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MAY THERE BE GOOD ON EARTH
MAY THERE BE GOOD ON EARTH
From the book by Vladimir Megre "Who Are We?"
(translated by Marian Schwartz)
A friendly family lived on one of the Russian homesteads. This husband and
wife had two children – a boy Konstantin, eight years old; and a girl Dasha,
five. Their father was considered one of Russia’s most talented program-
mers. There were several new-model computers in his study where he com-
piled programs for the military department. Sometimes, buried in work, he
would sit at his computers in the evenings as well.
The members of his family, who were used to gathering in the evening,
would go to his study and there each do something of their own. His wife
would sit in an armchair and embroider. His son would read or draw, depict-
ing the landscapes of the new settlements. Only five-year-old Dasha could
not always find herself something pleasing to do, and then she would sit in
an armchair in such a way that she could see all of her family and she would
spend a long time closely examining each one. From time to time she would
close her eyes and then her face expressed a gamut of emotions.
On that outwardly ordinary evening, the family sat in the father’s study,
where each was doing his own thing as always. The study door was open, so
everyone heard the old cuckoo clock cuckooing from the children’s bed-
room, next to the father’s study. Ordinarily the cuckoo only cuckooed during
daylight hours, but it was already evening. So the father tore himself away
from what he was doing and looked at the door, and the other members of
the family looked in surprise at where the sound had just come from. Only
