‘Go on now, you can’t be that stupid! Firstly you don’t have to dance in the village square for everyone to see. You do it at home. And secondly you won’t have to bang and stamp. You’ll put on the record-player, grab your wife, and away you go! Do you kiss your wife, tell me?’
‘To tell you the truth,’ he says, ‘I snarl at her and show my teeth – never have time for the trimmings.’
‘Never have time, my foot! What you need is a good thrashing and no mistake…. Such a meek and mild creature, your wife, and you snarl at her like some old wolf. And what does she say when you show your teeth?’
‘Nothing. She hides her face and shakes like a leaf.’
‘That’s enough!’ I says. ‘Stop!’
For a while we said nothing. Yumer hung his head and poked the fire with a stick. And how he sighed! Now and then his sighs were that heavy, the ash flew up like it was blown by some bellows. I felt sorry for him and took his arm.
‘If I were your age and in your position, do you know what I’d do? I’d go back to the village, I’d call in at the local, I’d shove a couple of bottles of wine in my sash and I’d go off home for supper. “Come along, love,” I’d say to my wife, “let’s have a bite to eat and we’ll drink to your health and your beauty.” Then I’d give her a hand clearing the table. “Why don’t you lie down, my love, so I can warm that little heart of yours!” Nothing difficult about warming a woman’s heart. No need for fire and kindling – it’s much simpler than that, just a word of love whispered in her ear, like the ram did with the ewe. I don’t understand sheep-language, but I do know what he said to her: “My love,” he said, “you are beautiful. You are my precious, and I love you.” You’ll stroke her hair a little – you saw how the ram combed back the ewe’s wool, didn’t you? You’ll stroke her with your hand – the ram hasn’t got a hand, but you have. You see what I mean ?’
‘That’s enough!’ said Yumer with a start. ‘Stop! I can see just what you mean.’
‘In that case, up you get and back home you go! It’s not far to the village, and I’ll look after the sheep till you get back in the morning.’
… Yumer was back next morning bright and early with a sprig of cranesbill behind his ear.
‘Well, how did it go?’ I asks.
‘Like a house on fire,’ he says with a grin. ‘That old ram isn’t a patch on me, but I’ll be grateful to him till the day I die! I’ll treat him like a brother and I’ll light two candles on his homs – one from Nezife and one from me….’
Three days I spent up there with Yumer, then I collected some mushrooms and a bundle of kindling and went back to the village. I dumped my presents in my old woman’s lap and went straight off to see the mayor.
‘Mayor,’ I says, ‘do you tie your wife to the bed?’
‘No need! One look from me and she’s flat on her back …! But what’s got into you in your old age,’ he says, ‘asking such questions?’
‘Nothing…. It’s just that all the men in this village either tie their wives to the bed, or snarl at them, and show their teeth, or put them flat on their backs by just looking at them. Why don’t you issue us all with pistols? Out with our pistols and away we’d go!’
The mayor got up from his chair and came over to me.
‘Breathe out,’ he says.
I did as he said.
‘Well, you haven’t been drinking, so what’s oiled your tongue so bright and early?’
‘I’ll tell you,’ I says. And I told him the whole story about the ram. Three times his face changed colour, and I could see that his own record wasn’t that clean neither. But he heard me out and then he asked :
‘Well, what do you suggest we do?’
‘Organize a course of instruction for the men in the village hall, that’s what…. We’ll bring the ram along to show us some good manners and I’ll do the commentary !’
‘Just a minute!’ the mayor shouted. ‘Do you realize what you’re saying? The village hall is for cultural events – not for rams, especially if they are with ewes!’
‘Well, isn’t it culture, Mr Mayor,’ I shouted back at him, ‘teaching people how to love one another! Think of all the divorce there is these days!’
That set the mayor scratching – first his head, then his neck, then his legs.
‘There’s one thing I don’t understand,’ he says. ‘Why are you getting so worked up about a ram, tell me?’
‘Well, Mayor,’ I says, ‘it makes my old heart bleed when I think that in making love our folk are worse than cattle, that’s why! It’s not the ram what worries me, but people, real people!’
The mayor came over thoughtful. He thought and he thought, and then he made up his mind :
‘Right,’ he says, ‘we’ll organize a course, but not in the village hall. It’ll be up at the sheepfolds – we’ll find a way of getting the men up there somehow. But it’ll need a name, this operation of yours – “Sheep Retraining Scheme” say, or just plain “Retraining”. But you better keep it dark, because if anyone starts asking questions, I don’t know a thing about it. Is that clear?’
‘Yes, quite clear,’ I says.
‘To work, then!’
… And that’s what I’m working at now.
What I want most of all is one day to see all the men in the village file past me like Yumer – with sprigs of cranesbill behind their ears.
Then all my sins will be forgiven, and my old soul will find peace at last.
When the World Stopped Wearing Baggy Breeches
Some are ruined by war, others by women, but it was ‘Bakish & Co.’ what gobbled me up. Bit by bit, it nibbled me away. Ate me out of house and home. But I’d best begin at the beginning….
I was a shoemaker. A real koundouri-maktr, I mean, not one of them cobbler fellows who turned up later and took the bread from our mouths. Before they came along it was us koundouri-mzktrs controlled the market. We had our shops by the fountain, bang in the centre of town, all eighteen side by side like beads on a string. And the whole of Shoemakers’ Row was bright and gay with the koundouris hung up outside – black ones and white ones, brown and red, just like a fair!
We used to make up all kinds of special koundouris. (Much the same thing, papoutsis and koundouris.) The smart dressers, they went in for Greek papoutsis with pointed toes like turned-up noses and silk tassels on the end. You wore papoutsis like that with your hat at an angle and a dagger in your belt. Then there was emini papoutsis for more solid citizens, with hard rounded toes and thick soles. They went with a string of amber beads from Jerusalem and an astrakhan hat. We used to make raftsman papoutsis too – white and low-cut, with double points and a tongue round the back. They were light and soft like the wing of a dove. It was mainly the Maritsa raftsmen bought them – that’s why they was called raftsman papoutsis – but others used to buy them too. Anyone with an eye for beauty. Then there were fireman papoutsis – for the lads in the fire brigade – with low heels and sling backs, so they could be got on and off quick. We made papoutsis for everyone you could think of! For master craftsmen and apprentices, hot-heads and stay-at-homes, for bachelors and for married men too. There was no need for identity cards. One look at the papoutsis and you knew all you needed : how old someone was, or how brainy, whether they was loaded or skint, meek and mild or liable to knock your block off, what their job was and what part of town they came from – Ambelinos, Zhablitsa or Metoshka maybe. Not like now – all shoes look the same today – no telling where a fellow comes from and what he’s up to.
Beats me why everyone rushed out and bought that newfangled rubbish. It wasn’t a patch on the shoes we used to make. No cheaper, neither. That modern muck was far more expensive, but it still put an end to us and our papoutsis. First just one cobbler came – no one knew where from – then another turned up and that made two. Not on Shoemakers’ Row, they wasn’t, nor in the guild neither, but everyone made a bee-line for their place and very soon our hammers were gathering the dust.
&n
bsp; So all us master koundouri-makers, old ones and young ones as well, we got together to decide what to do about it. Us young ones, we’d got fire in our bellies, and were all for chucking the two cobblers in the river. So they’d take fright and skedaddle, like. But the old ones were against it. Especially Ali. A Turk, Ali was, a wise old bird with a white beard and a crooked neck, and he was dead against chucking the two cobblers in the river.
‘It’s not just a question of cobbling and papoutsis,’ he said, looking at us young lads. ‘It’s a question of what’s going on in the world outside. If the world has stopped wearing papoutsis, it won’t change its mind just for us. It stopped wearing baggy breeches, so it’ll stop wearing papoutsis too. You let the cobblers be! And the youngsters among you had best forget about papoutsis and start cobbling shoes!’
Well, that put the cat among the pigeons good and proper. All up and at him, we were, and old Ali damn near finished in the river himself. We told him he’d been got at, gone off his rocker and God knows what else. And in the end us youngsters got our way. We waited till dark and then, with Greek papoutsis on our feet and daggers in our belts, five of us lads nobbled those miserable cobblers and chucked them in the river. Afterwards we got hold of a barrel organ and went off to the Yellow Peter to celebrate. All night long the red wine flowed, songs were sung and glasses cracked against our teeth. And not once did it occur to us that this binge would be our last. We were just ready to leave when the church bells started clanging. Fire! Out we went to see what was up. Christ Almighty ! The whole of Shoemakers’ Row was alight! We worked like stink – pails of water, wringing wet rugs, firemen with hoses – but all the barrels in Bulgaria couldn’t have put out that blaze. Not with those wooden buildings so nice and dry and just waiting for a spark to come flying past. The walls fell in, the roofs tumbled into the flames, and the papoutsis squealed and squeaked in the heat like they was alive!
So those cobblers hadn’t been so daft as they looked : we’d chucked them in the river and they’d set fire to our shops, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth! We did try and find them, to square the account like, but no luck. They’d got the hell out and were never seen in our town again.
After the fire most of us shoemakers split up and went looking for other work. A few kept on at their koundouris and opened up again. But me, I was left high and dry, no shop and not a penny to my name. I tried this and I tried that, but nothing was any good. Then one day I bumped into Kolyo the butcher – Spotty, we used to call him.
‘You’re still without a shop then, Kosta?’
‘Aye, that’s right,’ I says.
‘Well,’ he says ‘I’ll lend you my butcher’s shop for free if you like. Only first you’ll have to persuade the mayor to let me hang my meat on the hooks outside the shop, like I used to. If I get permission to do that, I’ll only need the shop in the evenings, and during the day you can have it to work on your papoutsis.’
It was a long shot, but I was ready to try anything and went straight off to see the mayor.
‘Mr Mayor, our friend and protector! My whole life long I’ll bow down before you and shower gifts upon you like you was my dearest relative, if you’ll only let Spotty Kolyo use his hooks and me use his shop! Lost everything in the fire, I did. You must help me!’
But the mayor wouldn’t hear of it. ‘How do you expect me to allow Spotty Kolyo to use his hooks when the sanitary inspectors have forbidden all meat-selling on the street? And besides, if I let him, all the other butchers will be at it too, and we can wave goodbye to our hygiene and sanitary.’
I begged him, I appealed to him, I offered him my friendship, I even said I’d dig his vineyard in the summer, and in the end he gave in.
‘All right,’ he said, ‘but only if Tarator agrees as well.’
Tarator was a big shot, a Deputy and that, and I went and told him what I was after.
‘No! Out of the question!’ he said. So I tried his weak spot.
‘Aren’t I right in thinking there’ll be elections very soon ?’ I says. ‘More than forty-five of us in all there are, me and my relatives, and that’s without second and third cousins. I could get the whole bunch of them to support you – fifty or sixty extra crosses for your Deputy’s ticket! I could even get them to parade your party’s flag through the centre of town – if you’ll only do that one little thing I was asking : let Spotty Kolyo hang up his meat outside.’
And he gave in too.
That night Kolyo put up a post outside his shop, fixed a hook to the post and hung out his meat. And the very next day all the other posts was back where they had been before. The sanitary inspector didn’t dare saw them down, and Butcher’s Row was back in business.
I borrowed some cash, bought a new sewing machine -a Singer – new lasts and soles and a supply of Morocco leather, and picked up where I’d left off. I made every possible kind of papoutsi: Greek, round-toed, raftsman, firemen’s, black ones, white ones, red ones with one point and with two, with a tongue and without, and I strung them all up outside the shop, so that everyone who passed stopped and stared…. Some just came to look, but others came to buy, and business soon picked up very nicely. I’d been engaged since before the fire, so I plucked up courage and got myself wed. We rented ourselves a room – pretty bare it was, just a couple of stools and a little table, but I was back at work, and with my hammer in my hand I was hoping to earn enough for a house and a table, and perhaps a couple of beds as well. But then ‘Bakish & Co.’ had to come along….
‘I say, Bai Kolyo,’ I says to old Spotty Kolyo one morning, ‘how about us making gyuvech for lunch today? You provide the meat and I’ll get the vegetables.’
‘Good idea!’ he says. ‘Why not! Give us some money and I’ll go and buy the vegetables for you.’
I gave him what he wanted, and off he went to the market. I was just wondering what might be keeping him, when I hears a shout and sees him coming back loaded up with onions, spuds and parsley.
‘Kosta!’ he yells, still a good way off, ‘down at the market they’re selling tsurvoulis made of rubber! Amazing – almost giving them away, they are. You go and see!’
I didn’t like the sound of that, so I puts down my hammer and runs along to the market. Packed, it was. Everyone pushing and shoving round a stand piled right up with tsurvoulis. I elbowed my way through and picked one up. I turned it over and on the sole I saw that word: Bakish! and something about a rubber factory….
‘How much?’ I asks the fellow on the stand.
‘To you – ten levs a pair,’ he says. ‘And if you take three pairs, I’ll knock a bit off. Three for twenty-four.’
I picked up another pair, weighed them in my hand -great heavy shiny things they were! Not a patch on my featherlight raftsman papoutsis, with their yellow trimmings and fine white leather. That’s what I thought, anyway. But the others weren’t worried about the weight. They was simple folk and liked them because they was shiny. Almost fighting over them, they were, buying like mad, chucking away their old tsurvoulis, and trogging off in those great rubber boats to have their picture taken. It made my heart bleed, seeing them go off to the photographer’s like that. All those years I’d been putting everything I’d got into my papoutsis, and not a single word of praise. Then along comes Bakish with those ugly great rubber barges, not an ounce of beauty, individuality or skill in them, and off everyone goes to get their picture taken!
Not a single soul with any feeling for beauty!
I didn’t go back to the shop from the market. I went off to the Yellow Peter instead. Got a real skinful, I did. No idea how they got me home. And from then on things went from bad to worse. Bakish took away all my customers from the villages round about, and business went dead. I cut the price of my papoutsis, and Bakish did the same. Bakish demanded cash on the table, so we thought we’d fix them by giving credit. But that backfired on us too! Nobody wanted to pay me cash any longer – they all wanted everything on tick. ‘You’ll have your money when I gets pa
id,’ says one. ‘When I sell my grapes,’ says the next, and the third says he’ll fork out once he’s got his threshing done. No end to it, there wasn’t. Not to mention a whole army of characters what wanted something for nothing – tax inspectors, tallymen, the police even – they just carted off whatever they could, without so much as a by your leave. One threatened you with his sword, another with his pen, and the clerks up at the town hall, they was the worst, they just threatened they’d have the butchers take their meat back inside. ‘When we get paid!’ they all promised, as they carried off papoutsis for their wives and their mothers and their children and their aunts. But I never got a penny.
Things got so bad with the credit lark that me, my wife and the mother-in-law, we only had one pair of papoutsis between us, and had to take turns going to Communion.
I was pretty well broke when I made up my mind : ‘No more credit! Not for no one! And if the Good Lord himself comes down from Heaven, it’s cash on the table, or home he goes!’ Even swore on the Bible, I did. I went down on me knees and swore: ‘Almighty God,’ I says, ‘strike me blind if I ever gives credit again!’ I hardly had time to cross myself and get back on me feet, when who do I see coming in the door but a pal of me dad’s from Kozanovo called Mityu, Mityu Gouka, grinning from ear to ear and carrying a sack over his shoulder.
‘Kosta, my lad!’ he shouts before he’s through the door. ‘You’re in luck. I need thirty pair of papoutsis for a whole party of wedding guests. Come on, let’s get measured up!’
And he took a bundle of short sticks out of his sack and started matching them against the papoutsis for size. ‘These I’ll take, and these, and these, and those too….’ Cleaned me out, took all my stock, he did. Stuffed my papoutsis into his sack and turned to go….
‘What about the money then, Gouka, eh?’
‘Money?’ he says. ‘Soon as we’re through with the threshing. I’ll owe it you.’
Wild Tales Page 4
