My Big Family. A Day of Tots. Дмитрий ЕмецЧитать онлайн книгу.
And somewhere there, under the roots, even now lies a dark two-handled amphora for wheat, full of gold and silver coins,» Pokrovskii said with such conviction, as if he had found dozens of such amphorae. He even ran his finger through the air, precisely feeling the long crack in this very amphora.
«Well, have you found any?» Papa Gavrilov asked.
«Not yet!» Pokrovskii uttered bitterly and stared at his metal detector with deep resentment. «It's rather weak for me to search for something serious. I have to limit myself to sand… But there're a lot of coins here. Over the years, ships smashed in storms, o-ho-ho, the bay is shallow, and gradually the coins wash ashore from the sand. And there are only fragments of grain amphorae, just rake it. The sea in general throws out everything superfluous, everything not its own.»
«Costa's frozen! Let's go, huh?» Mama hollered piteously, her nose was already quite blue from the cold.
Papa harnessed himself to the stroller, and the Gavrilovs continued their journey along the sea. Vicky held the horseshoe in her hands, looking at it with undecided joy. They walked for about a hundred metres along the beach when they heard someone catching up to them. It was Pokrovskii, carrying in his hand something extracted from his bag.
«Wait a minute! This is for you!» he shouted to Liuba and put something in her hand. It was a small silver sun, darkened by the water. «I found it yesterday. It came off someone's chain! Needs to be cleaned and it'll be fine!»
«Mouse girl» looked at the sun lying on her palm, «So, clean it!»
Pokrovskii began to rub the sun with a cloth, and rubbed it until the ornament shone.
«Ready?» Liuba asked. «It's mine now? I can do whatever I want?»
Pokrovskii nodded.
«Excellent!» Liuba stroked the sun with her finger, stepped toward the water, and launched it like a pancake. The silver sun flashed, jumped from the water twice, and disappeared.
«You yourself let me! No one pulled you by the tongue! Mine means mine!» Liuba said.
«Why?» Pokrovskii asked plaintively.
«So simple!» She shrugged and walked on, and Pokrovskii stood with his mouth open and watched her go.
Alena ran in front of her, looking into her face with curiosity. «Is it true that Pokrovskii was once in love with you and then fell in love with someone else?» she asked.
«How do you know?»
«Kate told me!»
«Nonsense!» Liuba grunted, turning away. «No gossip to pass on. He only danced with her all evening, but I don't forgive anyone for betrayal!»
«And I thought only our Peter is a jerk!» Alena said with delight.
Chapter Two
The Orderly Grandma
«They have a mama critic. It's very difficult to be a critic.»
«Why?»
«Because you need to write all the time on the Internet that you don't agree with anything. Here you sleep at night, and mama writes them, although she, by the way, also wants to sleep!»
The Gavrilovs returned home. Here was already the «figure eight» street. The gate ahead showed black. The dogs Stool, Lad, and Tot ran to meet them. Lad, as usual, barked hoarsely – this was a solitary, terrible, almost lion-like roar – and rushed on the attack, but always recognized them about twenty paces away, stopped and, looking embarrassed, turned away into the bushes, where it settled on the ground. Stool and Lad could not calm down for a long time. They were all running around, spinning, barking. Then Lad quieted down, and only Stool alone was barking. It was barking in a quarrelsome way, shrilly, exactly like an old female venndor quarrelling with a buyer. The buyer was already long gone, but she still could not calm down.
True, today Stool did not manage to bark. «Hands up!» Kate said, and the yelping Stool immediately fell on its back, exposing its dirty belly to her.
Opening the gates, the Gavrilovs discovered that a striped rug was hanging on the railing with a carpet beater next to it, and all the animals were thrown out onto the street and sitting like beggars in front of the door, waiting for the moment when it would be possible to scurry back in.
«Someone broke into our house! What crooks!» Peter said, contemplating the stack of cages in which the rats were frisking and the hamsters were burrowing in the sawdust.
«We must blow them up!» Alex proposed. «We'll put a lot of baking soda in their pockets, and then pour in vinegar! They'll run, and we'll dig a hole in their path!»
«And if they run the other way?» Costa asked.
«Then we'll dig a hole on the other side too!» Alex said, and this argument seemed so sound to Costa that he immediately started digging.
Papa and Mama exchanged glances.
«What date is it today?» Papa Gavrilov asked.
«Thursday,» Mama said.
«Thursday isn't a date. Today's December eighth. That means, we didn't meet your mama!»
«My mama comes on Friday!»
«No. Mama comes on the eighth. And the eighth is today!»
Pushing through between the cages, Papa opened the door. The cat immediately slipped into the house. The chief rat papa Schwartz, who was able to open the cage with its paw, was chasing after the cat. All the children were already running after Schwartz.
«Grandma!» the children shouted. «Food! Gifts!»
For some reason three of these concepts – «grandma,» «food,» and «gifts» – were stuck together in their minds into one, so that there was a mysterious single «grandmafoodgift.» From this the conclusion somehow very naturally followed that if the grandmas disappear from life, then both food and gifts would disappear together with them.
Papa and Mama discovered Grandma Masha and Great-Grandma Zina in the kitchen. Grandma was tall, determined, and wore square glasses. Great-Grandma, on the contrary, was small, round, and had a cane. Grandma never left Great-Grandma, and they also always travelled together.
Vicky, Alena, Kate, Alex, and Costa were all over the grandmas on all sides. There was not a single granny to hug Rita, so she just climbed on all fours between the legs and hugged a grandma's foot and sneaker. Peter alone did not join in but only stood on the side and moved his hands in the air. He considered himself above hugs but not above gifts.
«How did you get into the house?» Peter asked when all the hugs, shouts, and kisses were over.
«Very simple. We came from the airport by taxi and climbed over the balcony. I mean, I climbed and opened the door! We weren't standing for two hours at the gate waiting to be met!» Grandma Masha said, giving Papa a combative look.
«Over the balcony?» Papa was surprised. «Did you climb over the balcony?
«It's high!»
«What's wrong with that?» Grandma Masha said. Then she thought for a bit and added, «Of course, it wasn't easy for me! I had to put the four crates one on top of the other and lift a leg up high… And the neighbours looked at us strangely!»
«And where were the crates from?»
«The neighbours. I asked. Where else?» Grandma was surprised.
Five minutes later she was already standing at the sink and washing dishes, scrubbing them with a sponge with such force it was as if germs could get inside.
«Well, you have grime, Gavrilovs! Dishes shouldn't lie in the sink at all! Every hour of dishes standing in the sink increases the number of pathogens twofold!» she said.
«Think! There was one germ, and it became two!»