In a certain kingdom, but not in the state in which we live, there lived one person. And this man had an only son. This son's name was, well, let's say Vanyushka. Until the age of twelve he lived with his parents. They spoiled him. How can you refuse your only son? So he didn’t listen to them - neither his mother nor his father. No matter what they said, no matter what they asked, he did nothing. And then one day he says to them:
- That's it, mother, that's it, father. I am already twelve years old, and I want to go see the world.
The parents cried, sobbed bitter tears:
- No need, Vanyushka, what are you doing, why?! Don't go. After all, besides you, we have no one. And he doesn't care.
“That’s it,” he says, “bless me, I’ll go, and if you don’t bless me, I’ll go too.”
“God bless you, son,” the father and mother sighed with disappointment. - Go with God. If you want, go on foot, if you want, take the last horse...
In short, this Vanyushka set off on his journey. No one knows how far he walked, how much he traveled, but he only found a job with a rich man as an employee. Maybe to some prince, or maybe even to the sovereign himself, I won’t lie. He began to work for this man. And he had one and only daughter. They met Vanyushka and became friends - you can't spill water on them. And through this friendship, her father himself fell in love with Vanyushka as if he were his own son. So they began to live as one family. He calls her sister, and she calls him brother.
Vanyushka lives like this for a year, then he lives for two. He learned to read and write and read many smart books. He became an intelligent and worthy person, and he inherited his beauty from his parents.
And now Vanyushka turned eighteen years old. At that time, a rumor spread throughout Russia that there was such a beauty in the world, a girl of sixteen years old, that there was no such beauty in any power and there should not be. Is this really my destiny? – thought Vanyushka. - Since my parents blessed me, it means I must get along with this beauty.
He began to sort through his clever books, to see if the books were written about this girl. And I found it.
I found a photo and a description: who she is and where she lives. And what happened? This girl lives in Romania, the only daughter of the Romanian sovereign. Her father keeps her locked up, and until she was sixteen she did not see a single young man. He kept her in such a way that she could marry her to the richest man, no matter whether she was old or young.
So Vanyushka says to his adopted father and sister:
- Do you love me as much as you say?
“We love you so much,” they answer, “that we want to see you as the owner of all our wealth.”
- Thank you, but this is not what I want.
“What do you want, son, tell me, I won’t regret anything for you.”
“I found out that there lives in the world such a beauty as no other country can find. So, father, if you love me, then equip me a ship, load it with precious goods and send me to Romania. And also make a feast for me for the whole world and send me on my way with guns, gunfire and great glory. And let your word be strong.
“Well, son, I won’t go back on my word, I’ll equip you a ship as you ask.” Just how long will you give?
“And as quickly as you can turn around, I’ll go.”
– In two weeks everything will be ready. They built him a ship with a golden mast, loaded that ship with precious goods, silk, and not just silk - Shemakha.
- Well, everything is ready, son. Just tell me, will you go alone or with your sister?
- No, I’m afraid to go with my sister. I can’t vouch for myself, but I don’t want to ruin my sister. If I come back alone, you'll take my head off.
They arranged a farewell feast and sent Vanyushka on his way. His father gave him his best ship captains, they fired guns after them, and they were gone.
This is just a fairy tale that is quickly told, but things are done slowly. However, they came to Romania, put the ship at a dead anchor and opened trade. Vanyushka says to the shipbuilders:
– Sell goods only for gold, load gold into the holds, but don’t go anywhere without me. And how long I will be gone, and what will happen to me, and how - neither I nor you know.
He really wants to look at the Romanian girl, but he just doesn’t know which side to approach. So Vanyushka wondered where to go. Why, he thinks, should I go to an expensive restaurant? To show off? So that people can see, how good am I? No, I’ll go to the very last poor teahouse.
He went around the city to look for the most run-down teahouse. I found her on the outskirts of the city. Comes in. And there - my God! - smoked, not cared for. And the people are sitting - wretched passers-by, the kind that you couldn’t find worse: ragged, dirty. Vanyushka ordered a table for himself. The owner brought him a bottle of wine, a piece of bread, a herring tail, salted mushrooms - food that he had never eaten. But there can’t be better food in such a teapot. Vanyushka sits and thinks about his Romanian girl, and across the table in front of him sits a soldier, his cap is a green band. Sits and looks at him.
“Listen,” says the soldier, “young man, let me sit down with you?”
- Why not, sit down. You are a man and I am a man. Why don't you and I talk?
This soldier sits down next to Vanyushka. He pours him a glass of wine:
- Drink!
The soldier drank wine, pushed it with a mushroom, ate a herring and asked:
- What is your name?
- Vanyushka, what about you?
– I am a service man, a Russian soldier. And my last name is Zeleny Okolysh. That's what they called me because of my cap. Tell me, Vanyushka, why are you sitting so sad?
– Why are you interested, Green Okolysh?
- Tell me, maybe I can help you with something.
Well, okay, they drank some more wine and had a snack.
“Okay,” says Vanyushka, “I’ll tell you.” First I heard a rumor, and then in a book I found a photograph of a beautiful Romanian girl. She is the daughter of the Romanian sovereign, and she is sixteen years old. If only someone could help me see her at least once, I would reward that person with gold money, I would give as much as he could carry.
- Eh, Vanyushka, you’re late!
- How late?
- Yes, yes. It’s been four days since your Romanian girl was engaged to Prince Blugmert. This prince is an old man of seventy, but there is no richer man in all of Romania than him.
Vanyushka was saddened by this news and hung his head.
And Green Okolysh says:
“Don’t rush to grieve, since you’ve come to such a distant place, it means you have to do your job.” I am a soldier, as I understand it.
- What should I do?
- First, you will have to work as a doctor.
- What are you saying, what kind of doctor am I? – Vanyushka was surprised. - I don’t know anything about this case.
“You don’t know now, but you will know later.” I'll teach you. But if you haven’t been a doctor, then you won’t even see a Romanian woman. There is no other way to it.
- Well, what should I do?
“From the very beginning,” says Green Okolysh, “rent a house.” You will open a pharmacy in this house, and you will nail the following inscription on the door: A Russian doctor has arrived, who cures such diseases that thirteen years have not given peace. And then we'll see what happens...
That’s what Vanyushka did: he rented a house for a pharmacy and nailed a sign on it, as Green Okolysh advised.
And in this city, one prince’s wife was ill, and this illness tormented her for thirteen years. Wherever she was not treated - both in Russia and in other powers - but there was no use from that treatment. This prince is wasting his wealth in vain, but his wife is still drying up day by day. One day he walked past Vanyushkina’s pharmacy, read the inscription on the sign and quickly went home. He came and said:
- Listen, wife, what I tell you. Here came a doctor from Russia who we need. He cures thirteen-year-old illnesses. Let me take you to him. Look, you'll get better.
His wife answers him:
- Eh, you’re my beloved husband, I’ve already been treated by all the doctors, I’ve taken all the medications. You know it yourself. Apparently, there is only one last concern left for you, and only one medicine will save me - three pine boards.
The prince loved his wife so much, pitied her so much that such words brought tears to her eyes.
“No,” he says, “get ready, we’ll go to this doctor, we’ll try for the last time...
The prince ordered the troika of frisky men to be harnessed and went with his wife to the pharmacy. They are coming. The prince turned to Vanyushka:
“Listen, dear doctor, if you cure my wife, then I will write off all my wealth to you, I will give it all to you, and I will leave you, dressed in nothing.”
“We’ll talk about this later,” Vanyushka answers, “but for now, wait, I’ll bring the medicine.”
Vanyushka went to the pharmacy, and there Green Okolysh had already prepared everything. Vanyushka brought out a bottle of potion and said:
- This is an infusion of herbs, but not from those that grow here, but from overseas ones. Give your wife a drink from a spoon, and come see me tomorrow. And so on for three days. I have cured this disease three times.
Vanyushka said everything, as Green Okolysh taught him in advance.
The next day the prince and his wife came again, Vanyushka again gave her the same medicine, and on the third day she was cured, as if she had been born again. And from that time on, the wonderful Russian doctor gained great fame throughout Romania. But the prince cannot change his word. He came to Vanyushka to negotiate a reward:
- Take what you want: gold, silver and all my goods.
And Green Okolysh warned Vanyushka in advance not to take any reward for treatment. That’s what Vanyushka did.
“No,” he says to the prince, “I didn’t come to rob people, but to heal.” No need to offend me, no need to give me too much. Pay for the medicine, and come back with the rest of the goods...
So he left.
In short, soon another prince comes to Vanyushka with his sick wife, from another city. I heard about the Russian doctor and came. And this woman was cured with the help of the Green Okolysh Vanyushka. And so little by little his fame reached the sovereign's palace. The rumor also reached the Romanian woman. But she was not interested in the fact that the doctor was so good, but in the fact that he was a handsome guy, the likes of whom had not been seen in the world for a long time. She really wanted to look at this man. So she says to her father:
- Daddy, I’m sick for some reason. They say that a doctor from Russia showed up in the city and can cure any disease...
“Okay, I’ll order to call him,” the father agreed.
- No, daddy, the doctor is a busy man, it’s better that I come to him myself.
In short, the Romanian girl went to see Vanyushka. And looking at such a handsome man as Vanyushka, she lit up with red fire. And Vanyushka, as soon as he looked at the Romanian girl, not in a photo, but in real life, fell in love with her even more than before.
“You’ve been on my heart for a long time,” Vanyushka said to the Romanian girl, and then he told everything about himself, that he came here on the ship especially for her, that he had untold riches, that, God willing, he could handle everything. And he also told about his friend, about the Green Okolysh.
In short, they agreed. But is this a joke, after all, a Romanian girl is engaged! And not with some tramp, but with Prince Blugmert himself, the richest man in Romania...
The Romanian girl left. Green Okolysh comes and asks:
- How are you? Saw?
- Saw. A Romanian woman came to see me.
- That's it.
- That’s how it is, but what’s next? How can I be with her now?
“Here’s how,” said Green Okolysh. – From your house to the royal palace, to the Romanian woman’s bedroom itself, you need to make an underground passage. You will go to her through this passage.
- How will you and I make this move? After all, we can't handle it together.
- Listen to me. Buy a forty-bucket barrel of wine and all sorts of snacks for forty people, and then it’s up to me what to do...
How long will it take to buy all this with such wealth? As Green Okolysh said, that’s what Vanyushka did: he bought a barrel or forty of wine, a whole carload of snacks and put everything out on the street. And food and drink began near this pharmacy. Passers-by, tramps, riflemen came running from all over the city: all this was for nothing. And over all this eating and drinking - Green Okolysh is the master.
“Eat, drink,” he says, “help yourself while you can.”
- What happened? – passers-by are surprised. - Why is there such a feast?
- What do you care? - says Green Okolysh. “A kind man came and wanted to treat you.” He won't ask for anything for this. And if you want to thank him, then he has business with you. But just so that no one lets slip. Do you agree?
– We agree, Green Okolysh.
He told passers-by what and how to do it, and the work began. Maybe a day passed, or maybe a week - they made an underground passage, lined the walls and floor with marble, and made the steps also from marble. And Green Okolysh came up with such a mechanism that when you walk up to a Romanian girl’s bedroom and wave your hand, the door opens on its own.
“Only you,” he says to Vanyushka, “don’t rush to go to her, find out first when she is left alone in the bedroom.”
From then on, Vanyushka began to secretly visit this Romanian woman in the palace. What they had there is their business and their account, we don’t need to think about it or guess, but only soon they began to call each other my beloved husband and my beloved wife. And also, as a sign of her love, the Romanian woman gave Vanyushka her engagement ring, which Prince Blugmert gave her. And this ring almost cost Vanyushka his life.
How it all happened.
Prince Blugmert felt that the Romanian woman was not as affectionate with him as before, and he realized that something was not right here. He began to follow the Romanian woman and noticed that the ring he gave her was not on her hand.
One day, Prince Blugmert threw a feast for the whole world, invited to this feast all the richest people in the city and, of course, Vanyushka - he is in everyone’s sight, there is great fame about him. At this ball-feast, Prince Blugmert noticed that this same Russian doctor was wearing his name ring on his hand. Then Prince Blugmert stood up and said:
– My dear guests, I want to tell you something. The guests became quiet and began to look at Prince Blugmert to see what he would tell them.
“There is a thief among us, and I can point him out.”
- How is that a thief?! - the guests made noise. - Show me! Prince Blugmert approached Vanyushka and showed everyone the ring on his hand:
“Here is my personalized ring, he stole it from my fiancée when he was treating her.”
Prince Blugmert couldn’t tell the whole truth, otherwise he would have been laughed at, so he came up with such a black revenge for Vanyushka. The ring began to pass around: everyone wanted to look at it. And then, in the confusion, while everyone was shouting and arguing, Green Okolysh quietly picked up this ring, hid it in his pocket and walked out. Where's the ring? No ring. But Prince Blugmert does not calm down.
- To the gallows! - shouts. - Try him and execute him! They grabbed Vanyushka by the arms and sent him to prison. Meanwhile, Green Okolysh ran to the best jewelers.
- Come on, masters, make me a ring so that there is no difference with this, and make an inscription on the ring, saying that this ring belongs to a Russian doctor, the son of such and such a prince. If you do everything as I said, then I will reward you royally.
The jewelers made Green Okolysh exactly the same ring as Prince Blugmert's. At night Green Band made a dove. I checked it - it flies, flaps its wings, like a real one.
And the next morning Vanyushka’s execution was scheduled. They brought him to the square where people are executed, and there the gallows were ready and the rope was ready, and the executioner was already making the noose. They put a noose around Vanyushka's neck and began to read the sentence. And the people cry, sob, everyone feels sorry for such a doctor. And suddenly a dove appeared over the square, and Green Okolysh sat on it and shouted into the trumpet:
- Orthodox! Don't destroy an innocent soul. This ring was not given to him by you, and it is not for you to judge him for it! - and throws into the square the ring that the master jewelers made for him.
People came running, began to look at the ring, and began to read the inscription. In short, they did not allow the execution. In the meantime, while there was noise and they were figuring out who was right and who was wrong, Green Okolysh made his way underground to the Romanian woman’s bedroom and tossed her a ring given by Prince Blugmert. He did the job, came back, and waited. Vanyushka arrives. - Well, how? asks Green Okolysh.
- Yes, so and so, so and so, an angel flew in, waved his wings and ordered not to destroy an innocent soul...
“Well, I’m not an angel,” Green Okolysh laughed, “then I flew to your aid.”
However, the matter has already gone far, even though Prince Blugmert has fooled him, he knows what the matter is. Something needs to be done to take the Romanian girl away from here. So Green Okolysh says to Vanyushka:
- Go down the underground passage to the Romanian woman, tell her to get ready for the wedding and not worry about anything, they say, I will arrange everything as it should, just take her wedding dress.
Vanyushka went to his beloved Romanian, told her as the Green Okolysh ordered, took the wedding dress, and returned back.
- Did you bring it?
- Brought it.
Green Okolysh ran to the tailors:
“Make me exactly the same dress as this one, so that it’s the same height, folded into folds, so that there’s no difference in anything.”
The tailors sewed the dress. They sewed it in such a way that the keenest eye would not be able to discern it. OK. Then Green Okolysh ran to the master artists.
“Make me a doll,” he says, “so that no one can distinguish it from a Romanian girl, so that this doll can move and shake its head.”
The artists did what Green Okolysh asked them to do. The result was a wonderful doll - an exact copy of the Romanian girl. And when you turn on this doll, it starts shaking its head as if it were alive.
And then the wedding day came. The entire palace is preparing for the holiday. And Vanyushka secretly made his way through an underground passage to his beloved, placed a doll, dressed in a wedding dress, in front of the open window, wound it up, and he and his Romanian girl got out of the palace through an underground passage and onto the ship.
People look at the bride's window and see her bowing. They began to talk among themselves:
- She’s so happy, look how happy she is, how she smiles at you...
And here Prince Blugmert is riding in a carriage. He sees: the Romanian girl nods her head. He got out of the carriage, bowed to her, and thought that she was greeting him. Prince Blugmert goes to the palace and enters the Romanian woman’s bedroom. He approached the doll, hugged it, and felt it cold.
“You,” he says, “didn’t get sick by chance?” And the Romanian girl keeps nodding and nodding her head.
- Maybe you should call this doctor? The Romanian girl shook her head again.
- Or maybe it’s better for you to go to bed?
The Romanian girl agrees to this too.
Prince Blugmert picked her up in his arms, but when he saw that he was holding not a person, but a doll in his hands, he fell dead...
And Vanyushka, as soon as he arrived on his ship, said goodbye to the Green Okolysh, and in gratitude gave him all the gold that the shipbuilders had traded.
The ship captains pulled the sails, raised the anchors, and goodbye Romania!
They greeted Vanyushka and his beautiful Romanian girl with guns firing and great glory. His named father and sister arranged a ball-feast for the whole world for this occasion. Vanyushka married a Romanian and became a sovereign. And then I remembered my real parents. So they all began to live together, get along and make good things.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru