The Old Genie Hottabych

by Lazar Lagin

  “Did you hear him? That was the Sergeant of the Guard shouting. They’ll go looking for us after supper, and they’ll certainly find us. But my beard has soaked up as much water as a sponge, and I’m as helpless as a babe!”

  Just then he happened to glance at two towels hanging over the back of a park bench.

  “Allah be praised!” he cried excitedly, running towards the towels. “These will help me dry my beard! Then we won’t have to fear any guards in the world.”

  He picked up first one and then the other towel and groaned:

  “O Allah! They are quite damp! And the guards are so close!”

  Nevertheless, he hurriedly began to dry his beard.

  It was while he was drying it that an Azerbaijanian of tremendous height, dressed in a dark red robe, came upon them. He appeared from behind the pink bushes as unexpectedly as a Jack-in-the-box.

  “Aha!” he said rather calmly. “Here they are. Tell me, my dear man, is this your towel?”

  “Spare us, O mighty ruler!” Hottabych cried, falling to his knees. “You can chop off my head, but these youths are in no way guilty. Let them go free! They have lived but such a short while!”

  “Hottabych, get up and don’t make a fool of yourself!” Volka said in great embarrassment. “What kind of a ruler are you talking about? He’s just a very ordinary man here on a holiday.”

  “I won’t get up until this wonderful and merciful sultan promises to spare your lives, O my young friends!”

  The Azerbaijanian shrugged his mighty shoulders and said, “My dear citizen, why are you insulting me? What kind of a sultan am I? I’m an ordinary Soviet citizen.” He puffed out his chest and added, “I’m Jafar Alt Muhammedov, a drilling foreman. Do you know where Baku is?”

  Hottabych shook his head.

  “Do you know where Bibi-Aibat is?”

  Hottabych shook his head again.

  “Don’t you read the papers? Now, what are you kneeling for? That’s shameful. Oh, how very shameful and embarrassing, my dear man!” Muhammedov pulled the old man to his feet.

  “Wait a minute!” Volka whispered like a conspirator, taking Muhammedov off to a side. “Don’t pay any attention to the old man. He’s off his rocker. And the worst part of it is, we’re so wet.”

  “Ah! Did you get caught in the rain in the mountains too? I came back as wet as a mouse. Vai, vai! The old man may catch cold. Dear man,” he said, catching Hottabych under the arms as he was about to fall to his knees again. “You look very familiar. Are you from Gandji? You look like my father, except that he’s older. My father’s going on eighty-three.”

  “Then know ye, O mighty ruler, that I am going on three thousand seven hundred and thirty-three!” Hottabych replied hotly.

  It was only to Muhammedov’s credit that he didn’t bat an eyelid upon hearing these words. He merely nodded understandingly to Volka, who was winking hard from behind Hottabych’s back.

  Pressing his right hand to his heart, the drilling foreman answered Hottabych politely, “Of course, my good man, of course. But you’re so well preserved. Let’s go and warm up. We’ll have something to eat and rest or else you might catch cold. Va, how you remind me of my father!” -

  “I don’t dare disobey, O mighty ruler,” Hottabych answered fawningly, touching his beard ever so often. Alas! It was still very, very damp.

  Oh, how restless his soul was! All his many years’ experience rose up against the fact that the owner of the palace should invite a strange old man and two young boys — all dressed in a far from elaborate fashion — to share his meal. That meant there was some mischief to be expected. Perhaps this Jafar Alt ibn Mohammed was trying to coax them into his palace in order to play a joke on them and then, having had his fill of torturing them, would order his servants to chop off their heads, or throw them into cages with wild beasts. Oh, how cautious he had to be!

  So thought Hottabych as he and his young friends ascended the broad stairway to the first block of dormitories.

  They encountered no one, either on the stairs or in the hall, and this but served to confirm Hottabych’s suspicions. Muhammedov took them to his room, induced the old man to change into a pair of pyjamas, and left, telling them to make themselves at home. “I’ll be back soon, after I give a few orders. I’ll be right back.”

  “Aha! We know to whom you’ll give those orders and what they’ll be about, you crafty, two-faced ruler!” Hottabych thought. “You have a heart of stone, one that is immune to mercy. To chop off such noble boys’ heads!”

  Meanwhile, the noble boys were looking round the comfortable room.

  “Look, d’you see this?” Volka cried happily. He picked up a small table fan, a thing Hottabych had never seen.

  “It’s a fan,” Volka explained. “We’ll dry your beard in a flash!”

  True enough, in two minutes’ time Hottabych’s beard was ready for use.

  “We’ll test it,” the sly old man mumbled innocently.

  He yanked out two hairs. Before the crystal tinkling sound had died down, our friends suddenly found themselves about three miles away, on the warm sandy beach. At their feet, the blue-black waves of the rising tide softly lapped against the shore.

  “This is much better,” Hottabych said contentedly. Before the boys could utter a sound, he yanked three more hairs from his beard.

  That very instant a large tray of steaming roast lamb and a second, smaller tray of fruit and biscuits appeared on the sand.

  Hottabych snapped his fingers and two strange-looking bronze pitchers with sherbet appeared.

  “Golly!” Zhenya cried. “But what about our clothes?”

  “Alas, I am becoming forgetful before my time,” Hottabych said critically and yanked out another hair. Their clothes and shoes became dry the same instant.

  Moreover, their things appeared freshly pressed and their shoes shined brightly and even smelling of the most expensive shoe polish.

  “And may this treacherous ruler, Jafar Alt ibn Muhammed, call for as many guards as he wishes!” the old man said with satisfaction, pouring himself a cup of icy, fragrant sherbet. “The birds have flown out from under the knife!”

  “Why, he’s no ruler!” Volka said indignantly. “He’s a real nice man. And if you want to know, he didn’t go off to call any guards, he went to get us something to eat.”

  “You’re too young to teach me, O Volka!” Hottabych snapped, for he was really displeased that his young companions were not in the least thankful for having been saved from death’s jaws. “Who but I should know what rulers look like and how they behave! Know ye, that there are no more treacherous men than sultans.”

  “But he’s no sultan, he’s a foreman. D’you understand, a drilling foreman!”

  “Let’s not argue, O Volka,” the old man answered glumly.

  “Don’t you think it’s time we sat down to eat?”

  “What about your pyjamas?” Zhenya said, seeing that they could not out-talk the old man this time. “You’ve carried off someone else’s pyjamas!”

  “Oh, Allah! I’ve never yet degraded myself by stealing,” Hottabych cried unhappily.

  If all the people at the sanatorium were not then in the dining hall, they probably would have seen a pair of striped pyjamas appear suddenly in the dark sky, coming from the direction of Matsesta, flying at the height of the third-storey windows. The pyjamas flew into Muhammedov’s room through the open balcony doors and draped themselves neatly over the back of the chair, from which the kind drilling foreman had so recently picked them up and handed them to a shivering Hottabych.

  Muhammedov, however, forgot all about the old man and the boys before he even reached the dining hall.

  “I found them,” he said to his room-mate. “I found both towels. We left them on the bench when we sat down to rest.”

  Then he joined the others at the table and applied himself to his supper.

  IT’S SO EMBARRASSING TO BE AN ILLITERATE GENIE!

  Before Muhammedov
had a chance to start on his dessert, the clouds that our travellers had left somewhere between Tuapse and Sochi finally reached the spa and burst forth in a loud, torrential, sub-tropical storm.

  In a moment the streets, parks and beaches became deserted.

  Soon the storm reached the spot where, by Hottabych’s grace, the small crew of the drowned magic carpet were to spend the night on the shore of the Black Sea .

  Luckily, they noticed the approaching storm in time; the prospect of getting drenched to the bone again did not appeal to them in the least. However, the most important thing to keep dry was the old man’s beard. The simplest thing to do would have been to fly somewhere farther south, but in the pitch darkness of the southern night they might easily crash into a mountain.

  For the time being, they took refuge under some bushes and considered where to go.

  “I’ve got it!” Zhenya cried, jumping to his feet. “Golly, what an idea! We should smear his beard with oil!”

  “And then what?” the old man shrugged.

  “Then it won’t even get wet in another Flood, that’s what!”

  “Zhenya’s right,” Volka agreed, feeling a bit peeved that it was not he who had thought of such a wonderful, scientifically sound idea. “Hottabych, go into action!”

  Hottabych yanked out several hairs, tore one of them in two, and his beard became covered with a thin layer of excellent palm oil.

  Then he tore a second hair in two and they all found themselves in a comfortable, marble-faced cave that suddenly appeared on the steep bank. And while a warm June storm was booming loudly over the Caucasian coast, they sat on thick carpets, had a plentiful dinner and then fell asleep soundly till morning.

  They were awakened by the soft whispering of the crystal-clear waves.

  The sun had long since risen.

  Stretching and yawning, they went out onto the deserted beach, bathed in the slanting rays of the morning sun. Immediately, as if it had never existed, the cave that had sheltered them for the night disappeared.

  The boys were splashing delightedly in the cool waves when they heard the far-off hum of an airplane motor coming from the direction of Adler Airport .

  A large passenger plane with glistening silver wings was flying over the sea.

  “Ah-h!” Zhenya sighed dreamily. “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could go to Moscow in that plane?”

  “That’s not a bad idea at all,” Volka agreed.

  Thereupon Hottabych drew something very thin and white from his pocket. It resembled a delicate silver thread. He tore it into several pieces and suddenly all three of them found themselves in comfortable reclining seats inside the airplane.

  The most surprising thing was that none of the passengers paid the slightest attention to them, as if they had been aboard the plane right from the start.

  “Hottabych,” Zhenya whispered. “What was it you tore that looked just like a silver thread?”

  “Just a little hair from my beard,” Hottabych replied, though he seemed strangely embarrassed.

  “But you took it from your pocket.”

  “I tore it out of my beard beforehand and hid it in my pocket, just … in case… Forgive me, but I wasn’t sure my oiled beard would stay dry.”

  “Don’t you believe in science?” Zhenya cried in amazement.

  “I am quite well versed in the sciences,” Hottabych said in a hurt voice, “but I don’t know what kind of a science teaches you to protect a magic beard from getting wet by oiling it.” To change the subject he said, “How comfortable and speedy this air chariot is! At first, I thought we were inside a tremendous and truly unusual iron bird and was indeed surprised.”

  All conversation stopped at this point, because the old man became just a tiny bit air-sick. Rather, he was very tired. He dozed off in his seat and did not open his eyes until they were quite near Moscow . Beneath them was the great Moscow Sea .

  Volka, who was sitting beside him, whispered proudly, “My uncle made this sea.”

  “This sea?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your uncle?”

  “Yes.”

  “You mean to say that you’re Allah’s nephew?” the old man sounded very sad.

  “My uncle’s an excavator operator. He’s in charge of a walking excavator. His name’s Vladimir Nekrasov. If you want to know, he’s digging the Kuibyshev Sea right now.”

  “My, oh my! You most blessed one!” Hottabych said turning an angry red. “I so believed you, O Volka! I respected you so! And suddenly you tell such horrid, shameful lies!”

  “Is Vladimir Nekrasov really your uncle?” the stocky man with a broad, weather-beaten face sitting behind them asked loudly. “Is he really?”

  “He’s my mother’s cousin.”

  “Why didn’t you say so before!” the man exclaimed. “The boy’s got such a man for an uncle, and he doesn’t say a thing! Why, he’s a rare man, indeed! I’m on my way back from the Kuibyshev Sea right now. We’re working on the same sector. Why, if you want to know, we…”

  Volka nodded towards a gloomy Hottabych.

  “But he doesn’t believe my uncle made the Moscow Sea .”

  “Ai-ai-ai, citizen. That’s not nice at all!” the man began to shame Hottabych. “How can you doubt it? Vladimir Nekrasov dug that sea and now he’s digging another, and if a third sea has to be dug, he’ll dig that one, too! What’s the matter? Don’t you read the papers? Here, have a look. Right here. This is our paper.” He pulled a newspaper from his battered brief-case and pointed to a photograph. “See?”

  “Look! That’s my uncle!” Volka shouted. “Can I have this paper? I want to give it to my mother.”

  “Take it, it’s yours,” the man said. “Do you still doubt him?” he asked Hottabych, who now seemed very small. “Here, read the heading: ‘Our Wonderful Sea-Builders.’ It’s all about his uncle.”

  “Is it about you, too?” Zhenya asked.

  “It’s mostly about Nekrasov. I’m not famous. Here, read it.”

  Hottabych took the paper and pretended to read. Really now, he couldn’t admit he didn’t know how to read, could he?

  That is why, on the way home from the airport, he asked his young friends to teach him how to read and write, for he said he had nearly died of shame when the man had asked him to read the words “Our Wonderful Sea-Builders.”

  They agreed that at the very first opportunity they would teach him how to read the papers, because the old man was very insistent that he begin with them. Nothing else would do.

  “So’s I’ll know which sea is being built, and where,” he explained, looking away shyly.

  WHO’S THE RICHEST?

  “Let’s go for a walk, O crystal of my soul,” Hottabych said the next day.

  “On one condition only, and that’s that you won’t shy away from every bus like a village horse. But I’m insulting village horses for nothing. They haven’t shied away from cars in a long, long time. And it’s about time you got used to the idea that these aren’t any Jirjises, but honest-to-goodness Russian internal combustion engines.”

  “I hear and I obey, O Volka ibn Alyosha,” the old man answered timidly.

  “Then repeat after me: I will never again be afraid of…”

  “I will never again be afraid of…”

  “. … buses, trolley-buses, trolley-cars, trucks, helicopters…”

  “… buses, trolley-buses, trolley-cars, trucks, helicopters…”

  “… automobiles, searchlights, excavators, typewriters…”

  “… automobiles, searchlights, excavators, typewriters…” “… gramophones, loud-speakers, vacuum-cleaners…” “… gramophones, loud-speakers, vacuum-cleaners…” “… electric plugs, TV-sets, fans and rubber toys that squeak.’* “… electric plugs, TV-sets, fans and rubber toys that squeak.” “Well, I guess that takes care of everything,” Volka said. “Well, I guess that takes care of everything,” Hottabych repeated automatically, and they both burst out laughing.

 
In order to harden the old man’s nerves, they crossed the busiest streets at least twenty times. Then they rode on a trolley-car for a long while and, finally, tired but content, they boarded a bus.

  They rode off, bouncing softly on the leather-upholstered seats.

  Volka was engrossed in a copy of Pionerskaya Pravda, the children’s newspaper. The old man was lost in thought and kept glancing at his young companion kindly from time to time. Then his face broke into a smile, evidently reflecting some pleasant idea he had conceived.

  The bus took them to the doorstep. Soon they were back in Volka’s room.

  “Do you know what, O most honourable of secondary school pupils?” Hottabych began the minute the door closed behind them. “I think you should be more aloof and reserved in your relations with the young inhabitants of your house. Believe it or not, my heart was ready to break when I heard them shouting: ‘Hey, Volka!’ ‘Hello, Volka!’ and so forth, all of which is obviously unworthy of you. Forgive me for being so outspoken, O blessed one, but you have slackened the reins unnecessarily. How can they be your equals when you are the richest of the rich, to say nothing of your other innumerable qualities?”

  “Huh! They certainly are my equals. One boy is even a grade ahead of me, and we’re all equally rich.”

  “No, you are mistaken here, O treasure of my soul!” Hottabych cried delightedly and led Volka to the window. “Look, and be convinced of the truth of my words.”

  A strange sight met Volka’s eyes.

  A few moments before, the left half of their tremendous yard had been occupied by a volley-ball pitch, a big pile of fresh sand for the toddlers, “giant steps” and swings for the daring, exercise bars and rings for athletics fans, and one long and two round bright flower-beds for all the inhabitants to enjoy.

  Now, instead of all this, there towered in glittering magnificence three marble palaces in an ancient Asiatic style. Great columns adorned the façades. Shady gardens crowned the flat roofs, and strange red, yellow and blue flowers grew in the flower-beds. The spray issuing from exotic fountains sparkled like precious stones in the sunlight. Beside the entrance of each palace stood two giants holding huge curved swords. Volka and Hottabych went down to the yard. At the sight of Volka, the giants fell to their knees as one and greeted him in thunderous voices, while terrible flames escaped their mouths. Volka shuddered.