The Old Genie Hottabych

A MYSTERIOUS HAPPENING IN THE BANK

Despite the day’s unpleasant experiences, Volka was in high spirits when he and Hottabych returned home. He had finally hit upon an idea of how to dispose of the endless treasures he had so suddenly acquired.

First, he asked Hottabych whether he could make the drivers, elephants, camels, mules and all their loads invisible.

“You need only command me to do so, and it will be done.”

“Fine. Then please make them invisible for the time being, and let’s go to bed. We’ll have to get up at sunrise tomorrow.”

“I hear and I obey!”

And so, the people who had gathered in the yard to stare at the strange and noisy caravan suddenly found the place to be completely empty. They went back to their homes in amazement.

Volka gulped down his supper, undressed and climbed into bed with a happy sigh. He only had a sheet for a cover, since it was so hot.

Hottabych, however, had decided to comply with an ancient custom Genies had. He became invisible and lay down across the threshold, to guard his young master’s sleep. Hottabych was just about to begin a solemn conversation when the door opened and Volka’s grandmother entered, to say good night as always. She tripped over the invisible old man and nearly fell.

“Why, something was definitely lying on the threshold!” she gasped when Volka’s father came running.

“Where was that something lying?” he asked. “And what did that something look like?”

“It didn’t look like anything, Alyosha.”

“Mother, do you mean to tell me you tripped over an empty space?” he asked and laughed with relief, happy that she had not hurt herself.

“Yes, I guess I did,” Grandma answered in bewilderment and laughed, too.

Volka’s father and grandmother left.

As for Hottabych, he had wisely decided to crawl under Volka’s bed — at least no one would step on him there, and he would be closer to Volka.

For several minutes no one said a word. Volka could not decide how to begin such a ticklish conversation.

“Good night!” Hottabych said amiably from under the bed.

Volka realized he had better begin.

“Hottabych,” he called, hanging his head over the side of the bed, “I want to talk to you about something.”

“Not about my gifts to you today?” Hottabych asked warily, and when he received an affirmative answer he sighed.

“You see, dear Hottabych, I’d like to know whether I can do as I please with your presents?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“And you won’t be angry at me, no matter what I do with them?”

“No, I won’t, O Volka. How can I dare be angry with someone who has done so much for me?”

“If it’s not too much trouble, Hottabych, could you please swear to that?”

“I swear!” Hottabych said in a hollow voice from under the bed. He understood that there must be a catch to this.

“That’s fine,” Volka said happily. “That means you won’t feel too bad if I tell you that I have no earthly use for these presents, though I’m awfully grateful to you for them.”

“O woe is me!” Hottabych moaned. “You’re refusing my gifts again. But these aren’t palaces! Can’t you see, O Volka, I’m not giving you palaces any more. You might as well tell me the truth — that the gifts of your most devoted servant disgust you.”

“Figure it out yourself, Hottabych, you’re a very wise old man: now, what in the world could I do with so many treasures?”

“You could be the richest of the rich, that’s what,” Hottabych grumbled. “Don’t tell me you wouldn’t want to be the richest person in your country? Yet, it would be just like you, O most capricious and puzzling of all boys I have ever met! Money means power, money means glory, money means friends galore! That’s what money means!”

“Who needs bought friends and bought glory? You make me laugh, Hottabych! What’s the use of glory that’s been bought, instead of earned through honest labour in your country’s service?”

“You forget that money gives you the most reliable and durable power over people, O my young and stubborn arguer.”

“But not in our country.”

“Next thing, you’ll be saying that people in your country don’t want to get richer. Ha, ha, ha!” Hottabych thought this was really a cutting remark.

“Sure they do,” Volka answered patiently. “A person who does more useful work makes more money. Sure, everyone wants to earn more, but only through honest work.”

“Be that as it may, nothing could be further from my mind than to make my precious young friend seek dishonest earnings. If you don’t need these treasures, turn them into money and lend the money out. You must agree, that’s a very honourable undertaking — to lend money to those who need it.”

“Why, you must be crazy! You don’t know what you’re talking about. How can a Soviet person be a usurer! And even if there was such a vampire, who’d ever go to him? If a person needs money, he can ask for a loan at the Mutual Aid, or borrow some from a friend.”

“Well then,” a somewhat disheartened Hottabych persisted, “buy as many goods as you can and open up your own shops in every part of the city. You’ll become a well-known merchant and everyone will respect you and seek your favour.”

“Don’t you understand, the Government and the co-operatives are in charge of all trade? Why, making a profit by selling stuff in your own shop…”

“Hm!” Hottabych pretended to agree. “Supposing it is as you say it is. I hope you think creating goods is an honest occupation?”

“Sure it is! See, you’re beginning to understand!” Volka said happily.

“I am extremely pleased.” Hottabych smiled sourly. “I recall you once said that your greatly respected father was a foreman in a factory. Am I correct?”

“Yes.”

“Is he the most important man in the factory?”

“No. He’s a foreman, but there’s a shop foreman, and a chief engineer, and a director above him.”

“Well then,” Hottabych concluded triumphantly, “you can use the treasures I’ve given you to buy your excellent father the factory he works in and lots of other factories besides.”

“It belongs to him already.”

“Volka ibn Alyosha, you just said…”

“If you want to know, he owns the factory he works in and all the other factories and plants, and all the mines and the railways, and the land and the water, and the mountains and the shops and the schools, and the universities and the clubs, and the palaces, and the theatres, and the parks, and the movies in the country. And they belong to me and to Zhenya Bogorad, and to his parents, and…”

“You wish to say that your father has partners, don’t you?”

“Yes, that’s what it is — partners. About two hundred million partners. As many as there are people in the country.”

“You have a very strange country, one that I cannot understand at all,” Hottabych mumbled from under the bed and said no more.

At sunrise the next day the ringing of a telephone awakened the District Branch Manager of the State Bank. He was urgently being summoned to the office. Worried by such an early phone call, he dashed to his office and, upon entering the yard of the building in which the branch was located, he saw a great number of heavily-laden elephants, camels and mules.

“There’s someone here who wants to make a deposit,” the night watchman said in dismay.

“A deposit?” the manager repeated. “So early in the morning? What kind of a deposit?”

The watchman handed him a sheet of paper torn from a school notebook. It was covered with a firm, childish scrawl. The manager read the paper and asked the watchman to pinch him. The puzzled man did as he was told. The manager winced, looked at the page again and said:

“Impossible! It’s absolutely incredible!”

A person who wished to remain anonymous was giving the State Bank two hundred and forty-six bags of gold, silver and precious stones, valued at three thousand four hundred and sixty-seven million, one hundred and thirty-five thousand, seven hundred and three roubles and eighteen kopeks, to use as it saw fit.

The most amazing thing happened a moment later. First, the animals which had delivered the treasure, then, the people who had driven the animals, and then, the treasures they had brought began to sway; they became transparent and dissolved in the air, just like steam. A fresh morning breeze tore the sheet of paper from the amazed manager’s hand, whipped it high into the air and carried it off into an open window. It was Volka Kostylkov’s room. As he slept soundly, the page was fitted back into the notebook it had recently been torn from and once again became a clean piece of paper.

But that is not all. Strange as it may seem, neither the people at the branch office of the bank, nor Volka’s neighbours, nor Volka himself ever remembered anything at all about the event afterwards. It was as if someone had erased it from their memories completely.