The Old Genie Hottabych

A CAMEL IN THE STREET

Instead, the yard suddenly filled with heavily laden elephants, camels and mules. New caravans kept arriving constantly. The shouts of the dark-skinned drivers, dressed in snow-white robes, blended with the elephants’ trumpeting, the camels’ snorting, the mules’ braying, the stamping of hundreds of hooves and the melodious tinkling of bells.

A short sunburnt man in rich silk robes climbed down from his elephant, approached the middle of the yard, and tapped the pavement thrice with his ivory cane. Suddenly, a huge fountain appeared. Immediately drivers carrying leather pails formed a long queue; soon the yard was filled with the snorting, chomping and wheezing of the thirsty animals.

“All this is yours, O Volka,” Hottabych cried, trying to make himself heard above the din. “Won’t you please accept my humble gift?”

“What do you mean by ‘all this’?”

“Everything. The elephants, and the camels, and the mules, and all the gold and precious stones they carry, and the people who are accompanying them — everything is yours!”

Things were going from bad to worse. Volka had nearly become the owner of three magnificent but quite useless palaces, and now he was to be the owner of a vast fortune, an owner of elephants and, to top it all — a slave-owner!

His first thought was to beg Hottabych to make all these useless gifts disappear before anyone had noticed them. But he immediately recalled how things had gone with the palaces. If he had been smarter, he probably would have been able to talk the old man into letting the city keep them.

He had to stall for time to think and map out a plan of action.

“You know what, Hottabych?” he said, trying to sound nonchalant. “What do you say if we go for a ride on a camel, while the men take care of the caravan?”

“It would really be a pleasure,” answered the unsuspecting old man.

A moment later, a double-humped camel appeared on the street, swaying majestically and looking round with an arrogant air. On its back were an excited Volka and Hottabych, who felt quite at home and was fanning himself lazily with his hat.

“A camel! A camel!” the children shouted excitedly. They had poured out into the street in great numbers, just as if they had all been waiting for the camel to appear.

They surrounded the unruffled animal in a close circle, and it towered over them like a double-decker bus towers over an ice-cream cart. One of the little boys was skipping and shouting:

The camel approached the crossing just as the light turned red. Since it was not used to traffic rules, it coolly stepped across the white line with the word “STOP!” written in large letters in front of it. In vain did Volka try to hold it back. The camel continued on its way, straight towards the militia man who was quickly pulling out his receipt book for fines.

Suddenly a horn blared, brakes screeched and a light blue car came to a stop right under the steely-nerved camel’s nose. The driver jumped out and began yelling at the animal and its two passengers. And true enough, in another second there would have been a terrible accident.

“Kindly pull over to the curb,” the militia man said politely as he walked up to them.

Volka had great difficulty in making the camel obey this fatal order. A crowd gathered immediately, and everyone had an opinion to offer:

“This is the first time I’ve seen people riding a camel in Moscow .”

“Just think, there could have been a terrible accident!”

“What’s wrong with a child going for a ride on a camel?”

“No one’s allowed to break traffic rules.”

“You try and stop a proud animal like that. That’s no car, you know!”

“I can’t imagine where people get camels in Moscow !”

“It’s obviously from the zoo. There are several camels there.”

“It makes me shiver to think what could have happened. He’s an excellent driver!”

“The militia man is absolutely right.”

Volka felt he was in a jam. He hung down over the camel’s side and began to apologize:

“It’ll never happen again! Please let us go! It’s time to feed the camel. This is a first offence.”

“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do about it,” the militia man replied dryly. “They always say it’s the first time in cases like this.”

Volka was still attempting to soften the stern man’s heart when he felt Hottabych tugging at his sleeve.

“O my young master, it makes me sad to see you lower yourself in order to shield me from any unpleasantness. All these people are unworthy of even kissing your heels. You should let them know of the chasm that separates them from you.”

Volka waved the old man away impatiently, but all at once he felt as he had during the geography examination: once again he was not the master of his own words.

He wanted to say:

“Please, won’t you let us go? I promise never to break any traffic rules as long as I live.”

Instead of this humble plea, he suddenly bellowed at the top of his voice:

“How dare you, O despicable guard, detain me during the precious hour of my promenade! On your knees! On your knees immediately, or I’ll do something terrible to you! I swear by my beard — I mean, by his beard!” And he nodded towards Hottabych.

At these .words, Hottabych grinned smugly and stroked his beard fondly.

As concerns the militia man and the crowd, the child’s insolence was so unexpected that they were more dumbfounded than indignant.

“I am the most outstanding boy in this whole city!” Volka kept on shouting, inwardly wishing he were dead. “You’re unworthy of even kissing my heels! I am handsome! I am wise!”

“All right,” the militia man answered darkly. “They’ll see just how wise you are down at the station.”

“Goodness! What nonsense I’m saying! It’s really hooliganism!” Volka thought and shuddered. Nevertheless, he continued:

“Repent, you, who have dared to spoil my good spirits! Cease your insolence before it’s too late!”

Just then, something distracted Hottabych’s attention. He stopped whispering to Volka and for a few moments the boy was once again on his own. As he hung down over the side of the camel and looked at the crowd pathetically he began to plead:

“Citizens! Dear people! Don’t listen to me. Do you think it’s me talking? It’s him, this old man, who’s making me talk like this.”

But here Hottabych once again picked up the reins and in the same breath Volka screamed:

“Tremble before me and do not anger me, for I am terrible in my wrath! Oh, how fearsome I am!”

He understood only too well that his words did not frighten anyone; instead, they made some indignant, while others found them simply funny. But there was nothing he could do. Meanwhile, the crowd’s feeling of surprise and indignation began to change to one of concern. It was clear that no schoolboy could ever speak so foolishly and rudely if he were normal.

Then a woman shouted, “Look! The child has a fever! Look, he’s steaming!”

“What disrespect!” Volka shouted back, but, to his utter horror, he saw large puffs of black smoke escaping his mouth at every word.

People gasped, someone ran to call an ambulance, and Volka whispered to Hottabych, taking advantage of the confusion:

“Hassan Abdurrakhman ibn Hottab! I order you to take this camel and us as far away as possible. Immediately. Somewhere outside the city limits. Otherwise, we can get in very bad trouble. Do you hear me? Im-me-di-ate-ly!”

“I hear and I obey,” the old man replied in a whisper.

That very instant, the camel and its riders soared into the air and disappeared, leaving everyone behind in the greatest confusion.

A moment later it landed gracefully on the outskirts of the city. There its passengers parted with it forever.

The camel is probably still grazing there. You’ll recognize it at once if you see it, for its bridle is studded with diamonds and emeralds.