The Amber, a true Friend

Ôèðóç Ìóñòàôà 2
                Firuz MUSTAFA
           “The Amber”, a true Friend
It happened in one of the western districts of our country.
The war was going on for three years long. Although gun fires could not be heard in and around that attractive small village, but the war did not escape even a single hours there. Some people had lost their brothers but the others - their close relatives. The wounded and cripple ones were often seen in the central street of the village.
    The war like a dragon was devouring the young, strong and handsome men as if grinding them under black millstones. Many of the village boys went for fighting and not very often there came small, three cornered letters with some death news on them.  Little Sona didn’t know what was the death news meaning. And the letters coming from front line on death news local people called them ‘dark-papers’. Sona was four years old, and her two uncles were in the front, too. They were seldom received letters from them. And Sona’s elder uncle sent his photo to his niece. With a number of medals and orders on his breast one could notice her uncle’s sad looking from the photo. The  same time they got death news, i.e. so called ‘dark paper’ from the front on her younger uncle’s death. From time to time Sona felt that her father was mourning secretly for her brother. But little Sona could see that very ‘dark paper’ of death news was not dark but white-blue in colour. And of course she wondered why people called it like that.
Neither Sona, nor her brother who was two years elder than her could find out the real meaning of it. She never dared asking her elders the secret of it.
In one of these cold autumn days the local people of that village became very anxious. The rail way  passing nearby was full of grey goods wagons opening their mouths as the huge and dangerous snakes to swallow their victims in this case were the local men who had to be jammed in these wagons and sent to the front. There was a slight similarity between these wagons and the bloody battles held far from the villages.
In her childish mind Sona felt that those grey goods wagons would take local people away who will never come back again.
   Most of them were packed into those wagons and sent away for front line. And this sort of work was performed by the young, strong men in military uniforms. Most of these young men had batons in their hands and automatic guns held in their shoulders.
   The men here used their bad languages to the address of some people but the women were crying and crying …  At last the time for Sona’s family came, too.  And that very time she could neither see the carpets and their things packed into the wagons, crying mother and smoking father nor her brother, bursting into tears clasping to his breast their beloved cat by the name of ‘Amber’ and watching everything nearby. The grandmother, whose name had been taken out of that list of people sending to exile for her serious illness took sleepy Sona on her back and went to the direction of the neighbouring village. Sona’s aunt was living in that village …
    The train coiling up like a snake with hundreds of innocent local people aboard hurrying to North, Sona’s parents and the dreaming ‘Amber’ on her brother’s knee were among them too.
The train was hurrying but the people were trembling from severe cold.
    When Sona opened her eyes they were already at her aunt’s place. The sun had already risen in the East. Her aunt was milking a cow in the cattle-shed. Seating on a stool the grandmother in some dismal mood was singing some melancholy thing in a low voice.
    Sona opened her eyes jumping off her bed and looked around. Neither her parents, nor her brother with the cat were seen nearby. And Sona began crying for her people. On hearing Sona’s crying, grandmother turned round and came up to her. Embracing her neck grandmother clasped the girl to her own breast. The grandmother’s breast was as hard as a piece of wood. Her hands smelled of a ground but the hair like a wormwood. The grandmother together with Sona began crying out  loudly and loudly. The tears on their faces mixed to each other.
    These days, the gloomy days like those grey wagons were passing away very fastly but the people got bad news in answer.   
The girl could not get any news on her parents and bored for them greatly. Remembering her lovely ‘Amber’ she could not keep her tears. Grandmother always tried to cheer up the little girl and said: “Do not be so miserable, my little girl. Your parents, your brother and even your ‘Amber’ will come back soon. How could ‘Amber’ live away from you?”
    Sona couldn’t see her parents any longer. But the cat came back one day.
    It happened to be like this. In one spring day, after three or four months from that dangerous night grandmother took little Sona by the hand and started towards the native settlement. The fences of the houses had been completely destroyed, door and window frames were broken and removed away.Seeing that all the grandmother’s eyes became wet and tears went down her face, and the girl standing nearby cried out: “Oh, granny, have  a look, what is happening in there?!”
    The yell coming from Sona’s heart shook the grandmother and as if her heart went to her feet. And putting hand on her breast she watched everything around. But little Sona jumped out awkwardly and came near the cat sitting under the wooden cadder. She bent down and watched the cat thoroughly. “Oh my God! It is really my ‘Amber’, it is completely in mud” she said to herself. May be the cat had come some hundreds of kilome ters before getting here she thought. Her eyes were shining with some fury and sorrow in them. The cat had a thin string around her neck. It was her brother’s shoe-laces. Seeing it Sona remembered the ‘black-paper’ they got from her uncle before. She busted into tears then taking the cat on her arms said: “Let us go, my little girl, leave this place”.
    But the cat sitting calmly on grandmother’s  breast and looking at Sona as if wanted to utter something to the girl but …