Page 36 - Revelation
P. 36
Svetlana de Rohan-Levashova. Revelation
My grandma was in the kitchen at that moment, and I feverishly tried to find
something to fix the thing in order not to blush again and explain myself, expecting
to hear her words of complete disapproval. But the stubborn cup did not want to come
back to the table. On the contrary, it suddenly glided and, as if teasing me, began to
make wide circles over it, and I was unable to catch it.
My grandma came back into the room and froze on the threshold with her cup in
her hand. Of course I rushed to explain that "it just flies, for no particular reason" and
"isn’t it really beautiful"? In short, I tried to find a way out of this situation, in order
not to appear helpless. And suddently I was very ashamed of myself. I saw that my
grandma knew that I simply could not find the solution to the problem and was trying
to "mask" my ignorance with unnecessary and pretty words. Then, being indignant
with myself, I gathered all my "wounded" pride and quickly blurted:
– Well, I don't know why it flies! And I don't know how to let it down!
– Granny looked at me, her face serious and suddenly very joyfully said:
– Try then! This is what your mind is given to you for.
A load off my mind! I hated to seem clumsy, especially, when it came to my
"strange" abilities. And I tried... from morning till evening, until I flopped out being
absolutely exhausted.
A sage once said that there are three ways conducive to higher reason: the way
of reflection is the noblest, imitation is the easiest and one’s own experience is the
heaviest. For some reason I always chose the third way and my poor "neck" truly
suffered because of my endless experiments.
But sometimes the game truly was "worth the candle" and my unremitting toil
was crowned with success and at last it happened with moving things. Soon I could
move any object; they flew, dropped and rose when I wished, and it already did not
seem difficult to control that, except in one case, a huge omission of mine, which to
my regret happened at school – the thing I always honestly tried to avoid. I did not
need additional rumours about my "oddities", especially among my schoomates!
My being far too relaxed was the reason for the vexatious event, which was
absolutely inexcusable in this situation, taking account of my "moving" abilities. But
we all make big or small mistakes once and, as they say, learn by them. Although,
frankly speaking, I would prefer to learn some other way...
The teacher Gibiene was my form-mistress then. She was a gentle and kind
woman and all the schoolchildren sincerely adored her. Her son Remi was in our class.
Unfortunately, he was a very spoiled and unpleasant boy. He always despised
everybody and mocked the girls and was constantly tittle-tattling about his classmates
to his mother. I was always surprised at the fact that, being such an open, clever and
pleasant person, his mother could not or did not want to see the real face of her darling
offspring. Maybe, it is true that love can sometimes be blind, and in this case it was
truly blind.
That ill-starred day Remi came to school already being "wound up" and at once
began to search for a scapegoat to vent all his accumulated malice on. Of course, I
was "lucky" enough to appear exactly within striking distance at that moment, and
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