as he answered shrugging his shoulders: “I don’t know. Maybe. Since it has a heart, then heart attacks can happen.”
“Oh, I see now.”
“What do you see?”
“I was thinking how you were going to get it out.”
“Oh, bother!” the man latched on. The SUV driver laughed good-naturedly together with Eugene. Then he spoke in level tones: “All right, then, call the owner of the car.”
“I’m for him. What, do I not look like?”
“You?” the man hemmed. “You’ve not enough wit... and moustache too.”
Eugene was just about to open his mouth to argue about his effulgent intellect, but after hearing about the moustache he stopped short and took a good look at the driver.
“Come on, now, call him,” he hurried observing Eugene’s reaction.
“What do you need him for?”
“I need him, full stop. Should I report to you, or something?”
“Well, have it your way, man,” Eugene warned him in jest to be on the safe side. “You’ve asked for it yourself. I tried my best to make it safer for your persona...”
With that he moved towards the river and passed out of sight behind the waterside slope.
Sensei and Nikolai Andreevich were sitting on a snag that seemed to have seen quite a lot of fishermen’s second principal “operating tools” in its recumbent life. Both men with fishing rods in their arms were watching their floats in such a manner as though fish was just about to bite. Eugene came down the sand fill. The fishers were so focused on the process that no one paid attention to his coming. The lad looked at the floats rocking gently in the water and asked an eternal question of a traveler passing along the shore.
“Well, does it nibble?”
“Ah, just small fry,” Sensei answered with eternal reply of a fisher.
Eugene lingered for a moment in secret hope that a grandiose biting would start at his presence. But with no sign of that momentous event he returned to the urgent subject.
“Hey, Sensei! There is a cheeky fellow looking for you. He’s come on an SUV. He hold himself so high-flown...”
Keeping his eyes on the float Sensei smiled and asked: “Skinny, with a thin red beard?”
“Yes.”
“Turn him out!”
“OK,” Eugene rejoiced and started climbing up the sandy slope.
“Hey, wait!” Sensei called after him. “I’m joking, you know... He’s a parson.”
“A parson?!” Eugene slid down the slope in ineffable amazement. “The parson who, you said, would join us to fish?”
Observing confused the confused guy’s face, Sensei nodded with laughter and stood up to come out of his “fishing ambush”.
At the sight of his friend, Father John (or Vano as Sensei called him since childhood) seemed to have transformed right away. One wouldn’t recognize a former SUV driver in him. He assumed a humble posture and took on long-suffering air.
In uncommonly heartfelt voice, laying stress on “o”s, the guest started pouring out his complaints and admonitions: “What in the wide world is going on? It not enough that I’d barely found you, God being my helper at that, now there’s also this arch adolescent indulges in vile blasphemies. It almost came to manhandling...”
And so, Father John drew an intentionally vivid picture of his acquaintance with Eugene, winning the audience naturally on him. Then, he delivered a short edifying sermon on the topic that one ought to love one's neighbors. With a serious look on his face, Sensei ‘attended’ unto Father John’s touching speech, nodding in response and casting reproving glances at Eugene. The latter even got embarrassed at such words of the priest. The tips of his ears turned red as if he were a delinquent teenager. And when the guy – with the aid of flaming speech of the priest – was driven into a condition of browsing grass under his feet, wishing to sink into the ground for his behavior, before Sensei first of all, Father John suspiciously stopped short. Eugene was silent at first, depressed with shattering ‘accusation’. Then he raised his ‘madcap’ timidly and... saw Vano and Sensei shudder in silent laughter. That’s when Eugene finally grasped the concealed meaning of the aforesaid.
“Gee whiz!” he breathed out with relief.
All three let out a booming laughter. The laughter as a bait lured the guys and girls. After calming down, Vano heartily greeted Sensei and shook hands with the rest. Changing to ordinary pronunciation he observed in jest: “No, really, I’ve been puzzling out your maneuvers for two hours. I thought we agreed to meet in a different place...”
“I passed the word to you as it was explained to me,” Sensei said merrily, pointing to Eugene.
“Now, that’s who explained it to you?!” Vano exclaimed with a laughter. “No wonder you turned out here then. Pretends to be Ivan Osipovich!..”
“Do what? Which Ivan Osipovich?” Eugene didn’t get it.
“Susanin, young man. Susanin. It’s a shame not to know one’s history,” Father John uttered with reproof.
The entire company rolled with a new fit of laughter. The name of a renowned peasant of Kostroma uyezd (district), who led a party of Polish-Lithuanian interventionists into impassable dense forest, glued to Eugene through life by widely different people at that. But he did not seem to be daunted by that a bit. Quite the opposite, it stirred up pride in his historical compatriot.
Being in the focus of everyone’s attention, Eugene feigned a smile, shrugged his shoulders and pronounced: “Even Homer sometimes nods. You never know what happens in life. Incidentally, the motto of my ancestors has it that all happenings of life in their incidents and opportunities are divided precisely into two halves. May be and may not be.”
By these words he called forth a new hailstorm of jokes and laughter. Later on, when everyone managed to figure out who is who and what place they occupy under the sun, there began a hospitable welcome of the dear guest. In an attempt to rehabilitate himself before the newcomer, Eugene started fussing about, which was unnatural for his mischievous nature, offering a verity of services. He aided in parking the SUV near the “best tree on the glade” that in his opinion cast the widest shadow. He thoughtfully carried Vano’s fishing tackle to the bank of the river and even inflated his rubber dinghy.
Such a valuable addition to fisherman’s accessories as a means of travel by water ineffably inspired the gathering. As would be expected, the right of “the first rowing” was passed to inveterate fishermen. Along with Vano they started to plough the waters in turns in quest of a decent fish biting.
As of Eugene, as soon as he made sure that the object of his “first-sight affections” swam out a considerable distance, he smiled slyly. His eyes lit-up with mischievous twinkle. While everyone was consumed with the process of morning fishing, “Susanin’s descendant” set out to implement his much suffered insidious intent. Especially as, in his opinion, there was not much of a true fishing to look forward to as such because of his hopelessly entangled net.
Having found an empty water bottle, Eugene learnedly
