In n Rasputin French lessons summary. Analysis of the work "French Lessons" by Rasputin V.G. Moving to the regional center

It was the forty-eighth year, then the main character of the story was barely eleven years old. The boy successfully completed four grades of school, but he did not have the opportunity to receive further education: to continue his education, he had to leave for the city.

Those were difficult post-war years, the child's family was left without a father, his mother barely made ends meet in an attempt to feed three children. Everyone was starving. However, in spite of everything, he still managed to adequately learn to read and write, and in the village he was known as a literate man.

The child often read for the elderly, helped write letters, and, more importantly, knew a little about bonds, because of which he often helped the villagers win money, albeit small. Those in gratitude sometimes fed the child.

Realizing that her son has great potential for learning, and listening to the punishment of other people every day, in the end, the mother of the protagonist decided to send him to study further. Yes, there was nothing to live on, but it could not have been worse, and literacy was now expensive. The woman reasoned that the risk was worth it.

Somehow she gathered the child to school, agreed with a friend from the district to settle her son with her, sent the child to the city. Thus began the independent life of the protagonist, and for him it was very difficult. He often had absolutely nothing to eat: those grains that his mother somehow sent were barely enough, not to mention the fact that the hostess of the house often secretly took part of the food for her children.

The boy was lonely and dreary in a strange city, but he did not abandon his education and studied as well as before in the village. French remained his only problem in his studies. The child perfectly understood grammar, calmly learned words, but his pronunciation was very poor. Because of this, his French teacher, Lidia Mikhailovna, remained dissatisfied with him and never gave grades higher than four, but otherwise he was an excellent student.

Days passed after days, and somewhere at the end of September, the mother came to the boy. visit. What she saw horrified her: her son was very thin and looked extremely exhausted. But deciding that he did not want to upset his mother, main character behaved with restraint, did not cry in her presence and did not complain about life. However, when the woman was about to leave, he could not stand it and, sobbing, rushed after the car. His mother could not stand it and, stopping the car, offered to return home. Frightened that everything they had done would go to waste, he ran away. Then his life went on knurled.

One day, one of his classmates approached the main character, it was at the end of September, and asked if he was afraid to play Chica. The main character said that he did not know about this game at all, to which he received an invitation to participate. He had neither money nor any skills, so for the first time the children decided to just watch the game. A small company of children had already gathered in the agreed place, led by a high school student named Vadik and his right hand- Bird.

The game was in full swing. Watching her, the main character was able to understand the rules of the game and note that Vadik did not play quite honestly and most of the time it was because of this that he won money, although his playing skills were at their best. Gradually, the thought grew stronger in the boy's head that he could easily play this game.

From time to time, along with the parcels from my mother, an envelope came with a few coins, for which you could buy five small jars of milk. They needed a baby because of anemia. When once again this package fell into the hands of the boy, he decided not to buy milk this time, but to exchange money for a trifle and try to play Chica. And so he did. The first time he was unlucky.

However, the more he played, the better his game became. He came up with a strategy, day by day he trained his hand, and finally the day came when he began to win. The boy played carefully and accurately, leaving as soon as he received a ruble, despite all persuasion to stay. His life began to improve. Now he at least had food.

But, as the child later realized, such success could not be made so obvious. At first, Vadik and Ptakha, suspecting something was wrong, began to interfere with the main character in every possible way, but seeing that this did not help, they decided to act radically. So, during the next game, they went to outright cheating, after which they beat the main character and kicked him out of the company in disgrace. Going home beaten and empty-handed, the boy felt like the most miserable person in the world.

In the morning, in the reflection of the mirror, the child was met by a beaten face. It was not possible to hide the traces of the beatings, and the boy, with fear, decided to go to school in this way, because he did not dare to play truant without a good reason. At school, Lidia Mikhailovna, which is obvious, noticed the boy's condition and inquired about the cause of so many injuries. The protagonist lied about falling down the stairs, but one of his classmates blurted out the whole truth. There was silence for a moment. After that, to the surprise of the protagonist, the sneak was punished, but they didn’t touch him at all, but asked to come in after school.

All day the boy sat on pins and needles, afraid that he (like all the troublemakers in this school) would be placed in the center of a crowd of students and publicly scolded. However, this did not happen. There was no scandal. Lidia Mikhailovna simply sat him down in front of her and began to question him in a low voice. I had to tell everything: about hunger, and about gambling. The woman reacted to his misfortune with understanding, promised not to tell anything in response to a promise not to play such games anymore. That's what they decided on.

He actually lasted a long time. But the word had to be broken. There were problems with the harvest in the village, and the child did not receive more parcels. And the hunger never went away. Once again, having collected all the little things, the boy began to wander around the neighborhood, hoping to stumble upon any other playing company, but he only stumbled upon a friend. Being in a state of complete despair, he, to his own surprise, decided to approach.

They didn't put him out and beat him up just because Vadik had been bored with playing with inept punks for a long time. The main character was even allowed to play. As he did not try to play minimally flickering, but on the fourth day the story of the beating was repeated. Happiness did not last long, alas. The path to the game was completely closed.

In the morning the teacher again noted his bruised face. Without commenting on this in any way, she called him to the blackboard and again hearing the expectedly terrible pronunciation, said that it could not continue like this and called him for additional classes.

Thus began additional classes with Lidia Mikhailovna, which took place in her house. The boy felt very uncomfortable about this. The classes were hard, the pronunciation was still bad, but the teacher continued to teach him. By the end of the day, she invariably invited him to join her for dinner, but the boy would not agree. He could not afford to beg, he constantly told her that he was full.

The woman knew that this was not so, and every time after the refusal, a shadow of resentment flashed across her face. Shortly after another refusal to offer to share the meal with her, the woman stopped. Their relationship has improved. The child stopped seeing a strict teacher in front of him, but began to see a kind young girl. The lessons also began to bear fruit, but the feeling of awkwardness did not go anywhere. He did not accept the help of a woman, despite all the persuasion, but he kindled an interest in the French language.

One day, while in his room, the boy learned about the parcel that had come to him. Delighted that his mother still found food for him, he rushed downstairs, but instead of the expected bag, he found a small box below. The child went with it to a quiet place and, opening it, groaned. It contained potatoes, bread and pasta, which he had not seen for a long time.

For his family, this has always been an unaffordable luxury. But, mad with hunger, he hurriedly began to eat this wealth. And, only after satisfying the first hunger, he suddenly realized that this parcel could not be from his mother. There was nowhere to take pasta in the village. After some thought, he came to the conclusion that the package was from his teacher. He did not touch the contents of the box anymore and returned it to the woman by morning. She again tried to persuade him to accept the gift, but the child, afraid of being persuaded, simply ran out of the room.

Classes with Lidia Mikhailovna continued, the result was obvious, but there was still something to work on. They continued. One day the woman asked the boy what game he was playing then with other children. At first, he blushed and did not want to tell this to the teacher, but then he did tell. In response, she was surprised, because, according to her, in her time they played a completely different game. She offered to teach him this game, which made the student even more shocked and embarrassed.

Play something with the teacher! At this, the teacher laughed and told him her secret that she still feels like that mischievous girl that she was just recently. That teachers are also people and are not alien to them funny Games. The persuasion worked and they devoted some time to the game every day. At first, the main character did little, but he soon got used to it and even began to win.

Somehow, after another victory, Lidia Mikhailovna suggested that he try to play for money, explaining that without betting the game lost its zest, and they were going to play only for small amounts. Again there was a wall of misunderstanding, but soon the teacher got her way, and they began to play with small stakes.

A couple of times the main character caught Lydia Mikhailovna trying to give in, which he was very offended by, but soon these attempts stopped and things went smoothly. Now the child had money again, and he spent his free time playing games with Lydia Mikhailovna. Perhaps this is how his happiness felt.

The protagonist would know what these games could lead them to ... But what has been done cannot be returned. Everything was going well until one day they were caught talking about the game by the director. Shocked, he tried to find out the truth, to which the teacher calmly confessed everything to him. She was fired the next day.

They met with the main character right before she left. In that last meeting, the teacher told the boy that he had nothing to worry about, the woman herself was to blame for everything and nothing bad would happen to her. She will just go home. The conversation was short, but the teacher and the child parted on a very warm note.

A few months later, the main character received a package from an unknown sender. In it he found pasta. And the most precious - a few apples, which I had never seen before in my life.

The action in the story "French Lessons" by Valentin Rasputin takes place in the Russian outback, which has just begun to recover from the consequences of the war with. The protagonist is an eleven-year-old boy who, through his efforts, goes to study from his remote village to the regional center.

It is at school and around it that the events of the story unfold.

Torn from his mother and forced to live in a strange family, the boy feels discomfort all the time. Having never found friends, the hero is almost always lonely, distrustful of people and always hungry. Someone is carrying bread and potatoes from his meager stocks, collected for his son by a selfless mother. The condition of a thin boy is such that every day he needs to drink at least one glass of milk, for which he has no money.

The main concern of the hero of the story is study. He was very good at all subjects, with the exception of the French language: he could not put the pronunciation in any way. The young teacher Lidia Mikhailovna struggled in vain to eliminate this shortcoming. French speech did not give in, despite the stubbornness and conscientiousness of the boy.

Somehow the hero witnessed a far from childish game for money, in which the older guys played with enthusiasm, having gathered in a deaf and deserted place. Having tried his hand at this wisdom, the boy gradually began to win. The meager kopecks that he got by this trade were more than enough for milk. Health began to improve.

The success of the boy in the game for money became the cause of dissatisfaction with the older guys. It all ended badly - after another win, he was beaten off, forbidding him to come in the future. From, injustice and resentment, he took his breath away, the boy sobbed for a long time and inconsolably, experiencing what had happened.

Humanity Lesson

The next day, the boy appeared before the French teacher in all its glory. A broken lip and abrasions on his face spoke eloquently of the fact that the guy had serious problems. Having found out, the preoccupied Lidia Mikhailovna found out to her horror that he began to gamble because he could not eat well.

Driven by a noble desire to help the boy, the teacher insisted that he come to her house to additionally study French. Between conversations about life and lessons, she tried to feed the boy. And when he flatly refused to accept such gifts from her hands, Lidia Mikhailovna went to the trick. She somehow casually offered to play for money in a game she invented after the next homework.

On reflection, the hero found this way of earning quite honest and gradually got carried away by throwing coins.

It was for this exciting and noisy activity that the director of the school found the teacher and the student. Without trying to understand the motives of the teacher's act, the director angrily fired her for immoral behavior, which, in his opinion, was a blatant case of molestation of a gullible child. Lidia Mikhailovna, not wanting to make excuses, was forced to leave the school, but she never reproached the boy for what had happened.

Takovo summary this story, surprising in its power of influence. French lessons turned into an invaluable life experience for the boy. The noble act of the teacher allowed him to know what real mercy and sympathy are.

Valentin Rasputin is a Soviet and Russian writer whose work belongs to the genre of the so-called "village prose". While reading the works of this author, one gets the impression that what they say happens to your good friends, their heroes are so vividly and vividly described. Behind the seeming simplicity of the presentation lies a deep immersion in the characters of people who are forced to act in difficult everyday circumstances.

The story "French Lessons", a summary of which will be presented in this article, is largely autobiographical. It describes a difficult period in the life of the writer, when, after graduating from elementary school, he was sent to the city to study in high school. The future writer, like the hero of the story, had to live with strangers in the hungry post-war years. How he felt at the same time and what he experienced, you can find out by reading this small but vivid work.

Summary of "French Lessons". The game of "chika"

The story is told from the perspective of a village boy sent to the city to continue his studies in high school. It was a hungry year in 1948, the owners of the apartment also had children who needed to be fed, so the hero of the story had to take care of his own food. Mom sometimes sent parcels with potatoes and bread from the village, which quickly ended, and the boy was almost always hungry.

One day he came to a wasteland where the children played for money in "chika", and joined them. Soon he got used to the game and began to win. But each time he left after gaining a ruble, for which he bought himself a mug of milk in the market. He needed milk as a cure for anemia. But this did not last long. The guys beat him twice, after which he stopped the game.

Summary of "French Lessons". Lidia Mikhailovna

The hero of the story studied well in all subjects, except for the French language, in which he was not given any pronunciation. The French teacher, Lidia Mikhailovna, noted his diligence, but lamented over the obvious shortcomings in oral speech. She learned that her student had gambled to buy milk, that he had been beaten by his comrades, and was filled with sympathy for the able but poor boy. The teacher offered to study additional French at her home, hoping to feed the poor fellow under this pretext.

Summary of "French Lessons". "Zameryashki"

However, she did not yet know what a tough nut she had to face. All her attempts to seat him at the table were unsuccessful - the wild and proud boy flatly refused to "eat" with his teacher. Then she sent a parcel with pasta, sugar and hematogen to the address of the school, supposedly from her mother from the village. But the hero of the story knew perfectly well that it was impossible to buy such products in the general store, and returned the gift to the sender.

Then Lydia Mikhailovna went to extreme measures - she suggested that the boy play with her a game for money, familiar to her from childhood - “zameryashki”. He did not immediately, but agreed, considering it "honest earnings." From that day on, every time after French lessons (in which he began to make great strides), the teacher and the student played "zameryashki". The boy again had money for milk, and his life became much more satisfying.

Summary of "French Lessons". End of everything

Of course, it couldn't go on like this forever. One day, the headmaster caught Lydia Mikhailovna playing with a student for money. Of course, this was considered a misdemeanor, incompatible with her further work at the school. The teacher left three days later for her homeland, for the Kuban. And after some time, on one of the winter days, a parcel with pasta and apples arrived at the school in the name of the boy.

The story “French Lessons” (a brief summary of which became the subject of this article) inspired director Yevgeny Tashkov to shoot the film of the same name, which was shown for the first time in 1978. He immediately fell in love with the audience and is still available on discs.

From the manufacturer

"French Lessons" is one of the best works of Valentin Rasputin. It would seem how far from us are the difficult, hungry post-war years and the events described in the story. But why do we try on the actions of his heroes today? Every day we meet people who need our help, but often we are not ready to do good. Maybe there is not enough strength to cross the social canons, maybe because we live by inertia, not wanting to look at life with different eyes ...

The heroine of the story "French Lessons" - a young French teacher - Lydia Mikhailovna, will only see how difficult it is for her talented but half-starved student to live far from home and family. Having tried all the open ways to help him, she decides, according to the school principal, to commit a "crime" - she dares to play with the boy in the "wall" for money. Otherwise, accepting help for a child seems humiliating. What did this act of hers mean in those days? What did this mean for the teacher herself? How did that boy assess the motives for her actions? Many years later, the hero recalls this, having experienced a lot and gradually realizing for himself the meaning of these "lessons" - the lessons of humanity, kindness and compassion.

Few people know that, despite the fictitiousness of events, the prototype of the image of the main character existed. Lidia Mikhailovna Molokova in those post-war times taught French at the school where the future writer Valentin Rasputin studied.

On our website you can download the book "French Lessons" by Rasputin Valentin Grigorievich for free and without registration in epub, fb2, pdf, txt format, read the book online or buy a book in an online store.

Strange: why do we, just like before our parents, every time feel guilty before our teachers? And not for what happened at school - no, but for what happened to us after.

I went to the fifth grade in forty-eight. It would be more correct to say, I went: in our village there was only Primary School, therefore, in order to study further, I had to equip myself from home fifty kilometers away to the regional center. A week earlier, my mother had gone there, agreed with her friend that I would lodge with her, and on the last day of August, Uncle Vanya, the driver of the only lorry on the collective farm, unloaded me on Podkamennaya Street, where I was to live, helped bring a bundle of bed, patted him on the shoulder reassuringly and drove off. So, at the age of eleven, my independent life began.

Hunger that year had not yet let go, and my mother had three of us, I am the oldest. In the spring, when it was especially hard, I swallowed myself and forced my sister to swallow the eyes of sprouted potatoes and grains of oats and rye in order to dilute the plantings in the stomach - then you would not have to think about food all the time. All summer we diligently watered our seeds with pure Angarsk water, but for some reason we did not wait for the harvest, or it was so small that we did not feel it. However, I think that this idea is not entirely useless and someday it will come in handy for a person, and due to inexperience, we did something wrong there.

It is hard to say how my mother decided to let me go to the district (the district center was called the district). We lived without a father, lived very badly, and she, apparently, reasoned that it would not be worse - there was nowhere. I studied well, I went to school with pleasure, and in the village I was recognized as a literate person: I wrote for old women and read letters, went through all the books that ended up in our unprepossessing library, and in the evenings told all sorts of stories from them to the children, adding more from myself. But they especially believed in me when it came to bonds. People accumulated a lot of them during the war, the tables of winnings came often, and then the bonds were carried to me. I thought I had a lucky eye. Winnings really did happen, most often small ones, but the collective farmer in those years was happy with any penny, and here completely unexpected luck fell out of my hands. The joy from her involuntarily fell to me. I was singled out from the village children, they even fed me; Once Uncle Ilya, in general, a stingy, stingy old man, having won four hundred rubles, hastily heated a bucket of potatoes for me - in the spring it was considerable wealth.

And all because I understood bond numbers, mothers said:

Your brainy guy is growing. You are ... let's teach him. Gratitude will not go to waste.

And my mother, in spite of all the misfortunes, gathered me together, although before that no one from our village in the region had studied. I was first. Yes, I did not understand properly what was ahead of me, what trials awaited me, my dear, in a new place.

I studied here and it's good. What was left for me? - then I came here, I had no other business here, and then I did not know how to treat carelessly what was assigned to me. I would hardly have dared to go to school if I had not learned at least one lesson, so in all subjects except French, I kept fives.

I didn't get along well with French because of the pronunciation. I easily memorized words and phrases, translated quickly, coped well with the difficulties of spelling, but pronunciation with a head betrayed all my Angaran origin right up to the last generation, where no one ever pronounces foreign words, if at all suspected of their existence. I sputtered in French in the manner of our village tongue twisters, swallowing half of the sounds as unnecessary, and blurting out the other half in short barking bursts. Lidia Mikhailovna, the French teacher, listened to me, wincing helplessly and closing her eyes. She had never heard of anything like it, of course. Again and again she showed how to pronounce nasals, vowel combinations, asked me to repeat - I was lost, my tongue in my mouth became stiff and did not move. Everything was wasted. But the worst thing happened when I came home from school. There I was involuntarily distracted, all the time I had to do something, there the guys bothered me, along with them - like it or not, I had to move, play, and in the classroom - work. But as soon as I was left alone, longing immediately piled up - longing for home, for the village. Never before, even for a day, had I been absent from my family and, of course, I was not ready to live among strangers. I felt so bad, so bitter and disgusted! - worse than any disease. I wanted only one thing, I dreamed of one thing - home and home. I lost a lot of weight; my mother, who arrived at the end of September, was afraid for me. With her, I strengthened myself, did not complain and did not cry, but when she began to leave, I could not stand it and chased the car with a roar. Mother waved her hand to me from the back so that I would be behind, not to disgrace myself and her, I did not understand anything. Then she made up her mind and stopped the car.

Get ready,” she demanded as I approached. Enough, weaned, let's go home.

I came to my senses and ran away.

But I lost weight not only because of homesickness. In addition, I was constantly malnourished. In the autumn, while Uncle Vanya was carrying bread on his lorry to Zagotzerno, which was not far from the district center, food was sent to me quite often, about once a week. But the problem is that I missed her. There was nothing there but bread and potatoes, and occasionally her mother stuffed cottage cheese into a jar, which she took from someone for something: she did not keep a cow. It seems that they will bring a lot, you will miss it in two days - it's empty. I very soon began to notice that a good half of my bread was disappearing somewhere in the most mysterious way. Checked - it is: there was no. The same thing happened with potatoes. Whether it was Aunt Nadya, a noisy, overwrought woman who was running around alone with three children, one of her older girls or her youngest, Fedka, I didn’t know, I was afraid to even think about it, let alone follow. It was only a shame that my mother, for my sake, tears the last thing from her own, from her sister and brother, but it still goes by. But I forced myself to come to terms with it. It will not be easier for the mother if she hears the truth.

The famine here was not at all like the famine in the countryside. There, always, and especially in autumn, it was possible to intercept, pluck, dig, lift something, fish walked in the Angara, a bird flew in the forest. Here everything around me was empty: strange people, strange vegetable gardens, strange land. A small river for ten rows was filtered with nonsense. I once sat with a fishing rod all day on Sunday and caught three small, about a teaspoon, minnows - you won’t get good from such fishing either. I didn’t go anymore - what a waste of time to translate! In the evenings, he hung around at the teahouse, in the bazaar, remembering what they sell for how much, choked on saliva and walked back with nothing. Aunt Nadia had a hot kettle on the stove; throwing boiled water over the naked man and warming his stomach, he went to bed. Back to school in the morning. And so he lived up to that happy hour, when a lorry and a half drove up to the gate and Uncle Vanya knocked on the door. Hungry and knowing that my grub would still not last long, no matter how much I saved it, I ate to satiety, to pain and stomach, and then, after a day or two, again planted my teeth on the shelf.

* * *

Once, back in September, Fedka asked me:

Are you afraid to play "chika"?

In what "chika"? - I did not understand.

The game is like that. For money. If we have money, let's go and play.

And I don't have. Let's go, let's take a look. You'll see how great it is.

Fedka took me to the gardens. We walked along the edge of an oblong, ridged hill, completely overgrown with nettles, already black, tangled, with drooping poisonous clusters of seeds; We approached. The guys were worried. All of them were about the same age as me, except for one - tall and strong, noticeable for his strength and power, a guy with a long red bang. I remembered: he went to the seventh grade.

Why else did you bring this? he said discontentedly to Fedka.

He is his own, Vadik, his own, - Fedka began to justify himself. - He lives with us.

Will you play? - Vadik asked me.

There is no money.

Look, don't yell to anyone that we're here.

Here's another! - I was offended.

No one paid any more attention to me, I stepped aside and began to observe. Not all six, then seven played, the rest just stared, rooting mainly for Vadik. He was in charge here, I understood it at once.

It didn't cost anything to figure out the game. Each staked ten kopecks on the bet, a stack of coins was lowered tails up onto a platform bounded by a bold line about two meters from the cash register, and on the other side, from a boulder that had grown into the ground and served as an emphasis for the front foot, they threw a round stone washer. You had to throw it in such a way that it rolled as close as possible to the line, but did not go beyond it - then you got the right to be the first to break the cash register. They beat him with the same puck, trying to turn it over. eagle coins. Turned over - yours, beat further, no - give this right to the next one. But it was considered most important of all when throwing the puck to cover the coins, and if at least one of them turned out to be on the eagle, the entire cash register went into your pocket without talking, and the game began again.

Vadik was cunning. He walked to the boulder after everyone else, when the full picture of the turn was before his eyes and he saw where to throw to get ahead. The money went first, it rarely reached the last. Probably, everyone understood that Vadik was cunning, but no one dared to tell him about it. True, he played well. Approaching the stone, he crouched a little, squinted, aimed the puck at the target and slowly, smoothly straightened up - the puck slipped out of his hand and flew where he was aiming. With a quick movement of his head, he threw the bangs that had gone down, casually spat to the side, showing that the deed was done, and with a lazy, deliberately slow step stepped towards the money. If they were in a heap, he hit sharply, with a ringing sound, but he touched single coins with a puck carefully, with a knurling, so that the coin would not beat and spin in the air, but, not rising high, would just roll over to the other side. Nobody else could do that. The guys hit at random and took out new coins, and those who had nothing to get, turned into spectators.

It seemed to me that if I had money, I could play. In the countryside, we fiddled with grandmothers, but even there you need an accurate eye. And besides, I liked to invent for myself amusements for accuracy: I'll pick up a handful of stones, find a harder target and throw it at it until I get the full result - ten out of ten. He threw both from above, from behind his shoulder, and from below, hanging a stone over the target. So I had some flair. There was no money.

Mother sent me bread because we had no money, otherwise I would have bought it here too. Where can they get on the collective farm? Nevertheless, twice she put me five in a letter - for milk. For the present it is fifty kopecks, you can’t get hold of it, but all the same, money, you could buy five half-liter cans of milk at the market, at a ruble per jar. I was ordered to drink milk from anemia, I often suddenly felt dizzy for no reason at all.

But, having received a five for the third time, I did not go for milk, but exchanged it for a trifle and went to the dump. The place here was chosen sensibly, you can’t say anything: the clearing, closed by hills, was not visible from anywhere. In the village, in full view of adults, such games were chased, threatened by the director and the police. Nobody bothered us here. And not far, in ten minutes you will reach.

The first time I lost ninety kopecks, the second sixty. Of course, it was a pity for the money, but I felt that I was adjusting to the game, my hand gradually got used to the puck, I learned to release exactly as much force for a throw as it was required for the puck to go right, my eyes also learned to know in advance where it would fall and how much more roll across the ground. In the evenings, when everyone left, I returned here again, took out the puck hidden by Vadik from under the stone, raked out my change from my pocket and threw it until it got dark. I made sure that out of ten throws, three or four guessed exactly for the money.

And finally the day came when I won.

Autumn was warm and dry. Even in October it was so warm that one could walk in a shirt, the rains fell rarely and seemed random, inadvertently brought from somewhere out of bad weather by a weak tail breeze. The sky was turning blue quite like summer, but it seemed to have become narrower, and the sun was setting early. In clear hours the air smoked over the hills, carrying the bitter, intoxicating smell of dry wormwood, distant voices sounded clearly, flying birds screamed. The grass in our clearing, yellowed and smoky, nevertheless remained alive and soft, free from the game, or rather, lost guys, were busy on it.

Now I come here every day after school. The guys changed, newcomers appeared, and only Vadik did not miss a single game. She didn't start without him. Behind Vadik, like a shadow, followed a big-headed, short-haired, stocky guy, nicknamed Ptah. At school, I had never met Ptah before, but, looking ahead, I’ll say that in the third quarter, he suddenly, like snow on his head, fell on our class. It turns out that he stayed in the fifth for the second year and, under some pretext, gave himself a vacation until January. Ptakha also usually won, although not in the same way as Vadik, less, but did not remain at a loss. Yes, because, probably, he did not stay, because he was at the same time with Vadik and he slowly helped him.

From our class, Tishkin sometimes ran into the clearing, a fussy boy with blinking eyes who loved to raise his hand in class. Knows, does not know - still pulls. Called - silent.

Why did you raise your hand? - ask Tishkin.

He slapped his little eyes:

I remembered, but by the time I got up, I forgot.

I didn't make friends with him. From timidity, taciturnity, excessive rural isolation, and most importantly - from wild homesickness, which did not leave any desires in me, I had not yet made friends with any of the guys. They were not attracted to me either, I remained alone, not understanding and not singling out loneliness from my bitter situation: alone - because here, and not at home, not in the village, I have many comrades there.

Tishkin didn't even seem to notice me in the clearing. Having quickly lost, he disappeared and did not appear again soon.

And I won. I began to win constantly, every day. I had my own calculation: no need to roll the puck around the court, seeking the right to the first shot; when there are many players, it is not easy: the closer you reach for the line, the greater the danger of going over it and remaining last. It is necessary to cover the cash register when throwing. So I did. Of course, I took a risk, but with my skill it was a justified risk. I could lose three, four times in a row, but on the fifth, having taken the cashier, I returned my loss three times. Lost again and returned again. I rarely had to hit the puck on the coins, but even here I used my own trick: if Vadik rolled over myself, on the contrary, I baled away from myself - it was so unusual, but the puck held the coin in this way, did not let it spin and, moving away, turned over after itself.

Now I have money. I did not allow myself to get too carried away with the game and hang around in the clearing until the evening, I needed only a ruble, every day for a ruble. Having received it, I ran away, bought a jar of milk at the market (the aunts grumbled, looking at my bent, beaten, torn coins, but they poured milk), dined and sat down for lessons. All the same, I didn’t eat my fill, but the mere thought that I was drinking milk added strength to me and subdued my hunger. It seemed to me that my head was now spinning much less.

At first, Vadik was calm about my winnings. He himself was not at a loss, and from his pockets it is unlikely that I got anything. Sometimes he even praised me: here, they say, how to quit, study, muffins. However, soon Vadik noticed that I was leaving the game too quickly, and one day he stopped me:

What are you - raked in the cash register and fight? Look what a smart one! Play.

I need to do my homework, Vadik, - I began to excuse myself.

Who needs to do homework, he does not go here.

And Bird sang:

Who told you that this is how they play for money? For this, you want to know, they beat a little. Understood?

Vadik didn't give me the puck before him anymore and let me get to the stone only last. He shot well, and often I reached into my pocket for a new coin without touching the puck. But I threw better, and if I got the opportunity to throw, the puck, like a magnet, flew like a money. I myself was surprised at my accuracy, I should have guessed to hold it back, play more inconspicuously, but I ingenuously and ruthlessly continued to bomb the box office. How was I to know that no one has ever been forgiven if he breaks ahead in his work? Then do not expect mercy, do not seek intercession, for others he is an upstart, and the one who follows him hates him most of all. I had to comprehend this science in my own skin that autumn.

I had just hit the money again and was going to collect it when I noticed that Vadik had stepped on one of the scattered coins. All the rest were upside down. In such cases, when throwing, they usually shout “to the warehouse!” In order - if there is no eagle - to collect the money in one pile for the strike, but, as always, I hoped for luck and did not shout.

Not in the warehouse! Vadik announced.

I approached him and tried to move his foot off the coin, but he pushed me away, quickly grabbed it from the ground and showed me tails. I managed to notice that the coin was on the eagle - otherwise he would not have closed it.

You flipped it, I said. - She was on an eagle, I saw.

He thrust his fist under my nose.

Didn't you see this? Smell what it smells like.

I had to reconcile. It was pointless to insist on one's own; if a fight starts, no one, not a single soul will intercede for me, not even Tishkin, who was spinning right there.

Vadik's evil, narrowed eyes looked at me point-blank. I bent down, tapped the nearest coin softly, turned it over and moved the second one. “Hluzda will lead you to the truth,” I decided. “I’m going to take them all now anyway.” Again he pointed the puck for a strike, but he didn’t have time to lower it: someone suddenly gave me a strong knee from behind, and I awkwardly, bowed my head down, poked into the ground. Laughed around.

Behind me, smiling expectantly, stood Bird. I was taken aback:

What are you?!

Who told you it was me? he answered. - Dreamed, or what?

Come here! - Vadik extended his hand for the puck, but I did not give it away. Resentment overwhelmed me with fear of nothing in the world, I was no longer afraid. For what? Why are they doing this to me? What did I do to them?

Come here! - demanded Vadik.

You flipped that coin! I called out to him. - I saw it turned over. Saw.

Come on, repeat," he asked, advancing on me.

You turned it over,” I said more quietly, knowing full well what would follow.

First, again from behind, I was hit by Ptah. I flew at Vadik, he quickly and deftly, without trying on, poked me with his head in the face, and I fell, blood spurted from my nose. As soon as I jumped up, Ptah attacked me again. I could still break free and run away, but for some reason I did not think about it. I twirled between Vadik and Ptah, almost not defending myself, holding my hand to my nose, from which blood was gushing, and in despair, adding to their rage, stubbornly shouting the same thing:

Flipped over! Flipped over! Flipped over!

They beat me in turn, one and a second, one and a second. Someone third, small and vicious, kicked my legs, then they were almost completely covered with bruises. I tried only not to fall, not to fall again for anything, even in those moments it seemed to me a shame. But in the end they knocked me to the ground and stopped.

Get out of here while you're alive! - ordered Vadik. - Fast!

I got up and, sobbing, tossing my dead nose, trudged up the mountain.

Just blather to someone - we'll kill! - Vadik promised me after.

I didn't answer. Everything in me somehow hardened and closed in resentment, I did not have the strength to get a word out of myself. And, only having climbed the mountain, I could not resist and, as if foolish, I shouted at the top of my lungs - so that the whole village probably heard:

Flip-u-st!

Ptakha was about to rush after me, but he immediately returned - apparently, Vadik decided that enough was enough for me, and stopped him. For about five minutes I stood and, sobbing, looked at the clearing, where the game began again, then went down the other side of the hill to a hollow, tightened around with black nettles, fell on the hard dry grass and, not holding back any longer, wept bitterly, sobbing.

There was not and could not be in the whole wide world a person more unfortunate than me.

* * *

In the morning I looked at myself in the mirror with fear: my nose was swollen and swollen, there was a bruise under my left eye, and below it, on my cheek, there was a fat bloody abrasion. I had no idea how to go to school in this form, but somehow I had to go, skipping classes for whatever reason, I did not dare. Let’s say that people’s noses and naturally happen to be cleaner than mine, and if it weren’t for the usual place, you would never guess that this is a nose, but nothing can justify an abrasion and a bruise: it’s immediately obvious that they show off here not of my good will.

Shielding my eye with my hand, I darted into the classroom, sat down at my desk and lowered my head. The first lesson, unfortunately, was French. Lidia Mikhailovna, by right of a class teacher, was more interested in us than other teachers, and it was difficult to hide anything from her. She came in, greeted us, but before seating the class, she had a habit of carefully examining almost each of us, making supposedly playful, but obligatory remarks. And, of course, she immediately saw the marks on my face, even though I hid them as best I could; I realized this because the guys began to turn around on me.

Well, - said Lidia Mikhailovna, opening the magazine. There are wounded among us today.

The class laughed, and Lidia Mikhailovna looked up at me again. They mowed at her and looked as if past, but by that time we had already learned to recognize where they were looking.

What happened? she asked.

Fell, - I blurted out, for some reason not having guessed in advance to come up with even the slightest degree of decent explanation.

Oh, how unfortunate. Did it crash yesterday or today?

Today. No, last night when it was dark.

Hee fell! Tishkin shouted, choking with joy. - Vadik from the seventh grade brought it to him. They played for money, and he began to argue and earned. I saw. He says he fell.

I was dumbfounded by such betrayal. Does he not understand anything at all or is it on purpose? For playing for money, we could be expelled from school in no time. Finished it. In my head everything was alarmed and buzzed with fear: it was gone, now it was gone. Well, Tishkin. Here is Tishkin so Tishkin. Pleased. Brought clarity - nothing to say.

I wanted to ask you, Tishkin, something completely different, - without being surprised and without changing her calm, slightly indifferent tone, Lidia Mikhailovna stopped him. - Go to the blackboard, since you're talking, and get ready to answer. She waited until the bewildered, who immediately became unhappy Tishkin came out to the blackboard, and briefly said to me: - You will stay after the lessons.

Most of all, I was afraid that Lidia Mikhailovna would drag me to the director. This means that, in addition to today's conversation, tomorrow I will be taken out in front of school ruler and forced to tell what prompted me to do this dirty business. The director, Vasily Andreevich, asked the offender, no matter what he did, broke a window, got into a fight or smoked in the restroom: “What prompted you to do this dirty business?” He paced in front of the ruler, throwing his hands behind his back, moving his shoulders forward in time with his broad steps, so that it seemed as if the tightly buttoned, protruding dark jacket was moving independently a little ahead of the director, and urged: “Answer, answer. We are waiting. look, the whole school is waiting for you to tell us.” The student began to mutter something in his defense, but the director interrupted him: “You answer my question, answer my question. How was the question asked? - "What prompted me?" - That's it: what prompted? We listen to you." The case usually ended in tears, only after that the director calmed down, and we went to classes. It was more difficult with high school students who did not want to cry, but could not answer Vasily Andreevich's question either.

Once our first lesson started ten minutes late, and all this time the director interrogated one ninth-grader, but, having not achieved anything intelligible from him, took him to his office.

And what, interestingly, I will say? It would have been better to get kicked out right away. I briefly touched on this thought and thought that then I would be able to return home, and then, as if burned, I was frightened: no, you can’t go home with such a shame. Another thing is if I myself had left school ... But even then you can say about me that I am an unreliable person, since I could not stand what I wanted, and then everyone would shun me altogether. No, just not like that. I would still be patient here, I would get used to it, but you can’t go home like that.

After the lessons, trembling with fear, I waited for Lidia Mikhailovna in the corridor. She left the staff room and nodded as she led me into the classroom. As always, she sat down at the table, I wanted to sit at the third desk, away from her, but Lidia Mikhailovna pointed to the first one, right in front of her.

Is it true that you play for money? she started right away. She asked too loudly, it seemed to me that at school it was only necessary to talk about it in a whisper, and I was even more scared. But there was no point in locking myself up, Tishkin managed to sell me with giblets. I mumbled:

So how do you win or lose? I hesitated, not knowing which was better.

Let's tell it like it is. Are you losing, perhaps?

You… win.

Okay, anyway. You win, that is. And what do you do with money?

At first, at school, for a long time I could not get used to Lidia Mikhailovna's voice, it confused me. In our village they spoke, wrapping their voice deep in their guts, and therefore it sounded to their heart's content, but with Lidia Mikhailovna it was somehow small and light, so that you had to listen to it, and not from impotence at all - she could sometimes say to her heart's content , but as if from secrecy and unnecessary savings. I was ready to blame everything on French: of course, while I was studying, while I was adjusting to someone else's speech, my voice sat without freedom, weakened, like a bird in a cage, now wait for it to disperse again and get stronger. And now Lidia Mikhailovna asked as if she was at that time busy with something else, more important, but she still couldn’t get away from her questions.

Well, so what do you do with the money you win? Do you buy candy? Or books? Or are you saving up for something? After all, you probably have a lot of them now?

No, not much. I only win a ruble.

And you don't play anymore?

And the ruble? Why ruble? What are you doing with it?

I buy milk.

She sat in front of me neat, all smart and beautiful, beautiful in clothes, and in her feminine young pore, which I vaguely felt, the smell of perfume from her reached me, which I took for my very breath; besides, she was not a teacher of some kind of arithmetic, not of history, but of the mysterious French language, from which something special, fabulous, beyond the control of anyone, everyone, like, for example, me, came from. Not daring to raise my eyes to her, I did not dare to deceive her. And why, after all, should I lie?

She paused, examining me, and I felt with my skin how, at the glance of her squinting, attentive eyes, all my troubles and absurdities really swell and fill with their evil strength. There was, of course, something to look at: in front of her, crouched on a desk, was a skinny, wild boy with a broken face, untidy without a mother and alone, in an old, washed-out jacket on sagging shoulders, which was just right on his chest, but from which his arms protruded far; in light green trousers made from his father's breeches and tucked into teal, with traces of yesterday's fight. Even earlier I had noticed the curiosity with which Lidia Mikhailovna looked at my shoes. Of the entire class, I was the only one wearing teals. Only the next autumn, when I flatly refused to go to school in them, did my mother sell sewing machine, our only value, and bought me tarpaulin boots.

And yet, you don’t need to play for money, ”said Lidia Mikhailovna thoughtfully. - How would you manage without it. Can you get by?

Not daring to believe in my salvation, I easily promised:

I spoke sincerely, but what can you do if our sincerity cannot be tied with ropes.

In fairness, I must say that in those days I had a very bad time. In the dry autumn, our collective farm settled early with the delivery of grain, and Uncle Vanya did not come again. I knew that at home my mother couldn’t find a place for herself, worrying about me, but that didn’t make it any easier for me. The sack of potatoes brought for the last time by Uncle Vanya evaporated so quickly, as if they were fed, at least, to livestock. It’s good that, having remembered, I guessed to hide a little in an abandoned shed standing in the yard, and now I lived only with this hiding place. After school, sneaking like a thief, I darted into the shed, put a few potatoes in my pocket, and ran out into the hills to start a fire somewhere in a comfortable and hidden lowland. I was hungry all the time, even in my sleep I felt convulsive waves rolling through my stomach.

Hoping to stumble upon a new group of players, I began to slowly explore the neighboring streets, wandered through wastelands, followed the guys who were drifting into the hills. It was all in vain, the season was over, the cold October winds were blowing. And only in our clearing the guys continued to gather. I circled nearby, saw how the puck flashed in the sun, how, waving his arms, Vadik was in command and familiar figures were leaning over the cash register.

In the end, I could not stand it and went down to them. I knew that I was going to be humiliated, but it was no less humiliating to accept once and for all the fact that I was beaten and kicked out. I was itching to see how Vadik and Ptah would react to my appearance and how I could behave. But most of all, it was hunger. I needed a ruble - no longer for milk, but for bread. I didn't know of any other way to get it.

I approached, and the game paused by itself, everyone stared at me. The bird was wearing a cap with turned-up ears, sitting, like everyone else on him, carefree and bold, in a checkered, loose-fitting shirt with short sleeves; Vadik forsil in a beautiful thick jacket with a lock. Nearby, piled in one heap, lay sweatshirts and coats, on them, huddled in the wind, sat a small boy, five or six years old.

Bird met me first:

What came? Haven't beaten in a while?

I came to play, - I answered as calmly as possible, looking at Vadik.

Who told you that with you, - Bird cursed, - they will play here?

What, Vadik, will we hit right away or will we wait a little?

Why are you sticking to a man, Bird? - squinting at me, Vadik said. - Understood, a man came to play. Maybe he wants to win ten rubles from you and me?

You don't have ten rubles each, - just so as not to seem like a coward to myself, I said.

We have more than you dreamed of. Set, don't talk until Bird gets angry. And he is a hot man.

Give it to him, Vadik?

No, let him play. - Vadik winked at the guys. - He plays great, we are no match for him.

Now I was a scientist and understood what it was - Vadik's kindness. Apparently, he was tired of a boring, uninteresting game, therefore, in order to tickle his nerves and feel the taste of a real game, he decided to let me into it. But as soon as I touch his vanity, I'll be in trouble again. He will find something to complain about, next to him is Ptah.

I decided to play carefully and not to covet the cashier. Like everyone else, in order not to stand out, I rolled the puck, afraid of inadvertently hitting the money, then quietly poked the coins and looked around to see if Ptah had come in behind. In the early days I did not allow myself to dream of a ruble; twenty or thirty kopecks for a piece of bread, and that's good, and then give it here.

But what was supposed to happen sooner or later, of course, happened. On the fourth day, when, having won a ruble, I was about to leave, they beat me again. True, this time it was easier, but one trace remained: my lip was very swollen. At school, I had to bite her constantly. But no matter how I hid it, no matter how I bit it, Lidia Mikhailovna saw it. She deliberately called me to the blackboard and made me read the French text. I wouldn't be able to pronounce it correctly with ten healthy lips, and there's nothing to say about one.

Enough, oh, enough! - Lidia Mikhailovna was frightened and waved her hands at me, as if at an evil spirit. - Yes, what is it? No, you will have to work separately. There is no other way out.

* * *

Thus began a painful and awkward day for me. Since the very morning, I have been waiting with fear for the hour when I will have to be alone with Lidia Mikhailovna, and, breaking my tongue, repeat after her words that are inconvenient for pronunciation, invented only for punishment. Well, why else, if not for mockery, merge three vowels into one thick viscous sound, the same “o”, for example, in the word “beaucoup” (a lot), which you can choke on? Why, with some kind of priston, let sounds through the nose, when from time immemorial it has served a person for a completely different need? What for? There must be limits to reason. I was covered with sweat, blushed and choked, and Lidia Mikhailovna, without respite and without pity, made me callous my poor tongue. And why me alone? There were all sorts of guys at school who spoke no better French than I did, but they walked free, did what they wanted, and I, like a damned one, took the rap for everyone.

It turned out that this is not the worst thing. Lidia Mikhailovna suddenly decided that we were running out of time at school until the second shift, and told me to come to her apartment in the evenings. She lived near the school, in teachers' houses. On the other, larger half of Lidia Mikhailovna's house, the director himself lived. I went there like torture. Already by nature timid and shy, lost at any trifle, in this clean, tidy apartment of the teacher, at first I literally turned to stone and was afraid to breathe. I had to speak so that I undressed, went into the room, sat down - I had to be moved like a thing, and almost by force to extract words from me. It didn't help my French at all. But, strange to say, we did less here than at school, where the second shift supposedly interfered with us. Moreover, Lidia Mikhailovna, bustling about the apartment, asked me questions or told me about herself. I suspect that she deliberately invented for me that she went to the French faculty only because she was not given this language at school either, and she decided to prove to herself that she could master it no worse than others.

Hiding in a corner, I listened, not waiting for tea when they let me go home. There were a lot of books in the room, a large beautiful radio set on the bedside table by the window; with a player - rare for those times, but for me it was an unprecedented miracle. Lidia Mikhailovna put on records, and the dexterous male voice again taught French. One way or another, there was nowhere for him to go. Lidia Mikhailovna, in a simple house dress, in soft felt shoes, walked around the room, making me shudder and freeze when she approached me. I couldn’t believe that I was sitting in her house, everything here was too unexpected and unusual for me, even the air, saturated with light and unfamiliar smells of a different life than I knew. Involuntarily, a feeling was created, as if I were peeping into this life from the outside, and out of shame and embarrassment for myself, I wrapped myself even deeper into my short jacket.

Lidia Mikhailovna was then probably twenty-five or so; I remember well her regular and therefore not too lively face, with her eyes screwed up to hide the pigtail in them; tight, rarely revealed to the end of a smile and completely black, short-cropped hair. But with all this, one could not see the harshness in her face, which, as I later noticed, becomes over the years almost a professional sign of teachers, even the most kind and gentle by nature, but there was some kind of cautious, cunningly, bewilderment related to to herself and seemed to say: I wonder how I ended up here and what I'm doing here? Now I think that by that time she had managed to be married; in her voice, in her walk - soft, but confident, free, in her whole behavior, courage and experience were felt in her. And besides, I have always been of the opinion that girls who study French or Spanish, become women earlier than their peers who study, say, Russian or German.

I am ashamed now to remember how frightened and lost I was when Lidia Mikhailovna, having finished our lesson, called me to supper. If I were a thousand times hungry, every appetite immediately jumped out of me like a bullet. Sit down at the same table with Lydia Mikhailovna! No no! I'd better learn all French by heart by tomorrow so that I never come here again. A piece of bread would probably really get stuck in my throat. It seems that before that I did not suspect that Lidia Mikhailovna, like all of us, eats the most ordinary food, and not some kind of manna from heaven, so she seemed to me an extraordinary person, unlike everyone else.

I jumped up and, mumbling that I was full, that I didn’t want to, backed up along the wall to the exit. Lidia Mikhailovna looked at me with surprise and resentment, but it was impossible to stop me by any means. I ran. This was repeated several times, then Lidia Mikhailovna, in despair, stopped inviting me to the table. I breathed more freely.

Once I was told that downstairs, in the locker room, there was a package for me that some guy brought to school. Uncle Vanya, of course, is our driver - what a man! Probably, our house was closed, and Uncle Vanya could not wait for me from the lessons - so he left me in the locker room.

I hardly endured until the end of classes and rushed downstairs. Aunt Vera, the school cleaning lady, showed me a white plywood box standing in the corner, in which parcels are packed by mail. I was surprised: why in a drawer? - Mother used to send food in an ordinary bag. Maybe it's not for me at all? No, my class and my last name were printed on the lid. Apparently, Uncle Vanya already wrote here - so as not to be confused for whom. What is this mother thought up to nail food in a box ?! Look how intelligent she has become!

I could not carry the parcel home without knowing what was in it: not that kind of patience. It is clear that there are no potatoes. For bread, the container is also, perhaps, too small, and inconvenient. In addition, bread was sent to me recently, I still had it. Then what is there? Immediately, at school, I climbed under the stairs, where, I remembered, there was an ax, and, having found it, I tore off the lid. It was dark under the stairs, I climbed back out and, furtively looking around, put the box on the nearest windowsill.

Looking into the parcel, I was stunned: on top, neatly covered with a large white sheet of paper, lay pasta. Blimey! Long yellow tubes, laid one to the other in even rows, flashed in the light with such wealth, which nothing more expensive for me existed. Now it’s clear why my mother packed the box: so that the pasta wouldn’t break, didn’t crumble, they arrived to me safe and sound. I carefully took out one tube, looked, blew into it, and, unable to restrain myself any longer, began to grunt greedily. Then, in the same way, I took up the second, the third, thinking about where I could hide the box so that the pasta would not get to the overly voracious mice in my mistress's pantry. Not for that mother bought them, spent the last money. No, I won't go for pasta that easily. This is not some potato for you.

And suddenly I choked. Pasta… Really, where did mother get pasta? We never had them in our village, you can't buy them there for any money. What is it then? Hastily, in desperation and hope, I sorted through the pasta and found several large lumps of sugar and two hematogen tiles at the bottom of the box. Hematogen confirmed that the parcel was not sent by the mother. Who, in this case, who? I looked at the lid again: my class, my last name - me. Interesting, very interesting.

I pressed the nails of the lid into place and, leaving the box on the windowsill, went up to the second floor and knocked on the staff room. Lidia Mikhailovna has already left. Nothing, we will run into, we know where he lives, there have been. So, here's how: if you don't want to sit down at the table, get food at home. So yes. Will not work. No one else. This is not a mother: she would not forget to put a note, she would tell where, from what mines such wealth came from.

When I sideways climbed in with the parcel through the door, Lidia Mikhailovna pretended not to understand anything. She looked at the box, which I placed on the floor in front of her, and asked in surprise:

What's this? What is it you brought? What for?

You did it,” I said in a trembling, breaking voice.

What have I done? What are you talking about?

You sent this package to the school. I know you.

I noticed that Lidia Mikhailovna blushed and became embarrassed. This was the only, apparently, case when I was not afraid to look her straight in the eyes. I didn't care if she was a teacher or my second cousin. Then I asked, not she, and asked not in French, but in Russian, without any articles. Let him answer.

Why did you think it was me?

Because we don't have any pasta there. And there is no hematogenous.

How! Doesn't happen at all? She was so sincerely surprised that she betrayed herself completely.

It doesn't happen at all. It was necessary to know.

Lidia Mikhailovna suddenly laughed and tried to hug me, but I pulled away. from her.

Indeed, you should have known. How am I like this?! She thought for a moment. - But here it was hard to guess - honestly! I'm a city person. Are you saying it doesn't happen at all? What happens to you then?

Peas happen. Radish happens.

Peas ... radish ... And we have apples in the Kuban. Oh, how many apples are there now. Today I wanted to go to the Kuban, but for some reason I came here. Lidia Mikhailovna sighed and glanced at me. - Do not get mad. I wanted the best. Who knew you could get caught eating pasta? Nothing, now I'll be smarter. Take this pasta...

I won’t take it,” I interrupted her.

Well, why are you like this? I know that you are hungry. And I live alone, I have a lot of money. I can buy whatever I want, but I'm the only one ... I eat a little, I'm afraid to get fat.

I'm not hungry at all.

Please don't argue with me, I know. I spoke to your mistress. What's wrong if you take this pasta now and cook yourself a good dinner today. Why can't I help you for the only time in my life? I promise not to send any more packages. But please take this one. You have to eat enough to study. There are so many well-fed loafers in our school who don’t understand anything and probably never will, and you are a capable boy, you can’t leave school.

Her voice began to have a soporific effect on me; I was afraid that she would persuade me, and, angry with myself for understanding Lidia Mikhailovna's rightness, and for the fact that I was going to not understand her after all, shaking my head and muttering something, I ran out the door.

* * *

Our lessons did not stop there, I continued to go to Lidia Mikhailovna. But now she took me for real. She apparently decided: well, French is French. True, the sense of this came out, gradually I began to pronounce French words quite tolerably, they no longer broke off at my feet with heavy cobblestones, but, ringing, tried to fly somewhere.

Good, - Lydia Mikhailovna encouraged me. - In this quarter, the five will not work yet, but in the next - for sure.

We did not remember the parcel, but just in case, I kept my guard. You never know what Lidia Mikhailovna will undertake to come up with? I knew from my own experience: when something doesn’t work out, you will do everything to make it work out, you just won’t give up. It seemed to me that Lidia Mikhailovna was looking at me expectantly all the time, and looking closely, chuckles at my wildness - I was angry, but this anger, oddly enough, helped me to be more confident. I was no longer that meek and helpless boy who was afraid to take a step here, little by little I got used to Lidia Mikhailovna and her apartment. Still, of course, I was shy, hiding in a corner, hiding my teals under a chair, but the former stiffness and oppression receded, now I myself dared to ask Lidia Mikhailovna questions and even enter into disputes with her.

She made another attempt to put me at the table - in vain. Here I was adamant, stubbornness in me was enough for ten.

Probably, it was already possible to stop these classes at home, I learned the most important thing, my language softened and moved, the rest would eventually be added at school lessons. Years and years ahead. What will I do then if I learn everything in one go from beginning to end? But I did not dare to tell Lidia Mikhailovna about this, and she, apparently, did not at all consider our program completed, and I continued to pull my French strap. However, a webbing? Somehow involuntarily and imperceptibly, without expecting it myself, I felt a taste for the language and in my spare moments, without any prodding, I climbed into the dictionary, looked into the texts far away in the textbook. Punishment turned into pleasure. Ego also spurred me on: it didn’t work out - it will work out, and it will work out - no worse than the best. From another test, or what? If I didn’t have to go to Lidia Mikhailovna yet ... I would myself, myself ...

Once, about two weeks after the story with the parcel, Lidia Mikhailovna, smiling, asked:

Well, don't you play for money anymore? Or are you going somewhere on the sidelines and playing?

How to play now?! I wondered, looking out the window where the snow lay.

And what was that game? What is it?

Why do you need? I got worried.

Interesting. We used to play as children, so I want to know if this is a game or not. Tell me, tell me, don't be afraid.

I told him, omitting, of course, about Vadik, about Ptah and about my little tricks that I used in the game.

No, - Lidia Mikhailovna shook her head. - We played in the "wall". Do you know what it is?

Here look. - She easily jumped out from behind the table at which she was sitting, found coins in her purse and pushed the chair away from the wall. Come here, look. I bang the coin against the wall. - Lidia Mikhailovna lightly hit, and the coin, clinking, flew off to the floor in an arc. Now, - Lidia Mikhailovna thrust a second coin into my hand, you beat. But keep in mind: you need to beat so that your coin is as close as possible to mine. So that they can be measured, get them with the fingers of one hand. In another way, the game is called: freezing. If you get it, then you win. Bay.

I hit - my coin, hitting the edge, rolled into a corner.

Oh, - Lidia Mikhailovna waved her hand. - Long away. Now you are starting. Keep in mind: if my coin touches yours, even a little, by the edge, I win doubly. Understand?

What is not clear here?

Let's play?

I didn't believe my ears:

How can I play with you?

What is it?

You are a teacher!

So what? The teacher is a different person, isn't it? Sometimes you get tired of being only a teacher, teaching and teaching endlessly. Constantly pulling yourself up: this is impossible, this is impossible, - Lidia Mikhailovna screwed up her eyes more than usual and looked out the window thoughtfully, aloof. “Sometimes it’s useful to forget that you’re a teacher, otherwise you’ll become such a badass and beech that living people will get bored with you. Perhaps the most important thing for a teacher is not to take himself seriously, to understand that he can teach very little. - She shook herself and immediately cheered up. - And I was a desperate girl in childhood, my parents suffered with me. Even now I still often want to jump, jump, rush somewhere, do something not according to the program, not according to the schedule, but at will. I'm here, it happens, I jump, I jump. A person ages not when he lives to old age, but when he ceases to be a child. I would love to jump every day, but Vasily Andreevich lives behind the wall. He is a very serious person. In no case should he find out that we are playing "freeze".

But we don't play any "freezes". You just showed me.

We can play as easy as they say, make-believe. But you still don't betray me to Vasily Andreevich.

Lord, what is going on in the world! How long have I been scared to death that Lidia Mikhailovna would drag me to the director for playing for money, and now she asks me not to betray her. Doomsday - not otherwise. I looked around, frightened for some reason, and blinked my eyes in confusion.

Well, shall we try? If you don't like it - leave it.

Come on, I agreed hesitantly.

Get started.

We took the coins. It was evident that Lidia Mikhailovna had really played at one time, and I was only just trying on the game, I had not yet figured out for myself how to beat a coin against the wall with an edge or flat, at what height and with what force when it was better to throw. My blows went blind; if they had kept the score, I would have lost quite a lot in the first minutes, although there was nothing tricky in these “meanings”. Most of all, of course, what embarrassed and oppressed me, did not allow me to get used to the fact that I was playing with Lidia Mikhailovna. Not a single dream could dream of such a thing, not a single bad thought to think about it. I did not come to my senses immediately and not easily, but when I came to my senses and began to look at the game little by little, Lidia Mikhailovna took it and stopped it.

No, that's not interesting, - she said, straightening up and brushing her hair that had fallen over her eyes. - Playing is so real, but the fact that we are like three-year-old kids.

But then it will be a game for money, - I timidly reminded.

Of course. What are we holding in our hands? There is no other way to replace gambling with money. This is good and bad at the same time. We can agree on a very small rate, but there will still be interest.

I was silent, not knowing what to do and how to be.

Are you afraid? Lidia Mikhailovna encouraged me.

Here's another! I'm not afraid of anything.

I had some small things with me. I gave the coin to Lidia Mikhailovna and took mine out of my pocket. Well, let's play for real, Lidia Mikhailovna, if you like. Something to me - I was not the first to start. Vadik had zero attention to me either, and then he came to his senses, climbed with his fists. Learned there, learn here. It's not French, and I'll get French to my teeth soon.

I had to accept one condition: since Lidia Mikhailovna’s hand is larger and her fingers are longer, she will measure with her thumb and middle finger, and I, as expected, with my thumb and little finger. It was fair and I agreed.

The game restarted. We moved from the room to the hallway, where it was freer, and beat on a smooth wooden fence. They beat, knelt down, crawled, but the floor, touching each other, stretched their fingers, measuring the coins, then again rising to their feet, and Lidia Mikhailovna announced the score. She played noisily: she screamed, clapped her hands, teased me - in a word, she behaved like an ordinary girl, not a teacher, I even wanted to shout at times. But nevertheless she won, and I lost. Before I had time to come to my senses, eighty kopecks ran into me, with great difficulty I managed to knock off this debt to thirty, but Lidia Mikhailovna from a distance hit mine with her coin, and the account immediately jumped to fifty. I started to worry. We agreed to pay at the end of the game, but if things continue like this, my money will not be enough very soon, I have a little more than a ruble. So, you can’t go over the ruble - otherwise it’s a shame, shame and shame for life.

And then I suddenly noticed that Lidia Mikhailovna was not even trying to beat me at all. When measuring, her fingers hunched over, not stretching out to their full length - where she allegedly could not reach the coin, I reached out without any effort. This offended me, and I got up.

No, I said, I don't play like that. Why are you playing along with me? It's not fair.

But I really can’t get them,” she began to refuse. - I have wooden fingers.

Okay, okay, I'll try.

I don't know how it is in mathematics, but in life the best proof is by contradiction. When the next day I saw that Lidia Mikhailovna, in order to touch the coin, surreptitiously pushes it to her finger, I was stunned. Looking at me and for some reason not noticing that I perfectly see her pure fraud, she continued to move the coin as if nothing had happened.

What are you doing? - I was indignant.

I? And what am I doing?

Why did you move her?

No, she was lying there, - in the most shameless way, with some kind of even joy, Lidia Mikhailovna opened the door no worse than Vadik or Ptakha.

Blimey! The teacher is called! I saw with my own eyes at a distance of twenty centimeters that she touched the coin, and she assures me that she did not touch it, and even laughs at me. Does she take me for a blind man? For a little one? French teaches, is called. I immediately completely forgot that just yesterday Lidia Mikhailovna tried to play along with me, and I only made sure that she did not deceive me. Well well! Lidia Mikhailovna, is called.

On this day we studied French for fifteen or twenty minutes, and then even less. We have another interest. Lidia Mikhailovna made me read the passage, made comments, listened to the comments again, and without delay we moved on to the game. After two small losses, I began to win. I quickly got used to the "freezes", figured out all the secrets, knew how and where to hit, what to do as a point guard, so as not to substitute my coin for a freeze.

And again I have money. Again I ran to the market and bought milk - now in ice cream mugs. I carefully cut off the influx of cream from the mug, put crumbling ice slices into my mouth and, feeling their full sweetness all over my body, closed my eyes in pleasure. Then he turned the circle upside down and hollowed out the sweetish milk sludge with a knife. He allowed the leftovers to melt and drank them, eating them with a piece of black bread.

Nothing, it was possible to live, and in the near future, as soon as we heal the wounds of the war, they promised everyone a happy time.

Of course, accepting money from Lidia Mikhailovna, I felt embarrassed, but each time I was reassured by the fact that this was an honest win. I never asked for a game, Lidia Mikhailovna suggested it herself. I didn't dare refuse. It seemed to me that the game gives her pleasure, she was cheerful, laughed, disturbed me.

We would like to know how it all ends ...

... Kneeling against each other, we argued about the score. Before that, too, it seems, they were arguing about something.

Understand you, garden head, - crawling on me and Waving her arms, argued Lidia Mikhailovna, - why should I deceive you? I keep score, not you, I know better. I lost three times in a row, and before that I was “chika”.

- "Chika" is not a reading word.

Why is it not readable?

We were shouting, interrupting each other, when a surprised, if not startled, but firm, ringing voice reached us:

Lydia Mikhailovna!

We froze. Vasily Andreevich stood at the door.

Lidia Mikhailovna, what's the matter with you? What's going on here?

Lidia Mikhailovna slowly, very slowly got up from her knees, flushed and disheveled, and smoothing her hair, she said:

I, Vasily Andreevich, was hoping that you would knock before entering here.

I knocked. Nobody answered me. What's going on here? can you explain please. I have the right to know as a director.

We are playing in the "wall", - Lydia Mikhailovna calmly answered.

Do you play for money with this? .. - Vasily Andreevich pointed his finger at me, and with fear I crawled behind the partition to hide in the room. - Are you playing with a student? Did I understand you correctly?

Correctly.

Well, you know... - The director was suffocating, he did not have enough air. - I'm at a loss to immediately name your act. It is a crime. Corruption. Seduction. And more, more ... I have been working at school for twenty years, I have seen everything, but this ...

And he raised his hands above his head.

* * *

Three days later, Lidia Mikhailovna left. The day before, she met me after school and walked me home.

I'll go to my place in the Kuban, - she said, saying goodbye. - And you study calmly, no one will touch you for this stupid case. It's my fault here. Learn, - she patted me on the head and left.

And I never saw her again.

In the middle of winter, after the January holidays, a parcel arrived at school by mail. When I opened it, taking out the ax again from under the stairs, there were tubes of pasta in neat, dense rows. And below, in a thick cotton wrapper, I found three red apples.

I used to see apples only in pictures, but I guessed that they were.