Читать книгу Butterflies - Ксана Гильгенберг - Страница 10

At home Lika ate pies and, without even having cleaned the table, she went to her room and lay down on the bed. She was going to get some sleep, because the thoughts about Rita, how to help her, had completely exhausted her. “I must call her,” the girl thought and dialed Rita’s number. Rita did not answer. Lika listened to the beeps until the line got disconnected automatically. “Why isn’t she answering?” She began to worry, “She doesn’t want to? But what if she’s done something to herself? Oh, why did I leave her? I should’ve stayed until she didn’t calm down! What’s now? Should I go to her again?”

“I’m sure she’s all right,” opening the door with her paw and squeezing her fluffy head through the crack, said Coco.

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”

“She merely doesn’t want to talk to you after all that you’ve told her. It’s easy to check – send her a message and she’ll answer.”

Lika hastily began to press the buttons of her cheap Nokia. A reply did not keep her waiting.

“She says she’s all right. She just wants to be left alone and asks not to disturb her.”

“That’s just what I told you!” Coco solemnly uttered aloud.

“Look, Coco,” Lika got inspired, “How come you know everything? How come you can talk? Why haven’t you talked to me before – you’ve been here for ages?

“So many questions at once,” Coco sat opposite the bed, stretched forward its hinder paw and began to lick it.

“I sometimes wonder how one can be so smart and so ill-mannered at the same time,” Lika sighed. “I’m talking to you, and you’re washing your paw – it’s not polite.”

“Common,” replied the cat going on with her occupation. “We’ve known each other for ages! What are these conventionalities for? We’re almost blood. After all, it didn’t use to confuse you to walk naked in my presence.”

Lika blushed; it was true. She tried to comfort herself by the idea that she had not known that Coco could talk.

“Oh, right!” the cat drawled with simulated offence. “Why should you keep up appearances with dumb things?”

Lika blushed even more not knowing how else she could explain herself.

“Oh, come on, I’m just kidding,” the cat said cheerfully and even stopped licking its paw.

“I’m so sorry,” the girl still said.

As for Coco, it stretched forward the other hinder paw and began licking it.

“Will you tell me?” Lika asked gingerly.

“A tale? I don’t think I will. Not now at least. Let’s make it last thing at night. I know a large variety of wonderful tales. Which ones do you like, ancient or modern, Russian, oriental, European? I’ve got some Brazilian.” The cat pattered.

“Well, no, Coco,” Lika smiled. The more Coco tried to get off the subject, the more Lika wanted to get the answers to her questions.

“Well then… not Brazilian… may be Japanese?” Coco suggested.

“I don’t want a tale. I want your story. Where did you come from?”

“Lika, you’re old enough to know where cats come from. Should I tell you about the birds and the bees?”

Instead of the answer, Lika threw the small pillow, which she usually slept on, at Coco. The cat jumped aside and seemed to sneeze.

“It’s so ill-mannered to throw pillows at someone you’re talking to,” The cat said having copied Lika’s recent intonation and headed for the door.

“Coco, please!” the girl exclaimed. By the moment, she had jumped from the bed and having reached the door in two leaps shut it.

“You leave me no choice,” Coco sighed, “So make yourself comfortable and get ready to listen. A long time ago,” The cat began telling in a low voice, “In the year of three thousand eight hundred and five a pretty kitten was born…”

“Wait,” Lika cut across it; “In the year of three thousand eight hundred and five?” she thought the cat started telling her a tale. “Coco, you’ve promised to tell me a true story, not a tale!”

“But this is a true story!” Coco declared in its usual tone. I was truly born in the year of three thousand eight hundred and five!”

“I can admit you’re not an ordinary cat, but this fishy story’s too much!” Lika resented. “You can’t be born in the year that hasn’t come yet.” She looked over different variants of how it could possibly be done. “Do you live your life from the end? No, you can’t. It’s too far in the future… Oh, I get it!” she exclaimed cheerfully. “You mean your cat’s chronology! I should have guessed it at once!”

“Rubbish,” said the cat. The ideas apparently amused it. It watched Lika closely as the girl tried to find a rational explanation to its date of birth. “I can explain if you allow me, of course.”

“So,” the cat started again, “I was born in the year of three thousand eight hundred and five. I used thought-transference with my master as all the cats and dogs of my time did or… is it better to say ‘will do’?”

Lika was attentively listening but could not decide whether to believe the cat. She waited for any detail that could possibly prove the veracity of Coco’s story or refute it.

“So do you mean that in three thousand eight hundred and five all the cats and dogs will be able to communicate with people using telepathy? How can you explain this fact? How can you explain the emergence of this ability?”

“Isn’t it obvious? Evolution! Every living being evolves in this world, even a human.”

“Even a human?” Lika asked.

“Yes! People will acquire telepathy in the third millennium, but first they’ll be able to read only human thoughts. As for understanding animals and plants, they will come to it later.

“And cats? When will cats learn to read human minds?”

“There’s no need! Cats have always been able to do that!” Coco said with pride.

“They can’t do it now, can they?” Lika was not going to believe it so easily.

“Surely, they can! All the cats are telepathists. We can read your minds; we are sensitive to your mood and intents. We are sensitive to ghosts as well”.

“Why are some cats so stupid then? They won’t do what they’re told.”

“Don’t you ever call cats stupid! Cats aren’t stupid. We’re independent and freedom-loving! If we don’t wanna do something, nothing can make us.” Coco was full of determination to defend her “brothers and sisters’.

“Okay-okay, I won’t say a word,” Lika assured her. “All right, let it be so. You were born in three thousand five hundred and five….”

“Not five hundred but eight hundred!” The cat corrected the girl.

“Okay, let it be eight hundred… How come you’re here? Did you come by a time machine?” asked the girl. Mockery shadowed her voice.

“In my opinion, that’s the most appropriate version. I’m glad it’s been you who’s suggested it.” Lika’s tone did not offend her in the least. “Yes, believe I’ve come here in a time machine.”

“Oh, cats of future will evolve great enough to operate time-machines!” Lika taunted, “No, hang on! It must be a cat who will invent a time-machine! Am I right?”

“It seems to be my turn to hit you with a pillow,” Coco said calmly, “It’s much easier, deary. It wasn’t I but a human who operated the machine, of course. Precisely saying, it was a teenager, the son of my master, who used it without his father’s permission. I have no idea why he chose the end of the twentieth century for his first travelling, probably, it was just fortuity. As a result, I’m here and he’s gone away without me.

Coco sighed with a bit of sadness. Lika was at a loss. She did not know whether to believe the story or not. She suggested that she had to believe Coco if she wanted to remain friends with the cat.

“Does that mean that I have an ability of thought-transfer?” Lika suddenly asked. “If I can talk to you, I can talk to other cats as well… Can I?”

Coco was silent. She might have not expected the question.

“Oh, I knew you were telling lies,” the girl got upset.

“I’m telling the truth,” Coco began to justify herself, “It’s easy for you to talk to me because I first started speaking aloud, and you could make sure it was me who’d said the words you’d heard in an empty room. Other cats can’t do it. They can’t talk.”

“And what about people?”

“Oh, it isn’t that easy with people.”

“Why not? People can talk.”

“Yes, they can. They can also tell lies, they can hide their true intentions and feelings even from themselves. During the centuries they’ve made a go of it. What’s the use of reading minds if there’s no certainty? You’ll never prove a thought, especially an indecent one, to be someone else’s and not yours.

“Not all of them are indecent,” Lika objected.

“Anyway, I’m sure you’ve come across such coincidences when they say “great minds think alike’, “the same thought has just crossed my mind’.

“Year, it happens quite often…” the girl said thoughtfully. “So it means telepathy is real,” she came to the conclusion. “Why haven’ t you spoken to me before?”

“May be, it’s not me who hadn’t spoken, but you who hadn’t heard me…” the cat muttered.

It seemed that the answer was good enough for Lika because she asked the next question, and it was about what life would be like in three thousand eight hundred and five, but at the moment Coco was about to say something, the doorbell rang. It was Aunt Ann who returned from the summer cottage. She came earlier because the weather had got worse and she did not want to get into the storm.