A. Belyaev - Classics fantasy – 3

– Will be enough, will be enough, do not worry. We have a well. Vaska! Deliver a samovar to the guest.

I turned back and saw the guy of years of eighteen lying on a grass; it was Tarasovna’s son and her assistant – adding on a mill. Vaska it is lazy rose, stegnut a rod a grass and started wandering to the house, and Tarasovna tormented to me ears with a shrill voice for a long time, complaining of a drought, of the dried-up Ilevka, of god, of the whole world. Its mill stood, and the mill feeds it with children, feeds all year.

– And that for the people irresponsible! See: to a mosquito to get drunk will not be enough, and they – to grind. As though I refuse bread!.

– The samovar began to boil! – Vasily from the yard shouted.

– Welcome.

I did not manage to drink tea in a garden among mean apple-trees yet as I heard a familiar voice of Wagner:

The village where Evgeny missed,

There was a charming corner…

– You miss? – Wagner took seat for a little table near me. He told me that he becomes in the city, I to it – about the impressions.

– Yes, Tarasovna should help. Go after tea to it to a mill – professor offered.

And we went. Wagner was in the most cheerful mood.

– It is possible to look at the device of your mill? – he asked.

Tarasovna graciously resolved, and we with professor entered the twilight of a mill. Wagner examined its simple mechanics.

– For one and a half thousand years mills were under construction B.C., it is not enough what differing from this – Wagner told. – How many it at you in day of a namalyval?

– How many will bring, it is so much and namalyvat – Tarasovna answered. – Fifty centners, and even it is more when there is a lot of water.

– So, so. – Wagner thoughtfully nodded. – I do not promise fifty centners, but ten can be ground. For a start. And then we will look.

– Hundred! If at least hundred! – Tarasovna sighed. Wagner stood some more minutes over millstones, tried a shaft, thought and told:

– Here that, Anna Tarasovna. I will deliver you the small engine. It will only be necessary to rearrange millstones – these will be great for my engine. I will fit your old, it will be possible to make small of them. Vasily will help me. But only a promise is a promise. My engine will be in a box. Do not open this box and you do not watch what is in it, otherwise you will damage the engine, and then I will help nothing to you. Goes?

– Really! Yes of course! Yes unless I?. Be mercy!

Wagner turned to work. Vasily and I helped him.

I decided that, most likely, Wagner wants to put the small kerosene or oil engine. But why such mystery?

We worked almost till midnight. When we with Vasily fell down for fatigue and strong fell asleep, Wagner continued to work: it did not need rest.

Having woken up in the morning, I went to a mill. Wagner was there. He established quite voluminous box over millstones and now was busy with the fact that removed an iron pipe through a ceiling.

– Help me – he told.

– Chimney? – I asked.

Wagner lowed in reply something uncertain, but eyes so derisively and cheerfully glanced at me that I solved: Wagner starts something curious. It is not similar to the gazolinovy engine.

– What is in this box? – I asked.

– Engine.

– What?

– Crippled.

– Eternal? – I asked again, thinking that I misheard. But Wagner answered nothing. It strongly began to knock the axe, cutting through a hole in a ceiling. Through this hole it removed a pipe. Then Wagner asked us to leave and, having remained one, was engaged in the last preparations. In a few minutes I heard as millstones zavorochatsya slowly. I looked at the pipe rising meters by five over a roof, but did not notice over it the slightest sign of smoke or steam.

Wagner opened doors of a mill and invited us to enter.

– The mill works – he told, addressing Tarasovna. – You see this handle on a box? When want to stop a mill, turn the handle.

– Why to stop? It is more than enough of grain, I will grind day and night.

– Well also grind on health. Only you remember an arrangement: not to open a box.

Tarasovna began to thank Wagner.

– For the present there is nothing. When you collect flour for a grinding, then thank. We go – he addressed me. We went outside. – Now I go to Moscow – Wagner told. I will arrive back by a lunch by very interesting car.

– Car?

– D-d-yes – Wagner stretched. – Autofugue. Samobezhka, so to speak. Yes here you will see.

Having waved me at parting a hand, Wagner went to the station, vigorous, fresh in spite of the fact that worked all night long. I went to a garden, found for the town in a shadow of a shed and went deep into reading. However this day I was not fated to enjoy rest.

Bloodcurdling women’s scream sounded from a mill. As if two corkscrews made white-hot bored through to me eardrums, and at the same time and a brain. The violent cry which broke off silence sleepy Stryabtsov could be made only by vocal chords of the respectable widow Tulikova. Possibly, the bishop Gatton alive eaten by rats did not shout so before death as cried out Tarasovn. But what could frighten her so? On a mill was many rats and mice, but Tarasovna got used to them. I did not manage to rise from the earth as shout unexpectedly stopped on the choking note as though to Tarasovna someone squeezed a throat. I ran to a mill.

After a bright sun in the twilight of a mill at the first moment I could sort nothing. Everything was silent. Millstones continued the work. I took several steps and was hooked by a leg for something soft. My eyes already got used to the twilight a little. Having bent, I saw the heavy body of the widow Tulikova lying prone on a floor. Her one hand was rejected aside, fingers are convulsively compressed in a fist, other hand was pressed by a body… Murder?. Sudden death?. I turned Tarasovna’s body, took a hand and groped pulse. It was hardly notable. Tarasovna, probably, was in a deep faint.

I took a ladle and ran to the small river to gather waters and to sprinkle a little on Tarasovna. It seemed to me that I returned very quickly. But during this time Tarasovna already recovered. I did not manage to approach to the wide doors of a mill as from there ran out with the same violent shout of Tarasovn. As the enraged cow, she flew on me, brought down from legs, and the water from a ladle intended for its reduction in feeling poured over me. My side was decently hurt by the heavy foot which ran on my plunged Tarasovna’s body, the nape strongly hurt. I lay on the earth probably for about a minute while, at last, had an opportunity to think. At the end of the village, about the Village Council, Tarasovna’s shout interrupted by abrupt exclamations was heard. I hardly raised the head and took seat on the dusty road. On the occasion of a holiday peasants were at home, and members of the Village Council, sitting on a zavalinka at the chairman’s log hut, peacefully discussed public affairs when Tarasovna’s shout blew up before them as a bomb. The chairman поковырял in ears as if taking the got stuck Tarasovna’s squeals from there, and something told her. She began to chatter loudly again. Then all rose. The chairman called to the militiaman, and all moved to a mill. I noticed that Tarasovna, the woman not of shy ten, went in the thick of crowd, probably, being afraid to act forward. I rose, shook off and welcomed authorities.

– Well, show where it? – the chairman asked, shortening a stride.

– Yes here a box over a millstone, you see? – Tarasovna told, without entering a mill.

The chairman, probably, was afraid, but «noblesse oblige». It carefully approached a box.

– Here it piece what. How this box opens? Well, maybe, you understand better? – he addressed the militiaman.