smart… True, I can't persuade her, but hope and wait. I said, I'll help!
– Thank you, teacher! – only Aman-Jalil found to say.
Perplexed, he left and couldn't work for a whole day because of excitement, – amused: he took out of a box made of rubber, where winter take, glued them in different places, walked, trained, knocked down with a rubber band, then tied several "flies" to the fan, turned it on, the flow of air spun "flies", and Aman-Jalil shot them "on the fly".
But the confiscation and ruin machine worked, once launched, already independently.
…Aman-Jalil tried to kiss Gulshan, but she sharply and dissatisfied pushed away.
– It's hard to explain to you, even I don't understand.
– What to understand? The child must have a father, and you will be his, or I will go to your boss, remember, I'm still a minor, and I'll tell him everything.
Aman-Jalil laughed, just laughed.
– You're a beauty! – he moaned between fits of laughter. – Parroting your mother's words like a parrot, while you – a gazelle, a doe, a roe deer, should be yourself: timid, graceful, tender. Look at the words you've learned, picked up from that one prisoner, passing on his knowledge to me every day, very smart, a great philosopher, a professor… And here you are talking like a market vendor from the central market. Shame on you!
– Me, ashamed? – protested Gulshan and… burst into tears, wiping them away childishly with her fist. – Who invited you, damned one, came, disgraced, doesn't want to marry and still lectures me.
Ignoring her tears, Aman-Jalil opened the safe and took out the photographs. Gulshan continued to sob.
– Stop crying, enough. Look at these pictures, they're real.
Aman-Jalil threw the photographs on the table in front of Gulshan, then moved to the window. He had admired the photographs so many times that he knew them by heart: all showed Gulshan, naked and in poses she, he was sure, had no idea about… Only one showed her naked partner – Sardar Kareem.
Outside, snow was falling, and rare passers-by hurried to leave the inhospitable, drafty street… Behind Aman-Jalil, there was the sound of a falling body. Aman-Jalil turned in fright and rushed to Gulshan. She lay on the carpet, holding in her hand that very last photograph. Aman-Jalil began to kiss her, trying to bring her to her senses, and then, almost without undressing, greedily took possession of her. His convulsions or the weight of his body brought Gulshan to consciousness. Seeing his face so close above her, she whispered quietly, not fully aware of what was happening:
– Is it really him?
Aman-Jalil silently got off her, bluntly fastened his trousers without hiding, helped Gulshan up, and seated her on the couch.
– It's him, it's me!… The child is mine, but you don't need to know anything else. There are things that it's dangerous to know or think about. I don't advise you to…
Aman-Jalil put the photographs back in the safe, took out a bottle of fine brandy from the shelf, poured half a glass, and made Gulshan drink it.
– Drink, drink, you're so pale, like snow, cold like ice, it's bad for you, bad for the baby, drink and don't talk.
Gulshan drank the brandy without resistance, immediately blushed, and the tremor in her body disappeared. The bad dream she had hoped for did not pass; instead, she suddenly felt the full horror of reality, its inevitability…
– From today, you'll work as my secretary. Your first duty, besides love, is to guard this office… Well, it's in your interest too: there are photographs in the safe… No film, don't bother opening it, – joked Aman-Jalil. – Congratulations on the child; it's good you left it… Listen, idea! Let me marry you off to an old man: wealthy, has his own house, you won't need anything, and no need to sleep with him. High, eh!
Gulshan looked at him, but saw and heard nothing. Before her eyes was a huge fiery sphere from which pornographic photographs shot out like lightning bolts, and in the center of the sphere, Gulshan saw Aman-Jalil's grotesquely swollen face, with fangs sticking out of his mouth like a vampire. The sphere suddenly burst into fiery, jagged pieces and… Gulshan realized clearly that she was entirely under the spell of this man who loved her, she knew it firmly, rather felt it, and the only thing permitted to her was to completely submit to his whims and desires. And Gulshan decided to submit…
"Damn it, he's turned my whole world upside down. That's why Sardar Kareem disappeared, only to die suddenly in the capital. This nosy devil's to blame. He came here for this, knowing nothing about me and never seeing me, this damn nosy one… He was obstructing them somehow, so they got rid of him… Ah! What's it got to do with me? I'll have a child, and I must think about him. The main thing is, this damn nosy one is crazy about me, violated me again, scoundrel, if that's what he likes, let him, I don't feel a thing anyway. He rejoiced at the child, so he won't abandon it like some useless thing. I'll do whatever he says, won't be worse… Those photos are so terrible, if anyone sees them, shame won't save me, I'll have to sit like a dog on a leash in his office and guard… That's what that dream was about: an endless road, and I'm walking on it, the sun mercilessly scorching, dying of thirst, hands tied, a noose around my neck held by a horse's saddle, with him in the saddle, the nosy devil, in a red caftan, golden stars scattered, holding a long pike in his hand and skewering all passing children like butterflies and beetles. Fangs bloody protruded from his mouth, somehow giving him a perpetually smiling appearance. And Gulshan followed behind his horse, her bare feet bloodied along the road. Poor Gulshan!.. I'm going crazy, talking about myself like about someone else, a completely different person… About another person… Am I still the same Gulshan?"
Two weddings were taking place simultaneously. The chauffeur looked sadly at his wife, who was seven years older than him, and at his newlywed son-in-law, thirty years older than him, and it was difficult to calculate how much older he was than his wife's stepdaughter, whom the chauffeur cast longing glances at, and hard to calculate indeed. But the women were satisfied: the widow, receiving such a young and handsome husband, the father of her child, was so grateful to Aman-Jalil that she forgave some "trifles," such as the death of Sardar Ali, a friend of her family, violence against her daughter, and even the forced husband imposed on her, at the sight of whom she felt nauseated. Gulshan, for her part, was very pleased that her husband was so old and ugly.
"Ugly! Not even a thought will come to lie with you in bed at such a mournful moment. Sits there as if he's at a funeral," – thought Gulshan, pretending to be a happy bride.
Everything imaginable was on the table. Aman-Jalil spared no expense, asked all merchants for an additional tax, and they brought the freshest, best of everything. Usually, every wedding invites the zurna musicians, an ensemble of eastern instruments: tar, kamancheh, zurna, nagara. But Aman-Jalil decided to impress and invited a brass band as well. The brass band played waltzes, polkas, and marches while guests drank and ate. During the change of dishes, for rest, the quartet played "shur" or the tarist mournfully sang a long mugham. Specifically at Aman-Jalil's request, a famous baritone, Baybulat, came and sang several classical arias. After receiving the agreed sum in a sealed envelope, he habitually put the money in his pocket without opening it, preparing to leave for his next performance, but Aman-Jalil invited him to stay. The celebrity dared not refuse, although he was not supposed to receive the next fee. Invited to the table, as always, he drank, boasted, and flirted with
