- Are you talking about the monument? It's there, on the mountain, - they pointed to the opposite bank of the Vyrka, - But you are unlikely to go there. I did not clarify much for myself, but I thanked them, and inspired, forgetting about the twenty-five kilometers traveled, rushed forward. But soon I realized the pessimism of the guys. At first, I crossed a swaying tree, or rather, crawled over and found myself on the other side of the river. And at the same time in the swamp, having heroically passed it, he got all dirty in the mud. But that was not all. Then I had to climb the hill (I think Zhukovsky had a hill). But the hill was overgrown with nettles, burdocks and something else, from which my trousers were soon covered with thorny seeds. Finally, this is behind us. I walked through the remains of an apple orchard... What else could I expect? Thirty steps away, I saw something that looked like a marble pedestal. I approached and read: "Here, in Mishenskoye... the Russian writer V.A. Zhukovsky was born."

I don't understand anything. Mishenskoye is fifteen kilometers from here. Riddle. Meanwhile, I look around. The grass is well trampled. Clearly, they drive cows. There are no traces of the former buildings. A little lighter, you could try to look for the foundation of the house. In such places one thinks well: about merciless time, about memory, about forgetfulness... Somewhere there was a rumble - a thunderstorm was approaching. Remembering that I had walked twenty-five kilometers, I set off on my way back. And the mystery with the monument turned out to be quite simple. In the morning, everything was explained to me. A new monument was erected to Vasily Andreevich. Is the old to be lost? And the Kireevskys were not forgotten either. True, evil tongues claimed that the Belev authorities did not lose out from such savings (who will check all this now?). They took an old monument, screwed a plaque, from which it was clear that Pyotr Ivanovich and Ivan Ivanovich were born and lived in the village of Dolbino, installed and reported. And the people are curious, or maybe someone has coveted the sign: it shines after all. Shorter. The sign disappeared and the original letters appeared. They tried to cover it up, but it didn't help. This is how unlucky the Kireevskys are for the umpteenth time.

In the meantime, I made my way in the opposite direction. Midnight came. A fine rain, still timid, but already drizzling. There is not a single haystack around. A mosquito swarm was already howling and buzzing overhead. In the villages, they go to bed early, so I was not surprised by the lack of light in the houses. And you will not, looking at the night, knock and wake people. For the night when it is light. I don't know if it's worth writing about. But if there is hope that at least one person will read what you have written, you need to write everything honestly, as it was. I will not describe my mood. Two or three times I walked around the village. The only dog sleeping by the wattle fence considered it beneath his dignity even to bark at me. And then I remembered the words I had read in an old book. An old, wise man says to his grandson: "If there is any sorrow or need for anything, do not hesitate and ask the Lord. One can ask Him for small things and for great things. But you have to believe." I put my backpack on the ground, turned my face to the east and asked the Lord not to leave me, a sinner, and to give me a place to spend the night... A window lit up in the next house. Someone went out onto the porch.

"And where does he wear it?"

"Aren't you looking for me?" - I gave a voice. The woman did not flinch or be frightened. She smiled: "My husband works as a postman, something was delayed today." We started talking. Somehow imperceptibly, the conversation turned to illnesses, lack of medicines. The woman's husband had a stomach ulcer, and she herself was not in good health. I knew some herbs and told them a little about how they can be used for diseases. Soon the hostess's husband approached. We met.

"What are we standing for?" - she shook up. Let's go into the house and spend the night..." I dictated recipes, and my eyes were glued together. The pancakes only made things worse. And here is the bed. Probably, Solomon did not sleep on such a thing either. Lord, what bliss! And thank you, Lord, for not leaving me. Those were my last words. In the morning I was told that a thunderstorm had been rumbling all night.

June 21. Apple trees in the rain.

A gray, gloomy morning. I look at the sky with anxiety: it seems that today I have to walk in the rain. The way to Rovno, the village where I need to go, is not very long, but the owner of the house, Ivan Dmitrievich, promises to take me along an even shorter road. Now, in daylight, I can get a better look at it. He is surprisingly similar to the writer Konstantin Simonov - both in figure and face. Except that it doesn't squirm. I told him about it, he laughed: "And you know, my name is Simonov. True, I am not related to him at all."

In the morning I was able to better see the places where yesterday I heroically made my way to the Kireevsky estate. Houses in Dolbino stand on the high bank of the Vyrka River. You can see from here far away. As Ivan Dmitrievich said, it was here that the front line passed. At Vyrka our offensive stopped. For six months, Soviet and fascist troops stood against each other. Many times the Red Army tried to knock the Germans out of Retyun, but nothing worked. How many of our guys died! And Ivan Dmitrievich lost his father. His father was not a military man. He went down to the river for water, and then he was covered with mortar fire. And all this in front of his wife and children. The worst thing was that for two months they could not remove my father's body: the Nazis shot at every attempt to do this. Mom turned gray before her eyes.

Imperceptibly, during the conversation, they approached Rivne. Say goodbye. And the rain is already pouring with might and main. The village is large, but the rain is not the best time for excursions. Cursing, knee-deep in mud, I wait for me to go out on the big one. After all, most of our villages, where the central estates of collective farms and state farms are located, leave a gloomy impression. Especially in bad weather. Not yet a city, no longer a village. A chaotic accumulation of houses, dirt, slop on the roadway of the street... I put an ellipsis, and at the same time I apologize to such villages: for sure, they look better in sunny weather. And my mood is not the most elated now, and a lot depends on how you look at the object. Finally, the big one. At the bus stop there are several figures standing lonely in the rain. I already know that the bus service with Belev has been interrupted: a special commission recognized the condition of the road as dangerous for the lives of passengers. Here they are standing and catching hitchhiking: they have to go. On both sides of the road there are apple orchards. Belev is the apple capital of the Tula Territory. Local apples can feed half of Russia. But here's the trouble: there is no one to clean them. I remembered the words of my today's guide, said with bitterness: "My heart bleeds what is happening. There is no one to milk the cows, they come all the way from Ukraine, and they work for a ton of apples. But look at what kind of government they have built and how many people are wiping their asses there. Yes, in the old days, in the collective farms, the chairman and the accountant, that's all the bosses for you. Oh!" The situation, unfortunately, is typical and it would be possible not to talk about it, so much has been said about it, if not for one curious fact for me: here, in Rovno, before the revolution, there was the estate of the rich landowner Prokhorov. And they still remember him and say with respect that nothing was lost in his household. He built a factory for the production of marshmallows, sold apples. Now our children do not know what pastila is (I once heard an explanation from a big boss on the radio that for the production of marshmallow you need special components that are obtained from apples, and we buy them in Finland. And apples rot near Belev every year. I look at the apple orchards - it seemed to me that the trees were happily pulling their branches to meet the raindrops... In two hours, through the veil of rain, I could make out the outskirts of Belev, but I had to turn in the other direction.

I was going to Mishenskoye, the homeland of Zhukovsky. I walked for a long time, taking a detour - they did not advise me to go through the villages: it was muddy, I could not pass. Here, at last, is the estate. A large meadow lined with slabs, a wooden platform, apparently for performers at traditional holidays, is a monument, in my opinion, poorly conceived and executed. Next to it is the building of the club, or rather, the "Library and Club System", as it was written on the sign. I could not go deep into the nearby trees - it was raining and it would not be a pleasant pleasure. I confess that I was standing in the center of the clearing and did not feel at all that there used to be a picturesque noble estate on this place. The painful impression was complemented by the construction: trucks were "roaring", someone was cursing in the builders' trailer, and the already built houses were twins - a number of gray, monotonous buildings. And all this against the background of rain, gray and dreary in autumn. Sadly. And wet.

An hour later I approached Belev. The sky brightened, and although the sun did not shine through, it became more cheerful. Through the whole of Belev, from south to north, runs Karl Marx Street, before the revolution it was called Kozelskaya. Belev is an ancient city standing on the high bank of the Oka. So, getting to the main city street, you seem to find yourself in Belev at the beginning of the century. Of course, a lot has changed, new buildings have appeared, but most of the old houses are still standing. The woman is taking water from the pump, not without irony looking at me, plodding with a backpack, wet and dirty from bottom to top.

"Tell me, how far is it to the hotel?" - I ask.

"How to go, you won't be able to do it in an hour. Go straight ahead, at the very end of the street you will see a hotel. Such a large building. Let's assume that I got to the hotel in less than an hour, even having time to go to the local history museum. And in the evening, leaving his backpack in the room, he hurried to the place he had never been to, but which he had loved for a long time. In my youth, I once saw an engraving by an unknown artist "View of Belev from the right bank of the Oka". Immersed in greenery, the town was molded on a steep slope, and numerous domes of churches majestically towered above all this. After all, Belev used to be famous not only for marshmallows, the magnificent embroidery of its craftswomen (I assure you, in no way inferior to the Vologda one), but also for its monasteries. There were two monasteries here at once - male and female.