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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.
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.
'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 ever precise and accurate Azazello wanted to
make sure that everything was carried out properly. And everything turned
out to be in perfect order. Azazello saw a gloomy woman, who was waiting for
her husband's return, come out of her bedroom, suddenly turn pale, clutch
her heart, and cry helplessly:
'Natasha ... somebody ... come ...' and fall to the floor in the living
room before reaching the study.
'Everything's in order,' said Azazello. A moment later he was beside
the fallen lovers. Margarita lay with her face against the little rug. With
his iron hands, Azazello turned her over like a doll, face to him, and
peered at her. The face of the poisoned woman was changing before his eyes.
Even in the gathering dusk of the storm, one could see the temporary witch's
cast in her eyes and the cruelty and violence of her features disappear. The
face of the dead woman brightened and finally softened, and the look of her
bared teeth was no longer predatory but simply that of a suffering woman.
Then Azazello unclenched her white teeth and poured into her mouth
several drops of the same wine with which he had poisoned her. Margarita
sighed, began to rise without Azazello's help, sat up and asked weakly:
'Why, Azazello, why? What have you done to me?'
She saw the outstretched master, shuddered, and whispered:
'I didn't expect this ... murderer!'
'Oh, no, no,' answered Azazello, 'he'll rise presently. Ah, why are you
so nervous?'
Margarita believed him at once, so convincing was the red-headed
demon's voice. She jumped up, strong and alive, and helped to give the
outstretched man a drink of wine. Opening his eyes, he gave a dark look and
with hatred repeated his last word:
'Poisoner...'
'Ah, insults are the usual reward for a good job!' replied Azazello.
'Are you blind? Well, quickly recover your sight!'
Here the master rose, looked around with alive and bright eyes, and
asked:
'What does this new thing mean?'
'It means,' replied Azazello, 'that it's time for us to go. The storm
is already thundering, do you hear? It's getting dark. The steeds are pawing
the ground, your little garden is shuddering. Say farewell, quickly say
farewell to your little basement.'
'Ah, I understand...' the master said, glancing around, 'you've killed
us, we're dead. Oh, how intelligent that is! And how timely! Now I
understand everything.'
'Oh, for pity's sake,' replied Azazello, 'is it you I hear talking?
Your friend calls you a master, you can think, so how can you be dead?
Is it necessary, in order to consider yourself alive, to sit in a basement
and dress yourself in a shirt and hospital drawers? It's ridiculous! ...'
'I understand everything you're saying,' the master cried out, 'don't
go on! You're a thousand times right!'
'Great Woland!' Margarita began to echo him. 'Great Woland! He thought
it out much better than I did! But the novel, the novel,' she shouted to the
master, 'take the novel with you wherever you fly!' "
'No need,' replied the master, 'I remember it by heart.'
`But you won't ... you won't forget a single word of it?' Margarita
asked, pressing herself to her lover and wiping the blood from his cut
temple.
'Don't worry. I'll never forget anything now,' he replied.
'Fire, then!' cried Azazello. 'Fire, with which all began and with
which we end it all.'
'Fire!' Margarita cried terribly. The little basement window banged,
the curtain was beaten aside by the wind. The sky thundered merrily and
briefly. Azazello thrust his clawed hand into the stove, pulled out a
smoking brand, and set fire to the tablecloth. Then he set fire to the stack
of old newspapers on the sofa, and next to the manuscripts and the window
curtain.
The master, already drunk with the impending ride, flung some book from
the shelf on to the table, ruffled its pages in the flame of the tablecloth,
and the book blazed up merrily.
'Burn, burn, former life!'
'Burn, suffering!' cried Margarita.
The room was already swaying in crimson pillars, and along with the
smoke the three ran out of the door, went up the stone steps, and came to
the yard. The first thing they saw there was the landlord's cook sitting on
the ground. Beside her lay spilled potatoes and several bunches of onions.
The cook's state was comprehensible. Three black steeds snorted by the shed,
twitching, sending up fountains of earth. Margarita mounted first, then
Azazello, and last the master. The cook moaned and wanted to raise her hand
to make the sign of the cross, but Azazello shouted menacingly from the
saddle:
'I'll cut your hand off!' He whistled, and the steeds, breaking through
the linden branches, soared up and pierced the low black cloud. Smoke poured
at once from the basement window. From below came the weak, pitiful cry of
the cook:
'We're on fire...'
The steeds were already racing over the rooftops of Moscow.
'I want to bid farewell to the city,' the master cried to Azazello, who
rode at their head. Thunder ate up the end of the master's phrase. Azazello
nodded and sent his horse into a gallop. The dark cloud flew precipitously
to meet the fliers, but as yet gave not a sprinkle of rain.
They flew over the boulevards, they saw little figures of people
scatter, running for shelter from the rain. The first drops were falling.
They flew over smoke - all that remained of Griboedov House. They flew over
the city which was already being flooded by darkness. Over them lightning
flashed. Soon the roofs gave place to greenery. Only then did the rain pour
down, transforming the fliers into three huge bubbles in the water.
Margarita was already familiar with the sensation of flight, but the
master was not, and he marvelled at how quickly they reached their goal, the
one to whom he wished to bid farewell, because he had no one else to bid
farewell to. He immediately recognized through the veil of rain the building
of Stravinsky's clinic, the river, and the pine woods on the other bank,
which he had studied so well. They came down in the clearing of a copse not
far from the clinic.
'I'll wait for you here,' cried Azazello, his hands to his mouth, now
lit up by lightning, now disappearing behind the grey veil. 'Say your
farewells, but be quick!'
The master and Margarita jumped from their saddles and flew, flickering
like watery shadows, through the clinic garden. A moment later the master,
with an accustomed hand, was pushing aside the balcony grille of room
no.117. Margarita followed after him. They stepped into Ivanushka's room,
unseen and unnoticed in the rumbling and howling of the storm. The master
stopped by the bed. Ivanushka lay motionless, as before, when for the first
time he had watched a storm in the house of his repose. But he was not
weeping as he had been then. Once he had taken a good look at the dark
silhouette that burst into his room from the balcony, he raised himself,
held out his hands, and said joyfully:
'Ah, it's you! And I kept waiting and waiting for you! And here you
are, my neighbour!'
To this the master replied:
'I'm here, but unfortunately I cannot be your neighbour any longer. I'm
flying away for ever, and I've come to you only to say farewell.'
'I knew that, I guessed it,' Ivan replied quietly and asked: 'You met
him?'
'Yes,' said the master. 'I've come to say farewell to you, because you
are the only person I've talked with lately.'
Ivanushka brightened up and said:
`It's good that you stopped off here. I'll keep my word, I won't write
any more poems. I'm interested in something else now,' Ivanushka smiled and
with mad eyes looked somewhere past the master. 'I want to write something
else. You know, while I lay here, a lot became clear to me.'
The master was excited by these words and, sitting on the edge of
Ivanushka's bed, said:
'Ah, but that's good, that's good. You'll write a sequel about him.'
Ivanushka's eyes lit up.
'But won't you do that yourself?' Here he hung his head and added
pensively: 'Ah, yes ... what am I asking?' Ivanushka looked sidelong at the
floor, his eyes fearful.
'Yes,' said the master, and his voice seemed unfamiliar and hollow to
Ivanushka, `I won't write about him any more now. I'll be occupied with
other things.'
A distant whistle cut through the noise of the storm.
'Do you hear?' asked the master.
'The noise of the storm ...'
'No, I'm being called, it's time for me to go,' explained the master,
and he got up from the bed.
"Wait! One word more,' begged Ivan. "Did you find her? Did she remain
faithful to you?'
`Here she is,' the master replied and pointed to the wall. The dark
Margarita separated from the white wall and came up to the bed. She looked
at the young man lying there and sorrow could be read in her eyes.
'Poor boy, poor boy ...' Margarita whispered soundlessly and bent down
to the bed.
'She's so beautiful,' Ivan said, without envy, but sadly, and with a
certain quiet tenderness. 'Look how well everything has turned out for you.
But not so for me.' Here he thought a little and added thoughtfully:
'Or else maybe it is so...'
'It is so, it is so,' whispered Margarita, and she bent closer to him.
'I'm going to kiss you now, and everything will be as it should be with
you ... believe me in that, I've seen everything, I know everything ...' The
young man put his arms around her neck and she kissed him.
'Farewell, disciple,' the master said barely audibly and began melting
into air. He disappeared, and Margarita disappeared with him. The balcony
grille was closed.
Ivanushka fell into anxiety. He sat up in bed, looked around uneasily,
even moaned, began talking to himself, got up. The storm raged more and
more, and evidendy stirred up his soul. He was also upset by the troubling
footsteps and muted voices that his ear, accustomed to the constant silence,
heard outside the door. He called out, now nervous and trembling:
'Praskovya Fyodorovna!'
Praskovya Fyodorovna was already coming into the room, looking at
Ivanushka questioningly and uneasily.
'What? What is it?' she asked. The storm upsets you? Never mind, never
mind ... we'll help you now ... I'll call the doctor now ...'
'No, Praskovya Fyodorovna, you needn't call the doctor,' said
Ivanushka, looking anxiously not at Praskovya Fyodorovna but into the wall.
'There's nothing especially the matter with me. I can sort things out
now, don't worry. But you'd better tell me,' Ivan begged soulfully, 'what
just happened in room one-eighteen?'
'Eighteen?' Praskovya Fyodorovna repeated, and her eyes became furtive.
'Why, nothing happened there.' But her voice was false, Ivanushka
noticed it at once and said:
'Eh, Praskovya Fyodorovna! You're such a truthful person... You think
I'll get violent? No, Praskovya Fyodorovna, that won't happen. You'd better
speak direcdy, for I can feel everything through the wall.'
'Your neighbour has just passed away,' whispered Praskovya Fyodorovna,
unable to overcome her truthfulness and kindness, and, all clothed in a
flash of lightning, she looked fearfully at Ivanushka. But nothing terrible
happened to Ivanushka. He only raised his finger significandy and said:
'I knew it! I assure you, Praskovya Fyodorovna, that yet another person
has just passed away in the city. I even know who,' here Ivanushka smiled
mysteriously. 'It's a woman!'
The storm was swept away without a trace, and a multicoloured rainbow,
its arch thrown across all of Moscow, stood in the sky, drinking water from
the Moscow River. High up, on a hill between two copses, three dark
silhouettes could be seen. Woland, Koroviev and Behemoth sat in the saddle
on three black horses, looking at the city spread out beyond the river, with
the fragmented sun glittering in thousands of windows facing west, and at
the gingerbread towers of the Devichy Convent. [2]
There was a noise in the air, and Azazello, who had the master and
Margarita flying in the black tail of his cloak, alighted with them beside
the waiting group.
'We had to trouble you a little, Margarita Nikolaevna and master,'
Woland began after some silence, 'but you won't grudge me that. I don't
think you will regret it. So, then,' he addressed the master alone, 'bid
farewell to the city. It's time for us to go,' Woland pointed with his
black-gauntleted hand to where numberless suns melted the glass beyond the
river, to where, above these suns, stood the mist, smoke and steam of the
city scorched all day.
The master threw himself out of the saddle, left the mounted ones, and
ran to the edge of the hillside. The black cloak dragged on the ground
behind him. The master began to look at the city. In the first moments a
wringing sadness crept over his heart, but it very quickly gave wav to a
sweetish anxiety, a wondering gypsy excitement.
`For ever! ... That needs to be grasped,' the master whispered and
licked his dry, cracked lips. He began to heed and take precise note of
everything that went on in his soul. His excitement turned, as it seemed to
him, into a feeling of deep and grievous offence. But it was unstable,
vanished, and gave way for some reason to a haughty indifference, and that
to a foretaste of enduring peace.
The group of riders waited silently for the master. The group of riders
watched the black, long figure on the edge of the hillside gesticulate, now
raising his head, as if trying to reach across the whole city with his eyes,
to peer beyond its limits, now hanging his head down, as if studying the
trampled, meagre grass under his feet. The silence was broken by the bored
Behemoth. `Allow me, maltre,' he began, 'to give a farewell whisde before
the ride.'
'You may frighten the lady,' Woland answered, 'and, besides, don't
forget that all your outrages today are now at an end.'
'Ah, no, no, Messire,' responded Margarita, who sat side-saddle, arms
akimbo, the sharp corner of her train hanging to the ground, 'allow him, let
him whisde. I'm overcome with sadness before the long journey. Isn't it
true, Messire, it's quite natural even when a person knows that happiness is
waiting at the end of the road? Let him make us laugh, or I'm afraid it will
end in tears, and everything will be spoiled before the journey!'
Woland nodded to Behemoth, who became all animated, jumped down from
the saddle, put his fingers in his mouth, puffed out his cheeks, and
whistled. Margarita's ears rang. Her horse reared, in the copse dry twigs
rained down from the trees, a whole flock of crows and sparrows flew up, a
pillar of dust went sweeping down to the river, and, as an excursion boat
was passing the pier, one could see several of the passengers' caps blow off
into the water.
The whistle made the master start, yet he did not turn, but began
gesticulating still more anxiously, raising his hand to the sky as if
threatening the city. Behemoth gazed around proudly.
'That was whistled, I don't argue,' Koroviev observed condescendingly,
'whistled indeed, but, to be impartial, whistled rather middlingly.'
'I'm not a choirmaster,' Behemoth replied with dignity, puffing up, and
he winked unexpectedly at Margarita.
'Give us a try, for old times' sake,' Koroviev said, rubbed his hand,
and breathed on his fingers.
'Watch out, watch out,' came the stern voice of Woland on his horse,
'no inflicting of injuries.'
'Messire, believe me,' Koroviev responded, placing his hand on his
heart, 'in fun, merely in fun ...' Here he suddenly stretched himself
upwards, as if he were made of rubber, formed the fingers of his right hand
into some clever arrangement, twisted himself up like a screw, and then,
suddenly unwinding, whistled.
This whisde Margarita did not hear, but she saw it in the moment when
she, together with her fiery steed, was thrown some twenty yards away. An
oak tree beside her was torn up by the roots, and the ground was covered
with cracks all the way to the river. A huge slab of the bank, together with
the pier and the restaurant, sagged into the river. The water boiled, shot
up, and the entire excursion boat with its perfectly unharmed passengers was
washed on to the low bank opposite. A jackdaw, killed by Fagott's whistle,
was flung at the feet of Margarita's snorting steed.
The master was startled by this whistle. He clutched his head and ran
back to the group of waiting companions.
'Well, then,' Woland addressed him from the height of his steed, 'is
your farewell completed?'
'Yes, it's completed,' the master replied and, having calmed down,
looked directly and boldly into Woland's face.
And then over the hills like a trumpet blast rolled Woland's terrible
voice:
'It's time!!' - and with it the sharp whistle and guffaw of Behemoth.
The steeds tore off, and the riders rose into the air and galloped.
Margarita felt her furious steed champing and straining at the bit. Woland's
cloak billowed over the heads of the cavalcade; the cloak began to cover the
evening sky. When the black shroud was momentarily blown aside, Margarita
looked back as she rode and saw that there not only were no multicoloured
towers behind them, but the city itself had long been gone. It was as if it
had fallen through the earth - only mist and smoke were left...
Gods, my gods! How sad the evening earth! How mysterious the mists over
the swamps! He who has wandered in these mists, he who has suffered much
before death, he who has flown over this earth bearing on himself too heavy
a burden, knows it. The weary man knows it. And without regret he leaves the
mists of the earth, its swamps and rivers, with a light heart he gives
himself into the hands of death, knowing that she alone can bring him peace.
The magical black horses also became tired and carried their riders
slowly, and ineluctable night began to overtake them. Sensing it at his
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.
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.
'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 ever precise and accurate Azazello wanted to
make sure that everything was carried out properly. And everything turned
out to be in perfect order. Azazello saw a gloomy woman, who was waiting for
her husband's return, come out of her bedroom, suddenly turn pale, clutch
her heart, and cry helplessly:
'Natasha ... somebody ... come ...' and fall to the floor in the living
room before reaching the study.
'Everything's in order,' said Azazello. A moment later he was beside
the fallen lovers. Margarita lay with her face against the little rug. With
his iron hands, Azazello turned her over like a doll, face to him, and
peered at her. The face of the poisoned woman was changing before his eyes.
Even in the gathering dusk of the storm, one could see the temporary witch's
cast in her eyes and the cruelty and violence of her features disappear. The
face of the dead woman brightened and finally softened, and the look of her
bared teeth was no longer predatory but simply that of a suffering woman.
Then Azazello unclenched her white teeth and poured into her mouth
several drops of the same wine with which he had poisoned her. Margarita
sighed, began to rise without Azazello's help, sat up and asked weakly:
'Why, Azazello, why? What have you done to me?'
She saw the outstretched master, shuddered, and whispered:
'I didn't expect this ... murderer!'
'Oh, no, no,' answered Azazello, 'he'll rise presently. Ah, why are you
so nervous?'
Margarita believed him at once, so convincing was the red-headed
demon's voice. She jumped up, strong and alive, and helped to give the
outstretched man a drink of wine. Opening his eyes, he gave a dark look and
with hatred repeated his last word:
'Poisoner...'
'Ah, insults are the usual reward for a good job!' replied Azazello.
'Are you blind? Well, quickly recover your sight!'
Here the master rose, looked around with alive and bright eyes, and
asked:
'What does this new thing mean?'
'It means,' replied Azazello, 'that it's time for us to go. The storm
is already thundering, do you hear? It's getting dark. The steeds are pawing
the ground, your little garden is shuddering. Say farewell, quickly say
farewell to your little basement.'
'Ah, I understand...' the master said, glancing around, 'you've killed
us, we're dead. Oh, how intelligent that is! And how timely! Now I
understand everything.'
'Oh, for pity's sake,' replied Azazello, 'is it you I hear talking?
Your friend calls you a master, you can think, so how can you be dead?
Is it necessary, in order to consider yourself alive, to sit in a basement
and dress yourself in a shirt and hospital drawers? It's ridiculous! ...'
'I understand everything you're saying,' the master cried out, 'don't
go on! You're a thousand times right!'
'Great Woland!' Margarita began to echo him. 'Great Woland! He thought
it out much better than I did! But the novel, the novel,' she shouted to the
master, 'take the novel with you wherever you fly!' "
'No need,' replied the master, 'I remember it by heart.'
`But you won't ... you won't forget a single word of it?' Margarita
asked, pressing herself to her lover and wiping the blood from his cut
temple.
'Don't worry. I'll never forget anything now,' he replied.
'Fire, then!' cried Azazello. 'Fire, with which all began and with
which we end it all.'
'Fire!' Margarita cried terribly. The little basement window banged,
the curtain was beaten aside by the wind. The sky thundered merrily and
briefly. Azazello thrust his clawed hand into the stove, pulled out a
smoking brand, and set fire to the tablecloth. Then he set fire to the stack
of old newspapers on the sofa, and next to the manuscripts and the window
curtain.
The master, already drunk with the impending ride, flung some book from
the shelf on to the table, ruffled its pages in the flame of the tablecloth,
and the book blazed up merrily.
'Burn, burn, former life!'
'Burn, suffering!' cried Margarita.
The room was already swaying in crimson pillars, and along with the
smoke the three ran out of the door, went up the stone steps, and came to
the yard. The first thing they saw there was the landlord's cook sitting on
the ground. Beside her lay spilled potatoes and several bunches of onions.
The cook's state was comprehensible. Three black steeds snorted by the shed,
twitching, sending up fountains of earth. Margarita mounted first, then
Azazello, and last the master. The cook moaned and wanted to raise her hand
to make the sign of the cross, but Azazello shouted menacingly from the
saddle:
'I'll cut your hand off!' He whistled, and the steeds, breaking through
the linden branches, soared up and pierced the low black cloud. Smoke poured
at once from the basement window. From below came the weak, pitiful cry of
the cook:
'We're on fire...'
The steeds were already racing over the rooftops of Moscow.
'I want to bid farewell to the city,' the master cried to Azazello, who
rode at their head. Thunder ate up the end of the master's phrase. Azazello
nodded and sent his horse into a gallop. The dark cloud flew precipitously
to meet the fliers, but as yet gave not a sprinkle of rain.
They flew over the boulevards, they saw little figures of people
scatter, running for shelter from the rain. The first drops were falling.
They flew over smoke - all that remained of Griboedov House. They flew over
the city which was already being flooded by darkness. Over them lightning
flashed. Soon the roofs gave place to greenery. Only then did the rain pour
down, transforming the fliers into three huge bubbles in the water.
Margarita was already familiar with the sensation of flight, but the
master was not, and he marvelled at how quickly they reached their goal, the
one to whom he wished to bid farewell, because he had no one else to bid
farewell to. He immediately recognized through the veil of rain the building
of Stravinsky's clinic, the river, and the pine woods on the other bank,
which he had studied so well. They came down in the clearing of a copse not
far from the clinic.
'I'll wait for you here,' cried Azazello, his hands to his mouth, now
lit up by lightning, now disappearing behind the grey veil. 'Say your
farewells, but be quick!'
The master and Margarita jumped from their saddles and flew, flickering
like watery shadows, through the clinic garden. A moment later the master,
with an accustomed hand, was pushing aside the balcony grille of room
no.117. Margarita followed after him. They stepped into Ivanushka's room,
unseen and unnoticed in the rumbling and howling of the storm. The master
stopped by the bed. Ivanushka lay motionless, as before, when for the first
time he had watched a storm in the house of his repose. But he was not
weeping as he had been then. Once he had taken a good look at the dark
silhouette that burst into his room from the balcony, he raised himself,
held out his hands, and said joyfully:
'Ah, it's you! And I kept waiting and waiting for you! And here you
are, my neighbour!'
To this the master replied:
'I'm here, but unfortunately I cannot be your neighbour any longer. I'm
flying away for ever, and I've come to you only to say farewell.'
'I knew that, I guessed it,' Ivan replied quietly and asked: 'You met
him?'
'Yes,' said the master. 'I've come to say farewell to you, because you
are the only person I've talked with lately.'
Ivanushka brightened up and said:
`It's good that you stopped off here. I'll keep my word, I won't write
any more poems. I'm interested in something else now,' Ivanushka smiled and
with mad eyes looked somewhere past the master. 'I want to write something
else. You know, while I lay here, a lot became clear to me.'
The master was excited by these words and, sitting on the edge of
Ivanushka's bed, said:
'Ah, but that's good, that's good. You'll write a sequel about him.'
Ivanushka's eyes lit up.
'But won't you do that yourself?' Here he hung his head and added
pensively: 'Ah, yes ... what am I asking?' Ivanushka looked sidelong at the
floor, his eyes fearful.
'Yes,' said the master, and his voice seemed unfamiliar and hollow to
Ivanushka, `I won't write about him any more now. I'll be occupied with
other things.'
A distant whistle cut through the noise of the storm.
'Do you hear?' asked the master.
'The noise of the storm ...'
'No, I'm being called, it's time for me to go,' explained the master,
and he got up from the bed.
"Wait! One word more,' begged Ivan. "Did you find her? Did she remain
faithful to you?'
`Here she is,' the master replied and pointed to the wall. The dark
Margarita separated from the white wall and came up to the bed. She looked
at the young man lying there and sorrow could be read in her eyes.
'Poor boy, poor boy ...' Margarita whispered soundlessly and bent down
to the bed.
'She's so beautiful,' Ivan said, without envy, but sadly, and with a
certain quiet tenderness. 'Look how well everything has turned out for you.
But not so for me.' Here he thought a little and added thoughtfully:
'Or else maybe it is so...'
'It is so, it is so,' whispered Margarita, and she bent closer to him.
'I'm going to kiss you now, and everything will be as it should be with
you ... believe me in that, I've seen everything, I know everything ...' The
young man put his arms around her neck and she kissed him.
'Farewell, disciple,' the master said barely audibly and began melting
into air. He disappeared, and Margarita disappeared with him. The balcony
grille was closed.
Ivanushka fell into anxiety. He sat up in bed, looked around uneasily,
even moaned, began talking to himself, got up. The storm raged more and
more, and evidendy stirred up his soul. He was also upset by the troubling
footsteps and muted voices that his ear, accustomed to the constant silence,
heard outside the door. He called out, now nervous and trembling:
'Praskovya Fyodorovna!'
Praskovya Fyodorovna was already coming into the room, looking at
Ivanushka questioningly and uneasily.
'What? What is it?' she asked. The storm upsets you? Never mind, never
mind ... we'll help you now ... I'll call the doctor now ...'
'No, Praskovya Fyodorovna, you needn't call the doctor,' said
Ivanushka, looking anxiously not at Praskovya Fyodorovna but into the wall.
'There's nothing especially the matter with me. I can sort things out
now, don't worry. But you'd better tell me,' Ivan begged soulfully, 'what
just happened in room one-eighteen?'
'Eighteen?' Praskovya Fyodorovna repeated, and her eyes became furtive.
'Why, nothing happened there.' But her voice was false, Ivanushka
noticed it at once and said:
'Eh, Praskovya Fyodorovna! You're such a truthful person... You think
I'll get violent? No, Praskovya Fyodorovna, that won't happen. You'd better
speak direcdy, for I can feel everything through the wall.'
'Your neighbour has just passed away,' whispered Praskovya Fyodorovna,
unable to overcome her truthfulness and kindness, and, all clothed in a
flash of lightning, she looked fearfully at Ivanushka. But nothing terrible
happened to Ivanushka. He only raised his finger significandy and said:
'I knew it! I assure you, Praskovya Fyodorovna, that yet another person
has just passed away in the city. I even know who,' here Ivanushka smiled
mysteriously. 'It's a woman!'
The storm was swept away without a trace, and a multicoloured rainbow,
its arch thrown across all of Moscow, stood in the sky, drinking water from
the Moscow River. High up, on a hill between two copses, three dark
silhouettes could be seen. Woland, Koroviev and Behemoth sat in the saddle
on three black horses, looking at the city spread out beyond the river, with
the fragmented sun glittering in thousands of windows facing west, and at
the gingerbread towers of the Devichy Convent. [2]
There was a noise in the air, and Azazello, who had the master and
Margarita flying in the black tail of his cloak, alighted with them beside
the waiting group.
'We had to trouble you a little, Margarita Nikolaevna and master,'
Woland began after some silence, 'but you won't grudge me that. I don't
think you will regret it. So, then,' he addressed the master alone, 'bid
farewell to the city. It's time for us to go,' Woland pointed with his
black-gauntleted hand to where numberless suns melted the glass beyond the
river, to where, above these suns, stood the mist, smoke and steam of the
city scorched all day.
The master threw himself out of the saddle, left the mounted ones, and
ran to the edge of the hillside. The black cloak dragged on the ground
behind him. The master began to look at the city. In the first moments a
wringing sadness crept over his heart, but it very quickly gave wav to a
sweetish anxiety, a wondering gypsy excitement.
`For ever! ... That needs to be grasped,' the master whispered and
licked his dry, cracked lips. He began to heed and take precise note of
everything that went on in his soul. His excitement turned, as it seemed to
him, into a feeling of deep and grievous offence. But it was unstable,
vanished, and gave way for some reason to a haughty indifference, and that
to a foretaste of enduring peace.
The group of riders waited silently for the master. The group of riders
watched the black, long figure on the edge of the hillside gesticulate, now
raising his head, as if trying to reach across the whole city with his eyes,
to peer beyond its limits, now hanging his head down, as if studying the
trampled, meagre grass under his feet. The silence was broken by the bored
Behemoth. `Allow me, maltre,' he began, 'to give a farewell whisde before
the ride.'
'You may frighten the lady,' Woland answered, 'and, besides, don't
forget that all your outrages today are now at an end.'
'Ah, no, no, Messire,' responded Margarita, who sat side-saddle, arms
akimbo, the sharp corner of her train hanging to the ground, 'allow him, let
him whisde. I'm overcome with sadness before the long journey. Isn't it
true, Messire, it's quite natural even when a person knows that happiness is
waiting at the end of the road? Let him make us laugh, or I'm afraid it will
end in tears, and everything will be spoiled before the journey!'
Woland nodded to Behemoth, who became all animated, jumped down from
the saddle, put his fingers in his mouth, puffed out his cheeks, and
whistled. Margarita's ears rang. Her horse reared, in the copse dry twigs
rained down from the trees, a whole flock of crows and sparrows flew up, a
pillar of dust went sweeping down to the river, and, as an excursion boat
was passing the pier, one could see several of the passengers' caps blow off
into the water.
The whistle made the master start, yet he did not turn, but began
gesticulating still more anxiously, raising his hand to the sky as if
threatening the city. Behemoth gazed around proudly.
'That was whistled, I don't argue,' Koroviev observed condescendingly,
'whistled indeed, but, to be impartial, whistled rather middlingly.'
'I'm not a choirmaster,' Behemoth replied with dignity, puffing up, and
he winked unexpectedly at Margarita.
'Give us a try, for old times' sake,' Koroviev said, rubbed his hand,
and breathed on his fingers.
'Watch out, watch out,' came the stern voice of Woland on his horse,
'no inflicting of injuries.'
'Messire, believe me,' Koroviev responded, placing his hand on his
heart, 'in fun, merely in fun ...' Here he suddenly stretched himself
upwards, as if he were made of rubber, formed the fingers of his right hand
into some clever arrangement, twisted himself up like a screw, and then,
suddenly unwinding, whistled.
This whisde Margarita did not hear, but she saw it in the moment when
she, together with her fiery steed, was thrown some twenty yards away. An
oak tree beside her was torn up by the roots, and the ground was covered
with cracks all the way to the river. A huge slab of the bank, together with
the pier and the restaurant, sagged into the river. The water boiled, shot
up, and the entire excursion boat with its perfectly unharmed passengers was
washed on to the low bank opposite. A jackdaw, killed by Fagott's whistle,
was flung at the feet of Margarita's snorting steed.
The master was startled by this whistle. He clutched his head and ran
back to the group of waiting companions.
'Well, then,' Woland addressed him from the height of his steed, 'is
your farewell completed?'
'Yes, it's completed,' the master replied and, having calmed down,
looked directly and boldly into Woland's face.
And then over the hills like a trumpet blast rolled Woland's terrible
voice:
'It's time!!' - and with it the sharp whistle and guffaw of Behemoth.
The steeds tore off, and the riders rose into the air and galloped.
Margarita felt her furious steed champing and straining at the bit. Woland's
cloak billowed over the heads of the cavalcade; the cloak began to cover the
evening sky. When the black shroud was momentarily blown aside, Margarita
looked back as she rode and saw that there not only were no multicoloured
towers behind them, but the city itself had long been gone. It was as if it
had fallen through the earth - only mist and smoke were left...
Gods, my gods! How sad the evening earth! How mysterious the mists over
the swamps! He who has wandered in these mists, he who has suffered much
before death, he who has flown over this earth bearing on himself too heavy
a burden, knows it. The weary man knows it. And without regret he leaves the
mists of the earth, its swamps and rivers, with a light heart he gives
himself into the hands of death, knowing that she alone can bring him peace.
The magical black horses also became tired and carried their riders
slowly, and ineluctable night began to overtake them. Sensing it at his