AN INCIDENT AT SCHOOL

By Sofron Danilov

"Don’t you like this cigarette or you are not a smoker?" Mr. Nakhov said, smoking his cigarette. "You are not a smoker, are you? How clever of you! As for me, I started smoking when I became a grown up, during the war. Since that time I have been trying to give up smoking but I couldn’t help smoking, whenever I faced some difficulty.

"Last spring but one I gave up smoking but started all over again last winter. Well, nevertheless ..." Vassily Yegorovich wanted to say something but he refrained from doing it, and put his cap on again:

"Well, there was some incident, a shameful one. Last year we had Cleopatra Ksenofontovna, a teacher of History at our school. Your colleague - a historian. She was a very respectable looking lady, dressed according to the latest fashion, she used a lot of make up, cosmetics. I can’t say anything about her competence as a teacher since I had never been at her lessons. But Ivan Ivanovich, our school Head Teacher, who attended her lessons, was very satisfied by her lessons and paid a lot of compliments to her. But I don’t believe him.

"The incident in the classroom between Cleopatra Ksenofontovna and the 9th form pupils happened at the beginning of the 3d quarter of the academic year. One day after the 5th lesson Cleopatra Ksenofontovna came in the teachers’ room and announced an embarrassing piece of news to us. She said that the 9th form pupils had stolen her money - 10 rubles, put in the textbook. Everybody in the teachers’ room was shocked and stood speechless.

"It seemed that she was not able to live without those 10 rubles. She was quite sure that one of the pupils had stolen her money during the interval when she left the textbook with 10 rubles on the table.

"What a school! What a shame that the pupils steal their teacher’s money!" Cleopatra Ksenofontovna cried out loud. Some teachers tried to comfort her and began to look through her boos and notebooks in search of the 10 rubles but in vein.

"She became more hysterical. Soon the bell rang. Nadezhda Alexeevna, Ivan Ivanovich’s wife, was Cleopatra Ksenofontovna’s close friend. Their husbands were also close friends and Cleopatra Ksenofontovna’s husband was a doctor, an important person in our village.

"I think that’s why Ivan Ivanovich and Nadezhda Alexeevna did their best in the search of the lost money. They took for granted the words of Cleopatra Ksenofontovna.

"Besides, Nadezhda Alexeevna was the form teacher in that class. And the next lesson was hers.

"I’m going with you," Ivan Ivanovich said to Nadezhda Alexeevna and turning to Cleopatra Ksenofontovna he added:

"Please, Cleopatra Ksenofontovna, sit down and get calm. We'll find your money!"

Teacher Kylbanov put in a word: "We shouldn't leave this accident without punishment! We must find out who is guilty!"

I tried to stop their rush by saying:

"Wait, don’t be in a hurry. Never do anything in haste! Wait and see! We are making a terrible mistake!" But they even didn’t pay attention to my remarks. I had a lesson in the 8th form but I didn’t go there. I decided to wait outside classroom 9. Oh! I ought to have entered the classroom! I should have pushed Ivan Ivanovich out of the classroom! If I had done that I would have been discharged from my work. But the children would have been rescued from the terrible suspicion.

"I went out the teachers’ room and approached the classroom 9 door and began to listen to the conversation of Ivan Ivanovich and Nadezhda Alexeevna with the children inside. I heard the sounds of Ivan Ivanovich and Nadezhda Alexeevna’s voices. In 10 minutes the door was flung open and I saw Makar Gorgotov going out of the classroom with a red face and tears rolling down his cheeks. The boy went straight to the cloak-room and took on his coat and cap. Then he ran out of the school building.

Soon Sasha Bragin, Yura Monastyrev and the other boys and girls went out of the classroom with open schoolbags. Ivan Ivanovich was trying to stop them but they wouldn’t listen to him, crying out angrily: "We have been searched. We are under the suspicion! But we are not ashamed! You should be ashamed of your own behavior!" Soon the classroom was empty. Even Ivan Ivanovich’s daughter Lira didn’t stay. All the children had been gone out of the school.

"I became furious and didn’t feel the floor under my legs. I went into the teachers’ room and took out of my pocket 10 rubles of mine and threw it into Cleopatra’s face. I expressed my great indignation to Ivan Ivanovich, Nadezhda Alexeevna. I even don’t remember what I said to them. I had never been so angry in my life. I was so agitated that was not able to conduct my lessons and went home.

Translated by Nadya Matveeva

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