Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita (1997) -
68 >
rushed back to where he had been talking with the professor. And,
fortunately, it turned out that the man had not left yet.
The street lights were already lit on Bronnaya, and over the Ponds the
golden moon shone, and in the ever-deceptive light of the moon it seemed to
Ivan Nikolaevich that he stood holding a sword, not a walking stick, under
his arm.
The ex-choirmaster was sitting in the very place where Ivan Nikolaevich
had sat just recently. Now the busybody had perched on his nose an obviously
unnecessary pince-nez, in which one lens was missing altogether and the
other was cracked. This made the checkered citizen even more repulsive than
he had been when he showed Berlioz the way to the rails.
With a chill in his heart, Ivan approached the professor and, glancing
into his face, became convinced that there were not and never had been any
signs of madness in that face.
'Confess, who are you?' Ivan asked in a hollow voice.
The foreigner scowled, looked at the poet as if he were seeing him for
the first time, and answered inimically:
'No understand ... no speak Russian. ..'
The gent don't understand,' the choirmaster mixed in from the bench,
though no one had asked him to explain the foreigner's words.
'Don't pretend!' Ivan said threateningly, and felt cold in the pit of
his stomach. 'You spoke excellent Russian just now. You're not a German and
you're not a professor! You're a murderer and a spy! ... Your papers!' Ivan
cried fiercely.
The mysterious professor squeamishly twisted his mouth, which was
twisted to begin with, then shrugged his shoulders.
'Citizen!' the loathsome choirmaster butted in again. "What're you
doing bothering a foreign tourist? For that you'll incur severe punishment!'
And the suspicious professor made an arrogant face, turned, and walked
away from Ivan. Ivan felt himself at a loss. Breathless, he addressed the