldn’t stand this torture anymore, so I untied myself stealthily and fell off the camel under way. I got hurt and blacked out. They never put me into the chest after that.
When we had got a little older, they began to tie us down to the saddle of a quiet horse or to a blanket, which they rolled and placed between a camel’s humps. I couldn’t’t put up with this humiliation, either. Maybe this is the reason why I learned to ride a horse on my own early.
I was two years old when there happened to be no single rainfall in the Turgai steppe. The cattle fed on wizened grass and reeds, then it nibbled at stones fleeced with moss. My father had about a thousand horses, three thousand sheep, and twenty camels. To drive such huge herds all around the steppe in search of some feed was inconceivable. Then my father gave all our sheep away to the nearest auls under the condition that they’d return him “a hoof for a hoof” in a year; he gave the camels to the people of his aul and drove the horses to Mount Oral, as rich grass grew on its foot.
We didn’t know a thing about my father for about half a year. In the middle of winter, he came back. Once the sound of my mother screaming and a man speaking in an angry voice woke me in the night.
I though of the way a steppe boar snorts furiously in the reeds. Father was yelling, mother was crying, “I’m dying! Help!”, and my grandmother, hanging on my father with all her weight, was trying to turn the heavy blows away from my mother.
- Get over, get over yourself, Abeuzhan! – she kept saying.- You’re going to kill the poor thing!
The children woken started crying, and our house was full of incredible racket. Our neighbors came running. Father, beetle-browed and furious, stepped aside to the threshold and hunkered down, unwilling to talk to anyone.
“One who has bad luck gets even kumran (camel milk) clotted”, - the Kazakhs say when things like this happen. Later, my father turned out to have had bad luck, too.
As long as the weather was dry, the horses pastured on the slopes of Oral. But soon it started to rain, the weather became frosty. The horses couldn’t crush the thick layer of ice and snow with their hooves to get themselves food. Then snowstorms began, and nearly all the animals died. Father couldn’t but come home empty-handed. He just barely found his aul with houses smothered under the heaps of snow. We were using nosses not to get lost back then. Everybody was sleeping in the aul. It was late at night. The door of our house was snowed in, and so were the windows. Father started shouting, but noone heard him. He had nothing to shovel away the snow with. So he went to our neighbors, took their spade, and dug us out.
As soon as he entered the house, he rushed to my mother. Routed her out of her bed and started beating her, as there had to be a way for him, now absolutely furious and hardened in heart with his misfortune, to unburden himself.
For a long time, father remained sullen and angry, aching with his bad luck.
Hardly had the first rays of spring touched the earth when, taking along some helpers, he went around the neighboring auls to gather his cattle back. After a month, they drove back twenty scraggy horses – all that remained of the huge herd. Since then, our aul had ceased to wander long distances. The Kyzbel became our summer landing for several years.
ON MY PARENT’S HOUSE
An old aul has strange customs. Impoverished offsprings of the local families are proud of their ancestor’s richness; the quiet and the timid are proud of their batyr ancestors. But the Kazakhs aren’t ashamed of either poverty or timidity; it’s a shame to come from a different tribe; it’s humiliating to be a slave.
My eighth generation grandfather, Yernazar, an ethnic Kalmyk, was a stranger, too. But noone dared to call him a slave.
As my father told us, Yernazar (his real Kalmyk name was Subetei-mergen, Subetei the Archer) wasn’t taken prisoner by the Kazakhs; he came to khan Yesim, a renowned for his courage and strength, willingly, and became one of his best batyrs.
Yesim married one of his sisters off to him. So we came from the khan’s family through the female line. My father was utterly proud of it and was never averse to boast our noble origin.
- Our zhigits,- father would tell,- were the pick of the bunch, tall and broad-shouldered. “A Kalmyk is power”, they used to say back then. When our zhigits were riding stirrup to stirrup, noone dared to round upon them.
Yernazar had rich and numerous offsprings. Our family, when my father was young, numbered about two hundred people. My grandfather’s name was Zhaman, though my father was considered to be Zhautik’s son. Zhaman and Zhautik were brothers, Zhaman was timid and quiet, and Zhautik was a batyr.
Zhautik’s wife, Narbota, my grandmother, was a daughter of Derbesaly, who was a very famous bey in Orenburg Uyezd.
It’s wasn’t a long time that grandmother spent with Zhautik. In the first years f her married life, our clan fought against Kenesary Kasymov. Kenesary believed our clan to have surrendered to Russia and was at war with us. In one of the numerous frays, the desperately brave Zhautik was stabbed with a spear.
Old people said that my grandmother Narbota took part in this war, too, and that more than one enemy was killed by her hand. I can well believe these stories. My grandmother, lean and sturdy, with big, sinewy arms, looked more like a man than like a woman, even in her appearance. It was as easy as winking for her to heave a weight more suitable for a strong zhigit. She even spoke in a forcible, persuasive way, and when she had to swear at someone, she did it like a man.
After Zhautik’s death, according to the levirate law, my grandmother became the concubine of his brother Zhaman. My father was their son, though, as I have already said, many people believed him to be son of late Zhautik. Even my grandmother called father Zhautik’s son, and that was his name since then: Abeu Zhautikov (his full name was Abutalip).
Maybe this is the reason why my father was at enmity with Zhaman’s sons and tried to settle far from their houses for his whole life, and when he came of age, my grandmother left Zhaman, too.
The story of my father’s marriage was an interesting one. My mother, Asyltas, a noble stone, who came from Shakshak Zhanibek’s clan, one of the most honorable Argyn clans, was first engaged to Zhaman’s son. Soon after their our engagement, the intended one died suddenly. Apart from my father, there was no suitable levirate husband in the whole family, my father was only sixteen. Moreover, he was studying in the city of Turgai at that time. Believing my father to be still a “student”, Asyltas’s relatives decided to take the bride back and to repay a double bridewealth.
My father, who was part of council, found this decision degrading. Springing into the saddle, he declared that he wouldn’t obey the seniors and galloped back to his aul. The seniors neglected the reckless, frivolous words of the young man.
However, all honorable zhigits of the aul supported and even encouraged my father. A decision was made to kidnap Asyltas. Grandmother Narbota turned out to be on the dzigits’ side, too. She suggested that they should hide the bride at her relatives’ after she’s kidnapped.
Another news fueled the flame – one of the Kingan bais, whose land was situated along the Tobol, wanted his son to marry Asyltas.
The situation soon took a favorable turn. Asyltas’s relatives agreed to marry the girl off to the bai’s son. But for dzhigits snookered the bai’s people coming back with the bride and kidnapped Asyltas.
Father and the kidnapped bride rushed to her relatives, and the latter, being pleasantly shocked by the young man’s perseverance and courage, welcomed him and even helped him burke the story with the help of the Turgai Governor. When mother and father came back to their aul, they already had a child. It seemed that my parents should live in concord. It was never like this, though. When my mother married him, she was already pregnant, and my father felt rather bitter about it. He never showed his feelings to be polite to her parents, but, when he came back to his aul, he began beating her. He’d beat her to make her look like a marked sheep, as the saying goes. My mother wouldn’t dare to come out and spent month lying inside, hidden by a curtain, because of his beating.
I was the twelfth child in my family. Before I was born, mother had had two sons and nine daughters. The eldest brother, Koshkarbai, died, the other brother, Tekebai, is still alive. Seven sisters are alive, too. I find it curious that girls were named after high-valued things: Altyn – Gold, Kumis – Silver, Gaukhar – Diamond, Meruert – Pearl, Zhibek – Silk...
...But let me come back to my mother’s story. Her character was far from being timid. She always responded to my father’s blows with curses, and once she ventured to act in a really cruel way.
About five years before I was born, my father brought a concubine, a tokal, a poor man’s daughter, to our house, as he believed mother to be too old for him. My mother took cruel revenge on father and on her rival – on a summer day, she pushed her into a large pot with qurut boiling in it. The awful burns killed her. Mother’s life was no easier after that. Nobody in the aul accused her, though, they said that it was not my mother but a butting cow who pushed tokal into the boiling pot.
I was the youngest son in our family, maybe that’s what made me the most whimsical and spoiled one. Grandmother was spreading the gossip about my being her son and that of Zhautik instead of Abeu’s with great perseverance. I grasped whatever my grandmother told me very soon, so I called father ageke, as people call their elder brothers, and called my mother zheneshe, as his wife. When strangers started asking about how could I happen to be born by my grandmother, I told them that once, being scared, she gave a loud cry – ah! – and at that moment I fell out of her mouth.
Granny said that her feelings to me were so strong that her breasts got filled with milk and that it was she and not my mother who fed me. Judging by what my grandmother told me, as soon as I drew my first breath, her strong arms welcomed me, and we’d been inseparable since then.
Oh, Granny’s arms! When in them, I felt like a young bird in a warm nest and was afraid of nothing. Since very childhood I was used to the idea of having been born by my grandmother, of her being my real mother, and I knew that noone else had any right in me. Noone but my grandmother could cuddle and kiss me, there was noone to whom I obeyed like I did to my grandmother. And the reason was not because she raised me.
My grandmother was an extraordinary woman. People called her “our mother” respectfully. In spite of her slightly rude appearance and manners, this brave and strong batyr woman was demure and delicate. There was noone more generous and hospitable than she was. But her special glory was her fair mind and intelligence. People came to her to ask for advice like they come to their own mothers, and people worshipped her for her wisdom. There’s no wonder that Grandmother had such a deep influence on me in my earliest years.
However, my obsessive devotion to my grandmother and my stubbornness were much trouble to my parents, and once an unpleasant thing happened to me, which could have ended in a very sad way.
Soon after our family lost almost all the cattle in a murrain, it occurred to my father that he should go and visit a nagashy – a maternal relative of his. Allegedly, this relative had managed to protect his herds against the murrain even in this horrible year. I have a vague memory of my father taking me along with my grandmother’s permission. That summer I was four years old. At first everything was all right. Father put me onto a dromedary right in front of himself, and for several hours we moved along the dusty road. It was at white heat of the hot summer say that we reached the Tosyn sand hills overgrown with rich oleaster and tamarisk. These picturesque hills pierce Turgai, one of the three deepest rivers in our area.
It was so beautiful around, the water was so appealing that my father decided that we should take a short rest halt. Driven by a sudden flush of affection, father cuddled me and started kissing. Distrusting anyone’s but my grandmother’s caresses, I howled with fury, I broke from my father’s arms and ran away without even knowing where I was running.
My father was deeply insulted and he never moved to run after me. I was running farther and farther away, into the sand, till I got hidden completely by the oleaster and tamarisk tangles, and there was no force to make me come back to my offender – to my father. In the meantime, the sun began to droop, and I didn’t even think of coming back. Even if I felt like coming back, I was unlikely to find the way.
At first, father was sure I couldn’t run that far. But time was fleeting, and he was outright worried. His search was in vain, and he called me in a hoarse voice, begging me to come back, to no avail.
Being utterly upset, he felt like hanging or drowning himself.
A night passed.
At dawn, exhausted by the hunt, father got on the track of a large caravan which had stayed at the bank of Turgai, though downstream, for the night. He got his camel following the trail – it was his last and only hope.
It was only at midday that my father caught up with the unknown aul’s caravan. I was sleeping peacefully nestled on one of the camels. My father nearly lost his mind with joy, and the people in the caravan laughed and wondered when he told them about the way I got lost.
The caravanners told father that they had found me in the Tasyn sands. What drew their attention was an erne flying in large circles over one and the same place. When they came closer , they saw a living creature in a sand socket. Who could it possibly be? A lamb or a calf that had broken flock? No, there’s not a single aul here. Could it be a youngling? But wild animals hardly ever cast their offsprings adrift. Scared by people, the erne flew away. The camels reached the socket, and the caravanners saw a child walking in an unknown direction with a chapan in his hands, stumbling and falling.
- We were afraid to come close to him at once,- they said.- It could be shaitan who has assumed the appearance of a child. However, there was a kind and brave man among us, he took the scared boy in his arms, gave him some cheese-soured water, qurut. The little thing ate a little, but he refused to answer any of our question and was very arrogant.
- People say I’m cruel,- my father said to the caravanners,- they can be right. But there’s nothing like my son’s obstinacy. Sometimes I do think that he’s not my son but Zhautik’s, as my mother claims him to be.
- Yes, he’s a willful little thing,- the caravanners agreed.- He’ll have a hard life. Let the spirit of your brave ancestors save your son as he did this time.
Father promised to never take me along. And still once he couldn’t resist my grandmother and my whining and took me to Baikonur, where he had an important business.
In Baikonur, a coalmen’s aul, we stayed for a whole weak. It was the first time I had seen an auld which never moved. It was spread at the foot of a little hill, on the bank of a shallow river which dried in summer. Little yardless houses of the aul were built of stone. The aul had about a hundred houses altogether, and they had less cattle than our family did before the murrain. Since childhood, a disparagement to settled auls had been ingrained in me, but I still could see the life of such an aul in its true colors. In our aul, even the poorest man had both camels, and cows, and sheep, and here one could hardly find a family in which they’d have tea with milk, not to mention airan or camel milk – kumran. They didn’t have a crust of bread to spare.
Our relatives slaughtered their only goatling to celebrate the occasion of our visit. It was such a great event that nearly all women in the aul came running to taste goat meat from our pot.
The aul’s capital was its coal, which they mined deep underground. I wanted to see how they did it. When I told my father about my fancy, he yelled at me so that I understood that I’d better not even think of it. So I decided to go without his help.
I made friends with one of the Baikonur boys, and once my new friend took me to the place where people went underground to get coal. They had just taken out a large box which was used instead of what is now a cage for the coalmen. A young man was sitting in the box. I asked him to take me down to the pit, and he agreed, in an easy and cheerful tone.
Once I went down to the bottom of a cleaned well on the Kyzbel dzhailau, and however deep it was, light still reached its very bottom. But this well was as dark as a grave. We were going deeper and deeper, and there was no end to it!
The darkness and the fast sinking made me felt giddy. I was too proud to say anything to my companion, but he must have understood that I felt sick.
- Stick it, boy, stick it!- he said.- Mining is no sheep herding. Your father must be a rich man, looks like he get his money easily. Look what it costs us to get some bread.
At last, the box hit something hard – we reached the bottom. My eyes gradually got used to the darkness, as the Kazakhs say, “one can even get used to a grave”.
At first we walked along the dark corridor of the mine almost without bending down. I could see miners’ lamps glittering here and there and hear the sound of picks. Now we had to crawl along, and my companion warned me that I could hut my forehead. Finally, the dark corridor spread wide, and we could straighten up again.
Everything was good about my companion except for his care, which was too zealous. Such care was quite against my grain. I wanted to travel around the mine on my own and to touch everything with my own hands. Choosing the right moment when someone called the young dzhigit, I got mixed with the miners and started creeping along the corridors, which ended in my being lost.
It was pitch-dark. I could hear a distant echo of someone’s muffled voices, but I couldn’t understand where they were coming from. Gropingly, bumping into stone bulges, I began to move in their direction, as it seemed to me, but in fact I was moving farther away from them.
Soon the voices vanished completely. I gave a loud cry but got scared by the echo which repeated it many times. It was cold in the mine, and still I but I sweated.
I grew exhausted in no time. When I feel down, I couldn’t get to my feet anymore. I was half-sleeping. Little cold snakes seemed to be sliding all across my face. I saw someone’s eyes of fire, once narrow and small and then big and scary.
I crouched in a heap, trying not to move. And gradually I fainted. I don’t know how much time I spent underground. It might have been two or three days. With great effort, they found me, brought about and gave me the rough side of the tongue. The dzhigit caught it bad both from his fellow miners and from my father.
But I never regretted doing it. Weren’t I stubborn and curious, hadn’t I gone down to the mine, hadn’t I got lost there, I’d have never learned many interesting things. So my obstinate character didn’t just stand in my light, it often came at hand.
Finishing this chapter, I’d like to say a couple of words concerning the changes which had happened to our family. My sisters had got married long ago. The relationship between my mother and my father altered, too. After he beat her senseless when back at home in the year of murrain, there was no more fighting and quarreling in our house, and it looked like mother was playing the leading role in. Sometimes mother, who was stubborn and hot-tempered, started cursing my father, but he either chose not to answer her or mounted his horse with a curse and rode to the steppe.
When I was seven, my grandmother died of heart rupture. But this is the story I’m yet to tell.
CLOUDS OVER THE AUL
My father was still anxious. The idea of getting the cattle lost during the murrain in that rough year followed him everywhere. According to our ancient calendar, this year was called that of a Pig and was claimed to bring misfortune.
For a long time, my father’s attempts to bring back the wealth of the past failed. Noone from the neighboring auls, in which he had placed his sheep and camels, could pay this debt to him.
All of a sudden, fortune smiled upon my father – in 1914, he was elected a volost administrator. A volost administrator was lord and master for a Kazakh aul back then. A volost administrator’s word was law, and if a volost administrator said that white was black, you’d better say it was black, too.
Making use of his power, my father not only got all o his cattle back but got a double or a triple number of heads. Neither people from the distant auls nor those from the neighboring ones could avoid his robbery. Many of them even had to go away from out land. Being avaricious, my father went every length and didn’t scruple to take away the last cow and the last camel.
Our living was gracious. But now cattle was not enough for my father, he bought a separator to make butter for sale. He laid aryks from lake Sarykopa and began to sow wheat, millet, and oats. Huge caravans loaded with sacks of wheat headed for Turgai, Orenburg, Kostanai, Baikonur, and Karsakpai. I often went with my father, and I still have the Turgai steppes, the memory of which I cherish, before my eyes. They are calling me, and their call is welcoming as that of a mother. And if I do not see them for a long time, I miss them like I miss my mother.
Perhaps our family could have kept getting richer and richer. But in 1914, the world war broke out. The public purse always demanded more than before, and life was becoming harder and harder. In 1916, a rumor went around the steppe that the Russian tsar was going to draft the Kazakhs into the military. The auls grew turbulent. People could sleep neither in the daytime nor at night, they were gathering and parting to discuss the horrible news. Dzhigits were saddling their horses and forming troops. That’s when the steppe heard the name of Amangeldy for the first time.
Of course, I couldn’t fathom what was happening around me, as I was too young, but I will always remember the scenes of public unrest. Our family was as distressed by this news as any other family.
This news, as unexpected as a thunderstorm, found us on our way to the Kyzbel dzhailau. Agitated dzigits, both alone and in groups, were riding around the steppe and the surrounding flood meadows. People around our aul were unusually numerous, too. My parents’ house grew turbulent, too. Feverish debates never ceased. Every now and again, one could hear a sturdy curse. And I thought, what a bad tsar he is if he wants to send all our dzhigits to a distant war and exterminate them all there.
My father grew sullen and anxious again.
Once he set off for Orenburg urgently with several companions. The trip was hasty – each rider was leading two relief horses. Soon they were back, bringing us the news that our Turgai Uyezd alone was to produce five thousand soldiers.
There was no getting away from it. It turned out that father had sought advice of certain learned Kazakhs, among whom there was Zhakash, elder brother of my mother Asyltas; but Zhakash and his well-respected friends reached the same decision – that they could not but yield submission to the tsar.
That’s how the Kazakhs began to enroll in the army. All dzhigits aged from nineteen to thirty one were subject to the draft. This event brought about proper disorders. As the saying goes, “The gray-headed one starts, and the rest catch it up”. Being a volost administrator, my father allowed for one unlawful act after another. Both boys under sixteen and men in their late thirties were listed.
A dzhigit named Yerkin Yerzhanov, my brother Tekebai’s peer, lived in our aul. He was sixteen. His father, Yerzhan, had pastured our horses, but he died in a storm in the Cisurals in the year of murrain. Father took fancy to Yerzhan’s wife, Kazina, and he made up his mind to make her his concubine. I remember this slender, beautiful woman most clearly. Everyone admired her sweet disposition and affability. Being true to the memory of her husband, Kazina refused to my father, and it hurt him a lot. He tried to use his power and authority to bring Kazina to our house, but Yerzhan’s younger brother, Nurzhan, got in his way. So father put both the teenaged Yerkin and Nurzhan, who could hardly see forty again in the list of soldiers.
Upset, Nurzhan came to my father and begged him to have mercy on his nephew:
- If you’re so eager to send me there, do,- Nurzhan said.- But spare Yerkin, he’s the same age as your Tekebai is, a mere child! They were born the same spring!..
And tears were running down his hollow cheeks.
But my father was adamant.
- The paper’s already written, I can’t do a thing. In addition, noone takes Yerkin to be sixteen. He can pass for twenty just as well. He’s such a sturdy lad!
Nurzhan came away none the wiser.
My grandmother interfered.
- Apple of my eye! It’s a sin to be unfair!- she tried to persuade my father.- Release Yerkin, have mercy on his youth. Think of the tears he’ll shed.
- It’s no concerned of yours, apa,- father said briefly, leaving the yurt.
My father made concessions to those who bribed him, though. But tears and remonstrance of the poor had no effect on him.
Quite naturally, the lawless acts which my father and his accomplices committed, could not but bring about further consequences. The people’s cup was about to run over. The dwellers of the neighboring auls would jump their horses and gallop somewhere. I could hear the name of Amangeldy more and more often, he was the one to whom the dzigits were going.
If you have ever chanced to be in the steppe, you most probably know the way a steppe storm thickens. In the morning, the sky is clean and lucid, all of a sudden, a white cloud the size of a toy – a saddle mat – shows from somewhere low above the horizon. The cloud gets darker, another whitish clouds appear. They rush toward each other, gathering around the first cloud. Very soon, the whole sky is covered with a somber dove-colored veil. Here is the first wind blow, the first streams of water pour down obliquely. A couple o moments more, and a cold torrent will suddenly fall onto the ground, roaring on its hasty way through the steppe.
This time, a story like this happened to people. The enlistment of dzhigits wasn’t over yet when a rumor flew across the steppe that the men of the auls were leaving their houses, alone or in groups, and gathering around Amangeldy Imanov like thunderclouds do in the sky.
One day, one aul ran to him, and the other day another aul did. What remained even of our aul, which numbered twenty yurts, was a speck of five or six families. The same was happening in the rest of the auls, which were getting empty in an amazingly short time. Of course, people like we stayed and, being afraid of living all alone, they joined the other stray camps. Around our deserted aul, new people appeared.
Believing it disgraceful to live together, they kept afield, but still near us.
And the news was getting more and more distressing. Amangeldy’s adherents were in a forceful mood. They didn’t want to die in the outland. Refusing outright to sign up as soldiers, they whispered in their auls that they had taken up struggle with the Russian Tsar and that they intended to punish the local volost administrators.
My father had an especially rough time in these stormy days, though he tried to show no trace of his anxiety. But we still were well aware of his condition. In these days, father was gentling his best light-brown horse, called Zhylansyrt – Snake-Colored – with special diligence. This horse both came first during the summer baiga and could catch a wolf in winter, when the snow was deep. Yes, there was a reason for keeping him trapped. Father was preparing him for a disaster in case it came.
It did come. Once at dawn we were awoken by a loud cry of Kairakbai, a young dzhigit who was my father’s orderly. The whole family got up. We could hear horse hooves stamping loudly somewhere in the steppe, which was now enfolded in silence. The riders were coming closer and closer every single moment, hidden by a cloud of thick dust.
My father rushed to Zhylansyrt, released him from his trapping and, jumping into the saddle, shouted to my mother on the run:
- My gun!
My scared mother burst into tears:
- Oiboi, what kind of things are you going to do to him?
But father lashed her on the head.
When she came back with the gun, blood was trickling down her face.
I was scared to look at my father, his face was distorted with horror and anger.
The horse was jibbing. The stamping was getting closer. Father shouted again:
- Where’s the cartridge case?
Having armed himself, he vanished from our sight in no time. The horse was worth my father’s hopes. Zhylansyrt was a great racer. He flew like an arrow from a bow, leaving a little cloud of dust behind him.
In the meanwhile, our aul was drowning in the masses of dust raised by hooves of dozens of horses. The ground was booming with their stamping, strangers were shouting, we could heard someone yelling, “Get him! Get him!”
The fuss made me forgot about my grandmother completely. I though she had hidden somewhere in the yurt with my mother, but suddenly I saw her and gave a cry I couldn’t resist. Granny was lying behind the yurt , dead faint. There was noone near her.
I filled an iron kettle with cold water and splashed it over my granny’s face will she regained conscience. As soon as she realized where she was and what had happened to her, grandmother said:
- Where’s my only one?
I understood whom he meant. I knew that Granny had many sons and many daughters, but the only one she really loved was her Abeu, whom she called the son of Zhautik, the brave batyr. “Daughters, - she’d say, - daughters are no stone for one’s hearth, nothing to support one’s house. My son is my hope. I’d prefer a thorn in my forehead to one in his heel!”
- Where’s my only one? – my grandmother kept saying now.
I didn’t know whether my father’s enemies were going to catch him, whether he’d come back alive, but I didn’t want to add grief to her weakened heart and said:
- They didn’t catch him, Granny, he escaped and will come back to us soon!
And we heard a stamping of hooves again, as if to prove what I said.
The dust cloud was moving in our direction again. The troop was coming back.
In nomadic auls, a saying was well-known:
For a daughter who has already parted with her home, it’s bad to come back to the home of her father.
It’s bad to face one’s old enemy,
Whose cruelty one knows.
There was another one: it a storm which has passed an aul turns back to it, it’s no good – it will turn the yurts upside down and scatter the things in them.
The troop seemed to us to be a storm coming back.
The rebels realized they couldn’t get my father. With every single moment, they were becoming more and more numerous. Indeed, Father managed to escape, and they came to take his nest.
One of them, a stout man with a grizzling beard wearing a faded dust-covered chapan, rushed to my Granny like a bird of prey.
- You old bitch! Your puppy gave us the slip, but it doesn’t matter! We’ll get him. Your nest shall be burned to the ground! Come on, dzhigits, tie them down! Tie down them all – the kids, and the mother, and this old witch! We’ll take them away and see if the bird comes back to its nest.
Horrified, I hid behind my grandmother – the crowd was advancing, and there was noone to defend us.
- His puppies are going to get some water on the bottom of the Turgai,- I heard.
We thought there was no escaping death. Dismounting, the dzhigits surrounded the yurt in a tight circle. At this very moment, I heard a familiar, strong voice:
- Stop! Don’t.
Nurzhan appeared near us, the very Nurzhan who hated my father so bitterly!
He hid us with his arms like with two wide broad wings. Noone dared to touch him, noone tried to push him aside.
- Listen to me!- he said.- Abeu is a mean man. However cruel his punishment is, it will be fair. But his children, his family and, especially, this old kind-hearted mother – are they guilty of anything?
The dzhigits tried to answer back... Their objection wasn’t too fervent, though. But Nurzhan gestured to them, and they broke off.
- Believe me. I know more of Abeu’s scorn than you do. I’ve heard his curses and felt his blows. But I’ve never seen Grandmother doing anything wrong. She’s not to blame for her son’s evil deeds. And if you catch him, I’ll answer you with a proverb:
If you have water, use it to cook him,
If you have none, use fire to roast him.
But I tell you once again – don’t you hurt his mother, wife, and children!
It was just that my grandmother considered him to be a good dzhigit a man of a true soul. Nurzhan was an outstanding rebel, they respected him. I saw that everyone obeyed to him. It looked like these people have as much respect for him as he had for my grandmother. Later, I came to know for sure that he was one of the rebels’ leaders.
The rebels left us and soon departed. But they didn’t just leave the aul, they took all the cattle of my father along.
After all the misfortunes that overtook us in the year of the Pig, another murrain came, which had nothing to do with lack of fodder. Poverty came to our aul again.
The Turbulent Time
Trying to escape the pursuit, my father galloped for three or four hundred miles on lathery Zhylansyrt and reached Karabutak; soon a troop was sent from Orenburg to master the Turgai outbreak. The troop was headed by my mother’s younger brother, Zhakan.
Together with the troop, my father came back to the Kyzbel.
I had known Zhakan since previous summer. He stayed with us when our aul was on the dzhailau. He was quite a young man yet, too plump for his age, average height, a little round-shouldered. There was something playful and sly about his small, deep-set, and very lively eyes. His thin black moustache over his thick bold lips gave a special accent to the cheerful guile with which his swarthy face was radiant.
Among us, dwellers of the aul, Zhakan looked like a city dandy, though this must have been his ordinary, casual clothes but not his festive dress. He was wearing a black camisole (later I found out that it was called a frock coat), the back of which was hanging down like a dog’s tail, black trousers, a dazzling white shirt with a black bow. He had pointed black boots on his feet. For greater show, he wore glasses and always had a walking stick in his hands. Admittedly, it was his work that obliged him to dress like this and perhaps even to wear glasses. Zhakan worked for a newspaper, they say he was a good speaker, besides, Zhakan wrote poems. They were published as a separate book, and some of them, especially the poems on the murrain of 1911, Zhakan was eager to declare in our house, and Kairakbai, who was a good singer, often performed them accompanied by his dombra.
I really liked Zhakan, but his townish dress and his sly, cunning eyes scared me. My greatest fear was to somehow reveal our kinship. I was quite a big boy and had already come to realize vaguely that my old grandmother couldn’t be my mother; in spite of it, my grandmother was still my dearest and most treasured person, and I was still considered to be her son. If I become close to Zhakan, - I’d reflect, - he may guess that I’m his nephew and that I’m not Granny’s son, that they’re just lying to me. It would be humiliating to me, and I avoided Zhakan despite his being sweet and affable to me.
But now that Zhakan appeared in our aul as the head of a punitive detachment, I wouldn’t dare to talk to him even if I wanted to.
He looked fierce – his cheerful playfulness and politeness were clear gone! His elegant, dandyish clothes had disappeared without a trace, his face was black with dust, his moustache was grown – you couldn’t possibly recognize Zhakan!
My father’s fury was overwhelming when he found out that the rebels had taken all our cattle to the barymta. It looked like he was going crazy with rage. He was howling like a wounded wolf and scratching the ground with his nail furiously. He was trying to persuade Zhakan to gather a troop and massacre Amangeldy’s rebels immediately.
But Zhakan had quite a different thing on his mind. Having asked his closest men for a piece of advice, he went to the rebels’ camp with a small group of armed soldiers. However my father protested, Zhakan’s order was that he must go, too.
Soon, they all were back.
Amangeldy’s people declared that they were going to nail colors to the mast till the order on rear area military draft of Kazakhs was withdrawn. Zhakan promised to pass their demand to the highest command on condition that Amangeldy should stop his actions for this time.
The matter was settled.
In the meanwhile, Zhakan, taking advantage of the cease-fire, sent his orderly to Orenburg with a request for a military reinforcement. A true war, the scarce idea of which I borrowed from fairy-tales, was being prepared. This word was being uttered in our aul more and more often.
I kept bugging all every grown-up, whining and begging them to take me to the war.
- Shut up!- Father yelled,- you think war is a toi or an ait, the Muslims’ feast?
Granny was trying to persuade my father that he should take part in this cruel fight.
- Don’t go, darling, don’t go, kyragym, you shouldn’t. That’s mean thing to do,- she begged him, crying.
- It’s not my own will that makes me go, apazhan. I’m not the kind of bai for whom the most important thing is a piece of fat mutton and fresh kumis. I’m a volost administrator, and this is my civil service. Zhakan isn’t going of his own will, either. They gave him people and told him, “Go”. And he did. I cannot refuse now.
Granny chose not to discourage him anymore, she only said bitterly:
- Well, go! But make sure, my dear, that blood won’t shed of your will...
The life was anxious and far from being fun in our aul. We had no sleep and rest. The surrounding area turned into a proper military camp. Every day, more and more new people were coming. Carts with arms and other munitions were tailing incessantly. When they started bringing us little cannons – the grown-ups had never seen things like that, not to mention children, - everyone could see that it was a serious undertaking.
- What will it be like?- the aul was buzzing with anxiety.
- If they use the cannons, they’ll destroy all the troops over the six ridges, - they said, hoping for the possible defeat of Amangeldy’s rebels.
- If the people rise together to fight us, the cannon won’t help, - the others said. – Think of Kenesary – didn’t he want to bend the Kirghizs with the cannons he bought from the Russians? And didn’t the Kirghizs rip his self-assured schemes to pieces?
But once, everything grew silent in the aul. One of the nights, absolutely exhausted by the sickening anxiety of these days, I went to sleep and slept soundly and blissfully, and when I woke up, it was already time for the first milking of mares, midday, and everything was silent around me.
Feeling uneasy, I sprang to my feet and ran out of the yurt. I could see neither people nor carts with arms and horses – everything was empty and quiet; as if it wasn’t our aul that buzzed, and moved, and stirred just yesterday, getting ready for the menacing things which were yet to come.
I came back home and shook my grandmother, who was dozing, awake. She explained to me that all armed dzhigits went to fight the people of Amangeldy that night. My father left with them, too. Telling it to me reluctantly, Granny was wiping her tears with an end of her kundik, that is, a kerchief.
After several days, they brought the injured to the aul. They put up their tents close to us, put watchmen at the tents and sent a doctor from the town. The injured were getting more and more numerous. On one of the Kyzbel hills, graves with crosses on them appeared.
True and tall stories about the way the enemies fought were handed down. The name of Amangeldy was traveling around the steppe with astonishing rapidness.
Listening to what the grown-ups were telling, I was portraying the legendary and grand Amangeldy, the real batyr, with my childish imagination. Neither fire nor bullet nor sword can get him, he defeats his enemies bravely, and they all flee, horrified.
Zhakan’s attendant, who came to the aul from time to time, praised the courage of my father, who had plunged into the very thick of the rebellious crowd. They said he was both brave, courageous, and a sure shooter.
Being simple-minded, I was glad to hear this praise, while my grandmother and zheneshe only shed tears and turned to god for help. When we learned that my father was brought here, wounded, my grandmother rushed to the white tents.
A huge soldier stood in her way – no aul dwellers were admitted to the tents – but she gave him a push which nearly sent him to the ground. Fortunately, a doctor came out of the tent. Having taken into it, he waved the soldier aside and took my grandmother into the tent.
I have no idea how she could recognize her son, all bandaged form head to toe, among people who were just as bandaged and mutilated. Granny’s eyes froze with horror, and she stopped, she curdled both believing and not this to be her Abeu.
The doctor began to comfort my grandmother delicately, telling her that his injury was not very bad, that they had great remedies and that in two or three weeks he’d be over it.
But my grandmother wanted neither meds nor learned doctors. She declared straightaway that she was going to take her son to her house and treat him on her own.
The doctor couldn’t but give it up, and Granny nearly carried her bundle of joy home in her arms.
Distrustful to medicines, Granny invited a healer – a baksy.
The baksy ordered for a fat white mare to be slaughtered and skinned.
- I’ll take his evil spirit in my arms, wrap it with the skin and take away, - the healer said, - and your son will be safe and sound soon.
Medicines were put into play, too, just in case, so it’s hard to tell who cured my father – the fat white mare or the medicines brought from the town.
But, of course, my Granny only attributed the wonder to the baksy.
My father had almost recovered when a group of rebels was driven to our aul. I didn’t know who those people were and why they were guarded by several soldiers. The face of a man who was walking in one of the first rows seemed familiar to me. Running up closer to them, I recognized Nurzhan. He was dragging his feet with fatigue or, maybe, with languor, he had blood parched on his hands and face, there were rags hanging on his body instead of clothes. Convulsed with horror and pity, I rushed to him.
- Nurzhan!- I cried.- Nurzhan!
He started, skewed at me – and reverted his eyes.
I was running at his side and repeating his name, which became almost meaningless.
Choking with tears, I ran to my grandmother and told her about Nurzhan, floundering and stumbling. I was shouting and stamping my feet, demanding that they must release Nurzhan. I believed my grandmother to be an all-mighty and phenomenal being, and I was sure that she could do anything.
Having listened me out like a grown-up, she entered the house.
My father was sitting on his wooden bed and studying his mending wounds. He gave us an abstracted, somewhat indifferent glance.
Granny stopped by the threshold and was silent for quite a long time, thinking of what exactly she could start with. For a second, there was a flash of surprise in my father’s eyes, but he didn’t say a word.
- I have something to ask you about, son.
- I’m listening to you, apa.
- Promise me that you will do it.
- Have I ever failed to fulfill your request?
Father was obviously embarrassed by the deliberation of Granny’s speech, which sounded nearly solemn, and the restraint and calm with which she was looking at him.
- Do you love me, son?
- What happened to you, apazhan? Why are you asking?- my father, now utterly alarmed, was getting more and more surprised.- It looks like a storm is going to batter me!
- It’s not a storm,- Granny objected,- but it’s going to rain a little. It’s up to you to prevent it from pouring.
- Don’t you keep me in suspense, Apa!- Father pleaded.
- They brought captives, your enemies. Among them, there is Nurzhan – Burkut has just seen him. We have to rescue him.
Father nearly jumped out of his skin, as if his bed was ablaze.
- You say Nurzhan? Kazybai’s son?
Father’s eyes were glowing, his indifference disappeared without a trace.
I remember an old hawk that lived with us. In summer, he’d doze nearly breathlessly in his nest. But as soon as we showed him a living mouse or a ground squirrel, he heated up. Power rose in his body, and there were twinkles in his eyes.
My father shook up, too, like an old hawk on seeing a prey. His moves acquired a certain firmness. His eyes which had been dim since the day he was injured were now glowing and sparkling like love coals do under a heavy blow of wind.
- They got him!- he hissed with fury and pleasure.- We’ll give him hell now! He can’t keep crumbling us, now it’s his turn!
Father seemed to have completely forgotten about my grandmother.
- You must save him! – My grandmother shouted angrily.- But for Nurzhan, you’d have no mother and no son now. You can’t do evil to pay for good deeds!
- I can’t grant you this wish, Apa! It’s beyond me to deal with things like this.
- I adjure you in the name of everything which is sacred, don’t allow such a disgraceful thing to happen! This will kill me!
- I can’t, apa,- my father said grimly,- I can’t!
Granny got no change out of my father, who gave her the hardest and the most horrible offence: it was utterly uncommon among the Kazakhs not to grant a wish to a senior one.
We, the all-pervasive children, soon came to know that the prisoners had been places in our neighbors’ shabby black yurt and surrounded by armed guards.
In the afternoon, something which looked very much like a festive swing – altybakan, – which was most often made o six poles, was put up on the kotan, the place where sheep slept.
The soldiers wouldn’t let us, the kids, come close to the altybakan. Just like other kids, I failed to understand what it was about, but felth it was going to be no good.
I ran to my grandmother. She was talking to my father in an angry but low voice. As soon as I appeared, they broke off. I rushed to embrace Granny and told her about the strange swing.
- You see, son,- Granny said to my father,- even a child’s heart softened.
Father frowned but said nothing. Granny began to beg him to prevent the disgrace again:
- The respect you, they will obey you, I beg you...
I was turning my fearful glance from Granny to my father and still couldn’t understand a thing. I tried to ask them questions, they didn’t answer me. My heart pounded even harder, I was short of breath.
- I adjure you in the name of the white milk with which I fed you! Stop it!- my grandmother said entreatingly.
Father didn’t raise his drooped eyelids:
- It’s beyond me! Don’t torture me for nothing.
Granny reeled, as if she was going to faint, and said in a flat but firm voice:
- Here’s my final request: at least tell them out of hanging them on the aul kotan. Children and women won’t ever forget it. They’ll get scared in their sleep! Let this wicked thing be done far out of people’s sight.
It was only than that I understood the whole thing. So it’s not only fairy-tales that tell us about such dreary executions. What a horrible swing this altybakan turned out to be. That’s the punishment they want to inflict on Nurzhan and his comrades!
I was falling to pieces. Granny was trying to keep me at home, finding gentle words to persuade me. In the meanwhile, a crowd was gathering around the kotan. People from nearby camps were there, too. My ill father left the yurt, too. In spite of my grandmother’s prohibition, I seized the moment and ran away as well. Childhood! Quite unable to fathom things, you stare at the world with your curious eyes even when it’s terrible.
Soldiers with rifles were standing by the gallows. They were keeping the crowd away. I pushed my way closer to the scene and saw nooses hanging down from the crossbar. Both the locals and the soldiers were silent. All of a sudden, a strange sound pierced the quiet contemplation. It was the sound of tight ice cover on a river bursting in spring, pressed by the water. There was a shiver all around the crowd. The soldiers were leading the captives to the gallows. I couldn’t see their faces. The captives had sacks wrapped around them. I could only hear iron chains around their feet clinking. The noise was raising and then dying away, and suddenly, it broke off.
They placed the captives onto the scaffold under the nooses.
This was it!..
Suddenly I recognized Zhakan, whom I liked and feared so much, among the soldiers guarding the condemned men. Next to Zhakan, I could see my father adjusting a noose.
- Ageke!- I wanted to cry, but my tongue wouldn’t obey to me.
Desperate, I could see my father throwing the noose on the neck of one of those captives with his own hands. Suddenly I recognized Nurzhan by his coarse voice.
- Ageke!- I shrieked at the top of my voice and, rushing to my father, clinged at him like a little tiger. And I could hear Nuzrhan’s last words:
- God bless your son, Abeu. Let him punish you !
A soldier grabbed me and dragged me away from the gallows.
I was trying to break free, I was crying desperately, but the soldier was stronger than me.
They threw me into the yurt like a kitten, I fell down and hurt myself. Granny rushed to me.
- Ageke hanged Nurzhan!- I cried and wailed even harder.
I don’t remember what happened then. When I woke up and called my grandmother, as was my habit, late at night, noone came up to me.
I threw the curtain of the bed I’d slept in open and saw that our home was rife with silent strangers. Among the strangers, there was my father, too.
- Where’s Granny?- I asked him.
- You have no granny anymore,- he heaved a sigh.
- What do you mean?
- You Granny’s gone to a place from where people never come back.
- Where do you mean?- I still failed to understand him.
- Why torment the child? Tell the truth!- a gray-haired man interfered.- Your grandmother is dead, kid.
Unaware of the bitter meaning of this word, I rushed to Granny’s bed – she was lying there motionless, drawn up to the full length, hear head thrown back a little.
- You killed Granny!- I cried at the top of my lungs and ran out, sobbing.
THE BEGINNING OF VAGRANCY
A saying was well-known in steppe auls back then, “Allah saves a shabby yurt.” The reason was that during a storm, yurts made of old, worn blankets turned out to be the most enduring. If a yurt had many holes, the wind blew through it as if it was a sieve, while, stumbling across a thick blanket of which a rich and decent yurt was made, it often toppled it.
That’s why the Kazakhs said god to patronize shabby yurts. But one cannot live by one’s hope for god only. The nomads invented a protection against the violent wind of the steppe.
To prevent a yurt from toppling, they tie zhelbau – a tight rope made of horse hair – on both sides of its wooden frame, shanyrak; before a storm, they tie the zhelbau to a pole and pitch the pole. This wind pole, called zhel-kazyk, is a sacred thing in each yurt, it descends from grandfathers to fathers and is treasured. We had such a zhel-kazyk, too, it was made of a honeysuckle trunk.
My parents said it to have come from my great-grandfather, Subetei.
My grandmother was like a zhel-kazyk to my family. When she died, it took us long to put up our yurt again after the heavy blows of year 1916, as is pieces of worn blanket and broken frame were scattered all around.
But before I begin telling you this story, I’d like to say a couple of words to describe funerals in our parts.
The custom of digging a deep well of a grave for the dead came to us from our distant ancestors. A dome called kumbez was built over the wells. Out ancestors built such a kumbez on the bank of the Karakengir River. Bricks with melted goat fat added to them and hardened with horse hair were produced for it. As old people said, such a kumbez was resistant to time, wind, and water. It must be just the same even now. The well inside a kumbez was laid out with narrow planks. That’s where they put the dead man. After the body decayed, the bones fell into the pitch. The whole thing, including the well and the kumbez dome, is called sagana.
Only wealthy Kazakhs could build such tombs. Saganas are not very common in our vast steppe. But if one is built, no matter in what end of the steppe a person dies, they’ll bury the body in the family sagana. For instance, our batyr Zhautik, Granny’s husband, died in a hot summer fight against Kenesary. The tomb of his father, Subetei, was as long as a ten days’ horseride. But they wrapped Zhautik’s body in a blanket and brought into his family kumbez.
My grandmother married Zhaman, and our aul was staying on the bank of lake Sarykopa for the winter. That’s where Zhaman died. He was buried on one of the hills on the bank, and the place had been the cemetery of the aul since then. By custom, by grandmother’s body was to be brought there, too. But it couldn’t. One couldn’t keep thinking about customs during those awful days.
On the next day after Granny’s death, my father’s messenger Kairakbai , who was nicknamed Bustler for always being in a hurry and being totally unable to say a word without haste, arrived at the aul at dawn. This time he started talking when he was still panting, too.
- Oiboi, you have to fold the yurt down.
- What’s the matter again?- my father grew anxious.
- The enemy’s coming! Zhakanbek, your brother-in-law, told me.
The news struck Father. They hadn’t buried Granny yet, the bodies of Nurzhan and his comrades were still hanging on the kotan. They left them hanging like that as a deterrent, to make sure that noone would feel like rebelling anymore. Noone dared to come close to the kotan under penalty of death.
Father rushed out of the yurt – the work was already humming around. Nearly all the neighboring yurts were taken to pieces, and some families had already loaded their camels.
- Fold the yurt! – Father ordered.
- What are you going to do with your mother?- Zheneshe said roughly.- Maybe you’re going to leave her here?
My father was going to shout at her, as was his habit, but he choked with the words, frowned and started muttering something in a muffled and furious voice like a wild boar wading through the reeds.
- Why so fresh? I think Burkut was right – you killed her! Didn’t she tell you – have mercy on people, save Nurzhan! You can bury one man in sand, but you can’t bury a lot, you’ll rather choke!
Zheneshe burst into tears and lamented for Granny.
My father was completely lost, not knowing what he should do.
I don’t know how much it could have gone on if Zhakan, dressed in the military way and armed, hadn’t appeared in the yurt.
- Stop bawling!- he shouted at my lamenting mother as if giving an order. – Is the old thing the only one who died? Hundreds of men die in the battlefield. You should thank god for having your husband alive. All in all, the old woman couldn’t live a thousand years.
Zhakan kept giving my mother a noisy lecture for a long time and, when she raised the matter of burying her on the bank of Sarykop, he lost his temper completely.
- Just try and bury her! Can you got there now? Nothing but dust will remain of us all, including Grandmother. Burry her here, and hurry up, and then start packing. If you don’t get packed by the time of mare milking, it will be too late!
Mother was crying bitterly. The thought of granny Narbota lying all alone in the ground, far from her dearest and nearest, of granny who had always held the honor of her family in her hands, was tormenting to her.
It was the saddest and the most hurried funeral ever. They didn’t build a kumbez on the lonely hill near the aul. Nobody came to lay Narbota to rest but our family – everyone was busy, packing for the new travel, which was expected to save them from misfortune. Even mullah didn’t say prayers over Granny’s body, he was nearly the first to rush away from the aul. A semiliterate old man was reading the Quran hastily, with lots of stammering. He didn’t finish that lame reading of his: the news of rebel troops approaching the aul reached us.
We loaded the camels with the rest of our belongings and joined the caravan going away.
That’s how our long way of vagrancy began.
Our family was rocking on the waves of time, like a rickety boar with no rudder or sails. Whatever happened was driving us forth trough the vast steppe like wind drifts the tumbleweed.
Though the dzhigits of Amangeldy had taken our cattle away, at first we didn’t lack meat. Stray sheep and cows, which were numerous in the steppe, came across us. But, as Abai said,
Whatever you earn without working is no good.
It will vanish like melting snow.
Another akyn said,
What wind takes from wind will go back with the wind!
Little time had passed, and the cattle we’d got effortlessly seemed to be gone with the wind!
Now our family was scraping by on hunting. In his young years, my father was quite a good hunter, and it hadn’t been long since he gave it up. It was time for him to take it up again, not for fun but to somehow subsist.
However, hunting was more difficult for my father now than it used to be. He got his left arm injured when fighting against Amangeldy’s soldiers; its sinews were cut with a sable blow. But Father got used to it, he’d prop the gun against the game forearm and triggered it with a finger of his right hand after getting his bead. Father was a good shooter even before. And now, apart from the double-barrel gun his military friends once presented him with, he had two hounds. He had a fast horse, too - Kurai-Kuren, who hardly fell short of anything when compared to the famous Zhylansyrt who had fallen in the battlefield.
Fortune was still taking care of us. We had no lack of food.
Avoiding our enemies brought us to Tosyn, and Irgiz, and the Karakum Desert. We never stopped for a long time, as if the ground was burning under our feet.
The news of the Tsar’s dethronement found us in the Karakum Desert. I was nearly eight then. I remember my grandmother saying about a sly man, “They’d been baying him for so long that he grew as nimble as a fox tail”. I was just like that. I’ve been to all kinds of places, I’ve faced all kinds of dangers, I’ve been called all kinds of names. But I tolerated it all, I could get anywhere and find out anything. I could see the different ways in which people reacted to the news of the downfall of the autocracy. Some jumped with joy: “Now we have freedom! god grant, they’ll rip the white camel open!” The others wanted to come back to their camps. But they crouched and his in their exile like a clasp-knife and never revealed their true feelings to anyone.
My father, who hadn’t shown any great sedateness and equanimity before, used one and the same phrase to answer everyone:
- We’ll see what the elip tells us.
He meant fate, sheep-ball reading, in which the forty first ball, elip, is crucial.
Shortly speaking, Father was waiting.
Summer came to replace spring. People began to talk about the whites, defenders of the rich, and the reds, defenders of the poor. What shall we do now, whom shall we follow? But my father’s answer was one and the same:
- We’ll see what the elip tells us.
We spent the following winter in the Karakum Desert, too.
Now people said that the Kazakhs had divided into the whites and the reds, too, and that the whites were headed by Zhakynbek Dautov and the reds – by Amangeldy Imanov. And the whites seemed to be defeating the reads. But my father kept saying:
- We’ll see what the elip tells us.
Finally, another news reached us – the reads had defeated the whites and were driving them all around the steppe.
That’s when my father took real alarm and, for the first time, didn't refer to the elip.
Once, when the cruel winter of the Karakum Desert was waning, a man I didn’t know appeared in our house.
He and my father kept discussing something in a low voice for a long time, but the curious Kairakbai who was sticking to my father like a bur was bothering them a great deal, he was dying to know who the stranger and what they were whispering about so mysteriously and for so long. Finally, my father couldn’t stand it anymore and sent away the curious Kairakbai and his wife Katira, who was helping my mother about the house.
When there was nobody but our family left in the house and all the safety measures were taken, Father said, pointing at the stranger.
- This dzhigit came to us from Zhanybek. But button up your mouth! Remember – one word was revealed through thirty teeth, and all the thirty clans head it. Zhanash is safe and sound, he’s broken away from the whites and wants us to go to go to Turkestan. Zhanash claims that we have nothing to fear in Turkestan – Amangeldy won’t go there. Now he’s in Turgai, gaining strength and holding the power.
- What is Turkestan?- my mother got scared and burst into tears.- Wandering around again!
- Why do you cry? There are nice places in Turkestan, too. We’ll live on the Syra, relatives of Ishan Maral live in Karmakchi – they’ll welcome us. No two ways about it.
As I found out later, Ishan Maral was our grandfather Maldybai’s brother-in-law. Father had been to these parts as a child. On the bank of the Syra, there is a kumbez – Ishan Maral’s tombstone, and miserable and ill people come to this monument from all over the steppe. Both Maral and his son Kalkan and his grandson Tobagabyl are treated as saints. Near the kumbez, people build a mosque and a medrese.
The morning after, my father gathered all his friends and relatives, slaughtered a sheep and announced that he was going to Karmakchi.
They started asking him what the reason of such an unexpected departure was. Father showed great artfulness in finding a glib excuse:
- Burkut is growing up, we have to put him on his feet, and they have a medrese there.
- Why can’t he study in Turgai?
- It’s worse there, they’re still wandering. Above all, Amangeldy’s holding the power in Turgai. Will he leave us in peace if he knows how sharp our teeth are? It will be better on the Syra. Before the Turkestani know who I am, my son will leave school.
After a certain meditation, my father finished:
- I’ll remind you of a folk story:
A koulan faces a great misfortune.
The koulan is lashing and rushing like and arrow,
And he forgets in his fear
That his baby has fallen behind.
Let each of us seek refuge on his own. We shouldn’t be angry with each other. But if you want to go with me, pack your belongings tomorrow in the morning!
Our family woke up at dawn and started taking the yurt to pieces straightaway. Half-awake, I could hear my mother sobbing:
- Wasn’t it enough that we wandered because of you... And you’re forcing us to go god knows where again...
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST
Autumn was already coming when, moving slowly along the bank of the Syr Darya, we and Karakbai’s family, finally reached Karmakchi. Syr Darya seemed to me, who hadn’t seen a river bigger than the thin Turgai in the steppe, to be a cast sea. If the Syr wasn’t a great river, they wouldn’t have added the word Darya, meaning deep, big, to its name.
Ishan Maral’s relatives, as my father had expected, were warmly welcoming to us.
We stayed in a squad wattle-and-daub house with small windows and a flat roof. The locals call such houses tams. Behind the aul, on a little hill, there was a cemetery.
Next to the squad sun-dried buildings of the aul, on the low hill among the tombstones, Ishan Maral’s kumbez, which looked like a mosque, looked very particular. Near the dome, there stood two towers: one was low but as wide as the trunk of a one hundred year old tree, while the second was twice as thin and twice as high.
The dwellers of the aul, though very proud of being the ishan’s relatives, weren’t very rich. Maral’s successor, Ishan Mukhamedzhan was believed to be the richest man in his clan, but he had only nine camels, about a hundred sheep, and a herd of horses. Not all descendants of Maral lived in Karmakchi; some of them had settled in the Turgai Uyezd in the Land of the Sand Tree – Kumdy-Agach, the others lived in the north, near Petropavlovsk – Kyzyl-Kare. People say some of them were really rich. The most honorable of the local Maral’s descendants one was Mukhamedzhan. The one who wanted to become a faithful Muslim, ishan’s servant – a Murid – had, first of all, to go to Mukhamedzhan and to present his regards to him. The ill asked him to heal them, he taught children at the medrese, and people from all the nearby auls came to the mosque near his house on religious holidays, or acts, bringing generous gifts to him. The faithful respected the spirit of Ishan Maral, and his offsprings gained quite a profit from it. In the beginning of 1918, the Soviet authority was set up in Karmakchi. The most fervent devotees of the Soviet government were a Russian called Kerzhut and a Kazakh called Zhorabek, who browbeat the local religious moneybags. Kerzhut and Zhorabek hated the bai and the mullah more than anyone in the world. Short before we arrived, they appeared in the aul on the holiday of act, just when people were reading namaz. They accused Ishan Iskhak of making religious propaganda and cluttering minds of the poor with harmful fiction. He called him a bourgeois, beat him and took to Ak-Mosque, where they kept him in prison for two months.
Believers had been quite reluctant to bow to the remains of Ishan Maral and to present their regards to Mukhamedzhan since then. Those who still worshipped the holy spirit of Maral tried to do it secretly, at night. Generous gifts were out of the question. But the medrese was still working, and Ishan Mukhamedzhan was still ruling it. The medrese was now called simply a school, and Mukhamedzhan was dubbed its administrator. But in fact nothing changed and one couldn’t get any knowledge but that on religion at school. My father sent me to Mukhamedzhan for schooling. – Train your tongue for a while, - he said, - study here, and we’ll see later. So I went there to repeat what I couldn’t understand – alif, ba, ta, like Russian schoolboys repeated in old times – az, buky, vede. It didn’t last long and ended with my saying to Father stubbornly:
- I’m not going to school anymore.
He didn’t even insist. Instead of school, I began to go hunting with my father and Kairakbai and very soon got used to the unfamiliar and peculiar nature of the banks of Syr Darya. It was hard to get used to the stately deep river holding so much fresh water. The winter here seemed to be very strange to me, too. Later I came across Pushkin’s words that “...our northern summer is a travesty of the southern winter.” Winter on the Syr Darya is a travesty of our Turgai autumn. In our Turgai, winter is a true one. Much snow falls out at once and lies untouched till the very spring, clean and white. On the banks of the Syr Darya, snow falls and then melts, and one’s legs sink in the impassable mud. But how strong the wind can be in these parts! One can hardly stand on one’s feet under the blow of such wind; the cold strikes one to the marrow, burning one’s face and hands. Sometimes the wind in heavy in Turgai, too, but I’ve never seen a wind like that there.
The three of us went hunting almost every day before winter came. Father would mount his dark-ginger Kurai, Kairakbai – his sturdy yellowish bay horse, and I – a five-year-old one I was given on the day of my circumcision. We took two hounds along, my father was always carrying his gun, and Kairakbai had bags and cartridge-boxes on his belt and behind his shoulders. Father took a saddle-bag, korzhun, just in case we had to stay for a night somewhere, put there a small copper bucket with a tripod stand for cooking meat. Looking out for me, Father took a little dry spicy qurut and curdy irimshik. He never stored anything for himself, remembering that the food of a man and a wolf lay on the road. We rode along the bank of the river, across the occasional sand-drifts, tangles of tamarisk, oleaster, the thorny zhyngyl, and saxaul bushes. Pheasants and hares were common here.
If the bushes by the water were fallen by the locals, we went further. The real hunt began in the midwood.
One pheasant after another would fly from under the bushes here, disturbed by our hounds, and Father would shoot one of them or even both right in the air. Kairakbai and I hardly managed to take the birds shot down. The hounds helped us. Father shot one bird after another, he had sharp eyes and found a target immediately. He could kill a hundred pheasants on a day, but every time, having shot about a dozen, he stopped the hunt, “That will do for today, we’ll have what god sends us tomorrow. Let’s have dinner”. I kept asking my father about how he managed to become such a good shooter.
– My hands feel the bird! A real shooter is the one who doesn’t dab for a long time but hits the aim at once, - my father said.
In the tangles of the Kyzyl Kum, one could also find hares, but they were so small and scraggy that Father didn’t hunt them being too sorry. “Let them grow up a little”, he said and didn’t even let his hounds chase the leverets.
But on wolves and, especially, jackals, Father had no mercy. He hated jackals as if they were his arch-enemies and chased these predators with reddish-brown fur, that looked very much like dogs, with great cruelty. He didn’t stop it before the animal was killed. He told me much about their disgusting habits. They were scary and distasteful to hear: “A jackal is a special beast – if it fails to get some food, it’ll dig a dead body out of the grave; if it comes across an unarmed man, it’s sure to tear him to pieces.”
During our wandering around the Kyzyl Kum, I came to truly understand how fascinating hunting was. One can not only hunt for days, one can hunt for weeks and months on end...
Perhaps the whole Syr Darya winter could have been so amazing to us, but once my father and I nearly got lost in the Kyzyl Kum during a heavy storm. Since then, my mother was dead set to never let me go hunting, and father didn’t like to go alone and was reluctant to part with me.
My heart, which was used to fast ride, camp fire, and chasing of animals, went sick within four walls of the little sun-dried tam. It was sickening to slouch around the house in my wearing idleness and distract my family, who were doing their own business.
Kairakbai and I began to run away to the ice-holes in which the dwellers of the surrounding auls got their fish. We stuck there all day, and this was at least a way to fill our forced idleness. Father went to Ak-Mosque on business about which noone but he knew a thing, then to Tashkent.
He didn’t come home empty-handed – he brought a bridewealth for my elder sisters, the twenty-year-old Meruert and for Zhibek, who was eighteen. He arranged it for them to marry some bais’ sons not from around where we lived.
To drive cattle was too dangerous in that time, as the Soviet government began addressing the issue of bridewealth in that very year. They resorted to cunning: the grooms were to take along silk, velvet, tea, and carpets, and my father brought money – those of the Tsar and English papers. The Nickolay money could somehow pass muster, though my father backed the wrong horse again, but why would he need English papers?
As Father came back, he brought sadness into out house. When Meruert and Zhibek learned they were to marry, they burst into tears. Seeing it, my mother started crying and lamenting, too.
- Couldn’t you wait for a while? Aren’t Zhibek and Meruert your own children? Why do you send them away, to strange parts? They’ll never see their motherland!
Father was silent for a long time, his head drooped, as if looking for an excuse for the haste with which he bestowed his daughters in marriage. Finally, when my mother quieted down a little, he said:
- Dear, where was it that you saw a daughter who was the supporter of her family? Isn’t it for strangers that we bring up our daughters? Who can keep a girl in her parents’ house? We have to arrange it for them before it’s too late. I’m not going to marry my daughters off to paupers: one is a bai’s son and the other’s a son of a rich merchant from Tashkent. What kind of happiness do they need? And who knows how long we are to wander about till we reach our native land?
Soon, the intended one of Meruert came to visit us. He was far from young, about thirty five or forty years old. His neatly shaven chin made him look a little younger. As we found out eventually, he already had two wives apart from Meruert, first he married a very young girl and then his zhengei, his elder brother’s widow.
Poor Meruert! Seeing her groom, she nearly fainted. We somehow helped her mount the camel and bid our farewell – and Meruet left her family forever.
After several days, Zhibek was gone, too. Zhibek’s groom had nothing in common with Datke, Meruert’s husband, but his shaven head. Though he was a half-blood, kurama, as we call it, it was almost impossible to distinguish him from a real Uzbek. A smooth swarthy face, fluent Uzbek speech, and he was wearing just what the Uzbeks usually do – a bright chapan made of striped silk girdled with four to five kerchiefs, white pants, ichigs, a black skullcap instead of a hat.
Zhibek’s intended one claimed himself to be twenty five. It could be true. But his excess weight and the slate-gray color of his shaven face made him look much older.
His rosy, open-hearted disposition and cordial attitude to the others helped him win over all the relatives in time. He called the seniors “ake” with great respect, he called my mother “apa” and us, the kids, his little brothers. When Kairakbai’s wife Katira, having received the bridewealth, as the custom was, showed him Zhibek, he started billing and cooing, flooding the bride with words of affection and kisses. Being very shy, Zhibek was hiding her head.
I wasn’t on a camel that Zhibek left us. She and her husband got into a tarantass with two horses put to it. She was sad and pale at the moment of her departure. It turned out that she had a good reason for being said. She had to be the second wife of the funny plump merchant from Tashkent, just like her sister.
After my sisters left, our house became sad and silent. Mother was still scolding my father for having given his daughters to strangers so easily. At first, Father said nothing, then he grew more and more irritated and, finally, left, too. In fact, he was tired of being idle and started reselling textiles somewhere near Orenburg and in Turkestan.
Not to stay idle all alone, I went to fishermen or spent some time with Kairakbai. He was not only my father’s messenger, but also a relative of ours. Our fifth-generation great-grandfather Saudabai had five wives. Kairakbai’s father Tuiakbai was born from his youngest wife, tokal.
As it was in every Kazakh family, children of the senior wife, or baibishe, dominated the house. They did their best to humiliate the tokal’s children, who most often tolerated their bitter lot. But sometimes it was just the other way. The tokal’s children who didn’t want to tolerate humiliation grew up to be cheeky and headstrong. Sometimes they even overmastered the baibishe’s children. This is how our fourth-generation great-grandparent Moldabai did.
This son of Saudbai’s third tokal gathered all brothers and neighbors around himself and made the baibishe’s children toe the line. The timid and quiet Tuiakbai believed Moldabai to be his defender and patron and spent his whole life pasturing his cattle. When you get down to it, he was no more than a work-hand in our family.
Rumor has it that Tuiakbai’s wife had an affair with my father. People must have told the truth, as both Kairakbai’s appearance and his temper were amazingly similar to those of my father.
Their arc-shaped Mongol eyes and the very glance of them were very nearly the same, Kairakbai showed great deftness and swiftness, jut like my father, that’s why people called him Bustler. I think the only thing he lacked was my father’s energy and perseverance. Kairakbai was very limp and thoughtless. He had no property, no clothes, no horse of his own – whatever he had was my father’s. He only slept in a separate yurt. However, I have to give him credit – Father never had a dzhigit more faithful and dexterous than Kairakbai. He hadn’t been charged with any spade work since long before, he was just a messenger, an associate. To tell the truth, my mother was very cold to him for a long time. But eventually, her ill feeling disappeared, too, and Kairakbai became an insider in our family.
Everyone knew Kairakbai to be a passionate dandy. Good clothes and a light fast horse were meat and drink to him. My parents indulged that passion of his, knowing how Kairakbai, a funny joker, song and fun lover, relished his success with women.
The humorous Kairakbai had another soft spot. He liked gathering kids, unsophisticated boys around him, on the quiet, and teaching them most refined vile language. What fun it was to him when a little boy all of a sudden swore at his parents or even at Kairakbai with the strongest words without even understanding them. Among his pupils, I was a talented one. It was only when I grew up that I gave up the habit.
Kairakbai also liked to give children a gross description of relationships between girls and dzhigits. But it was no surprise to us. We were growing up in the aul, in our yurts. Poetic stories were a different thing – they told us about Kozy-Korpesh and Baian-Supu, Kyz-Zhybek, Segpil-Malik, Zhusip-Zlikha! Listening to him, I thought, “Oh my God! Will I ever love the way they do!”
We spent the whole winter like this. Father came back, and we moved from our wattle-and-daub tam to the dzhailiau, on which we lived in a gray felt yurt.
During that time, we had an unexpected guest, one of the most outstanding Kazakh characters in Ak-Mosque. His surname was Aralbaiev. He was dressed in the Russian way, the only Kazakh element was his marten hat with black canvas top. Lean, tall and all tucked up, with sunken brown eyes, he had dignified and simple manners. He must have been my father’s close acquaintance, as he came to feel at ease in our house very soon and called my father Abeke and my mother zheneshe straightaway. It was then that I first heard the strange and obscure word – the Entente.
I couldn’t catch the point of their conversation. They were talking about the West pressing the Soviets, about basmachis appearing somewhere near Samarkand and Bukhara, headed by an Anuar-pasha. The lean stranger claimed that the Soviet State, pressed in the West and in the East, wouldn’t last.
- You know, Abeke, Amangeldy’s dead.
Father was glad to hear this. He began to ask for details of the murder.
- I don’t know who killed him, but it’s our men, - Aralbaiev, as the stranger’s name was, answered, and suddenly asked:
- Abeke, you must know where Zhakynbek Dautov is now. He’s your son-in-law.
- I don’t,- trying to be indifferent, my father responded. But Mother was all attention.
- Will you give me a present, suiunshi, if I tell you where he is now? – Aralbaiev said humorously.
- Whatever you wish!- Mother exclaimed.
- Your Zhakyn is now the judge of Chingistau, in our akyn Abai’s aul!
- I’ll believe anything but his being a judge!
- A most true man told me this. In Tashkent. This man is Abai’s younger brother, Iskhak's grandson, a dzhigit called Daniar. Don’t you still believe me?
- May you have butter in your mouth, my dear!- Mother said and burst into tears of joy.
It looked like Aralbaiev could declare publicly. After that he and my father went out to continue their conversation. After coming back, they had some jerked meat and rice, drank some tea, and Aralbaiev was about to set out. He had already put on his coat and marten hat when, as something very important occurred to him, he shouted to Kairakbai:
- Hey, dzhigit! Bring me the korzhun lying near you!
When Kairakbai brought him the korzhun, Aralbaiev untied it and took out a pack of little books in gray covers. Then he took out a pen and an inkpot.
- Your name’s Abutalip. And your surname? – he asked my father.
- Zhautikov.
- Well, Abutalip Zhautikov,- Aralbaiev repeated and wrote something in one of the books quickly.
He put the rest of the pack of books, as well as the pen and inkpot, into the korzhun, and stretched the book in which he’d written something to my father.
- What’s this?- Father was surprised.
- It’s a party card.
- Oiboi what kind of card is it?
- Do take it. You’ll need it. I’ve given such cards to many of our men. Hide it in the chest for a while.
When my father came home after seeing Aralbaiev off he spent a long time turning the little gray book in his hands and studying it.
- What a trickster,- he was astonished at Aralbaiev.- Son of a famous bai, he somehow joined the communist party himself and gives party card to the first comer! Oh, God, forgive me, the sinner, - my father heaved a sigh and hid the little book in the chest.
HOW I ATE SNAKE MEAT
In earlier days, when a torrid summer came to the banks of the Syr Darya, cattle breeder would drive their herds to the sands of the Kyzyl Kum or the Kara Kum. Since time immemorial, wells with walls stabilized with sazaul were dug in these deserts. These wells saved more than one generation of cattle breeding Kazakhs from devastation, even in the hardest years.
It was harder on tillers. They had to dig out aryks and stream water from the Syr Darya to their fields with their help.
But the Syr Darya is quite q whimsical river. It’s produced by the conflux of two rivers, the Kara Darya, starting from the Pamir glaciers, and the Naryn, which is born in the Tian Shan chimes.
This is why it often has fever. In certain years, it overflows in winter, filling the banks, and people have to move hurriedly to other places to avoid dying. But sometimes, the Syr Darya gets so shallow that one cannot even irrigate little infields. In the years of high water, crops, fruit, and vegetables are abundant, in the years of shoaling, one should expect a famine.
It was not joy but grief that year 1920 brought to dwellers of the Syr Darya area. For the whole winter and spring, people were waiting for the Syr Darya to overflow, watering the dry ground, and the year would be fruitful then, and the tiller would be happy.
But winter passed, then spring, and summer came, but the Syr Darya didn’t just fail to overflow, it grew so shallow that nothing but thin and muddy stripes glistening in the sun remained of the mighty deep river.
The people, in the memory of which the terror of the famine of the previous year still lingered, used buckets to carry water, at least to water their vegetable gardens, which could be found near each house. Wilted spouts of their crops grew yellow and died as soon as they reached the surface.
They had nothing to feed their cattle with, the grass was growing yellow and dry. The Syr Darya valleys were cracked and dried, whitish blotches of salt-marshes were showing on the surface more and more often.
It was in that summer that I came to fully understand the true meaning of the Kazakh saying, “There’s one trouble in a kyr (a kyr is a hilly area with sowings and pastures) and a thousand troubles in the Syr Darya.”
If the trouble resulting from the shallowing of the Syr Darya was limited to a drought, it could be less painful. But the draught on the banks of the river, indeed, brought myriad misfortunes, from which every living thing suffered – the cattle, the people, and the crops.
The nature seemed to have meant a dangerous and fierce enemy for each and every living creature in the steppe.
As soon as the summer heat had dried the last of the poor grass, camels, in search of their feed, come across reeds, which are mostly located on swampy spots of clay along the bank. That is where danger is waiting for them. Horse-flies attack the camels in hordes. Their stings is even more painful, as the camels’ hair’s just been cut short, and now, without the thick cover, they are utterly helpless. Going mad with the unbearable pain, the camels roll on the ground.
Some of them, mostly timid and patient, use their legs and heads to send the horse-flies down in fury. The frequent beating makes the camel’s body swell, and many animals die eventually.
It was more than once that I saw dozens of cows running all around the steppe with their tail in the air, bellowing wildly. It was hard to believe that the calm, languid animals could stand such galloping. The fact that it was just the gay-colored Spanish-flies, a king of horse-flies, that turned the cows to flight. But this Spanish fly, looking quite innocent, was just as dangerous an enemy for the cow as the horse-fly is for the camel.
Only sheep and goat are afraid neither of horse -flies nor of Spanish flies. But in the years of draught, forest flies won’t leave goats in peace, and sheep die of the disease which the Kazakhs call sekirpte.
As old people say, this disease is caused by small white worms. They usually get into the nostrils of sheep and exasperate the mucosa. The poor sheep won’t pasture, it kicks itself in the face with its front legs, jumps, and dies exhausted. The literary meaning of the word “sekirpte” is “making one jump”.
Every spring, as soon as the snow melted and the first green showed, the people of our aul would get equipped with purple willow broom and go to destroy the locust larvae. In autumn, the locusts lays their eggs in clay. For the whole winter, these eggs are stored in the ground, and in spring, when the sun shines and the snow melts, little white red-headed worms develop – the lost larvae. A little more time passes, and the larvae turn into locusts. The locals try to sweep them out to one place in time, before the worms grow wings, they lay dried reeds over them and burn them. But it doesn’t mean that herds of locusts won’t come here from some other place to destroy all of our sowings in summer.
How numerous the misfortunes are which can take the Syr Darya dweller anytime! Not to mention black widows, scorpions, tarantulas, and snakes – their bites can be lethal. But people get used to them so much that is a scorpion or a black widow happens to appear on the spread called dastarkhan while people are having dinner, noone will be surprised or jump or even scream. All in all, one can send the scorpion to glory right here, and that’s the end to the agitation.
Sometimes it’s harder, when in a dry summer, myriads of yellow mosquitoes – sary-masa, as we call them – are flying in circles over each house and yurt. There are mosquitoes in Turgai, too, but their bites are almost harmless. A man has never died of Turgai fever. But the bites of sary-masa, especially in earlier days, could cause one of the most horrible diseases ever-dengue fever. Dengue fever killed one of my sisters and Kairakbai’s daughter. There was almost no escaping it back then. If summer is rainy, the mosquitoes’ wings get wet soon, preventing them from flying long distances. But during a draught, herds of mosquitoes rise from the reeds, and there’s no place they cannot reach. They get into every chink and haut one night and day.
Wealthy people move to a light and thick tent called masakhana in summer. But not every family can afford a masakhana. Some will suffer for the whole summer. Though I was just a young boy, I had to go through some of the thousand misfortunes of the Syr Darya. First, there was an outbreak of smallpox in our parts in that year. I don’t know what miracle saved me.
But how Bulis, my peer, was disfeatured by smallpox! She was growing to be a slender and attractive girl, but now, after she had the disease, her face seemed to be a reddish patchwork.
As soon as I recovered after smallpox, I fell a victim to a snake. That’s how it was.
Once I was at home, messing about with my unsophisticated toys. Close to me, a fluffy tigroid cat called Zholbarys was dozing. All of a sudden, the cat jumped to his paws, arching his back, and mewed drawingly with anxiety. Over the shoes in the game, I lifted my head and, to my horror, I saw a gray snake with black spots on it not far from the cat! Zholbarys was shifting from one paw to another, snorting, but he didn’t venture to approach the snake. He bristled, which made him look like a hedgehog, and was glowering at the unfamiliar enemy.
I was frozen with terror and surprise. But Zholbarys finally contrived to hit the snake first with one paw and then with the other, it looked like he was enjoying it, as he began to mill the snake with both hands without a pause, hitting wherever he happened to hit. In the meanwhile, the furious snake started coiling around Zholbarys’s body. He started meowing desperately. I felt sorry for the cat and finally plucked up the heart to step forward stretched my hand out and grabbed the snake on the head. It bit my finger. I howled with pain. At that moment, my father entered the house.
He understood what the matter was at once.
- It stung you, didn’t it?
I howled even louder, showing him the finger.
Father didn’t try to comfort me, instead he caught the snake deftly and hid it into a small thick sack.
Horrified, I could see the wound on my finger getting black and felt the pain growing more intense.
Father clutched at my hand, and we rushed to Ishan Iskhan, who doctored the locals for all the diseases they could or couldn’t think of.
Iskhak hung the snake by the tail, tying its head to a pitched pole. Then he went on his knees by the snake and started murmuring.
“What on earth will the end be like?” I was thinking.
Iskhak placed me and my father near himself and sent everyone else out. He ordered us to be silent and not to call him by his first name on any pretext.
Ishan was murmuring till evening came, and then he ordered us to close our eyes. We did. At that moment, we heard a strange sound. When we opened our eyes the snake was cut in two pieces.
- I split the snake with a prayer,- Iskhak explained.- Now take half of the snake and make broth of it:
Allah will drive off all of your diseases
When you have snake sorpa.
I don’t know what rescued me. The sting was very painful. I was all swollen and was suffocating in fever. But after I had the snake soup, I soon turned the corner.
TOI ON THE HOP
My mother didn’t appreciate the beauty of Syr Darya. She was missing her dear Turgai more and more and kept bothering my father, begging him to go back.
- You said the turbulent time’s over, that the people have calmed down. Why can’t we go back to Turgai? Hungry or not, home is best than the outland.
At first father tried to persuade her:
- Why are you so anxious to come back home? We have nothing but our devastated house there. There’s nothing for us to do in our Turgai so far. We aren’t very rich here, either, but it’s not bad, Allah be thanked. Out table isn’t empty – we eat butter and drink tea, and who know what will come then?
Once, Father said:
- Yesterday I came across an acquaintance – he’s just come here from Turgai. He said that one can’t get more than a pud of millet for five sheep or a cow; the cattle’s hidebound, the people are poor. And you keep harping on your Turgai.
Mother seemed to have yielded to my father’s compelling arguments and didn’t bother him with her pleases anymore.
In autumn, the Syr Darya banks were starving, too. Many paupers appeared here – they escaped from wasted areas. Not every family could give shelter and sufficient food to such a pauper –the life was getting rougher and rougher.
Our family might have seemed to be living in the small way, merely holding head above the water. But it was not exactly like this.
As I have already said, when my father sent his elder daughters, Zhibek and Meruert, to Tashkent, he got many cuts of costly material from their husbands. He his those cuts in the ura – the bread-stоring pit dug under the oven.
One night, my father along with Kairakbai and Tekebai took out all the cuts from the ura, and they started digging the pit, which was quite deep, even deeper and wider. They made it look like a foxhole with numerous branches. And we, the kids, were taking out the clay and heaping it in the yard. We covered it with litter immediately so that noone could guess what was happening. We were given strict orders to keep silent.
We spent several night working like this.
Soon we came to know why our father needed to dig such a huge storing pit secretly.
Every day, as soon as the daylight faded, strangers began to come to us.
Later I found out that they were workers of the orphan house and the asylum in Ak-Mosque. They would bring bags of corn and other food, instead of the corn, Father gave them clothes and textiles. By the time winter came, Father had got rid of most of the textiles and filled the pit with crops. Many times my mother tried to pry into the secret, asking about where those people were getting so much bread and why we needed it. He smiled mysteriously and said:
- The woman has long hair and short wits. Can’t you understand that each single grain will turn into gold? This wheat will make us happy.
Father knew what he was doing.
But I didn’t chance to see him growing rich that time. More and more paupers and starving men were appearing on the banks of the Sur Darya. Swollen and pale, they came to our aul for alms, too. To free me from the sad scenes and to give me the opportunity to learn to read and write a little, father took me to Ak-Mosque in early winter. He was going to place me in the
“Orphan Commune”.
I didn’t know what a commune meant, but I understood what the word “orphan” meant. The only thing I couldn’t fathom was why they wanted to send me to an orphanage if I had a father.
I kept asking my father questions, but he never gave me a clear answer. It was Aralbaiev, at whose place we stayed when in Ak-Mosque.
Narrowing his sly small eyes and twitching his eyebrows, Aralbaiev explained to me the whole thing in the right order.
- To make it easier for you, let’s replace the word “commune” with a simple word – “house”. “Orphan house”. At the moment, four hundred fifty children are raised in this house, but they all are children of wealthy people, like your father. Real orphans make about fifty people there, not more. From now on, you’ll live and study with those children.
- I don’t want to live in an orphan house. I’m not an orphan, I’ve got a mother and a father.
- Your son’s quite funny,- Aralbaiev said to my father.
- Well, do you want to study, then?- Aralbaiev bent his wide eyebrows, piercing me with his fierce eyes of a snake.
- I do,- I said gruffly. The more I looked at this man, the more I disliked him.
- And do you know that the Soviet government doesn’t like children of rich men? What will you do when they start persecuting us, who’ll let you, son of a bai, go to school? Go study at the commune while you can, follow the advice of the seniors! They mean well.
Unable to fathom what Aralbaiev was trying to infix in my mind, I turned to my father, as if looking to him for protection. But Father was on Aralbaiev’s side – he believed that I should stay in the commune, too.
On the following day, they took me to a beautiful large house with a vast fruit garden. It used to be the homestead of a famous Uzbek man of wealth, who fled abroad after the Kokand Autonomy fell. In 1920, the house was conveyed to the child commune.
The so called “Orphan House” was a horrible sight.
Along with little kids, who were probably three or four years old, grown-up girls and young men were living there. Real orphans were only plenty among the infants, while the grown-ups mostly belonged to well-off families. They were ashamed of the rough clothes issued by the government and put on those of their own, which they had taken from their home, when they went to town.
Everything I saw in the commune during my first days there was a lot of suffering to me. I couldn’t understand how those sons and daughters of bais could happen to live in the commune created for true orphans, for starving, miserable children, dozens of whom were dying in the streets of the town. And, finally, why was I sent here, too? Admittedly, I was a good pupil, I liked attending lessons, but I was neither starving nor barefooted!
At the end of winter, the news about an inspection committee headed by Gani Muratbaiev, a man who was already famous in our parts, coming here from Tashkent reached us. He was said to be only eighteen and to work as the secretary of the Central Committee of Komsomol of the Republic of Turkestan.
The commune was in a flurry. It wasn’t only our administrators that got scared. The “orphans” were whispering anxiously in the corners, too, speculating and conjecturing.
On the day when the committee was to arrive, they gave us identical suits to wear and lined us in the wide corridor. The administrator told us that, when the guests entered, we would hear the “Attention” command. On that command, we were to bolt upright and to respond to the greeting with a loud and harmonious salem.
I was so excited that my heart was nearly bursting. The “Attention!” command, which came all of a sudden, was like a thunderbolt to me. I shuddered, and at that very moment I saw strangers walking along the corridor. It was the committee. I felt like the committee was bound to come up to me, then everyone would stop, and a horrible, irretrievable thing would happen. I stood there red as fire with my eyes down and ready to shed tears. I was ashamed.
Someone took me by the chin. I lifted my head.
In front of me, I saw a very young dzhigit with a moustache just growing, black-haired, black-eyed, with an open and bright-looking face.
- What’s your name, boy?- the friendly dzhigit said.
The administrator of the commune stepped forward, bowing ingratiatingly and shifting his wheedling look from me to the dzhigit:
- Boy, this is our senior friend, our aga. His name is Gani Muratbaiev.
But the dzhigit waved the administrator aside with a confident move:
- Don’t interfere. We can talk on out own. Don’t be shy, boy. So what’s your name?
- Burkut Zhautikov,- I said in a loud and brave voice.
- That’s a good name, Burkut. Do you have parents?
- I do.
- Is your father very poor? You don’t seem to look like the son of a poor man? Don’t be afraid, be honest!
I was short of breath and blurted out nearly unwillingly:
- My father is a bai!
- Thank you for your honest answer,- the dzhigit said.- You are a good boy.
- Children, who don’t have parents? Raise your hands!
I looked around. I could see several hands raising shyly over the line.
- I knew it, Sulteke,- the dzhigit said, turning to one of his comrades,- we can see one orphan for ten sons of a bai. It’s clear now, let’s go to the office, we’ll have a lot of things to do now!
When the members of the committee were gone, I was sent to the commune administrator and rebuked:
- What have you done?!
My cup was full – besides lying at every step, they wanted me to lie, too. They wanted me to lie to Gani Muratbaiev and to pretend to be an orphan!
On the following day, I fled the commune and went to Karmakchi. It was the right thing to do, as soon all sons and daughters of bais were kicked out of there.
I somehow managed to get home. At first, my father was very surprised and anxious. But when he heard me out, he calmed down. He was even glad to a certain degree at having got off so cheap.
...While I was absent, the life of my family changed a lot. The first thing I learned after crossing the threshold was that Tekebai, my elder brother who was already twenty years old, was getting married.
The bride was already in our house. As I found out, she hadn’t come o age yet, father was trying to hide the fact from me and was reluctant even to show her to me. He bought her for a half a pud of millet from poor me swollen with starvation. The girl’s parents ventured to take the awful step to save themselves and their daughter.
My father’s cruelty made me sick. And still I wanted to have a look at the girl. Kairakbai’s wife, Katira, to whom I was younger brother-in-law, helped me to do it. As the Kazakh custom was, she could show me the bride of my elder brother, the only thing I had to do was give her a korimdik, that is, a present for the right to see the bride.
Finding a good opportunity, we got into the house where the girl was living. Katira threw the curtain open - and I couldn’t believe my eyes.
It was a very beautiful thin girl. She had some resemblance to a big doll. She seemed to be amazingly lucid to me. I didn’t even know how old one could take Shinar – that was her name – to be. Eight? Nine? Twelve? She was wearing worn, oversized clothes.
Katira was only chuckling, seeing me astonished.
But to me, it was no laughing matter.
The older I got, the more I understood and the more surprised I got at my father’s greediness and cruelty. Why did he need to send me to the commune? Why was he so unfair to this girl, whom he took away from her parents? Every single day new ideas occurred to him, and each of them was even more evil and cunning than the previous one.
That’s what I though, looking at the lucid little bride. All of a sudden, my father appeared in the room. I asked him out for a couple of words and said firmly:
- I have something important to ask you about, ageke! I want this little doll, whom you call “kelin”, to be taken away from here this very day.
My boldness and my words surprised Father.
- Where? Why? I don’t understand you, Burkut.
- I ask you to take Shinar to the orphanage. Why? I doubt if I should tell you, father. But if you don’t grant me this wish, I’ll leave the house. You ask where I will go? I will go, that’s it. Nobody will know where I go.
Trying to talk me out of it, father used the most affectionate words he knew, but he was pale and angry.
- Have you thought it over, son, are you sane?
- I remember your words well, ageke: “God hasn’t given much to out clan, but we don’t lack firmness”. I told you and I mean it. Choose me or the kelin. And if you ask me “why”, I’ll tell you. You should have scrupled to buy this poor child for half a pud of millet...
Though I wanted to be firm, I stumbled and started whining. I was a mere boy yet, too.
- You should have scrupled, Father, to buy a wife for your own son like this.
Father attempted to suppress his fury. His mouth twisted, his face muscles were quivering like qurut boiling in a pot. His crossed arms looked especially cruel – his frozen clenched fists were about to hit. But suddenly he got limp, waved his hand vaguely, pointing at somewhere in the desert:
- Well, get out!
And I went away without knowing where I was going. He shouted to me:
- Wait, stop!.. You have always obeyed me.
- What is said is said, - I answered weepingly, - if you don’t want to send the girl to the orphanage, I’ll leave your house, ageke.
- And what if I don’t let either you or her go?- I could hear fatigue in my father’s voice.
- Are you going to tie me down with a rope? I’m stubborn, Father. If I fail to escape, I’ll drown in the Syr Darya or hang myself!
- What did she do to win you, that...
Father call the poor girl a rude and unfair name.
- Why should you suffer because of her...
- You’re brutalizing a human being. She is a human being...
Father broke off. He stretched his hands, as if feeling a flush of parental affection, gave a groan, but recollected himself and froze again.
Feeling his mean glance, I left the aul again.
Not far from our house, the gray reeds of the Syr Darya began. Horseways and footpaths were trailed there. In that spring, the snow had melted and the ground had always dried before the ice broke up on the river. I was making my way to the Syr Darya along a narrow path. I don’t know if I had covered much when I heard the stamping of hooves behind me. Of course, it was my father approaching me.
- Bokezhan!- he called me by the most sentimental name I had.
But I didn’t answer. When in advance, he dismounted and stood in my way.
- Come, come, son, don’t be foolish! You should go back home.
Though the words were very ordinary, I could hear that Father’s voice was unusually warm. With the same warmth, I told him I would if only he granted me my wish.
- Son, you shouldn’t worry so much!- father spoke in an even softer voice.- Never mind Shinar’s young age. She’s already fourteen. And our ancestors said a thirteen-year-old to be a proper hostess of a yurt. I’ve happened to see ten- year old girls come to a house. At first they keep the house and then become wives.
- The times have changed a lot, ageke...
- You silly thing!- It seemed to me Father even smiled.- Hasn’t she already been your elder brother’s wife for several month? What shall we do? If we let her go, that will be a real sin!
- It won’t! She’ll feel better in the orphanage.
- But what if she refuses to go?
- She can’t refuse but out of fear. If she’s not afraid, she’ll go to where she’ll feel better, she’ll rush there like a one-year-old camel.
Father still insisted.
- Let’s not play cat and mouse, ageke,- I flared. – I’m twelve! Wasn’t it you who told me: “When I was ten, I was in charge for myself”. And I am twelve now. And I have taken an oath. You must be fair to the girl.
Surprisingly, my father gave up.
He stood for a while in a severe meditation, though, keeping silent, but then he heaved a sigh and finally said:
- Have it your way, son. But we have to arrange it in such a way that noone will make fun of us... We’ll give her an opportunity to run away on her own.
- No, ageke, we cannot. If you don’t want to go to Karmakchi, I’ll go there and arrange it...
The following morning, I went there with my father. Father was doing some business of his, while I came to the orphanage and introduced myself to its administrator, a friendly elderly man. I told him the whole story in detail. He patted me on the back:
- What a nice lad you are. I’ll admit your kelin, I surely will. She’ll blend in the kids and become a good girl
Three more years passed, and Adambekov, as was the name of the administrator of the orphanage, came to our house, and I placed Shinar onto his aroba with my own hands.
By the way, she agreed to go to the orphanage very soon.
The only thing that upset me was my parent’s greediness – they kept all of her clothes at home. Shinar left the house wearing an old patched dress.
It was during those days that I learned that father had given all the crops hidden in out ura to the neighboring auls on the condition that everyone must return him five times as much wheat. In that year, the overflow of the Syr Darya was extremely wide, and people were expecting a fair yield. But they had nothing to sow – where can one find crops in that season? They were glad to take crops from my father, in spite of his hawkish terms.
Summer came, and Father demanded that my mother prepared him and me for a journey.
Mother, who detested unexpected departures, began to ask my father about where he was going. But he just shouted at her, as was his common practice.
- If I go, I have a business. You’d better keep your mouth shut. If they ask where I’m gone, tell them I’m in Turgai.
Father told nothing to me or Kairakbai, either. It was only at the railroad station that we found out we were going in the Orenburg direction, alight in Chelkar and reach Irgiz with a wagon to go to our natal Turgai.
At the Chelkar station, wagons loaded with provisions for the starving of Irgiz and Turgai stood in a line. The wagons were dragged by bony horses and camels, the drivers were walking beside. We joined them, too.
The journey was hard and joyless!
Since the very morning, the sun began to grill without mercy, so the exhausted camels couldn’t move. They would lie onto the sand as well as people did and lie there till sunset. When dusk fell, the caravan got to their feet and mover forth. The starving drivers were trotting along – they were given not more than a small wooden cup of millet for the whole day. They cooked a thin soup of it and settled for it.
There was a lack of water – one couldn’t fine a lake with fresh water or a river around. Within five hundred kilometers with which Chelkar was separated from Turgai we only came across two lakes – the Chelkar and the Turgai, but the water was muddy, hot, and salty.
I was boiling with fury, vexation, and hatred – why did father need to drive us through the empty steppe, enduring the cruel heat, hunger, and thirst ! What is the mean plan he has on his mind why won’t he tell us about the purpose of the journey?
I told my father what I thought. But my vexation didn’t affect him at all. Falling behind the drivers a little, he finally revealed to me his plan:
- Your nagashi, your maternal uncle, informed me with the help of loyal people that the Kazakhs of the Semipalatinsk and the Akmolinsk Governorate are driving some cattle for the starving in Turgai. If we come in time, we’ll get quite a lot.
- Oipyrmai, Father,- I exclaimed,- aren’t you ashamed to tear this piece from the hungry man’s teeth?
- Hey, dear, now I see you’re a mere child! What should I be ashamed of? There’s much cattle, enough for both the hungry and the sate.
The conversation was over. I tried not to talk to my father till we reached Turgai. For some reason, the episode when Gani Muratbaiev took me gently by the chin, asked me several questions, and I somehow couldn’t lie to him, came to my mind. What is someone comes to me here, looking me into the eyes, and asks me:
- Are you very hungry, boy?
What will I tell him? And what will my father do?
When in Turgai, we stayed in the house of my father’s distant relatives. One cannot even compare Turgai to Ak-Mosque... Ak-Mosque is a real town with stone and wooden buildings, while Turgai looks almost like home, like our winter houses – clay, squash, and flat-roofed.
In Turgai, there was an orphanage meant for five hundred people, but not all the children were alive after that hungry winter – some of them ran away, many died of starvation. The town and the neighboring settlements were famished, too. Turgai was situated far from the railroad, and cart carrying provisions couldn’t reach it through deep drifts and through the steppe snowstorms in the cold long winter.
For the first weeks after we came to Turgai, my father led a quiet and unremarkable life. He seldom left the house and usually learned the news from Kairakbai or sometimes from me. During those days, I finally realized that I had known Kairakbai very poorly, though we had spent much time together. He seemed to be not more than a simple jester and my father’s faithful ringleader to me before. I was mistaken. He was far from that. Kairakbai was extremely cunning and agile, he could gain confidence of people he didn’t even know easily and could always fish out their secrets.
My father took great interest with Amangeldy’s friends and enemies, he wanted to know which of them were well-respected and which had to lie low starving...
Step by step, my father made sure that Amangeldy’s enemies were far from being poor. Some of them they were stronger than his friends. But the latter were on the rise, too.
People in Turgai told us that Yerkin Yerzhanov, who was Amangeldy’s right-hand man during the Civil War, founded a commune in our native parts, in Sarykopa, the previous year. He gathered about fifty poor families in it. In that year, the commune received some crops from the Soviet government, which they used to sow about ten dessiatins of millet and wheat on the banks of the Sarykop. People said Yerkin to have laid aryks from the lake to the sowings. They were expecting a fair yield.
Shaping their life on our land, the communards disliked us, the previous hosts, and even directed a paper to Ak-Mosque, asking to send us away from the banks of the Syr Darya.
We heard a detailed story of the cruel murder of Amangeldy, who was trapped cunningly. Now his arch-enemies creped into the Soviet establishments of Turgai and Orenburg and were working there, safe and sound.
There were many fact which I found very strange. Amangeldy’s henchmen, who were his brothers in arms both in the ranks of rebels and in the Red Guard, were producing petitions in which they asked to punish his enemies and murderers. But there was no answer to their petitions. Another thing my father chanced to find out was that one of the Alash Orda leaders Akhmet Baitursunov went to Moscow in the autumn of 1919 with a guilty air and agreed with some outstanding Soviet workers that they would forgive the Alash Orda men for their mistakes of the past. They weren’t punished for what they’d done before anymore. Moreover, people say Akhmet Baitursunov to have joined the party and become People’s Commissar for Education.
After my father heard the news, he stopped hiding and often walked along the streets of Turgai. There was always somebody to invite us. Though people were starving, well-off families had kumis and lambs to their heart’s content. One could see black walking stick – kara-taiaks – of big-name Kazakhs here and there. At such meetings, one could hear dombrists, singers, and wisecrackers, among which our Kairakbai was present, too.
After several days, the news reached Turgai that huge herds of cattle were about to come here from Akmolinsk and Semipalatinsk, mostly cows, horses, and camels.
That very moment, Turgai was flooded with people from the whole uyezd – the sate and the hungry came here like ravens smelling a loot. The town was too small for them. So many people had to settle on the banks of the river as they did when nomadizing.
Father started settling in Turgai and bought horses for himself, for me, and for Kairakbai. He bought himself a sturdy and agile horse, a racer for Kairakbai and a quiet three-year-old for me. He was waiting for his share of the cattle to come. And there was no driving it back home without horses.
It stands to reason that we were among the sate. Listening to my father and his like-minded fellows talking, I couldn’t but see their habits of wolves. The wolf teaches its babies to steal goatlings as soon as their teeth have cut. My father was a real predator, too: as soon as we came to Turgai, he won’t let me go anywhere, telling me about his secrets and plans.
The sate were thinking of an awful undertaking – they were going to excite a riot of the hungry against the Soviet government. That’s why they wanted the poor to never get the cattle. For this purpose, they decided to drive it all along the volosts, to give it to bais who had got their power by hook or by crook. They even prepared a list of bais for whom they intended the cattle. My father and Kairakbai were included into the list as hungry men who came from the Syr Darya area.
When we found out that the cattle were approaching the east bank of the Turgai, the “Committee to Help the Starving” sent a proper commission to meet the drivers. Kairakbai was one of the commissioners.
We knew it from Kairakbai’s hearsay that one thousand six hundred forty three heads of cattle were to come to Turgai, including twenty one camels, four hundred forty two horses, three hundred sixty two cows, and eight hundred sixteen sheep. Among those who were driving the cattle, one of the well-educated fat cats of Semipalatinsk, Zhunusbek Mauytbaiev, was present.
There was a good reason for such precision in calculations. Everyone was desperate to get as much as possible. Kairakbai and my father were sure they were going to get about ten cows each.
Short before it, Kairakbai and the Turgai atkaminers and karataiaks had worked out quite a smart plan. According the plan, the drivers were invited to come to the town, a toi with games, races, and other entertainments were to be arranged for them as for the most honorable and welcome guests on the bank of the Turgai; a rally with pompous speeches and greetings was to be arranged on the broad square in the town centre.
The day was approaching when the plan was to be implemented. But my father suddenly grew anxious. The reason was that he’d come across Yerkin Yerzhanov in the town and was apprehensive, as there might be a trouble.
Father found out that Yerkin had recognized him, too. He didn’t only recognize him but also passed the message about Abeu Zhautikov, who was injured when fighting against Amangeldy and fled to the Syr Darya banks, being there among “the sate”. Yerkin suspected the uyezd workers of taking part in the sophisticated cattle machinations. He said they’d have only themselves to blame if they hurt the starving. He also said menacingly that my father wouldn’t leave the place alive if he interfered with the carve-up.
Father felt rather uncomfortable and very scared, but he still hoped for the better. He said his favorite phrase again:
- We’ll see what the elip tells us.
In those days, I chanced to see Yerkin, too. He’d changed a lot – he’d grown some muscles and got broader shoulders. His face was round now. He didn’t have even a nap over his lips before, and now he has a beautiful thin moustache. Wearing an old belted military greatcoat and army boots, with a handgun in his holster, he looked manly and hawkish, smart and slim.
I admired the dzhigit sincerely, though I didn’t venture to talk to him. I still thought him to be our family’s enemy and felt a resentment to him deep in my mind.
Finally, the drivers reached Turgai. They were taken to the house of one of the bais straightaway. They had a feast with speeches there. Zhunusbek Mauytbaiev, squash, plump, wearing a camel hair robe and a opulent hat, was especially smooth-talking. He was thirty then.
He knew everything, including the way our ancestors used to live and the way our descendants were going to live in the Communist regime. In old days, the life was rich and frivolous, while the communists were going to share everything, including cattle, food, wives, and children. Zhunusbek was silver-tongued, and they were hanging on his words. When he started telling what communism was like, the spacious house of the bai was buzzing. Zhunusbek’s words struck everybody, and many people seemed to have forgotten about the thing which was most important for them now – about the cattle. People were trying to get closer to Zhunusbek and asking him for more details of the communist lifestyle, but Zhunusbek kept repeating one and the same thing – they were going to share everything.
Early in the morning, people start coming to the town square. Some of them looked scary – shaggy and skinny, dragging their feet along. Noone of the well-off appeared at the square, as was the agreement – they were not to go to the square but to divide the cattle secretly, without the poor, and to drive it secretly to volosts. That’s why my father stayed at home, while Kairakbai and I went to the square.
The crowd was buzzing in a great toss. In the middle of the square, a high stage had been built. A group of horsemen appeared from somewhere aside, among them, there were the uyezd council chef, Alimbetov, and Mauytbaiev, whom we already know. The crowd opened to make way. The horsemen dismounted and, passing through the crowd, climbed the stage.
Silence fell. Alimbetov was the first to speech.
- It’s not the right time for long speeches,- he began.- Willing to help the starving of Turgai, Semipalatinsk and Akmolinsk Governorates have brought large herds of cattle to us. We have to distribute the cattle, but not here, not on the square. If we do it here, we’ll end in a total confusion. We have to be fair! We decided to distribute the cattle among the volosts of Turgai Uyezd for the volosts to distribute it among the people.
- Wrong you are, comrade!- someone shouted, and Yerkin Yerzhanov appeared on the stage. He waved his Red Army cap. – The cattle must be divided here, only here, among these hungry people. We mustn’t divide it between volosts! Let everyone drive his share home! That’s the right way to do things.
- Right! Right!- people agreed with Yerkin.
- Stop it!- someone said in a thick coarse voice.
The buzzing went a little lower. was going to introduce Yerkin to Mauytbaiev, but Yerkin grinned:
- If we are to each other’s taste, we’ll have enough time for this. We’ll have to settle the matter...
- I was going to call this comrade upon to speech...
- Later, when the people are sate, he’ll make his ten speeches.
- Who’s to blame for their starving?- Mauytbaiev said. He didn’t like the way Yerkin was acting.
- The tsar!.. The whites!.. The alas hers!..- Yerzhanov shouted.
- Find faults with them, then!
- No, I’m going to find faults with you and your friends. You are the afterthought of the tsar, of the whites, of the alas hers!..
- Me too?- Alimbetov asked directly.
- You too!
- One could think it’s you and not me who’d the President of the Revolutionary Committee, - he shouted at Yerkin Yerzhanov. – You give orders, and I’m in charge. Right? So who’s the president?
- You!.. But you’re a wolf in sheep’s clothing!.. We know you were among those who killed Amangeldy...
- Yes you were!- the crowd started buzzing.
The rest was undecipherable.
- Oibai, let’s go!- Kairakbai tugged me at the sleeve. He was not only bold but chicken-hearted, too. I tried to jib, but my father’s faithful messenger dragged me home by the hands and ears.
...On the following day, we heard that Alimbetov and his henchmen had fled from Turgai to escape the people’s rage.
That very night, the Revolutionary Committee of Turgai got a wire from Orenburg: “Before Dzhangildin’s commission has arrived, it is forbidden to give out cattle. The military community of the town is to guard the cattle...”
It wasn’t the end yet. The local and stranger bais were arrested and put on trial. Father realized we had to flee immediately. We’d have left at once, but we had to avoid people’s attention in the daytime, so Father was waiting for the nightfall impatiently.
The day seemed long to my father. The sun rose and froze in the sky. Father was tearing around the room, as if the ground was burning under his feet. He was a bad Muslim, he didn’t read namaz, he didn’t keep the sawm, that is, the fast. He never cared about god, but now he kept muttering: “God! Oh my God! Save me, Allah!”
Towards the evening, the host invited us to have some tea. As soon as we took our places around the samovar, armed people entered the room without knocking at the door. Among them, there was Yerkin, too. Father went pale, his nostrils narrowed, his eyes grew dim and gray. He wanted to rise to his feet but he failed, as if tied down to his seat. He wanted to say something, but his voice wouldn’t obey him.
- Wait a moment!- Yerkin said.- You have a good reason for being anxious. It would be nice to kill you right here, on the spot. But I won’t touch you this time. It’s not for you. It’s or your son, Burkut.
I could see a tear running down my father’s face, but Yerkin didn’t even look at him.
- Boy!- he said to me.- I recognized you on the square yesterday. You were standing very close to me. I’ll tell you what I wanted to tell you long ago. In 1916, when they were hanging my elder brother Nurzhan, you were the only one who wanted to get in their way. You were the only one who cried. Nurzhan was in your father’s hands. But I won’t spill blood – for you.
- Dear, apple of my eyes, karagym!- my father stretched his hand out to Yerkin.
- Where’s your sense of conscience? Keep your filthy hand away!- Yerkin was furious.- You’ve come from the Syr Darya, which is far away, just to rob the poor. You are steppe wolves! You find each other by your howling and you formed a lie in Turgai. But you didn’t know about a trap waiting for you here. I tell you once again: it’s for your son that I won’t spill your blood. But get out. Get out tonight.
Turning to his man, he added with an incisive smile:
- They wanted to have a toi on the hop. No way! Their toi is over. Let’s go, comrades. There’s nothing for us to do here.
THE ROADS I WANDERED
My father, who was desperate to get rich on the remote banks of the Syr Darya and in the dusty Turgai, nearly got trapped. The morning after he faced Yerkin, he was packing to go back. It was both dangerous and pointless to stay in the town.
Father sold one of our three horses to buy a camel, which is more convenient to load. The camel was intended for Kairakbai. Kairakbai tried to crack a joke, as was his habit, but my father won’t have any jests that morning. His face was bloodless, pale, and evil-looking. An old, well-respected man could hardly find a way to talk to my father, not to mention Kairakbai. Kairakbai started fidgeting like a young calf wagging his tail before a fierce bull. He didn’t even venture to ask my father about the road we were going to take and charged me with it. But Father was brief and angry, anyway.
- Does it matter to you? You don’t know the way.
I was hurt, but it didn’t make me shy:
- I’ll know if you tell me.
Just to get rid of me, my father told me with reluctance:
- At first, we’ll go along the Sarykop, then we’ll cross the Kyzbel dzhailau, through Aksuat, heading for the Aman-Karagai forests and the sacred lake, the Aulie-Kol, from there we’ll get to Kostanai. Then we’ll take a train...
I retold the words to Kairakbai. How happy he was to see the dear steppe! How much his face brightened up!
- ТIt’s a pity we won’t stay for a while by the Sarykop. He didn’t mention it. It’s our wintering place, kystau. It would be nice to have a rest by the lake for a couple of days. Shall we ask him?
But I advised Kairakbai not to bother my irritated father.
We started packing.
At first our way went through a dull flat plateau, takyr. White salt marshes which looked like spilt milk ere very common there. Kairakbai told me that it was the very place where Amangeldy enticed the tsar’s army and chawed them up in the waterless, desolate parts. My father got wounded in this fight, too.
After the takyr, a feather grass steppe began. The feather grass was swinging in the wind in a soft rhythm. The steppe here resembled the vast Aral Sea. The previous summer we went to the Aral Sea with Father. We got to Barsa-Kelmes (“You won’t return if you leave”) Island, which was situated all but in the middle of the sea, by a fisherman’s sailing-ship. On the first day, we had a smooth journey. The boat was sailing shakily in the waves. But when we were far from the shore, the white foam of the waves was getting higher and higher. We flew up on the crest of the blistering hush and then plunged into the wallow again. Sometimes I though we were going to drown before we came home...
The feather grass waves of Turgai were soften and gentler. But they were getting thicker closer to the centre, just like they did in the Aral Sea. Going deeper into the south-east parts of the takyr and the Sarykop, we suddenly felt like we were in the boundless vast of feather-glass. While the feather grass manes only whisper near the takyr under soft blows of wind, they were boiling here like bow waves of the sea, and the monotonous noise made my head swivel in a harrowing way... I’ve hear that sea waves can lift gemstones from the bottom and sometimes throw them onto the shore. The Turgai wind was raising the savory smell of herbs and filling the turgid air of the steppe with a must fragrance just like they do. Oipyroi, how beautiful you are, steppe!.. Oipyroi, how delicious and balmy your air is!
We were going close to the east bank of the Sarykop. Sparing our horses, which weren’t well-fed, we didn’t hurry and made some stops, by the end of the day we had reached the plot of land called Katyn-Kazgan after the well on the dzhailau on the Kyzbel foot. Nomadic auls hadn’t stopped here for a long time, and rich fresh grass was growing over the ground. Kairakbai needn’t have worried. Father was in no hurry. He’d missed these part for long ago and lingered on the dzhailau, though we didn’t ask him to. He was wandering on the lush grass, green after the rain, with me and Kairakbai, and marveling at the vast space. But the well, near which we spent two days, was the most attractive to us.
As my father told me, I was born by this well in spring, when our aul had just arrived on the dzhailau. That’s why I gravitated to it even now. The camel lay on the ground, the heated horses were cooling down. I took a cooking bucket from the saddle bag, tied a rope to its bail and called Kairakbai to the well to have some water.
There were no footpaths leading to the well, it had been long since people last quenched their thirst there. I plunged the bucket into the water, and it was filled to the brim. The water was as clean as a tear, as cold as ice, as sweet as honey. I closed my eyes with bliss and drank without taking a breath. Suddenly I felt something slippery, unpleasant touch my lips. I looked there and saw a dead mouse. I threw it out of the water without a trace of disgust and got to the water, as ravenous as ever.
- How can you?- Kairakbai wondered. But I didn’t answer his question. Only when I felt that I had quenched my thirst, I said:
- The milk of one’s mother is always delicious. A mouse cannot spoil it. Or can it?
Kairakbai agreed with me and even heaved a sigh.
The water of Katyn-Kazgan will always be as sweet to me as my mother’s milk!
We spent two days here. Early in the morning, before leaving, I went to say goodbye to the well. The first crimson rays of sun slipped along its brim, showing the dry ground of the deep shaft. For the first time, the ground look dark red to me. I scratched off a few balls of sand with my finger and smeared them in my hand. I thought that the soil had soaked up my blood and that of my ancestors. When we were leaving soon, I looked at the well once again and made sure that the reddish tone hadn’t disappeared. It was the color of my land. It hurt me to part with it!
My dear land...
The steppe was as deserted as ever, the feathergrass was just as rich and wavy. All of a sudden, an unfamiliar bluish arrow-silhouette appeared on the horizon. I was told that it was Aman-Karagai, but it took me some time to make sure. When we came closer, I saw came to see a forest, a big forest, in which birches and pine trees were growing together. I had never seen such a wonderful forest before and I have never seen one since. The silvery-white trunks of curly birches and the straight copper pine trunks were equally slender and beautiful. When we found ourselves in the shadow of the trees, I couldn not but marvel at the sunlight which looked like trickling through the foliage and the fir-needs swaying in the light wind from the steppe. Spotted leopards seemed to be prowling stealthily on the ground. If one only jumped off one’s horse, one could walk through the grass and bushes to find dark crimson raspberries, liuscious, sweet, and tongue-ticlking, hiding under small leaves.
A winding forest path brought us to a bright lake, round and rather big. At that time, light clouds were overcasting the sky. The lake reflected the clouds which dimmed it, making the water look dark and shiny like mercury.
- This is the Alulie-kol!- my father said, and I recalled him telling me about seven lakes with clean sweet water being hidden in the deep of the Aman-Karagai forest and about settlements of migrant peasants, who came there about forty years before, spread on their banks. And even longer ago, there was a kystau on the bank of one of the seven lakes – the wintering place of a well-respected man called Zhampykhoja.
- Those whom people call khoja are believed to be Phophet Muhammad’s descendants, - my father said. – Zhampy’s name was Zhan-Mohammad. But it the Kazakhs had some trouble pronouncing the full name, so they called him the short name – Zhampy. He came from near Turkestan to the khan of Junior Zhus, Abulkhair, and the khan mappointed him his imam. The Kazakhs were bad Muslims, and he taught them fasting – the sawm – and praying – the namaz, he foretold the future, taught children and healed the ill with spells and incantations. That’s why people believed him to be a saint, and they called the lake Aulie-kol.
- Do you remember,- my father went on,- in Turgai, we saw Mambet. Mambet’s father is Karakhoja, Zhampy’s offspring, he was our grandather’s nephew. But Karakhoja didn’t know that much. Some rites, like circumcision, and mosque levy – zeket and kushir. His wits were short, his tongue was far from silver, he liked to be given things and was reluctant to give. His son, Mambet, had little in common with his fatger. He was a quick learner and a lively, glib boy. At home, he learned the basics, but he decided to get further education. He begged his relatives to send him to Ishan Zeinulla’s medrese in Troitsk, and they did. There he mastered both the old alphabet, the kadim, and the new one, the zhadshi.
He married Karakyz, younger sister of a bai who was quite well-known in his parts, Smail, Zhamashal’s son. Karakyz was a middle-aged woman, about thirty years old. Men wearing blue boots, well-off people looking for a wide, wouldn’t have her, and those who wore bridle leather boots, that is, the poor, got refusals from her parents.
Having got married, Mambet became a seller in a big trade business which had connections with Moscow and Petersburg, Bukhara and Khiva, Omsk and Semipalatinsk. Mambet grew rich, but he had come back to his home parts when Smail went bankrupt, and all of their property could be confiscated. Still working as a merchant, Mambet took the responsibility of a mullah. During the rebel of 1916, he was against Amangeldy. The rebels drove his cattle away like they did to that of our family. But he was richer than my father even without his herds and flocks. But for the revolution, he’d have grown rich again. During the Alash-Orda, he was regaining his power and was elected imam. But then the Soviet government came to ruin his plans.
- Now the poor things minds his own business only, sitting at home all the time, - my father shared his thoughts. – He’s got only hope now, like any wealthy man – to get some part of the cattle sent for the starving...
Father had some hard feelings for Mambet, who used to visit him quite often. After Yerkin’s actions, Mambet fled immediately without warning us. That’s why Father didn’t visit him in his house, which was in our way.
However, he often spoke about Mambet and his relatives on the bank of the Aulie-kol.
- A khoja is not necessarily rich,- he said.- But if one has much land, it’s easier to get much cattle. Pastures with lush high grass are numerous in Aman-Karagai. That’s why Zhampy’s son, Akhoja, and Akhoja’s son, Karakhoja, were only doubling their herds and flocks. Karakhoja had two thousand horses, not to mention other animals. But the dreary year of the murrain, takyr-koian, came, and much cattle died. What remained of Karakhoja’s herds was one hundred horses. So he had to master the mullah’s work – circumcision. After Alash-Orda fell, Mambet did the low-profit job as well. What else could he do – baibishe Karakyz didn’t bring him children. Hic concubine, tokal, was only giving birth to girls. It was only in the time of turbulence that he finally got a son. Daughters won’t support one’s heath! Now, being quite old and not very rich, he’s taken up his father’s job.
- However,- Father added,- I don’t quite believe in his timidity. He’ll find a way to live in abundance.
...We stayed in Aman-Karagai for about a week, both in Russian villages and in Kazakh auls. I was reluctant to move. If I had the power, I’d stay there for the whole summer. The place has everything one can think of – thick forest, lake with clean water, and exhilarating air. Berries of the forest stick to the manes of one’s horses. There are no nasty mosquitoes and horse-flies here. Though cold has made its way to the auls of these parts, it’s still easier to live here – Russian peasants from the Semiozernoie are a great help. We haven’t seen people swollen with starvation or beggars in Aman-Karagai in all the days we stayed there...
Kostanai turned out to be a small town on the high bank of the Tobol. Among wooden log houses, two-storey buildings were very uncommon. Low trees grew in light sand in its wide streets.
- The town’s about seventy to eighty years old, - Father informed me and Kairakbai.- It was called Kostanai after the mother of noble people from the Kipchak clan, Kangozh and Balgozh. The tomb of Kostanai, one of two twins, was the place where the town was founded.
Father had a relative in Kostanai – a rich bai, Mynaidar, he owned a house, a shop, a medrese, and a mosque – almost a neighborhood.
Idleness made the bais of Kostanai fat – they spent all their days drinking beer and playing nine. Father joined the card players, too, and was a little bit intoxicated all these days, which surprised me a lot, as he used to observe the Islamic prohibition to have spirits. He was lucky with the cards. He won a bag of money. It was very cheap then, though.
In Kostanai, we boarded a train to Chelyabinsk, and then home via Kinel...
It is not for fun that hands of the clock
Keep running in circles.
The life is the passing of moments.
A moment – and the life of a man is over!
There’s no bringing back a split second!
That’s what the great Abai said. It seemed to us that we only left home the previous days. But the summer had passed, though we hadn’t lingered anywhere and hadn’t visited anyone.
Winter comes early to the banks of the Syr Darya to stay there almost till December. In Turgai, people usually start harvesting at the end of Augustor in early September, but here they have their crops in their hutches by that time.
The harvesting was over when we arrived, and our family was having quarrels with dwellers of the local auls. I have already mentioned my father lending grains from his secret hole to many people in spring, expecting to get five or six times as much in autumn.
Time had come for the debt to be paid, but noone gave back more than my father had given them, as if it was a kind of conspiration. In good old days, before the war, when my father was a bolys, that is, a volost administrator, it would be different. The debtor would bring him as much wheat as he wanted, or else he’d press them till they were afraid to produce a sound. But those days were over. What could my father do? He went to Ak-Mosque to Aralbaiev, his constant advisor, and came back very soon, accompanied with a Kazakh named Laumullin and two more militia men. As the gossip had it, Laumullin was Chief of Staff of Uyezd Militia . He was about thirty five years old, but he looked as if he’d had a rough time. One could see false teeth glistening in his mouth, and his right leg was limp. Blood rushed to his swarthy pitted face when he was yelling, swallowing words. But in spite of Laumullin’s toughness, the debtors turned out to be not liable to fear. The Kokand rulers could break their will. They wouldn’t give up. When the militia men tried to use force, they nearly got beaten. Shortly speaking, my father never got the debt back. Laumullin came back to Ak-Mosque high and dry.
It wasn’t the end, though. People, whom my father and the militia had insulted, sent petitions not only to the government of the Republic of Turkestan but even to Moscow. In early winter, a commission arrived from Tashkent. My father was imprisoned. The only man who managed to help him was Aralbaiev.
What was gained by deception escaped us again. My father was desperately furious. The situation in our family was far from favorable. Father decided to marry off the rest two sisters to get the bridewealth and showed great artfulness in arranging the whole thing. Mother was dead set not to let it happen. Still the elder one, Berep, was given to her groom. However, when it was Bulis’s turn, Father was helpless. Mother was defending her like a tiger. Father tried to teas the girl from her mother’s hands, but Tekebai and I were solidly behind our mother and sister. Willing or not, my father had to accept it.
“Joy escapes the house in which people squabble”. We all could feel how true the old Kazakh saying was. We couldn’t even think of domestic harmony. After the quarrels related to the daughter, we couldn’t speak to each other in a calm tone. There is a saying like this:
Embarrassed, I faced the khan.
He didn’t tear out my tongue.
I wanted people to say -
They said I was not to blame.
But at home I cannot but bob.
At home I live like a dog.
Another akyn said.
With my wife, I am out of favor.
She never fails to find a fault with me,
My relatives are not likely to praise me,
As they know what my face is like.
Father, whom the others believed to be cruel, was no menace to my mother. After long years of silence, her tongue was unleashed, and she could stand up for herself.
Thinking about my family, I cannot but think of a saying by an aul wit:
There’s no putting out the embers
Hidden in dried manure.
They’ll be ablaze
When they are to.
In brief, the old quarrels flared up, and mother was not only equal to my father in terms of spite and dash, but also in terms of ambition.
After there squabbles, father left home even more often. Just before spring came, he took me along when going to Tashkent. We stayed at the place of an Uzbek we knew, Balatkhan, who used to be a merchant in Irgiz and Turgai in tsarist days. He had not only shops but also houses and families in those towns. To tell the truth, he had wives and shops in other places, too. My father, who was Balatkhan’s old friend, had just married his young niece off to him. By the time we met, Balatkha was seventy years old. Gray-haired, wrinked, and bloated, he moved slowly leaning on his walking stick and couldn’t see a thing without his eyeglasses. Father’s niece, that is, his wife, turned out to be so young, ample-bodied, and beautiful... We saw her only once, as the rest of time she spent hiding in her zenana. Old Balatkhan was always jealous.
We got an abundant treat here and in the houses of other acquaintances, who were mostly well-educated and well-respected Kazakhs. Despite my being a mere boy, I came to understand much watching those people and listening to them talking. The cream of Alash-Orda had gathered in Tashkent. Here was the head of the alashers in West Kazakhstan, Zhikhansha Dosmukhammetov, the East Kazakhstan head, Khalil Gabbasov, and that of Central Kazakhstan – Aidarkhan Turlybaiev. They were legion. Famous writers such as Magzhan Zhumabaiev and Zhusypbek Aimautov were here, too.
They weren’t just enjoying themselves. The whole Tashkent was working strenuously. I heard people talking about poems and articles published in the local newspaper “The White Way” and in the magazine called “The Star”. But what surprised me most was the story of the basmachis. They were hiding in the mountains of Pamir and Tien Shan, headed by Turkish pasha Anuarbek. The words about this Anuarbek having come to Tashkent in early winter to meet the local nationalists, shared in a whisper, sent shivers down my spine.
One of my father’s new friends told him in s straight fashion:
- I think you’d better join the basmachis instead of being wind-driven, hiding in every gulley.
Father was hesitant:
- How can I do this?
- As soon as you venture, it’s not a big deal. If you want, join the basmachis or, if you don’t, cross the border – either the Afghan or the Iran one.
Father was still hesitant, and later he told me:
- Not all alashers are here, in Tashkent. Your uncle isn’t among them. And he’s got no rival in cunning, knowledge, or wit here. I wonder why he keeps aside?
Soon my father learned that my uncle had moved from Chingistau to Orenburg and found a job there. Father wondered what the reason might be. Parting with his friends in Tashkent, they promised to come back soon and to inform them of his decision.
In the train, he suddenly told me:
- You get off at Dzhysaly and go to the aul. Tell them that I’m delayed in Tashkent. I’ll go to Orenburg and see your uncle. Make sure you don’t tell!
It was only after a month that Father came back.
- In summer, the local rich men will move to the Kara Kum Desert. At first we’ll join them and then we’ll move further along the Sazan-bai Road secretly. We’ll go via Ak-kol, to Turgai, and spend the second half of the summer by our Kyzbel.
That’s what my father said.
My dear land was floating like a dim picture in my mind. It haunted me in my dreams and called me when I was awake. But my father’s heavy authority bound me like a colt caught in a noose. So I was glad to learn we were going to Turgai, to the Kyzbel dzhailau.
Wait for me, my dear land. Soon, very soon I’ll see you again.
THE FIRST COMMUNE OF TURGAI
In spring, we joined the auls moving towards the Syr Darya area of the Kara Kum Desert. Though we hadn’t revealed our intention to leave Turkestan forever and to come back to Turgai, or neighbors seemed to see through our plans. My father showed too much diligence in preparing the camels and the outfit. It was clear that he was intending to go far. He didn’t want to leave a thing in the aul in Karmakchi, he wouldn’t leave as much as a cattle-pen. He loaded camels with poles, which, as he claimed, could be helpful, he didn’t forget about props and even manure cakes. What he couldn’t take away, he sold cheaply.
In a manner of speaking, we didn’t hide our preparations but never mouthed our plans.
I asked my father:
- Why are we playing hide-and-seek? Do we really have to hide from our neighbors?
- Shut up!- Father shouted.- Do you want us to be robbed?
As a caravan of ten camel, we set off. After five or six nights, we reached the Kara Kum Desert. We had to cross the waterless vast steppe overgrown with wormwood and wheat grass. Tangles of saxaul and thorny reeds, zhyngel, were getting more and more frequent. We rarely came across wells. Only the local old-timers knew which paths lead to them. The sun was scorching without mercy.
When the quicksand hills were left behind, we could feel the chill of spring again. There was enough and to spate feed. The auls hadn’t moved to this part of the Kara Kum Desert for two years. Perhaps this is the reason why the grass was so high and lush there. Water was quite abundant over the sandhills, too. As soon as we made a shallow well, water filled it to the brim. People said that in the lowlands overgrown with bullrush steppe goats dug pits with their front legs to see water appear on their bottom at once. I’ve watched a horse get some water like this, too. The cattle, which had grown thin on the banks of the Syr Darya, was gaining fat easily on the pastures. The sour sweet grasses of the Kara Kum Desert are much more nourishing than those near the Syr Darya. The meat and milk o cattle fed in the Kara Kum Desert tastes better and is healthier. The cream is thicker and sweeter, the kumis is heady.
In that year, there was much game in the sand, but Father gave up hunting and was moving on tirelessly. By the end of the summer, we had reached the fringe of the Turgai steppe. We saw the first feather grass sparkling in the sun like froth from the sea of feather-grass, which was so close. Skylarks, the nightingales of the steppe, were warbling. Greeting us as if we were guests of honor, myriads of them rose into the deep blue sky and sang their songs there, remaining unseen.
The weather was almost always bright. Only once whitish clouds came from the north, and a poor rain laid the dust on the road.
Zormans, or ground squirrels, were more numerous in the Turgai steppe than ever in that summer. People used to hunt them before, and they were rare. Now they were standing motionless along roads and paths, looking like pitched poles. They vanished in their hides with a frisk of tails only when we came close. Their holes were giving off sweet musk smell, which was sometimes mixed with the bitterness of wormwood. I learned that the local girls and dandyish dzhigits used to quilt tails of ground squirrels into their sleeves with the same purpose as dandies nowadays use eau de cologne or perfume. The smell was called zhupar.
Admiring the beauty of my land, I was especially delighted to watch stocks of bustards pasturing. They also weren’t afraid of the man anymore. But when we came very close to them, they ran away, flipping their wide wings. Sometimes they rose as high as a man and went down on the ground again not far from us. Father could hunt bustards day and night before. But now he ignored them.
Another kind of darlings of the steppe, cranes, were flying in circles, calling to one another.
- You see, they teach their nestling how to fly,- my father told me,- there’s no other bird to fly so high!
That’s how birds and animals met us. But we hadn’t come across the people of Turgai, among which there were so many men and women we knew, yet. We were moving along the banks of the white lake, the Ak-kol. I’d heard much about it, but it was the first time I’d seen it. There were many bird nests in its reeds, and the water by its bank, covered with sea weeds, was rife with fish. And this luxury was going to waste!
The even straight road brought us from the lake to the Kenzhaik River, which ran into my dear Sarykopa. It seemed to me that I knew every single bush and remembered the way each single blade of grass smelt. In spring, the Kenzhaik floods its banks to come back to its bed in summer. A colt can hide in the lush grass of its banks. Flowers look like a spriggy carpet spread over them. One can find whatever one can think of here – wold leek, savory and sweet, buldylyk with white flowers and long stalks. A buldylyk bulb baked in ashes is delicious. It eats short, just melting in one’s mouth.
The gossip about the commune “Sparkle”, founded by Yerkin, having occupied the land around the Kenzhaik, reached us the previous year. When our caravan came close to the Sarykopa now, my father ordered to me to put up small camp yurts, intending to see what was going on the Kenzhaik with his own eyes. I accompanied him.
We could not believe our eyes. Everything was green with thick high crops. It was rice, it wasn’t ripe yet. We were walking along the margin of the sowings, leading our horses. A horseman was approaching us from the settlement, the silhouette of which we could see on the horizon. We mounted our horses and rode to meet him. Father was dumbfounded. It was Yerkin. They exchanged reserved, even abstracted greetings. Only after Yerkin shook my hand warmly and enquired about my health, my father uttered the traditional greeting, as if suddenly recollecting g it:
- Are your family in good health, are you and your cattle in good health?
I was ashamed of my father. He had always seemed to me to be one of the strongest and the bravest people, but how he wheedled, how pathetic he looked when facing Yerkin!
To smooth over the tense situation, I asked, pointing at the rice sowings:
- To what bai do they belong?
Yerkin found my question a nice one. He looked at me, smiling, and didn’t answer.
Having overcome his embarrassment, father started telling him how he’d missed his dear land.
- He’s especially anxious to come home.- Father pointed at me. I looked at him to prove it was true.
- So your are moving?- Yerkin asked straightforwardly.- Where’s your caravan?
- There’s no caravan anymore... Only two families – mine and Kairakbai’s. We stay by that ravine... When we found out that there is an aul here, we decided to see our landsmen, as the custom is...
- Well, all right,- Yerkin said,- let’s not stand here melting in the sun. I’ll show you the way we live.
Father was had been waiting for this forced invitation, as he was eager to have a look at the commune.
We were riding side by side, and Yerkin was telling me about his life and that of the aul, almost ignoring my father.
In autumn of 1918, Yerkin joined the Red Guard to fight Ataman Dutov. In spring of 1922, when the enemies of the Soviet government were defeated, he returned home. On his way, he came to Omsk and took a two-month preparational course for Soviet party workers, which he himself hadn’t expected to do. After the course, he came back to his aul via Kostanai. The land of Turgai had been the civil war front for about four years. It was devastated and deserted. Little nomadic households were ruined. Only after peace came, people began to come to life, to take care of their cattle and sowings. They had to help them, to consolidate them together and to invite them into a new life.
- That’s why I decided to get settled here and moved to the centre of Turgai Governorate, Orenburg, - Yerkin went on. – I saw the home of the Turgai Autonomy being built. In a manner of speaking, it was all about the roof then. I was offered to stay in Orenburg. But I refused, as I wanted to stay with my aul friends. That’s how I came back to my motherland. I’ve been a communist since autumn o 1919. When I heard about collective farms, communes, being founded around the Soviet Russia, I thought of carrying out such an experiment here, too.
I consulted the poor men of my aul, the other homeless people who had come here, to the land of their ancestors. That’s how we got settled on the bank of the Sarykopa... The first commune in Turgai...
Father kept nodding his head, as if showing approval, but it was hard for him to hide his spite and envy.
Yerkin told that a major part of the cattle and property of landowner Chushkin, who lived in Semiozernoie, was given to the commune by the government. The commune received twenty two milk cows, eight bulls for service, youngsters, seven horses...
Father, who’d been listening to each and every word Yerkin said, said gruffly without trying to hide his irritation:
- That’s a nice gain!
Yerkin went on calmly, as if fueling the flame:
- We have double-furrow ploughs, a sow, road carts, and the rest of equipment.
- Useful things!.. You got them for free!..- Father was sighing as heavily as if it was his property that had gone to the commune.- So you’re picking up.
- Yes,- Yerkin answered my father reluctantly,- your Kenzhaik turned out to be the most suitable place, both for crops and for the settlement.
- How many houses have you got?
- Seventy three. We have people from forty clans, so to say, but they live in peace. Last spring, we sowed two dessiatins of millet, two dessiatins of wheat, and two dessiatins of oat in Kenzhaik. We used the Sarykopa to water the sowings. It was a fair yielding – one hundred fifty puds millet, eighty puds of wheat and one hundred ten puds of oat. We sowed about a dessiatins of potatoes, carrots, cucumbers, water melons and other green things, just to try. They all did well. People are satisfied.
It was painful to hear it for my father, who used to sow millet and wheat here. He even dug field ditches from the lake to the sowings.
Talking, we didn’t noticed when we approached the aul.
The sun-dried houses stretched in two lines to make something like a street.
Yerkin stopped near one of the flat-roofed houses painted with yellow clay and, hanging over his saddle a little, looked into a tiny window.
- Apa – he called in a low voice.- Come here, apa, your relatives have come.
While we were tying the horses to a pole by the gate, a woman wearing an old brown robe went out of the house. I recognized Yerkin’s mother, Kazina, at once. Once people said her to be a very beautiful woman. My mother used to be jealous of her, and Father had actually given her a good reason. Kazina had got much older since then, but wrinkles didn’t spoil her face, and her sinewy figure was still slender like that of a young girl. I looked into her clear, lucid eyes. One could read everything in them. Now they were showing surprise – who are you?
- Apa, do you recognize these people?- Yerkin asked his mother, pointing at us.
She was looking at my father, taken aback, she pinched herself by the cheel and finally exclaimed:
- My God, is this Kesir?!
- Yes, I am,- Father said and made a step towards her.
She called him by his old nickname, which meant “wicked”. It used to be uttered behind his back only, but Father was all aware of the aul nickname. Father could understand how much the time had changed by the way the old woman pronounced the offensive nickname without a trace of embarrassment.
The time had changed, but the people still were true to the law of kinship. Otherwise, Kazina wouldn’t have greeted my father so warmly, as the custom demands. Kazina cried with a lamentation according to an ancient tradition of the auls. She was not howling, though, but muttering some plaintive words. What was she crying over? Was she thinking about the hanged Nurzhan?
After that, she looked at me in even greater surprise, wiping her eyes with her fingers:
- This must be Burkutzhan!
And she kissed me on the forehead.
- What a real dzhigit you’ve become. Not jinxing it!
When we entered the house, Yerkin beckoned me aside.
- Burkut, wait a little! I’ve got a fat goat, and I want to slaughter it for you. I want your whole family to try it, I’ll send a man to accompany you, and you bring me your mother and all the people traveling with you.
I thanked Yerkin, thinking: “Can he really want to be close to us?”
Accompanied by a dzhigit from the commune, I rode to our camp. Having got onto the hill, I saw that they had already put up a yurt very close to “Sparkle”.
Mother asked me about father in a worried voice. When she found out that he stayed with Yerkin, she was surprised and upset. When I mentioned Kazina, she even got angry. Her lips were trembling, and a shadow dimmed her face like dimple on the surface of a lake, he eyes were glowing like matches.
I needn’t have given her Yerkin’s regards and invitation. She wouldn’t go and see him.
- Tell your father,- she said furiously,- that he can stay there as long as he wants. But we’ll go straight to Kyzbel, anyway!..
I realized that I’d spoilt the whole thing and there was no persuading my mother. I rode back to “Sparkle” in silence.
...Yerkin and my father had already had some tea, got meat was boiling in the pot. The house was buzzing with talks. I had a cup of millet drink, kozhe, went out and joined some boys who gathered in groups, just like in any other aul.
I’ve had a folk saying.
A little eagle looks into the sky.
Leftovers draw the attention of a puppy.
I don’t know whether the way I looked at the commune aul was that of an eagle or of a puppy, but everything I saw with the boys was fascinating.
Before I was invited to have dinner, I’d been to many houses. They didn’t show the bai-like abundance, when sour milk is poured onto a dog’s head, yet, but people lacked nothing and laid high hopes on the autumn.
Yerkin was the head here. Such a young dzhigit, he was only twenty two. His peer and our relative, Tekebai, can hardly bear his own head, what kind of a support can he be for the others?
An akyn joked:
An Orazdy is a dzhigit at the age fifteen.
A Togyshar is a child at the age of twenty!
Yerkin was far in advance of our Tekebai.
...I woke up to see there was noone else in the room. Rays of the midday sun were seeping through the window. I got dressed and went out. Father was sitting in the shadow and talking to old men. I didn’t want to bother him and started wandering around the aul. Soon I came across Yerkin, who looked solicitous, plunged into some domesticities.
- So, boy, yesterday you wanted to know something about the way we live? Come and watch. Do come again. Make sure you do! We’re trying to clear the way for the new life. We even spilt blood for this. Do you know why we chose this name for our commune? The first commune in Turgai. It’s a sparkle to destroy the relic of the past. However, people trying to douse it are still numerous. But do they have the guts?
I thought, yes, there are such people. My father is among them.
When we were leaving the aul, Father told me: You know, Yerkin’s going to Orenburg in autumn. For three years. To study. He’s got little education.
- I think it’s good that he’ll go.
- It’s very good!- That’s when I saw the mean glowing in his eyes that I knew well.- While he’s in Orenburg, we’re sure to have his commune fall.
His words sounded terrible to me.
- Why do you say so?
- You’re too young to understand it.
I couldn’t guess what kind of trouble my father was preparing for “Sparkle”. But it was clear to me that he would go any length. My heart faltered, anticipating a catastrophe. But the Soviet government, who had defeated the enemies, was far stronger that my father. They could crush him, too.
No, it won’t happen. Like a blade of steppe grass torn out of its mother soil, I’ve been thrown about by the wind since early years. But I have found my way, I have become a green sprout with my roots in the Turgai steppe again. I can feel a lucid love for my motherland growing me. And the sparkle lit by Yerkin is so close to me. It has set my heart of a boy ablaze.
PART TWO
THE BELOVED BRIDE
(From Burkut’s second notebook)
...But, full of young life, I’m just as human as any other!
M. Lermontov
“Boyar Orsha”
LILY-OF-THE-VALLEY BUD UNOPENED
We approached the well which people called Katyn-Kazgan, a woman dug out. Here, at the east foot of the Kyzbel, we stayed in the previous year, too.
It was early summer, thick and high grass was lustrous green. The light fresh wind was sending wafts of their strong and sweet smell all around. It seemed to be inviting one to have a rest. I felt like staying here forever.
Our few camels and horses were picking the lush grass. At last the animal exhausted by the long journey could pasture freely. Indeed, when a camel lay on the grass, it reached its spine. Poor camel! It was so tired after covering such a long distance with heavy burden. It was so desperate to have a rest, it lay down for a while, stretching its body out in a comfortable way, but the sweet herbal smell tickles it’s nostrils sweetly. The camel lifted it’s head to sneeze and flop its lips. Without getting up, it began to munch on the juicy stalks with a rustle.
I looked at my mother with affection. She’d missed her land so badly and was so tired of waiting to come back. Now, breathing the painfully familiar air of Turgai, she crouched, pressing her bosom against the grass, spreading her arms as if embracing the steppe, and howled a happy lamentation.
Like a colt who has broken its tie, I was running and jumping, walking on air. I was lolling in the grass to spring back to my feet and rush to the well, look into the dark deep and move my lips as if taking in its cold and clean water.
The others were admiring Turgai, too, though they were doing it in a more demure and reserved manner, which serious people were supposed to have. “Wonderful! Marvelous! We can live here!” The only one who didn’t say a word of make a gesture to show his delight was my father. He dropped his eyes and was staring at his feet gloomily. Perhaps he thought of “Sparkle” commune, which was a menace to his peaceful living, and was looking for ways to fight it. Mother’s lamentation and my bustle distracted him.
- Stop squealing, get up! Noone’s trying to take your puppy away!- he yelled furiously.
My mother broke off immediately, lifting her head, scared.
- It’s time to put up the yurts!- Father grumbled.
Everyone took to work. It didn’t go with a swing, the grill frame of the yurt was shredding, making it a torture to squeeze it into collars. In the meanwhile, umounted people and horsemen surrounded us. Their auls must have already got settled in the Kyzbel ravines. Turgai had been turning the corner since the previous autumn. That’s why in spring nearly all Turgai dwellers moved to the Kyzbel dzhailau.
Our landsmen helped us finally put up our yurts and unpack our belongings, treated us to yerulik which they prepared to welcome us. We were the last to arrive at the dzhailau. Our dear land and dear people gave is a warm welcoming. As the saying goes, the horse paths to our aul were hot with the stamping of hooves.
Batsapy, my mother’s sister, came to visit us. My mother and my aunt looked stunningly alike. However, my mother looked far younger in spite of her being five to six years older than Batsapy. They traveled down the memory line, which was a sad journey, and asked each other about their daily lives. Mother could guess by her sister’s new wrinkles and grizzling hair that those years had been rough to her.
Batsapy didn’t come alone – she brought her younger son. His name was Musapyr. He was elegant and slim and wore dandyish clothes of the town. His oblong, soft oval face would be thoroughly sweet but for his face, which was a little hooked like that of a bird of prey. I was far heavier and sturdier than he, but Musapyr still looked more like a grown-up. In fact, he turned out to be four years older than me. Musapyr was studying in Orenburg.
As a child, I used to be a fighting cock and a bully. I can’t think of a boy who came to visit us and left without being driven to tears after getting his jacket warmed. It was my contentious temper. Musapyr could have shared the same way but for his timidity and quiet temper. I didn’t quite like him deep inside, but he never gave me a pretext for starting a fight. Musapyr had taken much after his mother, who was the timid kind which people call to quiet to take away grass from a sheep. Though her son had her temper, I still felt like beating him sometimes. But what could I do if he always obeyed to me. Even a dog won’t bite one who is down.
Musaryp’s most curious feature was his ability to please. If one looked into his eyes during an insignificant conversation and smiled, he’d return the smile. As soon as one assumed the serious air and gave him a cold look, he got very serious, too. His countenance could be tuned and changed like the strings of the dombra are tuned before producing a melody.
When Musapyr tries to retell me the books he has read, his speech becomes as liquid as a river. He loved spouting poetry. I think his favorite subject was the distant Orenburg, which he praised in every way and propagated as the best place to study. But his words hardly ever reached my heart.
As soon as Batsapy and Musapyr left, new guest began to come to our yurts. Batsapy laid the road for our relatives and friends.
Once a company of three stopped by our yurts – a woman was riding a double-humped camel led by a man, a young camel meant for service, buyrshyn, was walking slowly next to the first camel carrying a large leather bottle with a kumis mixer sticking out of it. The little caravan was reared by a boy riding a light-brown curtailed three-year-old with its mane cut short. The forelock was untouched, though. The horsemen drew my attention when I was in the steppe. They came closer, and I could study them. The heavy body of the old swarthy woman was too big for the camel. Her face was so fat that not only her eyes, but also the nose looked puffed up. Her head in a kerchief looked as huge as a cooking pot. As for the man leading her camel, one could take him for a fourteen-year-old, as he was very short. But his thick curly black beard was an evidence of long years he’d lived. Looking at the boy who reared the caravan closely, I was surprised to find out that his face looked more like that of a girl.
They stopped close to our yurts. The black-bearded shorty jumped easily from the saddle and forced the camel, who was howling desperately, to go on its knees. He tried to take the woman off, but soon he realized he couldn’t do it alone. He began to look around to find someone to help him. I came up to them and greeted him, as the old custom was, though I found the shorty quite funny.
- Aleikum assalam,- the shorty said in a voice far from friendly, giving me a suspicious glance. The shorty was vexed by the fact that noone helped him to take off the old woman.- Whose son are you?
- My father’s! – I couldn’t resist pranking a little.
- Are there children who have no father? Why are you talking to me like this? Why are you babbling? You’d better help me take her off,- the shorty pointed at the old woman. But at that moment, my father went out of the yurt and ran up to the strangers.
- God, it’s Kareke!
- Abeke!- the black old woman exclaimed in a low, masculine voice. Being afraid of falling down, she tried not to move. Father embraced her and tried to take her off, but he failed, too. Then my mother, who came to help, and several more people brought the fat woman down, which cost them great effort. I had seen many fat people, both man and women, but I had never met such a huge and tall fat person yet!..
Both she and the shorty were so surprising to me that I didn’t notice the boy dismount his colt and come up to us. The grown-ups were greeting the old woman, whose name was Kareke, and the shorty called Kikym, while I was studying the child standing shyly aside. Of course it was a girl!.. Looking at her delicate and sweet features, at her slim and tall silhouette, long, elegant fingers clasping at a kamcha, I thought her to be either the same age as me or about a year younger. In a word, she had reached the age when a Kazakh girl is supposed to wear the dress of a Kazakh girl. But why was she dressed like a boy, then?
Greeting Kareke, my mother included a little lamentation, as the tradition was, and then, wiping the tears away with her kerchief, she spoke in a calmer tone before she saw the teenage girl.
- My God, it’s Bateszhan. Come here, dear!
Embracing the girl, who was totally abashed, she kissed her on the cheeks and the forehead.
- Let’s talk about the news and the daily life in the yurt, - my father invited them. – Kareke must be tired after the journey, and the day is so sultry. Come in, welcome.
Indeed, Kareke looked tired and sick. She could hardly stand on her fat legs. Father and mother took her under the arms and brought to the yurt. The girl followed them. Only the short Kikym stayed y the camels and was unreining them with the help of Kairakbai and unpacking the treat Kareke had brought with her.
The short Kikym was making heavy steps, as if trying to look more significant and to get some additional weight. His whole appearance said, “My work is done, the rest will be all right without me”.
- Who are they?- I asked Kairakbai who was leading the camel unreined to the yurt.
- Did you see Mambet-khoja, the offspring of Saint Zhampa, last year in Turgai? You did. Well, this fat woman, Karakyz, is his senior wife, baibishe. And the bearded shorty is Mambet’s younger brother, Kikym. The girl in boy’s clothes must be the second daughter of Mambet’s concubine. You mother calls her Bates. As far as I remember, the elder daughter’s name is Katima, the family calls her Kaken. Unless I forgot it, the girl’s name’s Batima. Most often people call her Bates. She’s a year younger than Kaken, and Kaken’s the same age as you are.
Unless my memory deceives me, her mother’s name is Zhania. I’ve heard that in their house, they aren’t accustomed to calling Bates’s mother tokal, the concubine, and baibishe Karakyz – the senior wife. Remember it and try not to babble. Or else you’ll embarrass the girl and hurt the baibishe!
- All right, I’ll remember it!- I said and parted from Kairakbai to go to my yurt.
When the Kazakhs are going to visit well-respected people, they usually put on their best and most gallant clothes, no matter is they are warm or light. I marked the guests’ fine dressed, too – Kareke was wearing a fox fur coat with a canvas top. Kikym had on a thick canvas chekmen and self-made boots with felt stockings. The girl was wearing a white fine-grained karakul coat over her camisole. When I entered the yurt, our guest had already taken off their heavy winter clothes. The fresh air of the steppe came from behind the blanket which was slightly lifted. The hot red faces of the guest were acquiring their normal appearance. Karakyz’s face, which had just seemed to be dark crimson to me, was getting dark and dry. Bates looked pale and white, her rosy cheeks faded very soon. Without her fur coat, wearing a thin belted velour camisole, Bates looked amazingly fragile and thin. I looked at her, thinking that she could break at bending down. At first I found her neck a little bit too short for her tall figure. But now I could see that the neck was well-proportioned, too. I couldn’t find a flaw with her beautiful round face but one – her eyes was a little narrow. But, to tell the truth, I liked the eyes, too, as they were clean and lucid and shone like black currants among green leaves.
The guests spent five or six days in our yurts. I got used to them and came to understand them better. Karakyz was hot-tempered and authoritative. She felt like a hostess and a man in her family, and she was not a frump but a powerful and honorable man. Most often her words sounded like an order. Like you’d better not stand up to us.
Kikym the Shorty was desperate to look like a sturdy and strong man, no nail with a head, like people called it in the auls. He told that he’d been training race horses since childhood and that horses he bred always came first at the baiga. He must have bragged a little. Or else he wouldn’t have mentioned Kalisa so often when talking about horses. I was curious to know who she was. Kairakbai, who was well-informed, told me that Kalisa was Kikym’s wife, a woman taller than he, portly, beautiful, neat and dressy, who avoided spade work.
- The host of the house is not the shorty but his wife, - Kairakbai told me, - As a girl, she didn’t want to marry Kikym, but “Saint” Zhampa persuaded her. She used to be frivolous before marriage and is still true to her habits. Kikym knew it but he was afraid of staying alone if they divorced. As spiteful as a ferret, a rowdy who’s always bothering people, he’s as tractable as a child with his wife and never contradicts her. This Kalisa has not only her husband but all the youth of the aul at nod. A girl or a young man has never disobeyed her during games. If she dislikes the was a dzhigit taking part in the games acts, she can say, “We have to go!” and rise to her feet, and both girls and young women follow her. Knowing that girls are subject to Kalisa, dzhigits are anxious to catch her fancy. god helps the dzhigit who pleases her. There’s no one to match him with the girl he likes better and sooner than Kalisa does.
This is what Kairakbai told me. But most of all I was interested in Bates. At first we were estranged and shy, but gradually we got closer.
At first she preferred to keep silent, but by the time they had to depart, she had become my best advisor. Bates often reminded me of the wild goatling we had bred for about a house at home. At first the goatling was tickle and wouldn’t let people come close, but step by step he turned into a most fawning pet. As soon as I called him, he rushed to me to butt me or buck, to nuzzle my knees with affection. He’d get upset when we stopped the game. I got really attached to him and even loved the goatling. I remember clearly the bitter feeling I got when our neighbor’s limp hound tore him. I wouldn’t eat for several days, nearly crying my heart out. Finally I wanted to take revenge – I put a needle into raw meat and gave it to the hound. The dog swallowed it and soon died. The death was painful. It was making fitful moves with its throat but couldn’t eat anymore. Seeing it’s agony, I knew the goatling was avenged.
How much Bates resembled that goatling, both whimsical and affectionate. She had me behind her as if I was a two-year-old camel to lead. She did whatever she wanted and I didn’t dare contradict her. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen a girl dressed like a boy. I remember meeting such a girl when we were living of the banks of the Syr Darya. People called her Yerkekshora, which means man’s servant. “If you are a man today, what will you do tomorrow?”, “What will you be if you get married?” – I mocked at the dandyish, arrogant girl.
My bravado didn’t only hurt the girl. Her parents had a quarrel with my family. That’s why here, at the foot of the Kyzbel, my father and mother were afraid that I could insult Bates, as this was my temper. At first they watched us with anxiety, but then they calmed down, assured of our friendship. We played together, tiding along the Turgai steppe.
Before their departure, Kareke invited my parents to visit her with “the groom brother”. We had got invitations like that before. Sometimes I went with my parents, sometimes I stayed at home. I don’t know what could have happened that time if it hadn’t been for one fact. I went to see off the guests with my father. We were parting far in the step. Having dismounted, Bates said to me:
- Burkut, come to visit us, too, it you don’t, you’ll hurt me! – and she wagged her thin finger at me.
So I promised her.
On the date appointed, my father, my mother, me, Kairakbai, and about five or six people more went to Mambet-khoja’s aul. It was situated on the west side of the Kyzbel, in the area called Taksuduka, that is, stone well. We could see other auls around it. The yurts of Khoja’s aul were pleasantly different due to their whiteness. Especially the central one, which was towering like a huge one-humped camel. Such rich light yurts are not frequent nowadays. As it seemed to me, much cattle was pasturing near the aul. Horses and camels were especially numerous. Father even heaved a sigh of sad envy:
- That’s how people leave! They never change the places for camps, they know their land... Unlike us, moving here and there! Look at their cattle and then look at ours!
When we were very close to Khoja’s aul, two horsemen galloped to meet us. I didn’t think about who the second rider was, but I had no doubt that Bates was the first one. Heating the horse, I left my father and his companions far behind.
It could be tomfoolery or a different feeling, but, anyway, I couldn’t think of anything but Bates. I caught up to her and, shouting “Let’s compete” without even slowing down, rode on. Turning around after a few seconds, I saw Bates galloping behind me with her horse’s mane nearly touching the tail of mine.
A game called “kyz-kuu” is popular with the Kazakhs. The participants are riders, a girl and a dzhigit. The dzhigit has to catch up the girl. If he manages to reach her before a certain place, he has a right to kiss her. If he doesn’t, he turns the horse back abruptly. The girl chases him. Having caught up with the dzhigit, the girl keeps lashing him with her kamcha till the very finish.
I imagined the race I was having with Bates to be the game. My horse had won the baiga more than once. Father bought him from one of his closest friends. If I give the horse free rein, he’ll win this race. Unfortunately, Bates is too ambitious. When they were staying with us, I was studying het character. If something went wrong, not like she wanted it, she could take great offence.
If only I beat her or didn’t let her catch up with me, she’d get upset and angry. But it was clear that I wouldn’t be vexed when defeated. That’s why I held my horse back, letting the rider get in advance of me and only pretending to be doing my best to keep up with her. We covered more than a verst like this. The aul dogs, excited by the stamping of hooves, started barking. The most desperate of them rushed to my horse at bit him, perhaps on the gaskin. Scared, my horse buckjumped and unseated me. Knocked senseless, I could hardly get back to my feet. My head was aching, blood was running down my face. The aul dogs sat not far from with their eyes perched up, as if enjoying the small triumph. Seeing Bates, who was approaching me, I hid my face with my hand.
- What happened to you?- Bates was very close. She sprang down from her horse and came up to me. What happened to you ? Is your eye injured?
- No, my eyes are intact, - I took my hand aside.
She took a little mirror from her breast pocket and brought it to my face. I saw skin grazed over my right eyebrow. Some people came to me to say comforting words. Like things happen. My head was all right, bones unbroken, it was just a little wound. Someone had already caught my horse. My father came up to me, too. He was disgruntled and even indignant. Why?! His son, a dzhigit, fell from his horse nearly in the aul.
- Well, son, mount the horse and don’t fall again!
Not only my father, I was upset over my clumsiness, I was fir to die of shame! I got into the saddle and rode quietly to the aul.
That’s how we finally reached the big white yurt.
Kareke along with several men and women came to greet us. They had seen me fall and were now plying me with their pitiful questions:
- Is the poor boy badly injured?
- Your head must hurt a lot, right?
Kareke invited us to the yurt, so I thought that the host wasn’t there, otherwise he’d be greeting us, too. I was walking modestly, following the seniors.
In the yurt, three aksakals were sitting on the place of honor, tore. In the right corner, on a skin mat spread in front of a bed, an old man with a large head was sitting. The bed was decorated with the Kazakh bone carving. As my habit was, I began studying the man. He had a moustache cut short and an unusual beard divided into three peaks. From under his low brows, his bulging eyes were staring. He had a large nose, a short fat neck and a heavy body. His swarthy skin and sharp features made him look like an Uzbek. His clothes capped the impression. He was wearing a black skullcap, a silk-embroidered yellow chapan, white loose pants. When my father and his companions shook hands with him, I sat down by the threshold before the seniors invited me. My father didn’t like it – he gave me an askant glance of disapproval. But the giant who looked like an Uzbek paid no attention to my boyish incivility. He seemed to be too busy to notice me.
Soon I understood that he was Mambet’s brother. Konyr, as was his name, was the oldest and the most honorable offspring of Zhampa.
He spoke little, his voice was languid and slow, and he was constantly huffing and puffing, trying to look severe, sitting as still as a pitched pole. But what surprised me most was his age. Konyr was seventy eight, though one couldn’t find a white spot in his raven hair, and all of his teeth, large and yellowish, were intact.
When we had already got used to the chilly yurt and felt all right, Mambet arrived. He’d cut off his beard which was as rampant as that of Kanyr-khoja but had grown his moustache, which used to be short, so that its ends curled. The change was easy to explain – he took a one month teaching course in Turgai the previous autumn and was now on the post of the state teacher in the aul.
It took me a short time to introduce myself to everyone. First of all, I recognized Bates's mother, Zhania, though they didn’t call her by her name in my presence. Bates was her mother’s copy in terms of face and figure. I was shocked to hear Bates call the black old stranger she didn’t bear the least resemblance too her mother so assuredly.
What else did I find out? Zhania had had several children after Bates, but all of her children died early except for a boy named Seil who was four years old then. But Seil was considered the black old woman’s son, too.
One could took Zhania for an elderly woman, though she was only thirty. Her husband was nine years older, but she looked young, especially when contrasted to her – his cheeks were so ruddy that they seemed to be about to shed blood.
Zhania, daughter of a poor man, was brought to Mambet’s yurt when she was only fourteen. Mambet paid the full bridewealth – forty heads of cattle – for her. But it wasn’t he who gave her parents the camel and came to take the bride. It was considered below a khoja, an atkaminer and a rich merchant to visit a poor man. So he sent his senior wife, baibishe, for Zhania.
If a woman in the family which has been waiting for children for too long has once a son and then a daughter, it means that the fortune smiles on the house. If she is also sprightly and deft, she is soon respected. But I noticed at once that Zhania wasn’t respected at all in her family. She worked more than anyone else, though, getting up and dawn to work about the house. What effort Zhania took to keep the house rich and prosperous! But she doesn’t deserve as much as a festive dress, her clothes are patched rags.
Even her daughter, her own daughter, Bates, avoids talking to her, believing Karakyz to be her real mother.
Kikym, a man of business and a “tough” one, as people called him, was managing Mambet’s property. He knew how to handle work-hands and watch the herds pasture and double.
But in fact, the real ruler was Kalisa – Kikym’s wife.
It was one and the same family, though they lived in two yurts. Each yurt had its food and utensils. The yurt of Kikym and Kalisa was believed to be the junior yurt – the otau.
On regular days, Kalisa didn’t interfere in the life of the big yurt. When guests came, they all were taking care of them together.
The yield was common, but the shares were not equal. There was another particular feature about the life in Mambet-khoja’s aul. Though the wealth was all concentrated in the big yurt, it was the yurt which was unhomely and untidy, while the otau looked like a brightly painted woman cup. Every single item in it had its place and looked beautiful. Kalisa herself was dressed in a neat and pleasant way
The Kazakhs say that the most highbred animals have little offsprings. Both swanhens and eaglehens, the highest birds, produce two eggs. The king of animals, the lion, has only two babies. Perhaps Kalisa was of a special breed, too. In nine years of her married life, she had only given birth to one son, Aktai, She dressed him, a five-year-old boy, in a beautiful townish manner and made sure that he was always clean and had hair neatly cut. Little Seil, who was wearing rags, looked like a slave’s son when compared to him.
- Why is it like this?- I asked Kairakbai.
He explained to me that it was not about the parent’s negligence or slapdash but about some customs of the Kazakhs. A son long-hoped for is given a bad name, so that a bad name cannot harm him. Thanks God, they don’t call boys Itbas, which means dog’s head, or Shoshkabai, that is, a rich hogman. They dress the child shabbily so that he cannot be jinxed.
I got to know Bates even better this time. The more I studied her and her manners, the more I thought, “She acts like a girl is supposed to act. Why does the poor thing still believe herself to be a boy?”
Her cautious moves and her temper, which was yet hidden deep in her mind, resembled a bud of lily-of-the-valley unopened. Thin, gentle, sensitive to cold, she really was a flower which hadn’t yet let the sun play on its folded petals. What will she be like tomorrow? Maybe she’ll blossom rampantly, like a carefully grown town flower with wide petals but little fragrance. But I believe that she will be a modest little flower of the steppe, a flower with a heady sweet smell. No matter what, she looked so much like an unopened lily-of the valley bud!
THE FAITHFUL LOVE
Our visit was a short one, and soon we came back home. But now I was always tethered to a pole in Mambet’s aul, like a horse in a loop. I found numerous pretexts to visit Bates. Even though the sly Kalisa suspected all kinds of sins, our relationship still remained as pure as that of siblings.
Being Bates’s friend, I came close to the fortress I had just been desperate to avoid – to studying. I came to hate the commune of Ak-Mosque. I used to believe that school was the place where fairness and honestly were encouraged. But after coming across Aralbaiev and the rest of the so called well-educated people in Ak-Mosque, I was sure they were far too mean. I shouldn’t have tried to find the teensiest bit of honesty about them. The first time a light had shone for me was when I met Gani Muratbaiev. But the short time was not enough for me to understand what kind of a man he was. I simply believed him to be honest and pure.
“What will come out of me? I must study, right? Isn’t it too late?” – that’s what occupied my thoughts in those days. I had a faithful memory. I thought of the story of Bey Tol. This bey tried a case at the age of nine. Our Abai had been helping his father in his sultan’s business since the age of thirteen. Most of people believe young people to get some common sense and the ability to choose a profession only after they have come of age. But if it’s true, what has one to do with Bey Tole and Abai the poet? And Chokan Valikhanov, renowned Kazakh scientist, recorded the “Yedige” song as performed by akyn Kurleut-Kipchak Zhamankul when he was only five years old!..
So a person doesn’t always have to be full-age to define his destiny. Sometimes one’s mental development is in advance of one’s years. I have already given you some proofs. But it doesn’t mean that I believed myself to be one of the great. I even didn’t expect myself to become a big man...
But what will come of me, anyway? I often thought about this. One can see by my short life that I’ve been walking a winding path since childhood. It seems to me that I learned what real thinking was when I was ten. Since then, I’ve seen our house as a raven nestle made on a branch of a dry tree. I’s constantly shaking in the wind and seems about to fall down, it definitely will as soon as the storm grows violent. My poor father was well aware of it and always thought of the ways to save his family and himself. He couldn’t find any way out and was torn by his thoughts. Not hoping anymore, he came back to Turgai and settled here. Only uncle Zhakynbek gave him a feeble hope. He said:
- There’s a new trend in Russia now, called new economic policy, NEP. It’s a fight between the rich and the poor for the economy. The Bolsheviks’ head, Lenin, is assured that he will win. But how does he know? Of course he’s hoping to win, otherwise he wouldn’t have started the fight. But we don’t refuse to fight, either. Maybe we’ll find a way out and defeat the Bolsheviks.
It seemed to me that Father had only moved from the Syr Darya to his mother land just to hear those words o my uncle. I realized it when my father met his Turgai friends. Being too young or too unreasonable, I believe my uncle’s hopes to be vain, or maybe the reason is that I only believe my eyes. All the previous bais and beys of Turgai whom people said to have “six-mile fangs” could fear Yerkin Yerzhanov alone. As soon as one said he was approaching, they’d run in all directions to hide!.. I’ve seen the life of the poor since the rebel of 1916. The poor is much stronger now. Could it be otherwise? Is the Soviet government not the government of the poor?.. It’s the power which wouldn’t break when pressed by an armed enemy, so it will not let an unarmed one defeat itself. It is supported by a vast majority, by the laborers. This majority will not let the minority, the expolitators, defeat them. But what is waiting for them, the exploitators, if they fail to win?..
These thoughts overtook me at the beginning of my conscious experience. But the more I thought of the fight, the more difficult it was to foresee what it would end in, the vaguer my own future grew. Sometimes I seemed to face an unscalable mountain, the top of which I could never reach. What could I do? At first I decided that studying would be the best thing to support me throughout my life. But, as I have already mentioned, both studying and those who provided it were a great disappointment to me. That’s why I decided to stay in the aul. I thought I’d stay there to see what I should do.
But now that I had met Bates I had to think over the necessity of studying once again.
- Why?- you will ask me.
I got so close to Bates that I tied myself up in knots whenever I was alone. But it would be embarrassing to go to see her again and again before the hooves of my horse cooled down. At first I didn’t understand what was happening to me, but the others were well aware of it. Their gossip reached me, too. I would be glad to ignore it, but finally I realized that a nasty rumor could be born...
So what could I do?
The answer came with a wave of a magic hand - study!
Now I should tell you about the school I was going to go to.
I think the reader should know that the vast enlightment of the Kazakh steppe is associated with the name of Ibrai Altynsarin. He was born just here, in the Turgai aul, from where he went to Orenburg to study. Being an educated man, Ibrai started founding schools which were called Russian-and-Kazakh. Ibrai came to our aul, too, people say that it was just in the days when my father, Abutalip, was born. They say that Ibrai said to our grandfather, Zhaman,” Open a school in the aul to celebrate your son’s birth”. My grandmother was a gnarly man. He said neither yes or no and asked Ibrai to consult the honorable people of the aul, promising to follow their recommendation. If they decided unanimously, Altynsary’s wish would be granted him. People also tell about a man called Tanatar making a speech as follows:
- The well-off people of the aul didn’t send their children to school. Sometimes Russian officials managed to send some poor orphans there. Among the illiterate Kazakhs, there chanced to be bey Baigozha to take his grandson, Ibrai, to a Russian school in Orenburg, of his own accord. Many people of the auls were petrified with rage. They said the bey to have baptized his child and abandoned him. You can see Ibrai sitting here, and you can see that he proved to be a true Kazakh, and nobody actually baptized him. Why refuse to do some good then. Let’s do like Ibrai thinks is better and found a school.
Tanatar was a well-respected man on whose words people hung.
- Where shall we open a school, then?- they asked Ibrai.
- In Tanatar’s aul, on the bank of the Sarykopa, people are the most numerous there, - Altynsarin answered.
Everyone supported Ibrai. In 1875, people began building a burnt brick school in Tanatar’s aul. It took them five years to complete the building. In 1880, two teachers, a Kazakh and a Russian, came from Orenburg. Among the first pupils, shakirts, from the near auls, there was my father, too. I took after him – he wasn’t really eager to study and, having mastered the least of reading and writing, gave up attending the school. Unlike my father, many pupils completed their studying to be replaced by new ones. The Sarykopa school opened the eyes of many people, turning them to the source of knowledge. People who became the first educated people in our parts attended it.
The Sarykopa school existed till the rebellion of 1916. That’s when it stopped to function. The tsarist army, fighting against Amangeldy’s rebels, the whites turned the school building into a Civil War barrack, ruining it completely.
After its final victory, the Soviet government went upon school repair. In summer of 1922, when we moved to Turgai, repair works on the building in Sarykopa was about to be completed. The pupils of small-scale local school closed for reconstruction were supposed to be transferred to that big school.
That’s how my dreams and wishes got suddenly attached to the Sarykopa school. I thought of a song our Kairakbai sang:
Clouds have covered the Alataus,
Their tops are belted by fog.
Don’t say goodbye, we should better
See every day, again and again.
The school in Tanatar’s aul helped me see Bates every day, every single hour, stay close to her all the time. The school building was nearly new. But it was difficult to place all the pupils in this aul. Many of them had to settle somewhere in the nearby auls. I decided to follow their example and settle in Mambet’s aul.
Bates had completed three years of primary school, my knowledge was very much the same. So we entered the fourth year together and took the same desk.
The school administrator was Balkash Zhydevbaiev. Besides him, there were two teachers. In a manner of speaking, it was cozy and warm. The studying was fine, and my life grew happier and more joyful!
My dear friend! I don’t know how old you were when you fell in love with your bride. If one believes the legends about Baian-Sulu and Kozy-Korpesh, about Medzhnun and Leila, they had been in love with each other nearly since the day of there birth. But what about me? When did I start to love?
Thinking of the days I spent with Bates, I come to think that it wasn’t truly the love like the one a brother feels for his sister. The sinful love for a girl rose in me, a young dzhigit. When I realized what was going on, I was baffled, I was afraid of myself.
You ask why?
I feel ashamed to speak of it frankly, but I still will try and explain it. Being a constant guest in the yurt of the sly Kairakbai and his wife, who was just as sly, I had known the “basis” of life which youngsters are so eager so fathom since long before. The glances I’d cast at Bates were far from innocent. Kalisa, who was sound on these thing, soon got me pegged. Once I was sitting in her house and, being an enthusiastic joker, she confused me with her indelicate inklings.
- I thought you to be an innocent, artless kid, but you start twisting round like a fox...
- Why do you think so?- I pretended to be surprised, not knowing where the sly Kalisa would lead her speech.
- I’ve known you to be a traveled boy since I met you. Now I’m sure you are.
- Traveled! Put it in a clearer way.
- It’s clear enough. Pets like you ripen soon. But I understand another thing, too. However ripe you are, you’re still innocent. That’s why you can’t venture to do what you have on tour mind.
- Where did you dream that up, Kalisa?
- My dear boy, it looks like you believe yourself to be the only one who has eyes. Can’t I see what is happening right in my eyes?
- If you’ve seen something, tell me!- I responded to Kalisa.- You have many girls, the same age as me, in your aul. When I see them, I like cracking jokes, playing the buffoon, and fooling around.
I’m getting ready to listen to Kalisa like a traveled boy, expecting her to speak on this very subject. She approaches it in a roundabout way, as if agreeing with me, and then she suddenly turns round:
- Dear, you seem to have taken a great fancy to our Yerkezhan,- she calls Bates by her boy’s name, making her beautiful black eyes at me.
Embarrassment makes me stutter, I protest, expecting Kalisa to keep on prying. That’s when I’m going to explain to her that we are just friends. But the sly Kalisa keeps away from the trap:
- Can your look hide it,- she says with an air of significance, sighing.- But, dear, I think it’ too early far too early...
- Too early for what?- I blurt.
- Too early to see her as a girl!
- My God!- scared, I utter the words my grandmother often said. They’ve become a habit of mine.
- Don’t be afraid, boy!- Kalisa’s voice gets firmer, she puts off every trace of cunning. – It’s not only me who noticed you looking at her amorously, there are other people in the house, too. Say, the concubine – tokal Zhania. I was eager to tell you. Yesterday, when you were admiring Yerkezhan, unable to take your eyes off her, tokal whispered to me, “My sister-in-law, tell the boy to behave properly. If the adults see it, they’ll bring him to disgrace. He won’t be able to stay here even at daytime”.
Perhaps Zhania did say it, indeed, or maybe Kalisa made it up, god knows. But I didn’t dare to deny the truth and lose my nerve, embarrassed.
Sensing my shyness and, seemingly, willing to encourage me, Kalisa switched to a different tone:
- You know, boy, leave Bates it peace. If you want to become a real dzhigit before the time has come, we’ll find another way out. Why mess about with the child if this child has a grown-up elder sister. You may be sure I’ll help you drift together...
- Who do you mean?- I was puzzled.
- As long as we are face to face, I can tell you. Kaken, Kakezhan. She’s your peer. It’s easy to persuade her... You want it?
- Damn her!- I flew into temper and left Kalisa’s otau.
My life in Mambet’s family grew very hard after that conversation. It seemed to me that everyone was following me, each glance of mine, especially if was cast at Bates. I always felt embarrassed and didn’t know what to do with myself. I was so embarrassed that I finally had to move to Kikym’s yurt. It was Kalisa who gave me the hint. There was a good pretext, too – Turgai was off to Turgai on a domestic business, and Kalisa found it a bit scary to stay all alone.
One evening, she continued the conversation that once embarrassed me a lot:
- Right, boy. Now it’s beyond doubt you’re in love with Yerkezhan. Tell me, be honest. I do understand that people of your age can fall in love, too. But, while you’ve seen the life, she’s an infant still glued to her mother’s breasts. Even though your passion’s a true one, don’t hurry, hold it back. Remember the akyn’s words:
Patience is like a bar of gold,
While impatience is no more than dust.
The one who can wait will succeed,
While the one who cannot is doomed to fail.
Nice words! Aren’t they? And bear it in your mind that the Kazakh say – a thirteen year old is a hostess. You don’t have to wait much. You can rely on me! I’ll arrange it for you to have fun before she’s gone.
- She? Gone?- How bitter I felt at once. I knew what she meant at that very moment.- Kalisa, is there a man who has already paid the bridewealth for her?
- Haven’t you heard it?
- No!.. It didn’t occur to me...
- Shame on you! Don’t you know a Kazakh can propose to an infant? She’s got a bride since long ago. You want to know who he is? I’ll tell you – he’s a bai named Sasyk.
- Where could he come from?
All of a sudden, Kalisa made a swing round and began to comfort me.
- You’ll have it your way, Burkut. Tsar Mikolai’s time is over. They don’t take girl by force now. The only thing you have to do it catch Yerkezhan’s fancy, the rest will just come. But beware, don’t give yourself away...
I followed the sly Kalisa’s advice and became more circumspect and serious. I plunged deep into studying. Nor without boasting, I’ll tell you that I was the best student in the class. When the teacher was ill, I was even trusted to teach primary school pupils.
Our daily routine was like this: the first one in the house to get up was Mambet, he woke up at dawn. He went to perform his morning ablutions. I was the next one to get up. Most often I had my breakfast at Kalisa’s. Then I’d get up and go out of the yurt to meet Bates. In winter, we went to Tanatar aul on a sledge with a camel put to it. To make it stop, say “Stop!”. To make it pace, shout, “Shu!”. If you say “Shok!”, it lies onto the ground obediently. It’s a timid and docile animals. We slide cozily in the wide sledge carpeted richly with straw. Sometimes the sledge turn turtle over a large snowdrift, and we fall into the snow. The camels freezes the, waiting calmly till we put up the sledge and got into it.
The four verst road between the Saint’s aul and that of Tanatar goes through the ice coat of the lake overgrown with thick reeds. The greedy Kikym sparing his camel, wouldn’t let other kids get into out sledge. We loved the privacy and those rides in the evening and in the morning. In that year, the lake reeds were especially high. One couldn’t see a horseman approaching straightaway. The rich sultans of reeds, white with masses of hoarfrost, were drooping, merging into one to look like a hill. The wind couldn’t reach the lake. A storm could be raging somewhere in the steppe, but an amazing silence lay here. As if copying the reeds, the camel acquired a thick frost coat, especially in places where its fur was thick – on the neck, on the withers, and on the legs. Looking from a certain distance, one could see it like reeds arranged in a stack moving there. While we are riding, the frost creeps like a fox to bite our cheeks. Bates’s pallid face grows ruddy in the cold, as crimson as the spring tulip in the steppe.
No, neither of us fears the biting frost. The road is a short one, and we are warmly dressed. The camel never loses its way. We often free it, and it carried an empty sledge, while we turn to walk a narrow path in the reeds. We race, we climb a hill to slide down the snow crust, we dive into a freshly fallen fluffy heap of snow. When tired, we’ll catch the sledge, sit there side by side, and sing, cuddling, sing at the top of our voice...
I remember it: we’re going home along the road pressed by the weeds, as usually. It’s a cheerful and merry day. The snow, still the blushful sun of the winter, was already warming the ground. The snow had melted a bit and frozen again by the time of sunset, which made it look yellowish. The camel was making slow steps with a soft rocking of our sledge. Its deliberation was a little irritating to us. We got out from the sledge, onto the road, and raced to a hill. I got onto it first and turned back to see than Bates had slipped on the sleet, fallen down and was climbing onto it with great effort. I rushed to help her but slipped, too, falling down. We’d switched places. Not Bates was on the hill with me climbing to meet her. The frost, the racing, and the funny incident made the girl’s cheeks blush brightly.
Bates shouted to me from the steep hill.
- Catch me. Can you?
- Jump, Bateszhan.
The same moment, she was in my arms. Pressing my lips against her mouth, I suddenly felt a touch of her hot soft tongue. We were drinking our kisses like honey, sweet and heady. We forgot everything, and god know how long the bliss would have lasted if an abrupt sarcastic exclamation hadn’t flushed us.
- Congratulations! Let your kisses be numerous.
The acrid words cut us like a knife. We opened our lips, unlocked our hands and sprang back from each other in terror. Choking with shame, Bates hid her face behind her hands and ran to catch the sledge. I had enough countenance to turn my head and look at the affronter. I recognized the dzhigit who caught up with us, riding a frisky abler, to be Zhuman, Saudabai’s son...
- Congratulations, myrza! Let your kisses be numerous!- he repeated with a saucy smile, working his hands from his mittens to twist his black moustache.
I knew at once that it was beyond me to fight Zhuman. He often took part in fights and was even considered to be a paluan, that is, an athlete. Had he been a feeble one, I’d have kicked him off the saddle and trampled him underfoot.
Steamed up by the cruel affront, aware of my own helplessness, I didn’t talk back to Zhuman and followed Bates. The clever camel stopped, Bates was approaching the sledge, trampling over frozen hillocks. But Zhuman wouldn’t let me be. His ambler was walking level with me. Suddenly the insulter grabbed me by the chin.
- Hold on! I’ve got to talk to you.
- Let me go!- I took his hand aside.
- I said wait a little!
- Why are haunting me, am I indebted to your father?
- What if it, darling?- Crimson with rage, Zhuman raised his kamcha.- Looks like you want me to lash a couple of times. Huh?
- Do if you have the guts!
Furious, Zhuman took a swing with his kamcha to shudder at that very moment and drop it languidly. It was clear that he was scared not of me, as I was just a boy, but of my father.
- All right, darling, wait a little,- he said between his teeth,- once I’ll snook you. I’ll lie in your way like a snake. I wonder if you have the guts to step across me.
Having said this, he turned his horse back abruptly and rushed to Taratar.
The camel had dragged the sledge far away. Bates hadn’t even caught up with it. Reaching her, I lifted her in my arms, made about a hundred steps more and placed Bates gently in the sledge.
Sensing that home was near, the camel went faster.
We didn’t utter a word through the whole evening before we got there. When we were finally back, Bates, insulted, went to her room without even looking at me. I only found Kalisa in Kikym’s house. She was wearing a fur coating, just about to visit someone. I wonder – how could she see it in the twilight that something was wrong with me?
- Darling, you seem to be ill-humored, what’s the matter with you?- she was asking anxiously.
- Nothing... A headache,- I muttered, but I think my voice sounded in a different way.
- Why should you have a headache?-Kalisa asked with a certain suspicion.
I kept muttering:
- The homework. I went to bed late yesterday and got up early today.
- Poor boy, you’re too deep into your studying. What makes your head ache is staying glued to your books. Look, you’ve even got thinner. Listen, dear. I’ve got some housework to do, you take a nap till supper. I’ll wake you up. Your head will be all right after a good sleep.
She spread a soft warm blanket in the corner, gave me a pillow and, making sure I was half-asleep, left.
Sometimes the only thing I had to do to fall asleep was go to bed after a long day at school. But that time the salutary sleep wouldn’t come, no matter how I called for it. I didn’t lie to Kalisa about going to bed late at night and waking up early in the morning. But shame and spite were torturing me. This all made my head ache and swivel, indeed. When my face touched the pillow, I could fell I was burning.
Unable to collect my thoughts, I lay there. Soon the door opened with a creek, and I heard Kalisa making her cautious steps, which were familiar to me. I closed my eyes and wheezed to feign sleep. Kalisa moved almost noiselessly in the dark, then, listening to me breathing, she mutter in a low voice, “He’s really sick, poor boy”. She lit a petrol lamp by the oven and drew the wick down. Only having done this, she threw her coat off and came up to me on the tips of her toes, patting by feverish forehead with her cold hand. I pretended to have just woken up.
- Ah, God, why did I wake you?- Kalisa exclaimed and asked anxiously:- Are you any better, dear?
- I am,- I asked without a moment’s hesitation,- only my head still aches a little.
- Wait a bit, you’ll have some strong tea and be sound again.
And she raked out some glowing coals from the oven for her small yellow samovar.
- You know, I’ve got some horse meat belyashes. As if in case you fell ill. The samovar will boil soon, and you’ll like them hot. You’ll have some tea and some belyashes, and your sickness will disappear without a trace.
Kalisa was a gifted persuader. I felt good sitting with her at supper. She enjoyed her little sips of the hot tea so much, munching seductively on the crisp belyashes which melted in her mouse.
But how sly she was!
- You know, I’ve heard it all,- she said suddenly, putting her bowl aside.
- What, what have you heard?- I grew anxious.
- Zhuman has told me, dear.
- Zhuman?!- I felt my heart falter.
- Why so scared,- Kalisa smiled, looking cunningly into my eyes, - have you forgotten about my promise to help you in your heart affairs. Didn’t I tell you – wait, don’t hurry. But you did. But there’s no helping it now. It’s done, now take courage, dear. Be as hard as a rock. Let’s think it over together – what can we do to prevent a fire from starting.
I couldn’t hide my confusion while Kalisa went on:
- Didn’t I tell you that our Yerkezhan is engaged. There’s a man to have her. Remember? Well, this Zhuman is her groom’s nephew. Do you understand now? That’s why Zhuman guards the girl as if she was his own bride. Especially from you. Everyone knows that you used to come often to her last year. But now that you live and study here people can’t speak but of you and Bates. I’ve heard true people retell the groom’s words to Zhuman: “Be my eyes and my ears”. Zhuman’s wife, Biken, is desperate to come here, both on business and not. They’ve given me an inkling, too – you’re matching them, putting the, closer! Beware, you can’t cover up your tracks. I know what will come after Zhuman has caught you. Biken will see me and say, - you can admire it, that’s your job. They’ll blow it all around the steppe, stir every aul.
It seemed to me that Kalisa was exaggerating.
- Ah, what a child you are! Can’t you understand it?- annoyed, she attacked me.- There’s no stopping the rumor. It will get into your house and into Kozha-ata’s family, too. You’ll have a rough time.
I thought that Kalisa was overestimating Zhuman and the gossip again. But step by step she made me think she was right:
- The previous year was a hard one. The year of the Pig. You know this. The murrain and the famine came to the steppe. The cattle fell. Your father was ruined, just as this house was. As the saying goes, we had nothing but a rein left. Sasyk was the only one who escaped the murrain. Kozha-ata asked him for help. Sasyk brought him a herd of horses. As they were turning the corner, they intended to give the herd back to Sasykbai.
- Don’t return them, I can do without them,- Sasyk’s answer was,- I’ve heard you have a child. She’s said to be worth forty seven heads. It’s a full bridewealth. My will be a dzhigit soon, too. We can dub them bride and groom. Your blessing?
Kalisa told me that Molda-ata agreed, and they fixed it up in autumn. Sasyk’s herd proved to be vey helpful. The abundance of things they had in the house now originated from it. Molda-gaa and Sasyk got so close that they looked like cream untouched.
- Try to understand it, boy,- Kalisa went on.- Many people criticize Sasyk’s son. So what! Will people pay any attention to his drawbacks if they’re true to the old custom? They believe matchmaking to be a sacred thing. The Soviet government is establishing quite a different order, though. But the custom is still stronger. The government prohibits the bridewealth and polygamy, it’s not allowed to marry young girls. Perhaps it will be like that. But who observes the law now? We still have it the old way – paying the bridewealth and making our girls cry when we marry them off, and old bait have more wives than there are fingers on one hand.
Of course, Kalisa was right. But why did she need to explain it to me in such details? Far and by, I’d known it all before.
- Hey, Kaleke! You’d better tell me what I should do now?
The sly aunt Kalisa looked at me complacently.
- You are asking me what you should do? First of all you have to pacify Zhuman, to make him keep silent.
- But how can I, Kalisa?
- As easy as that. Bribe him. Give him a gift.
- Will he accept it?
- I bet. A colt sin coat was enough to marry his own sister off to a fat purse. His sister must mean more to him than Yerkezhan.
- What can I give to cajole him?- I had already got what Kalisa’s friendliness was like and thought that Tekebai somehow resembled Zhuman, too.- Give me a peace of advice, please.
- We’ll think of something. I’ll give you a hint. But bear it in your mind that you’ll stop his mouth with the present. He’ll be quiet. You’ll have to do the rest. Wait till Bates is, as the saying goes, the hostess of a house. She’s just a young girl,as well as you. Look at yourself, Burkut. Wait a little, dear, be patient.
- Oibo-o-oi, Kaleke!- I said drawling.- What a long story it is!..
- Try and find a shorter none,- Kalisa laughed it off,- but first of all do understand that you have to make Zhuman keep silent. Otherwise you’ll have a rough time. He’s a mean and indiscreet man. He’ll be telling what he saw everywhere, embellishing it. He’ll say things to get you out of this house for sure. Have you thought of it? And, what is more important, what will happen to Bates? You’re a boy, you needn’t be afraid of ill fame. But she can get her whole life ruined. Have you ever heard about brides sent back to her aul placed on a black ass with her back first and a glowing firebrand in her hands? She’ll be doomed to beating till she dies. Have you thought of it?
I was so sorry for Bates that I nearly burst into tears.
- Tell me, Aunt Kalisa, what can I do. Settle it with Zhuman.
Kalisa promised me to settle it.
In the morning I found out that Bates had fever, as she took the incident very hard.
As for Kalisa, she kept her promise. Zhuman passed his word of honor that he wouldn’t tell and demanded a three-year-old colt from me. I had to go to my father’s aul to bring a colt for Zhuman in spring, after we began moving to the dzhailau. Of course, we were to tell the dwellers of the aul that the three-year-old was not a present but a purchase.
- I agree, let it be,- I said to Kalisa.- But tell me why I have to leave the aul now if noone but Zhuman and you, dear aunt, knows.
Kalisa gave me an irritated and perhaps even a pitiful look.
- Boy, boy! You don’t understand a thing. We nearly missed the dangerous sparkle. But you won’t be able to hide your feelings. You’ll be constantly looking at Bates, the sweet little swan. You can’t realize the meaning of what you did yesterday yet. Don’t be a child. Go away to take your secret away. The school can wait. And who cares if you attend your classes or not. You asked me to arrange it with Zhuman. So you have to satisfy the agreement, too. Don’t show here. We’ll see later.
On the following day, Kikym brought me to my aul.
They flooded me with questions at once – why are you back, Burkut? Putting on airs, I told them that there were no lessons at school to give me anything new till the end of the year.
In fact, the only one I had on my mind was Bates. Won’t I see her till summer? Can I bear the long parting? I remembered the taste of her lips, the trustful twinkle in her eyes. Dear Yerkezhan! I had her on my mind day and night.
What the spell you’ve cast on me?
What’s your special charm?
That’s a folk song. I often repeated the lyrics, half-sleeping and awake, thinking of Bates. With each day, my wish to see her was growing stronger. With each day, my love for her was growing deeper. This love jaundice my relationship with my father. It all ended in a rash act I still cannot forgive myself for.
A little lime had passed after I came back to my father’s aul. Snow was melting in the aul, creeks were jingling, the spring warmth came to the steppe. I told my family that I had to go to Tanatar aul, to the school. I had already chosen a horse – a slim dark brown colt, who was so big and well-fed that he seemed to be not three years old, which he actually was, but at least five. But father wouldn’t’t listen to me. He plainly refused to give me the horse. We had long disputed which resulted in nothing. I made up my mind to leave, neglecting his prohibition. Once I went to the horses, dressed for the trip. My colt’s front legs were tethered. All of a sudden, I found myself facing Father.
- Who has tethered my colt?
- I have.- Father stared at me with his heavy furious eyes.- I’m the host. I’ve got no horses for crook dirty business.
- I don’t know what you mean, father.
- So you think I haven’t heard a thing?- He came closer to me, as if willing to pierce me with those cold spiteful eyes of his.
I began to realize that my father knew the whole thing, but I asked just in case:
- What have you heard, then, Father?
- Answer honestly – why did you quit school?
There was no use lying. I though of how could he knew it, repeating the question pointlessly:
- Why did U quit school?
Father gave a softer and calmer look:
- Leave the crook business, boy. It’s no good.
- Crook business? I don’t know myself to have any crook business.
I looked my father straight in the eyes.
- Ah, boy, do you think I’m dumb? Can’t we find a free girl for you? But you mess with a bride for whom a bridewealth is paid!
- Bridewealth, bride... What bride do you mean, father?- I was stubborn.
- Don’t talk back to me, Burkut. You shouldn’t argue with your father. Try to understand it that we’ve just begun to live after the move. We are too weak yet. We cannon fight fat cats like Sasyk.
Now father was trying to persuade me. I couldn’t hear any menace in his tone. But I didn’t want to, I couldn’t agree with him. My in-born obstinacy and my anxiety to see Bates were stronger.
- Don’t worry, Father,- I interrupted him,- you’d better believe me I have something to do at school. Am I not entitled to take a horse from your herd?
- If it’s not a crook business, you can have the whole herd.- Father flew into temper again.
- You just tell me, are you giving me a horse?
- No, no!- my father yelled furiously.
I tried to persuade him once again, but it was in vain. He’s understood everything.
- It’s not for Zhuman, Saudabai’s son, that I’ve collected and grown my cattle. I’m not having it your way.
My father headed resolutely for the house
- Wait, wait!- I shouted to his back.
- I say it and I mean it!- He didn’t even turn his head or slow down.
I was unconscious of what happened then. I don’t remember how my clasp-knife, which I had never taken out of my pocket, happened to be in my hand. I don’t remember opening the three-year-old’s right side with a heavy blow. The poor colt fell onto the ground with a shriek, bucking his legs. Father was running to me, and I was yelling with the knife still in my hand:
- Don’t come close to me!
But I stepped aside and watched my father, who stood frozen over the colt, frowningly. The legs of that miserable dark brown animal were moving convulsively, and the ground was soon dark with blood.
I RUN THE RISK
Some rejoiced in the quarrel between me and my father and the colt’s death, while the rest were upset.
Some admired me, encouraging, “He looks like his grandfather and is going to be an hero like he was. It’s good that he’s not afraid of blood”.
The others were disapproving, “The heroes’ time is over. His ill temper will bring much grief and misfortune to his father.”
As for my family, my mother happened to be on my side, which was surprising. Father was going to punish me for what I had done, to give me a beating, but Mother stood between us, pressing her hands against Father’s chest:
- Don’t touch him. You’d better think of yourself when you were his age. Burkut isn’t lost, he’s just taken your way. When you were fourteen, you could stir the whole aul. He’s far more demure. Should you beat the boy for a colt? You’d better believe that wolves have torn him.
Mother almost brought us to reconciliation. Father ceased to frown and looking at me askance.
My elder brother Tekebai – he was in his early twenties – didn’t care for anything but the house and didn’t interfere. He sent his daughter to an orphanage the previous year and wasn’t even going to marry again. People said:
- Tekebai pastures sheep and drinks airan with sweet milk. He doesn’t care for the rest.
Indeed, he supported neither me nor my father.
My elder sister Bulis behaved in the same way. Cowed and timid, she hardly ever stepped across the threshold of her house, spending most of her time sewing.
The first grass showed, the weather was warm, and our family set for the dzhailau. We stayed at the place we’d taken long before, near Katyn-Kazgan.
After several days, an unexpected guest came to visit us, Uncle Zhakypbek. He had changed a lot in the recent year, he’d developed a spread, including his shoulders, and acquired a portly look. His face was different, too. His new wrinkles didn’t make him look older. His moustache and beard were neatly trimmed. His cheeks were silken. Uncle was wearing brown-rimmed glassed, and one could hardly see the weary red of his eyes behind them. People said that his eyes had been bloodshot since he fought in the war. Perhaps they were wrong. He had just read a lot, straining his eyes. Uncle’s voice was a little coarse now, but he seldom raised it, as now he was calmer and better-balanced than he was when he came to visit us the previous time.
As a relative and an old friend, my father gave my uncle a warm welcome. He was generous enough to slaughter a mare and invited all well-reputed men, who had also headed for the dzhailau, from the neighboring auls to the toi. Mambet-khoja arrived, too. My uncle was his peer, kurdas, so they were constantly teasing each other, as the old custom was.
On the following day, people started inviting my uncle. He took me along. Those who were present at our first toi, that it, rich and powerful people, arranged the feasts.
Munching on fresh meat and sipping at spring kumis, we talked about the time and the Soviet government. Uncle tried to give mostly detailed answered to any questions he was asked. I was not that simple, though, and sometimes read the newspaper issued in Orenburg, “The Working Kazakh”, ad well as “The Red Kazakhstan” magazine. That’s why I soon came to realize that the questions that our fat cats of the steppe were putting to my uncle were viperish, but he never said anything bad about the Soviet government when answering.
The Kazakhs have a humorous saying, “It happened when the colt was dumb and a three-year-old lost his milk teeth”. That is, long ago or never. It has much in common with the way my uncle was trying to prove to his interlocutors that the bloody fights which set Turgai ablaze in 1914 were old enough to forget and neglect them. They protested. Listening to what the arguers were saying, I came to understand that the quarrel was still going on. Too many families lost their dearest and nearest in the fights of 1916 and during the Civil War. Many of them still cherish the need for revenge. Who is strong enough to consolidate the enemies?
...One Sasyk, Mambet-khoja’s son, invited us. Frankly speaking, I was very glad to receive the invitation. You bet! I was going to see not only the much-vaunted Sasyk, but also his son, my Bates’s groom.
We found the aul shabby and small on approaching it. The surrounding land was bare, too. I thought of the story a wise cracker of the steppe once told about a stranger who stayed in a house for the night. The stranger went out of the house to see that his horse was still hungry. “How bare your land is, you don’t even have grass,” – he said to the host. The latter’s answer was: “If you were reach, your horses would have got the ground in front of your house grassless, too.”
Indeed, Sasyk’s aul looked unhomely. I could see dark silhouettes of several riding camels and milk mares by the house, but far away there were numerous flocks and herds.
- Can this all be Sasyk’s property?- Uncle asked our companion.- So you say all this cattle to be his? How many heads does he have now?
- The misfortune of the recent years and the murrain has taken much cattle away!
But my uncle still wanted to know how many horses Sasyk had. So his companion said:
- Not more than four thousand sheep. About a thousand horses. Perhaps one hundred and fifty camels...
- Is it few?- I was curios.
- It’s very few when compared to the past!
- How many heads did he have?
My uncle answered me as Akyn Karpyk from the clan of Argyn put it:
Doskan’s flocks are endless,
Bai Yeszhan has just as much.
Asan is richer. Asan is fit
To outshine the rich with his richness.
As people told me, Sasyk had inherited his fortune from his ancestor, Asan. Luck had been with this family for seven generations. They said that Sasyk’s great-grandfather, Tyrnak, had three thousand camels. Not to lose count, Tyrkan would gouge an eye of every hundredth camel. So people called him Bai Owning Thirty Blind Camels.
As I listened to the old praise, my wish to see the famous man and his house grew even stronger.
Situated between two hills, the aul was covered with a floaty veil of haze, which is common in the steppe. Houses were showing and disappearing again like boats in the sea. It looked as though the aul was reluctant to let us come close.
We found the road long and tiresome, so we switched to gallop to reach our destination sooner.
The haze was still shaking a little, looking like a sea with numerous boats of yurts in it. But when we came close to it, another simile occurred to me. The small dark yurts looked like a flock of ducks feeding. Several white yurts, which were far less numerous, looked like an arrogant flight of geese. But even they looked quiet and demure when contrasted to the large white yurt placed in the centre of the aul.
What a light yurt it was, the most important, the finest one! If the other yurts looked like geese. it was surely a white swan! As a child, I hadn’t seen blankets as white as milk. I couldn’t wait to get inside. It must be a true heaven in the steppe.
But my naive expectation were far from coming true. I still want to tell you about Sasyk first. He was awfully ungainly and unpleasant. One can seldom see a man as ugly and thick-boned. Wide-mouthed, with flat rake tooth protruding like little spades, he looked at the guests with his small sunken eyes with a hint of a smile. The sparse hair on his chin and the scanty moustache didn’t make his huge ill-shaped, oblongish face look any better. He looked just like a bull! A middle-size bull, I would say!
Spring was merging into summer, the worst heat one could think of, the beginning of the shilde, when the sun burns the grass in the steppe and warm clothes are put into chests till autumn comes. However, Sasyk was wearing a padded beshmet with a camel hair lap, a lambskin earflap hat, and boots with felt stockings.
Sasyk’s voice surprised me, too – it was as thick as that f a camel. Perhaps he wasn’t too garrulous and friendly, judging by his brief questions about our health, family, and house. To tell the truth, I didn’t like the way my uncle behaved. He was cringing before Dadyk like a partridge, according all kinds of courtesy to him.
If that’s her groom’s father, what can the groom be like, I though, looking for him with my eyes among the people surrounding the yurt. The groom was likely to be fifteen or sixteen years old, but I couldn’t see any dzhigits of this age here.
Finally, we entered Sasyk’s big yurt. Its shabby interior was so much out of character with the descriptions of the renowned Asan’s wealth! Desolated, neglected. Cheap gray blanket in the beautiful corner, over the heath, and several horse skins to sit on.
Most often, one can find costly things in the middle of a rich yurt, all but reaching its top, with chests of astonishing beauty standing beside. Sasyk didn’t have anything like that. Where chests were supposed to be, a huge belted felt sack was lying. god knows what was kept there. I failed to find any blankets or cushions, which every Kazakh family keeps to the fore. I couldn’t understand how they slept in the yurt, what they covered themselves with, what kind of a bed they could offer to their guests.
Near the yurt, I noticed a high-wheeled two-axle cart. There was a food chest, called kebezhe, on it. It smelled of jerked meat and dry cheese. Not far from the cart, behind the fence, some other victuals were lying – I guess it was a bottle of milk, boiling pots, and dishes. Apart from them, there was a black leather bottle, which was overfilled with kumis, judging by its steep and turgid sides. I could see a huge handle of kumis mixer sticking out. Another thing to draw my attention was a bed littered with all kinds of things and covered untidily with a dirty blanket. Between the wooden bed and the felt sack, there was a knarred pole, as is the custom, which supported the yurt dome. People usually hand their most valuable clothes on the pole. Sasyk had it his own way. Sheepskins and worn coats, dirty women’s dresses and other rags, embarrassing to look at, were hanging on the pole. No fox fur, no wolf skins, no costly dresses. I was accustomed to seeing separated parts of a yurt connected with thin multicolor stripes of carpet. These motley stripes made one’s house look homely and cheerful. But noone cared here. They used self-made ropes made of coarse wool with horse hairs interwoven with them for greater durability to connect parts of the yurt.
That’s not a very comfortable place for guest, I thought. How can one do without cushions to lean against, without carpets... Something must be wrong.
But both my uncle and the rest of the guests took their places in the beautiful corner, on the rough blankets and horse skins. I was looking around, displeased, and suddenly a saying by a famous akyn called Akmoldy occurred to me:
All you have to do to be beautiful
Is clear away the dirt inside.
Akyn meant the beauty of a human being. But those words fit Sasyk’s yurt, which seemed to be a white swan among gucks and geese at first, perfectly. Poor things! They even said the yurt owner’s father to be saint. It was quite insightful of him to call his son Sasyk1, anyway.
1Sasyk means rotten, stinking.
I could hardly hide my bad feelings for Sasyk. It wasn’t only his voice that resembled that of a camel, he was panting like a camel with sick lungs, coughing coarsely to spit every now and then. Besides, he was always taking some tobacco, nasybai, out of a bottle, to place it behind his lips. To tell the truth, I haven’t met many people like that.
But he was sitting on his place of honor, looking matter-of-factly. Willing to please us, he turned to a wrinkled little old woman, whose dirty clothes fit the interior of the yurt perfectly, and said imperiously:
- Well, baibishe, the guests must be tortured by thirst. Pour them some kumis.
So this is his senior wife, I thought, both believing my guess and not. She was, indeed. But how funny she looked near her huge, heavyset, fat husband.
The little old thing rose to her feet, showing unusual sprightliness in following her master’s command. Vanishing behind a yellow cheegrass wall, she called to a dzhigit guarding the entrance:
- Hey, you, take the kersen out of the pit, quick!.
The dzhigit soon brought in a large black kersen filled with kumis to the brim, holding it by the ears, and the baibishe had already spread the dastarkhan cloth made of roughly worked ship skin in our beautiful corner. A bag of gray blanket, decorated with a colorful pattern, and a ladle with a curved shaft appeared at once. The baibishe took some wooden cups out of the bag. Each of them was the size of a small meat dish. But it wasn’t their size that scared me – the cups were just too dark, looking as if they had never ever been washed.
Sasyk was mixing and stirring the froathy kumis with deliberation, in silence. Only after he completed the rite, he turned to the dzhigit who was sitting on his hunkers behind the guests:
- Move the dishes closer.
Pouring the kumis, he was staring at the heavy white stream with his small, deep-set eyes. The dzhigit handed the first cups to me and my uncle with great care, as if being afraid to spill a drop.
I was well aware of the custom prohibiting the young to take a sip of the drink or touch their food before the seniors have tried them. My uncle, who was younger than most of the guest, followed the tradition, too. That’s why we both passed out cups to gray-bearded men. Now our turn had come. I looked at the cup I got and froze. Both the kumis and the cup were dirty. I tried to take a sip to avoid hurting the host, but I was sick.
- It was awkward, Burkut!- my uncle said, leaving the yurt with me.
- It’s they who must feel awkward,- I replied.
- You don’t know how to behave.
- They don’t know how to receive guests.
While my uncle was scolding me languidly and I was talking back, two horsemen approached the yurt. One of them was dragging a wild colt in the noose, the other was lashing it with a kamcha from behind. Both the front rider, a heavy set man with a pointed raven beard, and the youngster in the back, a powerfully built dzhigit, looked very much like Sasyk. The groom, my rival. So who’s the black-bearded one?
The yurt grew livelier as they arrived. The black-bearded man and Sasyk were discussing the colt cheerfully. Finally, the host along with several dzhigits came out to the horsemen. и
| - That’s a restive one, indeed, - Sasyk muttered. – It must have been a tough thing to get him. He’s fast and wild, as if born from a koulan. Well done.
- Is there a colt we cannot catch? – the black-bearded man was bragging with arrogance.
But Sasyk turned to my uncle, ignoring him:
- Myrza Zhakypbek, the turbulent time sent you far away. You had to travel a lot. Thanks to Allah, you came back to the steppe safe and sound. It would be a disgrace to treat you to mutton, so I ordered for a colt to be brought here for you.
- Hurry up, butcher him, otherwise the meat will be tasteless!
I watched Sasyk’s men butchering the colt, standing at a distance. They admired its belly fat as thick as a finger, the young white meat. They were clicking their tongues, joking and laughing, noisy in anticipation of a treat.
My father disliked domestic preparations and preferred to go to the steppe for the time whey were carried out. Besides, it looked like he wanted to talk to me face to face.
- Let’s have a walk to the hills over there.
I agreed readily and, when we had walked a little aside from the aul, asked my uncle frankly and with a trace of irritation:
- Why did we come to that Sasyk’s yurt?
- Dear, don’t you pay any attention to the dirt, to the dishes. You’d better learn about his deeds, and the whole things will be clear to you.
- So what are the deeds he’s renowned for?
- I could tell you much...
- So?
Uncle started telling me:
- In the year when the Kazakh blood was dribbling down the white tsar’s sable, we, a group of shabby Kazakhs, decided to issue a newspaper in Orenburg. It was hard to get a permission from the government, but we did. It proved to be even harder to find some money to issue it. Sasyk’s uncle Akhmet Baitursunov, me, and several more young men founded a society for comradely assistance to get the money for the newspaper. That’s when Sasyk, whom you’ve seen today, was one of the first fat cats in Turgai to give his share, a hundred valukhs, and enter the society...
- So he’s a conscious man? – I asked not without sarcasm.
- Why care for the reasons. The main thing is that he did help us.
- Did he often have such fits of generosity?
Uncle turned around in anxiety to make sure noone was overhearing... When certain that we were alone, he went on:
- In the recent turbulent times, when the Bolsheviks were called the reds and we were called the whites, the Alash regiment was formed in Turgai. For this regiment, Sasyk gave his finest horses. Why are you laughing? You can’t believe it? There’s nothing funny about it. Even though Sasyk’s dastarkhan is smeared, his soul is pure. He’s a support for those who walk the road they ancestors walked...
I rather disagreed with my uncle but chose not to mouth it. If I contradicted him, a wall could grow between us, and no conversation would follow.
He was silent, too, till I changed the subject:
- Uncle, you used to write? Right?
- Why the past tense? Are you sure I’m not?- my uncle smiled.
- I never chanced to read what you have recently written, Uncle. But I’ve read many previous things. You wrote about the love between a young man and a girl. Their dream never came true. They died...
- Right, it was me. But why did you think of it?
- Ah, Uncle, things repeat. Even now, an intelligent beauty is married off to a foul, disgraceful man, like Sasyk’s son, even now. She’s married off in spite of her will, in spite of her cherished dream. She gets lost to die of cold during a snowstorm. What shall I do, Uncle, if the same thing happens to Mambet-khoja’s daughter?
It set my uncle thinking. We were still walking in the steppe. The yurts of the aul had already vanished in the valley. The only sign of people’s dwelling was light smoke curling over the hill.
- You thing it may happen again,- my uncle repeated my words in a serious tone,- no, you are wrong. The time is different now. To tell the truth, I dislike most of what the Soviet government is doing in the steppe. But I’m glad to see our women granted equal rights with us and released from the bridewealth noose. That’s good, Nephew.
- Yes, it is. But don’t you know that the bridewealth is still being paid, in spite of the law?
- If the government stands its ground, the laws will be observed, too.
Having uttered those words, my uncle suddenly heaved a sigh. Perhaps it was the lingering bridewealth that upset him, but it could be just as well the Soviet government settled firmly.
Silence fell again. This time my uncle broke it.
- Listen, my dear nephew. If god has mercy on us, it will be all right, we’ll come back to your house tomorrow to go to Orenburg together.
I said that I was hoping for that, too, in a reserved tone.
- Hoping?- my uncle was surprised.- I have already arranged it with your father and even told you. Don’t you want to go to the town?
- No. I don’t know,- I muttered, plunged deep into my thoughts.
Suddenly we heard someone cry drawlingly. We saw a horsemen reaching us at full gallop from the aul. I realized that we were invited to go to the yurt and asked Uncle Zhakynbek to do everything possible to avoid staying in Sasyk’s aul for the night.
- There’s no place for sleeping there.
Uncle disagreed. He tried to persuade me that my behavior could be interpreted as arrogance.
Sasyk’s messenger interfered with our petty argument, informing us of the roasted kuyrdak waiting for us.
We came back to the yurt. New guest, both familiar and not, had arrived. Most refined people, the bais and beys of the Turgai parts, and their true henchmen. They were talking loudly and drinking kumis greediness. The closer I was listening to what they were saying, the more certain I was that Sasyk actually enjoyed their special respect. He couldn’t be called silver-tongued, but the people present were hanging on his words.
Perhaps the talk could have lasted till the morning, but distressing news reached Sasyk’s aul at midnight. It tuned out that the Gubcheka was informed of the Turgai bais’ secret deeds on the dzhailau. Someone claimed that troops were coming to get the anti-Soviet propagandists...
Sasyk’s guests grew as fussy as sheep in the pond on smelling a wolf. They didn’t care about the kuyrdak steaming on the dished anymore. The most cowardly ones rushed to their horses. I heard hooves stamping fast. Blandishment had little effect on people. My uncle was pretty scared, not to mention the low-browed Kazakhs of the aul. Uncle’s face grew pallid and looked like a bone lying in the sand of the desert. “Do try a little meat I ordered for you”, - Sasyk was telling him. But my uncle wouldn’t have touched the huyrdak – he was bidding his farewell to the hosts – but for a surprising circumstance.
A man appeared in the yurt, whom the aul gossipers had taken to be a Gubcheka worker. He turned out to be no more than a representative of the financial department, which we called Samalyk. He used to work for the local bais, after which he spent two or three years fighting for Amangeldy. In the years of Soviet government, he studied a little and, after a little bit of Grammar drilling, became a tax agent. He managed to calm down Sasyk’s guests who stayed in the yurt a little – he said that there wasn’t any Turgai squadron approaching. But the most terrible point about the whole situation was that the shabby Sasyk, like any soviet worker, was just menacing to the bais as the plague. They believed him to be just as merciless and were glad to find any hole to hide in. Samalyk was well aware of it. He liked to put on airs and put them in fear.
- Well, of course, I’ve heard something,- he let the words drops from his lips, toying with his kamcha,- bais and the alashes have a feast. So it’s true. I was just thinking, where the bais who don’t pay the additional tax could be. Now I see they’re jollifying. But you don’t seem to be very numerous. I ask you, where’s the rest?
One could tell by his look that he had something bad in store for them. They crook, crowing very quiet. Salmyk was probing them with his eyes, searching for someone to vent his ager on.
- Aha, you’re here, too, Alashi wolf! – he stared at Uncle Zhakypbek.- I bet you’re telling some fairy tail to encourage the bais. Like the Soviet government is just about to crack up completely. The NEP’s going to sap it from the inside. Have a little patience, patience. You won’t have to wait for too long. Am I right?
My uncle was silent, but what could he say?
- So you say they won’t have to wait so much?- Samalyk repeated with a mockery.- You won’t have it like you want. I’ll strain the bais with the additional tax. The progressive tax. You get it?
For some reasons, he said the last phrase in Russian.
- I do,- my uncle uttered lamely.
- Now I’m going to talk to you, Saseke,- the tax agent gave the host a glance of disdain.- I hope you hear me, don’t you?
Sasyk produced a short exclamation to flatter him.
- Do you remember promising me to send thirty dry cows and a hundred wedders to Kostanai? It was long ago, but the cattle is still at home. You’ll send it there tomorrow. If you hold it back, I’ll send you there along with the wedders.
- I will...I will,- Sasyk started wheedling.- I’ll drive the cattle to Kostanai.
- Good!- Samalyk sprawled.- But while you are away, I’ll be staying here, in your yurt.
Sasyk agreed on it, too.
- Well, what are you going to do now?- the tax agent asked mockingly.- You’ve invited the bais and butchered a colt. The meat is cooked, but the guests have fled. Right? You’ll have to give it to dogs?
- Those who stay here will eat it,- Sasyk waved his hands apart to encompass the guests.- You, too.
- No, that won’t do!- Samalyk wasn’t joking or mocking anymore. His words were mere orders:- Your guests can't have the whole colt, but the meat will go off tomorrow. You’d better do as follow: gather all the workmen of the aul, as you can hire them due to the NEP, and let them eat all the meat till the last piece and drink all the surpa.
- You’ve got a brilliant sense of humor,- Sasyk said timidly. He still couldn’t understand whether the unexpected guest was joking or not.
The tax agent hurried to clear the air.
- I’m not joking at all. Do what you are told to do. Or else you’ll drive two hundred sheep and sixty cows tomorrow. Twice as much!
My uncle was about to interfere, but Samalyk checked him rudely and suggested that he should leave the aul. Leave immediately.
- I’ll have the law of you,- he threatened.
Uncle couldn’t but tell Sasyk, who was going to invite some laborers:
- Well, we are going home.
- Without food?
- It’s not food, Saseke. It’s a curse. Why should I sit here, at the dastarkhan, with your ragged day-laborers. I won’t have it!
Sasyk heaved a sigh and gave up trying to persuade my uncle.
We went home at once. Uncle spent only one day on out dzhailau and started packing for Orenburg. My parents were begging him to stay for at least a weak, but he wouldn’t agree on the pretext that his leave was over and he didn’t want to be late for work. Samalyk, who even said he’d come to the Katyn-Kazgan well, had obviously scared my uncle. Who knew what trouble the tax agent who wouldn’t tolerate any bais could bring him?
My uncle raised the subject of my going to Orenburg again. Seep inside I’d already agreed, but my whimsical temper made me pretend that I was still hesitant.
To tell the truth, at first I was. But by that moment I had already thought it over.
Watching my father, who put high hopes on the NEP, I sometimes imagined myself as a bai, too. Why do I need to study then, I thought. I can just live, doubling my fortune. Frankly speaking, such dreams did sometimes overcome me, though it was rare. But as soon as I had a look at the bais in Sasyk’s aul, at the host himself, especially when he was talking to the tax agent, I realized that I was never going to be a bai.
Not every kind of learnedness seemed tempting to me. For instance, my uncle’s learnedness was far from being amazing. Damn it!
But I still wanted to study. I had seen Yerkin again some time before. He’d already heard of my intentions to go to Orenburg with my uncle. He asked whether I was really going to do so. When I avoided giving a clear answer, he started persuading me into it.
- Go to Orenburg,- he insisted.- Don’t hesitate to go. You don’t need to be rich. Only studying can make you a true man. I detest your father. But somehow I believe in you. You’ll soak in the Soviet juice at school. Who knows, maybe you’ll be a good worker.
I had always respected Yerkin’s word. Once again he proved to be one of my most cordial advisors.
But I want to tell you a frank story of everything that took place, including my thoughts and hesitations.
While my uncle and me were paying visits, we happened to stay for a night in the aul of Mambet-khoja. I noticed Zhuman, who was still watching me, at once. But I took advantage of him and managed to see Bates. We didn’t have much time to spend face to face. We could only exchange a couple of phrases. Bates was aware of my plan to go to Orenburg. Her unexpected decision was surprising and delightful – she was also going to study in the town. The goddamn Zhuman interfered again, preventing us from agreeing on the details. He was following me like my own shadow, there was no way to see each other again.
The only thing Bates managed to do was slip me a note. It read as follows: “If you don’t take me along, we’ll never meet again. Bates.”
Now I had to explain the whole situation to my uncle. I did, I even showed him Bates’s note. And added: “Face it, Uncle! If she doesn’t go, I won’t, either.”
My uncle was well aware of my habits, my obstinate temper, so he reflected silently for a long time before he could answer me.
- It’s nothing new tome, dear, the reason why I didn’t rise the subject of Bates is that I didn’t want to hurt you, - his voice was utterly serious. – But you’ve raised it yourself today, so I will be frank, too. A Russian poet said that one can love at any age. It’s beyond doubt that you love this girl, nearly a child, in a way. But for the new time, your love would have had a sad end. But, fortunately, women are free now. The only obstacle you’ve got in your way is your youth. You say the girl wants to study, she wants to go with us. Well, we can take a detour and come to her father’s aul. The only thing I can hardly believe is that her parents will agree to let her go. I’ve heard them to cherish her a great deal.
- But she said she wants to go!- I nearly shouted.
- Well... She can say it once again, it still will be difficult for her to go. Tell me, Burkut, do you know any girl from an aul somewhere around Turgai to have gone to the town to study?
I had nothing to tell him. He told me the truth. Uncle went on:
- If she was an orphan, it would be quite a different thing. But she has a mother and a father. They are wealthy and well-respected people. Why do you think they will entrust you with their dear daughter?
- They don’t have to marry her off, it’s about studying.
Uncle waved his hand:
- You don’t know what life is. It’s the same for them parents if you take her to school or marry her.
- Uncle!- I implored.- Please explain them they are wrong!
- Burkut, Burkut! I will, but they won't understand. It’s quite obvious. They aren’t blind. . They can see the way you stare at her, they know that you are in love with her. And you still want them to believe you? Just imagine how people will buzz in the aul when you leave – married children...
- We haven’t departed yet, but you have already started to buzz, Uncle – I flew into temper. There was no stopping me. – Shortly speaking, if Bates doesn’t go, I am not going either!
I was being very disrespectful and indiscreet. One could expect my uncle to give up trying to take me to Orenburg. But, for some unknown reasons of his own, he proved to be greatly concerned about me and was ready to accommodate.
- All right,- he agreed,- let it be as you wish, dear. We’ll go to Mambet-khoja’s aul. Then we’ll see.
Father ordered to harness a couple of sturdy horses to a tarantass with a spacious body. Kairakbai and Tekebai were to accompany us till we reached Mambet-khoja’s aul, and then Kairakbai was to go with us to Orenburg. My father presented the horses to my uncle. Kairakbai was to go back home by a Kostanai train and then by an accidental wagon.
Mambet’s family extended a warm welcome for us. When we came in, Bates was reading a book. She secretly flashed me a friendly smile. At that very moment I thought, yes, she will go with me.
After a short rest, my uncle suggested to Mambet that they should take a walk. They left. I realized that Bates’s future was being shaped. But I didn’t have to outwear my patience, as my uncle sent for me very soon.
Not far from the aul, my uncle was sitting on a low hill. Mambet had already risen to his feet. One could see at once that the conversation was over. I didn’t walk to meet them – I ran.
- You owe me a suiunshy, a present for good news!
- I’ll give you whatever you want, Uncle.
- Congratulations, Bates is going with us to study...
Though I had been strongly assured that it would happen, I couldn’t believe my ears.
- I tell you she will go. Whatever people might say, Mambet is a learned man. He soon agreed with my arguments. They are going to finish packing for the journey today, and tomorrow Mambet and his daughter will set off with us.
I was walking on air. I was even slapping my sides with joy. Uncle was telling me the details:
- Burkut, I want you to know the whole thing. Of course you remember our visiting Mambet the other day. Well, Bates wouldn’t leave her father in peace after that. I want to study and that’s it. It looks like they agreed with her in their family circle. The only man who doesn’t know anything yet is Mambet’s elder brother, Konyr.
Konyr! The name expressed volumes. An utterly mean man. My joy was tinged with gloom. I tell my uncle about the way I felt.
- Don’t be in a hurry to cry, Nephew. Mambet asked me to tell Konyr the whole story.
- Oh, woe is me! Uncle, are you expecting him to listen to you? He cares about nobody but himself. He’s as obstinate as a willful horse, and he will stand his ground. That’s a bad bird!..
- He is a human being, anyway, I have to talk to him,- Uncle was assured of his talent.
Even though I knew Konyr to be extremely stubborn, I implored my uncle plaintively to make his let Bates go. I accompanied my uncle till he reached the house of that menacing senior relative of hers. One can imagine the way I was waiting for him.
- What did he say!?What?!..
- The man is sparing of words,- my uncle said between his teeth,- I couldn’t draw the final decision from him. “I’ll think it over, I’ll think it over”,- вот и весь его ответ.
I realized that the fierce relative had merely hold his refusal back, which upset me a lot.
Uncle left the aul for the evening. I didn’t want to pay any visits. I couldn’t wait to see the end of the story. I knew from my uncle’s words that Mambet was going to consult his relatives again..
In the morning, I felt that Mambet’s family, who were quite friendly the previous day, were treating me in a reserved and chilly manner. Bates was nowhere to be seen. I tried to find her to no avail. She turned out to be staying in Konyr’s house. Then Mambet and my uncle had another conversation.
Mambet was very upset or at least he was doing his best to look so.
- Only god knows what the old man will say,- Mambet was complaining about Konyr.- He agreed just yesterday. In the evening, his old wife came to say that Bates should stay with them for the night. That is, before leaving. In the morning, when we came for the girl, they wouldn’t let her go. They are holding our Bates locked up. We wanted to take her by force, but then we suddenly saw her shedding tears. They must have persuaded and threatened her for the whole night. She wouldn’t even answer our questions. Konyr was walking around with a knife in his hands. He can kill her!..
My uncle was baffled, upset, and sorry for the girl.
- It is beyond me,- Mambet admitted,- I can’t eat my brother. If you want, you can talk to him once again.
- I will perhaps he’ll give me some kind of an answer!- Uncle headed for Konyr’s house. I followed him.
- Don’t go, dear, don’t!- Mambet shouted after me,- You know how hot-tempered he is, you may find yourself in a trouble.
I didn’t turn back, I only answered to him with a gross joke. Mambet chose not to warn me anymore. He was standing in silence, a little crooked, gazing intently after us.
...Konyr-khoja’s yurt looked gloomy, even gloomier than that of Sasyk. The host was sitting close to the beautiful corner, while Bates was cringing between the household bags and the bed like a trapped rabbit. Beside, the fat yellow-faced baibishe seemed to be guarding her.
Uncle greeted Konyr in a perfectly polite traditional manner, while I sat down quietly by the threshold. Konyr looked like a bull about to butt. A scary furious bull. My eyes met Bates’s gaze. Her eyes were wandering around in an odd manner. They reminded those of a weakened skylark forced by a mesmerizing snake to come down to the ground. Poor Bates!
It was hard for my uncle to raise the subject. But as soon as he uttered the first word, Konyr interrupted him authoritatively:
- I am well aware of what you are going to tell me, dear Zhakypbek. People have a good reason to believe you to be an intelligent and reasonable person. So listen to my final words. It would be one pair of shoes if the girls of our Turgai land studied and ours didn’t. But it’s quite a different pair of shoes is there’s no single girl studying in the town, but ours is going there. Why should we go against the people, why should we let our child go? That’ll be the day! You know those words of an akyn:
A boy never grows up, instead he interferes
With an argument never settled.
No, Zhakypbek, we shouldn’t lose the respect for nothing!
- But it’s the girl’s will to go,- Bates intervened on behalf of Bates.
- She won’t tell you a thing, she doesn’t want it at all. She’s too shallow-minded yet. And we are holding the girl’s rein.
I couldn’t resist bringing Konyr to shame. But he yelled at me:
- Stop this nonsense. Get away before you’re dead.
Toying with his knife and piercing me with his eyes, he rose to his feet. “Even a hero needs his life”, - the ancient words occured to me, and I ran out of the yurt.
I was going to Mambet giddily, and, of course, I wasn’t expecting to encounter the tax agent, Samalyk, on my way. In a manner of speaking, he stood in my way.
- Don’t hurry boy!- He flashed a smile which seemed to me much kinder and simpler than the one I saw in Sasyk’s yurt.- I know everything. Don’t be upset. You’re too young to marry. She’s too young as well. Go to Orenburg and study.
I felt that I could trust Samalyk straightaway:
- Well, all right, but what if they marry her off while I’m away?
- Don’t worry, Burkut! They won’t. I’ll be your girl’s shepherd. A vigilant one. If they do, I’ll smother Mambet with taxes. Go and study in peace. When the time comes, the love will come, too, and she’ll be your wife.
Samalyk was speaking in a confident tone. I was looking into his eyes hopefully, realizing that I had just found a support. However, I wondered at once what the reason of his good attitude to me could be. Samalyk cleared the air at once, though:
- Yerkin has told me about you. I have felt a warmth to you since then. Do you remember that I was ignoring you in Sasyk’s aul? I had to, Burkut. You shouldn’t stay in the Turgai steppe now. What can you find here? Do you want to be a bai? By the time you grow up, all the bais will be crocky because of the taxes. But who knows, you may be a good soviet worker.
I realized that Samalyk was reciting Yerkin’s ideas.
- Lei it be, aga!- I thanked the agent. He made me more confident about the future.
I ran the risk and followed my uncle.
MY SAVIOR
From the Kyzbel to the very city of Orenburg, a wide plateau is stretched. There are summer pastures of the Little Horde clans, Zhagaibaily and Zhannas, here. About two hundred years before, the beys of the Little Horse, headed by Khan Abulkhair, came to Orenburg to swear an oath of loyalty to Russia. Bai Zhazy from the Argyns brought them here through the vast steppe. We were going to Orenburg by Zhazy’s road.
We were moving slowly from one aul to another. Scattered like islands around the steppe, they were usually situated aside from the bolshak, so the journey took us nearly a fortnight.
It was a hot and dry time, all the living creatures of the steppe had wandered off, closer to lakes and rivers, to small unremarkable groves.
One could see feather-grass, as thick as camel hair, and herbs growing yellow all around. Vast space, fertile land! But god had deprived the fertile land of water. My uncle shared neither my delight nor my sadness.
- Just look, even the grass is foul here – that’s fear-grass! Nothing can grow here without water.
- Cannot we dig out many wells to water the soil?- I asked.
- It looks like there’s no reaching the water in these parts, no matter how hard you try. The Russians cherish their land and know how to tend it, they know how to find water, too. Over there, over the Ural, in Russian, they don’t enjoy masses of sowing and pasturing land. They pasture their calf tethered. If there was water here, good grain-growers wouldn’t have let fertile soil stay vacant. That’s why auls and villages are so few here. Did you understand, darling?
...In the while, green winding stripes started showing from under a light haze.
As always, I asked about what they were?
- Now you can see,- my uncle said,- the valley of the Zhaik, or Ural, River. Dense flood-plain forests grow here, while the other side is steep and bold.
The green stripe seemed to be very close, but it took us a whole day to reach it. What a river! Though I loved my dear Turgai with its deep and sweet clear water and its banks overgrown with steppe feathergrass, it could not compete with Zhaik. Zhaik, Zhaik! It seems to me that it’s deeper than the Syr Darya. There is no comparing the Ural water to that of the Syr Darya, a clean light stream to a yellowish torrent of mud! On the banks of the Syr Darya, there are thorny reeds, which seem to be piercing you, oleaster, and tamarisk. But here, in the flood-plain forests, one can also see slender poplars and gentle branchy birches. Trees are so powerful and clad in such thick foliage that, as my boyish imagination told me, one who climbed the very top would feel as if sitting on the soft back of a fatted horse. How lucky one should be to be born and grow up on the bank of such a wonderful river.
We relished the crimson berries which we found in the lush grass on the meadows.
Moving along the flood plain, we finally reached the outskirts of Orenburg. The first bridge was ruined. The whites blew it up during the Civil War. Only occasional piles were sticking out of the water now. Another bridge, a railway one, somehow reminded me a erne trap. It had been ruined, too, but it had then been reconstructed, and a freight train passed it slowly before our eyes. When behind the river. it gathered speed to vanish from our eyesight.
When we entered the city, the dusk had already fallen. Everything surprised me – the river, the bank, and the houses. I had never seen houses like that before, huge, with numerous windows, and festive...
After long wandering around the streets and lanes growing dark, we finally stopped by the house where my uncle lived. Someone opened the gate, and hardly had the tarantass entered the yard when he heard the stamping of feet running, cheerful exclamation, and greetings.
- I would like to ask you to remember about our guest. Do greet him. My nephew, - my uncle introduced me.
A tall woman wearing a townish dress was the first to stretch out her hand.
It was Taslima, zhengei, Uncle’s wife.
A little girl with spiky hair caught my attention. She was fidgeting near her father in excitement and only calmed down after he had taken her in his arms and pressed her against his chest.
- Gulazhan, greet Burkut, too.
But, giving me a surprised glance, the girl hid her face on Zhakypbek’s chest at once.
Uncle’s flat was situated on the upper store. Even this was a novelty to me. In one of the most spacious room, a clothed table was already laden with appetizers and wine.
At first, guests were very few, but they were gradually coming, one after another, and the lack of space at the table was growing more and more tragic. Everything was new to and surprising to me. I complained about having a headache and asked for a permission to have a rest. Taslima led me to a small dark room. The only piece of furniture it had was a rickety wooden sofa. That’s where I got my bed arranged for me. I lay awake for a long time, unable to fall asleep. I was thinking of my aul, of the house where I had grown, my dearest and nearest and, among them, Bates. But fatigue took its course, and I all asleep without noticing it.
In the morning, my uncle suggested that we should take a stroll around the town. I didn’t want to waste any time, so I asked him to took me to the place where I was to study. Uncle agreed to do so and told me on our way that his decision was to send me to an experimental and demonstrational school as it was called now. It was placed in the building in which the first Russian-Kirghiz school was founded in the middle of the previous century. Ibrai Altynsarin, who became a wise old man well-know in our steppe, went to it. People of the Little and Missle Hordes knew the school, and many aul teenagers got their education in it. My uncle used to go to this school, too. The Russian-Kirghiz school was closed in the revolutionary years to be opened again after the autonomous republic was acclaimed, but its concept was changed completely. The experimental and demonstrational school was first of all meant for teaching and raiding uncared-for Kazakh children. In recent years, they had grown very numerous.
The school buildings were truly splendid. The thing is that the Russian-Kirghiz school had been given a strangely generous present of the homestead with a courtyard which used to belong to one of Governors General of Orenburg, Catherine’s nobleman Nepluiev. Now the homestead and its numerous annexes were hosting about four hundred and fifty pupils – they even lived there in the dormitory and got free food from the canteen.
As my uncle told me, the post of school administrator was occupied by a comparatively young man named Korzhau Muzdybaiev:
- I can rely on him. He sympathizes with us and will give us support.
He must be an alasher! That’s what I thought, but, of course, I didn’t tell my uncle. Being one of the most powerful Alash party representatives, he wouldn’t be glad to her my speculation!
So Nepluiev street brought us to a rich-looking mansion with marble lions by the front door. My uncle didn’t lead me inside, though. He took me into a small squad house deep in the yard instead. That’s where the school office was.
Some narrow long corridors, which cut the building into pieces, brought us to a spacious administrator’s office.
He looked like a Kalmyk due to his high cheekbones, skint moustache, and tar-black hair. He was wearing the dandyish dress of responsible workers of his time – a khaki service shirt girdled tightly with a wide belt, galif trousers and sparkling clean yellow galoshes. His table was covered with red canvas, like that of a boss.
The administrator rose to his feet to utter the traditional Muslim greeting, referring to my uncle respectfully as to Zhake.
- This is my nephew, I have brought him here to study, he is a very gifted boy,- my uncle introduced me.- Meet Comrade Muzdybaiev, Burkut... His name is Korzhau, I have told you!.
Korzhau shook my head and asked me about my health, as was the custom. I hadn’t expected him to welcome us so warmly. Looking like a conspirator, he locked the door and sat down near us, not at the table, to emphasize his positive attitude to my uncle.
- So you are Burkut. Burkut Zhautikov,- Korzhau repeated.- I have never happened to see his father, but I have hear of him.
He gave me a warm look.
- He’s the pet of his father and mine as well,- my uncle said in an oily voice.- Brother got some education, too. Both in a Muslim school and in a Russian one. He is willing to give his son a proper education. But the time was an anxious, unstable one. It was hard for the boy to study. He could know more at his age. He is especially bad at Russia. But I think he’ll be keen on studying and have rapid progress. He’s a talented boy.
- We will arrange him, it is not a problem,- Korzhau said encouragingly.
- This is my decision,- my uncle sais,- he will live with us and go to school for classes and additional classes.
- As you wish,- the administrator agreed and offered us to have a look at the school.
We began from the dormitory, large two-storey building made of red brick. Surprisingly, it was Nepluiev’s slaves who used to live here. In the spacious room, there were shiny nickel-plated beds, the kind I had never seen even in fat cats’ auls. Both the pillows and the fresh bedcovers were spotlessly clean. The thing I liked most of all were bed tables by each bed. On the bed tables, there were pencils, pens, and inkpots. I had never seen lamps like those. They were fixed right under the ceiling and hung down like two long icicles of glass. If only I lived here, by this bed table, in the light of this lamp, I thought.
- Our boys sleep in these rooms, - Korzhau explained in the meanwhile,- below, on the first floor, there is girls’ dormitory. Let’s go and have a look.
Uncle said nothing. Perhaps he felt embarrassed, as his petty lies had been discovered. When still in the aul, he once said me that there were no Kazakh girls in Orenburg. I still cannot understand why he needed to tell lies. As he was the one who attempted to help me take Bates to the town. In my uncle’s despite, I asked Korzhau about how many girls were studying there.
- Ninety nine so far, thirty more are to arrive this autumn.
- Are they all Kazakhs?
- The school is a Kazakh one. We have only about twenty boys of other nationalities, but they speak Kazakh fluently, too.
I think Uncle was quite reluctant to continue the conversation, so he hurried us to proceed to the girls’ dormitory.
It was even cleaner and even more beautiful than the boys’ one. I thought of Bates. How glad she could be to be placed here!
Having seen the dormitory, we bid our farewell to Korzhau Muzdybaiev.
On our way back, my uncle was mostly silent, while I was speaking. I spoke, knowing that my words would touch the right cord:
- Some curse the Soviet government, but look around. Even though there’s still much work to do, isn’t what we see now wonderful?
I caught my uncle’s gloomy look and felt he didn’t want to go on, I could feel that my words were far from hitting his taste. I understood it but carried it off. I went on in a calm tone:
- The tsarist government was ruling our steppe for two hundred years. But did it take any care of Kazakh children? They were so poor, the late tsars, that couldn’t even build schools.
I broke off, waiting for my uncle to say, “Right”. But he didn’t even lift his head.
- But the Soviet government, though it is very young, does take care of children.
Even then my uncle didn’t support me.
For some time, we were walking in silence.
- Uncle, where that Korzhau used to work?
- Korzhau? He’s a teacher. Before becoming one, in 1918, when the Alash regiment was formed, he was its officer.
- Did he fight?
- Why on earth can you need it?- my uncle got angry, so I stopped asking.
I spent only five to six days and Zhakynbek and Taslima’s, then I decided to move to the dormitory. My uncle didn’t stand in my way. I had solid reasons for doing so. Having started to go to the experimental demonstrational school, I very soon realized that I had fallen behind my peers.
To catch up with them, I needed both to learn and to live in their company.
At first I had great difficulties, especially at Russian lessons. I’d sit at the desk like a cat on hot bricks, burning with shame. I murdered Russian words, always provoking my comrades’ chorus of laughter. Then I turned to Muzdybaiev, and he allocated me to the Russian teacher, Anton Antonovich, for supportive lessons.
Anton Antonovich was a great teacher and a wonderful personality. By that time, he had turned fifty five. His life was truly amazing. He was a homeless orphan when a Russian officer Antsuferov bought him at a town market. A childless, lonely man, he took to raising the poor wretch and gave him his name and surname.
When the boy had grown up a little, Atsuferov sent him to Kharkov normal school and, as he graduated successfully at the age of 21, helped him find a job of a teacher at Orenburg Russian-Kirghiz school. “You must serve to your people”, - his foster son said to Anton Antonovich.
He had been teaching in Orenburg incessantly since then. He had learned the Kazakh language thoroughly. His pupils adored him.
I feel the gratitude of a son when I think of him. He used his teaching skills and best feelings to sow the seeds to sprout richly in me like crops do in virgin soil. My progress was rapid, and at the beginning of the new year my Russian was quite fluent and I could read and write well.
At that time, educational establishments were numerous in Orenburg. At first I easily remembered three institutes, as their abbreviations were KIPE, TIPE, and BIPE. Kazakh Institute of People’s Education, Kazakh Institute of People’s Education, and Kazakh Institute of People’s Education.
People said jokingly that institutes in the town could be divided into three “IPEs”. About three or four hundred young people who came from Kazakhstan, Bashkiria, and Tatarstan studied there.
Four more schools opened in Orenburg at that time – a party school, a school for workers, a military school, and a militia school. Among their students, Kazakhs were quite numerous.
Among the students of the town, I met many dzhigits from our Turgai steppe. Most of all I liked Nurbek Kasymov. He was only five years older than me. I struck up such a close friendship with him that soon he became something like a member of my family. His father, a poor man named Kasym, used to live not far from us. During the rebellion of 1916, Kasym joined Amangeldy’s sarbazes and was killed by a punisher’s bullet. Nurbek was Kasym’s only son. His childhood was a hard time, but since his early years he had loved sons and the dombra, so he grew up to be a cheerful and sociable dzhigit. Tall and slender, with a lean handsome face, active and agile, he didn’t give up music even at the militia school. He was an enthusiastic participant of amateur performances. He had a favorite song called “Maira”. Many people in Orenburg called him by its name – Maira. One could do without knowing his name or surname, as the words was enough for everyone to understand who was meant.
Even though our fathers used to be enemies, we were close friends and met nearly every day.
Nurbek introduced me to another Turgai dzhigit who studied at the militia school, too, Naizabek Samarkanov. He was in his late twenties. He wore a thick black moustache which made his swarthy face with high cheekbones look severe and somehow even strong. Naizabek had fought in Amangeldy’s army and had never forgotten his hatred for bais, Alashers, for my father.
Once he came into Nurbek’s room and found me there.
- So the steppe wolf’s puppy is in the town, too.- He burnt me with his spiteful look full of disdain.
Meeting him cost me a lot.
In spring of 1924, we learned that a combing was to be carried out at the experimental demonstrational school. Many children of bais were hiding among its students, and some of the teachers had an outlook that didn’t fir in, too. Indeed, a combing commission headed by Second Secretary of the Regional Party Committee Abdollah Asylbekov plumped upon the school.
I had seen him two or three times. Plump and freckled, he seemed to me to be a severe and decisive person. My uncle and his friends told me that Abdollah took part in the October Revolution and in the Civil War and was among those who set up the Soviet government. But what my uncle’s guests spoke most often about was his mercilessness for the bourgeois, bais, and especially for the Alashers.
The commission withdrew Korzhau Muzdybaiev very soon, appointing Secretary of the Komsomol of Kazakhstan, Yergali Aldongarov, instead. That was when we came to know the bitter truth – our polite and timid Muzdybaiev used to be the cruelest officer in the Alash regiment. He’d cut prisoned fighters and commanders of the Red Army with his sword... Along with Korzhau, several more Alashes were teaching at the school. They called the bluff of them all.
The combing commission found out many children of famous bais and Alashers among the students, too, most of them were enlisted as homeless. Korzhau had added me to the list as well. Now that the truth was revealed I was scared to death.
I turned for my uncle for protection, but he didn’t make me any happier:
- There’s no way I can help you know. That Asylbkov is merciless. There’s no persuading him. He neglects all the customs of the Kazakhs. He says he has principles. He’s a communist. He won’t budge. If they find out who your father is, you’d better not hope that they’ll let you study.
- What shall I do then?
- Be patient and believe in your good luck!
That’s the only thigh my uncle did to comfort me. I thought of the words I had once heard, “When captured by a torrent, look for a tree to cling to”. Where’s my tree, where’s my salvation? I was going to drown without it. Suddenly I realized – it was Yerkin Yerzhanov. It seemed to me he was the one to help me out. But he was too far away. My arms were too short to reach him. And I, Burkut, was the only one to blame.
Somehow Yerkin happened to come to Orenburg nearly at the same time as I did to sit exams for entering the Soviet party school. Once we met and started getting closer but, hearing of this, my uncle warned me:
- Don’t believe him. He pretends to like him. He hates bais and most of all he hates your father. He can only be waiting for you with a trap. Once you are in, he’ll eat every bone of yours. Being young, inexperienced, and naive, I began avoiding Yerkin after that conversation and even pretending to fail to notice him when we encountered in the street.
The way I was behaving upset Yerkin. One he told Nurbek that I shouldn’t be avoiding me. Like – tell Burkut that I’m not going to do him any harm. It was my recommendation for him to study. My behavior upset Yerkin. While shall I be mining him now? To expel him is as easy as the ABC. But it’s harder to fight for a man.
Nurbek retold me his words, which I recited to my uncle. Но But my uncle stuck to his guns, telling me that I could only blame Yerkin when expelled.
However, I had a good reason for worrying. The Commission hadn’t even finished working when someone whispered to me:
- You know, there seems to be something about you.
My heart faltered:
- I wonder who did this?
- No idea...
Could it be Yerkin? Could my uncle have been right? Could he have merely pretended to be my friend? And if he is my enemy, what am I to do?
Fortunately, my apprehension turned out to be groundless. Indeed, there was a statement. It did describe my father’s household and deeds in detail. There was a signature, too – Naizabek Samarkanov.
I rushed to my uncle again. He didn’t change his opinion.
- It is Yerkin, anyway. He’s only hiding behind Naizabek’s back.
The commission were still working. One by one, they were summoning all suspicious “homeless” students. Now it was my turn. The following morning I was to face the commission. I was more nervous that I had ever been. Being sure that they would expel me, I believed my uncle implicitly at some moments, and, blaming Yerkin, tried to see him, feeling the knife in my pocket. I waited till he showed, standing not far from the militia school dormitory. He did pass me surrounded by friends. I didn’t even speak to him.
Then I went to the Zhaik, came up to an ice-hole and was just about to plunge into the water. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t end my life. Suddenly it seemed to me that I heard someone whisper: never say die! Two days before, the commission let a bai’s son stay. Perhaps they will let you stay tomorrow.
That’s how Hope took me carefully by the hand to lead me to the bank, walking on the ice. I felt like going to Nurbek. He was one of Yerkin’s bosom friends. Why can’t the three of us have a talk? I came to the militia school dormitory, but it was too late, and they didn’t let me it. Well, I thought, see you in the morning.
I didn’t get a wink of sleep at night. The sun rose, and I went to the militia school again. But, before I reached it, I turned back. Come what may. I wasn’t going to beg.
Shortly speaking, when my time came I was already entering the room in which the combing commission stayed. My God, Yerkin was sitting next to Asylbekov. My heart was pounding. I was too nervous to greet them and froze by the threshold. Asylbekov was staring at me darkly with his slant Kalmyk eyes.
- What’s his surname?- he turned to the commission.
- Zhautikov,- Yerkin was the first to answer.
Asylbekov turned to him with an abrupt move:
- So it’s the one you told me about?
- He is,- Yerkin said quietly.
“Ah, that’s a timid boy! You’ve done your ob”,- I thought spitefully.
Suddenly I saw lively kind-looking twinkles in the Kalmyk eyes of Asylbekov.
- I’ve got something to tell you, dear. You father is such a bad man that we could kick you out without talking to you. But Yerkin Yerzhanov – I think you know him – has saved your soul. Go and learn!
I burst into tears. I was too overjoyed to say thank you to Asylbekov and Yerkin, and I was sobbing. I didn’t even say thank you to my dear Yerkin, whom I am now very much ashamed to have doubted! I hid my face behind my hands and rushed into the corridor. “That’s my true savior”, - I said, letting myself go.
THE OFFENSE
I can see you on the opposite bank.
Work your earring into a boat
To take me there. My angel
Don’t you tell me we’ll part.
From a folk song.
I never expected myself to finish the year so successfully.
However, my uncle had a different reason for being in high feather. Anyway, he insisted on my staying with him in the Crimea till classes began in autumn.
Mark it, my uncle had big money, and when I asked him, which I admit to be very impolite of me, about their origin, he smiled slyly:
- Burkut, have you ever heard of honoraria?
No, I had heard the word neither at my Russian classes nor when talking to my friends.
- Have you seen the textbooks I wrote? You say you have. You have even used them in studying. I get money for them, something like wages. That’s my honorarium – payment for a printed work.
My uncle explained to me the system in detail, saying that there was a honorarium for every printed page, while a printed page was equal to sixteen pages of an ordinary book. That is, the bigger the book, the higher the honorarium. I was struck when my uncle told me that he got fifty to seventy roubles for each printed page. It turned out that he had got thirty printed pages in that year only. I counted my uncle’s income in my mind – it was quite a large sum. The money were not the paper we used to have, which were counted by thousands or even millions, but chervonets roubles issued in 1923.
I was well aware of how much the new money cost. A Sheep in Orenburg cost five roubles while a cow cost twenty. When I was leaving Kyzbel, my father shoved a hundred roubles into my pocket. I remember buying heaps of clothes for eighty three roubles – I got me a pair of box calf boots, a canvas coat, some trousers, a camisole, a cap, not to mention shirts and underwear...
After this conversation with my uncle I wasn’t surprised at his rich interior anymore. His wife Taslima, whom he called Tania (and whom I called Tania-zhengei, too, following his example), was constantly fussing to get some costly things sold out by those who used to be fat cats from a consignment shop. Once, Tania-zhengei brought in a raccoon coat. The coat was worth at least sixty sheep.
I could well understand my father’s generosity when he mentioned going to the Crimea. By the way, though he had numerous drawbacks, he had never been greedy. He said, “If you have a horse, see the world, set it to gallop to see more. If you have some savings, don’t spare them if you can meet some people, let your house will always be full of guests. You won’t love your money any more if you have it locked in a chest.”
But, no matter how going to the Crimea tempted me and my uncle tried to persuade me, I didn’t feel like going to any resort. Why should I go there? Is there a land dearer to me than my steppe, are there people in the world dearer to me that my Bates?
From time to time, people from the auls came to Orenburg. I knew that Bates was safe and sound and was living in her father’s house. I knew that she had been wearing the usual girl’s clothes and reading much since long before. The news that the financial agent had kept his word reached me, too. He had not just imposed taxes on Sasyk but also sent him to the Turgai prison. The told a story of Sasyk’s must hampered release in spring. As the saying goes, he doesn’t care about a mare now, he only cares about his head!
Occupied with his own business, Sasyk couldn’t even think of winning himself the girl he had once paid the bridewealth for.
In winter, I sent several letters to Bates, but I didn’t get a single sound back. Could they have never reached her hands? Kairakbai, who came in December, told me that she considered herself to be my bride. The aul people thought so, too. But this made her silence even more dramatic.
I had to go to the aul, no matter what, so, as soon as the classes were over, I started packing. But that’s when the long-awaited letter from Bates reached me.
In the vestibule – right! In the vestibule – in that year, I came to lie foreign words and used them whenever necessary or not! – of our dormitory, there was a letter box with cells marked with letters of the alphabet. Normally, my letter was empty. Only once in a month, as my father charged Tekebai with writing me a letter, I got one. But the letters were so boring, they were no more than brief reports of the family’s and the cattle’s health and wealth. That’s why I was being too lazy to check the mail box for weeks. But once, almost accidentally, I lingered by the mail box and suddenly saw an envelope in my cell. I took it to recognize Bates’s hand at once, though it had no return address on. But why did she send her letter to the school – I’d asked her to direct them to my uncle’s flat! So she somehow didn’t trust him a lot? I opened the envelope and read the final lines. Your Akbota, your white camel! I was the only one to call Bates like this.
I had long before lost any hope for getting a letter from Bates. So now, instead of reading it at once, I was pressing the unsealed envelope against my chest with great affection and embarrassment. I must have been quite a sight. I heard someone exclaim, “What’s going on with him?” My classmates were surprised. I ran away to hide in my room, as if they were entrenching upon Akbota’s letter. How happy I was to find out that all my roommates were away at the time. I was alone, facing the letter. Face to face with my thoughts of Bates. I could here boys talking in the corridor. What if they come here, I thought. Hiding my feelings from them with jealousy, I started reading those school copybook pages. Even in addressing me, Bates was true to herself. My father mostly called me Bokezhan. This was the way Bates called me, too. Both back in the aul and here, in the letter. Here it is, without any omissions:
«Bokezhan!
I have received all of your letters. Why did I not answer them? Judging by what you wrote and what Kairakbai has been telling me, your studying is quite successful. I did not want to distract you. Moreover, I just had nothing to write you about. But now there’s a solid reason. Your father has recently received a letter from your uncle. Kairakbai told be about your uncle inviting you to stay with him in the Crimea this summer. He told me you did not want to. Your uncle believed me to be the reason and asked your father to do everything possible to prevent you from coming back to the aul in summer. He is afraid that you will quit studying because of me. Moreover, he is afraid of the aul gossip. You know, Bokezhan, I think your uncle is tight. Don’t worry about me. Samalyk Sagymbaiev repeated what he told you at your departure to me. I can doubt the others, but I believe him. For the bais of our parts, he is now lord and master. I know that the news about Sasyk’s spending the whole winter imprisoned have reached you. It’s not only because he resisted paying taxes, but also because of the bridewealth, because of matchmaking for an under aged girl. You know, Sasyk used to visit us quite often, but now we never hear the hooves of his horse. Once Samalyk scolded my father, “Your girl was still in the cradle when Sasyk paid the bridewealth for her. They say you are waiting for her to reach the age of a hostess, too. I said it to him and I’ll say it to you – you won’t marry her off to Sasyk’s son. I’ll be watching you. Even if I go away, the Soviet government will stay. Just you try and ruin the girl’s life! You’ll have noone but yourself to blame”. My father was burning with shame. He was looking for words to justify himself, speaking of the Kazakh customs. Towards the end, he promised to do what the law told him to do. Even though I felt ashamed to be listening to the adults talking about me, I did not go. I like Samalyk’s perseverance. Now I have ceased to be afraid. There is no way for them to do it.
You should not come to us this summer. Your uncle is right. You tell me that in a winter your studying in Orenburg will be over. If you are safe and sound, you will come to stay in the aul. But if you do not obey your uncle and me, bear it in your mind that I will go somewhere, and you will never find me. Even if you do, I will not talk to you...”
Having reached those lines, I felt in a twit. Was it a letter by a naive, sweet, and innocent girl? I thought that this could only have been written by a mature, experienced person. Where did she get that sobriety? Why was she so pert with me? Why was she using the gentle and passionate “Bokezhan” to relish the letter, which brought me no joy?..
However, having turned over the copybook page, I found that it covered with writing on the reverse side, too. I looked passingly through the end of the letter and started reading it closer. That’s when I finally felt the warmness its beginning lacked so much.
“My letter can hurt you, dear Boken!.. But I had a reason to add the “zhan” to your name... The Kazakhs call a thirteen-year-old girl “hostess of the house”. I have already turned fourteen. Some people still believe me to be a child. But I know that a person aged fourteen does think about his or her future. If poets tell the truth, people must begin to love in the years of their childhood.
My feeling of love did not awake when I was a child, instead, it burst into flame in Sarykop, in a frosty snowy winter... It has been running higher by leaps and bounds since them. The hot feeling burning in the deep of my heart... But what if I see you? What will happen then?
I called my reason for help. It seems to me that we are too young to burn like this... In early days, lovers were afraid of being unable to get together. We have no obstacle of the kind!.. Why hurry then?.. Think of Father’s favorite saying – “Patience is red gold. The patient will prevail, while the impatient will be disgraced...”
So do not be impatient, Bokezhan!.. I will wait for you as long as we need. You do not have to come to the aul in summer. You will finish your school in Orenburg, and we will go there to study together next year.
Your Akbota!»
I spent much time thinking over Bates’s letter. It hurt me a lot, but I could not but admit that she was right. I hesitated for some time, after which I decided to stay in Orenburg. After some time, I went to a Pioneer camp with my friends and spent the whole summer working as a group leader.
I was still missing Bates, and my patience was wearing. However, the second year of study was more rapid than the first one. I was studying a lot, giving all of my free time to books, to Russian belles-lettres. How much I was reading during that winter! It was Lermontov that fascinated me most of all. Of all his works, I was most impressed by his novel “A Hero of Our Time”. I read it several times and knew many pages by heart. I must admit that I liked Pechorin very much. Sometimes he seemed to be my inspiration. I imagined myself to be Pechorin and Bates to be Bela. However, our relationship was very different. Moreover, I was sure that I would never stop loving Bates. But I still could not imagine what our future would be like...
Spring of 1925 came. Semirechye and Syrdarya Province, which had belonged to the Republic of Turkestan, were known to be joining the Kazakh Autonomy. The Republic’s capital was brought to Ak-Mosque instead of Orenburg.
I was finishing the experimental and demonstrational school. Some people recommended me to enter the third year of Orenburg Worker’s Faculty to go to an institute later. But, honestly speaking, I did not want to stay in the city which was not the capital of Kazakhstan anymore. My uncle agreed with me. He thought that I should leave Orenburg, too. However, as soon as I mentioned Ak-Mosque, Uncle remonstrated:
- There are some technical schools, Burkut, but you don’t know a technical school. You’ve finished six classes and have fluent Russian. A technical school will hog-tie you. Well, the Kazakh Institute for People’s Education is moving to Ak-Mosque. But the situation’s rather bad there. All lessons are given in Kazakh, while they lack Kazakh textbooks greatly You won’t get any great knowledge there. Don’t even think about Ak-Mosque. You ask me where you can go instead? I think you’d better go to Tashkent! They have a pedagogical institute there, the Inpros. Finest teachers. Brilliant. Fascinating lectures. Beautiful city. That’s where you should study.
It was quite easy to persuade me, to get me burning. But the question was whether they would accept me. I asked my uncle. He gave me a sly look:
- Of course, they won’t. Unless there’s a well-respected man to recommend you. – After a minute’s pause, he added: - But we’ll find someone. Do you know Zhunusbek Mauytbaiev? Yes. The one who dealt with the cattle sent for the hungry from the auls of Semipalatinsk back in Turgai. So Zhunusbek is the one who managers the institute in Tashkent. He’s one of the most authoritative Alash people. With a note from me, you’re bound to be accepted.
My doubts were dead.
Shortly speaking, I finished the experimental and demonstrative school with a “good” in all subjects and went to my home part with a note from my uncle.
Musapyr Lusyrmainov was coming back with me, too. He’d just finished the Kazakh Pedagogical Institute. I somehow disliked my cousin, but neither of us had alternative companions. Besides, Musapyr had a document allowing him to use horsed transport for free when in auls, which was quite important for me.
There were two ways to get home. One meant going by train to Kostanai via Kinel and Chelyabinsk and then riding through the steppe past the Saint lake, the Aulie-kol. The other way was the Zhazy Bolshak, along which I had traveled with my uncle. I chose that way to stay in Bates’s aul. It was longer but, as I have already said, more appealing.
After nine days, we could see the dim hills of the Kyzbel in a flimsy haze of mirage. Kyzbek looked like a large ship rocking in the waves of the ocean. It must be true that our Turgai, our steppe lowland, used to be the bottom of a real sea. The ancient landscape was somehow being revived now.
As it always happens in the steppe during a hot summer, the hills seemed to be getting farther as we were coming closer, like a fox escaped an exhausted hound.
Our destination was both close and distant.
I was especially exhausted. This time, I found the way intolerably long.
Finally we had reached our destination.
Despite the haze, I could discern yurts of the aul, in which Bates was waiting for me.
I didn’t share my excitement with Musapyr, though. He was not a reliable friend. Once I entrusted him with my secrets, and he revealed him to my uncle. I had been wary of Musapyr since then, hiding my deepest. However, Sultanmakhmut Toraigyrov was right:
Does a man has a secret
To never show?
Is a man strong enough
To keep it forever and ever?
I was almost sure that Musapyr understood why I had chosen the Zhazy Bolshak. However, he didn’t worry me with questions, still remembering how insulted I was in Orenburg.
The road was dragging on, and the steppe ahead was still in a haze.
- Damn, are you going to let us in or not?- I rapped out an oath.
- What do you mean?- Musapyr said with a startle.
- The Kyzbel. The hills have been showing for ages, but we can’t reach them.
- Why such hurry?- Musapyr smiled.
I said nothing. Musapyr looked at me closely, and his smile disappeared at once. He could feel that I did not feel like talking to him, so he turned away.
We were silent again.
As usual, yurts of Bates’s aul, which were situated by Bazaukes, showed unexpectedly.
I knew the yurts, I knew the aul, I knew the ravine, the crook, and the hills.
The poem “Munlyk-Zarlyk” tells about Khan Shanshar. He failed to get children for a long time. It was only his sixtieth young wife who got pregnant. The time of labor came. The khan had never heard an infant cry in his house. He was afraid that his heart could fail at hearing the voice of his child. The khan took along forty vizirs and went hunting to wait till the glad news from the horde reached him.
As I was thinking of the poem, it seemed to me that my heart could fail like that of Shanshar. Unlike the khan, I was impatient. I wanted to be in advance of the glad news...
My thoughts were confused, and Imy nerves were strained. I was constantly hurrying the horses. But why were we met with such silence? It looked like there was not a single human being in the aul. Only Kikym’s furious bitch rushed to us, barking with shrieks, but, having recognized me, she broke off and started fawning... It was strange to see nobody come out at the barking.
We stopped the horses between Kikym’s and Mambet’s yurts. I was still in the cart. Looking at me, Musapyr didn’t move, either. It was like this till Kalisa showed, wearing a light shawl thrown over her heard:
- Apyrau, what’s going on here?- I exclaimed, jumping off to the ground.- Is everyone all right?
- They are,- Kalisa answered, looking at me with a slight surprise. Perhaps I had changed too much or was too excited.
- But why is it so silent? Where are the people?
- They all are safe and sound, they are here!-Kalisa smiled.
- Yeah... But where are they?
- First you greet me,- Kalisa stretched out a hand to me.- So you are back, safe and sound?
- Thanks God, I am!
- I wanted to kiss you as I used to, but you’ve grown so much in two years, now you’re a proper dzhigit! Anyway, let me hug you as I always did, Burkut!
Indeed, I’d got much taller since I left the aul. Kalisa was just as high as my shoulder was. Had it been long since she was a little taller, though?
Kalisa pointed at her yurt
- Let’s go.
I was taken aback a little, but she gestured to me as if inviting me again. Making way for Musapyr, I lingered there with Kalisa.
- Don’t worry. Yerkezhan’s off for a long journey now,- Kalisa told me in a hasty whisper,- she’s gone to the relatives of Karakyz. Her aroba was bursting with presents.
- Who else went with Bates?
- A man from our aul. Seil. Maybe someone else.
- Did Bates leave something for me?
- This sheet of paper,- Kalisa took out a little letter tied in her kerchief.
“Boken! – I read the up-and-down hasty lines. – I don’t know if it is true. Perhaps my mother felt you were coming. This made her even more eager to leave the aul. But she had been intending to see her relatives long before. This is also true. She insisted on my accompanying her. I just could not refuse. Our relatives live not far from Troitsk. I have received your letter from Orenburg. I promised to wait you – please do not take it unkindly, I simply could not. If you have time, wait for me there.
Your Akbota”.
But I did take it unkindly!
Kalisa noticed it at once, in fact, I did not try to hide my hard feelings. No matter how hard she tried to comfort me, her words just would not reach me.
Being hot-tempered, as usual, I decided to leave at once.
- Will you stay at least for today?- Kalisa asked in an upset voice.- Don’t you want to know anyone but Yerkezhan?.. I was going to slaughter a lamb... I knew that you were coming. You remember what they say: “If you remember a man, leave a part of your old dinner for him”. That’s why I’ve kept a little jerked meat for you, we prepared it in winter. Try it and then you may go.
Kalisa moved my heart. I remembered how kind she was to me, so I did not protest. Musapyr, who had been listening to our talk absent-mindedly, had some kumis and went out to have a walk around the aul.
I fell to the kumis, too. Having quenched my thirst, I felt calmer. The fury and hard feelings which had been torturing me calmed down a little, too.
I began to ask Kalisa questions about the life Mambet’s aul. Only Zhanis, Bates’s real mother and Mambet’s concubine, Kaken, Bates’s sister, and a dzhigit laborer were here now.
It was somehow surprising to hear about Mambet’s being my father’s trade companion – he was buying goods from our aul shop and carrying them around the steppe. That’s why he was not at home.
Kalisa told me another piece of news. Mambet’s family was now separated – Karakyz, Bates, and Seil stayed in the old house, while Mambet, Zhania, and Kaken were living separately.
I could not understand it at all. But Kalisa explained to me that this was what all bais of Turgai who had two wives were doing now. As there was a new law prohibiting polygamy. The taxes had risen a lot, too. So the bais realized that they could reduce the tax by dividing the cattle and property in two.
I wanted to know the way they separated. Kalisa told me:
- last year, when the field court came, Molda-aga,- that’s how Kalisa called Mambet,- submitted a claim. He wrote that the low prohibited to have two wives. He had never loved his senior wife. Moreover, she’s become old and quarrelsome and wouldn’t let his dear concubine in peace. That’s why Molda-aga was asking for a divorce with his baibishe.
- Did the court believe him?- I interrupted Kalisa. She smiled ironically.
- Do some thinking, Burkut. The judge was one of Molda-aga's old friends. I think he even helped him write the claim. The court granted him a divorce, parting the family, and divided the cattle equally. Now Molda-aga doesn’t have to pay the additional tax.
- Tell me, do their yurts stand separately or together?
- Didn’t you see a gray, smaller yurt behind the big one? It’s the junior house. You get it?
- Uh-huh!.. So they did part?
- My god, how childish you are! And you’ve studied in town for two years,- my slow wits irritated Kalisa.- A simple trick. They deceived the Soviet government. living separately for strangers but living together in fact.
- So who’s staying in the big yurt now? You say they all are away.
- In the big yurt, Tokal Zhania and Kaken are staying. It’s only Dzhigit Kainazar who stays in the otau.
I was eager to see Zhania, so I asked Kalisa why she hadn’t shown.
- Don’t forget, Burkut, that Zhania is tired after working. I think she is having a nap between two milking sessions. You know, Kaken’s little help to her, she’s languid and lazy. Just before you came, Tokal milked the mares. perhaps she went to sleep.
I often felt sorry for Zhania even before, as she was Bates’s mother. Zhania responded to me with warm cordiality, feeling that I liked her daughter. I loved talking to her. Being always burdened with household cares, usually taciturn, she showed intelligence and sobriety in our short conversations. That’s why I made up my mind to find Zhania and to greet her while Kalisa was cooking dinner.
First I entered the big yurt, expecting Zhania to be sleeping there. I could hear some rustling and a giggly whisper from behind the curtain, which was pulled down on my right. I brought my eyes down and saw legs sticking out from under a blanket at the bottom of the curtain. No, it was not Zhania. A demon possessed me, and I tore the blanket off. My God, Kaken and Musapyr were lying there. How could he?.. I was taken aback. I was more ashamed than they were. Throwing the blanket back over their bodies hastily, I ran away. Bastards!
I don’t know if I had been walking around the aul for a long time, thinking about life, but my sad thoughts about Musapyr vanished when I saw Zhania coming out of the otau. Two years had passed, but she had not changed and was even wearing the same old clothes.
- I did hear you come, Burkutzhan- she rushed to meet you.- I’m sorry for not greeting you at once. I just couldn’t think of a face to wear, as Akbota wasn’t at home!
Akbota, white baby camel! How could she know this, I only called Bates this name when face to face with her.
- Do come to me. Don’t be disgusted by my clothes. Let me hug you!
How warm her careful, gentle hands were to me!
I could have stayed with the mother of my Bates for a long time, but Kalisa called us for dinner.
I could saw tears in Zhania’s eyes, and I shed tears, too, feeling her anxiety of a mother, listening to her faltering sad speech:
- She went against her will, against her will. Please try to understand this. She was so worried. I could see her looking back at the aul till the arobas vanished in the steppe. She’d been missing you. She’d been missing you all the time.
Zhania broke off. Kalisa was approaching us...
Musapyr wasn’t late for dinner. We had enough jerked meat and lamb as well as Kalisa’s delicious kumis.
We left Mambet’s aul accompanied by a boy riding a three-year-old. Musapyr got a fast horse, but mine was stumbling. I was afraid of falling behind my cousin in the race and got my horse pacing to spare him. The boy was apace with me on his three-year-old. He turned out to be a little sly and talkative. While Musapyr, who had got far in advance, was waiting for us at the foot of a hill, the kid was telling me funny stories.
When we caught up with Musapyr, I started teasing him, reminding him of the incident in the big yurt. But he, though he looked to calm and patient, flew into temper, flushed and broke off my joke rudely.
We started quarreling. One thing led to another. It could have lasted for ages if he hadn’t mentioned Bates.
- Maybe you think Kaken’s worse than she is?- he asked ironically.
That was a poisoned arrow. Believing Bates to be more pure than an angel, I was now burning with fury and anguish.
- Repeat what you said!- I came close to Musapyr.
- Didn’t you hear it?- Lashing his horse, he trotted away.
- Get what I’ve heard!- spurring on my horse, I lashed him on the head with my kamcha.
I aimed another blow, but Musapyr managed to avoid it – his horse was faster than mine. I used some trick riding, and in a second I was on the croup of Musapyr’s horse, ready to start a fight. But the animal startled so violently that I tumbled onto the grass. I still noticed blood trickling down Musapyr’s face, from temple to chin. Grim and angry, he shouted to me:
- What? It is burning inside? Lick some salt. And bear it in your mind – I got Bates before you did!
I could not make out the rest of his words. Musapyr was retiring rapidly, lashing his horse furiously.
I swore an oath vexedly. I wished I could get him. Our fight could have a bitter end. Most probably, one of us would not have stayed alive.
Reflecting sullenly, I was walking on the bleached grass. In the meanwhile, the boy, who was taking aback by our quarrel, caught my horse and brought him to me.
The two of us went on. Musapyr had already disappeared beyond the hills.
THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ONE
What I found in the aul were great changes. Life had become far better in two years. In 1923, the law on unified agricultural tax was adopted. Being free now, the poor could sigh with relief, while beys were to pay much more to the government than they used to.
A credit was open for the poor at a new organization called Association for Mutual Help so that they could buy agricultural machines. Their life was shaking down rapidly.
Moreover, the Kosshi Union, the Union of the Poor, was founded in the auls. Bais could only employ laborers by sighing a contract. A day laborer called Saktagan Sagymbaiev was chairmen of the union in our province. As soon as he learned how to read and write after a six-month’s course in Turgai, he took to work with such proficiency and enthusiasm that people were dazed and confused. They said he had learned laws by heart and could draft a document like an experienced record clerk. Bais avoided him like plague. Not only did he force them to pay their laborers for their work, the bais were also made to pay their debts of fifteen years in full. The laborers who used to live with us got more than a dozen lambs, two bulls, a camel, and a horse from my father with the help of the Kosshi Union.
Finding themselves in the clutches of the law, bais would not give up, they would not put up with poverty. They used their slyness, art, and sometimes bribes to beat the obstacle. They were bringing bottles splitting with kumis and lambs to Kostanai. It did not take long for them to learn how to give royal presents to the people they needed in various establishments, so they could always succeed. Sasyk’s property should have been confiscated long ago for not paying his tax and hiding his cattle, and the man himself was to be sent to prison for several years. However, he got away with it after a short bit. He had someone to help him save the herds, too.
My father had to fox as well. Being well aware of the fact that the only factor importing the sum of the tax for nomadic auls was the number of cattle, he reduced it significantly, improving the breed instead. Now he has one herd of horses. But what kind of horses they were! The previous year, he got a Caucasian riding horse from the governmental stable with the help of the governorate land department. No sum of money could be enough to buy one at the market. How beautiful he was! It was so tall than one could hardly reach its neck, as rangy as a hound, no extra flesh, just muscles, his back was smooth enough to sleep on it, the thin-maned willowy neck ended in a small well-turned head with beautiful bulging black eyes, pointed ears, and flared nostrils. Experts admired his legs most of all – they were strong, flexible, and slender. The kind of legs to barely tough the ground when galloping.
When I came, the horse had already produced some colts. They were about five to six months old, but they looked like one-year-olds of out local steppe breed.
Another new comer was a huge bull with a white blaze. People called him a Hereford. The bull turned out to be very apt to butt. Once they let him try to walk freely – it ended with his attacking not only cattle, but people, too. After that, he got a bridle leather muzzle and chain instead of the usual lead.
Noone but Tekebai dared to come close to him. All our calves descended from that bull. They said that the new breed gave two to three times as much milk and meat as the local one.
Father had a calculating mind. Being afraid of missing the opportunity, he never lent the horse or the white-blazed bull to anyone.
Unlike the rest of Turgai bais, my father neglected fine-fleece sheep and did not even try to improve his flocks with their help. He claimed the breed to be unaccommodated to dry grass and hard frost. “They will all die, I don’t need any of them”, - father said.
Father did not sow crops, either, believing such sowings to be taxed. Instead, he got to know the some cooperators in Kostanai and founded a cooperative departments, which people called multishop, in the aul, and became its manager with mamber as his first assistant. Trade turned out to be extremely profitable. Our family, which had been lacking all kinds of necessary things in recent years, now wanted for nothing, absolutely nothing. Our yurt looked just as good as that of the richest bai.
In two years, changes had taken place in my family as well. Tekebai separated from my father and got a junior yurt, the otau, put up for him. The hostess of the otau was my brother’s wife, Zhengei Bykia. She is the kind to describe like that:
Oh, daughter of a bai!
You are one of the beauties
That let their parents sigh with relief,
At getting rid of them...
I found my zhengei unattractive – she was short and too fat for her young age, she had sandy hair and eyebrows of the same color and a moon face with large gray eyes to embellish it. Her daughter, who looked very much like her mother, was crying in the cradle. Bykia was pregnant again, which I could see by her stomach. What I detested most was Zhengei’s sluggishness. I could imagine how shabby she was going to look in several years. How peevish she will get! Even now, one cannot tell her a joke without hearing most sophisticated invectives. God, save me from a wife like this!
Tekebai had changed, too. When I was parting with him two years before, one could call him a slim dzhigit, but now he was round and well-fed, with a fat paunch showing.
Before the revolution, very few people in Turgai used razors. Most often, young twenty-year-old lads looked like respectable black-bearded man. Our clan, which, as you remember, descended from the Kalmyks, was some kinds of exception – both my grandfather and my father had short dock-tailed beards. Tekebai took after him. As the custom was, he never shaved, so what used to look downy now turned into thin bristly bushes, which made his face look funny and sluggish.
Tekebai did not take part in my father’s trade business and only minded the household.
What can I add? Perhaps a couple of words about Tekebai’s yurt. Its interior gave one a feeling of abundance and wellness. Rich blankets, feather-beds, velvet. White pillow cases, which was a rare sight in the auls of Turgai. White curtains by the entrance. A lot of fine dishes. However, the otau looked very different from the big yurt. My parent kept it clean and near, while my brother and his wife has a neglected, dirty home due to the wife’s laziness and peevish temper and Tekebai’s indifference to his living conditions.
The shop turned into my family’s main source of revenue. The revenue was far from being honest. My father was merely robbing people. He would sell goods on credit and impose fines on those who couldn’t pay in time. The debt would grow day my day. The aul people called that aul fine Siberian plague. As I was told, some had to give a sheep for an iron spade and a dry cow for a bar of crick tea. Father was to send the fine to the budget, but I found out that he detain most of it. This is why he managed to get rich rather soon.
I asked with indignation:
- What is this, Father?
He even smiled:
- It’s all fair, my boy. Don’t bais pay the additional tax? There’s no comparing it to that Siberian plague. I don’t force the poor to take good on credit. They are to blame. They take them and don’t pay.
I tried to protest, to defend the poor, but he stubbornly believed himself to be right and only blamed the Soviet government.
- But you’ll have to answer for it, Father.
- We’ll see when the time comes, why should I let happiness out of my hands?
...I stayed in the aul for more than a month and, as the saying goes, not only took full pulls from my father’s rich cup but even rinsed my mouth.
Time was passing, but I heard nothing about Bates coming back from Troitsk. I could not stay any longer, as I had to settle in Tashkent. In those days, Yerkin Yerzhanov, who had finished studying in Orenburg, became chairman of the volost executive committee. I decided to seek his advice in an honest manner. I told him that I would like her to agree to flee with me. But how could I free her with the help of the government? According to the law, she was under-aged. Did I have to wait? I was tired of waiting, I didn’t want to.
Yerkin’s answer was the following:
- Try to understand it, Burkut, you main purpose is studying. Don’t fall behind. Go to Tashkent. Don’t worry about your girl. I promise you that noone will hurt her as long as she is under-aged. Then you’ll arrange you life in your own way.
I believed Yerkin, as he had come to help me more than once. Believing him, I headed for Tashkent, planning to stay in Ak-Mosque on my way.
The city was changing rapidly. The fifth congress of Kazakhstan Soviets had just taken place there, after which Ak-Mosque, which was now the capital, was called Kzylorda. The republican establishments had already moved there. A newspaper called “The Tongue of the Aul” was being published. Chairman of General Committee of Kazakh Central Executive Committee Eltai Yernazarov was appointed its editor. My uncle, Zhakynbek Dauletov, was working for him as a literary assistant. My uncle was the one to tell me this.
- Is Yernazarov a journalist?- I was surprised.
Uncle answered laughingly:
- He may be not, but he can become one...
Musapyr had come to Kzylorda before I did and was working for the newspaper together with my uncle. He had enough time to depict me as the initiator of the quarrel, and I heard many angry words from my uncle. I was defending myself hard, I told him about the reasons for the quarrel and the fight. Uncle pretended to believe me and started persuading me to make it up.
- Uncle, I beg you, don’t interfere with our relationship, - I implored, - we shouldn’t see each other now. There’s no good. We’ll live as we used to. There are no mountains between us to throw into each other. Time will pass, the rage will fade, and we will shake hands.
Uncle even heaved a sigh. He gave me a warm look I probably had never seen before:
- It is me who addicted Musapyr to studied. god never gave me a son, my only child is growing for other people. That’s why I hope for my two nephews to become my support, my wings. Musapyr will easily agree to make it up. Easier than you. You’re younger than Musapyr is, but you’re tough. Think of it, Dear. Have you heard the akyn’d words?
How tight are little camels,
Little cousins,
Live as tight as they are!
That’s what I’m asking you about. There’s nothing to separate you. Do reconcile!
We could reconcile, but only provided that Musapyr had lied about himself and Bates. But what if he told the truth? What then?
My uncle tried to introduce me into the sphere of politics, but, to tell the truth, I didn’t quite make it out then. He told me something about “the left” and “the right”, claiming that “the left” were bitter foes of bais, but the governors of Kazakhstan were mostly “right”. “The right” were no danger to bais. According to “the right”, bais were going to come to be socialists, too.
- To us, whom people call nationalists,- my uncle went on,- “the right” is no trouble. If they were, would I be working for the newspaper?!
Before finishing the conversation, Uncle told me the most important piece of news. It turned out that he had recently seen Zhunusbek Mauytbaiev, director of the institute in Tashkent, and told him about me. Mauytbaiev promised him to accept me as a student.
Uncle’s friend kept his word and did his best to make it easier for me to enter the institute. I even didn’t have to sit the exams. The teachers just signed my examination sheet on his request.
Kazakhs were few in Tashkent then, especially those who called themselves nationalists. most of them had come back to their Kazakhstani cities, some moved to Moscow and Leningrad. As for outstanding figures, Mauytbaiev, who spread the rumor about himself writing a book on the October Revolution, was the only one what was still there.
I took to studying at the Inpros timidly, with apprehension. What scared me most of all was the fact that there were no people of my age there. It seemed to me that I looked like a boy among mature, even old people. But very son I realized that it was not me but they who had fallen behind in terms of knowledge. Especially when in came to Russian Language and Literature.
Shortly speaking, it was not difficult for me to study.
However, I was missing Bates harder than I used to when in the steppe of Turgai. Only poetry helped me.
A poet feels good alone in the sublunar realm. He can breathe life into the dead, he can talk to people even when he is alone, he can sing like the nightingale does, pleasing the others!
...Run, my pen, run faster and bolder along the white field of paper. Let the words be a rapid and melodious torrent like that of a crook in the hills. Let the end of a line unexpectedly and nearly thoughtlessly resonate with the end of another. Let the lines make a poem in graceful lines. Let each of your thoughts be lucid and beautiful, may you feel its sweetness, as if you had a mellow fruit in your mouth. Let the music of the poem caress your ear and warm your heart. Let words and thoughts, images and melodies merge into a poem.
“Some jump to get warm while the others jump in the fullness of their heart”, - the Kazakhs say. Poets jump in the fullness of their heart. Oh, how much I want to be a poet, too. But if I was a real poet, I would only write poems about what I myself feel and experience. I had reached that conclusion long before, about two of three years. I filled several writing books with my poems. Of course, I like my poems, but when I read them out to poetry lovers, some say in a condescending tone that they are “not bad”, and the others laugh. My head is in a whirl – whom shall I believe?
All of my poems are dedicated to Bates. Sometimes it seems to me that my love is no less than that of heroes about whom the ancient legends tell. Though I have never happened to plunge into water and fire, defending my beloved one, I will not flee if I have to. This is why I am starving for poetry.
Open your beautiful chest,
Do not hide the gifts of your soul.
The dombra is the dombra
When you can hear the melody played by the dombra.
Those lines belong to Saken. Reciting them silently, I imagine my own soul as a chest, in which songs and melodies are kept locked. What can I do to find the key to make my could speak? Perhaps I should sea great poets, who have already opened their souls to people, more often.
I was dissatisfied with my poems, but I kept writing them stubbornly, filling one copybook after another...
...Winter holidays were approaching. I still got no news from Bates. I even came to think that she could be hurt because I didn’t wait for her and didn’t inform her. Sometimes I thought that something awful had happened to her. Sometimes I was angry with her again. However, my patience was nearly exhausting, and the pain was wrenching my heart so badly that I finally made up my mind to go to the aul. I informed Mauytbaiev.
- Now, in winter?!- he shrugged his shoulders.- From Tashkent to Turgai and then to Sarykopa?
- Yes. You’re right.
- I’m surprised just because I know the parts. It’s a different thing to go there in summer. But in winter... Ugh! It’s quite tolerable in calm weather, but if it’s storming... It keeps storming for the whole day, for two days, then for months. The frost is so hard that crows freeze on the wing. What will you do then? You will fail either to reach home or to come to Tashkent in time. You’ll fall behind the group.
I shook my head to indicate that I wouldn’t.
- Well, what about clothes and horses? Where will they be waiting for you?
- In Kostanai!.. It will be more convenient to go from there in winter than on the lake side.
- Right. But do you remember that Kostanai to Sarykopa means almost five hundred versts? So you have already covered the way. Well, Dear. Think it over once again. It’s not your delay and falling behind the group that I’m worried about now. All in all, it’s not that bad. Just imagine – you come to Kostanai to find out that warm clothes haven’t been sent to you. Or to find no horses in the aul... All kinds of things can happen on the road in winter.
- Thank you for your concern, agai. But I’ve already thought it over, and I must go. Zhunusbek stared at me with his small bulging black eyes.
- Won’t you be hurt if I ask you a question, Burkut?
- Ask me, agai. I will answer you.
- You’ve chosen a hard way. Only love can bring you through it. Right?
- How did you guess?
- It’s not that difficult, Burkut. I could see it on your face.
Feeling embarrassed, I lowered my eyes:
- I’ve read your book, agai, “Temper and Choice of Profession”. I think you’re never wrong...
- Now everything is clear!- Zhunusbek rose from the chair.- Don’t forget to send a telegram to the aul. You can get your travel papers tomorrow. Just in case. But I beg you, do not hurry. It’s no good. If you’re a little bit late for studying, it’s all right. You’ll catch up with the group!
...I got to Kostanai by train and went to the house of our landsmen, in which I’d always stayed, straightaway. Tekebai and Kairakbai were already waiting for me. I was vey pleased to get my father’s wolf overcoat, new inwrought pims, and a rich malakhai hat. However, I was upset to find out that father hadn’t sent two or three horses, as he did in previous years, and sent one dark gray colt instead.
- He wasn’t too generous!
- Shame on you,- Tekebai grumbled.- Why on earth do you need a herd? The colt has a strong heart and slim legs, he’s as good as a herd. The road seems to be nice...Unless there’s a storm, we’ll get home in five days.
We set off at the gray winter dawn. The sledge was gliding easily along the smooth road which had not seen any snowdrifts since long before. That’s when I came to knew what a Caucasian horse is. He was galloping rapidly, breathing out steam with great noise and throwing away the sharp snow dust with his hooves. If there happened to be cart ahead of us, the horse outraced it easily. He seemed to be tireless! His swift running was breathtaking.
I was listening to the runners creaking and admiring the colt who kept flying, and I felt as good as never before. I was enjoying the mere speed. Each single verst of the way was bringing me closer to Bates.
There was nothing to spoil my mood. I took both Tekebai’s languid indifference and Kairakbai’s vulgar tall tales, in which women were the focus, with complacence. The latter was trying to amuse us all the way long. When Kairakbai realized that I was hardly interested in those stories, he started expounding on love and beauty. At first I was listening to him absently, but then I couldn’t take it any longer and interrupted Kairakbai:
- I’ll tell you what, Kairakbai, for each of us, the most beautiful one is the one we love.
He must have failed to understand what I meant, though he pretended to agree. He added immediately:
- So tell me, Burkut, what does the word “to love” finally mean?
- To be utterly true. In your soul and body...
Kairakbai uttered another suspicious yes and asked:
- So you think there’s noone for you apart from Mambet’s daughter. But maybe you’ll find another girl.
- Where have you seen a girl for me?
- I have! It’s she that I’m talking about. I’ve seen many beauties. Russian, and Kazakh, and Tartar, and Uzbek. But I’ve never chanced to admire a woman so slender and beautiful. You know Abai’s poem by heart. Remember? – Kairakbai declared:
He white forehead is finest silver
With radiant eyes on it.
Her brows are finely arched,
She is as beautiful as a new moon.
Abai wrote about her. Believe me, she does look like a man!
Even the lazy Tekebai was moved by his words.
- He’s telling the truth...
- How generous you are with your praise. So who is she?
Kairakbai had obviously been waiting for me to ask.
- You ask me who she is? For several generations, her family has been living in abundance and wealth. Even now, her family is one of the most prosperous ones. The girl’s brother is Saudabai Mailybaiev, who works in the governorate cooperation. It’s he who helped you father about the multishop. But your house looks poor when compared to that of Mailybai. His sister, Shai, is wearing the finest silk. He knows that the folk is right to say:
A dress and a headband is a girl’s adornment,
A fast-legged horse is that of a dzhigit!
She’s a most snappy dresser. She’s got all kinds of things – dresses, costly necklaces, fur coats...
- I do believe you,- I interrupted Kairakbai.- But why are you telling me this?
- For a good reason...
I felt even more surprise:
- So tell me as it is!
- I’ve told you what I was going to tell you. Let me say it again – they are famous, rich people. You have a vague idea both of the girl and of her brother now...We’ll discuss the rest later.
That was annoying.
- What can I discuss with you?
- Wait a little, keep your hair on. First have a look at the girl, see the house. Then we’ll continue our conversation.
I waved my hand, pretending to agree, as I was tired of Kairakbai’s hinting.
...The dark-gray colt proved to be tireless. He was galloping on and on with snow bursting under his hooves. What a horse! – I keep admiring him.
...We stopped three times to have a sleep. After three days on the road, we came to Mailybai’s aul. We already head three hundred eighty versts behind us. Even in winter, the aul lying on the bank of Lake Aksuat was a pleasant sight. Wooden houses with many windows and sloping roofs stood in two rows, making a wide street like in a Russian village. The yards, which were separated from each other was fences, added to the semblance. We entered one of the yards. A tall fat man wearing a wolf coat and a fox fur malakhai hat with a dark-blue velvet top came to meet us. Judging by his beard and moustache covered with hoar-frost, he had been working in the yard for a long time. This was Mailybai. He greeted Tekebai and Kairakbai like old friends. Stretching his hand out to me, he asked:
- So you’re Abutalip’s son. Studying in Tashkent? Live long, dear, nice to meet you... Well... Tie your horse to the post. Welcome to the house...
A dzhigit took us to a spacious, richly furnished cozy parlor. We threw off the journey clothes and made ourselves comfortable on carpets and blankets. Through the door, which was half-open, we could hear a light clinking of necklaces and muffled voices.
- The girl! – Kairakbai said in an excited whisper.
I smelt a sweet and gentle perfume... To tell the truth, I suddenly felt an urge to see the beautiful Shai, whom Kairakbai had been praising so generously.
She hadn’t entered the parlor yet. But the dastarkhan was spread, and a lucid calescent samovar, which was for some reason called bolyskey – it must be a distorted Russian word for “Polish” – onto the tray, and cream, sweets, and baursaks appeared. The girl came out with a slight clinking of necklaces. No, Kairakbai had not exaggerated. Shai’s beauty and slim silhouette couldn’t but strike one, not to mention her dress – thin colorful silk, bands, ribbons, and costly necklaces... From a day’s distance,
Through a thousand obstacles,
You will smell your dear hair,
The smell of cloves.
Such odor is heady, no matter how long the distance is!
...Being true to the Kazakh customs, she came in with her eyes lowered, hardly producing any sound, sat by the samovar and started pouring tea into blue gilded cups. It occured to me that her white narrow fingers looked like new sprigs of reed.
The girl was acting in a slightly shy manner. When I was looking aside, I could feel her lucid, radiant eyes looking at me. But as soon as I gave her a straight look, she lowered her eyes. We seemed to be waylaying each other. Finally, the moment came when our eyes met like animals luring each other. The moment lingered. We only averted our eyes when Mailybai coughed delicately to tell that it was not the proper way to behave.
I do not know what the girl thought. But I could see it clearly written in her eyes “If you have come as a groom, your bride is ready”.
I was not mistaken.
...The tea was long over, it was time to go to sleep. The agile Kairakbai threw a stealthy look into the half-open door leading to the next room and told me in a cheerful whisper:
- Thanks God, the girl’s all alone in the room. The only thing that separates you is the curtain.
An akyn put in into beautiful words:
The story is a simple one.
To make it short,
I’ll tell you that the dawn came unexpected.
In that room, hidden by the white curtain, I was surprised to see the dawn come.
Mailybai was doing his best to persuade me to stay in his house for another day. It did not look like regular hospitality. Most probably, Mailybai considered me to be his son-in-law-to-be. However, I did not want to stay any longer, though my companions would not mind another week. I thanked Mailybai and told him that I had to visit my family and then be in time to start my studying at the institute.
...The runners were creaking again.
As soon as we left the aul, Kairakbai raised the subject of the beauty again:
- Well, dzhigit, let’s think the fat’s in the fire. Don’t you look at me like this. Can’t you understand? The proposal’s accepted! Do you have any doubts? Why did we stay in Mailybai’s house then? I wanted to tell you yesterday. But it’s not late yet. Your father’s already arranged it. They decided that they’d better introduce the girl to the dzhigit before announcing an engagement. They were sure that you’d like each other. So you know each other. That was a nice introduction.
I saw a grin on Kairakbai’s sly face:
- So I’m right, the fat’s in the fire!
- No fat!- I answered rudely to Kairakbai.
Both of my companions started shouting
- That’s nor true! Why say so?
- I’m not the kind of man to marry the first girl he meets. I don’t care about her beauty. If you want, I can recite Abai again:
Do not get fascinated by beautiful appearance,
Do not go blind in passion,
Do not let a beautiful woman carry you away!
The girl is one of those girls... One has to be a very unscrupulous dzhigit to marry her.
- So what girl is beautiful to you?- Tekebai asked ironically.
But my answer was simple:
- My beloved one is the most beautiful one.
- Who is she? Who?
- Be patient, you’ll know in due time...
THE HAPPY NIGHT
Do you really love me? Is it not a dream?
Do prove it, do talk to me,
Feed me like a bird,
Teach me how to fly.
From a song
When it was clear to my companions that I was no longer attracted by Shai, their mood was spoilt. The weather changed, too.
- You tumbled a cup full of food, which was given to you with all cordiality, - Tekebai grumbled sullenly. – Saudabai was endowing our house. He was scattering goods and chattels all about like millet. Now try and make him be generous again! You must understand another thing, too. He thought he’d be our relative. That’s why he turned the blind eye to your father, who was robbing the shop.
- Robbing? That’s not the word,- Kairakbai interfered. – He’s eating it out non-stop.
- Saudabai will be angry with us,- my brother went on, ignoring Kairakbai,- he cam force Father to give back everything we’ve ever taken from the multishop. His hair’s not enough to pay.
- He may eat us,- I was getting annoyed.
- Huh...What are we supposed to do then? Who’ll send you money? Not to mention the rest. You’ll have to forget about the Caucasian colt.
- I can do without him. It’s you who’s riding the horse.
We turned away from each other in silence, as we had nothing to talk about.
How cloudless and calm the weather was just yesterday. But now it was getting worse and worse. In the morning, as we were in the aul, Tekebai tried to postpone our departure, threatening us with the storm which could find us on the road, far away from any village. Where could we hide then? Maybe we’d better wait for a couple of days? But I insisted, and they chose not to protest.
Soon it started to snow, and the wind grew stronger. Its blows were getting more and more violent. Snowdrifts were winding and hissing. Then a cruel white storm his everything. The only thing I could sometimes discern was the dark croup of the Caucasian horse, who was now jogging. Frost was burning my cheeks in the wind, it felt like red-hot iron. I wrapped deeper in my father’s wolf overcoat. Tekebai hid his face in the high collar of his coat. His voice sounded muffled and distant. But suddenly I heard him say clearly:
- There’s no helping it, we have to come back!- saying this, he grasped the reins which Kairakbai was holding and began to turn the Caucasian colt. But I got hold of the reins.
- No, we won’t!
Tekebai was persistent, he kept tearing the reins away from me, I was protesting and shouting. But Tekebai would not give up.
- Burkut, do you want to get lost and die in the steppe?
I told him that if we are likely to lose our way going ahead, we could get back to Mailybai’s aul. I also asked about the distance which we had already covered.
Tekebai did not hurry to answer, as if counting. Then he said in a voice which lacked confidence:
- At least forty to fifty versts. Am I right, Kairakbai?
- Maybe you are. We’ve been going fast. The weather was good.
- But Mailybai’s aul is still closet than the first village we’ll reach, - Tekebai kept insisting. – We’ll have to cover another seventy versts to find a shelter. The horse knows the way he’s just covered well and won’t lose it. It may be dangerous to go farther. We’ll get lost. How are we supposed to direct the horse with that snow blinding us. We have to go back.
- Go ahead!- I was yelling.
- Don’t be stubborn!
There was another fight for the reins between me and Tekebai. That’s when I realized that I could not defeat Tekebai. He was just as stubborn as me but could beat me in terms of strength, as he was considered to be one of the aul’s true fighters. Kairakbai was staying out. He must have decided not to interfere with the brothers’ fight.
I dropped the reins with a wave of my hand, cursing both Tekebai and the horse, got out of the sledge and started walking straight ahead.
Perhaps my brother thought is to be an absurd threat or a joke. He did not even try to stop me. Soon we could not see each other in the storm. However, I was neither joking nor trying to scare Tekebai. I was really intending to go on foot. Much later, as I was thinking back, I thought that is was stupid and mad. Where could I get in such a storm! But behind me, there was the aul, Mailybai’s aul, and ahead there was Bates – young age and love can send one the wrong way.
Soon I could hear the familiar clop of hooves through the noise of the wind. They were reaching me. I did get it my way.
- Get in!- Kairakbai invited me to the sledge in an amicable tone.
Tekebai was silent. We didn’t talk anymore. It happens after a violent fight, a fight which shed some blood. The horse was still running quite fast. It looked like he was running the right way, as the old runner prints were sometimes glistening behind the sledge.
Wrapped in steam, the colt was working out his milt without slowing down. Just the opposite, it was running faster as if eager to get to the aul before dark like we were. He snorted every once in a while, hitting the shaft to get rid of an icicle hanging down from his face.
It was hard for him to get onto flaky hills the storm had produced in the middle of the road. But when he ran down a hill, the runners were hardly touching the ground, and the speed was crazy. I thought of a Kazakh song I had once heard or read:
You can recognize a Caucasian horse running.
Even if he is exhausted and sinks in the snow,
He will run faster than before
When running downhill.
He’s just like this, our horse. Run! Run ahead!
In the meanwhile, the steppe was getting darker and darker in the haze of the storm. The sun was setting. Soon the sky was pitch dark. One could not see a thing. After long silence, after the quarrel, Tekebai finally spoke.
- Looks like a grave!- his voice sounded scared.- When it was light, the horse still could find the road, but now god knows where he’ll get us. Oh, that’s a bad time! Packs of hungry wolves are prowling. The time of coupling’s come for wolves. The animals can smell us at a good distance. They won’t be scared by our single sledge. I’ve heard many stories about wolves eating travelers lost in a storm.
My heart failed me at hearing those words, but Tekebai went on, as if wanting to scare me even more:
- We’ve got two clubs in the sledge. Kairakbai’s holding the reins, and we’ll get the clubs. But if wolves surround us, a stick won’t help. A lamb flings before dying, too. What can we do? Take a club and keep hold of it...
Saying this, Tekebai shoved a knarred stick into my hand. It was dark, the snow was violent. We were lucky to have that dark gray horse, who was running as fast as before. We still had a poor hope that he hadn’t lost his way yet. If only we could avoid pristine ice-scum. It would be very difficult for the horse to keep on trotting on such surface.
The storm was even more violent, and if one looked closely at the dark whirlpool, one could see myriads of dragons hissing and millions of wolves with their eyes glowing. It’s very scary! But I never regretted going. As I was thinking of the novels I’d read, as was my common practice, I thought of lovers who had to face obstacles much more difficult that I had on my way.
We kept going. There was no telling how much we had covered or whether we had lost our way. Though Tekebai was only hoping for God, I put my trust in the dark gray Caucasian horse. Indeed, he was no weaker than allah. Trotting stubbornly, he brought us right to the flocks of sheep near Mambet’s aul, through storm and snowdrifts. We could hear dogs barking in the wind at smelling strangers, and in this barking I could discern the ear-splitting shrieking of Kikym’s black bitch.
The dark-gray horse did not lest us down. I regretted cursing him shortly before...
In the meanwhile, Kairakbai held back the horse.
- Which aul is this?
- Mambet’s aul.
- How on earth do you know?- Tekebai exclaimed with joy.
- It’s only Kikym’s black bitch that barks like this.
- So he recognized her!- Tekebai added.- Well, he couldn’t fail, he’s seen the bitch more than once.
- So turn the horse!- Tekebai decided suddenly.
- Where shall I turn him? It’s storming, and it’s late.
- Head for your aul. The horse will find it with his eyes closed now.
- Let me ask you what’s wrong about this aul? We’re hungry and the horse is tired. Noone’s chasing us, there’s no need to hurry.
- Stop talking, turn the horse!- Tekebai grew irritated.
Kairakbai lose his nerve and was about to turn he horse when I took hold of the reins, making the animal stop.
- No, Tekebai, you’re a mean, you’re a very mean man. Why should we run away? If you don’t have mercy one me, you could at least have mercy on the horse, you bastard! On our dear dark gray horse, who has brought us here from such a far place in spite of the awful weather. Don’t you touch the reins, or I’ll beat you! I’ll shed your blood.
- Damn it, another squabble!- Kairakbai was annoyed. – As the saying goes,
Children of those who are cursed by allah
Will quarrel even in the snow of a desert.
You’re just like this. Quarreling in the steppe, quarreling by the aul. What’s wrong with you?
I took Kairakbai’s words personally and ordered him to get closer to Mambet’s house:
- I you don’t want to do this, I may get out here!
Tekebai obeyed, and soon we stopped the sledge in Mambet’s yard. Barking loudly, the black bitch followed us to the very gate. Only after I had got out of the sledge and started shaking off the snow with my wolf coat open on my chest, she recognized me and started fawning, trying to put her paws on my shoulders. A good omen!
Shutters on the windows of Mambet’s wooden house were closed, and I could only see the dim light of the lamp, which I thought to be lit in a wrong time, through the chinks.
Just in front of Mambet’s house, there was a small cattle-pen. I wanted to open the door of the pen, but probably it was locked, which was an unmistakable sign of the host’s absence. Thinking of this I felt only silent joy, but at the same time I was worried – what if the black old woman, as steadfast as a black castle, was here?
Kairakbai looked at the door.
- Who is it?- I heard a female voice, which I recognized immediately to be Zhania’s.
Soon the door was ajar, and we saw Zhania. While we were greeting her, Kaken showed in the back of the room. She showed to disappear at once.
- Bates!.. Wake up!.. Burkut’s come!..- we heard her excited voice.
I followed her running, without waiting for Kairakbai and Tekebai. Still sleepy, Bates sat onto the couch and couldn’t understand what was going on. Kaken shook her:
- Wake up! Look, Burkut’s here.
Suddenly she recognized me and rushed to embrace me with her eyes wide open.
How thin and little she was! She just reached my shoulder.
I hadn’t get rid of my coat covered with hoar-frost yet. Only when inside I could finally feel that I had frozen on the road. I had fever, I was shaking. But Bates’s warmth seemed to be melting the cold, and her light dress seemed to me to be hotter than a wolf coat.
When her cheeks touched mine, I melted like ice against which red-hot iron is pressed. Drops of sweat appeared all over my body.
We could have stood like this for a long time if Kalisa had not suddenly turned up.
- That’s it, enough!
I dropped my arms, but Bates would not let me go.
- You must have missed your brother badly, Yerkezhan! – Kalisa tried to bring her to the blush.- Strangers are here, where’s your shame?
Finally Bates revived herself and got confused at seeing Kairakbai and Tekebai. She came to her bed silently to draw the curtain closed.
I took a glance at the wall clock – the time was approaching five o’clock. The dawn was to come soon.
After asking us about our family’s health, as was the custom, Kalisa said:
- When the black bitch started barking, I knew at once you were coming. We’d already heard about your intentions. But we never expected you to come today. The storm’s so hard. Moreover, Molda-aga and Zheneshe haven’t come back yet...
Kairakbai gave her a brief account of our journey.
- As far as I understand, you’re staying for the night?- Kalisa asked.
- Can we go no? We’re frozen, and the horse’s tires.
Those words of mine irritated Tekebai. Still he did not say anything.
- So have a rest and leave tomorrow. Right?- Kalisa asked.
- Right,- Kairakbai agreed.- order for beds to be prepared. Arrange mine in your house, not here.
- Why not here?
- It’s more convenient there.
Tekebai did not say anything again. We came out to unharness the horse. The storm had just started to calm down. The clouds had drifted apart, showing the full moon.
Kalisa showed at the threshold, wearing a quilted robe. She said that our beds were ready.
- I’ll sleep in your house, too,- Tekebai gave voice.
- As you wish,- Kalisa said meaningfully.- The lamp’s lit. Head for the light. I’ll accompany Burkut.
- Listen, won’t your bitch bite us?- Kairakbai said jokingly.
- Since when have you been afraid of dogs. Getting old, aren’t you?- Kalisa gave tit for tat.
Tekebai and Kairakbai went to Kikym, and I was still standing near Mambet’s house, by the colt pen. Kalisa smiled, inviting me inside:
A dzhigit will be loved and lucky
If there is a zhengei to meet him by the gate...
- You chose the right time, Burkut. I understand you. Now you want to come in and see my husband’s younger sister. Oh, wasn’t it me who cherished her like an angel, like honey...So you don’t want to observe the custom?
- I’m ready to repay you, Kalisa. You’ll have whatever you wish.
- You came unexpectedly. I don’t know what you took with you.
- I’ve got a golden watch, Kalisa, have it!
- So you believe this to be the right price for my husband’s younger sister?
- Do you want a golden ring, too?
- You are well aware of the fact that the sacred numbers for the Kazakhs are three and nine, Burkut. Add a third one. We’ll see then...
- I’ll give you a silk kerchief!
- Fine! That will do!- Taking the gifts, Kalisa added: - Don’t scold me for robbing you, Burkut. It’s not me who wrote that song:
My pockets are empty, I have no hat,
I have nothing to belt my chapan.
I have just give presents to zhengei
From the aul in which my girl lives.
- I won’t spare a thing to see Bates, Kalisa,- my answer was. – I wouldn’t spare myself. But who’d Bates stay with then?
Kalisa said me goodbye and went to her house. The lamp in the first room was not burning anymore. It was light only in the second room. I thought of where Bates’s mother, Zhania, could be. The curtain was down, a bed had already been arranged for me in the corner. I sat for a while, thinking. The door creaked, and Zhania entered the room.
- I couldn’t even kiss you in the public eye, Dear,- she stretched her hands out to me.- Let your happiness blossom, my swallow!
Swallow, karlygash! I never understood what made her chose these very words. Perhaps she already believed me to be her daughter’s husband-to be.
- Undress and go to sleep, Dear! Do you need the lamp? Or shall I put it out?
She went out, and I was still sitting as I had been. I do not remember whether I thought of the Kazakh song saying:
A lad cannot sleep at night,
I must have been thinking of something else then. Bates surprised me as we just saw each other. She rushed to embrace you ignoring the presence of strangers, but then she got too confused and hid behind the curtain immediately.
All kinds of thoughts were haunting me, both good and bad. Perhaps she was really shy and that was the reason why she did not say the warm words I had been waiting for so much. But what if Bates s worth than I believe her to be. What if Musapyr was right saying, “Hasn’t it occured to you that your Bates is just as featherbrained as Kaken?”. If Musapyr did not lie to me, it was not the others that Bates was shy to see – she was ashamed to look me in the eyes. Could it be the reason why she rushed behind the curtain?
Finally, I blew out the lamp, took off my suit, and headed for the room in which the sisters were lying.
A cold hand touched my arm in the darkness:
- There, there...
Of course, it was Kaken. She dragged me aside and dropped my hand abruptly. At once I felt Bates lying under a thin silk blanket. The same moment she was pressing her hot breast against my body, touching my cheek with a hot cheek of hers. But it was not enough for me. My lips were biting into her half-open mouth. Feeling Bates’s hot, sharp little tongue, I kept kissing her.
We forgot everything, we could only feel each other. The oblivion could have lasted for ages but for Kaken, who pinched me suddenly.
I pried myself away from Bates’s lips:
- What’s up?..
- Let me lie in your bed, Burkut,- Kaken asked me.
- Do you have to pinch me because of this?
- You wouldn’t stand it, I bet, you’d give yourself a pinch, too!
Saying this, Kaken went to the bed which had been intended for me.
- Poor girl! – Bates said to me in a whisper.- That’s the only way she understands love...
- So what’s your understanding?
We started the long secret conversation which regular words fail to describe.
- I belong to you,- Bates said,- without you, I have no life. My entire happiness is in you.
- I can tell you the same thing. We have one and the same cherished dream. Let this night be the start of our happy journey.
- I agree, Burkut...
- Throw off your blanket, Bates.
- Will you be happy then?
- Not exactly. But if we share thoughts, why separate our bodies?
She began to whisper in a very low voice:
- You’ll have to wait a little, just a little...
Her words seemed to compose a song about spring to me...
- You and me have grown up in the steppe which has no end. Don’t hurry to make love in winter. Will the bright spring not come tomorrow? Will not tulips blossom in the steppe? Will not the plumes of feather-grass, which look like white owl feathers, be swing in the wind? Will not nightingales sing in riparian forests? Will we not hear swans calling for each other in lakes? Will not a horse wrangler whistle in the steppe?.. That’s when we will be united, and the dark sky with stars laughing on it, the birch wood and the steppe grass will witness our love... Noone will know in the yurt made of night firmament that we have brought our souls and bodies together...
- Why are you telling this, Bates? Do we care about the others?
- Burkut, Bokezhan! True love cannot stand theft. Love is born secretly, but after that everyone must know about it.
- So you think we need to go to the registry?
- You haven’t quite understood me. A marriage certificate is a paper. But no papers, no Islamic customs can separate hearts that love...
- So what are you talking about, Bates?
- You and me were born in Turgai. Let the dear steppe of Turgai be witness to our love.
I still could not fully understand Bates. She kept talking about Turgai, while I was trying to tear off the blanket in which she was wrapped.
- Bokezhan!- Bates was resisting me.- You mustn’t use force!.. Bear it in your mind that I’m not that weak and I can defend my honor.
While we were arguing like this, Kaken ran up to us.
- You aren’t very hospitable to the dzhigit, Bates! But how impatient you’ve been to see him. Do you want to be a boy again? Give up the useless resistance. Obey your fate!.. You don’t have to hesitate anymore. Can a dzhigit like such indecision?
Having blurted the irritated sputter, Kaken retreated.
We were lying together in silence. Suddenly, someone opened the shutters outside, and the morning light got into the room.
- Remember my words, Boken!- Bates broke the silence.- In spring, when you are on holidays, we’ll see Kaken off to her groom’s house. Come to the wedding. It will be as I’ve told you.
However, I felt hurt. I did not feel like philosophizing. I turned my back to Bates. But she embraced me, pressing her face against my body, and sang me one of the popular songs of our parts in a low voice:
A boy is tending his moustache with great care,
He is sure to be a brave dzhigit with a beautiful moustache.
If you love me truly, Dear,
Let me fly, let me fly.
I had heard the melody and the lyrics before, but now I came to understand their meaning. I embraced Bates and gave her a hot kiss. Suddenly, we heard Tekebai’s voice. I rushed to my bed, woke Kaken and began dressing.
- Ah, you’re already up!- Tekebai was surprised.- We’re leaving now – I’ve harnessed the colt. We’ll have tea at home. I think Father’s been waiting for us too long.
We departed. I could hardly imagine seeing my father in my sweet oblivion. I just did not think about it.
When we reached the aul, Father was busy with the cattle. He greeted us in a reserved manner when we were still at a distance but did not stop working. This hurt me – we have not seen for ages, but he did not even utter a word of affection. I did not say anything, either, and enter the house. Kairakbai got out of the sledge, too. Tekebai stayed in the yard.
“He must be going to gossip”,- I thought. I was not mistaken.
When my father came in for breakfast, he looked sullen. He avoided looking at me at all. Sometimes he said something abrupt, but most often he kept silent. The family were quiet, too. We had a common law – when my father was out of humor, noone dared to tell a joke or smile, or even speak loudly. Even my mother, who believes Father to be fully subject to her, is afraid of displeasing him and making him angry.
Having had our meal in silence, we left the room in silence, too. I felt sleepy after the sleepless night. Food and warmth got me drowsy, and I could only think of a soft bed. Father was sitting on his place like a stone idol. I was going to have a rest in the little mud hut we called Tekel’s otau, but Father prevented me from doing this.
- Don’t hurry, dear boy, I have something serious to discuss with you.
Father was rather bellowing than speaking, resembling a bull ready to butt.
“This is it”,- I thought, cursing my talkative brother who was always eager to please my father.
- Well, son, it looks like you’ve come back as a groom. Congratulations. When is the wedding to take place?
- When the time comes, we’ll have the wedding,- I answered, smelling something ironic about my father’s words.
- But I think the time’s already come,- Father was still mocking at me spitefully.
It hurt me.
- Why talk like this? Aren’t you ashamed to watch a couple in their bed?
- Why not?- Father raised his voice.
- Don’t you shout, I beg you! It’s not your strength, it’s your weakness that makes you shout...
Father gave me a close look and started telling me without arguing:
- I’ve happened to hear that Bey Izbasty from the Kipchak clan once took part in a trial against Bey Toksan of the Kereis. This was the time they met. Izbasty was a strong tall man, while Toksan, which means ninety, looked like a boy. Looking at his opponent, Izbasty said jokingly:
- People say you, Toksan, to be a giant, but as far as I can see, you’re no more than a Tomasha nightingale...
- Well,- Toksan’s answer was,- in a nightingale’s nest, only one egg out of nine turns finally into a bird, out of eight eggs a tarantula has, only one turns into a little spider. If I turn out to be Tomasha, I’ll have a nightingale, if I am a tarantula, I’ll have a spider as well...
Father added:
- I hoped that you, a Kalmyk descendant, would be both a nightingale and a tarantula. But now I can see that my hopes were groundless. Why hope, anyway. Akan was right:
We are in a rickety boat with no oar;
The sea is vast, it has no end.
But storm will start, darkness will fall on the sea,
And we will sink without a support.
Our situation is just as sad...
- Who is Akan, Father?- I asked him meaningfully.
- Didn’t you understand? Akhment Baitursunov...
- That’s just the kind of poems he should be writing. But if he doesn’t want to sink, he’d better sit still and silent...
- The poem was written in tsarist days, Son.
- Looks like they are. They are fit for those days... But why is your Akyn being so mean in Soviet time?.. The people has finally been granted freedom.
- Freedom!-Father repeated, looking at me out of the corners of his eyes.- What has he done, why are criticizing him?
- Haven’t you heard about his speeches against the Soviet government? The government forgave him much. His being an Alash and fighting against the revolution. He was not just forgiven, he was given a job and accepted as a member of the party. And what did he do? He’s showing his black ingratitude by cursing the Soviet regime.
- All right, forget it, let’s talk about the situation in the family!- Father crayfished, realizing that he was defeated.
- Wait a little. It wasn't me who raised the subject of Baitursunov. It’s time he was sent to prison. But he’s only been expelled from the party.
- Drop the subject!- Father insisted.
- All right, we’ll drop the subject of Baitursunov, let’s talk about you. You’ve spoken against the people, against the Soviet government, too, Father! You should have been punished severely!
I could see obduracy and anger glowing in my father’s eyes.
- They left me alive. So you’ll have to do your best for them to shoot me.
- Why do I need this? But why won’t you listen to what I’ve been boiling with for so long. I’ve telling you since last year, “Give up that trade, Father. You’ll choke with people’s money. Noone will hurt you if you are an honest man. But you wouldn’t listen to me. You got all bogged down in the dirt. You want to throw me into the same dirt. Otherwise, why would you need to match me with Mailybai’s daughter. I’m not a milksop anymore, Father. You aren’t likely to keep a whole skin even if you sacrifice me. Can’t you feel that you’re in for it?! The Soviet government has the people to support it. The people have defeated bais, beys, and foreign enemies. You are well aware of it. But you’re still heading for your death like a butterfly attracted by fire. To cap it all, you recite Baitursunov. Were you expecting to make me change my mind with their help? Do I care? It’s not the Soviet government but you and Baitursunov who are drifting in a rickety boat with no oar!..
Red-hot, I started walking around the room, while my father stood with his brows contracted, frozen. It was only after a long silence that he started speaking in a low voice:
- Right you are, son. We believed the revolution to be no harm, like water to a naked man. We decided to fight and didn’t take a turn when the time came. Much has changed now. The government’s gained strength. Now it’s time we thought about saving our lives. My wish to become Mailybai’s relative is no more than my concern about my life. We have to think about it, anyway. If Mailybai’s son Saudabai wasn’t a friend of mine, I wouldn’t have got what I’ve got now. But how can you live, how can you stay alive if you have no property? Sasyk could have been sent to prison long ago, what helps him escape is his wealth. The Soviet government may be just, but there are people ready to beat any law, and they are working in establishments meant to control the observation of laws.
I was trying to prove to my father that what he was talking about was remnants of the past which would vanish soon, but he stuck to his guns:
- As long as they are alive, they want something to eat and drink. They’ll line their pockets. Don’t you interrupt me, boy. It’s not an oratory competition. Sit down and listen me out. As I was starting the trade business, I thought hard days were yet to come, I thought we’d need money. You’ve dispelled my hopes. Now I can’t have a different opinion. It isn’t only me whom our break with Mailybai will affect. Mambet will feel it, too. Unless you marry Saudabai’s sister, Mambet will take the shop from us. Then we won’t ever be able to repay our depts. Hairs on our heads aren’t enough to count them. The only way for me will be prison...
- But why didn’t you think about it before, Father?
- Indeed, nothing but prison,- Father repeated, ignoring my question.- There’s no saving myself. You must have heard that Sasyk’s nephew Azimbai Kadyrbaiev has become Chairman of the Supreme Court of Kazakhstan. He’s sure to be tough. You reproach me for my Alash-Orda past. But what about Azimbai? He used to be one of the heads of Alash-Orda! Why did he become a senior official?
- It’s not forever. His covert will be flooded, too.
- But he’ll have enough time to ruin people.
- But what do you want me to do, Father? What do you think I am to do?
- It’s a bitter feeling to see you disobedient like this. Try to understand this, Dear! If you married Mailybai’s daughter, the clouds over my house would pass. I’m your father, anyway. Think about me, think about the house. If you can’t think about it now, return to it later.
I must admit that I felt sorry for my father:
- All right. I’ll think it over, but it’s unlikely to make any differences. My marrying Mailybai’s daughter isn’t enough to make it easier to you. You need a different regime, Father... We can’t do a thing...
- Just think of what I’ve told you,- my father said briefly.
The following day I departed with a string of carts heading for some goods to Chelkar via Turgai and Irgiz. Father did not try to make me stay any longer and only repeated at parting:
- Remember what I told you yesterday, Son!
Months of studying began. When I came to the aul for my summer holidays, Father was very hospitable, as he probably was expecting me to have changed my mind. He’d bought a ginger ambler as fast as a bird.
- You follow the new customs, Son. Well, I’ve got a new saddle, stirrups, and a bridle cheap from a Russian Cossack. It’s for you, Burkut!
He saddled the horse. Both the ambler and the harness were splendid.
- You’ve turned eighteen,- Father went on,- It’s time to boast, to show off. You’ll indulge in all kinds if pleasures. Do you want any dzhigit friends to ride with? I’ll get them horses and saddles, too! Ride as you wish! Stay here as long as you need!
My father did not wasn’t to make the mistakes he made the previous winter again. He was not trying to protrude his own opinion directly and never mentioned Mailybai’s daughter. However, it did not take me long to realize that he had not given up his plan and was now trying to fulfill it with the help of Kairakbai. Kairakbai was constantly reminding me of the girl’s beauty and telling me that she was staying at home, acting in a most demure way, that she was sure to be in love with me. Her parent were still hoping for the better, too. They were concerned with the wedding which was to come and had prepared a white yurt and a rich dowry for the young couple. If I married her, I would have as much cattle as a proper bai had.
As for Bates, Kairakbai was very delicate in his expressions. However, he was trying to insinuate, giving some playful hints. Of course, he had heard about the incident which took place in winter and had a good reason to be asking me questions like this:
- Was it really like this? Watch out, Burkut, you can found her in a certain position!
I did not say anything, but Kairakbai would not stop:
- You know, Musapyr came, he was saying all kinds of things. I think we should check it. What if they are true?
I did not say a word, thinking: you must be honest! You are a good girl. But if I find you disgraced, it’s your fault, don’t blame it on me...
I chanced to make sure. As Bates had told me, the day came when her elder sister Kaken was getting married. I went to the wedding among the other dzhigits. To mark being now a relative of a bai who was much wealthier than he, Mambet was generous enough to arrange a luxurious and cheerful toi. When we arrived, we saw people, both on foot and mounted, carts and hobbled horses, not only in the valley, where the aul was situated, but also on the slopes of the hills.
We stayed in Kimy’s house. It took me long to find an opportunity to talk to Kalisa because of the hustle and bustle of the wedding. When I finally had one, she chattered hastily:
- I know it all from Bates. We mustn’t talk long, there are too many eyes and ears. I’ll try to arrange a meeting for you in the Tobylgi Ravine tonight, short before dawn.
- How can you?..
- If I can’t, I’m not Kalisa anymore... But I’ll keep choosing presents...
- Oiboi, Kalisa. Remember what I’ve told you – take anything but myself...
...I finally went down into the ravine, into the thick spirea bushes, as Kalisa had told me. Venus was already shining brightly in the East. Dawn was approaching. But the aul was still buzzing, I could see lights blinking, people were still running between yurts. The feast which started the previous day was in full swing. About an hour passed. Why was Bates late? My patience was exhausted.
At that moment I heard a rustle in the bushes. I started back like a deer on seeing a tiger. But in no time I could discern silhouettes of two people covered with one and the same chapan. Bates, my dear Bates!- I guessed. The chapan felt onto the ground, and I could see Kalisa and my little camel, my Akbota.
I embraced her. I do not know what happened next. Kalisa vanished. We were alone, all alone. We were alone for a long time.
- Day’s breaking, Bokezhan!- Bates was stroking my forehead with her gentle and tired hands. I opened my eyes to see a skylark flying into the sky, which was yet dim. Its morning song seemed to be telling us, “Go away, you mustn’t stay there at such time” Bates made a movement to raise to her feet, but I pressed her even harder against my chest.
- My Akbota! – My kisses were getting hotter and hotter. – Who can separate us now that we’re together forever and ever!
- Noone knows,- Bates uttered in an unexpectedly sad voice.- Don’t we have the fate, which can send us all kinds of misfortune.
- No, we’re stronger than fate...
I do not know how long we could have talked if Kalisa had not came up to us.
- You’re dissatisfied even now, Burkut?- she cracked a slightly vulgar joke.
- Can a duck swim? I am satisfied. Not once, not a thousand times, not a million times, but as many times as stars have blinked before dawn!
But the sly Kalisa did not care about my feelings:
- We have to part quickly before someone sees us. You, Yerkezhan, - she called Bates by her male name her family used, - go first and hide under the chapan. We’ll be watching you from that steep rock. Then I’ll leave. After me, you go, Burkut!
Bates threw Kalisas’s silk chapan over her shoulders and started climbing the slope. But I felt so sorry to part with her that I caught up with her and grabbed the skirt of her embroidered dress. Bates nearly fell down. Kalisa got angry with me:
- What are you doing! Hands off! You mustn’t grab a woman’s skirt when she’s leaving.
I let Bates go but, being scared by Kalisa, ran like a wild goatling runs to escape an unknown predator.
- Why did you do it?- I was angry with Kalisa, - can you see people near? The poor girl is moving so hastily that she can call people’s to herself. Otherwise they wouldn’t even notice her. A girl’s just walking, why not. I can’t even call out to her...
- Oiboi, oiboi,- Kalisa broke into a sweat and started lamenting.
We were lying in silence thinking of what it could end with. Bates had already got out of the ravine in the place where the tall spirea grew especially thick. A man rushed out of the bushes and shouted something to her. Bates ran even faster, but he was following her. It was intolerable to watch it without being able to surface. It reminded me of wolves hunting for a hare. I’ve chanced to see it. They keep chasing the animal till it gets into some bushes, in which a seasoned wolf is couching. In a manner of speaking, the hare finds itself right it the wolf’s chaps. Suddenly it seemed to me that the chaser was one of such wolves. I imagined clearly that he was intending to bite Bates to death. Despair seized me, and I rushed to help her.
Kalisa tried to hold me back but failed. I can’t remember ever running that fast! The moment when the chaser had already reached Bates, I reached him, too, grabbed him by the shoulders, threw him onto the ground and dragged like one drags a goatling when playing kokpar. It was only then that I recognized him. It was Zhuman.
- I’ll show you what is what!- cursing him, I was hitting his head and ears.
- Are you mad?- he was grasping me by the hands.
- No, you are. Why did you chase the girl?
- Burkut! Burkut! I’ve always thought you to be a clever dzhigit,- Zhuman was currying flavor with me.- I never meant any harm. I saw a girl running. Where was she running and why – I didn’t know. So I decided to catch up with her.
That moment, Kalisa joined us. She was panting but still trying to put on a smile:
- That’s a nice encounter, I should say! But as the saying goes, dzhigits won’t be friends unless they have a row. So you’ve already had a raw and made it up.
- Stop that blabber, Kalisa!- I said and added, turning to Zhuman:- You’d better disappear before I get you.
I did not need to ask him twice. He was scared enough and backed to the spirea bushes.
- Well, well!- Kalisa said after him.- Make sure your tongue is not itching. The rest will be all right. I guarantee it.
I was face to face with Kalisa.
- I told you, dzhigit,- she lamented,- take care when it comes to Zhuman. A bribe can get him watch his own sister. Had you given him that colt last year, he’d have a different attitude to you. It’s not too late to make him bite his lip yet.
Kalisa with concerned about covering the tracks, but I did not even want to listen to her. Despite everything, that night was the happiest night of my short life. The taste of honey I had tried still lingered in my house.
- No, Kalisa, don’t tell me anything more! We’ll talk it over later. Now I’m thinking about my happiness.
- All right, I cut my mouth. I won’t open it unless you tell me to do so. I won’t interfere with your thinking about Bates.
- Indeed, Kalisa, this night I learned what happiness is!
THE UNEXPECTED HAPPINESS
I was happy. Bates, who was as pure as an angel, did love and now belonged to me completely. I felt embarrassed to raise the subject of marriage with my father, so a true man did this for me. My request did not make my father happy. Why do you need this now, he asked mockingly. After all, neither I nor the girl’s father can stand in their way. But it’s not the right time for taking them to the mullah and arranging an Islamic wedding for them. It’s Soviet time now. Go to the registry, and you’ll get everything done. But is she brings her to the house, I’ll arrange a wedding, I’m not protesting. What else does he want from me?
That’s how my father’s words were retold to me. I knew him to well and realized that he was dead set against Bates, he was still hoping to fight against me.
I made up my mind to conceal nothing. I dismissed all my precious doubts as well as my shyness and began visiting Mambet’s aul so often that my horse’s hooves would not cool down. Both Karakyz and Mambet did not show great hospitality to me. But I ignored them. It was beyond them to throw a shadow over my happiness. Bates loved me, Bates was true to me.
However, she did not agree with me completely. She demanded that I fulfill her condition. A single condition, but a very severe one:
- We have agreed, Boken, to go to study together. But as long as we are here, come at daytime only. Don’t even show close to our aul at night. I’ll tell you why. I don’t know what the morals of the town girls are. I live in the steppe. According to the aul custom, engaged lovers mustn’t see each other at night before the mother’s eyes. It’s a disgrace.
- Akbota, what do you stand for?! That’s what they believed before, in the old aul.
- Don’t you think I was born in the old aul? Am I not familiar with the old customs? Shortly speaking, I’ll be acting in the way which is right and proper till we leave. We’ve got a longs life to live, it has enough time for all kinds of dates.
To disagree with Bates would mean to hurt you, which I did not want to do. It would have been difficult for me to get her current kindness, her eagerness to be with me back. However, I could not agree with her straightaway, for I had never embraced her after the time we met in the ravine, in the spirea bushes. The happy night seemed to me to have been a dream. My passion was eating me out. How long it had been since I was alone with my dear bride!
Sad and exhausted, I decided to seek Kalisa’s advance.
The cautious sly Kalisa who was well aware of what was going on in the house found a solution.
- Next Friday,- she rattled,- Mambet and Karakyz are going to visit their relatives in a far aul. Come at night when everyone’s gone to bed. Don’t hopple your horse too close, leave him in the ravine and go on foot. My black dog will recognize you by the gait. I’ll come out at hearing her bark and let you into Molda-aga’s house.
- But what if Bates gets angry. She’ll say, you shouldn’t have come without my permission.
- Do rely on me, Burkut. I’ll arrange it with her, too.
Once again I was surprised by Kalisa’s artfulness and, being overjoyed, asked about what I can give her to pay for her service.
- Let your heart be quiet,- she smiled.- Unlike you, I can wait. When the two of you live together, you’ll give me my present...
- I will, Kalisa! Demand whatever you wish...
- Don’t be afraid, I’m not going to ruin you. Remember giving me five hundred roubles. It was just enough to fill one of my hands. Fill the other hand, and that will do. That’s enough for me. Do you understand?
Kalisa stressed the “me”. I even thought that it was the end to my bribing. But something was wrong.
- So it’s enough for you. Who else needs anything?- I asked straightforwardly.
- Who? Can’t you understand even now? Zhuman!- Kalisa was speaking in a serious tone.- Dear Burkut, don’t think that incident to be a trifle. He was hurt and indignant. They say a tiny dog can stand in the way of a wolf escaping. Well, you aren’t a wolf trying to escape. But you have to steal into the aul, too. He’ll find an opportunity and catch you. The gossip will be spread again, you’ll be frustrated again. Have you heard the saying – if a panhandler’s nagging at you, cut off his tongue. Zhuman’s tongue is your arch-enemy. The best thin you can do is lure him to your side. Buy it off! We’ll get him.
I dropped a rude word involuntarily. Zhuman had been to irksome.
- I believed you to be a sensible dzhigit!- Kalisa grew angry.- Make sure you don’t for mad! It’s not that bad to stumble while doing good. But if you stumble while doing harm, you can get a bad wound which won’t heal soon. Anyway, it’s up to you. You know the way you should act. It was just some friendly advice...
...Next Friday was still very distant. I tried to think of something to keep me busy and close to Bates’s aul. I found a solution. Father had already offered me and Kairakbai to go hunting with a hawk more than once. He wanted to distract me from my sad thoughts. I did not enjoy shooting much and took my father’s offer indifferently. But now it came at hand. Kairakbai was delighted. My father was glad, too. He did not spare anything for me, neither fine clothes nor the ginger ambler.
- You can wear the townish dress in the town, here wear that of a rich dzhigit,- my father said and began outfitting me.
I put on a corduroy camisole made by a local tailor and a Kazakhs chekmen made of light white camel hair with a striped silk lining on top of it. The collar and the flaps of the chekman were edged with otter fur. A skillful bootmaker made me a pair of high-heeled boots with curved toes. Moreover, I inherited my grandfather’s thin leather pants, which were convenient for riding. My father’s hat made of sheep leg skins, which had never been worn before, and a silk shirt completed the hunting outfit of a dzhigit.
What about the ginger ambler? My father prepared him on his own.
- Look, Burkut, that’s how batyrs used to decorate their horses.
Saying this, he cut the ambler’s mane to form a topping, on which he fixed a luxurious owl feather plumage. He wove girl’s necklaces into the horse’s tail and waved it. He used a downy pillow to make the flat Kalmyk saddle more comfortable for the dzhigit. To prevent the saddle from pressing to hard on the horse’s back, he placed a blanket onto the saddlecloth. He arranged a crupper to prevent the saddle from drifting towards the animal’s neck and a breast-collar to prevent it from slipping off the croup.
- I guess you’ll take part in the baiga. The girth is not enough then. It’s only enough for slow riding.
My father added another band.
Watching him, I felt surprised. The whole thing looked like a sacred rite. One could think that father was not preparing a horse for a hunt but rather doing some magic.
Now my ginger ambler look like a batyr’s horse, indeed. Silver shone both on the saddle and on the harness.
- The whole outfit,- Father told me,- was ordered by your grandmother as a bride for your grandfather, Zhautik. As far as I remember, she had to pay forty sheep to the craftsman. She loved Zhautik very much. When Grandfather died, she hid the saddle and the harness into the chest and wouldn’t let anyone use them. When the time grew unsteady, she was afraid to keep the things she treasured at home and gave them to a poor man for keeping. Very shortly before, when you were away, the poor man, now he’s in “Sparkle”, brought the saddle and the harness to our house. You know how your grandmother loved you, Burkut. But let me tell you for the first time that she asked me to give you those things when you are a dzhigit shortly before her death.
I felt so moved by my father’s speech that I cried. Then I asked, wiping the tears away:
- So what did you give to the poor man from “Sparkle” to thank him?
He grinned warily:
- Some coarse calico for pair of drawers and a suit and a pound of wrapped tea. Enough for him...
I had many evil words I wanted to say to my father, but I choked: I felt both hurt and grateful to my father for his luxurious present.
I can imagine how splendid I looked. I was all creampuff. I wished I could ride dressed like this before Bates’s eyes. Now I lacked nothing but a hawk. I got one, anyway. Shortly speaking, it reminds me of a folk song:
I am learning to hold
A hunting bird.
A dzhigit without a bird
Is like a song without a heart.
A hawk is a light, small bird. Once can hold a hawk on one’s hand without getting tired. In old days, rich Kazakhs used to attach two rings to the saddle ping – one for a heavy erne and the other for a light hawk. A folk song about hunting has the following lines:
The steppe and the mountains are calling me –
It is time to go hunting!
I have a liver ring
To rest my hawk!
The songs seemed to have been written about me.
The craftsman had attached two silver rings to my grandfather’s saddle pin, as Granny asked him. One was meant for an erne and the other – for a hawk. One could put the rings on and take them off easily. Father hid the first ring till winter – one does not usually go hunting with an erne in summer. The second ring remained on the saddle pin. I could see it glowing due to the transparent gemstone embedded into the metal as it used to many years before, when my grandparents were very young.
I liked our hunting bird, too. In a manner of speaking, it was the best hawk I could think of. Its feathers on the wings and on the tail had not grown after the spring mew yet and were pearly bluish gray. However, it was very successful at getting a duck or a goose. It was well-trained and could take two to three ducks simultaneously on the fly. Its only trouble were bustard. The hawk could not cope with them on the ground. Those cunning birds made him blind with their droppings. So we had to scare bustards and make them fly first. When on the fly, the hawk could grasp a bird and fall into the grass like a stone with the heavy burden in its claws. Unless a hunter rushed to help the hawk, the bird had a rough time – nearly the whole flock gathered to save the bustard. Bustards attacked the hawk, beating it with their wings. But the predator, who was very experienced, did know the right way to defend – it would hide under the wide wing of the bustard it had caught. After that, it was the bustard who had to struggle – it would get all the blows its saviors meant for the predator.
...I was thinking of those funny things when Kairakbai and me went for a hunt, or, to be more exact, to Mambet’s aul. Above all, I remembered about my agreement with Kalisa and longed for Bates. But I still wanted to try hunting, at least to show off to my bride, wearing that luxurious clothes, to boast the game killed. If only she could see ducks, geese, and bustards hanging down from my saddle!
Indeed, Kairakbai and I started hunting for bustards on our way to the aul.
However, an unexpected misfortune was waiting for me.
We noticed a flock of bustards, and Kairakbai sent me there – to scare the birds. But I failed, instead a bird hiding in the thick feather grass scared me and the horse. A bustard who had lost the flock and had gone unnoticed so far suddenly appeared right under my horse’s hooves. It started flapping its wings noisily and ran away, trying to save its life. The scared horse played up. I fell out of the saddle in a twinkling of the eye. The vexed ambler fell onto the feather grass, kicking his legs and rolling on the ground. What happened to the costly saddle, to the wonderful harness! Before Kairakbai came up on his raven horse, mine kept tearing about and suddenly rushed away. There was not getting him. Kairakbai was taken aback. He let the hawk out of his hands, and the latter flew into the sky, squawking and ignoring the bustards. Our excitement affected it, too. What about the bustards? They seemed to be enjoying their small triumph and vanished far away simultaneously.
Kairakbai looked confused and upset. I think I looked the same.
- What are we going to do now?- he asked me.
The road we chose lead to Mambet’s aul.
At first I suggested that Kairakbai should wait for me in the ravine together with the horses while I visited the aul unnoticed.
But then I changed my minds and asked Kairakbai to give me his raven horse.
- Kairakbai, get yourself another horse somewhere in the nearby and go home with my broken saddle and harness. Father will be very upset and angry. I don’t want to meet his eye now. I think I’ll be delayed. I’ll be staying in some aul.
Kairakbai agreed with me. Aside from the road, we found a small aul, in which we got a horse, and Kairakbai went to my father, while I headed for my destination.
At the time appointed I met Kalisa where we had agreed to meet.
How rapidly news travelled around an uzunkalak of the steppe. People in Mambet’s aul knew in detail about my falling off the ginger ambler. They were also well aware of my confrontation with Zhuman. While several days before Mambet and Karakyz were afraid that I could kidnap Bates and were hesitant as for whether they should leave to pay a visit or not, the horse incident made them calm down. They thought that much time would pass before I appeared in their aul again.
- Your Akbota’s very upset, she was anxious to know if you were badly injured, - Kalisa told me in a low voice.- After what happened last time, she didn’t want to let you into her house. She was afraid that people would come to know this. But now she sais, “Boken believes me, and I believe him. If he wants, he may come. But he must do it secretly, so that people can’t guess”. Your Bates has a timid and restless heart. Well, let’s hide under a chapan and walk faster. Tokal said she wouldn’t lock the door.
Her own mother can understand her. Poor thing, she’s so happy to know that At least Bates has found an equal, a man she loves. She’ll give her heart away for you, understand? Her greatest wish is for you to leave the place, to go together holding hands.
I asked Kalisa whether Bates’s family knew about our oath.
- I think they don’t,- she answered.- Otherwise, I’d see it by Molda-aga’s sullen face!.. But he seems to be all right and even looks cheerful.
Kalisa broke off, and her steps grew faster.
- Hurry up, hurry up! You mustn’t waste time.
The door of Mambet’s house was open. I slipped into the dark to find myself facing my bride...
...I did not see the day break, I rather heard it approaching: cows started moving and bellowing somewhere on the margin of the aul, a cock shouted.
- You should be leaving, Bokezhan. Go before the dawn has come, - Bates told me in a gentle whisper.
- So we have to wait for a week more? As agreed. Right, Akbota?
She uttered a single word silently:
- Yes.
- Will you come when I call you? Will you come to the volost administration?
- We’ve given hands to each other, Boken. If you don’t believe me, here’s my hand.
Giving Bates a hot kiss, I shook her hand.
I could already see the dawn flush when coming back to the ravine, in which I had left the raven horse. The aul looked barren but for the cows coming out to pasture. I looked around. Noone seemed to be watching me.
I had nearly got absolutely calm. But I startled when approaching the ravine – the horse was both the horse and not, raven and not. I came closer and could not believe my eyes. My god, what happened! What happened that night! My enemy cut the horse’s tail and mane. The horse did not look like a horse anymore. He looked bare and pathetic. I looked at the saddle – the rascal had turned it hinder part before.
To cut off a horse’s tail, to turn the saddle means to bring a dzhigit to disgrace, to insult him dreadfully.
My head began to swim. I could not think of anything to undertake. Could Yerkin help me? Of course he would. Who could help me if not he! I made my decision.
I could not ride in the face of sun. I made my way through ravines, hiding in unknown auls, before I finally got to the volost office. Here, I thought, Bates and me will meet. I could not think of a different solution.
Fortunately, I found Yerkin in. Even now he supported me:
- But you shouldn’t go for Bates, Burkut. Even if you have a militia man by your side. You know the morals of the aul. It’s not right to stir it. I think I’d better send our friend Nurbek for her. He’ll say that she’s summoned to the volost and that he has no idea why. You can rely on Nurbek...
I waited for Bates for a long time. But Nurbek came back alone. His face told me at once that something bad had happened.
- Bates refused to go. At first I talked to her overtly. Mambet wasn’t trying to hold her back. Like here’s the girl. Take her to the office. But Bates said that she had nothing to do there. Then I talked to her face to face. I mentioned you, Burkut. I told her that she’d promised. She’s denying it all. She says she’d prefer to never have met you.
- I don’t understand it at all! – Yerkin exclaimed.- Something is wrong. What shall we do?
- I’ll go there, I’ll go alone. No militia man. I can’t believe those words unless she repeats them to me.
- I’m going, too,- Yerkin said, as he did not want to leave me in trouble.
...The three of us, that is, Nurbek, Yerkin, and me, headed for Mambet’s aul. A span brought us there in no time.
When we entered the yurt, the whole family was there. They greeted us in a friendly manner. Only Bates, who was sullen, did not give us even a cursory glance. What had happened to her? She used to be a different person just a while ago – gentle, affectionate, and loyal.
- I can guess what brought you here,- Mambet spoke to us amicably.- They say people are free now and everyone can love whoever he or she wants. If the children love each other, who stand in their way? Here is Bates, she is nearly mature. She’ll tell you everything. I know that a daughter is born to live in a strange house. If she says that she is in love, I will give her my blessing. I think the fact that the militia came hurt her. That’s why she’s being so stubborn... Let all strangers leave so that she can feel free.
Mambet, Bates, Yerkin, and me were left in the yurt.
- Akbota! – I came up to her.
- Don’t come close to me!- I saw her eyes glower furiously.- Don’t.
- What’s wrong with you, Akbota? I can’t recognize you! What are you doing?
- We are strangers. I don’t want to know you. It’s all over. Like foam on the lake.
I felt something hot and heavy poured into my ears. I was not master of myself anymore. I could feel Nurbek’s hand on my shoulder, but I still failed to fight down my tears:
- What did you say, Bates?
She gave me a scornful look.
- I’ve said what I wanted to say. Go back and do your business, now!
Yerkin, who was both surprised and upset, spoke to her in a delicate, low voice.
- Opyrmai, my dear. I don’t want to interfere with your personal life. You’ve talked it over yourselves. I was just afraid that you could suffer, that they could be keeping you here. In such case, the law would be with you. But you’re saying different things now. We aren’t going to take you by force.
- Right, agai. You shouldn’t interfere. You didn’t interfere before. I’m responsible for what I do. Burkut is free, and so am I. The thread is snapped. Let each of us do whatever he or she wants...
- But you were my bride, Akbota!- I shouted in despair.
- I have nothing more to tell you,- saying this, Bates ran out of the yurt.
I could not understand a thing. I did not know how to live. I was asking questions to Yerkin, but he could not explain it to me.
I could only think about deeper reasons we were yet unaware of. It was not about the horse’s mane and tail cut and me disgraces. There was something more serious and dreadful to separate us.
But now we had to go back in our own footsteps, as Bates put it.
We left the yurt. It was getting dark. We got into the cart, and the horses were taking us deeper and deeper into the dark. The night was devouring us. The night of unexpected grief, my saddest night ever.
PART THREE
WANDERING
(From Bates’s notebook)
One who is lost
can find a sure way,
But if you in love,
You will never rest...
Firdousi
BETASHAR
“Betashar!” Since ancient times, this has been the name for the song the Kazakhs sing at taking the curtain off the bride’s face after she has entered the aul. I have happened to see the ancient rite and hear this song.
Most often, people would meet brides in summer on the dzhailau, according to the tradition. The whole aul felt festive when waiting for the newlyweds to come. The ceremony was especially attractive too children. Little things got sleepless one or two days before the bride’s arrival, as they were afraid to miss the fun. Being childishly impatient, they would spend hours looking in the direction from which the bride would appear, as they were told.
Ritually, the groom is to leave the bride’s aul first and gallop home to give the glad tidings, after which youth, both on foot and mounted, rushed to meet the bride. In the auls of our Kyzbel, which are situated among the hills, one could see horsemen approaching only after they came very close. That is why dzhigits and girls, being anxious to see the bride, would head for Artykyrdynsty, which means the Foot of Six Ranges. That is where the welcoming of the bride took place. Being accustomed to riding since young age, I have galloped as part of the cheerful cavalcade more than once.
At seeing people, the bride would get out of the saddle and greet her future friends, which were watching her in delight, with a low bow. If the aul was far away, they would put the bride onto the horse, if it was close, they would took her by the arms and walk. Just before the aul, either two dzhigits or two sisters-in-law unfurled skins they had prepared in advance as a curtain to hide the bride, while a light shawl was thrown over her face...
Near the first yurt of the aul, one of the groom’s sister, a girl close to the bride, would come up to her to take the shawl away. At the same moment, the youth would start singing the song to congratulate her – “Betashar”, which means “Opening of the Face”. A saying originated from this custom – “By taking the shawl off the bride’s face, you became her close friend.”
Meeting the bride, watching the strange ceremony, hearing and singing the Betashar song – I found this appealing and nice. I dreamt of being one of them brides...
But now that my coming of age was so close this custom is no more interesting to me, as it belongs to a distant past. Though my parents still believed me to be a child and even I sometimes felt like a little girl, it suddenly occured to me that the times when a bride was met like this were over forever. Another thought seized me. What does the fact that my family sees me as a little girl matter if the shawl has already been taken off my face, and my Betashar song has already been sung. Who was it that three the shawl off? Of course, it was he – Burkut! Who was it that sang me the Betashar song? It was he as well!.. Do I have anyone closer than Burkut now?...
Burkut, having become so close to me, spoke to me deliberately, as if trying my patience, during one of our dates:
- Akbota! Have you ever heard the Russian word “drama”?
- No. What can it mean?
- I think that you won’t understand it if I explain straightaway. I’ll try to give you examples. Well, take you and me. We have loved each other since childhood, haven’t we?
- We have... So what?..
- People have been standing in our way, preventing us from seeing each other, from getting so close, haven’t they, Akbota?
- You’re right, but I can’t understand you yet...
- Think of our hardest times, Akbota, of the obstacles we had to break, and now we’re finally together...
- I want us to be together forever, Burkut.
- So the whole thing we’re thinking about now is a drama.
- Then it’s a good word, Burkut...
- It is, but it has a twin. It can even be that twin. It’s a bad, it’s a bitter word.
- Don’t mention it, don’t...
- Listen, Akbota! Everything is worth knowing. When lovers fail to surmount the hurdles and the end is a sad one, it’s a tragedy.
- You seem to be talking about Kozy-Korpesh and Baian, aren’t you?
- You nearly guessed it right, Akbota...
- Don’t speak about this! It’s a sad word, I’m afraid of it.
- Wait a little, don’t be afraid. I’m going to introduce a funny word to you. Imagine that the one who’d been scheming against the lovers is a fool for pains and a laughing-stock. it’s called a comedy.
- That’s a good word...
- Do you know what a theater is?
- I’ve heard of it but never seen one.
- Both a tragedy and a comedy can be seen at a theater. They show them to entertain people.
- It’s hard for me to understand, I need to see it.
Burkut was confusing and surprising me even more.
- The Russians have many curious customs. Do you want me to tell you about one?
- Of course I do.
- So be careful. There are well-educated people who take notes of events which happen to them daily. They call such things diaries. When they come to have many diaries, they call them memoirs...
- That’s a truly nice custom.
- It’s started getting into the Kazakh life, too. Such notebooks are called kundeliks.
- Do you have a kudelik, then?
- I do.
- Do you have it now?
Burkut smiled in a way which made me understand that he had brought his diary.
- Will you show me? Can I?..
- Why not,- saying this, Burkut produced a folded large leather-bounded notebook from his camisole pocket...
On that very day I began reading it. How fascinating it was! But the notes were written so thickly and in such tiny letters that I still had much to read when Burkut had to leave. So I asked him to leave the diary to me.
- All right, take it. But mind you that it’s just the first notebook.
- So where’s the second one?
Instead of answering, Burkut took a notebook which looked just as the one I had now from his bootleg.
I touched the fine leather binding respectfully.
- Where on earth do you get them?
- I got them bound in Orenburg. That’s where I kept my first diary. It was last year in the aul that I started filling the second notebook...
Flipping through the second notebook, I noticed that it was only half-covered.
- So you are still making notes?- I asked.- What about?
Burkut gave me a sly look:
- Things are in full swing. Too much for me to record...
- Please speak clearly!
- You’ll understand everything when you’ve read it. What I can tell you so far is that my first notebook describes nothing but my life, while the second one is dedicated to you and me...
- Really, Burkut?
- Why should I be deceiving you?
- Then I want to read both notebooks.
- Well, it’s for you to read them that I’m showing them to you. Perhaps you’ll be overjoyed at reading some pages and scold me for the rest. I’m not going to resist. But let’s agree at the very beginning – you may take things as you wish, but there’s no way for a quarrel here. Right?
- Right!
- Agreed!
We shook hands. Soon, Burkut left, leaving me the notebooks.
Before he came back, I had read and reread his diaries several times. After some reflexion it occured to me that I had known Burkut very poorly before. I could imagine his childhood so clearly. I could not stop admiring his ability to analyze the life so deeply in spite of his young age. I was delighted by how truthful he was to himself.
- Have you read everything?- Burkut asked me when he came back to the aul.
- I didn’t miss a word! I read them several times in a row..
- Did it often hurt you?
- No!
- Even when reading the page in which I described the night in Mailybai’s house?
- After reading that page I couldn’t but believe in you even more, Burkut!
She gave me a warm and trusting look. I knew those would be your words, Akbota!..
Now it was my turn to ask questions.
- Your notebooks end with your description of the day you came to Kaken’s wedding. Till what moment are you going to keep your diary?
- Till we leave the registry, holding each other! Now I’m keeping the diary for you.
How grateful I felt to Burkut for his words and his notebooks. I do not remember what I said to him when giving his diaries back. But my memory has preserved each single word of his clearly.
- Will you grant me a wish, Akbota?- he asked, looking me fixedly in the eyes.
- You tell me what it’s like.
- What if I asked you to keep a diary like this, too?
- Can I?
- Aren’t you my Bates, the one I know so well? Of course, you can! You’ll do it better than I do!..
- Why do you say this?
- You see, you’re more impressible than I am. A diary is nothing but a record of one’s impressions. Your descriptions will be deeper and more vivid.
- But what if I fail?
- You won’t. Believe me, Bates.
Though I never mouthed my consent to Burkut, I made up my mind to fulfill his request. Even though I have seen less than Burkut has in my short life, even though I have been through fewer hard and bitter things, but the world of my feelings, my thoughts is just as big and complex. Sometimes we reminded a chekmen to me, him being the top and me the lining. Burkut had given a vivid, true, and interesting description of himself. He told much about me, but could he have noticed my deepest? Why not try and reveal my secrets for people to judge them? As Burkut put it on the first page of his notebook, “Who knows, maybe the time will come and these notes will be helpful to someone.”
Thinking like this, I have started making notes in the large notebook starting with today, too. Trying to imitate Burkut, I wrote a foreword which I called “Betashar”.. .
YERKEZHAN
I think there is no person in the whole world who has not felt, at least vaguely, the nature of his or her sex, since childhood, since the very day when he or she first thought of what was around. Not only people know the feeling – animals have it, too. We, dwellers of stock-raising auls, who spend their days among herds and flock, do know how early the animal instinct wakes. Later, as I was already reading school textbooks on natural science, I came to understand that not only animals but all living creatures, including even plants, which are considered to be inanimate, have a very delicate sense of sex!..
The reason why I say this is because my childhood was not easy. Even after a girl with her in-born shyness woke up inside me, I still believed myself to be a boy, being too simple-minded, and many members of my family kept speaking to me in this way. I even had a boy’s name - Yerkezhan... But nature took its course. Even on the days when I was playing asyk, that is, sheep dibs, among boys, feeling like one of them, I felt like sewing or indulging in dolls. The time came for me to be considered a little hostess of the house, but I still was treated as a boy in my family.
I was by no means to blame for what happened. The cruel customs of a Kazakh aul were. Both stories told my the grown-ups and my own observations brought me to realization of the fact that the Kazakhs’ attitude to girls, who cannot help and support their parents in the future, is negligent. Since childhood, a girl is doomed to be sold. Her price is the bridewealth. The one who pays most will get her. That is why both those buying and selling her treat her with equal contempt. Who cares about her soul, her temper? She is equal to cattle or property. and her host is free to dispose of her in any way he likes.
I always have a sad example right before my eyes – the life of my own mother, Zhania. For as long as I can remember, my father, Mambet, has been cruel and unfair to her. If only she was guilty! She was innocent both to her family and to her husband. Being the host’s slave, she has been working like mad. And she never get a thing for it. She has been surrounded by luxury and wellness but has never worn beautiful clothes and or had her meal with the others. Her dress has always looked just like that of a poor man’s wise, she has been feeding on remnants from our meals. I cannot remember her even taking part in feasts and celebrations in our house, though she was just a little older than twenty-five!..
She has never thing anything kind in her life. She hardly ever told me anything, but other people told me about how hard her way had been. Being a poor man’s daughter, she appeared in my father’s family because his senior wife, his baibishe, could not have children. Father paid the bridewealth for her to have heirs. My father, being the well-respected Mambet-khoja, did not even go to bring his new fourteen-year-old bride home, instead he asked Baibishe Karakyz to get her. At once she found herself in the cruel hands of my father and his senior wife. The way she lived in our house reminds me of a saying – if she sits down, hit her on the head, if she stand up, hit her on the legs. Work and beating, day and night.
She say down under insults. Noone has ever heard her raise her voice. She has never complained about her life. Even secretly, she has never badmouthed her husband or, as people in the aul say, thrown rubbish into his eyes.
I remember a story which was hard to think of.
- Your mother,- an old woman whispered to me,- had her first child aged fifteen. It was a boy. The infertile baibishe committed a crime, being afraid that her husband would turn his back to her forever. She bribed a god’s fool living not far from our aul. He dropped the boy into a pot with qurut boiling in it, pretending it to be an accident.
...I had some elder brothers and sisters, but most often my brothers died as infants. Being nineteen years old, my mother gave birth to Kaken, aged twenty, she had me. I was a suckling, Baibishe tore me away from my mother, and long time passed before I realized that she was not my real mother.
But how did I happen to get the name of Yerkezhan and believe myself to be a boy with the naïveté of a child?
- My poor child,- a kind old woman answered me,- don’t you know the customs of the aul? A girl is born for a stranger’s house. As soon as she is grown up, she’ll be sold for cattle. That’s it. There’s no daughter in the house. So even when she’s a child, they won’t treat her as their own child. If a person has several daughters and no son, his answer to the question “Do you have children?” will be a resolute “No!” If he has several daughters and one son, the answer to the same question will be “Only one!”
- It is true,- I said sadly,- but what’s the point of calling a girl a boy?
- They’re deceiving you, they want to have at least a short period of joy...
That’s where the story of my boyhood starts. Baibishe had taught me to wear boy’s clothes since I was a child. I was told to be their only son. They’d tailor me most costly suits but would never let me wear any gold, silver, or gemstones, which were common in rich families. One could always recognize a spoiled aul boy by a forelock on his forehead and a tuft of hair on the top of his head. But my head was shaven clean both in summer and in winter. I might have realized that they were treating me in a way which was not entirely honest, I felt deceived. I was being spoiled and I was a toy. That is why I was a peevish and too sensitive child. A little splinter would seem to be a sharp arrow to me, whenever I got just slightly scratched, I would howl as if being cut with a knife; as for head shaving, I have always taken it as a terrible torture, but for the hands of Baibishe Karakyz pressing my head to her chest, I would never have let the razor touch my forehead. Anyway, I would fidget and kick my legs so violently that a most experienced hairdresser could not but cut me many times.
Karakyz had her own manner of looking after me, which she did with great care. She would not let girls of my age come close to me and would always say: “Do not talk to him, Yerkezhan, you can only sip nonsense”.
But boys and girls have different words and passions. Boys of the old al, especially the spoiled once, got used to most sophisticated swearwords, which was not considered to be scandalous. But the custom did not allow girls to utter not only swearwords but even those which simply lacked politeness and respect. Baibishe Karakyz was a rare exception. Having no prudency, she felt very calm and safe saying most vulgar swearwords in public, which she did with a man-like bravado. Maybe she wanted me to inherit that habit of hers or found it essential to highlight my masculine nature, as she was still playing her game with great diligence. Anyway, as soon as I began to speak, she started teaching me to make the air blue at every turn. I cold not think of it as something disgraceful, so I would call everyone at whom I would be pointed obediently.
With special pleasure, Baibishe Karakyz would set me at my own mother, Zhania. Why did I call her such bad names? Was she guilty to me? She had a quiet conscience and a bitter life. No matter how bad I cursed her, she would most often pretend not to be hurt by what I was saying. Perhaps she got so used to swearwords that she did not even take to hear what a child she had given birth to was saying. Karakyz did not stop at that. She taught me to threaten my mother with my feasts. We played fighting. It was a cruel game, as both my father and Karakyz often beat my mother. In a way, my father was a well-educated person, but he treated Mother in a merciless and rude way...
Life took its course. Certainly, there was no separating me from my peers, who would say me in the face that I was no boy at all and who my real mother was. At first the children’s mockery would drive me to tears. I believed them to be deceiving me and teasing me cruelly. But finally the scales gradually fell from my eyes. I came to realize that my face and gait reminded those of Zhania, especially the face. As people of the aul put it jokingly, it looked as if I had fallen out of her mouth. Zhania and me had similar black moles on right cheeks, near the eye. When I was absolutely sure that Zhania was my mother, I started helping her, protecting her against my father and Karakyz when they were trying to beat her.
When I turned seven, my mother gave birth to a boy. He was called Seil. Not only had not my father stopped beating my mother since then but he even grew more violent to her. Baibishe Karakyz relented. She would shout at Tokal every once in a while by force of habit, but she never manhandled.
Those events coincided with the end of my boyhood. Of, how much the game which the grown-ups invented had been bothering me recently. I would shy away from my fellow girls, but I would not join boys plating dibs, either...
I began to think about going to school more and more often.
In autumn on 1918, a Kazakh school was founded in our aul. My father was one of those who were most considered about it. During the rebellion of 1916-1917, he was fighting against Amangeldy, but as soon as Soviet government was set up in our parts, he came back to the aul to take care of the school. At first he even gave lessons, but the following year he switched to his household. Being one of the most learned people of the aul, he as subscribed to magazines – “Red Kazakhstan”, “Women as Equals”, “The Star”, a newspaper called “Working Kazakh”, and some more. He always spent his free time reading.
Father did not let my elder sister Kaken set her foot in the school, but when it came to me, he brought me there by the hand. He was very glad to see me do well since my first days in school. Later he told me:
- If you keep doing like this, you’ll rich good heights. First, I’ll send you to Turgai, and then you’ll study in Orenburg!
In every form I was ahead of my peers. Our school administrator, Balkash, praised me a lot and expected me to have a bright future:
- Not jinxing it, she just must be in good health. Next year she’ll leave form four and I’ll take her to the experimental and demonstrational school. Two years is enough for her to get to the university, it will be as swift as the baiga.
Perhaps it could be the way our Balkash expected it to be, but an obstacle suddenly emerged in his way. This obstacle was Burkut.
Once Baibishe Karakyz said to me:
- Some good relative of ours have come back from the banks of the Syr Darya. We should visit them and bring them some presents...
I was to go to the relatives, too.
By I had already lost my zest for traveling by the time and was reluctant to pay visits. As soon as I gave a hint of being not eager to go, Baibishe interrupted me abruptly. It was no use arguing with her, and soon we set off. During the journey, Karakyz gave me a detailed description of each of them relatives.
- When they moved to the Syr Darya, their son Burkut was a young child. But even then he was the naughtiest child of the aul. I wonder is he’s still the same or has sobered down. He’s three years older than our Bates is. If he’s the same, it’s dreadful... – anxiety showed in the eyes of Karakyz, and she was felt for several minutes. – When we came to visit them or they came to our place, Burkut would keep everyone on the alert, he used to be a great nuisance.
- Right you are,- Kikym joined in,- I’ve seen many naughty kids, but I’ve never seen a madcap...
He won’t listen to kind words
Nor will he obey to a stick.
- The saying seems to be dedicated to him personally. His parents spoiled him too much,- Kikym went on,- beware, Bokezhan, it’s very much like him to get up to a mischief...
The more I listened to them saying this, the more I wanted to see the madcap. I had never been a goody, either.
However, when I met Burkut, I found out that he was quite different from what I had imagined him to be. Either Karakyz was right to guess that he had already sobered down or they had been badmouthing him, exaggerating his regular childish mischief. Shortly speaking, there was nothing rude or unusually naughty about him. He treated me in a very sweet way. I could feel both his respect for me as a guest and maybe his pity for a girl whose life was different from that of the others. We had much fun. Burkut was about fourteen, but, being tall and heavyset, he looked much older. I liked his disposition – simple-minded and frank as well as his cheerfulness, which was effervescent.
The four or five days I spent in his house brought us together. We got as close as children born by one and the same mother. We were together from morning till night. Sometimes I tried to make him angry, teasing him and mocking at him, but my pranks did not hurt the boy and he never failed to laugh complacently and indulge me without complaint.
Our friendship turned out to be so passionate that we already came to feel bored when separated after we met. Especially Burkut. He would visit our aul so often that dust would not cover the prints of his horse’s hooves on various pretexts. He called me by the pet names of Bota and Akbota – Baby Camel and White Baby Camel. As for me, I transformed his name into Bokezhan. What I liked even more was calling him Ak Boken, that is, White Saiga.
Autumn had come to replace summer, auls had left for their winter camps, kystas, and the roads between them became longer and harder to cover. In autumn, Burkut entered form four, in which I was learning, too. He was staying in our house as a relative.
The school was situated far from the house, so we had to go there together. Day be day, our friendship was growing stronger. It felt good to fly in a sledge with a camel put to it in winter. Sometimes our peers would go with us, sometimes we rushed through the snowy steppe alone. What a funny journey it was! We would get into a snowdrift or throw snowballs at each other, laugh with our burning eyes open to the wind. Burkut had never yet given me a hint on my being a girl and his being a boy, he had never stepped over the line behind which there was no childish friendship.
Once we were coming home after classes. A quiet twilight fell. The sledge was gliding on the shiny road, which was winding among the reeds feathery with snow. The sun, which was very low and looked crimson in the fog, shone dimly like a fire decaying. On most of days like this, storms blow in the steppe, creeping along the crusted snow like a wolf. But that day was not windy. The journey home from school peculiarly silent. The road led us through thick reeds. Snow and hoar-frost that had fallen onto the motionless reeds made them look like think birch trees. Bending under their heavy burden, they held their heads low. The ice-and-snow bluish ribbon of the road was shining like a bridle leather belt smeared with grease because there had been no storms for a week.
As usually, Burkut and I were pranking. As always, I was the initiator. Burkut was not afraid of cold. Even ringing frost could not make him wrap up like other boys did. He did not button the collar of his ferret fur coat, which he wore on top of his velveteen camisole, and the latter was undone, too. He had boots and thin felt stockings on his feet, his trousers were light, too. He never did up the tie-strings of his malakhai hat, which one could take for a head of a flop-eared sheep from afar. He would shove fur mittens his mother had sown him under his belt jauntily. His coat was belted dead tight with a wide belt decorated with silver. He never left that belt, which his father had given to him as a present, even when he took off the coat. Instead, he wore it over the camisole. He walked and rode the sledge with his chest open.
Either his blood was hotter than that of the others or his skin was thicker. When the merciless frost seemed to be burning my body with red-hot iron, Burkut’s skin would merely get goose bumps like that of a bird deplumed and broiled. Children’s faces get read in frosty weather, but Burkut’s swarthy face remained unchanged even in the cold month of January.
Quite unexpectedly, Burkut was mostly silent on that day. When he got seized by depression, which happened from time to time, and I failed to clear it away, I would start to bother him with tickling, and soon his mood changed. No matter how frivolous I was, Burkut never took offence at me...
On that day, I was telling something to make Burkut, who was being taciturn and thoughtful, laugh. But my words had no affect on him. I tried tickling him, but he said indifferently, “Let me be, Bates!” And relapsed into his sullen silence again. As for me, I just cannot stand tickling, and if I feel that someone is going to tickle me, I get cold feet even before the hand touches me, if it did, it may be a child who is tickling me, nevertheless, the tickler ill defeat me, and I do not know what to do with myself and where to hide; but you may tickle Burkut as long as you wish, he remains calm, he will not move a muscle of his face!.. That time was no exception.
I did not give up the thought of rattling up the upset Burkut, I was desperate to win his attention. Our sledge came very close to a snow pile. I grabbed a handful of snow, which I crumpled and shoved quickly under his shirt. It was so unexpected that Burkut, who was irritated, startled and darted to me. I jumped off onto the road and started running. He was following me. Our camel was dragging the sledge along slowly, looking at us indifferently and with a certain contempt. Slipping and falling down, I was running away from Burkut. I jumped onto a high snow pile propped by the reeds growing on both sides of the road. One by one, I was making snowballs to throw at Burkut. Hiding his face behind his hands, Burkut found the right move and caught me on the slippery crest of the pile, he lifted me like a child and pressed tightly against his chest. His cheek touched my cheek, his lips sank into my lips!.. For a moment, I demented. I did not know what was happening to me! Suddenly an unpleasant but familiar voice made me sober up by saying, “Lo, they’re kissing!” It is the way a sleepy man can feel when someone is pouring cold water on him. I turned round to see a relative of mine and a gossip, Zhuman, standing near me!
I escaped Burkut’s grasping arms and ran away! I think I could have got lost and frozen if I had nor heard Burkut’s voice calling my name soon. I still did not stop running. He caught me. If I were stronger, maybe I would not have subsided to him. He brought me to the sledge in his arms, while I was howling like a jackal. I would now answer his questions. I was not trying to run away anymore. But I did not say a word before we came to the aul and entered the house. I neither wanted nor could speak. I was both angry and burning with shame, besides, running in freezing cold took its toll. Soon my fever grew more violent, and I was truly burning.
I do not remember how we got home, I do not remember reaching the door. I was glad that evening had already come and there was noone around. Only Burkut called my name once again, I could hear pity and fear in his voice.
He even took me by the hand, intending to help me enter the room.
- Let me go!- I said, trying to break free,- go to my uncle’s house. For God’s sake, don’t even think about entering our house!..!
Noone but Karakyz was in, she was reading her evening prayer, the namaz.
I could hardly reach the low wooden bed covered with blankets, after which I fell onto it with my face in the pillow... I could feel the fever getting worse. My body seemed to be melting like lard in fire.
Drops of a downpour get accumulated in a ravine to teem. I could not choke back the tears I had been accumulating for so long. I must have lost control, as Baibishe Karakyz could hear my loud weeping before she had finished her namaz. After some time, she came to me and asked, “What’s wrong with you Yerkezhan?”. I wouldn’t answer, neither could I stop crying. Karakyz touched my head and felt my pulse:
- God... You are sick!.. What’s wrong with you, Dear?!
I only pressed my face harder against the pillow.
Karakyz was stronger than a woman is expected to be. She could lift weights which not every dzhigit could handle easily. Having realized that there was no point in coaxing me, she embraced me, ignoring my resistance, lifted me easily from the bed and sat down onto the floor, pressing me against her chest. Someone entered the mud room.
- Is it you, Zhanash?- Karakyz asked.
- Yes!- I recognized my mother’s voice.
- Bates’s sick. She’s hot as fire! I wish her father was at home he could say a prayer! Call old Pushyk, let her charm it away!- Karakyz muttered in a scared voice.
Soon old Pushyk came. “You should have charmed her on entering the house!” – she sighed regretfully. She touched my burning head.
Old Pushyk had her own methods of healing.
- I have to bedrop her so that the fright is over,- she said and ordered for the poker to be heat up in the fire.
Mother did. After that, she was holding the iron-hot iron over my head, while old Pushyk was pouring water over it. The water was sizzling, steam was curling around, I could feel hot drops falling onto my body. It was a little scary and unpleasant. I wanted to hide on Baibishe’s huge chest.
Bedropping me with hot water had nearly no effect. My fright might have retreated, but fever lingered. Neighbors who heard about my being ill came to visit me, but Karakyz was not very polite to them, like why are you bothering her, especially at night?
Feeling like a grease spot, I saw the sunrise without having had a wink of sleep. Karakyz, who was sitting at my bad, was snorting, but my mother, who was lying on the floor close to the door, lifted her head from the pillow as soon as I made a move. Poor mother, she did not dare to come close to me even then and could only speak timidly...
In the morning, I slumbered... Having woken up, I saw Kalisa standing at the door. Judging by the sun, it was nearly noon. Observing the clan rules, Kalisa stopped by the threshold.
- How do you feel, Yerkezhan?- she called me by my boyish name.
I did not want to answer her. I understood clearly that the sly Kalisa knew the reason why I was ill. What should I answered her? I was feeling very weak, though fever, which had been burning me more the whole night, had died away. The heavy thoughts made my head swivel... As I licked my dry lips, I felt that they were cracked like the surface of dry ground, on which a puddle of rain water used to be not long ago... I did not feel like talking, so I looked vexedly at Kalisa’s face.
- We’ve heard about you,- Kalisa said sympathetically,- you weren’t careful poor children!.. Anyway, you can’t be careful!- she said to herself.- How can those poor thinks which have just pipped know what kind of flies to expect!..
Kalisa turned her face away and wiped her eyes with an end of her shawl.
- Where’s Boken?- the phrase escaped my lips unwillingly.
- He’s gone home.
- Home?!
- Yes, home!.. Unless you jump down Zhuman’s throat, he’s sure to spill your guts. So Burkut went to get him something from his father’s house.
- Will he stop doing us harm then?
- Who knows. His chaps are wide and insatiable. He can very well exhaust you like a ravenous dog that can’t ever get enough.
I thought other impertinent Zhuman and felt uneasy again.
In the meanwhile, the sly Kalisa went one:
- There’s a saying, Dear: a word that’s escape thirty teeth can travel around thirty clans... No matter what you do now, Zhuman’s gossip will be repeated by people. In addition you aren’t grown-up, you cannot say that you don’t care about their palaver. Now it’s Soviet time. Who cares if you join yourselves of your own accord. But you don’t have a voice of your own yet, you have to wait. In the old times, your husband’s-to-be relatives would have come to you with clubs to disgrace you by playing the kobyza by your house as soon as they heard the gossip. You father couldn’t help it. They won’t do it now – that’s not the right time! But that mean Zhuman isn’t likely to lie low, anyway. He’ll bespatter you on the sly...
- Why are you telling me this?
- By the way,- Kalisa answered,- anyway, don’t you be afraid. In Soviet time, noone can eat anyone. What is left to us is praying to god so that your father and Burkut’s father could agree on this matter!
Kalisa caught my fancy with her sympathetic attitude and advice. Kalisa knew how to win someone’s trust and light someone’s hope. I remember clearly the words she said to me at parting:
- The time when you were Yerkezhan and tried to act like a boy is over. Your not a boy anymore, you’re a girl... You’re already thirteen.
My answer was silence. What could I say knowing that Kalisa’s words were the truth.
MATURITY
After a week, I felt much better. The disease was receding. Fever was not tormenting me anymore. I had got out of my bed, but in those several days I had lost so much weight that I looked like a person who had just overcome typhus. I got so weak that I walked teeteringly. Once I looked at myself in the mirror – how yellow I looked, my cheekbones were now protruding due to hollow cheeks, the whites of my eyes were bluish, my lips were white and cracked, and my neck was as thin as a reed – it looked as though anyone would break it on merely touching it...
Maybe I would have stayed in bed some more time, but the grown-ups in our house were beginning to frown. The all-pervasive Kalisa told me that the gossip Zhuman spread had reached my father, Baibishe Karakyz, and my mother. As one could expect everything was exaggerated. The news about the colt which Burkut was going to give to Zhuman as a present for him to keep silent reached the aul as well. People would give an extremely well-detailed account of how Burkut stabbed that colt after having a quarrel with his father.
Now Zhuman grew even more furious. He and his gossip of a wife, Bike, began telling stories against us which we could not even think of. That ill fame reached Burkut’s parent as well. They even sent a dzhigit to find out what was going on in our house. It was not easy for my father and mother to listen to those sad talks.
Neither father nor Karakyz spoke to me on this, but I could see it in their countenances that they were reproaching me, like how could you get your reputation spoilt like this, being so young? Of course, I felt ashamed, but what could I do? Later I learned from books that girls committed suicide when in my position. Fortunately, it did not occur to me, and took it lying down, feeling sorry for my father and mother.
In those sad days, when I looked like a ghost, my father left on some business, and women of the aul began gathering in our house, making use of his absence. By the scattered phrases I could hear, I understood that they were going to dress me, who used to wear boy’s clothes, like a girl and make a feast for the wives of my relatives to celebrated. My real mother, Zhania, protested noisily against this idea. I could feel a quarrel in our house even before, and my mother and Karakyz still had not reached common ground. They were still arguing.
- Well, Tokal, get up, heat some water for tea!..Put the pot on fire!- Baibishe Karakyz said to my mother.
- Are you going to arrange a bastandyk for your house, to wish him a happy journey?- my mother asked in a querulous voice.
- Stop this nonsense!- Baibishe nearly ordered.
But my mother had ceased to be afraid of Karakyz long before and had been fierce against her recently. If Karakyz said something to be white, Mother would say it to be black. Now Father did not take sides with Baibishe. Sometimes he would give her and Tokal a menacing look. “As far as I can see, you can’t cotton together under the same roof. Let either of you croak and the other be quiet!” – and he would leave the house in warm blood. Realizing that her words were losing their force, Karakyz would not let her rude tongue loose as she used to do.
- What’s up, why such hurry?- my mother asked.- Are you afraid of blabbers saying whatever occurs to them? Why force a girl white than milk and purer than water to dress like a woman...
- You needn’t worry, Zhania!- Salike, the wife of my father’s elder brother, objected to her in a low and patient voice, - don’t they call a thirteen-year-old girl hostess of the house Bates in nearly grown-up... Why should she be wearing boy’s clothes? You aren’t left empty-handed, you have a real boy, not jinxing it. Seilzhan will soon be a dzhigit. So let us not break the custom of our ancestors.
- Right!- women exclaimed approvingly.
My mother, who respected Salike, made a conciliatory move.
- But what will Bates wear? We haven’t tailored any dresses for her so far Maybe we should give her Kaken’s old dresses?..
- I won’t wear casts!- I exclaimed and went out.
Without arguing too long, the women agreed that it would be really embarrassing for Bates, daughter of a well-off man, to wear old dresses, and that clothes should be tailored for her as the custom is.
Baibishe Karakyz ordered to open the chests, in which cuts of various fabrics were kept, and called me up.
- Come here, Dear. Tell me what you like most. Let Aunt Kalisa cut out and sew some dresses for you.
To tell the truth, I did not care about new clothes in those days, so I did not rush to Karakyz to thank her but stood silently by the door.
Baibishe shook her head disapprovingly:
- Take the cuts she might like, Kalisa... Tailor two dresses of this chintz and one more of that sateen... two silk camisoles, one sleeveless and the other with sleeves... Take this all to your house and start sewing!
- So, are you going to choose?- Kalisa asked.
What could I tell her? I was indifferent to everything.
- Then let me measure you,- and Kalisa began to unfold the chintz cuts. My mother entered the room.
Having thrown the fabric over my shoulders, Kalisa took to her work.
- We need the skirt to be as low as her heels are! -, Karakyz insisted.
- Why so low?- mother gave me a cursory glance,- a little lower than knee-length is enough.
“So which of you am I to obey”, - Kalisa was trying to say with her baffled countenance, turning her gaze whom Baibishe to my mother.
- Do what I tell you!- my mother was being stubborn.
- Let it be your way!- Karakyz finally agreed.
Of course, there are wonderful tailors in towns, but in our aul, in our parts there was noone to sew better than Kalisa. Customs came to her from far away. If a bai had a marriageable daughter, he could not do without Kalisa. Being arrogant and peevish, she hardly ever accepted an invitation to serve someone at home...
Dressed bur and sewn with Kalisa’s skillful hands fit me beautifully. But for a long time, I felt ashamed to show in public dressed like this!.. Sometimes I felt like dying of shame and tried not to leave the house during the day-time.
On a Thursday, I was walking around the yard. Several camels were lying on the ground, I came up to them and, being hidden by their humps, I suddenly saw two men approaching our aul. At first I took them for guests who were staying at our place then and was too shy to mark my presence. They took a seat very close to me. But they were not guests. By their voices, I recognized them to be my father and Zhuman. After listening closely, I understood that they were talking about me.
- I called you to give you Sasyk’s salem,- Zhuman said,- his ideas are the following: there is not changing the course of life, but in good times, when a crow sits on our hand, I swear that I will never miss my son’s bride elect. Even if the Soviet government wins will bell, I won’t spare the whole of my cattle to save my honor, if I don’t have enough cattle, I’ll sacrifice even my head.
- So what is Sasyk’s suggestion?
- He believes that Burkut should be sent to Orenburg for studying. Zhakynbek is to take him there... They say Burkut is very pleased. But he will come to you to ask you to let Bates go with him. Uncle promised him that they would visit you.
Apparently, my father did not understand the entire situation, so he asked Zhuman for a more detailed account.
- Zhakynbek has promised Burkut to arrange his life for him. But Zhakynbek doesn’t want to fall out with Sasyk. It’s up to you now. Do you understand? You have to try and keep Bates at home. However, Uncle Sasyk wants you not to antagonize the stubborn youth. He still hopes that you will be able to persuade your daughter to refuse to accompany Burkut. It would be perfect if Bates stood the racket.
- But how can she stand the racket?- my father was indignant.- She’s a mere girl. But even I can’t easily persuade her. Tell me who can do this?
The talkers relapsed into silence for some time. Zhuman was the first to break it.
- I’ll find a solution, Make. Everyone knows Kuba-eke’s cruel disposition. So we need him to stand the racket. He will do it as we want. He’ll be pleased to do this. You know him better than I do. Zhakynbek and Burkut are sure to come here on their way to Orenburg. We will be informed beforehand. On the day of their arrival, Kuba-eke will take Bates to his house to keep her locked. Let Zhakynbek pretend to be going to take her away. You’ll pretend not to mind it. But Kuba-eke will stick to his guns, threatening you with a knife to cap it all. Noone will cope with him, he’ll be true to himself, it’s no skin off his nose. The militia won’t help it, as Bates is yet under age.
- Indeed, we seem to have found the solution,- my father said,- we need to consult Kuba-eke on the rest.
They raised to their feet and went to the aul without entering the house.
It was not straightaway that I had the hard feeling on overhearing the conversation. At first I found it merely funny. When Zhuman and my father vanished in the darkness, I came to understand the entire bitter meaning of the talk. I knew that Burkut was going to study and asked him to take me along, which I believed to be unnoticeable for the other. Burkut agreed gladly. Could it occur to us, poor things, that we would face an obstacle like this. It was not that easy to demolish the obstacles. The most difficult thing was neutralizing Kuba-eke...
Kuba-eke is my father’s elder brother. He is an extremely stubborn man. He hated women more than anyone. Only old women of the aul and well-respected baibishes dared enter his house. If a young woman happened to show in the house where he was staying, he would leave at once, neglecting the treat prepared for him. Being extremely devout to Islam, he believed each letter of the Shariat law to be sacred and never doubted Mohammed’s saying “A girl of nine years is full-aged.” That is why he would not let even nine-year-old girls come close to him. His hatred for women was so obsessive that he had never given his single daughter a caress, never smelt her forehead, as the custom was. When she was thirteen , he married her off and neither visited her nor allowed her to come to her father’s house.
Once he was beaten cruelly for his fanatic hatred for girls. About fifteen to twenty years ago, Kuba-eke moved to his wife’s relatives to the land of Ara-karachai and became a local mullah. Coming home on an evening, he came across several little girls, who were picking berries in the ravine on the forest margin. Without long hesitation, Kuba-eke said a prayer and started lashing the girls with his kamcha. Crying with pain and fear, the girls recognized the cruel man to be the new mullah of the aul.
- Why are you beating us, Kuba-eke?- they were crying.
- Yapyrai, the devils even know my name! – Kuba-eke exclaimed and started lashing the girls even more violently.
Haymakers happened to be there. Hearing the children cry, the came there running.
- What are you doing?
- The whole ravine, the whole forest are rife with devils! – Kuba-eke answered, - Are your eyes blind?..
- Where are the devils?- the haymakers were perplexed.
- Here!- with a blow of his kamcha, he attacked the children again.
Then the haymakers dragged Kuba-eke from his horse and beat him, saying, “Get your devils!.
After his violence to the children, Kuba-eke could not stay in Ara-Karachai. His relatives abjure him, too. Kuba-eke came back to his aul. During his last years, his only job was performing the rite of circumcision.
To tell the truth, some people of the ignorant aul believed Kuba-eke to be a learned person, but after studying him closer I made sure that he was an ignorant man and did not even know the Koran. Though he could read lamely, he could not sign his name. As I have already said, he was utterly religious – he would spend all of his free time, which was plenty, on the praying mat zhaimanze. He was always holding his beads and muttering “Subkhan allah!” – “God be thanked!”, he had no friendly conversations with anyone and always looked inaccessible and sullen. His appearance was not attractive, either – a dark face, low brows, swollen lids over large black eyes, a small pert nose, a moustache hanging down and a beard arranged in spikes. Moreover, those who talked to him felt suppressed by his heavy baleful stare, that of a bull ready to butt. Once, when I was wearing boy’s clothes as a child, I came to Kuba-eke. He shouted, “Go away, little devil!” I have been afraid to talk to him since then... His wife Sakpan was a sweet kind woman fond of children. But, being afraid of her husband, she seldom invited me and did it only when Kuba-eke was out. In his presence, Sakpan seemed not to be noticing me. He was suppressing her with his dull power. I still fail to understand why, but my father would cringe before his brother, too. Father chose a cruel advisor! He never contradicted his elder brother.
In that ill time, when I was haunted by the thoughts of my future, Burkut and Zhakynbek came to our aul. I saw Burkut face to face and revealed to him the cunning scheme of my father and Zhuman, who were doing their best to prevent me from going to Orenburg.
- We have few people to protect us, - Burkut said sadly,- maybe at least my uncle will support me..
Later Burkut told me that my father avoided giving a straight answer when talking to my Zhakynbek and said that it was up to his elder brother.
Zhakynbek and Burkut, who were staying in our house, happened to be invited by one of the bais from the neighboring aul. As soon as they left, the sullen Kuba-eke came to our house with a walking-stick and started yelling before he even crossed the threshold:
- Is it true that you are going to let Bates go studying?
- I have discussed it!- my father answered, stepping back from Kuba-eke, as his elder brother had tried the durability of his stick on him more than once.
- Tell me who was the initiator?- Kuba-eke kept pressing on him.
- Well, Zhakynbek said that girls are allowed to study now... he wanted to take her along...
- Why should he take her?.. Bates has a mother and a father! They are rich enough for her to live happily. Get your “Zhakypbek”, get your “he said”!- Kuba hit my father violently on the shoulder with his walking-stick. He aimed another blow, but at that moment an old man, who had been listening to their argument indifferently, grasped him by the hand determinatedly.
- Let me go!- Kuba-eke was trying to break loose.- He’s going to bet some beans! It’s you who invented the anarchy!.. Zhakypbek, Zhakypbek!.. What does Zhakynbek have to do with this?.. He’s going to take your daughter god know where... Whom are you going to entrust with your daughter? Even if she was full-aged, you’d have to think it over... Are you too strong to be afraid to break the custom by letting Bates go and do this.
At that moment, Kuba-eke’s wife Sakpan entered the house.
-Wife!- Kuba-eke made a decision.- Take Bates to our house.
The obedient Sakpan darted to me, but I hid behind Karakyz’s back.
- Let Sakpan take the girl!- Kuba-eke roared.
- Go, my dear, go!- Karakyz whispered.- Or else we all will suffer...
There was no way out, they took me out... Scared to death, shivering, I wanted to cry, but I simply had no tears, I wanted to shout, but something was strangulating my throat, making me unable to give voice... Sakpan took me out of the house like a hungry wolf snatches a lamb away from a flock pasturing. She dragged me so fast that, as the saying goes, my feet were hardly touching the ground...
In that night, Sakpan put me to sleep in her bed. Either she was afraid that I could be abducted or it was the local custom, but Sakpan closed the door from the inside reliably using a rope for the night. To make sure double sure, the lit a lamp which she placed on the headboard of the wooden bed. Being in the twilight zone between asleep and awake, I could see Kuba-eke praying frantically on the zhainamaz.
I could not get a wink of sleep for the whole anxious night. I could hear the aul dogs bark every now and then. Perhaps they were fighting with each other or against a wolf that had creeped into a flock of sheep. Shrieking and roaring did not die out for a long time. Sheep were thrown into flutter, cows were bellowing, and I heard a camel howling. Kuba-eke woke to groan worriedly but, not venturing to leave the house, he lay in his bed shouting at the cattle rambling about the yard.
It was only at dawn that I finally went to sleep, which cost me great effort. I woke at feeling someone bend over me. I startled, opened my eyes and saw Sakpan.
- People are coming. get up, Bates!
- Who’s coming?
- Zhakypbek...
I grew agitated.
Kuba-eke, who was even more ungracious and cheerless than he usually was, entered the house, sat down onto his praying mat and started telling his beads with his eyes down. Suddenly Burkut and Zhakynbek appeared in the room. I was to excited to understand what Zhakynbek and Kuba-eke were talking about. It was only when Burkut joined in that Kuba-eke’s yelling reached me. He was threatening Burkut with a knife and was well prepared to use it. Burkut could not but leave the house. Kuba-eke said to Zhakypbek triumphantly:
- Let us not waste words. When Bates is mature enough to tell where her right and left hands are, she will be free to choose her way. But so far we have control over her.
Zhakynbek said goodbye to Kuba-eke and left.
After several hours, Burkut and he left our aul. I was allowed to go back home.
At home, I found Saktagan. He was already bidding his farewell to my father, telling him in a respectful and very firm voice:
- It’s Mameke! If you don’t follow my advice, you will have only yourself to blame. Mind it that I can use the additional tax to wash you out.
- But now we’ve agreed!- father tried to flash a friendly smile, but one could clearly see fear behind it.
I learned the details of the conversation from my mother – it could affect my future directly. Saktagan was a reliable protector I now had. Being inspector of the financial department and a representative of the poor of the aul, he could see into the motives of my father, Kuba-eke, and Sasyk, who were springing and would not allow me to go studying. Saktagan was firmly insisting that I should be considered to be Burkut’s bride and promised to help us marry by the time I came of age. As my mother told me, father had surrendered. Saktagan had rather scared than persuaded him.
Indeed, that combatant financial inspector, whom every bai of the aul believed to be dangerous, was true to his word. Visiting us, he was watching closely to see whether my father was going into a huddle with Sasyk. When he learned about Sasyk having been welcomed in our house, he attacked my father and frazzled his nerves completely.
Soon I realized that it was not only me that Saktagan was considered about, though he was really eager to help a deprived girl from an aul; his aim was to undermine the power of bais by hook or by crook. Sasyk had a rough time. The financial inspector had such a strangle on him that, being unable to pay the additional tax, he was sent to the prison of Turgai for nearly the whole winter, and some of his cattle was forfeited.
They would not let me continue going to the aul school. Baibishe Karakyz kept inventing all kinds of things.
To make me look not like a schoolgirl but a marriageable woman, she was working diligently on my clothes and hair. She ordered for my dressed to be made heel-long and frilled skirts to be made. She insisted on my camisoles being decorated with gemstones and costly embroidery. My fur hat, which was already decorated with an owl plumage, was embroidered, too. Razor had not touched my hair for a long time, and it had grown to be long and rich, I could already wear two plaits. At first I wove colorful silk ribbons into my hair, but Karakyz found them too cheap and replaced them with heavy chains of ancient coins which clinked with each step of mind. I got my ears pierced and decorated with bulky silver earrings which looked like little stirrups. Finally, to make me look taller, they made me a pair of pointed boots with heels of a vershok.
This is how I turned from a yerkekshor, that is, a boy pretending to be a boy, into a proper mature girl in no time. I could not even think of going to school and sitting at the desk dressed up like this. I would be ashamed to do this. But I never mentioned my hesitation in my letter to Burkut, as I did not want to worry or disappoint him.
Local dzhigits were now paying attention to me. Many of them were trying to get close to me. There is a saying as follows:
Everyone is glad to have some kumis,
Everyone is eager to give a girl his glance.
The Kazakhs have a custom called “persuading a girl”. Older women, mostly wives of elder brothers, zhengeis, act as intermediaries between girls and dzhigits. If young people like each other, the zhengei gets rich presents.
Quite understandably, my zhengei was Kalisa. People were turning to her more and more often, asking her to introduce them to me, to match us. But Kalisa, my true Kalisa, would only retell me the talks smilingly.
Being pained bitterly by her life, Kalisa loved me passionately and was absolutely frank to me.
- There’s no dzhigit who hasn’t promised me a gift. Poor boys! All they can dream of is you. You, a swan growing up, are so enticing to them! How eager are they to get you! I’ll tell you what – it’s as easy as that for me to mislead you, to turn your brain. Why conceal it! Many girls have got under my control without even noticing it. I have never thrown the noose in vain. But I’m not going to scheme with you. I’ve promised Burkut to save you, and I’ll be true to my word. As for dzhigits nagging at me I’m going to wind them round my little finger to get presents from them.
Indeed, Kalisa would carve dzhigits expertly, especially brags who would mill wheat with their tongues. However, some of them would spread gossip about their achievements, about having an affair with me. As it usually is in an aul, the gossip reached my family, too. When Karakyz or my mother asked Kalisa questions about those talks, she always answered the same way, “Let them talk. If only Burkut is in good health, if he comes soon. You’ll see what is white and what is black... If it is black, spit not only in Bates’s face, but also in mine...”
People in the aul started gossiping about Burkut’s coming from Orenburg to his home parts in summer, most probably, to abduct me. Short before his arrival, my father and Karakyz thought about visiting Baibishe’s relatives. They decided to took me along. But if they did, Burkut would not find me in the aul, and I have been missing him so badly. I sought Kalisa’s advice.
- Go with your father,- her answer was.- You must be lordly to your beloved one! Our ancestors were right to say that even brains of cheap cattle are tasteless. You need to torment the dzhigit with partings and only then let him come close to you. Then you’ll be desired. The longer he groans for you, the more he’ll love you. Let his passion accumulate, Bates! Leave a short note for him saying that you are very sorry and go on the journey...
- He’s headstrong and even cruel... He can be so hurt...
- It’s not a big deal, he’ll come over it... Being hurt is not the same as being ill. Let him take offense, let him leave... If he loves you truly, he’ll come back.
Both believing Kalisa and mistrusting her, I accompanied my father and Karakyz. It was only in winter that I realized how right my zhengei had been. The news of Burkut coming to us again reached our house and the whole aul.
Kalisa demanded a gift for happy news, suiunshi, from me.
- I was right! Remember me telling you that he’d come back if he loves you. It’s only for you that he’s coming. But I’ll tell you what. Be adamant, don’t surrender to him. Let him burn with passion. People say that a famous batyr Baluan-sholak once fell in love with a girl. Following the recommendation of a woman like me, the girl would tell him day after day, month after month – come tomorrow, come later. Then Baluan-sholak wrote a poem dedicated to her:
In autumn, you would tell me: “I’ll be yours and you will be mine in winter”,
In winter you said, “Wait till spring comes”.
It hurt me. You said, “Go away.”
Spring came. What I heard again was
“We should wait till summer”.
In summer, in the sparkling month of May, you told me
“Keep hoping for the autumn, dzhigit!”
Promise the same to Burkut. He should be patient.
- But what if it’s me who lacks patience!
- Burkut’s will fail him, as well. Now it’s winter, promise the summer to him. Don’t you worry about the rest – I’ll arrange it all for you.
This time Burkut went back, too. When he came for the wedding of my sister Kaken in summer, the most wonderful thing was the date Kalisa managed to arrange for us.
During a wedding, everything happens in the limelight. Dwellers of the aul are buzzing. Festive games are played from morning till evening and never stop for the night. Just try and hide somewhere. Moreover, you are well aware of the fact that as long as Burkut is here, careful eyes of both his rivals and aul scandalmonger are watching you.
At that point, Kalisa reassured me.
- Go to bed,- she said when dusk fell.- I hope god won’t deprive me of my artfulness, which is his own gift. When everyone has calmed down in the aul, I’ll take your out of the house secretly.
- But how can you do this?
- Wait, you’ll know when the time comes. If Baibishe asks you why you are in bed so early, complain her about a headache.
This is what I actually did.
Our house was restless even after dark.
Following the ancient tradition, elder women were to take the bride, our Kaken, to the groom, and leave them face to face on that night. When the groom has made sure that she is a virgin, he must give presents to young people from the bride’s aul. Presents, each of which has a meaning: to prevent the old woman from dying, to prevent dogs from roaring, for the pole of the yurt to stand still and firm... Presents to those who have held the bide by the hand, stoked her hair, made her bed... No doubt, it is a good custom. But only provided that my poor sister is really a virgin.
But my apprehension is that Kaken is so frivolous that she has long ceased to be innocent and that her groom may send the bride back to her family. Having expressed my doubts to Kalisa, I can see her laugh – it’s not a big deal, the groom isn’t a big shot, she’ll be happy with any variant of her.
Another custom of obscure origin must be observed at a wedding – it is bridal kidnapping. Even if the bride’s parents notice the act, they are to pretend to be unaware. Perhaps choosing not to stand in the kidnappers’ way, my father left the house for the night...
The lamp was put out, and silence fell.
Karakyz, who has heard us talk in whisper, asked me to sleep in her bed, though I had always slept alone. Moreover, she ordered for Seil’s bed to be placed at the opposite side. Shortly speaking, I seemed to be trapped. Would the sly Kalisa find a way out?
If elder women were not supposed to kidnap Kaken, perhaps the door would have been locked from the inside on Baibishe’s order.
But then the bride had already been kidnapped, and through the open door I could see the moon floating among colorful clouds and sending its rays to us.
At the same moment, Baibishe said to my mother:
- Zhanash, tie the door closed behind them!
- What on earth can happen, what enemies can harm us?- my mother said dismissively and did not move. My dear one, could she feel that I was going to see Burkut on that day?
Do people not believe sleep and food to be our enemies? When their time comes, they never ask for our permission...
I kept thinking about whether Kalisa would come or not. I did not even notice falling asleep. Suddenly a push in at my feet woke me, as though someone’s cold hand was clutching an my hot foot under the blanket, as if giving me a warning – don’t speak! As soon as I lifted my head from the pillow, someone touched my hand delicately, as if letting me know – hush, we’re going now! I strained my ears: Karakyz was snorting in her sleep, Seil was sleeping soundly, my mother’s breath was smooth.
Kalisa – it was she – lifted me in her arms silently and carried me out of the house creepingly like a cat that has just caught a mouse.
Dew had already fallen, and it looked like fog was descending, as the whole steppe was hidden behind a grayish haze. Kalisa put me onto the ground and led me by the hand. Very soon, the lines of buildings and the dark silhouettes of camels and cows, which were the same color as the ground, started fading from out view. We were going far from the aul.
- Now we can have a rest,- Kalisa said.
- Where are we?
- It’s the brink of the Tavylgi Ravine.- She placed me near herself, embraced me and started singing in a low voice:
Clouds are approaching you for a good reason, Baian-aul,.
We shall wait a little for the world to fall asleep.
The wish of two lovers will be heard by allah.
He will hide the moon that shines behind the floating clouds.
- The song is truthful!- I whispered, shaking with cod and agitation.
- There’s nothing to be afraid of now, girl.- Having thrown her chapan over my shoulders, Kalisa embosomed me.
- Anatai-ai, my dear mother, I shall never forget your kindness.
- Everything depends on your will, Bates! To tell the truth, it is not only for you and Burkut that I have been struggling, but also for myself. You see? You ask me why? So listen. I haven’t chanced to learn what the love of a groom is. Neither have I loved, I married the one who paid the bridewealth. I have never heard vows of love, I didn’t even believe in their existence. My dream had been to see true lovers. It seems to me that my dream’s come true, Bates. Both you and Burkut love each other truly...
- Believe me, anatai-ai, it is true, - I said in a low voice.
- Yerkezhan!- Kalisa still called me in this way whenever she was nervous, - will you feel hurt if I ask you something?
- No, I won’t... .
- No matter what I ask you?
- No matter what you asks me.
- So give me your hand. And listen. In ancient time, there was a saying – children grow up in their parents’ house, but parents are unaware of their deeds. I have been watching your life with my own eyes. I am sure that you’re something like an angel – whiter than milk and clearer than water. If this is true, then go to Burkut, go to him! But what if I’m mistaken, god forbid! Then you’ll kill me, yourself, and Burkut!
- Apazhan-ai, my elder sister, what kind of an oath shall I give you?- I was so hurt that I burst into tears.- By what shall I swear?
- Only by Burkut’s name if he permits you.
- Let it be!..
And I left for my happiness.
THE SLANDER
Now I could not imagine my further life without Burkut, so I was grimly determined to go to Orenburg with him. Kalisa approved of our plan, which was to go studying together in summer.
- The world has never seen a girl become a stone in the heath of her parents’ house,- she said.- You’re meant for another family... It’s right that you’re thinking about school. To leave with no pretext would be more difficult for you. Imagine your father and mother to agree unwillingly... But while there may be a girl for whom the bridewealth isn’t paid, is there any groom who doesn’t give presents to young people from his bride’s aul? And Abutalip, Burkut’s father, will he agree? He’s so stubborn that he reminds me of saxaul, he can’t be bent reverse. He’ll rather die than agree to the wedding! People here, in the aul, say – we won’t give her away without a wedding. It means that grown-ups will gammon both you and Burkut! Why do you need a stiff muzzle? Say that you’re going to study, that’s it. Your father and mother will be trying to prevent you from doing this. If they lack power, they’ll turn to Kuba-eke. But you’re not a child. Don’t agree! Many girls are leaving their auls to study now. Neither your parents not Kuba-eke are as powerful as they used to be now.
Both I and Burkut agreed with Kalisa that she would help us. Keeping it secret from my parents, I began getting ready for the long journey. In those very days, the news was spread that Burkut had been insulted – the hair his horse, on which he came to our aul, was cut. Being scared, I came to Kalisa, but she was already aware of it and looked by no means worried. Having heard my hasty and incoherent speech, she began reassuring me:
- Why on earth are you worrying? It’ll work out all right. Not it’s even easier for you to leave your home...
I did not quite understand Kalisa, so I asked her to explain it in detail.
- You know, there’s a saying – one who fights frankly has a sharp tongue. Burkut will be merciless now. They say he didn’t go home, instead he headed for the volost council. He’s a friend of our volost administrator Yerkin. Burkut will tell him the truth, ask for some militia men to help him, and take you. But don’t you even think of protesting. Now that you’ve been through betashar, you mustn’t, you shouldn’t be staying in the aul.
When Kalisa was sure that I had taken my decision, she kissed me on both cheeks.
- Are you ready, Bates?
- I am!
- Then I have a request!
- I’m listening to you, zhengei.
- If everything is all right, Burkut will come not later than the day after tomorrow, most probably tomorrow. It will be better if I’m not at home at that moment.
- I can’t understand you, Zhengei...
- You know the Kazakh custom. On the day of your departure, the house will be lamenting. Holding dear my honor and feeling for you, your parents will try once again to keep you at home. They are well aware of the fact that you have no secrets for me, that I am your older bosom friend. Perhaps they’ll ask me to stay with you. I’ll have to obey. There’no good in it.
- So you need to go somewhere, don’t you, Kalisa?
On the next day, I woke up to see the midday sun looking into the yurt through the lattice of its dome... For the whole night, I slept soundly, and the headache which had been torturing me so long before, was over. I felt really rested. I was alone in the yurt, so I lolled in my bed, stretching myself. When I was about to get up, my brother Seil came in. I love him so much, so awfully much... Because he is my sibling, because his appearance is so similar to mine, because he is the only boy in our family... He has already turned eight, so he is to go to school next year. Being heavyset, as all people of our family, he has been growing fast, especially recently, but I still saw him as a child just out of his cradle. I loved kissing and embosoming him. He doted on me, too, he never acted up with me. Seil would cuddle me as well, he often fell asleep in my bed. Since the day he began to talk, he has been calling me Bota, that is, Baby Camel, and Burkut followed his example and invented a name for me – Akbota, White Baby Camel. No words were warmer to me that Seil’s Bota and Burkut’s Akbota. Burkut knew how devoted I was to my brother. When we were discussing our departure during the last date, I told Burkut:
- I don’t regret a thing, it’s easy for me to part with the aul. But for Seil... I’ll have a rough time without him. I can imagine him clutching at me at the departure...
- Are you going there to die?- Burkut laughed. – Forget your uncertainty... Your brother will soon go to school. So let him learn in his aul so far. Then, when everything has worked out for us, we’ll study and take Seil to us. Do you agree, Akbota?
I agreed with Burkut, but my eyes welled up with tears.
Even though I knew I was not parting forever, pity and affection were pinching me.
During all these days I was sighing in public and crying when alone. So when Seil entered the yurt, I exclaimed happily:
- My darling!
He rushed into the warmth of my arms. I caressed my little brother, embraced him, and suddenly I noticed an object in his hand. I looked at it and realized it was a package, I read the address – it was for me...
The boy said that the postman had given the letter to him.
I opened the package to find a small and rather thick cardboard cover book in it. There was a sign on the binding, “Burkut’s Album”. Album? Is it the place where they attach photos? Yes, it is! I was turning one page after another rapidly, and strange photographs were flashing before my eyes. They were glued to the pages and numbered. I started studying them in the right order and with greater care.
Photo one. Burkut and a Russian boy walking arm-in-arm with two girls. One of them is Russian, the second is Kazakh. The girls are wearing light, tight, and open dresses.
Photo two is a variation of photo one. I can see clearly that all the four of them are smiling.
Photo three. An orchard. Under one of the trees, Burkut and the Russian girl are hiding, as if playing hide-and-seek, and the Kazakh girl seems to be watching them from behind thick bushes.
Photo four. On the bank of a lake or a river, a group of young people is getting ready for a swim. Among them, I could easily spot the four of them, including Burkut.
Photo four. The same bank. Girls are wearing swimsuits, and young men are wearing swimming briefs. According to the custom of the aul, such clothes are unseemly. Burkut and the Russian girly are exchanging sweet glances. The other one, the Kazakh girl, is standing aside, looking sad and sulky. She seems to be jealous.
Photo six. Young people are swimming. Burkut and the Russian girl are swimming side by side. They are smiling, the enjoy swimming together very much.
Photo seven. The picture was made on the bank, after swimming. Young men and women are lying on the sand. It is embarrassing to look at them! The Russian girl is lying with her head thrown back between Burkut and the Russian lad. Her smile looks like what she wants to say it “I’m ready to go wherever you wish with each of you...”
Photo eight. A feast in a house. At a table laden with dishes and bottles, many girls and young men are sitting. Among them, that wretch shines out due to her festive dress. Again she’s sitting between Burkut and the Russian lad. Burkut and he are looking at each other defiantly. one can easily guess that they are rivals. But obviously, the girl prefers Burkut, as it is he whom she is watching smilingly.
Photo nine. For an unknown reason, the Russian lad is kissing her this time. Burkut is looking at them with irritation...
Photo ten. The same young Russian. Her belly is puffed – she is pregnant...
Photo eleven. A one-storey long building. By the entrance, there is a small garden with a flower bed. Over the door, there is a legible sign in Arabic and in Russian, “Maternity Hospital”...
Photo twelve. In front of the maternity hospital door, Burkut stands, holding a baby. The baby is wrapped in white shrouds. Near him there are the same woman and the Russian man, who has now grown a moustache...
Photo thirteen. The baby has obviously just turned forty days. It is curly and funny. It is lying on a pillow. Burkut is amusing him, somehow cuddling him. The Russian lad with a moustache is sitting aside.
Photo fourteen. Burkut, wearing a sleeveless sports shirt, is looking affectionately into the well-fed boy’s face. This time the boy is wearing a gertrude and looks much fresher.
There were no more photos. In the end, a fair hand had written: “Burkut has found his happiness!”
...Tell me, tell me! Do these photos not tell the story of Burkut’s life? Everything was very clear.
I though of the gossip about Burkut spread over our aul.
People told about a dzhigit called Sakyzhan who went to the village of Dimitrovka, where he stayed for the night in the house of his acquaintance, and saw there a young Kazakh who asked for a bed. He turned out to be Burkut, son of Abeu, coming back from the town for the vacation. He said he was hungry. He was offered some pork, and Burkut said that he did not care and he would get baptized if he got an opportunity...
Besides, they said that dzhigit Adilbek came to town and called at Burkut to inquire after his health. Burkut was sleeping on a bed with a ginger-haired Russian girl. On Burkut’s neck, Adilbek noticed a baptismal cross. On the table, there was a bottle of vodka and pork cracknels. The Tartar hostess informed Adilbek that Burkut had married that girl, adjourned his religion, and went to church the previous day.
As the rumor had it, Burkut had a baby with that wife. When they went to the aul, Burkut’s father refused to receive them.
People said Burkut to have gone on a business trip to some aul, where kidnapped a bai’s daughter and took her to the town. She would make her eat pork and drink vodka. The girl protested, and he, being drunken, beat her black and blue. Finally, she cut her hair off, took her clothes away from her and sent her back to the aul.
People also said that he was going to take me to his house as a concubine, that is, tokal.
All kinds of gossip were circulating, much nonsense was being said about Burkut, but I had never believed it.
Rumors would go in one of my ears and out the other. During the days when we saw each other, I never mentioned what was being whispered to me in the aul to Burkut. I did not want to upset him. I was getting more and more sure of his honesty and kindness. Now he had become more sensible. He could not be as bad as people said him to be. Once, Kalisa told me:
- Let them wag their tongues. You do know that they are lying.
And now I was holding that photo album. I was thinking back about the rumors. They went into my ear again to get stuck there. I would be glad not to believe in them even now, but I could not. I was angry with Burkut, I was upset, I was weeping.
- What’s wrong with you, Bota?- Seil got scared and started soothing me.
I embraced my brother, and we wept together.
I do not know how long we would have sat like this, but Kainazar’s loud voice broke my bitter stupor:
- Unbidden guests are coming to us. I’m telling the truth, they are. A cart and two horsemen. They’re approaching us fast...They’ll be here in no time...
- Can it be Burkut?- a thought shot across my mind. But I was already hurt and furious... My agitation vanished at once like the heat of red-hot iron when it is put into cold water. At that moment, Karakyz came into the yurt in tears.
- Get up, my dear, hurry up! Get dressed!
I dressed hastily while Baibishe went one:
- Some horsemen are coming. I think they come from the volost. They won’t come for no reason. Oh, it’s a turbulent time, Yerkezhan. I’m afraid they can bring a disaster. I’m afraid, I’m afraid for you. We’d receive them with circumstance, as guests, but what if they are dangerous to you...Don’t kill your wretched father, dear, have mercy on your mother, have mercy on me. Don’t go with them, stay sensible, my dear. Don’t gladden your enemies, don’t upset your friends. Especially your father, think of him... We’ll let you marry the one you choose...
Dressing to the Karakyz’s lamentation, I said in a resolute tone:
- Don’t cry, don’t be afraid, I’m not going!
Baibishe repeated my words to my scared father, who was entering the yurt:
- Don’t be afraid! Our Bates isn’t going!
- You know, my dear child,- Father was shedding tears,- everything is in your hands today – you can kill us and you can give us life!
We heard the wheels of a tarantass clinking and horse hooves stamping behind the yurt. Burkut, Yerkin, and a volost militia men came to us. Rage must have beclouded my mind, as I still cannot remember what the guests were talking with my father and me about. The only thing I know well is that I said resolutely, I won’t come back to the yurt as long as you are here. Having lost my grip, I ran away, I do not know how, but I found myself at Kuba-eke’s. Besides the host, Sakpan and Zhuman were sitting there. The sly Zhuman must have already made enquiries and announced the reason why Burkut had come to our aul.
- Oh, we were just thinking if you could really leave, forgetting the sacred faith of your ancestors?.. How wonderful it is that you are with us, - Sakpan was very upset. – So you haven’t forgotten... The faith is not injured, and we are glad.
Muttering “Thanks god the creator”, Kuba-eke stroked his beard complacently. With a move of his eyebrows, he ordered to Zhuman:
- Hurry up and find out what’s going up there. And tell them that they aren’t expected to come here. They can enter the house over my dead body...
Zhuman came back very soon.
When the cart was far from the yurt and I could not hear the stamp of horses and clamp of wheels anymore, I fell onto my bed, exhausted. Someone drew the curtain of my bed closed.
I don’t know how much time passed. I was thinking about Burkut only. All our dates, one by one, were passing my memory like a large caravan going along a steppe road. But when the road disappeared suddenly, I felt like an hour had passed. A narrow path led to upright rocks, behind which an abyss. One movement, and you are down. There was no turning back, either. What shall one do? “I don’t need a life like this,” - the decision was brewing in my mind. How shall I live now? There is no rock to throw myself down, there is no deep water to drown, no lethal poison, there is no tree to hang on. What remained was the knife – it was so easy to cut my throat with it; and the dome of the yurt – it could by all means substitute a tree.
The more I thought of it, the more inevitable the sad end seemed to me. The otau yurt seemed to me to fit my purpose most of all. It was mostly vacant, as my father was always on the road, and the door of the otau was usually tied on the outside only.
Being upset and worried by something, silent and sullen, my father mounted his horse to go somewhere on business on that morning. In the afternoon, I entered the otau to see that everything was helpful – the previous day, as the weather was windy, the some rope, shanraka, was tied to the floor, so now it was waggling there with a ready noose on it. There was a high table there as well – I had just to stand on it, throw the noose onto my neck, kick the table away – the end!
But people could enter the yurt in the daytime. So I decided to wait till dark.
My bitter fortune smiled at me that night – my family was sleeping in the big yurt, while the half-closed otau was vacant. Soon I could hear people snorting. I was the only one wide alert. The wind which grew violent at dusk had grown even heavier by the night, and the blanket of the yurt was shaking. The night seemed to be telling me – it darkness isn’t enough for you, get more!..
Soon it started to pour, and the whole steppe rustled. The nature came to help me, the one who had decided to die. I rose to sit on the bed, listening to my family snorting. Seil, who had made himself comfortable at my side, as usually, was sleeping soundly, too. I suddenly felt an urge to cocker Seil, to smell his little forehead. But, being afraid to wake him, I chose not to bid farewell to my brother... In the darkness, I stumbled over either a bucket or a kumgan, but noone heard it through the noise of rain, noone woke up... Barefooted and bare-headed, wearing nothing but a shirt, I came out of the yurt to the downpour, splashing in the slurry. I was so cold, so eager to die as soon as possible, that I ran to the otau. The rope on the door tied in a true-love knot would not budge. The tight knot, slippery and swollen with rain, would not obey to my father. Doing my best to open the door, I even scratched my skin. When I realized that I could not do anything with my bare hands, I pressed the mazy knot to my mouth and started biting on it.
- Oh dear, what are you doing here?
Being scared, I sprang back from the otau and was going to run away, but Kalisa had recognized me:
- Yerkezhan!
I did not even notice my rushing to embrace Zhengei and drop my head onto her bosom.
- Dear, what’s it that you’ve got on your mind?
But I could not tell her a thing. I was merely trembling with cold and fear. Kalisa snuggled me and covered me with a wide chapan. She carried me to her house, opened the door noiselessly and put me onto the bed. Then she wrapped me in something warm, sat down at my side, and embraced me gently. Little by little I began coming round.
- Where is Kishi-aga, where is Uncle Kikym?
- He’s staying at his father-in-law’s.
- Where did you come?
- Just now. I knew that bad news was waiting for me – my eyelid was twigging, anticipating a misfortune. In the small hours, when I was staying at my elder sister’s, I had a strange dream – you and me went to a stone well to fetch water... You peeked into the well and suddenly fell into it. When I sent the bucket down laboriously, you grasped it and lifted your head over the water...Bending down under the burden, I felt that I couldn’t take you out... I was crying for help so loudly that I woke myself and the others... I told my elder sister about you and the dream. I thought that something must have happened to you. So I decided to leave immediately, without lingering at the feast, At first we were intending to visit my parents on our way back. I’d told my sister about this. But as soon as we set off I began to feel uneasy. I thought that something could happen to Bates, god forbid. I told Kikym – maybe we shall go straight, without turning? But Kikym follows the custom devotedly – we informed them yesterday!. It’d be a shame not to visit people waiting for us... Then take your nephews, my answer was and go alone. As for me, say I’m having fever again. Like that’s why Kalisa didn’t even stay at her elder sister’s.
I was gradually reviving – the tremble was over, and my heart calmed down. I told Kalisa about the grief I felt, but she was not surprised.
- You know, dear, a slanderer did it purpose. You can trust me.
- No matter what the slanderer did, Burkut is guilty as well... Can he deny it all?
- I tell you nothing’s wrong with Burkut.
Someone approached, making noise by the door, so we stopped speaking for a while.
- Kalisa, Kalisa!- I recognized the voice of my mother, Zhania. Kalisa answered her. - When did you come?
- Just now.
- The worst has happened, Kalisa! Bates’s not here! – And Mother burst into tears.
But I could not stand it anymore and gave voice:
- I’m hear!
- What do I hear, Kalisa?- my mother uttered in a low voice.- Am I awake or dreaming?
- You aren’t. Our Bates’s here, here’s our Yerkezhan!.. Come here!..
I felt the warm arms of my mother.
- Thanks allah! – she kept saying, pressing me against her chest.- I won’t cry anymore, my dear child... A thousand and one more thanks to god!..
- How long has it been since you began to take Baibishe’s child for your daughter?- Kalisa asked jokingly.
- Damn her!- my mother answered.- An empty woman. It’s Baibishe who woke me on seeing that Bates was missing. She’s too lazy to get up, she didn’t stir a finger. When I had looked around and came to the yurt, she was already snorting. Of course, I didn’t wake her and went in search of Bates instead. Suddenly I saw a camel by your house. So Kalisa’s at home, I thought... And I came to you.
- I’m joking,- Kalisa said,- the one who gave birth to you is the one, those who didn’t are strangers... Unlike that Karakyz, you could sell your soul for Bates... Here love is mere pretending lying... If something happens to our girl, she won’t pity her at all...
Mother heaved a sight...
- Now we won’t going to hide anything from you,- saying this Kalisa told my mother about everything which had happened to me. It turned out that little Seil had already told her something. Baibishe was happy to know that rumors and the album severed me from Burkut. She had searched all over the house to have a look at the photos, but I had hid it in a place about which not a single soul knew.
Mother shared Kalisa’s opinion that it was an evil gossiper’s job. The two of them gave me advice – if Burkut was still here, I should find him and ask straightly what those pictures were. But what if Burkut had already left the aul?
- Bates needs to overtake him,- Kalisa insisted.
- Isn't it disgraceful for a girl to hurry after a dzhigit?- my mother was hesitant.
- Of course it isn’t!- Kalisa said.- If they really love each other, let the girl look for her dzhigit!.. Or let the dzhigit look for his girl!.. Especially if they are a well-matched couple!
- Do you think Burkut went without looking back?
- I’ll tell you what. He’s a true dzhigit, a firm one. But, no matter what, we should be expecting news from him in the nearest future...Or maybe he’ll come himself.
Those were the speculations of my mother and Kalisa. But what could they event? How could they take revenge on the mean gossiper who had tried to light the fire of hostility between to lovers to tear them apart...
“But who’s this mean person?” – I kept asking myself without finding an answer.
On that night, I slept soundly. Someone woke me up delicately. The roof of the yurt was covered tightly with a blanket. I could hardly recognize Kalisa in the dusk light.
- Is it light?
- The sun’s already approaching noon. I didn’t throw the blanket open so that you could sleep properly. I wouldn’t be waking you now, but people are coming... It must be the volost administrator – Yerkin! Noone else has a horse and a cart like this. They’re running fast, just to our house.
- Zheneshe, what if you draw the curtain closed?- I asked, feeling my yesterday’s agitation coming back to me.
- So you want to hide. Why?
- Well, what if he sees me?
- I really don’t know,- Kalisa began to hesitate.- Anyway, let it be as you wish, I’ll draw the curtain closed. But you get dressed and stay alert. First we have to make sure that’s Yerkin. After that, you can decide whether you should show or not. Can you hear the cart approaching?.. Let me take off the blanket and meet the guests...
Kalisa threw off the blanket, and bright direct sunrays fell through the latticed screens. I was so excited that I did not know what to do with myself. Is Yerkin alone or accompanied by Burkut? – I was thinking, - Why did they come?..
The cart had already come close to the yurt.
- Ua, Kalisa-zhengei, how are you?- I recognized Yerkin’s loud and opulent voice. According to the tradition, aul women answer to men’s greetings whisperingly, in a low voice. Kalisa must have observed the tradition, as I did not hear her greet Yerkin.
- Did you remove the blanket just now?- Yerkin was teasing her innocuously.
- I wanted to have a good sleep...- Kalisa answered,- I came back from a journey at dawn...
- We heard about your setting of. We were very upset... Especially Burkut.
My heart began to pound. I strained my ears – he could be here, too!
- Let’s discuss the rest inside,- Kalisa suggested. Judging by their footsteps, there were two or three guests.
So who were the others?.. Maybe Burkut is among them?- I lurked from behind the curtain hopingly. But he was not there!.. Could he have left? The thought made my head swivel, and I could hardly reach my bed. ,
- Who is it that signs behind the curtain,- Yerkin said jokingly, making himself comfortable on the tore, that is, the place of honor. – Is it Kikym?
- Why would he be staying behind the curtain till noon?- Kalisa replied in the same tune.- Has he married recently?
- So who’s there?
- Never mind, just kids!..
- All right, Kalisa! We’re in a great hurry... Have you got any kumis? We’ll taste it and leave.
- Why such haste?
- An urgent business, we have to visit the auls. I wouldn’t even have called at you but for one fact.
- Will the day ever come for you to stop making haste?- Kalisa said sullenly.- Nothing’s happened to make you hurry your horse, has it?.. Save the mark, there must be other ways to bend bais harder than before. Anyway, they can’t escape you. You can bend them an hour later. You can spend this very hour with me. Yerkin, you haven’t visited this house for ages. I’ve got a little jerked beef, as sweet as raisins. I’ve been keeping this meat in case you came all of a sudden. Sweat won’t have dried on your horses by the time it’s ready. No hard feelings – I’m not sure about the kumis. I’ve been on a journey. This kumis was made in some other house. They make it not my way. I think I’d better make you some dark red tea. Nosey and strong. It’ll as iridescent as costly fox fur!
- No doubt, you can treat us to a good dinner,- Yerkin answered.- Tea of this house is equal to meat by a different host. But the business is still urgent. I think we have to postpone the dinner... Till my next visit...
- Over my dead body! I’ll order dzhigits to unharness your horses. You won’t beat me, will you? Say whatever you wish, but I won’t let you go unless you try the treatment I’ve been keeping for guests of honor.
- Damn, you’re tough,- Yerkin sighed.
- We cannot but obey,- one of Yerkin’s companions surrendered,- Zhengei’s firm-tempered. We’ll feel damn bad if we refuse to try her food. We’d better stay.
- But not too long, not too long!- Yerkin answered.
- I told you – for an hour. Maybe I can do it quicker.
- Well, dzhigits, hurry up, unharness the horses and let them go and grass when they’ve dried a little!..
- Have you heard,- Yerkin said in a low voice,- your husband’s younger sister spoilt the whole thing! She spat the dzhigit she was said to have been loving since childhood in the face. She did something after which he’ll never come back.
- Where’s he?
- Gone...
Yes, I was mad at Burkut, I believed the photo album, and still I loved him. So he was gone, and there was no repairing it. Nestling against the pillow, I burst into tear. Both Kalisa and Yerkin could hear me sobbing.
- Just... a... sick baby,- Kalisa answered haltingly but still feigning indifference.- So where did Burkut go?
- What do you mean?.. He’s gone studying!! What on earth are you asking. The Russians have a saying – “Love cannot be forced”. What can he do if the girl he loves broke up with him... The militia can’t help him... He’s lost his hope. He doesn’t believe he. And he cannot wait any longer!
- Did he leave without saying a word?
- He gave me a letter. He asked me to deliver it if I happen to be in this aul. A letter for his girl. But I don’t know what it says. It’s the letter that made me take a detour, that’s why I’m sitting here now.
- Yerkezhan!- Kalisa called me in a happy voice.
- What!- I answered...
- Come here, don’t be afraid of anyone!
When I left my shelter, Yerkin gave an intent and angry look – “So that’s the ill baby...”
- Give her the letter,- Kalisa pointed at me.
When thing which cannot come true do, one can be bereft of reason. Either because of this or for some other reason, I came up to Yerkin resolutely, feeling by no means shy. He took the letter out of his bosom and stretched it out to me. As is being afraid that he could change his mind, I clutched at the envelope. Kalisa must have found my behavior unseemly. Glancing at me angrily, she passed her index finger over her left chick to denote surprise and disapproval, which Yerkin could not notice.
I was going to go to my shelter, behind the curtain, to read the letter.
- Do you want to hide from me and Burkut? What do you take us for? There won’t be any swearwords in the letter. You can read the rest, no matter what he wrote, out to us!
Having said this, Kalisa drew the curtain open. I stopped, taken aback, there was no place in the yurt for me to hide in.
- Read!- Kalisa demanded.
- Do the following, dear,- Yerkin joined in softly,- first look it through, when you are sure we can listen to it without feeling embarrassed, read it aloud!
I opened the envelope and looked through the piece of paper, both sides of which were covered with writing. It was clear to me that there was nothing about Burkut’s letter to hide from people, especially from the friendly Kalisa and Yerkin. But I failed to read out the letter.
I would have burst into tears at the very beginning, as my eyes had already welled up. I gathered what remained of my strength and could hardly say at giving the letter back to Yerkin:
- Agatai, read it out!..
The letter which Yerkin read aloud was about as follows:
“Bates!
In summer, when my whole life was in bloom, I was enjoying my journey around the calm and clear ocean, which people call love. It was not windy, there was no thunderstorm, but suddenly a dreadful wave rose from god know where, out of the blue, to swallow me, and I sobbed. As Kaken says, the day came for me to be knocked senseless like a fish hit by a ice cake. But you must know that you have nothing to blame me for, my conscience is spotless. I wonder how you could struck such a heavy blow. “When there is no wind, the grass does not ripple”, - the Kazakhs say. Perhaps you had a reason to do so. We needed to talk about it, to understand each other. But you withdrew, slamming the door. I should not have left, I should have come back to you... But shame, which was burning in me, did not allow me to do so. You should have killed me if you had a reason to do so... And why did not you say anything frankly. Even though you were disillusioned, could you not tell me?.. Can love tolerate violence? Who needs love, in which parties are not equal?.. I was thinking back then, she has nothing to blame me for, why shall I go on my knees then? Seized by rage, I got to the cart unconsciously and left. Now I am far from you. I still fail to find the reason why you broke up with me, I cannot explain your behavior. What am I to do? Shall I come back to you? If I do, you may be unwilling to talk to me. This would be double death to me. Which of us needs a life like this?
Having thought the whole situation over, I decided to go back to town to study. I believe myself to be the person who have stood every challenge you offered to me. You seemed to be the same kind of person to me, but you gave up the oath you had sworn when the crucial time came. Love is a responsibility to each of the couple, and you must stand by the oath which you have tried to break. It is beyond me to advise you on what you have to do for this. Think it over thoroughly and seek your friends’ advise, the advise of those who feels for you truly!.. Kalisa must be especially helpful to us!.. I was surprised not to find her in when I came last time!.. If there was someone to light the fire of enmity between us, I am sure it was not she! However, the fact that Kalisa went on a journey just when the situation was so unstable and turbulent to us, worries me!..»
- If I had known it could happen!- Kalisa burst into tears.
- Don’t, Zhengei, let me finish reading,- Yerkin shook his head disapprovingly and went on reading:
“...You do know Kalisa, Bates! Another one I trust deeply is Yerkin Yerzhanov. If you seek his advice, I think he will not spare his experience and his heart.
Yours with all my pure soul, your Boken”.
Those two words – “your Boken” seemed to bring my happiness, which I believed to be gone forever, back... I, who had died, was alive again, I, who had faded, was burning again. Clouds hanging over the sky of my life broke away, the sun rose, and, as Burkut put it, all my flowers were in bloom like in a shiny summer...
Kalisa shared my happiness. Her instinct of a woman told her that Yerkin could be more helpful than anyone else, so she turned to him:
- My dear! They’re suffering for nothing. Their quarrels are like pimples on a weather-beaten face. They are over after the first spell by a baksy. As soon as Burkut and Bates face each other, they’ll understand each other. What can we do to make them meet?
- I’ve been thinking about it much, Zhengei. But everyone loves whom he or she wants to love...Noone can interfere with love.
- This is true,- Kalisa answered,- does anyone have enough power to bind hearts of two people together? But many hearts struggle to get bound but fail... They drift apart in spite of their wish... Aren’t they kind of lovers we usually call unhappy ones. There are people who prevent them from uniting. And there are people who can help them unite. Am I right?
- You are, Zhengei!- Yerkin even laughed with pleasure, - You sometimes speak as beautifully as an akyn...
Kalisa felt some irony about Yerkin’s words:
- We aren’t going to compete in oratory here, my friend. I’m concerned with a different thing. We have to know who parted the young couple, as they truly love each other... – This is when Kalisa told him about the photo album and the pictures in it.
- So that’s it!- Yerkin grew thoughtful.
Kalisa suggested that they take Burkut to the aul, but Yerkin disagreed with her.
- So what shall we do?
Kalisa was looking at Yerkin intently, who, in his turn, was looking at me:
- I think the girl shouldn’t be staying in the aul after what happened. I believe she’d better go and study.
That was the recommendation I liked. But I did not know where I should go. I could not follow Burkut to Orenburg. Yerkin was the one to find a solution:
- First, you need to go to the Red Yurt. That’s where the volost establishments are now.
- Red Yurt? What is it?
- Have you seen the Red Caravan of Alibei Dzhan-gildin? It passed the place last year...
- I have... The caravan stayed in our aul for several days... They helped the starving with crops and meat, they arranged learning for orphans and released laborers from serving to bais. I even remember that there was a shop selling goods to the needy... Artists were performing and reporters were speaking... They told people about the Soviet government and explained its prescriptions...
- Well, Kalisa, the Red Yurt we are talking about serves to the same purpose as the Red Caravan, - Yerkin explained to me. – Of course, there is some difference. Noone is starving now, so there’s no food in the yurt. Goods have appeared in the aul, so the yurt’s not trading, But the rest is similar to the Red Caravan. The director of the Yurt is a woman, Asia Bektasova.
- A woman?!- Kalisa and I exclaimed unanimously with suspicion and delight.
- Yes, a women!- Yerkin said.- Nowadays the Kazakh women who used to see nothing but day-labor are turning into those who take part in the state service. Well, Asia doesn’t come from an aul, she’s a daughter of a worker from Kazalinsk. As a child, she used to learn some Russian. Her life was far from easy, but she turned into a beautiful and slender girl. A bai was seduced by her beauty and was going to make her his concubine, that is, tokal. He would have succeeded but for the revolution which took place at that time. The girl’s eyes unclosed to see many things. She joined the Reds and helped set up the Soviet government in her motherland. When the Soviet government defeated its enemies, she went to Tashkent and entered a one-year learning course. There she got assistance for learning the new Soviet laws, and she worked as an interrogation officer and then a judge. She’s recently become a member of the Board of the Supreme Court of Kazakhstan. That’s where they sent her to manage the Red Yurts...
Kalisa and I could not believe our ears... We were struck by the fact that common Kazakh women could become state officials.
In the meanwhile, Yerkin went on.
- The Red Yurt’s already functioning. It’s fighting bravely for the liberation of girls. Complaints from girls who were sold for the bridewealth, from women who were married off to people they didn’t love, from concubines, that is, tokals, are flooding the Red Yurt. Fathers and husbands are being summoned to the Red Yurt, and the complainers are being granted freedom.
- Do the hosts let their daughters and concubines go?- Kalisa asked suspiciously.
- In you uncurb them, they won’t, of course. But they aren’t more powerful that the law is. When they are being stubborn, the militia is called to help the women.
- Do they send militia men to everyone?
- We have enough militia men. There is a militia department in Sarykopa now. Its head is Naizabek Samarkanov. He’s got about forty militia men. It is not enough?
Kalisa found forty militia men to be quite a reliable defense for all women in the nearby.
- Anyway, we’ve drifted aside, - Yerkin said,- let’s come back to the main issue – is Bates going to study or not?..
- Oh, if only my parents let me go,- Kalisa heaved a sigh.
- If this was at their mercy solely, they wouldn’t, of course, - Yerkin was reflecting.- But nowadays the girl doesn’t have to ask her parents is she’s intelligent enough. She needs to put it frankly. The rumors about her dating Burkut are quite embarrassing, that’s not good. Now that there’s no stopping that gossip, why should she be staying at home?
- Of course, there’s not much fun about is!- Мне It seemed to me that even Kalisa was trying to pique me.- Bates mustn’t stay at home – she’ll be a thorn in everyone’s flesh. If will be far better if she goes... Moreover, as soon as we started revealing some secrets, let’s arrange the whole thing from the very beginning.
Saying this, Kalisa told Yerkin what happened to me the previous night.
- Now that you have Burkut’s letter, you needn’t die!- Yerkin waved the envelop he was still holding in his hands.
- I think you’re right!- Kalisa agreed.
- So,- Yerkin advised.- Go and study. Studying will open your eyes and help you live, as for love, you heart will tell you everything you need. So? Have you decided?
- I think she has,- Kalisa got ahead of me.
- Then you need to apply to the Red Yurt,- Yerkin insisted.
- We’ve been just talking about the militia ,- Kalisa remarked,- that’s good that we have. Father and Karakyz, especially Karakyz, won’t let you go easily. Scandals and quarrels are not the limit to it. It may come to fighting. Can you stand it?
- I can,- I answered.
- Will you reel back, will you go back upon your word?- Kalisa asked once again.
- I won’t reel back, I won’t go back upon my word!
- So write the application, Dear,- Yerkin rose to his feet.
- Can’t you help her write it?- Kalisa stopped him.
- Why help her? Let her write as she can...
And Yerkin left, forgetting about the treat offered to him, about the jerked meat and strong tea, which was iridescent like fox fur.
Kalisa still doubted my firmness, but I managed to persuade her that I had taken my decision.
- Well, I wish you a good journey!..
According to the Kazakh custom, I was to answer Kalisa with a “Let it be!” But I did not utter those words. Anyway, why say them aloud? Even though I have made up my mind to leave the native aul, who can tell me what kind of a journey I will have?
Fighting my own doubts, I took to writing the application. A modest sheet of paper! It was to lead me to the unknown!
Realizing what was happening to me, Kalisa left the yurt in tears.
MY KIND TEACHERS
The ancient saying – “Happiness flies away from the plays where quarrels live” – turned out to be true this time, too. Our house grew somber. Baibishe Karakyz, who used to be utterly severe and peevish even before, was constantly hissing at the rest of the family like a viper. She was finding faults with them and quarreling with whoever she could quarrel with. My mother, who had ceased to be timid in recent years and had been raising her voice quite often, became taciturn again. When Baibishe shouted at her irritatedly or even let her heavy hand touch her, Mother would stay as indifferent as a deaf-and-dumb one, being upset but my misfortunes. Perhaps she had already heard from Kalisa that I was going to leave. Anyway, she grew weak and pale. Sometimes we happened to be face to face, in such cases, her eyes were constantly shedding tears. Father, who usually spent spring at home, now turned his blind eye to what was going on in his family and was always inventing pretexts to go somewhere. Most often, he would mention the necessity to visit his brother Konyr-khoja, who, being accused of some crook religious business, had been imprisoned. I guess my father learned about my intention to hang in the otau; I also believe that the rest of my secrets, including my intention to o studying, were no secrets to him anymore. On the next day after Yerkin took my application away, father came home and started another trip without even staying for the night. Usually he stroke me before departing he smelt my forehead, but this time he did not even look at his daughter.
In the previous days, when there was no discord in our life, our house was always rife with guests, both from our aul or from some remote ones. But now they seemed to be gone with the wind, and even our neighbors were keeping away from our house, as if it was pox-infected.
In the previous day, every member of the family could find something to do, we would exchange jokes and hardly ever went to sleep before midnight. Now it was quiet and sad, and at dusk each of us dropped into bed. There’s a true saying – a murrain has seven brothers. Fear may have many eyes, but I remember clearly that dogs have never howled like this and cattle had never been as anxious in our aul as it was in those days. Broken sleep and uneasy dreams made all my relatives languid, sleepy, and peevish. My dear house, which used to be magic and dear to me, something like a cradle of gold, now looked like a grave which I was anxious to get out of.
Once at dusk, after each of us went to his or her bed without having supper or lighting the lamp, the aul dogs started barking wildly. “Why are they barking like mad”, I thought and strained my ears hard. Through the barking, I could hear horses galloping in our direction. My heart faltered – did they come for me?
Karakyz was listening to the stamping of hooves, too. When the horsemen came close to the aul, she lifted her body a little and said in a scared voice:
- Allah, who could it be?!
My mother, who was lying by the threshold, as always, grew anxious as well. Without saying a word, she came to the corner of the yurt where a battle lamp was hanging on the latticed called kerege and lit the lamp. We could hear clearly that a group of horsemen stopped before our yurt, surrounded by dogs that were still barking furiously. The had dismounted and were talking to each other in low voices. Anticipating unsettling news, Karakym pressed me firmly against her chest. Her rough hands embraced me so tightly that each of my bones seemed to crack, and my stomach turned upside down. Such holding knocked the wind out of me.
- Оuch, Karakyz, you can killed me!- I said beggingly.
About ten men entered the illuminated yurt simultaneously.
Among them, I recognized head of the region militia department, Naizabek Samarkanov, militia man junior Nurbek Kasymov, and chairman of the volost union of the poor Saktagan Sagymbaiev; the rest were unfamiliar to me.
- Baibishe, dress your child!- Naizabek nearly ordered to Karakyz.
- What child?- Karakyz did not stir a finger.
- The girl you’re embracing now.
- Why would I do this?
- She’s going with us to the Red Yurt.
- I don’t know what’s the Red Yurt you’re talking about!
- That’s where Kazakh women get liberated!- Saktagan explained proudly.
- What does my child has to do with it?
- She’s summoned there to study,- militia man Nurbek answered.
- Oiboi, what kind of law can make people study,- Karakyz insisted.
- Drop your talks,- Naizabek uttered severely,- we’re here by order of our great establishment. Besides, we have an application by your daughter. It states clearly that she wants to study.
- Did you write anything, Botash?- Baibishe asked me.
I said nothing.
- Silent doesn’t mean “no”, - Naizabek said. – How can she deny it? I have the application, which is written by her own hand, in my pocket.
- Let it be!- Karakyz said.- Even if it is written by her own hand, I won’t let her go.
- Why?
- She’s mine!.. Her father’s not at home. He’ll come tomorrow or the day after tomorrow and take her wherever she wants. I’m not going to entrust men cursed by heaven with my child... Prowling around the steppe, raiding auls...
Neighbors came into the yurt and started making noise to support Baibishe.
- Silence!- Saktagan shouted,- are you going to beat the government. Are you powerful enough to go against the law? Why on earth did you get so agitated? She’s not going to doom, noone means harm to her. Bates’ll be taken to the Red Yurt, why do you need to object?
- We can’t but objet!- Kishi-aga gave his small voice.
- Don’t interfere!- Kalisa, who was a stout woman, grasped her poor punch on the shoulders and dragged him out.
- I won’t give her to you!- Karakyz was holding me tight.
- You won’t give her to us?- Nurbek started pulling me stubbornly.- I tell you let her go!
But it was not that easy to open Baibishe’s rigid arms. I even shrieked with pain. Suddenly Mother came to help me. Cursing Karakyz, she clutched at her elbows. But the bulky Baibishe would not budge, she was as stable as a stone. My vexed mother rushed to the food chest, kebezhe, and took a long sharp knife.
- Now I’m going to cut your arms apart.
The threat proved to be efficient. Karakyz let me go and I fell after making the first step. Nurbek helped me stand up. Baibishe, who was most probably pretending, dropped onto the bed, breathing heavily, and showed the whites of her eyes to indicate a faint. Some old women from the aul started rubbing her head.
- It’s no use being stubborn,- Kalisa, who looked resolute, came to me, pushing the others aside.- We should free our Bates.
She knew where I had put the clothes I prepared for the journey and dressed me like a child. I was nearly collapsing with excitement and did not protests.
- Here you are,- Kalisa looked at me.
- So it’s time to go!- Naizabek said to me and his companions.
We all headed for the exit. Leaning on Nurbek, I left my parents’ yurt, too.
- Bates, you’ll have to ride, the horse is saddled for you, but we couldn’t find a tarantass, - Naizabek said apologizing.
Kalisa was going to start lamenting, as the custom was, but my mother interrupted her.
- Please, be silent, don’t even think of howling, you can beshrew the girl! It’s a long-wished journey. Have a good trip, Dear. – And she added, kissing me on the forehead: - If Kalisa wants, we’ll see you off together, if not, I’ll go alone...
- N-n-no, I... I... I’m not going!- Kalisa murmured weepingly.
- Why not?
- I’ve been hoping so desperately to see Bates happy...- Kalisa spoke hastily and breathily.- And now the hope’s vanishing, mist is around, black mist...
Kalisa was truly choking... Some were holding her by the arms, some were trying to comfort her... I had to go.
I do not remember mounting my horse. I heard someone say indistinctly: “Off we go!” I think one of my companions took the rein, I think another one embraced me delicately so that I could sit more firmly.
We have a custom... When someone feels sick, when someone loses consciousness, they spray water onto his or her face. The ill person feels better at once. I was riding on the outskirts of my consciousness and would have fallen out of my saddle if someone’s hands had not been holding me. Suddenly the steppe I was born in, the nature seemed to have mercy on me. I could feel cool drops of a short rain sprinkle my face, and soon I felt renewed, rested, and woken after a long sleep. My strength returned to me, and I drew the hand of my companion which was supporting me aside. I felt confident in the saddle and took the rein. But my companion would not yield to me.
- Give it to me!- I repeated obstinately, pulling at the rein.
- You give it to me,- the horsemen on my left said.
- What if she runs away?
- Let her run away if she wants, - we aren’t forcing her to go there. Why hold her horse by the rein? She wrote the application on her own, let her go on her own. If she denies her words, she can go home right now!
I tucked up the reins, sat straight in the saddle and asked my companions:
- Why didn’t you give me a kamcha?
- Yes, it’s embarrassing,- the one who was supporting me must a while before said. My eyes had already got used to the darkness, so I could recognize Nurbek. On my left, Naizabek was riding.
- So who’s riding first?- I said aloud.
- It’s me, Saktagan,- our volost administrator answered me.
The horse was pacing obediently along the paths puddled by the sprinkling. I came to notice the extraordinary beauty of this night in the steppe of Turgai. The southern part of the sky was clear and starry. It was shaded with thin feathery clouds which looked like lined with translucid muslin, while the northern part was covered with black clouds. Rapid lightnings were flashing their like a kamcha blow there from time to time. In between the clouds, towards the West, a white semicircle of the moon was floating, edged and bright... The night was filled with wonderful smells of the steppe. Grasses and flowers seemed to be giving all of their aroma to the fresh air. When I took a deep breath of this herbal infusion, I did not want to exhale anymore.
Four horsemen, the endless steppe, and the night...
As if intending to grab us and take away, an owl attacks suddenly from above and flies away just as rapidly.
As though to say – who are you, who are you? – ducks fly very close to us.
As though to give us a sign, to show that there is life even in the desert steppe, birds fluted somewhere in the nearby.
Sometimes, as we pass the lowland, where springs play or the horseshoe lake of an unknown river is preserved, plovers were crying tight over our heads. Perhaps they were afraid that we could crush their nestlings, so they flew in circles over us before their home sites were far behind.
Sometimes we could heard horses nickering or dogs barking at a distance, sometimes it even happened to be wolves howling, which was a sure sign to tell us that there were no auls in the vicinity.
However, there were no signs around to tell us where we were.
For a long time, we rode in silence...
- It’s boring, my friend!- Naizabek turned to Nurbek.- Maybe you can sing “Maira” lift our spirits?
- Well, I could... But if someone hears it, he’ll think – what’s this crank bawling in the steppe at night?
- Sing! Noone will hear you in these parts. There are no auls here. Even if we come across some travelers,- they’ll recognize you at once by your “Maira”.
- Don’t be stubborn, Dear!- Saktagan joined to Naizabek.
- All right. But I want Bates to help me! – Nurbek agreed.
- It’s up to her!
- Shall we began, then?- And Nurbek set his spurs into the horse, approaching me...
- You sing on your own!
I did not feel like singing with Nurbek at all, I even dislike the fact that he was riding at my side. But he went on without noticing it:
- I know your voice, Bates. Do you remember last summer? When the young were swinging on the swings, you warble the whole night through. You sang wonderfully. Let’s not be silent, let’s revive our spirits!
- Do it on your own if you wish!- I said rudely.
- Stop pestering the girl! You must understand. Sing alone!- Saktagan interceded for me.
Maira is my name, my father is Vali...
When I start singing, everyone can hear me,
My voice keeps ringing over the steppe,
When will a dzhigit take up my song?
Maira, I am Maira from the banks of the Irtysh,
Aira, raira!
My soul is singing
In the vast of the steppe
Hey!..
Nurbek was singing in his pretty thready voice. Singing away, he happened to be far in advance of us, while I suddenly burst into tears, which the others could not notice. Why? Let me explain.
Last winter, some business brought Nurbek to out aul. He was going to go back after a day, but his singing was so enticing to my landsmen, especially “Maira”, that they started asking him over, vying with each other, so he was delayed for a weak. People raised Nurbek so much for his singing that I wanted to listen to him as well to stand the pace. Unfortunately, I did not get the chance...
Baibishe Karakyz was the one to blame. A most extraordinary person! I still cannot fully understand her... Perhaps it was her ancient lineage or the role of a famous khoja’s senior wife that made her act like this, or maybe she found it unseemly to be light-minded in her respectable age, but most probably, she was naturally hard to budge. Anyway, I have never seen her spirits rise at hearing songs. Moreover, she would not let anyone play the dombra or sing in her presence. If she happened to be where songs were being sung and music was being played, she usually went home after a short conversation. Back in the days when I was Yerkezhan, I was fascinated by the dombra. But Karakyz would only scold me – don’t you dare call shaitan to the house, don’t ever show the rattle to me. Finally, she broke the dombra into pieces and threw it into the fire. Otherwise, I think, I could have become a good single or dombrist. I could remember melodies easily and had quite a big voice. But Baibishe Karakyz who turned into my step-mother when my own mother was still alive, protested violently: “You’re a saint’s offspring! In the whole of your clan, there haven’t been any unholy men like you. They’ve respected the spirit of their dead ancestors and wouldn’t befoul their lips, which said prayers. Songs are shaitan’s words. They say, when the end of the world comes, evil spirits will drive sinners to hell and make them sing songs. Forget this toy!”
This is how Karakyz threatened me. It was only shortly before that I joined girls and dzhigits on swings and girl’s meadows to sing together with the others, breaking Baibishe’s ban.
But she would not let me visit anyone if Nurbek was singing there, still trying to save me both from young dzhigits and from singing, while people were constantly inviting me and Kalisa. Dzhigits of the aul would come to bow to Karakyz, try to persuade her to be hospitable to Nurbek, but she was adamant and only yelled:
- Don’t you gammon me!
This is how it happened... In winter, when Nurbek stayed in our aul for a week, I did not hear a single song of his. And now the plangent melody of “Maira” was ringing in my ears. The song was truly wonderful. But what did me burst into tears?
Baibishe Karakyz! Not only bad things in my life, but only many good ones are connected with her. Back in the aul, she guarded me like a plover guards its nesting. She was there when I was born and when they put me into the cradle, and I think she was the first to kiss me on the forehead after my own mother. She had been at my side till that night. Even though she was bad-tempered and unfairly strict, but had she done me much harm? She had been growing me without letting me go out of her hands. But how did I express my gratitude, what did I tell her on that day?
Yes, I was crying, thinking about Karakyz and my own mother. When Karakyz was holding me tightly in her arms, being afraid of the militia , my mother threatened her with a knife. Does it mean that Karakyz was sorry for me and my mother was not? I thought of the fairy-tales Karakyz had told me.
Karakyz’s First Fairy-Tail
A cattle nomad lost his baby camel. Another cattle breeder found him and let the suckling feed on his camel. The real owner learned about it and started demanding his baby camel back. “No, I won’t give it to you. It’s my camel’s baby,- the man who had laid his hands on the camel. Then the two of them asked a bey to arbitrate them.
- Bring here the mother camels,- the bey said,- and mark the baby camel with red-hot iron in their presence.
When they started branding the baby camel and it started bellowing, the real mother darted to it, while the other camel stood with her eyes bulging.
- Now it’s clear,- the bey said.
Karakyz’s Second Fairy-Tail
Some parents lost their child. A childless married couple found him and raised him like their own child. The real parents found the child, but his foster family would not give him to them.
The two parties went to the bey.
Then the bey lifted his sword and said:
- I’m going to divide him in halves.
The steppe-mother agreed, while the real mother said:
- I’d rather he’s with strangers but alive...
...This is how I came to think of baibishe’s fairy-tales, after which I imagined my only brother, Seil, with great excitement. He, who has never parted with me since his earliest days, was at my side even at that night. When I was leaving the yurt with the militia man, Seil was sitting still on his bed, wearing nothing but a shirt. He looked very much like a gopher frozen by its hole ready to vanish in it. Why did he not start crying when they were taking me out of the house? Why did not her rush to me? What if he ran to the steppe, being scared by what happened? What was he doing now?
Thoughts of my father swept me down. No, he cannot think the way the Kazakhs say – a daughter is an enemy. He does love me in a way. By leaving, I shorten his life, pushing him towards his grave...
I could not stand it anymore and started weeping... Nurbek’s singing broke off.
- What is it, Bates?- Naizabek said in a brusque tone. I was weeping even harder.
- What’s wrong with you?- he was still trying to cajole me.- Stop crying at last. Are we taking you there by force? Wasn’t it you who ventured to take the journey? It’s the road of happiness. Double good is waiting for you – you’ll study and tie your life with that of the man you love. Instead of shedding tears, you’d better jubilate, as the Soviet government has opened the way to studying and to your beloved man to you, a Kazakh girl. A girl could be sold for cattle not so long ago... Even now...
- She’s thinking of her house and the family, - Saktagan sighed. – Is it surprising that she, who has never traveled alone before, feels shy and lonely now!..
- Nonsense, Sake,- Nurbek replied in an irritated tone, - you should be supporting her not upsetting. She already feel uneasy!
And he added, now turning to me:
- Forget your tears, Bates. You’ve started a good journey, why follow bad customs?
- What’s bad about it?- Naizabek objected.- Not only girls, but even dzhigits sometimes shed tears at parting with the auls they were born in.
- You’re right!- Nurbek replied.- I’ve shed enough during my first trip to Orenburg. But it’s in the past. Now we need to cheer up Bates. Singing failed us. Let’s try another method. As far as I remember, when people called Bates Yerkezhan and she was dressing like a boy, she would often take part in horse races. People have told me that at one of the baigas she outdid everyone and came to the karakshy pole first. Let’s have a little baiga now!
- If the horses don’t stumble in the dark,- Saktagan agreed.
- So Saken’s ready!- Naizabek said.- Let’s let our horses loose and have some racing! The horses were born and grew up here. They don’t care about holes and ruts if they don’t get into animal holes!
- Let’s start!- Nurbek was the first to start galloping forth.
I could already feel a fast trained horse under my saddle. His impatient nicker showed a true racer. He seemed to be white in the dark.
When Nurbek galloped past us, shouting “let’s begin” in his jingly voice, my horse perked up his ears to listen anxiously to the stamping. Suddenly, as if bitten by a dog, he darted aside and rushed forward, snatching on the bit. Saktagan and Naizabek entered the baiga, too. Either they were holding their horses back or my racer was lighter and hotter, but very soon I was far in advance. I outdid Nurbek as well.
Perhaps I had been missing horseback riding and the baiga, and my mood was that of despair. At first I did not let the horse loose by pressing the horse’s sides with my knees and holding the reins back. But then I wanted to try the racer’s real speed, and I lashed him on the croup with my kamcha. The racer flew like a bird. Head wind was whizzing me in the face and cutting my eyes painfully. I was carried so far away that I lashed him once again with a whoop.
- Fly on, my dear, fly on!..
As I turned my head back at full speed, I could hardly discern the dark silhouettes of the rest.
In the meanwhile, the racer, who most probably had already taken part in the baiga, was still accelerating. He did not obey to me anymore. My heads were to weak. I could not hold back the horse snatching on his bit, I could not stop his gallop. In a situation like this, the horseman would most probably try to drag the rein to one side, turn the horse in a curve and then get him pacing. So did I. But it turned out that the horse started climbing a hill or a tuffet instead of the even road...
At the same moment, I heard one of my companions who was galloping just to block my way:
- We’ve missed her. Gone. There’s no catching her now!
“Do they really think I’ve run away? –I thought. – What will they do if I do? But where will I go then? Return home? No, I can’t...”
Bending down to the saddlebow, I got my racer trotting, which cost me great effort, then pacing, and came up to my companions, feeling calm.
- We were worried, we thought you’d changed your mind,- торопливо Nurbek said hastily.
- Forget it, don’t say those unnecessary words. – Naizabek even got angry with Nurbek. – Bates isn’t mad! Why would she turn from the happy road she hose herself... Do you think she’s a child?
They kept cheering me up and comforting me... Perhaps this is what they aimed at when raising the subject of Kazakh women. Naizabek initiated the conversation, and long time passed before I joined it.
- In earlier days, the only one who could get a girl was the groom who had paid the bridewealth for her. Am I right, Saktagan?
- You are!
- Even if her father and mother start paltering and fail to give it to him?..
- This is right, too!
- But have you ever heard about a girl from our parts who went searching for her groom?
- So you think this has never happened not only in our parts but in the whole of the Kazakh steppe, don’t you?
- Right, Saktan!
- We’ve seen wives of bais lording the poor and day laborers with our own eyes.
- You’re telling the truth, Saktagan. So what?
- Now you tell me – have you ever seen a bai’s wife who got married but by means of the bridewealth?
- How could I see things which do not happen with our people.
- Don’t the Kazakh say that the one who wasn’t born as your son won’t ever be your son, the one you haven’t bought won’t be a slave in your house?
- I’ve heard the saying, Saktagan.
- So tell me – both a poor man’s wife and that of a bai bought for the bridewealth are slaves? Am I right?
- No doubt, you are...
- I don’t know when we, the Kazakhs, developed the custom of paying the bridewealth. I think it’s been inherited by young generations from the old ones since ancient times...And it’s only now that the Soviet government has been set up that there’s a law prohibiting it! But has the bridewealth been destroyed?
- It lingers. But now people sometimes use money instead of cattle to pay for their brides!
- There now... Think of what we should do to defeat this kind of bridewealth as well.
Instead of Naizabek, Nurbek answered the question enthusiastically:
- We should try them all!
- No, we can’t!- Naizabek interrupted him.
- Why?
- Because there’s not a single man in the aul who has never paid the bridewealth, my dear.
- What then?- Nurbek wondered.
- It seems to me the bridewealth will live as long as girl’s mind is blurred. Girls need to protest against the bridewealth, and this will be its end.
Saktagan agreed with Naizabek.
- But what should we do to make them conscious?
- We should teach them...
- It’s okay, but how long do we have to wait?
- You’re right again, Saktagan. We need years. As the Kazakhs say, agues come to us on horseback but go away on foot. Ignorance has soaked the people. I’m glad to know that the new time has come. That’s why Bates’s going with us now. It’s the beginning of her new journey.
Saktagan was moved and wished me a happy journey.
- I wish her the same,- Naizabek sighed,- but what you should remember that there are beginnings of journeys and their peaks. Roads are different, too. There are field paths with turns, hills, and cavities. There are smooth steel ways for trains. They always bring you to your destinations. But the roads you take in your life are not what they are. It’s difficult to tell in advance when they’ll fail you and where you’ll stay. You have to fight and know what you’re fighting for.
I liked Naizabek’s speech so much that I exclaimed:
- What a clever man you are, aga!
- Girl, do you know the word “compliment”? – Naizabek asked me with a trace of mockery. But I did not know the word, so he explained it to me:
- It’s when people praise each other in the face. Not always deservedly. But still I want to thank you. Thank you, dear! Do you want to think why I’m concerned about you? I serve to the Soviet government, so I have to see people and what they’re doing. During the years when I was chasing the basmaches, I happened to see the mountains of Pamir. On their tops, there is perpetual snow and glaciers.
...This made me think back and remember Pamir, our teacher had told me at a lesson...
- Don’t interrupt me, Bates. So, in the Pamir mountains, the old-timers told me about bearded vultures. These mountain eagles deposit their eggs right in the snow, where frosty wind blows. Like if they can stand the awful weather, it’s good. If they fail, let them die. But what’s even more extraordinary about bearded vultures is the way they teach their fledgelings to fly. They make them fly to the peaks. If they drop with fatigue, they make them fly to the steep slope again after a short pause. That’s how eagles temper their younglings.
- Yapyrai, marvelous!-we kept exclaiming.
- Why am I telling this?- Naizabek looked at me intently.- You’ve just stepped onto the road of your life, and many ascents and mountain passages are waiting ahead of you. They are no easier than those of the Pamir. Unless you get tempered by frost and heat, unless you learn to fly to the peaks, it’ll be difficult for you to reach your destination.
- Stop scaring the girl!- Saktagan interfered.
- Are you very scared, Bates?- Nurbek asked jokingly.
But I wasn’t scared at all. I felt grateful to Naizabek.
- Agatai-aga,- I addressed him respectfully,- I used to think of you differently. I saw you as an owner of a gun and a cruel man. I’m surprise to find out how many truthful and cordial words you keep inside.
- My dear, you’ve just repeated what our enemies, our class enemies, say about us,- Saktagan said bitterly.- For instance, what do they know about me? That I impose taxes and am severe to bais. They know nothing about my heart of a man.
- You shouldn’t expect your enemies to praise you, they’ll always curse you,- Naizabek said.
Saktagan agreed with him. Why did Nurbek, who did not participate in the conversation, asked Naizabek to explain to me the most essential thing in a word.
- Be firm, Bates! Then the Soviet government will stand up for you...
I promised to myself that I would never forget those kind words.
THE RED YURT
I had heard many times that the volost office was not far from our aul but had never chanced to go there. Now I was heading for the office for the first time.
...The night journey seemed to me to be infinitely long. We left the aul before sunset. Now dawn was about to break – the few clouds which had been traveling around the sky for the whole night now began to cover it, starts disappeared, wind grew heavier and started rustling in the grass, gray hazy colors replaced the thick darkness.
We must have got far from the aul. Our horses were galloping fast after the rest they had had. Sometimes we were as fast as during the baiga. Our destination was getting close to us with every minute. So many versts were left behind!
We ascended a little hill.
Looking around the gray step, I could not find a single sign to tell me that an aul was somewhere in the nearby. Where is the mysterious office, which should have already shown Are we lost?..
I wanted to ask my companions, but I kept silent – their tired faces looked pale and gray like the gray dawn of the steppe. One after another, they started yawning. I did not want to bother those tired, sleepy people with my questions. To tell the truth, I was exhausted due to my thoughts and the poor sleep I had been getting lately. Fatigue was taking over me, I could barely hold my eyes open, I started dozing off and hardly avoided falling off the trotting horse, by shaking a little to shake the sleep away.
Finally, a strange view opened in the lowland, on the other side of the hills we were passing.
Through the hazy gray dawn, lights were blinking here and there, and something dark was showing there, which looked like thick clouds. Fires? No, those were not fires at all. Straining my eyes even harder, I could see that there were even more lights than I saw at first I was about to ask my companions the question. But Naizabek seemed to read my thoughts, so he answered it before I did:
- We’ve reached the Red Yurt. Can you see the red flag on it? There are little flags on the rest of the buildings, too.
- The Red Yurt! The Red Yurt!- I repeated with relief and hope.
- Yes, it’s the Red Yurt. The volost offices are here, too... A little lower...
...According to the ancient custom, one must approach an aul without haste. Perhaps Naizabek was following the tradition, but it was more probable that he just wanted to let our hot horses have a rest.
- Let’s slow down!- He held back his horse, and we switched from trot to pace.
Naizabek started educating me again.
- Dear Bates!- He said deliberately, in a patronizing manner.- You shouldn’t be surprised. Please don’t think that the office is a town with streets and high buildings. Indeed, our life’s getting better. But the Kazakh auls, which have been nomadic for ages, haven’t become sedentary yet, especially here, in the Turgai steppe. If auls are nomadic, it means that establishments should be nomadic, too. Our offices move to the dzhailau, too. But in Sarykopa, near the Ushkun cooperative society, we started building large houses in spring. The basement for all governmental buildings has been laid. We’ll have a hospital, a veterinary clinic, a bath, a club, and a library.
Naizabek knew all numbers by heart, he remembered that there were going to be six rooms in the veterinary clinic, that the hospital was being built for fifty persons, that the club hall could host a hundred listeners at a time, and that forty men and women could bath simultaneously.
Whenever Naizabek mentioned a figure, I was amazed. I have never seen anything like that in an aul. Glad to impress me that much, Naizabek described even more marvelous things.
- Wait a little, dear! Many things are yet to come. Ushkun is the first center of culture in the Turgai steppe. The government will help people build themselves brick and wooden houses like the ones they have in the town. The government give them money, a loan. Have you heard the words? In this year only, the association has received about eighty thousand roubles.
Of course I had never heard about loans, and the sum of money seemed to me enormous.
In the meanwhile, we reached the Red yurts. The land near our Kyzbel has a characteristic feature. Sometimes the destination seemed to be very close. But one has spend long time on the road before getting there... This time it was like this, too. The hills were the reason. The red flags would hide behind them to show again, after which they suddenly disappeared for a long time.
- Agai, where does the hills of our Kyzbel begin and end?- I asked Naizabek.
- That’s the expert!- Naizabek pointed at Saktagan.
- That’s true, I’ve happened to accompany land-surveyors, now I remember each single hill and low spot. The upland of Kyzbel stretches from the East to the West for eighty three kilometers and seven hundred sixty two meters.
Nurbek laughed:
- What a man you are, Saka!.. You didn’t forget a single meter. Indeed, Saktagan’s memory is unthinkable. He won’t forget anything he’s heard or seen. He’s proved it many times. Ask him how wide the Kyzbel is.
- I’ll tell you. But I think Nurbek will laugh at me again. He’s light-mined. So try to remember it – forty one kilometer one hundred ninety meters.
Indeed, Nurbek burst out laughing:
- So its length is only twice bigger than its width?
- You’re right, Nurbek...
- Well, I am, but if so, why is Kyzbel called a girl’s body, and not a woman’s waist?
I guessed at once why Nurbek was smiling cunningly. The thing as that he was mocking at Saktan-ganoad. His wife was unusually fat, that’s why the tax collector took Nurbek’s joke personally.
- I don’t quite understand you,- he muttered.
- You think of it,- Nurbek flashed a sly smile,- can you find a woman, whose height would be only twice as much as her waist?
- Well, you’re such a mocker,- Naizabek interfered with the conversation for the sake of his colleague.- But bear it in your mind that people never give pieces of land, rivers, or lakes meaningless names... Isn’t it true that the Kyzbel looks to a traveler like the body of a girl having a rest when its hazy in summer weather?
- I’ve been to many places, I’ve seen mountains and valleys, hills and steppes. But I’ve never seen a nook to be so attractive to my heart, perhaps because that’s where I was born and grew up. What warmth it gives to us, our dear land!
I wiped my eyes, which were welled up with tears with my sleeve.
We were descending from the top of the hill to the lowland and could see crimson flags put up on felt yurts. In violation of the aul rules, yurts were arranged not in a circle but in long streets like those of towns.
The dim gray colors of sunrise were gradually being replaced by the sparkling dawn of the steppe. Clouds in the east of the sky flashed red. The flags on the yurt, dancing in the morning breeze, looked like parts of the large flag of dawn. The flag was rising higher and higher over the yurts and over the steppe of Turgai. A beautiful dawn was breaking over the Turgai land...
...I had never seen auls like the one which we were facing. Usually, the first thing to see in a Kazakh aul, no matter if it is rich or poor, is the cattle. It is either resting of pasturing, once can see flocks both within the aul and in the nearby. But here, apart from several horses tethered at some distance, there were no signs of cattle breeding.
- Don’t you find it strange, that there’s no cattle around the aul? Naizabek read my thought and looked me in the face smilingly.
- I do and I can’t understand it,- I answered frankly.
- Our mockers call it “paper aul”. Here, only papers pasture near each yurt...
- But what do they feed on...
- They visit their neighbors, moreover, their neighbors from other auls bring them something to eat. Shortly speaking, they aren’t starving...
- There aren’t even dogs to meet us with barking,- I complained.
But Naizabek didn’t like those words of mine.
- That’s a nice thing to regret!.. Are there not enough dogs ready to bite you...
For several minutes, we were riding in silence. Only when we had reached the first of the yurts, Naizabek spoke to me again:
- Welcome, dear Bates. Yerkin’s given me the task to take you to his family. Yesterday, he was on the road. I don’t know is he’s come back. But he said he’d inform his wife. Her name’s Barshagul. A kind and hospitable woman. Literate. She reads newspapers. They have two children... You’ll feel good there. As for you, Saktagan and Nurbek, you go to your yurts. I’ll take Bates there ion my own.
The top of the big yurt we came up to was still covered with the blanket. As soon as we held up the reins, a short woman with a nice-looking face came out to meet us. She had a spacious chapan made of silk over her shoulders, and her head was wrapped in a damask shawl with tassels.
- Are you in good health, Barshagul,- Naizabek greeted her and pointed at me,- this is your little sister, Bates.
Barshagul held the stirrup to help me dismount and kissed me on the cheek as if I were her relative.
- Is Yerkin here?- Naizabek asked.
- Not yet.
- Well, then I’ll go. The kids must be sleeping. Our Bates needs a good sleep as well.
According to the custom, the Kazakh women do not hold long conversations with men apart from their husbands. Observing the tradition, Barshagul did not answer to Naizabek and spoke to me directly:
- Let’s go, Dear.
It was gloomy in the yurt, the light could hardly pass through the blankets and felt. But I soon got used to the darkness and could discern the unknown house. From behind the curtain, silent snuffling reached my ears – the children were sleeping there. On the right, an iron bed with sheets hidden was standing. Trunks, several modest blankets, and pillows were heaped on a low wooden bench, which stood in the corner. The place of honor, that is, the tore, was covered with a blanket, over which a simple-looking mat was spread. Behind the white cheegrass curtain by the entrance, food and dishes were kept. A little clothes were hanging on the kerege lattice. Obviously, this made the whole fortune of Yerkin’s family.
“Well, Bateszhan, - Barshagul said to me, - It’s very early. Have a good sleep till everyone wakes up. I’ll make that vacant bed for you and draw the curtain closed”.
I went behind the curtain, took off my clothes, lay down, and closed my eyes, trying to fall asleep, which was to no avail... Scattered fragments of the recent events were floating in my mind, and I opened my eyes with a startle, staring into the semigloom. How silent the “paper aul” was. I could hear neither barking of dogs nor bellowing of cows, nor even bleating of sheep. Straining my ears in the silence, I can only discern the children’s breathing. I was half asleep with my eyes open when I suddenly heard someone stepping delicately.
A man entered the yurt, and Barshagul, who had been half asleep as I was, got up to meet him at once. They started exchanging phrases in low voices.
- So Bates’s here?
- Yes, she’s come.
- Well, how’s she?
- How do I know? To tell the truth, she looks sick...Either she got frozen at night or she’s upset...
The parents’ whisper woke the children, for whom it was time to get up, anyway.
- Ake! Ake!- they chirped at seeing their father, and their thin voices, one of which seemed to belong to a boy, made a cheerful crook. I could hear the father cocker his children. Of course, it was him, Yerkin. After that, someone started making noise behind the yurt, and I heard Yerkin said:
- You’ve been sleeping for a long time...
- Bates came at dawn,- Barshagul explained,- I wanted her and the children to have a good sleep... I got up before dawn, too...
- Then it’s time to get up. Make breakfast...
I began getting dressed as well, producing awkward rustle with my dress and feeling embarrassed because of people whom I knew very poorly.
When I came out from behind the curtain, Yerkin was not in the room anymore. Barshagul was surprised by the fact that I chose not to sleep longer. But Yerkin’s kids were even more surprised and even taken aback as they discovered my presence. There were two of them – a girl of three years, who looked very much like her mother, a four-year-old fat boy who reminded me of Yerkin. The little things hid their heads in the skirt of their mother’s dress.
- I didn’t want to bother you, you looked so exhausted. That’s why I didn’t talk to you, - Barshagul said. – I know where you’re going. Burkut’s already left our house. The poor youth was looking back worriedly. You’ve found a decent dzhigit for you, I wish you good luck. Agasy (this was the respectful way in which Barshagul called her husband, meaning uncle) said he’d send you after him. How much we feared that you could change your mind and not come. You’ve done the right thing, Bates! If only people in the aul did not know anything... But now that your reputation is spoilt, you’ve got nothing to wait for! You have to go without a delay...
Perhaps Yerkin was busy or he was lingering where he was on purpose to leave us face to face for more time... But the tea was long ready, and Barshagul invited me to try the treat:
- We can start without him, too...
Barshagul turned out to be a frank and heartful woman, polite and ingratiating. We fall into a talk, sitting by the white dastarkhan cloth covering the meal prepared. Barshagul told me about herself. The poor thing used to be the bride-to-be of a bai. He wanted to have her as his concubine, tokal, and had already paid the bridewealth. During the rebellion of Amangeldy, bai opposed the people’s leader and got the lead. Then his younger brother, another bai, decided to make use of his right – the bridewealth had already been paid! - and started getting on his high horse with Barshagul. But that was already the happy year, the year when the Soviet government was established in Turgai. By that time, Barshagul had met Yerkin, and she fled with him. She had been studying for nearly as long as I, but she had experienced much more! She was telling me in an excited voice about the liberation of the Kazakh woman.
Yerkin did not come back to the yurt alone. A beautiful young woman dressed in the townish manner came with him. When I raised to my feet to be polite, he touched my forehead with his lips as an elder relative according to the custom. “This family welcomes me like its member,” – I thought with a warm feeling of gratitude.
- Here’s your elder sister. Her name is Asia Bektasova,- Yerkin introduced me to the woman,- she’s the hostess of the Red Yurt.
- Nice to meet you, Sister Bates, nice to meet you!- Asia stretched out a hand to me. – We called you here after receiving your application. All of us want you to take the good way.
Another person came to join us at tea. I recognized him at once, the teacher of my childhood, Balkash Zhidebaiev. He was accompanied by a young woman, his wife. Balkash loved me, as U was his first pupil, and greeted me just as he used to do when I was at school:
- Hello, Bokezhan, are you in good health?
He did not let me raise to my feet, as, according to him, the Kazakhs must not shake hands at the dastarkhan.
Balkash was placed on the tore – the place of honor, and Zhanyl, his wife, made herself comfortable closer to the door, by the lower end of the dastarkhan. Sipping at the tea, Balkash took a soft baursak from the cloth, munched on it and began a conversation:
- Sometimes an old crock becomes an ambler. Many of us lacked studying when we were young. Now we have to compensate for what we missed. Two years ago, I entered the institute for teachers in Tashkent. Now I’m already in the third year. I’ve decided to earn for a living and be useful to my landsmen during the summer holidays – I’ve been teaching the illiterate for about a month. Time’s approaching when I’ll need to go back to the university. But having heard of your coming and your intention to study, I lingered here deliberately to take you along. You was my favorite pupil, and I’ve promised to my comrades, Asia Bektasova and Yerkin Yerzhanov, that I’ll help you in every way...
- Oh, how nice it would be for you to go with Balkash,- Asia said in a hopeful tone,- you don’t know the roads meant for long journeys yet. Now you have a companion. he’s not accidental, not the first comer, he’s a teacher. He taught you and took you children to heart. Balkash promised to us that he would not only bring you to the town. He’ll help you enter the institute and find a room for you to live in, won’t he?
- I will,- Balkash answered. - Bates is my favorite pupil, if I don’t help her, whom will I help?.. Anyway, we’d better set off as soon as possible, without delay...
Balkash gave Yerkin a speechful look.
- We have horses,- Yerkin shook his head,- But unfortunately, Kostanai is far away and hard to reach on horseback, especially when there’s no suitable place to stay for the night. Can one get a damn cart here?.. There’s only one way out – to wait for the carcass of my cart to be delivered from Sarykop. It broke down, and the craftsman promised me to fix it soon. When it’s delivered, you can set off.
Listening to the conversation between Yerkin, Balkash, and Asia, I thought to myself, “They’re setting everything without even asking me questions. What is I get stubborn and say that I’m not going anywhere. What will they do to me?..”
...After tea, Asia took me for a walk along the settlement.
In the daylight, the “paper aul” looked less festive. I counted twelve yurts. They were arranged in a way to make something like two auls, one of which was bigger and the other one smaller. I could see flags on the yurts which were close to me only. On the most festive of the yurts, a large crimson flag was fluttering. Its entrance was decorated with wide stripes of red fabric with slogans written on them. That was the one to for which Asia and I headed.
- In a manner of speaking, we have two auls here,- she explained to me.- In one of them, the bigger one, volost offices are situated, while the second one is the aul of our Red Yurt.
- So how many yurts do you have in your aul?
- We have six. The large white yurt with a flag on it is the Red Yurt. In it, girls study before noon. They learn to read and to write. They are already ad many as forty. In the afternoon, trials start there. Our student live over there, in the yurt made of white blanket, on our right is the yurt of judiciary workers. Can you see another yurt, a dark one?.. That’s the kitchen. And the brown one standing separately – there’s no coming up to it –is a provisional prison...
Prison! The very word scared me.
- Yes, Bates, it’s a prison!- Asia’s face grew severe, and her voice became firm.- What shall we do to criminals who don’t observe the law? That’s whom the court sentenced to imprisonment. You can see what the punishment of our court is like. Though today there’s no meeting at the court, there will be trials on several civil and criminal cases tomorrow in the afternoon ...
To me, a girl from a remote aul, it was not clear, and Asia explained to me the difference between civil and criminal cases patiently:
- For instance, if someone’s indebted with money, it’s a civil case; but if it comes to raping, fighting, or murdering – it’s a criminal one...
...We came very close to the Red Yurt. Asia stopped to listen.
- Wait a little, it looks like there’s noone there, I can’t hear women talking. They must be in the dormitory revising their homework. Let’s go there.
Girls were sitting around a long wooden table in the middle of the room. Some of them were reading, the rest was writing.
When we entered the yurt, they rose to their feet to greet Asia.
- Sit down!- she said to them.
They took their seats noisily but did not come back to their books and notebooks. They were staring at me so hard that I felt embarrassed. It seemed to me that they were well aware of my misadventures and were thinking to themselves, “That’s what Bates, about whom gossip is spread in the auls, looks like”. But Asia said in a simple and hearty manner:
- For some of you, she’ll be an elder sister, for some – a younger one.
And she announced my name.
Perhaps I had not been mistaken, as the girls began studying me even with greater interest. Apparently, Asia did not like the tactless way they were staring at me, and she, as if trying to protect me from unnecessary questions, gave a brief account of what had brought me to the Red Yurt.
- You sit down, Dear, meet your peers.
But I was still standing, hurt by their unfriendly interest. But maybe I was not actually right? Who are they, those forty girls like those from a Kazakh fairy-tail? At first sight, they made a strange impression.
Being brought up in obedience to the strict rules of the aul, I disliked the girls’ dresses, which I found too light. Would a young Kazakh girl dare to wear it in an aul? As she tries to wrap her body as tight as to make it look flat like a board. Trying to save apperances, a girl tries to make her bosom unnoticeable. She only takes off her sleeveless bosom camisole before going to sleep. How can she show off her breasts! But those girls were wearing light skin-tight dresses without the slightest embarrassment. Could it be a new custom I had never seen anything like that! No, it could not be a custom! I found it merely shameless!
Another fact surprised me greatly. Many girls were far from being young. People say that in the family of Zhagaibaily-Zhannasy, who live near Orenburg, daughters get married no earlier than after thirty. They also say that this makes girls have babies without husbands. Are there any of the kind here?..
Asia seemed to notice the unfriendly glances which we were exchanging.
- Do your homework,- she said to the girls,- we’ll have another walk around the aul. Let Bates know that our routine is, what we’re doing here. It’s the first time she’s undertaken a long journey. Who knows, maybe soon she’ll be working in one of the red yurts...
But this time our tour around the “paper aul” was a short one.
- Apai! What if we go home?- I suggested.
Asia was surprised
- I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night,- I explained,- moreover, the night before it was an anxious one. Not long ago, I didn’t feel like sleeping at all, but now I feel that I’m exhausted.
- All right, let it be! I’ll see you off.
She went on educating me, telling me about the struggle in the auls, the new women... but I turned deaf ear to Asia’s words. My thoughts were occupied with a different subject. I seemed to myself to be a bustard that used to live in the vast steppe. And now the wind of fate has driven the bustard from its home land to the lake called Red Yurt. But who has ever heard of a bustard living by the lake or seen one do so? Will it survive there? Or will she be swallowed by the waves, being unable to swim?
...I did not notice how we came to Barshagul’s yurt.
- Have a rest, sleep for a while? Of course you can!- the hostess said hospitably.- I’ll cover the top of the yurt with a blanket and turn over the felt at the bottom. Let a light wind blow here. We’ll draw the curtain closed. I’ll have no mouse run past you, no fly buzz here. As you know, there’s no cattle in the aul. There aren’t any dogs, either... Children will be playing in another yurt. We’ve got no noisy idlers riding about...
Barshagul made a bed for me. I undressed and got into it. My soul was like the spring sky over my mother land. It is an amazingly changeable sky – all of a sudden, clouds cover the pure azure to drift away just as rapidly. Clouds never linger on one and the same place. They are constantly moving. Sometimes they sprinkle spits of light rain, sometimes they start a rapid downpour, sometimes they pass low, looking menacingly, but do not shed a single drop. My thoughts and flimsy dreams were changing as fast as that sky. Once I felt heavy-headed, then I fell half asleep to get up, woken by a subconscious fear. I saw some scattered fragments of sophisticated dreams again, I was seized by ridiculous, vague, and anxious thoughts. But more and more often I felt cordial warmness which I had never felt before and which my new friends and teachers emaciated. The sweet militia men, Naizabek and Nurbek, tax collector Saktagan, my old acquaintance Yerkin and his wife Barshagul, the hostess of the Red Yurt Asia... There was something common, lucid about the way the looked, the way they took care of me...
This is how my thoughts were replacing each other, and quite much time had passed before the distant voice of Yerkin calling his wife broke my half sleep. Then I heard some fragments of their conversation:
- Has Bates got up yet?
- I don’t know, I haven’t entered the yurt yet.
- What about dinner?
- It’s ready. I’ve put out the fire and closed the pot tight so that the meat could stay hot.
- Then, I think, it’s time you woke Bates up.
- I’ll have a look at her. But if she’s sleeping, I won’t wake her up. Let her have some proper sleep.
- She’ll have enough time for it. The day’s approaching its end. If she sleeps much in the daytime, she’ll get a headache. She’s had nothing but her morning tea. We must give the girl something to eat, she's sure to be starving. Do wake her up.
Barshagul had not even cast a glance behind the curtain when I started to get dressed.
- So you’re getting up on your own,- Barshagul was glad to hear the rustle of my dress.- Yerkin told me to wake you up.
By dinner, many guests had gathered in the yurt. Among them, I recognized Asia, Naizabek, Nurbek, and Saktagan. I did not dare even to greet them aloud, not to mention shaking hands. like any Kazakh girl from a remote aul, I was only moving my lips to answer the greetings.
- Come here, my dear!- Asia had me sit down at her side.- Here’s our Bates.
I could feel piercing curious looks on me again, like those of the girls from the Red Yurt, I dropped my eyes and thought bitterly, “Are you going to eat me or what?”
A dzhigit I did not know brought a wooden plate covered with a white dastarkhan cloth into the yurt and stopped on the right of the threshold, next to Yerkin. He took off the cloth, spread it, and put the plate with steaming meat onto it.
- Dear guests,- Yerkin said with a humorous grimace,- you are well aware of the fact that there are no sheep in out aul. I would like to recite the words by Windbag Asaubai of the Kanzhigaly clan:
If you have a lamb, slaughter it for eating!
A lamb is enough for a dozen of guests.
Slaughter it, you will have something to teat your guests to...
And eat yourself, while if you do not slaughter it,
It is doomed to die, anyway.
We have it a different way! Bates came to our house, and we decided to make a treat for her according to the custom. Unfortunately, we failed to find a lamb... It’s awkward, but what can we do to it? We had to buy this one-year-old goat and slaughter it for our guest...
- Never mind, Yerkin,- one of the people I did not know said,- she’s very young yet, this treat will do.
I cast a glance on the plate. The goat flesh was fat. Barshagul had cooked it without cutting it into pieces. The meat was not overcooked, instead it was done to a turn. The sauce which Zhengei had prepared looked tempting, too. Mountain onion, the spicy odor of which resembles that of garlic, was mixed with wild carrots, which grow in our sands. Some wild potatoes must have been added to the sauce as well. Our onions, carrots, and potatoes are extraordinarily large. Onions can be the size of a sheep pastern, a potato bulb can look like a guck egg, and a carrot can be too large for one’s hand to clutch. We would often bake carrots and potatoes in embers. If you boil carrots in milk, you will get a sweet drink resembling kaimac. What can be more delicious than young flesh, especially lamb with sauce into which all these dainties of the mountains and the steppe are crumbled...
But this time, I was not tempted even by the most mouth-watering odors. I took a small piece of meat reluctantly and ate it with great effort. Though I was being regaled with great diligence, I hardly touched the food and did not participate in the conversation.
The dinner did not last long. The guests left before the sun set, and I went to bed again, complaining about headache.
When it started to get dark, we heard girl’s singing, laughter, and noise, voices of young men from near the Red Yurt. In the “paper aul”, the youth had a funnier way of playing than in a usual one. I guessed at once that girls and boys were swinging on swings. This used to be my very favorite game when I was believed to be a boy called Yerkezhan and continued to be it after I turned into a girl. However, Baibishe did not very much approve of my passion for playing, but she always allowed me to swing on swings. Can there be any young people, I thought back then, who wouldn’t like the fun?
Now everything was different... I was so tired, exhausted, that I did not feel like having fun; the singing and laughing, the noise from the Red Yurt merely irritated me, so I tried not to pay any attention to them. They invited me to swing on the swing, but I pretended to be sick and refused to come. Soon I fell asleep.
...I woke up at hearing children cry and shout. Though the yurt was covered with a blanket as it was before, sunrays got there through the open door – it was already noon. The sound sleep and the hard thoughts made my head swivel. Barshagul’s kids were making noise. They had been playing and ended having a fight. The younger one – I noticed the previous day that she was quite a tease – bit the elder one on the hand, forcing tears from his eyes. Being scared by the fact that her brother could dust her jacket in retort, she started weeping as though she had already got some beans. I used to play with Kaken like this and, just like this spry little girl, I would burst into tears after beating my elder sister! Marvelous time of fun and pranks, you will never be back! Only Barshagul’s daughter repeats my trick, which is not extremely artful!
Hearing her children cry, the mother, who had been busy about the house near the yurt, came running to them. She even got angry:
- God, these children won’t let Bates have proper sleep!
- I already woke up myself, agai!- I reassured Barshagul,- I’m going to get up and wash my face.
- Fine, my dear!.. Asia’s just come. She’s inviting you for tea.
Barshagul took me to Asia’s house. To please me, the hostess of the Red Yurt had invited girls and women. About ten people had come. Everyone was studying me with the same interest as before.
On the dastarkhan, ruddy patties were showing fresh cheese with drawn butter poured over them. This is one of my favorite dishes. Today, I felt much better – I was not sleepy, the headache was over, the body pain after horse-riding had vanished. I gradually got used to the new atmosphere. For the first time in two days, I was really hungry.
But alas! The surprised glance of women hurt me again, and sudden hiccup prevented me from taking the patty, at which my eyes had been looking so greedily. I was smelling the delicious odor but could not eat properly. They were trying to make me eat. They were giving me tea. Finally, Asia said in a sad voice:
- My poor girl! How are you going to live? If it goes on like this, you can die of starvation! Pleas have a patty!
After tea, she invited me to the Red Yurt to look at the girls studying.
- I’m not forcing you, it’s up to you,- Asia said.
But I agreed gladly.
Those were the very girls I saw the previous day. This time, the teacher turned out to be Asia herself. Before the lesson began – maybe they had turned it into their tradition or Asia did it specially for me – the girls sang “The Internationale” anthem in chorus. It was the first time that I had heard it performed in chorus. All the forty girls joined Asia to sing harmoniously. Then they declared the following lines melodiously:
A poor man and a laborer is are close-knit family; send fat bais and mullahs away with your lash!”
The girls were looking at me smilingly... It seemed to me that their message was - “And you’re one of the daughters of a bai like this...”
First, they had a political awareness lesson. It goes without saying that I had never chanced to be present at such lessons and, to tell the truth, I did not really like the animosity and even hatred with which Asia was speaking of bais and the way she was bleaching over the poor.
During the following two lessons, Geography and Natural Science, I was listening to the students’ answers and realized that the girls’ knowledge was far poorer than mine. After the third lesson, Asia recommended that I should go to the yurt to have a rest:
- Right after dinner, we’ll have a court session. It’ll be useful for you to be present. The lessons you’ve just heard were bookish, while the lessons you’ll learn at the court will be that of life.
People who had gathered by the Red Yurt were rather numerous. Those who were especially curious made a hole in the blanket to look through it with one eye. Others were looking from under the kerege.
- What do you need here? Have you never seen people or what?- a dzhigit shouted angrily, coming out to the crowd.
Court secretary Salmen came. He was holding a cardboard folder with a heap of papers in it. After him, a ridiculously man who looked like a giraffe came. His skin color made him look like African. His appearance was rather menacing.
Asia introduced me to him:
- This comrade is secretary of the volost committee of Kosshi Union (the Union of the Poor), people’s assessor, and his name’s Buzaubak,- she said.
After that, a woman of about forty years, wearing a kerchief, entered. She turned out to be another people’s assessor and head of the volost women’s department, Kukshan.
I thought of my grandfather, who used to say when talking to other old men, “Bad times have come – sand’s turned into stone, slaves have turned into leaders, cows have become more expensive, and women have become judges!” It seemed to me that he meant noone else but Buzaubak and Kukshan.
Buzaubak took the place on Asia’s right side, while Kukshan sat at her left. Asia rang a bell. Everyone stopped talking. Asia’s countenance was serious, and she was speaking in a brief and clear manner.
Militia men, whom people of the aul believed to be the highest authority, were as quiet as lambs here. One of them was standing by the door holding a rifle, and another one was taking people in and out on Asia’s order. Very many people had gathered in the yurt. Accused people and witnesses in various cases were present here as well as total strangers.
I did not understand everything that was being said during the trial.
When I came across an article in “Aiel-Tendigi” about polygamy being subject to prosecution, I merely laughed. But now I could see with my own eyes that the law existed and that those who broke it were punished. Kushukbai Ishykbaiev, a man of about fifty, potbellied, swarthy, and clunky, used to come to visit us... Now I learned that he had proposed to a second wife. The militia man dragged the fat Kushukbai in easily, his young wife, a very good-looking girl of about sixteen to seventeen years was following him, looking embarrassed. Asia began the investigation:
- Did you marry him of your own accord?
- Y-yes...- the young woman answered haltingly, in a voice trembling with excitement. It was hard to understand whether she was simply confused or afraid of the court.
A gray-bearded old man wearing shabby clothes was listening to what the young woman was saying with breathless attention.
At the beginning of the court session, one could believe the girl to have agreed to marry Kushukbai instead of having been forced by her father.
But the further Asia investigated, the more confused the whole thing got. The defendants were lying through their teeth. Not only the court, but even I could understand this. Whatever they said, they did it haltingly. The girl’s daughter said that he had given his daughter to her groom himself. At the same time, Kushukbai claimed to have kidnapped the bride, as her father would not give her to him, moreover, he said to have kidnapped it “with support from the Soviet government”.
The testimony of witnesses were just as controversive. As for the young woman, her universal answer to every question was “yes’. She was too scared to understand what the court was about and what she was supposed to do or say. When People’s Assessor Buzaubak asked her “Is it true that your father married you off by force?”, the answer was positive, too.
During the break, Asia asked the young woman to stay and asked her questions. Finally, the young woman made a clean breast of having been married by Kushukbai against her will.
The court held that she and Kushukbai get divorced.
They took to the second case. In the previous year, Mullah Kudaizhar left his wife and petitioned to the court, claiming that he would disavow her. During the investigation, he was referring to the Koran and saying that he had made up his mind to live wifeless by the prophet’s order. The court granted a divorce to the married couple, but half of the mullah’s property was adjudged to the wife.
Actually, the story was as follows. The mullah’s brother, a young man of twenty years, died, leaving a widow. Mullah decided to marry his sister-in-law, but she would not agree. The aksakals interfered, forcing her to agree.
This was the first reason why the mullah disavowed his senior wife. The second one was that the mullah wanted to avoid extra taxes.
After the severance, the senior wife had a son by that very mullah. The mullah was terribly jealous of his second wife. If she dared to speak to somebody, she ended up beaten. During one of the fights, the mullah gouged out his wife’s eyes with a lash.
The injured wife of the mullah decided to submit a complaint to the people’s court.
The mullah was about sixty but looked sprightly, he was a black-bearded and red-cheeked man as fat as a pig. Now he was being tried for the second time.
- If you left your second wife, where did she get the baby?- Asia was asking him severely.
- I... I don’t know...- the mullah was murmuring stumblingly. He was lying, he got confused, he faltered at realizing that he was in an awkward situation and blushed.
I thought to myself, “Such a respectful-looking man lying!”
The court held that the mullah be sentenced to compulsory labor with conveying a certain part of his cattle to the government and giving some part of his property to his wife.
Case three. A Shoknyt was employed by Kodybai to pasture his sheep as a boy of eleven years. He was pasturing those sheep till he turned thirty five. Then he married a poor man’s daughter and paid the bridewealth according to the tradition. After Kodybai died, Shoknyt worked for his son Sasykbai. Shoknyt and his wife Domalak had three daughters and two sons, They lived together for twenty years. Then Shoknyt’s wife died. He married off two elder daughters. It was only his eight-year-old Balbota and a ten-year-old son Kenzhegara that stayed with him. As for his elder son, Shulgau, he was working for Sasykbai as well. A communist acquaintance of his took Kenzhegara to town to study. By the age of fourteen, Balbota had turned into a beautiful girl.
Sasykbai had three wives. One of them was the wife of his late brother. Still unsatisfied, he wanted to marry another young girl.
So the all-mighty Sasykbai forced the under-aged Balbota to sleep with him. Resisting him was out of the question, and so Balbota became Sasykbai’s fourth wife. Very soon, Sasykbai got fed up with Balbota. Her life was hard. Everyone was oppressing her. After a year, her brother Kenzhegara left school and came to the volost as a Komsomol Committee secretary.
Wiling to release his sister from the trap and demand a reckoning for his father’s labor of many years, Kenzhegara filed a petition in the people’s court.
Sasykbai had brought numerous witnesses. They all seemed to be hand-picked, as every one of them was extremely fat.
Old Shoknyt did not dare to say a word against Sasykbai during the trial. It is natural. He had been his slave for fifty years, and it was hard for him to act against his lord, especially taking into account the situation, which was new and strange to him.
Kenzhegara stepped forward. He was speaking in a clear and distinct way, but his voice was indignant.
- My father has been a slave for fifty years, my mother was a slave and died, being unable to stand the blow. My brother Shulgau is twenty eight now. Since young age, he has been working for Sasykbai without getting a rap for his honest labor. As for me, I’ve been pasturing sheep and lambs for Sasykbai since I was five. Look at my sister Balbota! You can see the state she’s in. It’s due to our labor that Sasykbai grew rich. In our whole life, we haven’t received a thing from him! We’ve been feeding on pathetical pittances that only dogs can be satisfied with!
Then Balbota was speaking. She said:
- Bais like swearing by gods and prophets and whoever. Look at me – Sasykbai hasn’t been generous enough to buy me a dress! All he can do is beat me cruelly. My body is always bruised! I’m black and blue now, look at me! – saying this, Balbota pointed at the crimson spots one could see through her shabby clothes.
The court held that half of Sasykbai’s cattle and property should be given to Shoknyt...
There is a story about a man who saw an unusually big baby camel in the old days and exclaimed, “What are his parents like, then?”. So I thought, if the Red Yurt is handling such cases, what is the scale of greater establishments in the distant towns?
However interesting it was here in the “paper aul” by the Red Yurt, I still wanted to leave as soon as possible. As the saying goes, fear has many eyes. It always seemed to me that any person looking at me believed me to be a shameless godless girl that had left her mother aul and her parents.
Soon, I had an opportunity to leave. In the evening of the third day, a tarantass came to the Red Yurt. The one which Yerkin had promised to have repaired in the commune, Asia invited me for the night, and in the morning we were to set off when it was still chilly. My companions turned out to be Teacher Balkash and his wife Zhanyl.
Before I left for Asia’s house, Yerkin sent Barshagul away from the yurt, ordering her to stay somewhere in the nearby and to prevent anyone from entering the yurt.
- So you’re going, dear Bates! Haven’t you changed you mind?
- Of course no!
- My first wish is to say – let your journeys be happy, as the custom is.
I thanked Yerkin.
- Listen to the second thing I’ll tell you. According to the tradition of our nation, an elder brother and his sister should be respectful to each other. It doesn’t matter that there’s no direct kinship between us. Now we are like members of one family. I want you to see me as one of you closest and most honest relatives.
- I will, I’m very happy, agai!
- Then, dear sister, I have something to discuss with you as a relative...
- I’m listening to you, again...
- I’m very attached to you, I feel for you, Bates! No I’m going to try and explain you the whole thing... Burkut is my class enemy. His father Abutalip and me have been enemies for the whole life. Even though Burkut took his own way in spite of his father’s will, a son is a son. No matter how hard a son quarrels with his father, they won’t ever wish death to each other...
I thought of my father and heaved a sigh.
- You see now!..- Yerkin understood me at once,- You thought of your father with affection, didn’t you?
I turned my face away and started crying.
- Don’t cry, Dear! Tough it out! We’ve got so little time. Listen to me, Bates!
Yerkin’s words poured oil on the troubled waters, and I wiped my tears away with my sleeve.
- We’re talking about the son and the father!- Yerkin went on.- Shortly speaking, about Burkut and Abutalipе. Abeu is an enemy of the laborers, a class enemy, as we call it... Our government, the Soviet government, will be fighting such enemies till the end, it’ll deprive them of all means they’ve been using to exploit the workers. If they want to work by the sweat of the brow, we’ll give them the opportunity. If they dig in their heels and resist us, we’ll punish them. It’s hard for you to understand the whole thing at once, Bates! – Yerkin made a pause. – Class struggle is a difficult thing. It’s not easy to understand. One has to learn from life for a long time. I’m not going to teach you political awareness, I’m telling it by the word. How do you expect me to treat Burkut if I believe his father to be an enemy?
- They say you treat him in a friendly, well-disposed way.
- They’re right! He’s going her own way, not that of his I like him, and I like you as well, for Burkut loves you. I’m glad to know that you want to be independent and self-sufficient. I know you’re devoted to Burkut and love him... Some unknown, unkind people are exciting enmity between you, pushing you apart. Now you’re trying to tie the thread cut again. I do wish it to never break again.
- Thank you, agai!- I answered to Yerkin.- But, to tell the truth, it’s not that easy to tie the ends together. Until I find out who made the album, until I believe that Burkut is not guilty – I don’t want to tie them together. Partially, what made me undertake this journey is the wish to find out the truth about the photos. If only he turns out to be innocent! Then we’ll find a solution. Well if he’s really like this – I don’t need either to study of to live... I don’t need anything...
- Don’t hurry, don’t get confused. Just make sure. The you’ll stop hesitating. Give me your hand, Dear. I feel that everything will be all right!
Yerkin shook my hand warmly and with great force.
- Naizabek and Nurbek are going with you tomorrow,- he said.
I was surprised – why?
He explained to me that the steppe had grown anxious lately, that bais were going mad like male camel. Unless they are kept in awe, they will attack people and kick them with their legs and will not even scruple to bite them to death. Kostanai is far away. There are absolutely deserted stepped and lowland on the way as well as hills and birchwoods. The relatives of your groom or some other enemies – who knows? – can be lying in wait for you to attack you unexpectedly. Believe me, one can’t do without armed people on this road...
- God forbid,- my voice trembled, - but tell me, agai, can two militia men defend us?
- Do you know the Kazakh saying about the muzzle of a single gun embracing a hundred people? If there’s a firefight, Naizabek will cope with a hundred people. Once he faced armed basmaches in the mountains of Pamir. What did he do?! He accepted the battle, he didn’t give up and killed many people. At the moments of danger, his heart turns into a stone, and his gun never fails him. He’s a hunter, and people say him to be able to shoot a wild goat in the eye.
...That is what Yerkin and me were discussing face to face. Dusk was coming, and Zhengei Barshagul took me to Asia.
The hostess of the Red Yurt was at home at that moment.
- I haven’t invited anyone today, Bateszhan. We’ll have a conversation face to face, - she said.
Barshagul had a cup of steaming tea and left. Asia and I lay down on the bed in the back of the yurt.
- Let’s talk and discuss the situation before we feel like going to sleep. Don’t you think that someone can hear us, Bates. We’re near the Red Yurt, which is guarded by a militia man. He won’t let anyone come close to us.
Asia’s advice was Yerkin’s valediction. She told me about the town, about studying, about the difficulties which I would have to face. Her words were sincere, but I was not being very carefully As the saying goes, I was listening to her with my left ear only. I thought of a wise saying, “When a child has cut some teeth, chewed food is now food for him”. A man cannot live for someone else. The life is the best advisor...
So I was thinking my own thoughts when listening to Asia. I was half asleep, Suddenly I heard excited voices by the yurt.
- Hey, who are you? Stop!- a man said in a stentorian bass. We froze. It was obvious that the man shouting was the militia man who was guarding the Red Yurt. He repeated the exclamation. It looked as though it was not taken into account.
- Stop or I shoot!
I imagined the militia man take his gun and start taking aim.
- So do, shoot!- a female voice cut the silence.
- I told you – don’t come close! But you keep going. I tell you stop!
- My child is here, why are you threatening me?..
- Mother!- I recognized her and got up rapidly.
- Is it your mother?- Asia was surprised and lifted her body as well.
- My own mother... Zhania!- Hitting some tables and buckets in the dark yurt, stumbling and falling, bare-headed, wearing nothing but a shirt, barefoot, I rushed outside.
I saw two black silhouettes not far from Asia’s yurt at once and rushed to them. The militia man kept saying, “I won’t let you in’, while mother, my mother, was trying to get there, taking the muzzle of the gun aimed at her aside. I pushed the militia man aside roughly and rushed to embrace her, crying “Mother1”. My poor mother pressed me against her chest tightly and began to weep.
Even though it was not my own mother but Baibishe Karakyz who brought me up, even though I used to avoid talking to my mother, the tokal, even though I hardly ever came close to her as a child, there was nothing warmer and firmer to me than my mother’s arms now! I had heard the pathetic words of miserable poor man, but nothing could be compared to Zhania’s lamentation. I could hear her weep right over my ear, her lamentation was intense, sharp, and heartwrenching. I had not even thought of how deep and soft her soul could be, how delicately she could feel and grieve!
The vast steppe seemed to be listening to my mother’s lament. People in distant and near yurts could hear her crying. They went out and whispered anxiously. I did not know who was surrounding us, and I did not want to know this. Both the cold air of the steppe and the realization of how much I loved my mother made my body shiver so hard that I could not say a word. My mother’s tears were running down my cheeks. My poor dear mother!..
Someone set us apart laboriously, someone was trying to sooth us. Asia invited my mother to the yurt, perhaps willing to take as far from the onlookers.
Yerkin, who turned out to be here as well, reminded that I was to leave at dawn:
- But now, - he went on, - she should take a nap.
- Take a nap!- someone said in a spiteful ironical tone.- I bet she’ll go after such an encounter with her mother!..
Three people entered the yurt – Asia, my mother, and I.
Outside of the yurt, it was still noisy, and someone was trying to persuade the people to go home in a grating voice.
Soon, silence came. Asia lit a lamp. After the usual questions about health and life, my mother calmed down a little. The two women spoke to each other. This is when Asia told my mother than I was going to undertake a great journey.
- I’m by no means going to interfere with my daughter’s plans, Dear. You mean no harm to her. I understand that you’re people of the state, unlike us! But we, the indignant, know that the new government helps women, too. It’s not to bring my daughter back to the aul that I’ve come for. I just want to have a look at her and to calm don. I gave birth to her, I feel for her! But I won’t delay the girl, send her away as you’ve arranged.
- We’ll have to wait long till dawn.- Asia looked at her bracelet watch.- What do you want, to sit for a while or to lie down?
- I’d rather lie down. Only let me lie near my Bopash, as her father would call her.
The two of us lay down onto my bed and embraced each other so tightly that we nearly merged into one body. We had never merged like this since the now distance days when my mother was carrying me in her womb. How unforgettably good it feels to be in the arms of one’s mother.
Some rustling woke us up.
- Asia!- I heard a low voice.
- Hoo-oo!- she answered.
- It’s me, Yerkin. Dawn’s breaking...
- They must be sleeping.
- It’s time you woke them up. The horses and their companions are ready.
- We aren’t sleeping,- my mother said.
- You should start packing,- Yerkin was hurrying us.- The day’s going to be a hot one. The sun set in a clear sky. We need to set off early. As long as the weather’s cool, we can cover a long distance. Otherwise, the horses’ll start sweating at once.
Speaking to my mother, Yerkin mentioned the previous night:
- Crying at night means a long journey, Zhengei. We felt sad as well. We had mothers and fathers, too, we have our own children. As the folk saying goes, everyone cries over his or her own misfortune. But words that weaken the soul escaped your lips. You shouldn’t act like this today.
- God forbid!- my mother answered.- I’m not going to beshrew my own child. I’ve mourned enough and won’t cry anymore.
- Thank you, Zhengei!
Saying this, Yerkin left, as if giving us an opportunity to talk face to face. Asia followed him out.
My mother an I were left facing each other and could not pry ourselves from each other again. She probably was suffering as much as when she was giving birth to me in the process of painful labor. I could feel the shiver of flesh, the beating of my mother’s heart.
We would have spent very much time together if Yerkin had not entered the yurt, which he now did noisily and decisively. His voice cut us apart like a knife cuts a navel cord...
...I started packing for the journey!
Barshagul was careful enough to make us some tea. But did I care about tea?! I was anxious to get into the cart, as I had no energy left. I cast a glance at my mother. She was silent like a cloud before a downpour. Blood slithered from her face, making it pale and sallow...
...In the morning, when the sun rose, two pair of harnessed horses were standing by the porch. In one of the carts, Balkash with his wife and I were to go. Barshagul and Asia were holding me by the arms. My mother was following me, accompanied by two women... I gave her a final embrace and started crying doubtlessly. Mother did not flinch, she did not weep. She was standing as still as a stone and could not but say the usual brief words:
- Have a happy journey, my dear!
She touched my cheek with her lips and did not move. Getting into the cart, I could see her face get fretty. It reminded me of milk about to start boiling. It seemed to me that the heat could spill on me.
And then we set off! The reins tautened with a push. The horses that had been standing too long rushed forward!
- Have a good trip!- our seers-off heaved unanimously. Tears blurred my eyes. The silhouettes of those who stayed there were indistinct as if seen through a haze. I could only guess how mournful my mother looked behind the fog.
- Farewell, my poor mother!
My lips moved to mouth those words. It was only with my heart that I said them.
WOLVES IN THE STEPPE
I was nearly aswoon when I left the Red Yurt. Everything told on me – the anguish I felt at parting with my mother, the anxious sleepless night, and even the fact that I had grew lean and seemed to look like a skeleton.
Тhe cart was jumping on the holes of the steppe road, which was as narrow as a turf. Sometimes I fell into oblivion, dozed off, and finally I lost consciousness. I was sitting between Zhanyl and Balkash. I teetered and nearly fell down the cart.
- You can’t sit on your own, Bates, come closer to me, I’ll support you. – Balkash said and held me.
The only thing I remember is that I leaned against him obediently and fell asleep as once.
...I opened my eyes at feeling someone shake me and hearing him call my name. The sun was approaching noon. Our carts were standing still. My companions were walking in the nearby. Only the two of us were staying in the cart – I was reclining in Balkash’s arms.
- You’re sleeping too fast,- Naizabek told me.- We’ve already got far from the aul. How much time has passed since them! Get out of the cart, drive the sleep away. You see, we’re in Kaska-Bulak, wash your face with cold water, and you sleepiness will vanish magically.
- Stop embracing the girl!- Zhanyl gave the teacher, who was still supporting me, a slightly disapproving look. – You can’t pry yourself away from your bundle of joy.
I could hear jealousy about her words, and this surprised me so much that I woke up at once.
I looked around. We had chosen our place for resting in a quiet place, by a steppe ravine. A creek was flowing out of a stone rill in thin streams. The water fell into a shallow sand sent, the size of which was about that of a yurt foundation. The water was amazingly clean and bubbling. Just like in the creek and basin of the Kainar near our Buzaukop.
I remember how Baibishe Karakyz got angry with us, little kids. “Watch out water can swallow you,” – she kept grumbling while I was swimming in the Kainar with my peers.
The pictures of my childhood spent in the aul were so lively that I rushed to the sandy bank and started tearing off my clothes.
- Wow, Bates, are you really going to swim?- I heard Nurbek’s slightly ironical voice. Feeling embarrassed, I got dressed at once.
- I’ve guessed it, Bates’s thought of her childhood. How much she liked to swim in the Kainar when on the dzhailau,- Balkash said,- I’d often see her there as a child.
- So you’ve known her since her very childhood. – Those words of Zhanyl was so angry that Balkash haltered and broke off. She was jealous again. I think that the same thing occured to joker Nurbek. He teased Zhanyl with a faint smile:
- Didn’t you know, Zhengei, that such a beauty had grown up before our teacher’s eyes?
- Enough!- Naizabek, who neither understood not liked mockery, interrupted the conversation.
Respecting Naizabek both as a boss and an older man, Burbek chose not to contradict him and got up joking.
...In lowlands, by creeks, high grass usually grew higher. It was like this by near Kainar, and it was like this around Kaska-Bulak. Naizabek was admiring the lush emerald green.
- Well, comrades! Here we’ll unharness our horses, let them get their swear dried, have a rest and pasture for a while... It seems to me that we’re hungry, too. We’ve got something for the journey. Moreover, we’ve got a small bottle of kumis. We’ll have something to eat and to drink, this’ll help us restore.
- Yesterday, Yerkin shot a fat goose and a duck. Barshagul stuffed them with mountain onions, zhua and potatoes, and cooked them. She said they were meant for Bates! She gave us a jug of cooked cream and said we should eat it soon, otherwise it can go off. Are we eating it today or tomorrow?- Balkash asked.
- Stop licking your lips!- Zhanyl gave her husband an angry look.
After that, I had no doubt that she was jealous of Balkash’s affection to me. Balkash was about twenty to thirty years older than his wife and had married her just recently. The all-knowing Kalisa once told me that he had always been shy with women. Noone had never heard any gossip about him. Many people even had doubts as for his health. Perhaps his shyness was the reason why he got married late. The heavyset, plump, flat-nosed ,and, moreover, snub-nosed Zhanyl was not an outstanding beauty. Balkash was far from being handsome as well. Humorous dzhigits like Nurbek often mocked at him, “The aunt’s well worth the uncle! What a match Allah did!”
...We were washing with water as clear as tears, dipping it with our hands. Then we sat down on a wide green meadow. The previous day was hot and sultry, but this one was a cloudy one, and the gentle wind was fanning us.
Nurbek turned out to be a dzhigit who was not only an apt joker but also a quick worker. In no time, he spread the dastarkhan over the ground and started putting the food on it, saying cheerfully:
- Among us all, only Bates is younger than I am. But she’s a guest. To tell the truth, Zhanyl-zhengei’s very young, too. But I chose not to bother her. She has a long journey ahead of her! That’s the one I’ll have to work with...
And he pointed at our coachman Zholdybai.
- We’ve got enough food. Look! Naizabek’s wife and Barshagul have prepare enough food to last us till Kostanai. If even this is too little, Mother’s put some jerked meat and a bottle of melted butter for Bates into the large trunk.
Nurbek glanced slyly over them:
- So what shall we begin with? Shall we begin with the lamb. This fat lamb was slaughtered to honor Bates, but we didn’t chanced to treat her to it in the aul. It’s warm now. Young meat can go off, let’s eat it. What if we heat it up? We’ve got a bucket.
- Lamb’s tasty even when it’s cold!- Balkash couldn’t stand it anymore. People had a good reason to say that he was a meat eater, when he was a school teacher, I heard a story about Balkash, whom the whole aul failed to provide enough meat. Once, my family slaughtered a mare, and I saw the gluttonous teacher eat the whole teshle, that is, flank with pre-groin fat as thick as four ringers with my own eyes. Is he was trying to persuade us that young lamb was eve more delicious when served cold, it meant that he was desperate to taste the lamb.
The food which the deft Nurbek fished out of the trunk and out of sacks, was utterly fat. Layers of fat were gleaming not only in the appealing fillet part, but also in the cannon-bone part, which is usually very lean. The whole body of the lamb had been cooked for the journey, the whole body, perhaps with an exception for the tripe. Naizabek’s wife remembered to keep even the fat tail, which was still on its base and unusually large for a lamb, as a special dainty.
- My baibishe’s an expert,- the militia man was happy about his wife’s care,- when slaughtering the lamp, I did not notice it was so fat. Come and join us, Balkash, go ahead. I don’t think we can cope with it without you. I’ve heard you to be a famous meshekei – a glutton!
Naizabek looked at the dastarkhan and the meat, which had already been divided into pieces, once again, and encouraged the teacher:
- Now we’re at the same table. Go ahead and eat.
- Are you expecting me to sit and look at it? – Balkash replied in a dignified manner without changing his usual facial expression.- I’ll finish those small pieces in to time. What else have you got to treat me to?
- I’ve got nothing but kumis,- Naizabek said, feigning fear.
- Drink your kumis yourself. I can have no more than two cups. But I’m serious about the meat.
When Balkash started gulping the huge lumps with fat jellied on them, we could not take our eyes off him.
- First I have to cope with that fat,- he said angrily and start throwing one piece of the tail, which Naizabek had already cut into pieces, after another into his mouth. He finished with it
- Now it’s the fillet’s turn,- he announced, prohibiting us to cut the bonefree fat into pieces. He took the fillet fat like people take big white loaf and, taking one bite after another, devoured it just as rapidly.
- Why on earth are you staring at me? Have you never seen a person who can eat? So listen to me. The rest of the fat is mine, you eat the lean meat, or else you’ll be hungry...
Balkash started removing the fat from the spinal marrowbones and gulped it in an enviably effortless manner.
Only when there were not fat pieces left on the dastarkhan, he tuned to Naizabek timidly:
- Are you angry with me now?
- If you’ve had enough, I’m not.
- Oh yeah, enough!- Balkash grinned.- Are you asking me, Balkash, who eats a whole wedder without leaving a thing? How can he be satiated with a little lamb? I even feel no heaviness in my stomach.
- Oh allah! Noone can compete with you, Balkash.
We had some food and were going to continue our journey.
- Again, if you allow me, I’ll sit next to you,- I asked Naizabek.
- Do you feel bad there?
- I beg you, please...
- All right, but why can’t you sit and talk to Zhanyl-zhengei?
- It seems to me Zhanyl’s the one Bates is especially reluctant to talk to,- Nurbek could not keep silent anymore.- I like to speak in straight phrases, thought they can be embarrassing. Zhanyl’s jealous of Balkash’s affection to Bates.
Balkash and his wife heard those words, too. The teacher called to allah for help, while Zhanyl turned her face away with a frown, stating that it was true with her whole appearance. How nice it would be if the teacher just explained the whole thing to his stupid wife, I thought, but it stands to reason that I never mouthed it. Perhaps the same thing occured to Naizabek, but he kept his mouth shut as well, switching his glance from Zhanyl to Balkash – like, shame on you! Nurbek was the only one to say it all:
- Oh, allah! Is she sick or what, your husband? У bates has a young dzhigit of her own! Can she fall for you – a low-browed bull?
- Stop this nonsense, Nurbek!- Balkash flared with indignation, staring him into the face...
Nurbek get even hotter under the collar:
- So you wife’s intelligence fits her appearance and figure!
- Stop it, Nurbek!- Naizabek interfered.
- Oh, that’s mad,- Nurbek said half-apologetically.
But it was not that easy to stop the furious Balkash. But for Naizabek, who could tell what the quarrel was going to end with... I sat onto the militia men’s cart next to Naizabek, while Nurbek took his place in front of the boxes and took the reins.
This is how we set off.
The familiar hills and simples of the Kyzbel!..
I felt fresh. On that cool and cloudy day, a gentle light wind was blowing pleasantly...
Naizabek, who seemed to be naturally taciturn, was thinking his own thoughts and dozing...
But what about Nurbek? He was looking back at me with a smile too often. He wanted to talk to me in his usual humorous manner, but it was obvious that he felt shy to do so.
Nurbek was whistling various melodies in a melodious and hardly hearable voice or singing songs of the steppe. What a cheerful and merry dzhigit he is!
...Towards the evening, during our second stop, when we had allowed our horses to have a rest, the subject of the night we had to stay somewhere for was raised.
- I’ve got a suggestion, comrades,- Balkash said,- Burkut’s house is in our way.
My heart faltered when he said this.
In the meanwhile, Balkash said in an imperturbably calm voice:
- As the saying goes, there’s nothing shameful about a truthful word. We’re al well aware of the fact that Bates’s going to find his Bokezhan. The young people misunderstood each other and broke up. But we have to reckon with certain Kazakh customs. Bates’s going without a permission from her father and mother...
- Speak precisely, Comrade Teacher, without a permission from her father, - Nurbek interrupted Balkash...
- I don’t understand what you mean...
- Don’t pretend, teacher, didn’t her mother came to the Red Yurt aul to see her off?
- Ah, her real mother,- Balkash drawled.- But the mother who’s brought her up, that is, Baibishe Karakyz, would never let her go...
- Listen, let’s drop the subject of mothers for a while,- Naizabek interfered,- tell us clearly, Balkash, what is it that you were going to suggest?
- It would be nice if Bates got a blessing from her Burkut’s mother and father, - Balkash said finally.
- We could put an end to the custom! – Nurbek turned his face away angrily.
- Why should I out an end to them?- Balkash flew into temper.- You and I don’t care! But if Burkut and Bates see each other and Bates tells Burkut that she’s received a blessing from his parents, can you imagine how happy he’ll be? Anyway, what do you know, what can you do?.. Perhaps only hold your rifle!..
- Don’t finish like this, Balkash!- Naizabek took what he said about a rifle personally.- Handling arms doesn’t mean being mad.
- What a pointless talk we’re having!- Coachman Zholdybai, who’d been silent before, said.
But Balkash went on. However, he treated Naizabek with great respect and was afraid of hurting him.
- You took my joke too seriously. I meant Nurbek only. He’s the one who can say anything...
- All right, all right, let’s go to Abutalip’s aul,- Naizabek agreed.
- Are you sure they’ll open us with welcome arms?
- I am!.. If they don’t, we’ll persuade them...
- Maybe it would be better for Bates to decide?
Balkash started persuading me.
- Ah, do whatever you want,- I said,- honestly, I don’t care if I’ll be approved of or not. I only don’t want them to blame me.
Balkash interpreted those words of mine as a consent to visit Burkut’s parents.
- Perhaps Abeu-agai will be displeased, he’s a cruel man. But his Asyltas-zhengei will be overjoyed to see Bates in her house and embrace her as a bosom friend of her son Burkut.
- Okay, so we’re visiting them!- my companions decided and turned to the aul.
When the sun started setting, we heard someone shouting behind us. Nurbek turned back and stopped the trotting horses.
- Look, Balkash’s waving his hat!
The second cart pulled level with us. Balkash pointed at the light yurts at a distance.
- That’s Abutalip’s aul. I’ll go first to inform him about our arrival. The hosts aren’t expecting us. Don’t hurry, go slowly, you’ll come just in time.
We agreed.
Balkash galloped ahead, while our cart was following him at a slow pace. The sun had already set, twilight was dying into dark in the east, while in the west, the last rays of the after shine were glowing. A horseman appeared from the aul and galloped towards us.
- This is Burkut’s father, Abeu,- Nurbek, whose eyes were extraordinarily keen, exclaimed.
- Abeu?- Naizabek was surprised.- How on earth did you recognize him?
- Well, I’m younger than you are,- Nurbek said with a trace of irony,- Nothing’s happened to my eyes to prevent me from recognizing him... Moreover, who but Abeu has a dark-gray horse like this... Allah knows, but it looks like the host has fled from his guests.
When we came close to the big white yurt in the west of the aul, we heard a screamy barking voice that offended the ear. A woman was shrieking. Without getting off the cart, we froze, listening to her shouting.
- Balkash! – she was screaming.- Are you my enemy or not?.. If you are, just tell me what you want to take!.. If you’re a man, just go away and don’t even think of showing this kanshyk. that is, this bitch, to me!
Now I understood the whole thing. Burkut’s mother, Asyltas, was raging. Blood flew to my head.
Balkash was arguing patience and trying to coax Asyltas.
- Patience?!- the woman shrieked even worse.- Isn’t that mare to blame for two stallions? Isn’t she the spotted colt that stirred to aul? Will you take the sly thing away or not, Balkans? Beware, first I’ll stab her and then myself
- Is she sane or not, that woman?- Nurbek rose.- Maybe I should beat the nonsense out of her?
He had already started moving to the yurt when Naizabek brought him down with a brusque gesture. At the same moment, coachman Zholdybai, Zhanyl, and Balkash rushed out of it one after another. Looking back in fear, they were running to their cart.
- So what happened?- Naizabek asked.
- Damn it!- Balkash waved his hand, getting into the cart hastily and pushing his companions into it.- Let’s go away from that witch before she kills us.
So we turned back. This time Balkash’s cart was rattling ahead of us, too. Having covered quite a long distance, we stopped, and Balkash told about what happened there:
- Oipyrmai! I’ve seen numerous pettish women, Naizabek, but I’ve never met one like that. She doesn’t know what she’s doing! I’ve been suspecting that allah had deprived her of reason. But now I know for sure she’s raving. If you’d lingered a little more, she’s have scratched and bitten us to death. When Asyltas heard you come, she got scared and managed to control her temper, this prevented her from letting her hands loose.
- But what does she want?- Naizabek was puzzled.
- She wants too much to tell. Sometimes she can’t tell you what she wants! She’s miserable, yes, she is!
- So what happened there?
- Abeu was summoned to Kostanai yesterday, all of a sudden. At home, they fear that they can send him to prison...
- Wait, Balkash... Wasn’t it Abeu who galloped away from the aul riding a dark gray horse?
- No, that was Tekebai, his son. I guess he fled from us. He rushed out of the yurt as soon as we entered it. He didn’t even return out greeting... At that very moment, we heard his horse stamping.
- I see,- Naizabek said drawlingly.- But they can put Abeu to prison, indeed. A case concerning goods spoliation at the multishop’s been heard recently. I’ve sent them tons of material from the volost. He seems to be of the kind to gulp a camel together with its hair and a horse with its load. He’s gulped much people’s stuff. It’s time he disgorged it.
Naizabek’s words struck me between wind and water. My father had been participating in the trade business of that multishop, which we called “kapduken”. I thought that the fat lumps must have got to his mouth as well. So my father could swallow the same hook as Abeu had swollen. Naizabek distracted me from thinking:
- Clear, no time for idling here, let’s go on!
- What road are we going to take?- Balkash asked.
- The straight one!..
- Oiboi, if we go across the desert steppe, we can die of starvation. Не Maybe we’d better choose a round way. We’ll come across aul, in which one can have a good sleep and eat to one’s heart’s content.
- We’ll feed you to your heart’s content, Balkash, with what we’ve got in store!
- Where have you got it?- Nurbek gave Naizabek sly look,- we’ll stop for the night five to six times before we reach Kostanai.- But you’ve seen with your own eyes how much Baeke can gulp. The meat we’ve got is one meal for him. Balkash needs at least a lamb per day, and a fat one...
But Naizabek didn’t accept the joke:
- Let’s go straight! It's Balkash who can afford the time for take detours for the sake of a treat, we can’t. No haggling!
- But here will we stop for the night?
- Ahead. I’ll tell you where...
- Ah, what wonderful legs... But we never got them. They must be bleating happily at having avoided slaughter,- Nurbek went on joking, speeding the horses.
It was getting dark. To raise our spirits, which were somehow low, Nurbek started singing his favorite “Maira” at the top of his lungs:
Maira is my name, my father is Vali...
When I start singing, everyone can hear me...
That Maira of his, she must have been quite a cheerful girl!.. Judging by the song, she was a Nurbek among girls... Why did allah not create me like this!..
...As we had expected, we had to sleep in the open steppe several times. As Nurbek had said the cooked meat we had taken along did not prove to be heavy for Balkash’s insatiable stomach. When we took to such and goose which Barshagul had cooked, Naizabek suggested that we give all the game to the teacher and restrict our menu to baursaks with qurut and butter. But Nurbek would not agree:
- Well,- he said,- are we going to lick his mouth?! If you want to be generous, give your shares to them, I’ll cope with mine on my own.
Saying this, he started devouring the goose meat. Balkash seemed to be hurt and insisted that all the food should be divided equally as well.
Shortly speaking, we quarreled during each stop, which sometimes led to real dustups. We quarreled before going to sleep. I was trying to sleep next to Zhanyl so that she could feel safe. But she would not agree. She was afraid to let her husband leave her for a moment and demanded that only he should be near her.
- What about Bates?- Balkash asked timidly.
- Why do you need that Bates thing!.. Doesn’t she have a cart of her own? She’ll find a place there! I said, go, and I mean it!- Zhanyl would give orders in an angry voice.
I recommended Balkash to keep from arguing with his wife:
- I’ll find myself a place to sleep, don’t worry!- I said.
- Wait! It’ll be nice if the women lie together,- Nurbek interfered out of season again.
- Stop mocking!- Balkash grew angry.- Mock at your peers. They aren’t here!
At that moment, Naizabek came to arbitrate, as they always did.
- Let’s not argue! Bates’ll stay in our cart, while Nurbek and I can sleep in the grass.
I lay down onto the blankets prepared in the cart without undressing and could not fall asleep for a long time again. The militia man were talking to each other in low voices. Suddenly, I heard Naizabek say very clearly:
- Today, we should be especially careful. We’re not far from Sasyk’s aul. Sasyk’s furious, hurt, and he feels disgraced. His son’s bride-to-be has fled. He may incite his hanger-s on against us.
- But what can they do to us?
- So you’re a mere child yet!- Naizabek got angry,- they’ll steal our horses! Try and find them then. You won’t find the chain, not to mention the horses! They can very well do it today as well. Can you imagine what a rough time we’ll have in the middle of our journey. That’s how they can take revenge on us.
- But how can we prevent it, Naizabek-agai?- Nurbek grew anxious and forgot his usual jokes.
- We need to tether the horses to the cart before dawn and hamshackle them. We must be prepared, too.
- Even after we’ve hamshackled the horses?
- How thoughtless you are, Nurbek!.. Does an experienced barymtach, horse-stealer, care about hamschackle?.. Would it take one long to tear the chain or open the lock? We should do as I say, and at dawn we’ll pasture the horses in turns. But bear it in your mind that as soon as you close your eyes, they’ll steal them. You don’t believe me? Try and fall asleep, I’ll cut off my nose if the horses are where they’re supposed to be after you get up.
- Are the horse-stealers close to us?
- What did you think?.. I bet they’re watching every step we make from the ravine. Why do you think Tekebai left the aul? He wasn’t too greedy to give us something to eat, he just went to warn his friends. Wolves who get lost can always find each other by howling. Tekebai’s prowling around the steppe like a wolf. He’s already informed all the necessary people. They’re sure to be close to us now.
More and more new fears were getting in the way. I asked Naizabek:
- So what shall we do?
- Sleep peacefully, dear. Being careful won’t harm us. As long as we’re vigilant, a thousand people won’t dare approach us.
And still my fear persisted. Both they and the chill of night made me shiver. I was straining my ears and could hear horses being tethered to the carts and then hamschackled. The three of them – Nurbek, Naizabek, and Zholdybai – were discussing something in a whisper. I was trying to drive sleep away. It seemed to me that the enemies would appear as soon as I closed my eyes.
They did... Some armed horsemen surrounded the camp, shouting and producing great noise, attacked us and dragged us like people drag goatling in the process of kokpar... I could hear some voices repeating, “I’m dying!” I recognized the man who grasped me by the hair and drag me to the cart to be Sasyk!.. He was as scary as a devil. Winding my hair around his hand, he said menacingly, “Now I’ll cut your throat”, - and took a dagger out of his pocket. I couldn’t resist crying...
At the same moment, I heard an anxious voice:
- What happened to you, Bates? It’s we!.. Naizabek and Nurbek...
I jumped off the cart and began hugging the two of them. I had recollected myself and understood that what I had seen was a dream.
- If we all sleep so soundly, the dream can come true,- Naizabek remarked. The steppe’s not a quiet place, indeed. We’ve seen some villains prowling in the ravines. They seem to be not that few. But they saw us guarding the place and didn’t venture to steal. They thought of an old saying, “Thieves make chase...”
The night was an anxious one.
On the following evening, I wanted to give my companions something to eat and opened the wooden trunk which my mother had given to me! All kinds of things were there! I saw some kazy – smoked sausage made of fat meat of a horse slaughtered at the end of winter. Large pieces of kakpysh, that is, dried meat, and many other things were there. This all was emaciating the spicy smell of smoked food. Poor mother! She must have remembered that I cannot eat even a slice of fat. For whom did she cook this all, then?
Balkash smelt the teasing odor at once and looked at the fat greedily.
- Wow, wow,- he purred gladly like a cat,- that’s the most delicious meat.
- What have you seen there, Balkash?
- I’ve seen that we aren’t going to starve. There’s so much fat meat in the cart. Cut off a piece and eat!
They tried to constrain him. They told him that Bates’s mother had meant the food to support her in town. But it was not that easy to outargue the gluttonous Balkash:
- Don’t I know Bates? She can’t eat a smallest slice of fat. She won’t touch the meat, anyway!- Foretasting the dainty, Balkash was licking his lips.- We’ll try it... As the saying goes, the food of a man and a wolf lies on the road... Bates will find herself something to eat...
- So let’s start cooking,- I suggested.
Naizabek attempted to talk us out of the idea once again. But Naizabek and I filled a pail with smoked meat and hung it onto the tripod over the fire.
- Even if he’s got a besyr in his stomach (besyr is a gluttonous snale from fairy-tales) – he can’t cope with this alone,- Nurbek whispered in a voice which Balkash could not hear.
- I guess be had a little less lamb back then,- I said.
- It’s not about the size. Вы look at that smoked meat, it’s as blue as ice. It’s much harder to eat than a young lamb...
- We’ll see if it’s harder or easier,- Balkash grinned.
When the meat in the plate was ready, the amount of it had increased. The wooden plate, on which Nurbek was cutting the lamb into pieces not long before, could hardly hold it.
After young lamb, it proved to be really hard to eat smoked fat. Noone even touched it. Noone but Balkash. He was devouring it, smacking his lips and champing. The sight made us sick, and we went aside. But soon Balkash gave voice:
- Come and look!
To out surprise, nothing but a piece of fat as big as a hand was left on the plate. But Balkash finished it in no time, after which he took the plate to his mouth to drink what remained of the fat sauce in a gulp.
- You’re a true meshkei!
Balkash listened to Nurbek say this with an air of dignity, taking it as praise.
...If Nurbek’s songs had not been sung during our journey – he could sing them as long as we wanted without ever getting tired – if Balkash’s incredible gluttony had not been amusing us, I think we would have felt bored in the desert steppe. Especially I. It is not easy for a girl from a n aul to talk to men. It is rude to initiate a conversation, but they rarely ask questions. Perhaps they believed me to be reluctant to talk and worried about my own life, or maybe he could not think of anything to talk to me about.
My only female companion, Zhanys, turned sulky in the first day of the journey and still remained angry with me.
...For a long time, we were traveling trough the steppe. But then a dim forest silhouette could be seen at a distance.
- Amankaragai!- Burbek announced.
I knew the wood and the seven lakes that its covert hid. I had been to the Russian village, which was called simply – Semiozernoye (Seven Lakes), too. It was in the previous year, when baibishe Karakyz took me along to visit her relatives. I saw a lot then. But what impressed me the most was the wonderful forest and the still clear water of the lake.
We were heading for Semiozernoye. Twilight fell. We stopped to start quarreling about the place to stay for the night as usual.
One wanted to sleep in the village, while the other wanted to sleep in the wood on the bank of the lake.
- Don’t you know that it’s not only meat but also bones that are sold in the village? You have to pay for everything – for bed, bread, and meat. They won’t let you feed your horses for free in the village! – Balkash was trying to persuade us to stay at the bank of the Aulie-kol, in the thick wood, far from the village. – In Semiozernoye, we’ll buy some bread and sweet loaves. We have some meat...
Indeed, I had the remnants of the smoked meat in my trunk, which Balkash’s greedy eyes had noticed. A vershok of kazy, a vershok of horse ham, and a little cracknels. Mere fat and now meat! Out of my companions, Teacher was the one to eat such food quite effortlessly. Well, let him eat, otherwise I would have to throw it away...
This time, the idea of sleeping at the bank of the lake did not seem tempting to Nurbek.
- Why should we sleep in the open when there’s a setting so close,- he grumbled. - In the forest, there are many mosquitoes and flies now, and it’s chilly, too. Moreover, we can’t guarantee that our chaser’s lost us. They can’t find a better place for lying in ambush than the thick of the wood. Moreover, it’s likely to rain at night. We can’t hide from it under pine-trees. It’s the smell of meat that tickles Balkash-agai’s nose; please don’t worry, agai! So be it, I’ll buy a fat Russian sheep with my own money today. It has a single shortcoming – there’s no fat tail, but the fat lamb of Semiozernoye is as good as pork. Even you won’t be able to eat a whole sheep. Под соснами мы от него не укроемся. Zholdybai and I’ll make enough hay on the bank, and it’ll be more than enough for our four horses. It was up to Naizabek to decide.
- We’ll see, - he answered vaguely to the question by Balkash, who was now thoroughly hungry.
It all ended up with our coming to the house of a well-off Russian peasant, from whom we could get some bread, milk, kaiman, and butter. In the yard, he had long-tailed black sheep.
Naizabek was the one to negotiate with the host. He went to his house to come back soon bringing loaves and buns. Under his arm, he was holding a little jug. His jacket pockets were jutting forth as well.
- Well, know you can well tether or Naken, there’s no holding him back, anyway!
I did not understand what Nurbek meant.
- Just look at his pockets. I swear by the name of allah, it’s moonshine!
I did not know what moonshine was, so Nurbek explained it to me
- Self-made vodka, very strong...
- How did you guess?
- I smelt it and understood it from the expression Naizabek’s face. He’s a man of gold, but he’s got a shortcoming – after fighting at the front, he’s been drinking whenever he gets some vodka. He hasn’t been touching it for a long time. Now he’s glad to have found some moonshine. To tell the truth, it’s no skin off his nose. But is he gets drunk, he’ll be talk rot and bother us...
- Maybe we should ask him not to drink?- I suggested shyly.
- Don’t even think of it! Naizabek can’t stand it. You’d better pretend to be unwitting...
Naizabek stretched the buns and loaves emaciating a pleasant sourish smell out to us.
- Just out of the oven, hot! We’ve got some fresh cream, too – he pointed at the jug,- dip hot loaves in it and eat. Fabulous food. I’ve got some onions, garlic, and carrots.
The last phrase was meant for Balkash:
- You need a sheep? If you want, I’ll buy you one.
Balkash did not answer.
- Don’t you grieve, my friend!- Nurbek went on.- Сегодня Today we’ll book the boil meat left in Bates’s trunk. If you eat those additional delicious loaves with kaimac, you’ll be sate even if a seven-headed snake is still stirring your stomach.
- I’m not asking you to buy anything,- Balkash was hurt.- You don’t feed me. Whether in a village or in the forest, I’ll always get myself something to eat.
- I’m joking,- Naizabek reassured him,- Take it easy. You know the saying – it feels good to chase a dodging fox, it feels good to laugh at hidden jokes.
Balkash made it clear that he had no hard feeling anymore.
- Then we’ll go to the lake!- Naizabek decided...
- If I could, I’d stay in the village till dusk,- Nurbek said suddenly.
Naizabek was surprised
- I want to have a bath. I’ll come at the time you tell me. Don’t worry about me.
- All right, stay here,- Naizabek agreed. – We’ll move a short distance away from the aul and sleep on the bank. There are no mosquitoes there. Come as soon as the dusk breaks.
Nurbek stayed in the village, while we headed for Lake Aiak-kol. Sun was setting. Our horses were jogging along the sand road leading through a thick pine wood. By the time we reached our place for sleeping, the twilight had already fallen.
Aiak means the last one... Perhaps the lake got this name because it is situated far from the rest six. Wide and clear, it was not the last in terms of beauty at all. Its sandy bank, smooth and low-sloped, seemed to be paved with chipped wood boards. The water, which was usually as clear as a tear, looked whitish during this twilight our, and the lake, being surrounded with a thick pine wall, looked like kumis in a colorful carved cup.
Many birds lived here. Geese, ducks, swallows, and plovers, alarmed by our appearance, were rising noisily and sitting down just to fly up again.
In the middle of the lake, two swans were sliding smoothly and peacefully along the milk-white water at a gun shot distance. They seemed to have nothing to do with the birds’ alarm. But it was an illusion. The swans got infected with anxiety, too. Seeing people on the bank, they started flopping their wings against the water and flew away.
Silence fell.
How beautiful the sight was! I could not stop admiring Lake Aiak!
...We unharnessed the horses and tethered them to pine trees hamshackled.
- So, Bateszhan, shall we cook the smoked meat you’ve got in your trunk?- Naizabek turned to me.
I took to work.
While Zhanyl and I were fetching water, washing the meat and putting it into the pail, the men got some dry wood and made a fire. When the food was ready, Naizabek placed two large bottles onto the dastarkhan.
- This is moonshine, comrades, that is, self-made vodka. Я I knew that it could be chilly by the lake at night. I took it just in case, to keep us warm... It’s enough for Balkash and me. Zholdybai won’t get any, no matter how he begs us. He should watch the horses. Zhanyl could have tried it, but I’m sure Bates doesn’t know what it is...
Zhanyl shook her head:
- I’ve never tried it, either...
- I think you don’t mind it, Balkash, do you?
- I can have a little,- Balkash agreed.
- So let’s start. We’ve got a chaser – bread with garlic...
There was no need to ask Balkash twice.
We had little crockery – three small wooden cups. We were using them to drink either kumis or surpa that is, meat broth. Naizabek filled two cups to the brim. The moonshine smelt disgustingly of salt lake dead water. To tell the truth, I had heard about arak-vodka before, but I had never seen it. So I decided that the smell of vodka was just as bad. I have seen people get drunk on kumis – they faces grow red, their arguments get hot, but noone ever turns mad. But people had told me that vodka could literally drive one crazy – one starts a fight and talks to oneself. In our aul, there were no drunkards, and noone was said to drink vodka. This is why my heart sank at hearing the gossip about Burkut drinking.
And now I saw arak, I saw moonshine for the first time in the heads of Naizabek, this intelligent and reserved person... Why did he drink this bad thing? I was so curious to see Balkash and Naizabek drunk that I wished they drank the vodka as soon as possible.
Naizabek handed the cup to the teacher.
- So what do we drink to?
- To a happy journey.
- All right, to a happy journey.
They clinked the brims of their cups together and drank the vodka. Surprisingly, Naizabek’s face got screwed. He smelt the garlic and started crunching on it. Balkash did not bat an eyelid. He was looking around in a most nonchalant way, as if he had drunk nothing but pure water.
- Well, Nake, let’s have another one,- he suggested to Naizabek, whose face was still distorted painfully due to the bitter moonshine and the garlic.
- Ag-ree! Let’s have a-no-ther one!
Naizabek was getting drunk before our eyes, but he would not stop. They had another cup each. Naizabek’s hand began to fail him. He took a loaf to dip it into the kaimac, but he could not get into the wide neck of the jug. He ended spilling the kaimac and throwing the jug away.
- Oh, don’t!- Balkash tried to bring him to reason, but Naizabek swore an oath. However he got embarrassed at seeing me:
- My dear, you’re here! I won’t swear, I won’t! But for your presence, I’d get him...
Threatening Balkash, he swore another oath and began apologizing again.
- And you, Balkash, you drink if you want to stay alive. or else....- He wagged his clenched fist at him.
The threat had its effect on Balkash, he raised his cup and drunk its content together with Naizabek. After this portion of moonshine, our militia man lost his tongue completely. He was forgetting the subjects he raised and cursing everyone but me... Breaking off the cursing, he suddenly turned to me – “You, my dear, Bates”.
However, there was some sense about Naizabek’s raving. He kept repeating that Balkash was no friend to me and Burkut, that he was an enemy, that he was going to help the bais fulfill their cunning plan:
- But you’ll do no such thing! If you try, you’ll see what I can do to you! You’ll be in for it...
At first Balkash got indignant and started protesting, but Naizabek was pressing at him so hard that the teacher grew silent and was listening to the militia man’s threats and curses without saying a word. Zhanyl was listening to him in terror. Like a goat chased by a hound, he was searching for a place to hide and could not find one. As for me, I did not worry much. I was sure that he would not hurt me, moreover, I found Naizabek’s odd speech and acts funny.
After some time, he dozed off. At that moment, Balkash started cursing the sleeping man with all anger he had accumulated. I put a pillow under Naizabek’s head and covered him with my chekmen.
- I’ve heard him to be a full-fledged alcoholic (I did not understand the meaning of the word then),- Balkash kept badmouthing him.- But it’s the first time I’ve seen him like this. He’s a dog.
- Oiboi, stop curding him. You’ll have a rough time if he wakes up,- I tried to stop Balkash.
- There’s no waking him now. The vodka finished him soon. We were drinking in equal amounts. And you, Zhanyl, hurry up and give me something to eat.
Balkash gulped the cooked fat in no time together with moonshine.
- You’ll get drunk, too,- his wife tried to stop him, but he only grinned and said that a barrel of moonshine would not harm him. Balkash offered Zholdybai to have some as well, but the coachman refused flatly.
- All right, you’d better keep your eyes on the horses.- Saying this, Balkash gulped the cup of moonshine which he had intended for Zholdybai.
“Why does it happen?- I was reflecting.- One can’t even tell that Balkash’s had some vodka. He didn’t even get his tongue tripped. So what happened to Naizabek? That’s a mystery...”
Balkash and Zhanyl went to sleep.
- The horses’ve cooled down, I’ll let them pasture for a while now. They’re hamshackled, I’ll be there, - Zholdybai said.
- I’ll stay with you, too, agai, - I offered to the coachman, but he recommended that I should have a rest:
- With allah’s help, I can gather the horses on my own...
I lay down on my cart but could not get a wink of sleep. My thoughts were confused. What Naizabek had said about Balkash, about me and Burkut, made me especially anxious. Was what he said true? Or did the vodka just obnubilate his mind? I fell asleep with this thought.
I was woken by a gun that cracked about near my ear. Then there came a second shot. Naizabek sprang to his feet. Looking around anxiously with somehow squinting eyes, he pulled a handgun from its holster. The steppe around us was gray, the dusk was about to break, and we could see someone approaching us along the bank of the lake.
- Stop or I’ll shoot!- Naizabek shouted.
- Don’t be afraid, it’s me, Zholdybai!..
- Who was shooting?
- I don’t know.
- But where are our horses?..
- They were hamshackled, pasturing...- Zholdybai answered in a low voice and not to the point...
- Okay, but where are they now?
Zholdybai said nothing.
A silhouette appeared between the pine trees.
Naizabek repeated his warning:
- Stop or I’ll shoot!
- It’s me, Nurbek! Bad luck, damn it...
- In earnest, what happened?..
- The horses’re stolen...
- How come?
- I was walking through the wood and suddenly came across two men. They were leading two horses at the bank side. “Can they be ours?” I thought. I called them, but they didn’t stop. Then I shot. The thieves mounted the horses, took two by the reins and vanished in the pines. Can one catch them?
- But where were you, Zholdybai?
- I was watching them for the whole night almost till dawn,- the coachman murmured quietly,- but then sleep seized me, and I dozed off.
- You dozed off. Like Balkash...
That is when we noticed that the teacher was the one whom the fuss had not affected. He was snorting like a giant next to his wife. She had woken up at hearing the shots and the noise, but fear made her feign sleep.
We had to wake him, too. The sun had already risen. We went along the lake. The hoofprints of our horses and their stealers’ footprints led to the thick of the wood...
- Huh!- Naizabek sighed,- if we could find some good horses now, we’d catch the thieves in no time.
- Oipyrmai, what dogs robbed us?- Balkash said in a frustrated eyes.
- Don’t you know,- Naizabek answered,- Sasyk’s hangers-on ha’ve been following us non-stop. A crow has some relatives, too, and here there are many people in the aul. They helped them.
- I wonder why they weren’t afraid. They knew there were armed militia men among us, didn’t they?- Zholdybai, whom I would call the villain of the piece, asked.
- They’re wolves, angry wolves of the steppe,- Naizabek answered.- Do those beasts fear a thing?
MISFORTUNE PERSISTING
When misfortune comes, sour milk can change. This is what people say and what happened to us. We did not stop hoping that someone would help us, that we would come across a human being. But our hope was to no avail! Nurbek was going to head for Semiozernoye again. But evening came, and we slept by the lake again. Early in the morning, Nurbek went to the village, while Naizabek and Zholdybai came out to the road to wait for an accidental cart to be passing. They asked Balkash to joined them, but he complained of a cold and a backache. Of course, the reason was different. As soon as the militia men and the coachman left, the sad glutton who had gone to bed empty-stomached started whining:
- Now we’re doomed to die of starvation.
I reassured him:
- Oh, don’t say that, agai! Why die? We’ve got some Russian bread, thought it’s a little too dry, some baursaks, and qurut...
But Balkash was shaking his head displeasedly:
- It’s like plain broth without sour milk, like surpa with no fat...
- So you need fat, agai... Take it, it’s in the goatskin bottle.
This time I was mistaken. There was no fat in the bottle anymore, as the gluttonous Burkut who had lost every trace of shame had eaten it to the last piece.
...By midday, Nurbek had come back. He brought four horses.
- I got them from the village militia We’ll bring our arobas to Semiozernoye and then travel to Kostanai... Bates, Naizabek, and me. Zholdybai should stay in the villa. I’ll send Balkash and Zhanyl along with the camel caravan. It’s coming from Turgai and is delayed in Semiozernoye.
Balkash was hurt. He was desperate to go by governmental horses:
- Why shall we drag along with the caravan? Can’t everybody travel dawk?
- Naizabek and me have a free transport paper, but you don’t...
- As you wish... You found one for yourself but can’t get any for me,- Balkash grew even more sullen.
- Do you really have to strangle me?- Nurbek flew into passion.
Naizabek interfered with the argument, as he always did in such situations:
- Harness the horses, we’ll discuss it when we’re in Semiozernoye...
The Turgai caravan was waiting for us in the village. One of their eighty camels was relieved of load.
- Let Balkash and Zhanyl mount this camel,- Nurbek insisted,- for us, the militia have a couple of horses.
- So go, have a nice journey,- The sullen Zhanyl said irritatedly, while her husband kept silent, frowning and staring at Naizabek to know what he would say.
And Naizabek uttered his last word:
- No, that won’t do. You ask me why. But we’re traveling together, and it’s a disgrace to leave our friends on the road. Imagine the way Bates will feel, as Balkash’s her companion till the end of the journey, while we’ll leave her in Kostanai.
- So what shall we do?
- It’s simple. We’ll go along with the caravan.
Nurbek did not like it:
- Do we have to drag on camels if we have horses? Why?
- Never mind, my friend, you’ll go on foot if you have to.
- But why do we need this? What will happen to Balkash if he arrives in Kostanai one day after us.
- That’s not the point, it’s about friendship!
How intelligent and fair he is, our Naizabek-agai! He would be wonderful if he did not drink. Indeed, as far as I understood now, drinking could turn even a man like this into a madman.
...The distance between Semiozernoye and Kostanai is one hundred twenty versts. Good horses can cover it in a day, while the caravan with which we were moving had to stop for the night three times before we got to the town.
I had heard much about Kostanai, but it was the first time that I had see it. The outskirts of the town were overlooking the high bank of the Tobol. The river girded Kostanai in the east, while the town stretched to the west. We had to stop by the bridge. It was a narrow rickety bridge built of clay-fixed oiser-bed. The time was most lively – people were transporting crops, hay, and wood. Numerous carts were waiting on both sides of the river by the ford. The place was teeming with people and looked like an ant hill. Shall we give Nurbek his head, he would use his revolver to cut in ahead of the line. But Naizabek believed it to be immodest, so we spent much time waiting and discussing the best way to stay for the night in Kostanai. Naizabek and Burbek had flats where they usually stayed, while Balkash had his wife’s relatives in the town.
- Bates should go with them,- Naizabek suggested.
Zhanyl was not happy to hear this:
- Maybe we should do it as we’ve been traveling... Bates has been in your cart, she should stay with you now.
- Shame on you, Zhanyl,- Naizabek brought her to the blush.- Both our volost administrators and the Red Yurt entrusted Balkash with Bates. We’ve been merely accompanying her to Kostanai. We’ll enter those streets and that’s it, we’ll have to part. Balkash has staked his life on the girl, he’ll be responsible for her till she gets where she needs...
...What I needed was to be sent to the Soviet Party School in Kzylorda. This is what Asia thought. She believed my knowledge to be enough to enter the soviet building department. They accepted non-party girls. The only thing which could stand in my way was the fact that I came from a rich family, but, according to Asia, this was insignificant. She told me about her friend working in the Regional Committee as head of the women’s department. Her name was Shamsia Kuntokova. Asia wrote her a letter, in which she told her everything about me:
- She’ll help you, she’ll arrange it for you to be accepted to the school,- Asia told me at parting.- If you don’t want to go to the dormitory, you can live in Shamsia’s house.
I did not read the letter, but the envelope which she gave to me was thick enough to look like a small book. I wrapped it tight together with the nasty mysterious album and put them onto the very bottom of my trunk, which the Russian call “sakpoiash”.
...I have distracted myself, let me return to the discussion on the place where I should stay. Though Zhanyl disliked Naizabek’s idea, she felt ashamed and brought me to her relatives.
The relatives turned out to be nice simple-minded people. When Balkash introduced me to them, I was very surprised to find out that they had been partially aware of my life story even before. “Let your wishes come true, let happiness await you in your way!” Those were the words which I heard in their house.
When we were having our evening tea, a uest came – a short knobby dzhigit. He had a longish face, an aquiline nose, and he was slightly flop-eared. He was wearing townish clothes.
- Ah, Musapyr!- Balkash rushed towards him.
Musapyr! I had heard this name many times. He was Burkut’s cousin. Kalisa had told me about the fight which Burkut and Musapyr had in the steppe last summer at leaving our aul. I think they quarreled over me. I soon forgot about that fight.
So this is what he looks like!
As soon as Balkash introduced me to him, he spoke to me in a gentle and patronizing tone:
- You needn’t introduce us to each other. Though I’ve never seen Bates, I’ve know her for a long time. Well, sister, give me your hand!...
“Why does he call me his sister, I’m not Burkut’s wife, not even his bride yet”,- I wondered, though I did not say a word.
Musapyr was invited to have tea. He was constantly talking. He came as a newspaper correspondent from Kzylorda and, if we believe his words, had solved many crimes and unmasked numerous saboteurs. He described himself as a fighter for justice and an enemy to dishonesty and lies.
It seemed to me that he and Balkash had know each other for a long time and understood each other well.
Musapyr had a camera. He showed us the photos he had taken in auls. The images were clear and interesting. He took one of us drinking tea.
In the morning, Naizabek and Nurbek came to us in a two-horse tarantass to see us off to the station.
Balkash had gone to the station even earlier, promising to buy tickets. Musapyr, who was going by the same train, joined him. They were already waiting for us with the tickets.
- Well... We can go,- Balkash said drawlingly,- but there are certain difficulties.
- What happened?- Naizabek grew suspicious.
- We all wanted to go in the same carriage, but we couldn’t. We had to buy tickets for different carriages. One compartment coach and one sitting one. So we wonder – in what way shall we the places?
- What’s difficult about it?- Nurbek grinned.- It will be a shame for you and your wife to occupy the compartment and let Bates go in the sitting carriage. The best thin you can do is place Zhanyl and Bates in the compartment, Musapyr and you can travel sitting.
I could not understand what they were talking about. I did not even know what a compartment coach was. Zhanyl did not, either. The two of us were looking at Balkash quizzically until he explained to us that is was a separate small room with a closed door. There are double and four-seat carriages. We had a double one.
- You’re lucky.
- So what’s a sitting carriage?- I asked then.
- Inside such carriage, there are no rooms with doors, people travel together like they do in an aroba,- Nurbek answered.
- I’ll sit here, I don’t care,- I told Balkash in a firm voice.
- So sitting or compartment?- he asked.
- The one with no doors...
- But why don’t you want to go in a compartment?
- With whom am I supposed to go there?
- Say, with your brother Musapyr...
The cheerful Nurbek giggled, he found those words obscenely mischievous.
- Why are you laughing again?- Balkash, who would not tolerate any jokes, got angry.
- Hey, why not? Where have you seen a girl left face to face with a dzhigit?
- You're thinking about the old customs of the Kazakh! In Europe, people have stopped seeing it as anything funny or disgraceful long ago.
- Are girl infertile in Europe?
- No scandal, please,- I begged my companions,- unless you forbid me, I’ll go in the sitting carriage...
- Why separate a married couple then?- Musapyr joined it.- I’ll go in the sitting carriage together with Bates...
Nurbek took my traveling belongings and led me into the carriage. The room in it was barely enough to move. Men, women, children, old people... A multipart noise hung in the hot stale air. People were quarreling over each vacant seat and some of them, being too zealous, let loose with their feasts. I was beginning to think that there would be no place for us. However, Nurbek found two vacant upper berths, which cost him great effort. Musapyr attempted to win the middle one, but a swarthy tall man shook him so hard that he drew blood from the correspondent’s nose.
When we, hot and tired, somehow managed to make ourselves relatively comfortable, Nurbek suggested that I should say goodbye to Naken.
- Naken... Who’s Naken?- Musapyr inquired in a displeased tone.
- I mean Naizabek Samarkanov, our head.
- How is she supposed to tell him goodbye in such a fuss?
- I wouldn’t like to hear things like these!- Nurbek gave my new companion an angry glance.- Naizabek had been defending her, accompanying her to Kostanai. He stayed outside by the carriage not to bother us. Now he’s sure to be waiting for Bates.
I went to the exit to bid my farewell.
- Wait!- Nurbek outstarted me and began to make way for me.
New and new passengers were going in the opposite direction. Right by the entrance, we had to move aside. Nurbek screened me with his shoulder:
- Get closer to the door, Bates, we’ll wait here till the crowd thins out.
We were standing in the corner, where nobody paid any attention to us.
- Bates, I’ll tell you what my three wishes, my three requests are,- Nurbek said.
- Here’s my first request. I love joking, and if some unwelcomed words have ever escaped my lips, please forgive me...
- I’ve never heard words like this... Don’t say that!..
- Then listen what my second request is. Bates, don’t linger in Kzylorda, go directly to Tashkent, to Burkut. There are many educational establishments there, he’ll arrange it for you. When he sees you, he’ll realize that you’ve been searching for him. He’ll forgive you everything and be even more affectionate than he used to be.
- I haven’t decided it yet, Nurbek. I’ll have to think it over.
- You needn’t think, you’d better do what I tell you. Here comes my third request, my third recommendation. Watch out for the man flocking about you.
- Whom do you mean?
- The one with a protruding jaw... Musapyr... He’s twisting round, claiming that he’s Burkut’s cousin... But he looks like a worm. A worm which gets into one’s spine to eat it out... Watch out, he can get you into a mess.
Boarding was over. We went to the door and saw Naizabek.
The station bell tolled.
- Hurry up, tell him goodbye,- Nurbek said and suddenly started whispering me in the ear:
- If everything is okay, I’m going to change my job in autumn and move to Kzylorda. I’ve got a man who promised to help me. But it’s a secret. I haven’t told even Naizabek...
He seemed so nice to me that I said cordially:
- Come soon, don’t keep me missing you...
- Hush! Naken can hear us.
But I was not afraid of Naken, I respected him greatly and felt indebted to him.
- Agai! – I told him at parting.- In spite of my young age, I do value true people. I’m indebted to you for the rest of my life for your kindness.- And I burst into tears on Naizabek’s breast.
- Come on, stop it,- he tried to comfort me.- Whatever I’ve done for you I did in state duty bound!
- No, agai!- I objected weepingly.- You’ve been a man, a good man!..
The bell tolled again.
- The train’s departing! Get in!
I climbed the steps into the carriage, and though someone was already saying to me – go and take your seat, don’t stand in the way! – I kept standing in the door. I hated to part with my kind companions.
- Let me remind you of what Abai wrote,- Naizabek said:
The road of our life is like a bow bound,
The creator has tied the semicircle with a string,
Be vigilant when traveling along this road,
Do not delay or fall down, my friend!
The train started moving slowly.
- Remember my last words!- Naizabek waved at me in a friendly manner, walking near the carriage.
- I will, again, I will!..
- Don’t you forget what I told you as a friend!- Nurbek shouted.
He could not hear my answer...
Crying, I could hardly climb onto my berth. Musapyr was near. His head attached to a long neck resembled that of a crow sitting in a nest on the top of a tree. I was in no disposition to answer his questions. My head was swiveling, my heart was pounding, and I felt nauseated.
Then I went off. If I slept, it did not last long. I remember clearly that my eyes were mostly open, though I was lying still. I did not want even to move my hand.
Musapyr was constantly trying to please me. He was trying to discuss some subject with me, to make me laugh by telling a funny story, he kept suggesting that we should walk along the platform at stations and buying me all kinds of dainties. But the word “no” was the only word I was saying at the beginning of our journey in the carriage. I rejected everything like a Muslim does during the sawm. I would not drink or eat anything.
Realizing that I was trying to stay indifferent to his stories and jokes, Musapyr suddenly started praising Burkut.
- What a clever, honest, and persistent dzhigit he is. He’s not only persistent but also stubborn. He won’t go back on his word... Sometime it’s even a shortcoming... He can grow really bitter-end...
So Musapyr mentioned Burkut’s drawbacks matter-of-factly and proceeded to tell about their quarrel which took place in the previous year.
- You know I just wanted to test him, I wounded his pride on purpose. But how outraged, how wild he grew! His eyes were bloodshot. He could have attacked me like an angry camel. And – can you imagine it? – I ran away. Don’t you think that I was scared. No, I knew that one dzhigit couldn’t cope with me, anyway. But I didn’t to ruin my relationship with the man I had never quarreled with before. When we saw each other in Kzylorda after some time, he felt so ashamed that he wished the earth could swallow him up, and we’ve been as good friends as ever since then.
Musapyr made a short pause and suddenly raised the subject which I cherished most:
- But this is true! He loves you as much as he loves his own soul. But it was indecent of him to leave you. I know that you love him, too. But you must bear it in your mind that a proper man must respect himself. The old saying is right – “If you want to take away my cattle, take it, but don’t you take away my honor.” When a man is not respected he ceased to be a man. Keep you honor intact. Let Burkut feel your pride as well. Don’t stir a finger till he finds you. He will if he loves you. If he doesn’t, it means that whatever he’s said is mere words. But is he’s the Burkut I know – persistent and impatient, he’s sure to come to you in the middle of the winter, after his recess. You’ll make it up, and he’ll cherish you even more after the ordeal.
Musapyr kept reassuring me, and I began to get over it, yielding to his silken words.
Then he raised the subject of my studying.
- You have no idea of what the Soviet Party School is. They won’t teach you anything but politics. Believe me! You’ll have to come back to your native parts to become a soviet worker. The job’s not suitable for a woman, especially for you. You’d better enter the preparation department of the Pedagogical Institute in Kzylorda. We can do something to make them accept you. After graduating, you’ll be a teacher, you can find a job in any town any aul. You won’t ever depend on your husband – if he loves you, you’ll live together, if he doesn’t, you’ll let him go!..
I liked Musapyr’s reasoning.
...Balkash was acting in a funny way during our journey. After our departure, neither he nor Zhanyl were keeping out of our sight for nearly a whole day. Then Musapyr decided to visit them. While the train was moving he went to their carriage. He told me laughingly that Balkash and Zhanyl were acting like the contemporary Yusuf and Zulaikha:
- Every time I come to see them I find them kissing. But it’s been several months since they got married. Either Balkash found the bride late or he’s got a fondness for women, anyway, there’s no prying him away from Zhanyl, even if you tie him to a horse’s tail!
At the end of day two, Balkash came to us. I feigned sleep. They were coaxing and shaking me, but I pretended to be sleeping extremely soundly and was lying still.
- That’s strange! Just a moment ago, she wasn’t sleeping, - Musapyr wondered still trying to wake me up.
But I would not open my eyes.
- Yapyrai, indeed! Sleeping like a log.
Trying to look like a learned man, Balkash said:
- I’ve heard about lethargical sleep, when there’s no waking the person. Maybe this is what happened to Bates?
- Who knows,- Musapyr answered.- I’ve told you. She’s lying without stirring a foot. She hasn’t eaten or drunk a thing. I wonder why she isn’t thirsty. What can you say?..
- It’s because of your timidity!.. You can’t cow a girl into submission...- Balkash began.
- Hush!- Musapyr interrupted him.
Balkash broke off. I opened my eyes to see Musapyr wagging his finger at Balkash in a conspirational manner, as if to say, “shut up!”.
- Maybe she’s feigning sleep,- Musapyr whispered.
At that moment, I realized that there was something they wanted to conceal from me. There must be a reason why Musapyr is afraid of my hearing him. I did not give myself away and kept lying still. Balkash and Musapyr were not paying any attention to me anymore and started quarreling jokingly.
- I didn’t know you were such a woman-chaser,- Musapyr teased him.
- I’ve just married. The Russian call it honeymoon. Time hasn’t come for growing cold yet...
- It’s sweet as honey, no doubt... But it’s awkward...
- Why awkward?
- Well, we have to follow the Kazakh customs. Have you ever seen a Kazakh man kissing his wife even when they’re alone? Especially in public!- Musapyr said in an irritated tone.
- The time’s over for the Kazakhs, too. It’s patriarchal nonsense... Feudalism,- Balkash objected.
Words which I did not know were flashing in their discussion. Obviously, Musapyr and Balkash had not got used to them yet and were pronouncing them with great effort and diligence.
- Let it be!.. But the Marxists believe the proletariat culture to be the righteous continuance of all the previous cultures, they think we’re adopting all the good things of the past... – Musapyr was showing off his erudition.
- So you think that not kissing one’s wedded wife is a good custom?
- The best custom ever!- Musapyr got excited.
- No, explain it in a clearer way...
- In the old day, people would say – treat your wife in a way to make her pray to you.
- What does it mean?
- You shouldn’t kiss her, you shouldn’t caress her, you shouldn’t flatter her!- Musapyr kept exhorting.
- Do you think we should follow the example of the Kazakhs who would talk to their wives without using a stick?
- Sometimes you need a stick to prevent your wife from lumbering you.
- ОгоWow, Musapyr, you’re a proper feudalist. Well, and if you marry... Will you act like this?
- Cer-tain-ly!- unexpectedly, Musapyr said the word in Russian.
- So whom are you going to marry?
- I know for sure I’ll never have a Russian as my wife...
- Oh, Musapyr, they say you’re communist, why do you say such things?- A meal smile appeared on Balkash’s face.- Only nationalists can think so... Even I, being non-partisan, won’t say things like this...
- What does it have to do with nationalism if I want to marry...- Musapyr said in a weighty and dignified manner. Then he added:- Don’t you made ridicule of nationalism. You’re pure Kazakh.
- Looks like you came it strong.- Balkash did not feel like keeping the ball rolling.
- A woman hiding her disease will suspect a healthy one... Why throw a stone at one who’s bent to the ground? They reproach the Kazakhs for nationalism every day...
Balkash sighed.
- It was a joke. Why should I care about that wretched nationalism...
- What do you mean - why? I can’t understand you.-Musapyr stared at Balkash. – Are we trying to escape nationalism?
- Why escape?- Balkash’s voice grew scared.- We aren’t... Akan and Zhakan put it right: we are ready to lay down our lives on this way...
- Fine!- Musapyr nodded and added:- Once, Aleken said: it’s not Zhakans and Akans who’ll foster the progress of nationalism, but we, neo-nationalist, that is, nationalist of the new form.
I was repeating silently – Zhakan, Akan, Aleken... I did not know who they were back then. Only after a long time I realized that they meant the famous nationalists, Akhmet Baitursunov and Zhakypbek, Burkut’s uncle, and Alikhan Bukeikhanov.
- Listen, aren’t we being too loud,- Balkash grew worried.- Do you remember what Shortambai said?
Don’t say that the whole house is mine – a thief if hiding nearby...
- Don’t worry, I’ve considered the problem before. In our carriage, there are no Kazakhs, not even Tartars or Baskirs.
- But maybe a Russian can understand us...
Musapyr grew anxious, too:
- Indeed, what if there is one...
The speakers broke off.
“So that’s what they are nationalists, - I thought. – The nationalists, about whom people talk and newspapers write so much. It’s a pity they stopped talking... I was so curious to get deeper into their secret”.
- Musapyr!- Balkash said.
- What?- he answered.
- You teased me too cruelly...
- By calling you a woman-chaser?
- So you understand why I’m hurt. I’ve told you why I love my wife.
- Now I’ll tell you. Listen – you’ve got six brothers. I mean neither of them any harm. If, God forbid, one brother dies, the others will remain. But I’m lonely... If a poor man spills the last cup of soup, he can die of starvation... Can you understand me? A man marries to have descendants... Forget your love talks. Have you ever seen a Kazakh marry for love? Haven’t we sold women for cattle? Don’t we buy them now? Not for cattle, for money, secretly?
- You too?
- Why shall I be impolite?- Balkash said laughingly.- But let’s not joke. We’re talking about my wife. So I’ve spent many years as a bachelor. I had many reasons to do so. I even wanted to marry a Tartar woman, but I found out that they have too many relatives. As soon as a wife enters your house, it’s teaming with people. Can I feed them all?
- I think so, too,- Musapyr said laughingly.
- I’ve been looking for a Kazakh girl who was free from the bridewealth, but I’ve failed to find one. I didn’t venture to steal other men’s brides, either. People can be hurt. Year by year was passing, and I found myself to be an elderly man.
- How old are you now if you believe yourself to be an elderly man? If I’m not mistaken, you’re only thirty one!
- Right, Musapyr. But I’m a year younger in my passport...
- Don’t hide it from me, why...
- No mystery to it? Did you tell your age accurately?
- I didn’t want to seem old before entering the university, so I reduced it a little.
- So how old are you now?
- Actually?
- Of course!
- Twen-ty se-ven!- Musapyr whispered in separate syllabi, looking around anxiously, as if someone could be overhearing.
- Oi-bai-au, you’re getting old, too,- Balkash was glad.- It’s time you got married as well!
- Married... A wife’s like a halter. As soon as your head’s in, there’s no getting out. A wife can wait. Nothing’s happened to you so far, and you’re thirty one... Let me live to be your age without a halter.
- You ‘re making me too old,- Balkash answered.
- Okay, it’s another joke! Go on with your story, we’ve lost the subject...
- So listen and don’t interrupt me. So this summer I came home, and one of my friends kept asking me one and the same thing – why wouldn’t I get married? I said that I couldn’t find a decent girl. He promised to find me one. I asked him who the girl was. He told me. He said he couldn’t claim her to be especially beautiful and slender. Not a bai’s daughter. Her father’s a modest hard-working man. He wouldn’t ask for a big bridewealth. Clothes and bedsheets would do. If I had any difficulties paying at once, he could make it a credit. Marry her my friend was persuading me. You’re a lonely dzhigit, you want to have children. The girl’s mother is a fertile woman. As far as I remember, your bride’s her third daughter. In twenty years, she’s had more than twenty children. The two elder daughters are already married and are as fertile as their mother... That’s how my friend managed to persuade me.
- So how much time has it been since you married?- Musapyr asked laughingly.
- A little more than two months...
- So has she really taken after her mother?
- Thanks to allah...
- Congratulations. May you have a son! – Saying this, Musapyr shook Balkash’s hand.
The train stopped. Balkash said goodbye and went out.
- So go to your dear wife!- Musapyr was still mocking at Balkash,- your Zhanyl, whom you love so desperately, must be already getting sullen: where’s my Bake, why is he late. Don’t you do her wrong...
At Parting, Balkash pointed at me and clenched his fist, gesturing to Musapyr, as if to say “be firm!” I never understood what he meant...
Soon, I fell asleep.
- Wake up, Bates, wake up!- I opened my eyes The train had stopped. Dusk was breaking. – Time to get out, Bates. We’re in Kinel. We have to change to the Tashkent train.
I lifted my body and stretched my hand our for the trunk. It had been at my head, behind the pillow. It had been... But now I could not find it. Maybe Musapyr took it? But his answer to me was a surprised:
- Isn’t the trunk there?
- No!
- Where can it be? Maybe you put it below?
- Would I be asking you?..
- But what if it’s stolen, Bates!..
- Who could steal it?- I asked, such a dummy.
Musapyr began to ask his neighbors, but they were only scolding him or laughing. Like – what can we know about a missing trunk.
The trunk had disappeared!.. I had packed it tightly with my best summer and autumn clothes. The trunk was at home when Nurbek and Naizabek took me away scandalously. It was my mother who brought the trunk to the Red Yurt. When Asia and I opened the trunk in Asia’s yurt, we sound there a full bag of necklaces, which had been lying locked in the chest of Вaibishe Karakyz.
Later, my mother told me about Baibishe sorting the necklaces and crying:
- Why do I need it, this damned jewellery, now that Botash’s not with us.
At such moments, Mother forgave Karakyz:
- It’s not she who gave birth to you but me,- my mother said,- but she, poor thing, has got so much used to you, to your smell, that she can’t stop crying since you left. Her eyes’re dim with tears.
However, the sorrowful words of my mother failed to weaken me. I was thinking of what was waiting for me, but not of what had passed.
In the meanwhile, my mother untied the bag and threw the jewelry onto the cloth. It was not a bai’s collection. Being made of cheap stones and silver, it looked much like ordinary necklaces and rings, which poor Kazakhs would collect patiently for their daughters. Among those presents from Karakyz, buckles, hooks, and rings, the most expensive was a chopped silver necklace. In the first years of my youth, I would weave each of those two chains into a plait, but then I somehow gave it up. There was an extraordinary stone. In the steppe of Turgai, people call it snake’s saliva. There’s a legend saying that is a snake licks a feather grass stalk, a hard short-grained build-up appears around the stalk. When taken off, it looks like a ring, hard as if it were made of metal wire, of gray color. Aul women believe it impossible for a snake to sting a child with this feather grass stalk ring. I used to have a “snake’s saliva”, so Baibishe found it and placed it in the precious bag. I also had a tiny sleeveless camisole. I used to wear it before the age of one. Made of multicolor velvet and silk pieces, it was richly decorated with beads.
Apart from beads, an owl leg was tied to it with a thread according to the custom, so that shaitan devils and taradzhin evil spirits could not hurt the child. Long after I left my cradle and started running around the aul, Baibishe would put me into my pillow. Sometimes she would press it hard against her face, “Botash, I’m missing your babyish smile”. She did not forget to put this small camisole with an owl leg into the bag as a keepsake. And now the clothes and the simple mementos of my childhood spent in the auk were gone.
However surprised you may be, but I did not burst in to tear or even shed some, though I was very upset to know that the trunk was missing. Why cry? This was something which belonged to the old world, which I was trying to escape. Both this world and its gifts were left behind.. “I wish allah does not forgive me my old sins but helps me in the future...” This was the only thing I wished for...
Burkut’s album was gone, too! Damn it! How much I feared to lose it when leaving my native aul. First, I sew the album into the lining of my camisole, wrapping it with a piece of firm textile. But, as the saying goes, the owner is to blame for a missing possession. Why did I cut the textile, take the album of the lining and put it onto the very bottom of the trunk after my mother came to the aul?!
...Now the album was missing... What could I use now to prove that Burkut was guilty?
Soon, the Tashkent train arrived in Kinel, we managed to find placed in the same carriage, though in its opposite ends – Balkash with his wife and Musapyr with me, as before. We lay onto the middle berth, one opposite to the other.
I curled up to think my own thoughts. This time, my companions believed me to be upset because of the lost trunk. Let them think so, why should I care...
The way from Kinel to Kzylorda is little fun. As the Kazaks put it, even a dog can die in the middle of the way... Days and nights were passing!.. The train seemed to be flying like an arrow with infrequent delays at stations. It was flying like an arrow, no, it was even faster than the wind. This is what I imagined, as I was only used to horseback riding. Unexpectedly for myself, I soon got accommodated to the fast moving. In the first days of my travel trip, I felt light-headed, while now I could contemplate the vast even steppe from the window and feel good. Inadvertently, I was repeating the poem by Saken Seifullin “Express”, which I learned at school:
Race, express! Fly and flash!
Twirl the darkness in a whirlwind!
Fly like a night star
Despite every storm.
I had stepped onto the long road as well. Where would I arrive or stay? Anyway, I wanted to reach my destination as soon as possible!
People say that there is no endless road. We were approaching Kzylorda, which had been unreachable a couple of days before. It was long after midnight when Musapyr woke me up. I thought of Asia saying at giving me the letter for Shamsia:
- I’ll send her a telegram, too. Her husband has a horse at work. They’ll meet you. If they can’t, the address is on the envelope, so you will be able to find Shamsia’s house. Balkash will help you as well. My task for him is to take care of you and hire a cab if necessary to bring you to Smamsia.
As far as I remembered, Balkash had promised to arrange it all, but I did not rely on him much.
So when Musapyr said that it was time to get off, I grew worried about whether Shamsia was going to meet me or not? The letter for her was lost along with the trunk. Obviously, Musapyr did not know this. However, he was trying to talk me out of staying at Smasia’s with great perseverance.
- Why would you go to people you don’t know? Town dwellers are polite, but they lack hospitality. They feed on their salary. It’s difficult for them to receive guests. Well, they can be generous to those whom they respects...But don’t you expect any of this. Shamsia can meet you and she won’t show her irritation for many days. But then she’ll do her best to get rid of you. You don’t know how many days it’ll take you to enter the school. Why won’t you stay in my flat?
- No, Musapyr, I'll do as arranged...
At the station, I was looking around in embarrassment. Noone was there to meet me. Suddenly, a man dressed in the townish way came up to me:
- Tell me, Dear, where did you come from?
Musapyr interfered rather rudely:
- Why do you need her?
- Do you think I can eat her?- the black-mustached man answered.- The girl I’m looking for was to come by this train.
- Where does the girl you’re looking for come from?- This time, Musapyr was more polite.
- From Turgai...
- I’m from Turgai!- I exclaimed.
- Tell me your name, girl.
- Bates!
- Then it’s you who I’m meeting, Dear... Your elder sister Asia sent a telegram to Shamsia... But Shamsia’s not at home. She’s gone to Moscow and Leningrad. I’m her husband. My name’s Amanzhol Amandykov.
Amanzhol shook my hand:
- The horse’s waiting for you, Dear...
- When is her sister coming?- Musapyr asked.
- You’re poison-tongued, dzhigit, - Amanzhol answered. – As for you girl, you must know that when the sister’s not at home, you have her house with bed and food for you...
- Don’t you recognize me, Comrade Amandykov. I am Balkash!- the teacher joined it.
- Balkash?- Amanzhol was surprised.
- Yes, Balkash Zhidebaiev...
- Aha! I think I remember you. Where are you going from?
- From Turgai. Along with Bates. Asia, the one you’ve just mentioned, asked me to bring the girl to Kzylorda and help her around.
- Then, let’s go with us. Tomorrow you’ll go on business.
- All right, but we need to discuss something,- Balkash answered.
Amanzhol went aside.
- If Shamsia was at home, she’d meet you, and everything would be okay, Bateszhan,- Balkash was arguing.- She’s a woman, she can help you better, she can understand. Thanks to Amanzhol for meeting you. But what shall you do now? Can you follow a man to a house with no woman in it?- Balkash went on.- I would invite you to my apartment, but the room is so tiny with so many people in that is doesn’t have enough room for you.
- So what will you recommend me?- I interrupted Balkash.
- What if we go to the house where Musapyr leaves? Good hosts, much space. You can stay there till you’ve settle your business. Will you go?
- I will!
What else could I tell you? Am I lucky? Had not misfortunes flooded me one after another... But the greatest one must be waiting for me in this house... I think it is!
I AM ROBBED AGAIN
- One thousand and one thanks to you, Comrade, for coming here on a dark night like this!- Saying this, Balkash came to Amanzhol, who had been waiting aside for our decision.- Все We all come from the same place, Turgai...
We’ve discussed it and came to the conclusion that Bates should go with us. The girl’s left her native aul to study. If we feel good, we’ll start arranging it for her tomorrow in the morning. Then Shamsia will come, and Bates will come to visit her.
- I don’t mind,- Amanzhol answered,- but at least don’t hire a cab, I’ll take you there.
- Don’t bother!- Balkash tried to refuse.- You’d have to take us to different parts of the town.
- Even if you live in ten different places, they’re all in our Kzylorda, that is, not too far away... So get in.
- I need to get to the very end of the town,- Musapyr joined the argument.
- It seems to me you’ve been talking too much,- Amanzhol said ironically,- I didn’t hire my horses to argue if its straight or not, close or far. If you want to go, get in!
According to the Kazakh custom as I had imagined it, my companions were to refuse and hire a cab. However, they followed Amanzhol languidly to the cart, which was standing under the trees on the railroad square. Coachmen were sitting on the boxes of two tarantasses, trying to ourshout each other “Go to me!, “Go to me!” to win passengers. They were preaching up their horses, calling them trotters and then amblers. In the gray of the dawn, I noticed two animal which looked like horses, a little smaller than a half-year-old calf. I asked Balkash in a whisper:
- What is this?
- Haven't you seen it?
- Never!
- That’s an ass.
I wonder how I could have seen them taking into account the fact that there never was a single ass in the whole Turgai steppe, where I had grown up.
... Suddenly, I heard a loud and coarse bellow. Being scared, I called to allah for help and rushed to embrace Balkash.
- What’s wrong with you?- the teacher was surprised.
- Who’s bellowing?..
- Bates, it’s the ass...
In the meanwhile, the one who was to blame for my fear finished its bellow with a whining shriek.
- Why did it do this?
And Balkash explained to me that asses shared this feature with cocks – they cried at dawn, at noon, and at dusk. But in henhouses, only cocks can sing, while female asses are just as loud as male ones.
Asses... For some reason, people say and even write in books that they are utterly stupid. Now I have seen and heard an ass.
We got onto Zmanzhols cart. The horse took us along a street cobbled with uneven stones in a trot. In some places. dim lamps were lit on house gates, but it was quite light, anyway.
- Hush!.. Hush!..- Balkash was constantly repeating, being displeased with the rocking of the uncomfortable springless cart.
On both sides of the street, a thick row of trees was growing, which sometimes hid the low houses completely.
- This is the very main street of our town,- Balkash said to me,- from the station to the corner, it is called Engels Street, and from the corner it is Karl Marx Street.
Soon we turned, as Balkash explained, to Lenin Street, and then we spent much time making circles and loops before Balkash finally asked Amanzhol to stop by a gate. Balkash helped Zhanyl get out, then took his belongings and wished us a happy journey.
Now Musapyr was telling the way.
- To the garden, to Airanbakh!..
Amanzhol began to hurry his fast horse.
- Was it the dzhigit’s sister or wife with him? You say wife. Isn’t she pregnant. Why am I asking? Because he was constantly bothering me, asking me to slow down. As if he had never traveled in a cart. So I thought he was afraid of a miscarriage...
- You’re right!- Musapyr said.- Balkash wants a baby more than anything. So he’s afraid of anything that can harm his wife.
- Whose relative is this little sister?- Amanzhol pointed at me.
- Of both of them.
- Why didn’t Bates stay with them, then? It would be more convenient for her to share a roof with a close woman.
- It’s true. But they lack room.- Musapyr looked embarrassed.- Bates is a very close relative of mine. That’s why she’s going with me...
- Ah-ha!- Amanzhol said and stopped speaking, apparently unwilling to continue the conversation.
We spent much time wandering in narrow and winding lanes. The sun had already reason, cocks were shouting frantically, and dogs were barking. How many dogs are there in this town! They were running in flock and jumping suddenly out of gateways...
The conversation was not getting on. We left the town silently. Streets and gardens were left behind... Around us, there was the steppe dotted with small hills which looked like kettles. People were coming out of those hills. I asked what it was.
- Kepes,- Musapyr explained,- houses of poor townsmen. They dig a cave in a hill or a ravine, put something like a shanrak, that is, a yurt hoop, to let the light in, and the house is ready.
- Are there many kepes in Kzylorda?
- There are none in the town, only in the outskirts. They say that every fourth dweller of Kzylorda lives in a kepe. Some live even in yurts, but most of yurts in these parts are black. Why? Here there are many nonmigratory Kazakhs growing crops. They are poor and never have gray yurts, not to mention white. They live in holey black yurts. The poorest ones don’t have even a yurt, though. Most of the poor men live in dug-outs called kepes. On the other side of the Darya, there’s even an aul called “Kyryk-kepe”, that is, forty kepes. Obviously, this used to be their number in the beginning, but now there are more than a hundred... The Syr Darya Kazakhs have a rough life. They have to water their crops manually. It’s a hard job. Turgai cattle breeders enjoy a far easier life...
I felt sad to look at the kepes. However, I sometimes saw small flat-roofed houses among those dug-outs. We stopped near one of them.
- Here’s my flat!
After the long journey on light sand, Amanzhol’s horse was tired and covered with white froth. We entered the open yard – there was no gate. A middle-aged man came out of the house to met us. His long black moustache, which was curled upwards, and a rich fox fur hat caught my attention.
- Ah, you’re back, Musapyr!- he shook his hand.
- So are you and your family in good health, Kuzeke?- my companion said respectfully.
- Allah, Musapyr’s come!- A fat freckled woman wearing a wife kerchief came up to us. As soon as I thought that she and the man looked like spouses, I felt them staring at me quizzically. Musapyr was quicker than their curiosity and said briefly that I had come from the Turgai steppe to study.
The hosts smiled, perhaps believing me to be Musapyr’s wife. They did not greet Amanzhol, perhaps believing him to be a cabman.
- We did not expect guests, Yesektas,- the host turned to his wife. – I’ll go to the market on my own. Replace the children from the living room to the entrance room and provide Musapyr with what he needs. And hurry up! It’s Sunday. The market’s opening. I’ll take the cart and go there.
- No, you won’t,- Amanzhol answered.
- Why?
- Because my house is in the opposite end of the town.
- Even if it is, I’ll pay you...
- You don’t have enough money!
Kuzen, as I found out later was his name, got indignant and started talking back to Amanzhol:
- Whom do you take me to be, what do you think you’re doing?
- Calm down!- Amanzhol frowned.- You’d better tell me, whom do you take me to be? Maybe you’ve heard about a man called Amandykov...
Кuzen got embarrassed and muttered something indiscernible. He did not answer his wife’s questioned and only made her a sign with his lips so that she would not say anything.
- You can go on your high horse!- Amanzhol gave Kuzen an ironical look, while the latter showed every sign of being displeased with the encounter and even stuttering with excitement:
- I didn’t mean it! I am sorry!..
The hosts invited us to the house. We started parting with Amanzhol.
- I never knew I’d find this villain Kuzen here. How do you know him, Musapyr?
- Do you know him well?- Musapyr answered with a question.
- He’s a notorious cheat and reseller. He’s sold all kinds of things, maybe except for his wife and children. But he’s a frightful gambler, once he gambled her away and won her back only after several months. This must be the woman he called Yesektas. Yesektas means a stone ass! Not great fun, is it? The poor thing’s got a row deal, and Kuzen means a ferret, that’s not too pleasant. As a small ferret is one of the most harmful animals. It smothers hens and doesn’t scruple to rob graves.
- How do you know him?
- I’m head of the town financial department...
- Aha, I see,- Musapyr was talking in a reserved manner.
- What do you see?- Amanzhol asked.
- You’ve just said Kuzen to be a reseller. Indeed, the financial department won’t let him breath, it’s smothering him with taxes. But it seems to be he’s a little different from what you imagine him to be. But I don’t live in this house. My flat’s situated in the town it belongs to Kuzen’s elder brother, Korsak. They are our distant relatives through the fourth generation. You’re mistaken about Kuzen. He’s ill, he’s suffering from asthma, he can’t work with a spade or a ketmen. He’s got no education. The trade he’s doing – is it reselling? They have no cattle. They buy and sell old things. They earn chicken feed.
- You don’t know Kuzen at all. Or maybe you do an do this on purpose. Anyway, we know him well,- Amanzhol replied roughly.
Musapyr obviously disliked the conversation. He was doing his best to stop it, though he was being reserved to seem indifferent. On an accidental pretext, he too his possessions and came into the house to see whether everything was ready.
When we were left alone, Amanzhol said to me in a hurrying and excited tone.
- Dear, I’m going to ask you a question. But don’t take it too serious.
- I can tell you everything, Amanzhol-aga!
- So tell me, do you have any affair with this Musapyr?
- Allah save me!- I exclaimed in a scared voice, realizing that he meant the most intimate thing.- Allah forbid! He’s merely my companion and my landsman, we’ve been traveling together, that’s the only way I’m connected to him!
- Then listen to what I tell you, Dear:
One can easily recognize an ambler
By the way it runs,
The manner speaks louder than words do.
The manner speaks louder than words do.
Musapyr’s manners do speak! He’s brought you to the house of a bad man! Couldn’t he find anything better?!.. Don’t stay here, Dear!.. Let’s go to us.
- I feel ashamed, agai!.. How can I leave my companion without a permission... We’ve been traveling together from our home land.
- Where will you study?
- I don’t remember... Musapyr should know.
- Well, I have to go!
Amanzhol took his reins. I stood there, not knowing what I should do. Turning onto the street, Amanzhol stopped the horse and bid his farewell in a friendly tone:
- Good bye, Dear, good bye. As far as I can see you’re a mere child. You still have traces of your mother’s milk on your lips and traces of cradle on your back. Have a good journey, Dear!
How numerous good people turned out to be. Creator, help me be among them!
When Amanzhol had left, Kuzen and Musapyr came out of the house. Kuzen was carrying a bag prepared for the market on his back.
- Well, I’m gone... I'll be back soon...
Musapyr came very close to me:
- This Amanzhol can’t get enough of bribes. He’s never satisfied. He hates people. He calls one a bai, another’s a mullah, a third one’s dubbed a reseller. If they bribe him, he won’t touch them, he’ll even help them out. If they don’t, he’ll keep imposing taxed on them till they’re ruined. He finds even people like Kuzen, who hardly exist. He smothers them if they refuse to bribe them. Whatever he said was window dressing. In a way, we Amanzhol to poor Kuzen’s house. He’ll hound him to death now.
- He doesn’t seem to be the kind of a man,- I objected.
- Don’t listen to what he says, look at what he does.
- But if the family is innocent, we can tell Amanzhol.
- He won’t listen to you!..
Yesektas came out and invited us to the house.
I did, and I was struck. In the first room which was divided in two with a brick oven, there was no furniture or rugs. The samovar and the crockery were covered with flies. The second room, which was the living and the bed-room, was very similar to the first one. In the corner, there was something like a clay berth. It was covered with some patchwork and an old piece of canvas. On the left, there was a bed made of rough wood boards. A shagged head belonging to a thin little girl stuck out from behind a patched blanket on a dirty pillow. Her shiny eyes and features resembled Yesektas greatly. This place was teaming with flies, too. But I failed to find any signs of wealth or abundance...
- You’ve had a long journey, you must be cold,- Yesektas said,- lie down and have a rest. That man with a moustache insulted us, called us reselleres. Can resellers have nothing to make a bed for their guests...
- What did I say?- Musapyr supported the hostess.
- Though I feel ashamed, cover yourselves with your clothes!- Yesektas said.
- Don’t you be ashamed!- And Musapyr quoted a saying:- You can’t hold what isn’t here.
- A polite man speaks frankly,- Yesektas thought of another saying, - if we don’t hide the truth, there’s even no food on the reseller’s house at the moment. But never mind, we’ll bring you something from the market while you’re sleeping...
- Don’t bother, Zhengei!
- How can I but bother! First guests are shy, then the host is ashamed. Musapyr, you’re an inner man here. But Bates hasn’t tried food here yet...
I thought to myself, how did Yesektas know my name?
She gave orders to her daughter, a raven-haired girl with evil eyes lying under the blanket, and left.
Kodyk – that was the name of the hosts’ daughter – was looking at me with malice which was not childlike at all.
- Maybe you’ll sleep with her?- Musapyr asked.
- No... I’d better lie down in the corner, on the floor... Tell me why is the house so dirty? And this Kuzen, is he a reseller or not?
Musapyr grinned.
- I haven’t counted his money, but I think he’s got less than your father.- And he broke off, unwilling to expatiate upon the subject.
Musapyr lay down in one of the corners with his coat under his head and went to sleep. I sat down in another corner to see Kodyk’s narrowed eyes staring at me again. She was lying still and looking at me intently. I was not sleepy, but I could not stand her gaze and turned away from her with my face to the wall and a camel hair camisole under my head.
Flies would not leave me in peace. Moreover, yellow mosquitoes buzzing in disgusting thin voices, got here. There were flees and some other insects which I did not know. They are called bedbugs. I was told this later. Their bites made my body itchy.
I scratched myself all over. As soon as I sunk into a sleep, I woke up again because of that itching. Musapyr was snorting as sound as a bell. The girl, who ad covered her head with the blanket, must have fallen asleep, too. But her sleep was troubled...
My nature makes my bad mood disappear as quickly as it appears. This time, the sun which lurked into my window chased it away.
The sun of our Turgai is hardly ever that bright. It usually rises to the clouds hiding the horizon. When it comes into the clear sky, it throws a veil of clouds over its face immediately, like a young bride or sheds tears trough the kerchief of clouds, causing a light rain, lie a young wife missing her father’s aul. On clear days, our Turgai sun grills only on midday, but at this time, a gentle breeze is usually blowing to make it easier for people and animals.
No, the sun of Kzylorda is very different. It burns from the very morning and, having reached the zenith point, heats so much that a person who is not used to it cannot breathe. I came out to freshen myself up, but instead of the chilly breeze of the steppe, I was burned by such intolerable heat that I came back to the room at the same moment. Musapyr was still snorting – it looked like he was used both to the heat and to the insects. The girl was till tossing and turning under her blanket...
I did not want to go to bed again, so I decided to wash my face and make toilet. I replaced my plaits from my back to my chest and suddenly saw that the ribbons with which I had tied my plaits were gone. The beautiful ribbons with coins on their ends. My plaits were unwoven... Where were the ribbons, where was the black silk tie which Kalisa had given to me? Ribbons on my plaits had never unwoven before. Moreover, I made the plaits thoroughly in Kostanai before getting on the train. Even here, in this house, they were present. Where could my ribbons have disappeared? What jinn or shaitan could have stolen them? Who was watching me when I was asleep? My son was short and not too deep. Musapyr couldn’t have taken the ribbons. Why would he need them? Moreover, he started snorting as soon as he lay down. Could it have been that Kodyk girl? She had been looking at me from time to time and tossing and turning even with her head covered. But she’s just a little girl. It couldn’t have occured to her to steal. But who took them, all in all? As there was noone but the three of us in the room.
My unexpected loss upset me.
For a Kazakh girl, her relatives have always saved some silver. According to the aul custom, it can he solid or not. The ribs of solid silver coins – roubles, ten-kopeck and half-rouble coins, had lines carved in them. Moreover, they usually had a tsar woman on one side. These coins have a very melodious sound, while . coins made of silver which is not solid, with a male tsar on them, clink like brass. Their rids are rough. In auls, solid sterling was thought to be precious, while the other kind was believed to be low-quality.
Later I found out that our Kazakhs were somehow right to judge like this. During the rule of female Russian tsars, Anna, Elizabeth, and Catherine, there was more silver in coins than it was during the rule of Alexander and Nikolai. So the Kazakhs, especially the well-off ones, hunted for Catherine’s roubles and ordered bracelets, rings, and necklaces made of them for their daughters.
Baibishe Karakyz attached a solid rouble coin to each of my ribbons. Or course it was not the silver of Catherine but the memory of a dear person that I treasured. First, the necklaces vanished together with trunk... Those two coins used to looked at me like Baibishe’s eyes, like those of my mother, while the ribbon uniting them was as radiant as the look of the kind zhengei Kalisa. I did not have those eyes, that look at my side anymore.
This is why I was so upset, this is why my face was burning.
ГAs the saying goes, one who has lost a dear thing can search even one’s own mother. The thought that the girl had stolen the coin ribbons would not leave me. I came up to her and tore her blanket off. How thin she was, one could see all of her ribs through the think skin. Her raven hair, as rough as that of a lamb, were crying for a comb. The girl woke up. She was blinking with her small black eyes, as if she was about to burst into tears.
- Kodyk, did you take my ribbons?
Her black eyes grew even narrower and more malicious. She shook her unkempt head.
- If you did, give them back!
She shook her head again.
Musapyr woke up, lifted his head, and asked me, wiping his swollen red eyes:
- What’s wrong, Bates?
- Thieved in the train and thieves here! How can I finally get rid of them?!
I began to cry.
- Tell me clearly what happened!..
I told him about the missing thing, but he was merely expressing surprise without speculations.
- Musapyr, I have to leave this house, I’m afraid of its mere appearance. I’m leaving now!
- Wait, where will you go?
- I have my tongue, my eyes, and my feet. I’ll ask people and find what I need.
- Please, don’t hurry. What are you doing to look for?
- What do you mean? An educational establishment.
Musapyr forced me to stay, covered the window, in which the sun was shining hot, with his coat and my chapan, made me sit down near him and began reassuring me:
- Bear it in your mind, Kzylorda’s no Turgai, Bates! You can’t here the house you need like you’d do in your aul. In a town, people don’t ask like where does a certain person live. In a town, you need to know the street and the house number, otherwise you’ll have to wander to no avail. Don’t do this, Bates!
I promised you to help you enter whatever establishment you can enter. I’ll keep to my word. But it’s too early...Only seven... All the establishments are closed. Let’s wait for the hosts. Я The we can go. As for your ribbon, I don’t know what to say. If you had it, I have no idea as for where it could have disappeared. Perhaps a stranger came in to grab it when you were sleeping. But it’s hard to believe. Tell the hosts, just in case they find it.
Having nearly given up the hope for finding my ribbon, I lit up after hearing Musapyr’s words and stopped threatening him with my immediate departure.
- Anyway, you’d better have a rest. It’s cooler in the house now, you can fall asleep.
- No, I don’t want to sleep here,- I answered to Musapyr.
For some time, we kept silent, and then he began to tell me about Kuzen:
- When I visited them about a year ago, this all didn’t look this poor. The host used to be a rich dzhigit. He even worked as a bai’s salesclerk. But now his things look black. The Soviet government requires labor. But he can’t work – he has poor health and doesn’t know how to do it. His household’s mined, there’s no abundance in his house, though he keeps something in store.... But, as the saying goes:
Licking a log
Won’t kill a dog’s hunger.
You can imagine their revenue from selling old things at the market.
Musapyr heaved a sigh and proceeded to describe the days of abundance for Kuzen and his family. When he felt that I was by no means interested in his stories, he began to extol Yesektas.
- Never mind her black appearance,- he said,- inside, she’s kind.
Why on earth did she praise her? Was I supposed to live there? And I interrupted Musapyr irritatedly:
- Why should I care about the way they used to live. It’s the kind of a house where a dog won’t live.
Musapyr did not say anything about Kuzen and his wife and went on to extol the institute, on the preparatory department of which he wanted me to study.
- Its director Moldagali Zholdybaiev is a man I know well. If allah helps me, I’ll arrange it for you to be accepted to his institute...
We heard some noise and rustle behind the door. We strained our ears and the girl lying under the blanket suddenly howled:
- Apa, mama!
Yesektas, who had just come back from the marked, rushed it at hearing her cry.
Kodyk was still weeping.
- What’s wrong with you, my dear?- her mother tried to sooth her down.
- She beat me!- and the girl rushed to embrace her mother, still crying.
- Who?- Yesektas asked surprisedly.
- She, she!-Kodyk pointed at me.
- God forbid, where did I beat her?- I got scared.
- She did!- the girl kept shrieking.
Yesektas took her daughter’s side:
- Why would she be crying if you hadn’t?
- I didn’t touch her, Zhengei. But the fact I’ve lost my hair ribbon is true. I was asking Kodyk if she’s taken the ribbon.
- What ribbon?
Yesektas and me were standing face to face, nearly touching each other. I told her about the ribbon and what actually happened.
- You lost your ribbon before coming here. Maybe you didn’t notice it being stolen in the train.
- No, Yesektas! I had the ribbon when I came to you and lay down over there in the corner...
- So where is it now? Mice won’t take it, and there was noone but mice here. Or do you still believe that my girl, the height of a small finger, stole her?
- Is it gone with the wind or what?- I got angry.
- Oiboi!- Yesektas smiled ironically.- I’ve been thinking what made you leave your mother aul. Now it’s clear – you fled because you’re mad!
- Don’t say so!- Musapyr took my side.- She’s not mad at all. I’m not sure it’s your daughter who took it. She’s an unsophisticated child. Can she steal? I think one of the neighbors took it while Bates was sleeping.
- Let’s not talk about this anymore. The ribbon is mine. Let is be gone. But to the one who took it I wish it becomes a stone in his or her throat!
- It’s only mean women that like cursing. You’re young, but you’ve already developed the habit... I didn’t know you’re like this.
Saying this, Yesektas left the room with the girl in her arms.
- She did take it!- I told Musapyr.
- How do you know?
- I can guess. She said I’d beaten her. But I didn’t touch her. Now I can think of a thievish girl from our aul who loved stealing necklaces and jewelry from girls and young women on holidays. When something was gone and they asked her, she’s start shouting and crying her heart out just like this... If the victim was silent, she got away with it, if she wasn’t, her mother, just like Yesektas, could make such fuss and clamor that the search would end at once. People feared them equally – the little thief was well worth her mother!
...And still I did taste the bread of this house.
Yesektas made tea and put bread torn into pieces onto the dastarkhan. It did not taste like the kind of bread we eat in Turgai. It was flatbread, tandyr-nan – bread baked in a special kind of clay oven. It bore a slight resemblance to the buns we would cook in frying pans. But the flatbread to which Yesektas treated us was very stale. The host poured nishalla, a white sweet, but very viscous beverage, into china cups. I could not drink it. Besides, she offered us melted sugar, kumsheker, yellow and slightly bitter. I hardly touched the sweets, had a small piece of tandyr-nan and a bowl of strong tea.
The time was approaching noon when Musapyr and I decided to go to the institute. He came out to return this very moment:
- The sun’s scorching! You’ll have to wear a light shirt, or else you can’t stand it. Leave your overclothes here, too, Bates.
- Now, I won’t!- I said.- I’ll take everything and won’t ever come to this house even if you drag me here by force.
- All right, don’t come if you don’t want to. But don’t you carry unnecessary things when it’s so hot. Leave them here, I’ll fetch them later.
- No and no again!- I answered. – Even a saint will flee from a mean man. I’m leaving this house and I’m not coming back. They, who stole my ribbon, won’t leave me any of my clothes. Dear people have sewn those dresses for me. Looking at these clothes, I can see their eyes.. I’ve been robbed twice, that’s enough. I don’t want any more of this!
WHY IS HE SILENT?
I put on the sleeveless camisole over my dress and took all my belongings. I did not want to come to this house anymore.
An otter fur hat was protecting my head against the scorching heat. Baibishe Karakyz would not let me take it off. “If the sun heats your hair, it will lose color”, - Baibishe said.
Aul girl did not wear ankle boots back then. Like any other girl, I had high ones. I took them off before sleep only. “A girl must not show her feet”, - Baibishe would say.
However hot it was in Turgai, I never sweated. But as soon as I had made several steps from Kuzen’s house, I realized that I was bathing in sweat and melting like ice under the sun...
- I told you, Bates, but you wouldn’t listen to me! – Musapyr felt sorry for me.- I say it once again, return to leave at least the clothes you’re carrying in your hands.
When I refused again, he grabbed my dresses and took them from my hands nearly be force.
- Now take off your hat and sleeveless camisole.
- I won’t!- I was being stubborn.
- But you’re bathing in sweat!
- Nothing will happen.- And I told Musapyr about several Kazakhs returning to Turgai after their Hajj, that is, pilgrimage to Mecca. Nearly all of them died of heat, as the killing sunrays could get through their thin clothes easily. Only Aldabai, who observed the aul customs rigidly, stayed alive. He was wearing a fox fur treukh hat, a thick woolen chapan, felt stockings, and high boots. He knew that warm clothes could protect him against the sun. I was doing the same thing as Aldabai. I not only refused to take off the camisole but even took my beshmet from Musapyr’s hands and threw it over my shoulders.
- People’ll laugh at you!- he was trying to persuade me.
- Let them laugh! Death is surely worse than laughter!
I was following Musapyr obediently wherever he led me. I was sweating all over. I felt like warm water had been poured into my boot collars. What about the sun? The higher it got, the hotter the air became. Looking at Musapyr, I felt surprised, as there was not a single drop of sweat on his face. So he way used to the hot rays?
- Maybe you’ll take off your beshmet and camisole?- he recommended. Though there was nothing bad about his words, I somehow felt ashamed and refused.
The town was rather far from Kuzen’s house. On or way, another misfortune found us very soon. The gray Kzylorda dust would raise in clouds after each cart that passed us. It was a choky thick dust! The closer we were to the market, the more carts were approaching us. The dust raised by their wheels was hanging in the air like a thick haze. It was getting into our noses and mouths – dense, pungent, and hot. It tickled my throat and provoked cough. I tried to keep my mouth closed, but it did not help. From time to time, when the dust cleared away, I noticed mocking looks followed by exclamations:
- Look, the sun’s scorching but the girl’s wrapped all over as if it was frosty!
- Is she mad?..
This mockery did not upset me. Gradually getting used to the heat and the dust, I was watching the fuss of the town and wondering at the amount of asses in the streets of Kzylorda. They were carrying all kinds of things – wood, hay, and bags. Many dwellers of Kzylorda were riding asses. When compared to the small animals, the riders looked massive, awkward, and large. It was especially funny to see several people riding one and the same ass. Indeed asses are strong and sturdy! Though they are ugly, they have sweet-looking colts, kodyks, as I learned by chance when watching a scene on the street, during which one passer-by was shouting to another:
- Here’s your lost kodyk.
In the centre of the town, there was very little dust. Right on the street, people were selling the sweet nishalla to which Yesektas had treated me in large pots. The sellers were inviting the passers-by to have some nishalla loudly and ladling it into the buyers’ cups. Here, close to the market, people sold various things and dresses. Musapyr stopped:
- Listen, your clothes are stolen. Let’s buy you a dress and some underwear.
- Why?
Perhaps Musapyr thought that deep inside I did not mind buying something at all, so he started haggling with the seller at once when he found a narrow dress he liked.
- No, I won’t wear a dress like this!
- All right! Then we’ll buy you some fabric and have someone tailor a thing you like.
...Finally, we reached a garden and went to the square in the shadow of its trees. Musapyr brought me to a large brick house with a red roof. What struck me about this house was a great number of windows.
- So we’ve got to the institute! – Musapyr said.
How numerous girls and young men buzzing along its corridors were! Some were wearing townish clothes, while the rest was dressed in the aul manner.
- People like you came to study!- Musapyr told me in a whisper.
We stopped by the door which teachers and students were constantly entering.
- Wait for me here,- Musapyr said and disappeared behind the door.
I had to wait for quite a long time. Finally, Musapyr invited me to the room, where my destiny was to be shaped. Apart from us, there were two persons there – a flat-faced thick-lipped man with his head neatly shaven was sitting at the desk, while another portentous man was sitting aside.
- So this is the girl?- the thick-lipped one asked straightaway.
Musapyr gave an affirmative answer and told me in a low voice that this was Moldagali Zholdybaiev, the director of the institute.
Ruffling his thick eyebrows, Moldagali studied me with his large bulging eyes. Suddenly it seemed to me that his face was laughing.
- It’s a good-looking, pretty girl!- he said.- Sly aul firebrands often take over such girls in the middle of their way and don’t let them study in town! How could they miss her?
- I’ll tell you later, Moldeke. I’ll tell you the hole story in detail!- Musapyr answered seriously.
- Why should you tell me? I’m not studying biographies to wrote a drama or a novel. What I wanted to say is that it would be nice to send not only aul people they don’t need but also slender, good-looking girls. In fact, every nation had beautiful and ugly people. Look at Russian girls in institutes. Among them, you’ll find both attractive and unattractive ones. But the Kazakhs who come here to study are mostly unattractive. But take any direction from Kzylorda, and you’ll find beauties in any aul. Но Perhaps I was right when I spoke of the sly men of the auls – they won’t let their brides-to-be to go to town...
- Moldeke, the girl’s almost a child,- the second man interrupted Zholdybaiev. - You’ve bored her with your philosophizing. She’s come to the town for the first town, standing in front of you more dead than alive, and you embarrass her by flatly assessing her beauty...
- Why should she be embarrassed,- Zholdybaiev gave me a cheerful look.- You know the saying:
Say good things to the good.
And you, the good one, shine when praised.
Say to the bad that they are bad at sight...
Even though the bad will heave a sigh.
- Take a sit, Dear, do.- He gestured me to the chair.
But I just nodded to show gratitude.
- If you’re so polite, I wish you a long and happy life, dear. If you came hear from the distant Turgai, of course, we will accept it. Who else can we accept? You’ll enter the first preparatory course. One needs a six years’ education to get there. You have only four years, right?
I told him that he was right.
- But never mind. You’ll work hard and finish the first preparatory year... Musapyr told me about your father. I used to know him, he was a well-respected man. Maybe he’s spoilt now... My requirement to you is that you should be the institute’s daughter till you graduate. We’ll shoulder all concerns about you. Do you understand? You’ll think about studying only.
- What else can she think of?- the older dzhigit who had kept silent said.
- Hey!- Moldagali shouted.- It’s never a shame to tell the truth. She’s nearly a grown-up girl. Of course she’ll have admirers. The place’s teaming with them. How do we know that one of them won’t get under her skin? I’m telling the truth, Dear... – Moldagali looked me in the face intently and went on: - Let agree like this: before you graduate, don’t even think about dzhigit. Have you understood me?.. Then write,- Zholdybaiev turned to the dzhigit,- write that she’s accepted...
- But what about examination?
- We won’t make a girl who’s come from the distant Turgai sit an exam. I say, write she’s accepted. If she can’t study, she can blame herself. You can go, daughter. Tomorrow you’ll get the necessary papers.
I thanked Moldagaly and headed for the door.
- Do you have a place to live at?- he said. – You say now. Then we’ll arrange it in the dormitory tomorrow.
- What a good man this Moldeke is,- I said to Musapyr.
- You’re right. A very good one. But he’s a joker. I hope his words didn’t hurt you?
- How could they hurt me? He gave me intelligent recommendations, and he took me to heart!
Musapyr suggested that we should go somewhere to have a rest.
- You won’t go to Kuzen’s house, of course...
- I won’t even if you cut off my head.
- What about his elder brother’s house? Are you surprised? I told you in the morning that he’s got a brother named Korsak who lived in the town centre.
- I remember this. But I doubt that the elder brother is better than the younger one.
- Don’t say it, Bates.
A black and a raven horse are born from the same mother.
You have nothing in common with your sister Kaken. Neither do Kuzen and Korsak. Korsak’s a nice man. His wife Bodene is a good woman, too. They’re hospitable, they’re ready to give you anything. They have a big dastarkhan and hands open wide. Don’t you believe me? Let’s go and have a look, Bates.
I did not want to go to Korsak, but fatigue was taking over me.
- All right, let it be your way, but you told me he’s redecorating his flat.
- Let’s go and see.
I had never seen such houses – squat, flat-roofed, with blank walls without any windows facing the street. Its gray clay walls and locked gate made it look like a fortress. Looking from the inside, from the yards, the numerous small windows make these houses look like wasps’ nest. In the yard, there were similar-looking clay sheds, the only difference between which and the houses was the absence of windows. Houses, sheds, and clay fences called duvals were cooped up so close that I, who had grown up in the steppe, could hardly imagine how people could live there... Here was the place where Korsak squeezed in his house with a yard. The hosts had already moved into their furnished flat.
How fat and sluggish Kuzen’s brother Korsak was. Not everyone would be able to embrace him. He had a bald head which looked like a potato, a double chin hanging down onto his breast, he was somehow dirty and sweaty and was wearing smeared clothes, which were gray with dust. Just imagine legs of canvas trousers as large as a good sack, about five puds of wheat each, a wide gay chintz shirt, a colorful Uzbek skullcap and worn slippers, which looked like camel hooves.
As for his wife, Bodene, her name, which meant Quail, did fit her. Being plump, agile, and small, she looked like a fat black quail, indeed. She was also infected with her husband’s sluggishness. She was barefooted, which surprised me a lot, as in the auls of Turgai neither girls nor women of bais’ and poor families never went around barefoot. And still Bodene was good-looking and even beautiful with her dark complexion and her shiny back eyes under the arches of her rich thin eyebrows. Her teeth made her face look especially attractive, as they were shiny and even like pearls.
Musapyr had told me the truth. Korsak and Bodene were hospitable people. As it turned out, Korsak had been to our house and knew my parents, who would meet him with utter respect, very well. They called be their relative at once, and the words I heard were warm and affectionate.
- Forget the dormitory!- Korsak told me.- Stay with us. By autumn, our new house will be finished, and what we have is enough for a while – there’s the house and the shed. There are only two of us. Do you think we never had children? We did. But none of them is alive. Shortly speaking, it’s as the saying goes:
A dzhigit worked as hard as he could,,
The dzhigit earned a living.
His wife was giving birth to sons,
But none of them stayed living.
I listened and wondered looking at Bodene – she was so young!
In the meanwhile, Korsak went on:
- We friendly and nice, you’ll be like a daughter to us.
I did not hurry to answer. I thought that I should first have a closer look at the family, visit the dormitory, and then decide.
In Korsak’s house, disorder and dirt depressed me. Apparently, the young spouses did not care to make their house tidy and cozy.
After tea, Bodene suggested that I should have a rest:
- Dear, you can stay in the house or go to the shed if you wish.
I chose the shed. Though it was pitch-dark, the air in it was easier to breathe.
I lay down onto the bed without undressing and slept like a log.
Bodene woke me up:
- You’ve been sleeping soundly, girl. The whole day. Now it’s time for the last namaz. You’ve got a whole night ahead. The food’s ready. Musapyr came back from the market long ago.
- Didn’t he sleep?
- Now, he wasn’t at home. He bought you some fabric for your dress and clothes.
I did not answer to Bodene but thought to myself – why is he doing this? I’d asked him not to buy me anything.
I went out of the shed. The sun was setting, so the shady yard was not so hot as it had been. I startled at seeing a nearly naked man washing in the yard. He was wearing nothing but short blue pants. Suddenly I guessed that it was Musapyr. Thin and crooked, he looked unattractive when dressed like this.
I tidied and fined myself and began helping Bodene. Together we cleaned the shed, spread the dastarkhan and placed the dishes on it.
- I’m going to treat you to some pilaf. I’ve cooked it specially for you...
Pilaf, pilaf... I had heard about this southern dish but ever tried it. When someone from our aul was staying in someone’s house for a very long time, people would say: “Why is he lingering there so long? They must have cooked pilaf there...” I imagined it to be delicious... But it was ordinary dry rice with small pieces of chicken, dried apricots, and raisins. We never sowed rice at home. We first tasted it aged young, when humanitarian supplies were sent to our parts. Most often, we cooked rice porridge. But as soon as the steppe economy turned the corner, people stopped cooking rice, as one could not get sate on it and it smelt of water. But the grains in the pilaf Bodene had cooked were dry and crumbly. As the host explained to me, good pilaf must be like this.
On that evening I also learned about the way in which tandyr-nan was baked. Fire was kept in a round oven, which like a small tent, till the brick got hot. After that, firebrands and ashes were raked out of the oven and circles of rolled dough were attached to the hot bricks. The flatbread was ready in no time. Tandyr-nan made of white, thoroughly sifted flower tasted amazingly good. The old stale flatbread from Kuzen’s house were pale in comparison.
After the rich pilaf and some strong tea, Musapyr suggested that we take a walk:
- It’s a chilly evening, Bates. Let’s go to the garden.
However, I failed to imagine what a garden was and what we could do there.
- Nothing. Just have a walk to raise our spirits,- Musapyr said laughingly.
- No, I won’t go, I’m tired...
- Then I’ll go alone, you have a rest... It was a new ad long journey for you... But you had a good sleep in the daytime and won’t fall asleep now. Bodene-zhengei, don’t waste time. Pattern a dress for Bates and start sewing it.
- No, I think I can’t do it on my own. A tailor woman lives in the nearby. I think she can do it faster.
- It’s even better. Now have a look! - he spread two colorful cuts of silk before us – one was crimson and the other was black and parti-colored.
- Why are you spending so much money, Musapyr!- I
