came from
behind them, the linen  curtains on the windows blazed up and the benzene on
the floor ignited.
     The public,  at  once  raising  a  desperate  cry, shrank back from the
confectionery   department,  running   down  the  no  longer   needed  Pavel
Yosifovich, and from behind the fish counter  the  sales  clerks  with their
whetted knives trotted in single file towards the door of the rear exit.
     The lilac citizen, having extracted himself from the barrel, thoroughly
drenched with herring juice, heaved himself over the  salmon  on the counter
and followed after them. The glass of the mirrored front doors clattered and
spilled  down,  pushed out  by fleeing people,  while the  two  blackguards,
Koroviev  and the  glutton Behemoth, got lost somewhere, but where - it  was
impossible to grasp.  Only afterwards did eyewitnesses who  had been present
at the starting of the fire in the currency store  in Smolensky market-place
tell how  the  two hooligans supposedly  flew up to  the  ceiling and  there
popped  like  children's  balloons.  It is  doubtful, of course, that things
happened that way, but what we don't know, we don't know.
     But we do know that exactly one minute after the happening in Smolensky
market-place,  Behemoth and Koroviev both  turned up on  the sidewalk of the
boulevard just by the house of Griboedov's aunt. Koroviev stood by the fence
and spoke:
     'Hah!  This is the writers' house! You know,  Behemoth, I've heard many
good and flattering things about this house. Pay attention to this house, my
friend. It's pleasant  to  think  how under this roof no end  of talents are
being sheltered and nurtured.'
     'Like  pineapples  in a  greenhouse,' said Behemoth and, the better  to
admire the  cream-coloured  building with columns, he  climbed the  concrete
footing of the cast-iron fence.
     `Perfectly correct,' Koroviev  agreed with  his  inseparable companion,
'and a  sweet awe creeps into one's heart at the thought that in  this house
there is now ripening  the future author  of a  Don Quixote or a Faust,  or,
devil take me, a Dead Souls. Eh?'
     'Frightful to think of,' agreed Behemoth.
     'Yes,'  Koroviev went on,  'one can expect astonishing  things from the
hotbeds  of this  house,  which  has united under its  roof several thousand
zealots  resolved  to  devote  their  lives  to the  service  of  Melpomene,
Polyhymnia and Thalia.  [7]  You  can imagine the noise that will arise when
one of  them, for  starters, offers the reading public The Inspector General
or, if worse comes to worst, Evgeny Onegin.'[9]
     'Quite easily,' Behemoth again agreed.
     'Yes,' Koroviev went on, anxiously raising his finger, 'but! ... But, I
say, and I repeat this but ... Only  if these tender hothouse plants are not
attacked  by some microorganism that gnaws  at their roots so that they rot!
And it does happen with pineapples! Oh, my, does it!'
     'Incidentally,' inquired Behemoth,  putting  his round head through  an
opening in the fence, 'what are they doing on the veranda?'
     'Having dinner,' explained Koroviev, 'and  to that I will add, my dear,
that the restaurant here is inexpensive and not bad at all. And, by the way,
like any tourist before continuing  his trip, I feel a desire to have a bite
and drink a big, ice-cold mug of beer.'
     'Me, too,'  replied  Behemoth, and the two blackguards marched down the
asphalt path under the lindens straight  to the  veranda of the unsuspecting
restaurant.
     A pale and bored citizeness in white socks and a white beret with a nib
sat on a Viennese chair  at  the corner  entrance to the veranda, where amid
the  greenery of  the trellis an opening for the entrance  had been made. In
front of her on a simple kitchen table lay a fat book of the ledger variety,
in  which the  citizeness,  for  unknown reasons, wrote down  all those  who
entered  the  restaurant.  It  was precisely  this  citizeness  who  stopped
Koroviev and Behemoth.
     'Your identification cards?' She was gazing in  amazement at Koroviev's
pince-nez, and also at Behemoth's primus and Behemoth's torn elbow.
     `A thousand pardons, but what  identification cards?' asked Koroviev in
surprise.
     'You're writers?' the cidzeness asked in her turn.
     'Unquestionably,' Koroviev answered with dignity.
     "Your identification cards?' the citizeness repeated.
     'My sweetie ...' Koroviev began tenderly.
     'I'm no sweetie,' interrupted the citizeness.
     'More's the pity,' Koroviev said disappointedly and went on; 'Well, so,
if you don't want to be a sweetie, which would  be quite pleasant, you don't
have to be. So, then, to convince yourself that Dostoevsky was  a writer, do
you have to ask  for his  identification card? Just take any five pages from
any one of his  novels and you'll be  convinced, without  any identification
card,  that  you're dealing with a writer. And I don't think he even had any
identification card! What do you think? ' Koroviev turned to Behemoth.
     'I'll bet he didn't,' replied Behemoth,  setting the primus down on the
table beside the  ledger and wiping the  sweat from  his sooty forehead with
his hand.
     'You're not Dostoevsky,' said the  citizeness, who was getting  muddled
by Koroviev.
     'Well, who knows, who knows,' he replied.
     `Dostoevsky's  dead,'  said  the  citizeness,  but  somehow  not   very
confidently.
     'I protest!' Behemoth exclaimed hotly. 'Dostoevsky is immortal!'
     'Your identification cards, citizens,' said the citizeness.
     'Good gracious, this is getting  to  be ridiculous!' Koroviev would not
give  in. 'A  writer is  defined not by any identity  card, but by  what  he
writes.  How do  you know  what plots  are  swarming in my head? Or in  this
head?'  and he pointed  at Behemoth's head, from  which the  latter  at once
removed the cap, as if to let the citizeness examine it better.
     'Step aside, citizens,' she said, nervously now.
     Koroviev and  Behemoth stepped aside and let pass some writer in a grey
suit with a tie-less,  summer white shirt, the collar of which lay wide open
on the lapels of his jacket, and with a newspaper  under his arm. The writer
nodded  affably to  the citizeness,  in  passing put  some  nourish  in  the
proffered ledger, and proceeded to the veranda.
     'Alas, not to us, not to us,' Koroviev began sadly, 'but to him will go
that  ice-cold mug of beer, which you and I, poor  wanderers, so dreamed  of
together.  Our position  is  woeful and difficult, and I  don't know what to
do.'
     Behemoth only spread  his arms bitterly  and put  his  cap on his round
head, covered with thick hair very much resembling a cat's fur.
     And at that  moment a low but peremptory voice sounded over the head of
the citizeness:
     'Let them pass, Sofya Pavlovna.'[10]
     The citizeness with the ledger  was amazed. Amidst the greenery, of the
trellis appeared  the white tailcoated chest and wedge-shaped  beard  of the
freebooter. He  was looking  affably  at  the two dubious  ragamuffins  and,
moreover,  even making inviting gestures to them. Archibald Archibaldovich's
authority  was  something  seriously  felt   in  the  restaurant  under  his
management, and Sofya Pavlovna obediently asked Koroviev:
     'What is your name?'
     'Panaev,'" he answered courteously. The citizeness wrote this name down
and raised a questioning glance to Behemoth.
     'Skabichevsky,'[12] the  latter squeaked, for some  reason  pointing to
his primus. Sofya Pavlovna wrote this down, too, and pushed the book towards
the visitors for  them to  sign.  Koroviev wrote 'Skabichevsky' next to  the
name 'Panaev', and Behemoth wrote `Panaev' next to 'Skabichevsky'.
     Archibald  Archibaldovich,  to  the utter amazement  of Sofya Pavlovna,
smiled seductively, and led  the guests to  the best table, at  the opposite
end of the  veranda, where the deepest  shade lay, a table next to which the
sun played merrily through one of the  gaps  in the  trellis greenery, while
Sofya Pavlovna, blinking with amazement, studied for a long time the strange
entry made in the book by the unexpected visitors.
     Archibald  Archibaldovich surprised  the waiters  no  less than he  had
Sofya Pavlovna. He  personally drew a chair  back from  the table,  inviting
Koroviev to sit down, winked to one, whispered something  to the  other, and
the two  waiters began  bustling  around the new guests, one of whom set his
primus down on the floor next to his scuffed shoe.
     The old  yellow-stained  tablecloth immediately  disappeared  from  the
table, another shot  up into the  air,  crackling  with starch,  white  as a
Bedouin's  burnous,  and  Archibald Archibaldovich  was  already  whispering
softly but very significantly, bending right to Koroviev's ear:
     What may I treat you  to? I have a special little balyk here ... bagged
at the architects' congress...'
     'Oh ... just give us  a bite of something ... eh? ...' Koroviev mumbled
good-naturedly, sprawling on the chair.
     `I  understand  ...'  Archibald  Archibaldovich  replied  meaningfully,
closing his eyes.
     Seeing the way the chief  of the restaurant  treated the rather dubious
visitors, the waiters laid aside their suspicions and got seriously down  to
business. One was already offering a match to Behemoth, who had taken a butt
from  his pocket and put it in his mouth, the other raced  up  clinking with
green  glass and  at  their places  arranged  goblets,  tumblers,  and those
thin-walled  glasses from which it is  so  nice to drink  seltzer  under the
awning ... no,  skipping ahead, let us say:  it used to be so  nice to drink
seltzer under the awning of the unforgettable Griboedov veranda.
     `I  might  recommend  a   little  fillet  of  hazel-grouse,'  Archibald
Archibaldovich murmured  musically. The guest in the cracked pince-nez fully
approved  the  commander  of   the  brig's  suggestions  and  gazed  at  him
benevolently through the useless bit of glass.
     The fiction writer Petrakov-Sukhovey, dining at the next table with his
wife,  who  was  finishing  a  pork  chop,  noticed  with  the  keenness  of
observation  proper to all writers the  wooing of Archibald  Archibaldovich,
and was quite, quite surprised.  And his wife, a very respectable lady, even
simply became jealous of Koroviev over  the pirate, and even rapped with her
teaspoon, as if to say: why are we kept waiting? ... It's time the ice cream
was served. What's the matter? ...
     However,  after  sending  Mrs  Petrakov  a  seductive smile,  Archibald
Archibaldovich dispatched a waiter to her, but did not leave his dear guests
himself. Ah, how intelligent Archibald Archibaldovich was! And his powers of
observation were perhaps no less keen than those of the writers themselves!
     Archibald Archibaldovich  knew  about  the seance  at the Variety,  and
about many other events of those days; he had heard, but, unlike the others,
had  not closed  his  ears  to, the  word 'checkered'  and  the word  'cat'.
Archibald Archibaldovich guessed at  once who his visitors were. And, having
guessed, naturally  did  not  start quarrelling  with  them. And that  Sofya
Pavlovna was a good one! To come up with  such a thing - barring the  way to
the veranda for those two! Though what could you expect of her! ...
     Haughtily  poking her little  spoon  into  the  slushy  ice cream,  Mrs
Petrakov, with displeased eyes, watched the table in front of the two motley
buffoons become overgrown  with dainties as if by magic. Shiny clean lettuce
leaves were already sticking from  a  bowl  of fresh  caviar  ... an instant
later a sweating silver  bucket  appeared, brought especially on a  separate
little table...
     Only when convinced that everything had been done impeccably, only when
there  came  flying  in  the  waiter's hands  a covered  pan with  something
gurgling in it, did Archibald Archibaldovich allow  himself to leave the two
mysterious visitors, and that after having first whispered to them:
     'Excuse me! One moment! I'll see to the fillets personally!'
     He  flew away  from the table and disappeared  into an inner passage of
the restaurant. If any observer had been  able to follow the further actions
of Archibald  Archibaldovich,  they  would  undoubtedly have seemed somewhat
mysterious to him.
     The  chief did not go to the kitchen  to supervise the  fillets at all,
but went  to  the restaurant  pantry. He opened  it with his own key, locked
himself inside, took  two hefty balyks from the icebox, carefully, so as not
to soil his cuffs, wrapped them  in newspaper, tied them neatly with string,
and  set them aside. Then  he made sure that his  hat and  silk-lined summer
coat were  in place in  the next room,  and only after that proceeded to the
kitchen,  where the  chef  was  carefully boning the fillets  the pirate had
promised his visitors.
     It must be  said that there was  nothing strange or incomprehensible in
any of  Archibald Archibaldovich's actions, and that they could seem strange
only to a superficial observer. Archibald Archibaldovich's behaviour was the
perfectly logical result  of  all that had gone before. A  knowledge  of the
latest   events,  and  above   all  Archibald   Archibaldovich's  phenomenal
intuition, told the chief of the Griboedov restaurant that his two visitors'
dinner, while abundant and sumptuous,  would be of extremely short duration.
And  his intuition, which had never yet  deceived the former freebooter, did
not let him down this time either.
     Just  as Koroviev and  Behemoth were clinking  their  second glasses of
wonderful, cold, double-distilled  Moskovskaya vodka, the sweaty and excited
chronicler  Boba   Kandalupsky,  famous   in  Moscow   for  his   astounding
omniscience,  appeared  on the  veranda  and  at  once  sat  down  with  the
Petrakovs. Placing his bulging briefcase on the table, Boba  immediately put
his lips to Petrakov's ear and whispered some very tempting things  into it.
Madame Petrakov, burning with curiosity, also  put her  ear to Boba's plump,
greasy lips.  And  he,  with  an occasional  furtive  look  around,  went on
whispering and whispering, and one could make out separate words, such as:
     'I swear to you! On Sadovaya, on Sadovaya!  ...' Boba lowered his voice
still more, 'bullets have no effect! ... bullets ... bullets ... benzene ...
fire bullets ...'
     'It's the liars that spread these vile rumours,' Madame Petrakov boomed
in a  contralto  voice,  somewhat  louder in her indignation than Boba would
have liked, 'they're the ones who  ought to  be explained! Well, never mind,
that's how it will be, they'll be called to order! Such pernicious lies!'
     `Why  lies,  Antonida  Porfirievna!'  exclaimed  Boba,   upset  by  the
disbelief of the writer's  wife,  and  again  began spinning: 'I  tell  you,
bullets  have  no effect! ... And then  the fire ... they went up in the air
... in the air!' Boba went  on hissing, not  suspecting  that  those he  was
talking about were sitting next to him, delighting in his yarn.
     However,  this delight  soon  ceased:  from an  inner  passage  of  the
restaurant three  men,  their  waists  drawn  in tightly by  belts,  wearing
leggings and holding  revolvers  in their hands, strode precipitously on  to
the veranda. The one in front cried ringingly and terribly:
     'Don't move!' And at once all  three opened fire on the veranda, aiming
at  the heads  of  Koroviev  and Behemoth. The two objects  of the  shooting
instantly melted into  air,  and  a pillar of fire  spurted  from the primus
directly on  to  the tent roof. It was as if a gaping maw  with  black edges
appeared in the tent and began spreading in all directions. The fire leaping
through it  rose  up to the roof  of Griboedov House. Folders full of papers
lying  on the  window-sill  of  the  editorial office  on  the second  floor
suddenly blazed up, followed by the  curtains, and now the fire,  howling as
if someone were blowing on it, went  on in pillars to  the  interior of  the
aunt's house.
     A few seconds  later, down  the asphalt paths leading to the  cast-iron
fence  on the boulevard, whence Ivanushka, the first herald of the disaster,
understood by no one,  had come on Wednesday evening, various writers, Sofya
Pavlovna,  Boba, Petrakov's wife  and  Petrakov,  now went running,  leaving
their dinners unfinished.
     Having stepped out through a side entrance beforehand,  not fleeing  or
hurrying anywhere, like a captain  who must be the last to leave his burning
brig, Archibald Archibaldovich stood  calmly  in his summer  coat  with silk
lining, the two balyk logs under his arm.

        CHAPTER 29. The Fate of the Master and Margarita is decided.


     At sunset, high over the  city, on the stone terrace of one of the most
beautiful houses in Moscow, a house built about a  hundred and  fifty  years
ago, there  were  two: Woland and  Azazello. They could not be seen from the
street below,  because they were hidden  from unwanted eyes by  a balustrade
with plaster vases and  plaster flowers. But they  could see the city almost
to its very edges.
     Woland was sitting on a folding stool, dressed in his black soutane.
     His long and  broad sword was stuck vertically into a crack between two
flags of  the  terrace so  as to make a  sundial. The shadow  of  the  sword
lengthened slowly and steadily, creeping towards the black shoes on  Satan's
feet.
     Resting his sharp chin on his  fist, hunched on the stool with  one leg
drawn  under  him,  Woland  stared fixedly'  at the  endless  collection  of
palaces, gigantic buildings and little hovels destined to be pulled down.
     Azazello, having  parted  with his  modern  attire -  that is,  jacket,
bowler  hat  and patent-leather shoes - and  dressed, like Woland, in black,
stood motionless not far from his sovereign, like him with his eyes fixed on
the city.
     Woland began to speak:
     'Such an interesting city, is it not?'
     Azazello stirred and replied respectfully:
     'I like Rome better, Messire.'
     'Yes, it's a matter of taste,' replied Woland.
     After a while, his voice resounded again:
     'And what is that smoke there on the boulevard?'
     That is Griboedov's burning,' replied Azazello.
     'It must be supposed that that inseparable pair, Koroviev and Behemoth,
stopped by there?'
     'Of that there can be no doubt, Messire.'
     Again silence fell, and the two on the terrace gazed at the fragmented,
dazzling  sunlight in the  upper-floor windows  of the huge buildings facing
west. Woland's eye burned like one of  those windows,  though Woland had his
back to the sunset.
     But here something made  Woland turn  his attention to the round  tower
behind  him on the roof. From its  wall  stepped a  tattered,  clay-covered,
sullen man in a chiton, in home-made sandals, black-bearded.
     'Hah!' exclaimed Woland, looking mockingly at  the newcomer. 'Least  of
all would I expect you here! What have you come with, uninvited guest?'
     'I have come to see you, spirit of evil and sovereign of shadows,'  the
newcomer replied, glowering inimically at Woland.
     `If  you've come to  see  me, why didn't you  wish  me a  good evening,
former tax collector?' Woland said sternly.
     `Because I  don't  wish you  a  good  anything,'  the newcomer  replied
insolendy.
     'But you'll have to reconcile yourself to that,' Woland objected, and a
grin twisted his  mouth. 'You no sooner appear on the roof than  you produce
an  absurdity,  and  I'll tell you what it is  - it's  your  intonation. You
uttered your words as if you don't acknowledge shadows, or evil either.
     Kindly consider  the question: what would your good do if evil did  not
exist, and what would the  earth look like  if  shadows disappeared from it?
Shadows are  cast by objects and  people. Here is  the  shadow  of my sword.
Trees and living  beings  also  have shadows.  Do you want to skin the whole
earth,  tearing all  the  trees and living things  off it,  because of  your
fantasy of enjoying bare light? You're a fool.'
     'I won't argue with you, old sophist,' replied Matthew Levi.
     'You also cannot argue with me, for the reason I've already  mentioned:
you're a fool,' Woland replied and asked: "Well, make  it short, don't weary
me, why have you appeared?'
     'He sent me.'
     'What did he tell you to say, slave?'
     'I'm not a slave,' Matthew Levi replied, growing ever angrier, 'I'm his
disciple.'
     'You and I speak different languages, as usual,' responded Woland, 'but
the things we say don't change for all that. And so? ...'
     'He has  read the  master's work,'  said Matthew Levi, 'and asks you to
take the master with you and  reward him with peace. Is that hard for you to
do, spirit of evil?'
     'Nothing is  hard for me to do,' answered Woland, 'you  know  that very
well.' He paused and added: 'But why don't  you take  him with you  into the
light?'
     'He does not deserve  the  light,  he deserves peace,' Levi  said in  a
sorrowful voice.
     'Tell him it will be done,' Woland replied and added, his eye flashing:
     'And leave me immediately.'
     'He  asks that she who  loved  him and suffered because of  him also be
taken with him,' Levi addressed Woland pleadingly for the first time.
     'We would never have thought of it without you. Go.'
     Matthew Levi  disappeared  after that, and  Woland  called Azazello and
ordered him:
     'Fly to them and arrange it all.'
     Azazello left the terrace, and Woland remained alone.
     But his solitude did not last. Over  the flags  of the terrace came the
sound of footsteps and animated voices, and before Woland stood Koroviev and
Behemoth. But now the fat fellow had no primus with him, but was loaded with
other things. Thus, under his arm he had a small landscape in a  gold frame,
from  one  hand hung a half-burnt cook's smock, and in  the other  he held a
whole salmon  with skin  and  tail.  Koroviev and  Behemoth reeked  of fire.
Behemoth's mug was all sooty and his cap was badly burnt.
     'Greetings, Messire!' cried the irrepressible pair, and Behemoth  waved
the salmon.
     'A fine sight,' said Woland.
     'Imagine, Messire!' Behemoth cried excitedly and joyfully, 'I was taken
for a looter!'
     'Judging by the things you've brought,' Woland replied, glancing at the
landscape, 'you are a looter!'
     'Believe me, Messire ...' Behemoth began in a soulful voice.
     'No, I don't,' Woland replied curdy.
     'Messire,  I swear,  I made heroic efforts to save everything  I could,
and this is all I was able to rescue.'
     'You'd better tell me, why did Griboedov's catch fire?' asked Woland.
     Both  Koroviev and Behemoth  spread their  arms, raised their  eyes  to
heaven, and Behemoth cried out:
     `I can't conceive  why!  We  were  sitting there  peacefully, perfectly
quiet, having a bite to eat...'
     'And suddenly - bang, bang!' Koroviev picked up, 'gunshots! Crazed with
fear,  Behemoth and I  ran out to the boulevard, our  pursuers  followed, we
rushed to Timiriazev! ...'[2]
     'But the sense  of  duty,' Behemoth put in, 'overcame our shameful fear
and we went back.'
     'Ah, you went  back?'  said Woland. 'Well,  then of course the building
was reduced to ashes.'
     To ashes!' Koroviev ruefully confirmed, 'that is, Messire, literally to
ashes, as you were pleased to put it so aptly. Nothing but embers!'
     'I hastened,' Behemoth narrated, 'to the meeting room, the one with the
columns, Messire, hoping  to  bring out something valuable. Ah, Messire,  my
wife, if only I had one, was twenty times in danger of being left  a  widow!
But  happily,  Messire, I'm  not  married, and, let me tell you, I'm  really
happy that I'm not. Ah, Messire, how can one trade a bachelor's freedom  for
the burdensome yoke...'
     'Again some gibberish gets going,' observed Woland.
     'I hear and continue,' the cat replied. 'Yes, sir, this landscape here!
It was impossible to bring anything more out of the meeting room, the flames
were beating in my face. I ran to the pantry  and rescued the  salmon. I ran
to  the  kitchen  and  rescued  the  smock. I  think,  Messire, that  I  did
everything  I  could, and  I don't understand  how to explain the  sceptical
expression on your face.'
     'And what did Koroviev do while you were looting?' asked Woland.
     'I was helping the firemen, Messire,' replied Koroviev, pointing to his
torn trousers.
     'Ah, if so, then of course a new building will have to be built.'
     'It will be built, Messire,'  Koroviev responded, `I venture  to assure
you of that.'
     'Well, so it  remains for us to wish  that it be better  than  the  old
one,' observed Woland.
     'It will be, Messire,' said Koroviev.
     'You can believe me,' the cat added, 'I'm a regular prophet.'
     'In  any case, we're here, Messire,' Koroviev reported, 'and await your
orders.'
     Woland got  up from  his stool, went over to the balustrade, and alone,
silently, his back turned to his retinue, gazed into the distance for a long
time. Then he stepped away from the edge, lowered himself  on to his  stool,
and said:
     'There will be no orders, you have fulfilled all you could, and for the
moment I no longer need  your  services. You may rest. Right now  a storm is
coming, the  last  storm, it  will complete all that  needs  completing, and
we'll be on our way.'
     `Very  well,  Messire,'  the  two  buffoons  replied  and   disappeared
somewhere behind the round  central tower, which stood in  the middle of the
terrace.
     The  storm  of which  Woland  had  spoken was already gathering on  the
horizon. A black cloud rose  in the  west  and cut off half the sun. Then it
covered it entirely. The air became cool on the terrace.  A little  later it
turned dark.
     This darkness which came from  the west covered the  vast city. Bridges
and palaces disappeared. Everything vanished as  if it had  never existed in
the  world. One fiery thread  ran across the whole sky.  Then  a thunderclap
shook the city. It was repeated, and the storm began. Woland could no longer
be seen in its gloom.

        CHAPTER 30. It's Time! It's Time!


     'You know,' said  Margarita, `just as you fell asleep last night, I was
reading about  the  darkness that came from  the Mediterranean Sea  ...  and
those idols,  ah, the golden idols! For some  reason they  never leave me in
peace.  I think  it's  going to rain now, too. Do you  feel  how  cool  it's
getting?'
     'That's all well and good,' replied the master, smoking and breaking up
the smoke with his hand, 'and  as for the  idols. God be  with them  ... but
what will happen further on is decidedly unclear!'
     This conversation occurred  at sunset,  just at the moment when Matthew
Levi came to Woland on  the terrace. The basement  window  was  open, and if
anyone had looked through  it, he would  have been astonished at how strange
the talkers looked. Margarita  had a black  cloak thrown directly  over  her
naked  body,  and  the  master was in his hospital underwear. The reason for
this was that  Margarita had decidedly  nothing  to  put on, because all her
clothes had stayed  in her house, and though this house was  very  near  by,
there was, of  course, no  question of going  there to take her clothes. And
the master, whose clothes  were all found in the wardrobe as if he had never
gone  anywhere,  simply  did not  want to  get  dressed,  developing  before
Margarita the thought that some perfect nonsense was  about to  begin at any
moment. True, he was clean-shaven for the first time since that autumn night
(in the clinic his beard had been cut with clippers).
     The room also had a strange look, and it was very hard to make anything
out in its  chaos. Manuscripts were  lying  on the  rug, and  on the sofa as
well. A  book sat  humpbacked on an armchair. And dinner was  set out on the
round table, with several bottles standing  among  the dishes of food. Where
all this food and drink came from  was known neither to Margarita nor to the
master. On waking up they found everything already on the table.
     Having slept  until  sunset  Saturday,  the master and his friend  felt
themselves  thoroughly  fortified,  and  only one thing told of the previous
day's adventure - both had a slight ache in the left temple. But with regard
to their minds, there were great changes in both  of  them, as anyone  would
have been convinced  who was able to  eavesdrop on the  conversation  in the
basement. But there was decidedly no one to eavesdrop. That little courtyard
was good  precisely for  being  always  empty.  With  each day the  greening
lindens and the  ivy  outside  the  window exuded an ever stronger smell  of
spring, and the rising breeze carried it into the basement.
     'Pah,  the devil!' exclaimed the master unexpectedly. 'But, just think,
it's  ...' he put out his cigarette butt in the ashtray and pressed his head
with  his hands.  'No, listen, you're an  intelligent person and  have never
been  crazy  ...  are  you  seriously  convinced  that  we were  at  Satan's
yesterday?'
     'Quite seriously,' Margarita replied.
     'Of course, of course,' the master said ironically, 'so now instead  of
one madman there are  two - husband and wife!' He raised his hands to heaven
and cried: 'No, the devil knows what this is! The devil, the devil...'
     Instead of  answering,  Margarita  collapsed  on  the  sofa,  burst out
laughing, waved her bare legs, and only then cried out:
     'Aie, I can't ... I can't! You should see what you look like! ...'
     Having  finished  laughing, while  the  master bashfully pulled  up his
hospital drawers, Margarita became serious.
     'You unwittingly spoke the truth just now,' she began, 'the devil knows
what it is, and the  devil, believe  me, will arrange everything!' Her  eyes
suddenly flashed, she jumped up and began dancing on the spot, crying out:
     'How happy I am, how happy I am, how happy I am that I struck a bargain
with him! Oh, Satan,  Satan! ... You'll have to live with a witch, my dear!'
Then  she  rushed  to  the master, put  her arms around  his neck, and began
kissing his lips, his nose, his cheeks. Strands of unkempt black hair leaped
at the master, and his cheeks and forehead burned under the kisses.
     'And you've really come to resemble a witch.'
     'And I  don't deny it,' answered Margarita,  'I'm  a witch and I'm very
glad of it.'
     'Well, all  right,'  said the master, `so  you're a witch,  very  nice,
splendid! And  I've been stolen from  the hospital ... also  very nice! I've
been brought here, let's grant  that, too.  Let's even suppose that we won't
be missed ... But tell me, by all that's holy, how and on what are  we going
to live? My concern is for you when I say that, believe me!'
     At  that  moment round-toed shoes and  the lower  part  of  a  pair  of
pinstriped trousers appeared in the window. Then  the trousers  bent at  the
knee and somebody's hefty backside blocked the daylight.
     'Aloisy, are you home?'  asked a voice somewhere up above the trousers,
outside the window.
     'There, it's beginning,' said the master.
     'Aloisy?' asked Margarita, going closer to the window. 'He was arrested
yesterday. Who's asking for him? What's your name?'
     That  instant  the  knees and backside vanished, there came the bang of
the gate, after which everything returned to normal.  Margarita collapsed on
the sofa and laughed so that tears poured from her eyes. But when she calmed
down,  her countenance changed greatly, she began speaking seriously, and as
she spoke she slipped down from the couch, crept over to the master's knees,
and, looking into his eyes, began to caress his head.
     'How you've suffered,  how  you've suffered, my poor one!  I'm the only
one who  knows  it. Look, you've got white threads  in  your  hair,  and  an
eternal crease by  your lips! My  only one,  my  dearest, don't think  about
anything! You've  had to think too much, and now I'll think  for  you. And I
promise you, I promise, that everything will be dazzlingly well!'
     'I'm  not afraid of anything, Margot,' the master suddenly answered her
and raised his head, and he seemed to her  the same as he  had  been when he
was inventing that which he had never seen, but of which he knew for certain
that it had been, 'not afraid, because I've already experienced it all. They
tried too  hard  to frighten me, and  cannot frighten me with  anything  any
more. But I pity you, Margot, that's the trick, that's why I  keep saying it
over and over. Come to your senses! Why do you have to ruin your life with a
sick man and a beggar? Go back! I pity you, that's why I say it.'
     'Oh, you, you  ...'  Margarita whispered, shaking her dishevelled head,
'oh, you  faithless, unfortunate man! ... Because  of you I spent the  whole
night yesterday shivering and naked. I lost my nature and replaced it with a
new  one, I spent several months sitting in a dark closet thinking about one
thing, about the storm  over Yershalaim, I cried my eyes out, and  now, when
happiness has befallen us, you  drive me away! Well,  then I'll go, I'll go,
but you should know that you are a cruel man! They've devastated your soul!'
     Bitter tenderness rose up  in the  master's heart, and, without knowing
why,  he began  to  weep,  burying  his face in  Margarita's  hair.  Weeping
herself, she whispered to  him, and her  fingers  trembled on  the  master's
temples.
     'Yes, threads, threads ... before my eyes your head is getting  covered
with snow ... ah, my much-suffering head! Look what eyes you've got! There's
a desert in them ... and the  shoulders, the shoulders with their burden ...
crippled,  crippled  ...'  Margarita's  speech   was   becoming  incoherent,
Margarita was shaking with tears.
     Then the master wiped his eyes, raised Margarita from her knees, got up
himself and said firmly:
     'Enough.   You've   shamed   me.   Never   again   will  I   yield   to
faint-heartedness, or come back  to this question, be reassured. I know that
we're both  the  victims  of our mental illness, which you perhaps got  from
me... Well, so we'll bear it together.'
     Margarita put her lips close to the master's ear and whispered:
     'I swear to you by your life, I swear by the astrologer's son whom, you
guessed, that all will be well!'
     'Fine, fine,' responded the master, and he added, laughing: 'Of course,
when people have been robbed  of everything,  like  you  and  me,  they seek
salvation from other-worldly powers! Well, so, I agree to seek there.'
     'Well,  there,  there,  now  you're  your  old self,  you're laughing,'
replied   Margarita,  `and   devil   take   you  with  your  learned  words.
Other-worldly or not other-worldly, isn't it all the same? I want to eat!'
     And she dragged the master to the table by the hand.
     'I'm not sure  this food  isn't  about to fall through the floor or fly
out the window,' he said, now completely calm.
     'It won't fly out.'
     And just then a nasal voice came through the window:
     'Peace be unto you.''
     The master  gave a  start,  but Margarita,  already  accustomed to  the
extraordinary, exclaimed:
     'Why, it's Azazello! Ah, how  nice, how good!' and,  whispering to  the
master: 'You  see, you see, we're not abandoned!'  - she rushed to  open the
door.
     'Cover yourself at least,' the master called after her.
     'Spit on it,' answered Margarita, already in the corridor.
     And there was  Azazello  bowing, greeting  the master, and flashing his
blind eye, while Margarita exclaimed:
     'Ah, how glad I am! I've never been so glad in my life! But forgive me,
Azazello, for being naked!'
     Azazello begged her not  to worry, assuring  her  that  he had seen not
only naked  women,  but even women  with  their skin flayed clean  off,  and
willingly sat down at the table, having first placed some package wrapped in
dark brocade in the corner by the stove.
     Margarita poured Azazello  some cognac, and he willingly  drank it. The
master, not taking his eyes off him, quietly pinched his own left hand under
the table. But the pinches did  not help.  Azazello  did not melt  into air,
and, to  tell the  truth, there  was  no need  for  that. There was  nothing
terrible  in  the short,  reddish-haired  man,  unless it was  his eye  with
albugo, but that occurs even without sorcery, or unless his clothes were not
quite  ordinary -  some  sort  of cassock or  cloak  - but  again,  strictly
considered, that  also happens. He  drank  his cognac adroitly, too,  as all
good  people do, by the glassful and without nibbling. From this same cognac
the master's head became giddy, and he began to think:
     'No, Margarita's right ...  Of  course, this is  the devil's  messenger
sitting before me. No more than  two nights ago, I myself tried to prove  to
Ivan that it was precisely Satan whom he  had met  at the Patriarch's Ponds,
and now for  some reason I got  scared of  the thought and started  babbling
something  about   hypnotists  and  hallucinations  ...  Devil  there's  any
hypnotists in it! ...'
     He began  looking at Azazello  more closely and became  convinced  that
there was some constraint in his eyes, some thought that he would not reveal
before its time.  'This is  not  just  a visit, he's  come on some  errand,'
thought the master.
     His powers  of observation did not deceive him. After  drinking a third
glass of cognac, which produced no effect in  Azazello,  the  visitor  spoke
thus:
     `A cosy little basement, devil take me! Only one question arises - what
is there to do in this little basement?'
     That's just what I was saying,' the master answered, laughing.
     'Why do you trouble me, Azazello?' asked Margarita. 'We'll live somehow
or other!'
     'Please, please!' cried Azazello,  'I never  even thought  of troubling
you. I say the same thing -  somehow or  other! Ah, yes! I almost forgot ...
Messire  sends his regards and has also asked me to tell you that he invites
you to go on a  little excursion with him - if you  wish, of course. What do
you say to that?'
     Margarita nudged the master under the table with her leg.
     With  great  pleasure,'  replied  the  master,  studying Azazello,  who
continued:
     `We  hope  that  Margarita  Nikolaevna  will   also  not  decline   the
invitation?'
     'I  certainly will not,'  said Margarita, and  again  her  leg  brushed
against the master's.
     `A wonderful thing!'  exclaimed Azazello. 'I like  that! One,  two, and
it's done! Not like that time in the Alexandrovsky Garden!'
     'Ah, don't remind  me,  Azazello,  I was  stupid then.  And anyhow  you
mustn't blame  me too severely for it -  you don't meet unclean powers every
day!'
     That you don't!'  agreed  Azazello. 'Wouldn't it  be pleasant if it was
every day!'
     'I like quickness myself,' Margarita said excitedly, 'I  like quickness
and nakedness...  Like from  a  Mauser - bang! Ah, how he shoots!' Margarita
cried,  turning  to the  master.  `A  seven under  the pillow - any pip  you
like!...' Margarita was getting drunk, and it made her eyes blaze.
     'And again I forgot!' cried Azazello, slapping himself on the forehead.
     `I'm  quite frazzled! Messire sends  you a present,'  here  he adverted
precisely to the master, 'a bottle of wine. I beg you to note that it's  the
same wine the procurator of Judea drank. Falernian wine.'
     It  was  perfectly  natural  that  such a rarity  should  arouse  great
attention in both Margarita and  the master. Azazello drew from the piece of
dark coffin brocade  a completely mouldy jug.  The wine was sniffed,  poured
into glasses,  held up to the light  in the  window, which was  disappearing
before the storm.
     To Woland's health!' exclaimed Margarita, raising her glass.
     All three put their glasses to their  lips and took big gulps. At  once
the pre-storm light began to  fade in  the master's eyes, his  breath failed
him,  and he  felt  the end  coming. He  could  still see the  deathly  pale
Margarita,  helplessly reaching her arms  out to him, drop her  head  to the
table and then slide down on the floor.
     `Poisoner...'  the master managed to  cry out. He wanted to snatch  the
knife  from  the  table and strike  Azazello with  it,  but  his  hand  slid
strengthlessly from  the  tablecloth,  everything around  the master  in the
basement took  on  a  black colour  and then vanished  altogether.  He  fell
backwards and in falling cut  the skin of his  temple on the  corner  of his
desk.
     When  the poisoned ones lay still, Azazello began to act. First of all,
he rushed out of the window and a few instants later was in the house  where
Margarita Nikolaevna lived. The ev