School

By ARKADY GAIDAR

Arkady Gaidar wrote the autobiographical story "School" in 1929. It describes the life of a fifteen-year-old boy, Boris Gorikov, during the years of the revolution and the Civil War. Events unfold in the quiet provincial town of Arzamas, where studying in a real school, rallies and battles become part of everyday life. The story tells of courage, character building and the school of life in an extraordinary time

• Language: English
• Publisher: EDGARS AUZINS
• Release date: Jun 19, 2024
• ISBN: 9798227759634

Book preview

I. SCHOOL

CHAPTER FIRST

Our town of Arzamas was quiet, filled with gardens surrounded by shabby fences. In those gardens grew a great variety of parent cherries, early-ripening apples, blackthorns and red peonies. The gardens, adjacent to one another, formed vast green areas, restlessly ringing with the whistling sounds of tits, goldfinches, bullfinches and robins.

Through the city, past the gardens, stretched quiet, flowering ponds, in which all the decent fish had long since died out and only slippery lumps and a filthy frog were found. The Tesha river flowed under the mountain.

The city looked like a monastery: there were about thirty churches and four monastic monasteries in it. There were many miraculous holy icons in our city. Perhaps there are even more miraculous ones than simple ones. But for some reason few miracles happened in Arzamas itself. Probably because sixty kilometers away there was the famous Sarov Hermitage with the saints, and these saints lured all the miracles to their place.

All that was heard was: now in Sarov a blind man received his sight, now a lame man walked in, now a hunchbacked man straightened up, but near our icons - nothing similar.

One day a rumor spread that Mitka the Gypsy, a tramp and famous drunkard, who annually swam for a bottle of vodka in the Epiphany ice hole, had a vision, and Mitka stopped drinking, repented and took monastic vows at the Spassky Monastery.

People flocked to the monastery. And sure enough, Mitka diligently bowed near the choir, publicly repented of his sins, and even confessed that last year he stole and drank a goat from the merchant Bebeshin. The merchant Bebeshin was touched and gave Mitka a ruble so that he could light a candle for the salvation of his soul. Many then shed tears when they saw how a vicious person returned from a disastrous path to the bosom of a righteous life.

This went on for a whole week, but just before he was tonsured, either Mitka had some other vision, in the opposite sense, or some other reason, but he did not show up to church. And a rumor spread among the parishioners that Mitka was lying in a ravine on Novoplotinnaya Street, and next to him lay an empty vodka bottle.

Deacon Paphnutius and church elder merchant Sinyugin were sent to the scene of the incident to admonish. Those sent soon returned and indignantly declared that Mitka was truly insensitive, like slaughtered cattle; that next to him there was already a second empty half-bottle, and when they managed to push him away, he, swearing, declared that he had changed his mind about becoming a monk, because he was supposedly a sinner and unworthy.

Our town was quiet and patriarchal. On holidays, especially Easter, when the bells of all thirty churches began to ring, a roar rose above the city, clearly audible in villages spread over twenty kilometers in circumference.

The Annunciation bell drowned out all the others. The bell of the Spassky Monastery was cracked and therefore roared in a jerky, rattling bass. The thin echoes of the St. Nicholas Monastery rang in high, ringing tones. These three singers were echoed by other bell towers, and even the nondescript church of the small prison, nestled on the edge of the city, joined the general discordant choir.

I loved climbing bell towers. Boys were allowed to do this only on Easter. You circle for a long time along a narrow, dark staircase. Pigeons coo affectionately in stone niches. My head is a little dizzy from the countless turns. From above you can see the entire city with patches of scattered ponds and thickets of gardens. Under the mountain - Tesha, an old mill, Goat Island, a copse, and further - ravines and the blue edge of the city forest.

My father was a soldier of the 12th Siberian Rifle Regiment. That regiment was stationed on the Riga sector of the German front.

I studied in the second grade of a real school. My mother, a paramedic, was always busy, and I grew up on my own. Every week you go to your mother with a sign for signature. The mother will quickly look at the grades, see a bad mark for drawing or penmanship and shake her head with displeasure:

- What is this?

Mom, it’s not my fault. Well, what can I do, since I have no talent for drawing? Mom, I drew him a horse, but he says it’s not a horse, but a pig. Then I serve it to him next time and say that it’s a pig, and he gets angry and says that it’s not a pig or a horse, but the devil knows what it is. Mom, I’m not preparing to be an artist at all.

- Well, why for penmanship? Give me your notebook... My God, what a mess! Why do you have a blot on every line, but here a cockroach is crushed between the pages? Ugh, what disgusting!

It’s a blot, Mom, because it was accidental, but about the cockroach it’s not my fault at all. After all, what is it, in fact, - you find fault with everything! What, did I plant a cockroach on purpose? He himself, a fool, crawled in and hanged himself, and I am responsible for him! And just think, what a science - penmanship! I’m not training to be a writer at all.

- What are you preparing for? - the mother asks sternly, signing the form. — Are you preparing to be a loafer? Why does the inspector write again that you climbed up the fire escape to the roof of the school? What else is this for? Are you training to be a chimney sweep?

- No. Neither an artist, nor a writer, nor a chimney sweep... I will be a sailor.

- Why a sailor? - the puzzled mother is surprised.

- Definitely a sailor... Here's another thing... Why don't you understand that this is interesting?

Mother shakes her head:

- Look, what a sneak peek. Don’t give me any more bad marks, otherwise I won’t even look at the sailor and I’ll tear you down.

Oh, what a lie! For her to rip me off? I've never jerked before. She locked me in the closet once, and then the whole next day she fed me pies and gave me two kopecks for a movie. It would be nice to do this more often!

CHAPTER TWO

One day, I quickly drank some tea, somehow collected my books, and ran to school. On the way I met Timka Shtukin, a classmate, a small, fidgety man.

Timka Shtukin was a harmless and unresponsive boy. You could hit him on the head without risking getting hit back. He willingly finished the sandwiches left by his comrades, ran to a nearby shop to buy some for the school breakfast and, without feeling any guilt, became frightenedly quiet when the class teacher approached.

Timka had one passion - he loved birds. The entire closet of his father, the caretaker of the cemetery church, was filled with cages with little birds. He bought birds, sold them, traded them, and caught them himself by force or traps in the cemetery. One day, his father gave him a great blow when the merchant Sinyugin, turning to his grandmother’s grave, saw on the stone slab of the monument a scattered bait of hemp seed and an onion - a net with a string stretched from it.

At Sinyugin’s complaint, the watchman pulled the boy’s hair, and our teacher of the law, Father Gennady, said disapprovingly during a lesson on the law of God:

— Monuments are erected to remember the dead, and not for any other purposes, and it is not appropriate to place traps and other extraneous devices on monuments - it is sinful and blasphemous.

He immediately cited several cases from the history of mankind when such blasphemy entailed the gravest punishments of heavenly powers.

It must be said that Father Gennady was a great master at examples. It seems to me that if he had found out, for example, that last week I went to the cinema without a letter of resignation, then, having rummaged through my memory, he would probably have found some historical case when the person who committed such a crime suffered a well-deserved divine punishment in this life. .

Timka walked, whistling as a blackbird. Noticing me, he blinked affably and at the same time looked incredulously in my direction, as if trying to determine whether a person was approaching him casually or with some kind of trick.

- Timka! We’ll be late for class, I said. - By God, we'll be late. Maybe not yet for class, but definitely for prayer.

- They won’t notice?! - he said fearfully and at the same time questioningly.

- They will definitely notice. Well, they’ll leave you without dinner, that’s all, I deliberately calmly teased, knowing that Timka was so afraid of any reprimands or comments.

Timka shrank and, quickening his pace, spoke sadly:

- What do I have to do with it? Father went to unlock the church. He left me at home for a minute, and he himself - that's how long. And all because of a prayer service. For Valka Spagina, my mother came to serve.

— How about Valka Spagina? - I opened my mouth. - What are you saying!.. Is he dead?

- Yes, not a prayer for the repose, but for the search.

- What other search? — I asked again with a trembling voice. - What are you talking about, Timka? I’m about to crack you... I, Timka, was not at school yesterday, I had a fever yesterday...

Ping-ping... tararah... tiu... Timka whistled with his tit and, glad that I still didn’t know anything, jumped on one leg. - It’s true, you weren’t there yesterday. Wow, brother, what happened yesterday!..

- What happened?

- Here's what. We are sitting yesterday... our first lesson is French. The witch asked verbs starting with etr. Leverb: alle, arrive, entre, reste, tombe... She called Raevsky to the board. As soon as he began to write reste, tombe, the door suddenly opened and the inspector entered (Timka closed his eyes), the director... (Timka looked at me meaningfully) and the class teacher. When we sat down. the director and tells us: Gentlemen, we had a misfortune: a student in your class, Spagin, ran away from home. He left a note that he had fled to the German front. I don’t think, gentlemen, that he did this without the knowledge of his comrades. Many of you, of course, knew about this escape in advance, but did not bother to inform me. I, gentlemen..." and began, and began, and spoke for half an hour.

My breath was taken away. So that's it! Such an incident, such amazing news, and I sat at home as if sick, and I don’t know anything. And no one - neither Yashka Tsukkerstein, nor Fedka Bashmakov - came to me after class to tell me. Also comrades... When Fedka needed traffic jams from the scarecrow, he came to me... And then - come on!.. Then half the school will run to the front, and I, like an idiot, sit there!

I burst into the school like a storm, threw off my overcoat as I ran and... Having successfully evaded the warden, he mingled with the crowd of guys leaving the common room, where the prayer was being read.

In the following days, all that was talked about was the heroic escape of Valka Spagin.

The director was wrong in suggesting that many were probably privy to Spagin's escape plan. Well, positively no one knew anything. No one could even imagine that Valka Spagin would run away. He was such a quiet person, he never took part in a single fight, not a single raid on someone else’s orchard for apples, his pants always fell off, well, in a word, he was a weakling, and suddenly - such a thing!

We began to discuss among ourselves, asking each other if anyone had noticed any preparations. It can’t be that a person suddenly, right away, out of the blue, gets it into his head, puts on a cap and goes to the front.

Fedka Bashmakov remembered that he had seen Valka’s map of the railways. Second-year student Dubilov said that he recently met Valka in a store where he was buying a battery for a flashlight. No matter how much they questioned him, they could not remember any actions indicating preparation for escape.

The mood in the class was high. Everyone was running around, freaking out, answering incorrectly in class, and the number of people left without lunch these days doubled as usual. Several more days passed. And suddenly there was news again - first-grader Mitka Tupikov ran away.

The school authorities were seriously alarmed.

Today there will be a conversation at the lesson of the law of God, Fedka told me in confidence. - About escapes. As I was taking the notebooks to the staff room, I heard people talking about it.

Our priest, Father Gennady, was about seventy years old. Because of his beard and eyebrows, his face was not visible at all, he was obese, and in order to turn his head back, he had to turn around his whole body, because his neck was not noticeable at all.

We loved him. In his lessons you could do anything: play cards, draw, put the forbidden Nat Pinkerton or Sherlock Holmes on your desk instead of the Old Testament, because Father Gennady was short-sighted.

Father Gennady entered the class, raised his hand, blessing everyone present, and immediately the roar of the duty officer was heard:

- Heavenly King, true comforter of the soul.

Father Gennady was deaf and generally demanded that the prayer be read loudly and clearly, but even it seemed to him that today the duty officer had gone overboard. He waved his hand and said angrily:

- Well, well... What is this? You read so that it is euphonious, otherwise you will roar just like a bull.

Father Gennady started from afar. First, he told us the parable of the prodigal son. This son, as I understood then, left his father to wander, but then, apparently, he had a hard time, and he backed down.

Then he told a parable about talents: how one master gave his slaves money, which were called talents, and how some slaves engaged in trade and received profit from this business, while others hid the money and received nothing.

- What do these parables say? - Father Gennady continued. — The first parable speaks of a disobedient son. This son left his father, wandered for a long time and still returned home to his parents’ roof. There is no need to say about your comrades, who are not at all experienced in life’s hardships and secretly left their home - there is no need to say that things will go badly for them on their disastrous path. And once again I convince you: if anyone knows where they are, let him write to them, so that they will not be afraid to return, while there is time, to their parents’ roof. And remember, in the parable, when the prodigal son returned, the father, out of his kindness, did not reproach him, but dressed him in the best clothes and ordered the fat calf to be slaughtered, as if for a holiday. So the parents of these two lost youths will forgive them everything and welcome them with open arms.

I somewhat doubted these words. As for the first-grader Tupikov, I don’t know how his parents would have greeted him, but that the baker Spagin, regarding the return of his son, would not cut up his well-fed little body, but would simply whip his son thoroughly with a belt, that’s for sure.

And the parable of the talents, continued Father Gennady, speaks of the fact that you should not bury your abilities in the ground. You learn all kinds of sciences here. Finish school, everyone will choose a profession according to their abilities, calling and position. One of us will be, say, a respectable businessman, another a doctor, a third an official. Everyone will respect us and think to themselves: Yes, this worthy man did not bury his talents in the ground, but multiplied them and now, as he deserves, enjoys all the benefits of life. But what, here Father Gennady sadly raised his hands to the sky, "what, I ask you, will come of these and similar fugitives, who, despised by all the opportunities given to them, ran away from home in search of adventures harmful to body and soul? You grow like delicate flowers in the warm greenhouse of a caring gardener, you know neither storms nor worries and bloom calmly, delighting the eyes of teachers and mentors. And they... even if they endure all the hardships, without care they will grow into lush thorns, blown by the winds and sprinkled with roadside dust.

When Gennady's father, majestic and inspired, like a prophet, left the class and slowly floated to the teacher's room, I sighed, thought and said:

- Fedka!

- Well?

— What do you think about talents?

- No way. And you?

- I?

Here I hesitated a little and added more quietly:

And I, Fedka, would probably also bury my talents. Well, a businessman or an official?

I would too, Fedka confessed after a little hesitation. - What interest is there in growing like a flower in a greenhouse? Spit on it and it will wither. Thorn, at least he doesn’t care about anything - neither rain nor heat.

Fedka, I said, but how did the priest say then: And you will answer in the future life." After all, even in the future, I still don’t want to answer!

Fedka thought about it. It was clear that he himself did not have a particularly clear idea of ​​how to avoid the promised punishment. He shook his head and answered evasively:

- Well, it won’t be soon... And then, maybe, something will come up.

First-grader Tupikov turned out to be a fool. He didn’t even know which way to run to the front: he was caught three days later, sixty kilometers from Arzamas to Nizhny Novgorod.

They say that at home they didn’t know where to put him, they bought him gifts, and his mother, having taken a solemn promise from him not to run away anymore, promised to buy him a Montecristo gun by the summer. But at school they laughed and mocked Tupikov: There is nothing to say, many of us would agree to run around the city for three days and receive a real gun as a gift for this.

Quite unexpectedly, Tupikov got it from the geography teacher Malinovsky, whom we called Kolya the mad behind our backs.

Malinovsky calls Tupikov to the board:

- Now, sir!.. Tell me, young man, to what front did you want to escape? In Japanese, or what?

No, Tupikov answered, turning purple, in German.

- Now, sir! - Malinovsky continued sarcastically - And let me ask you, why the hell brought you to Nizhny Novgorod? Where is your head and where are my geography lessons? Isn’t it clear as day that you should have headed through Moscow, he pointed at the map, through Smolensk and Brest, if you wanted to escape to Germany?" And you went straight in the opposite direction - to the east. How did you get carried away in the opposite direction? You learn from me in order to be able to apply the acquired knowledge in practice, and not keep it in your head, like in a trash can. Sit down. I'll give you two. And be ashamed, young man!

It should be noted that the consequence of this speech was that the first-graders, suddenly realizing the benefits of science, began to study geography with completely unusual zeal and even invented a new game called fugitive.

This game consisted in the fact that one named the border city, and the other had to list without hesitation the main points through which the path lies there. If the fugitive made a mistake, he paid a forfeit, and in the absence of a forfeit, he received a slap on the wrist or a click on the nose, depending on the agreement.

CHAPTER THREE

Every week, on Wednesday, in the common hall before the start of classes, a solemn prayer for the granting of victory took place.

After the prayer, everyone turned to the left, where portraits of the king and queen hung.

The choir began to sing the hymn God Save the Tsar, and everyone joined