"Mikhail Afanasievich Bulgakov" "The Master and Margarita" "PART NINE" "So tell me I would like to know your thoughts on this matter?" "Where are you going to look for him?" "Sit down, head of the secret service..." "I am going to look for him not far from the oil press in the garden of Gethsemane." "And why there, precisely?" "As I figure it, in any case it isn't possible that Judas was killed in Yershalaim itself he was killed near the city." "They managed to lure him out of the city..." "Who could have lured him, and how?" "Yes, Procurator that is the most difficult question in the whole affair!" "...and I don't even know if I will succeed in resolving it." "Could it have been done by a woman?" "By no means, Procurator!" "That possibility is utterly excluded such an interpretation of the murder can only throw us off the track, hinder the investigation and confuse me." "But what is it?" "I suppose it's money again!" "An excellent thought..." "But who could have offered him money at night, outside the city, and for what?" "Oh, no, Procurator, it's not that..." "Judas wanted to hide his money in a secluded place known only to himself." "Now I understand you he was lured out not by others but by his own purpose." "Yes, yes, yes that's so!" "I will immediately start a search for the murderers who tracked Judas out of the city." "And I myself, meanwhile, as I have already reported to you will stand trial!" "I declare to you Aphranius that I do not consider it necessary to try you!" "You did all you could and no one in the world could do more than you!" "Ah, yes I forgot to ask how did they manage to foist the money on Kaifa?" "You see." "Procurator... that is not especially complicated..." "They threw the packet over the fence!" "With a note?" "Yes!" "...exactly as you suspected, Procurator." "Good heavens, what are you doing, Aphranius those must be temple seals!" "The procurator needn't trouble himself with that question..." ""I return the cursed money. "" "Can it be that you have all the seals?" "It couldn't be otherwise." "Procurator!" "I can imagine the effect at Kaifa's!" "Yes, Procurator it caused great agitation." "To my question whether anyone had been paid money in Kaifa's palace?" "I was told categorically that there had been nothing of the sort!" "Well, so if no one was paid, no one was paid!" "It will be that much harder to find the killers!" "Absolutely right." "Procurator!" "But it suddenly occurs to me, Aphranius might he not have killed himself?" "Oh, no." "Procurator excuse me, but that is entirely unlikely!" "Ah, everything is likely in this city!" "I'm ready to bet that in a very short time rumors of it will spread all over the city!" "That may be." "Procurator!" "So then, the question is clear..." "Let's go on on to the burial." "The executed men have been buried, Procurator!" "Oh, Aphranius, it would be a crime to try you..." "You're deserving of the highest reward." "How was it?" "A secret guard detachment, led by my assistant, arrived at the hill as the evening came..." "One of the bodies was not found on the hilltop!" "Ah, how did I not foresee it!" "No need to worry, Procurator it was discovered in a very short time." "A certain man..." "Matthew Levi!" "Yes, Procurator Matthew Levi was hiding in a cave, waiting for darkness..." "The naked body of Yeshua Ha-Nozri was with him!" "When the guards entered the cave with a torch Levi fell into despair and wrath - waving a knife!" "Did they have to arrest him?" "They managed to quiet the impudent madman, explaining to him that the body would be buried." "Was he chased away?" "No, Procurator, no." "He was allowed to take part in the burial Perhaps my assistant made a mistake?" "There was no mistake." "Generally, I am beginning to feel a bit at a loss, Aphranius I am apparently dealing with a man who never makes mistakes!" "That man is you!" "Matthew Levi was taken in the cart with the bodies of the executed men and in about two hours they reached a solitary ravine." "There the detachment dug a deep hole and buried all three executed men in it." "Ah, if only I had foreseen it..." "I needed to see this Matthew Levi..." "He is here." "Procurator." "I thank you Aphranius for everything that has been done in this affair." "I request that the detachment that performed the burial be given rewards." "I beg you to accept this as a memento." "A great honor Procurator!" "What's wrong with you?" "I'm tired..." "Sit down!" "Explain to me, why did you not sit in the chair?" "I'm dirty, I'd soil it..." "You'll presently be given something to eat." "I don't want to eat!" "Why lie?" "You haven't eaten for the whole day and maybe even longer." "Very well don't eat." "I've summoned you so that you could show me the knife you had with you." "The soldiers took it from me when they brought me here." "You must give it back to me I have to return it to its owner I stole it." "What for?" "To cut the ropes..." "Mark!" "Give me his knife!" "Concerning the knife you needn't worry it will be returned to the shop." "But now show me that parchment you carry with you on which Yeshua's words are written down." "You want to take away the last thing I have!" "I didn't say "give me" I said "show me"!" ""... there is no death... "" ""... yesterday we ate sweet spring baccuroth... "" ""... we shall see the pure river of the water of life... "" ""... mankind shall look at the sun through transparent crystal... "" ""... greater vice cowardice... "" "Take it!" "You're a bookish man, I see and there's no need for you to go around alone in beggar's clothing, without shelter." "I have a big library in Caesarea I am very rich and want to take you to work for me." "You will sort out and look after the papyri you will be fed and clothed!" "No, I don't want to!" "Why?" "Am I disagreeable to you Are you afraid of me?" "No!" "...because you'll be afraid of me It won't be very easy for you to look me in the face now that you've killed him!" "Quiet!" "Take some money..." "You learned nothing of what he taught you!" "For if you had you would certainly take something from me." "Bear in mind that before he died he said he did not blame anyone!" "You are vindictive!" "...and he was not." "Where will you go?" "Know, Hegemon that in Yershalaim I am going to kill a man!" "I wanted to tell you that, so you'd know there will be more blood!" "I, too, know there will be more of it..." "You want, of course, to kill me?" "No!" "You I won't manage to kill I'm not such a foolish man as to count on that." "But I'll kill Judas of Kiriath I'll devote the rest of my life to it!" "You won't manage to do it don't trouble yourself This night, Judas was killed!" "Who?" "!" "Who did it?" "!" "Don't be jealous..." "I'm afraid he had other admirers besides you!" "Who did it...?" "I did it!" "It is, of course, not much to have done but all the same I did it." "Well and now will you take something?" "Have them give me a piece of clean parchment." "Greetings, Ivan Nikolaevich!" "I'm an investigator..." "I'd like to talk over the events at the Patriarch's Ponds two days ago." "I've heard you wanted to meet with us!" "So we meet..." "Are you no longer concerned with Berlioz's fate?" "I'm ready to answer all of your questions!" "Tell me, Ivan Nikolaevich, how far were you from the turnstile at the time when Berlioz slipped under the tram-car?" "I was far away!" "And the chequered one was right by the turnstile?" "So you know about the chequered one...?" "...and the cat we know everything!" "Once again... where was he?" "He sat on the bench, not far..." "You clearly recall, Ivan Nikolaevich that he did not go up to the turnstile at the moment when Berlioz fell?" "I recall He didn't go up to it." "I wish you a speedy recovery!" "I hope that we would soon be reading your poetry again." "No, I won't write any more poetry!" "... ...they were bad poems!" "...now I understand it!" "Likhodeev?" "You're under arrest" "Please lock me up in a bulletproof cell!" "...on Thursday afternoon in my office at the Variety I got drunk after which I went somewhere, but where I don't remember!" "...I remember I drank starka somewhere but where" " I don't remember then I laid about somewhere under a fence but where" " I don't remember and so on..." "You Varenukha, with your silly and senseless behavior are interfering with the investigation into an important matter!" "...for which you will obviously be charged!" "I'm lying I'm lying because I've been badly frightened by the gang who held me!" "Please I beg you.." "...I want to be locked up... in a bulletproof cell" "Pah, the devil!" "Really, them and their bulletproof cells!" "They've been badly frightened by those scoundrels!" "Calm down Varenukha we'll protect you without any cell!" "Tell us all about it!" "I have not drunk any starka under a fence I had been beaten by two!" ".. one red-haired and with a fang, the other fat!" "Ah, resembling a cat?" "Yes, yes, yes!" "I was for some two days in apartment no. 50 in the quality of a tip-off vampire!" "...who had all but caused the death of the findirector Rimsky!" "Yes it's not easy to believe you..." "One moment!" "A certificate!" "It is hereby certified that the bearer, Nikolai Ivanovich spent... the night..." "Behemoth" "How's that possible?" "It was Natasha, neighbor's housekeeper had flown out the window, got astride me and dragged me away from Moscow..." "Obedient to constraint, I was compelled to submit!" "I have a request to you!" "Lock me up in a bulletproof cell?" "No!" "Don't tell anything to my wife!" "Did you see in the window of your office, the suspect known as Hella?" "Did you talk in your office with administrator Varenukha?" "How did you get to Leningrad?" "I felt bad and in a state of unconsciousness I left..." "Lock me up in a bulletproof cell!" "I understand!" "Very well!" "Three teams ready to go!" "Immediately!" "Sadovaya 302-bis!" "Apartment 50 is again showing signs of life!" "And what are those footsteps on the stairs?" "That's them coming to arrest us!" "They're all at home." "However..." "Comrade Sidorov!" "That's quite something..." "Exceptionally neat job!" "Ain't misbehaving ain't bothering anybody just reparating my primus!" "and I also consider it my duty to warn you that the cat is an ancient and inviolable animal!" "Well, you inviolable, ventriloquous cat..." "It's all over..." "Take him!" "Legs, comrade officer..." "The only thing that can save a mortally wounded cat is a swig of gasoline!" "You can't touch..." "The net, the net, throw!" "..." "It's hooked!" "Halt - take him alive!" "Halt" " I say!" "I utterly fail to comprehend the reasons for such harsh treatment of me..." "Tear it off!" "I challenge you to a duel!" "Shoot him!" "Quiet, quiet, quiet!" "What's going on in the apartment?" "!" "They prevent me from working!" "Well, it's Behemoth, of course, devil take him!" "Messire!" "It's Saturday, The sun is setting!" "Time to go..." "Excuse me I can't talk any more time to go!" "Get him!" "Through the corridor..." "Fire department?" "To the right!" "Go to the right!" "...Sadovaya 302-bis, come at once!" "Search for them in the whole Moscow!" "Send IPB to all train stations!" "Take them dead or alive!" "No cats allowed!" "I beg your pardon, no cats, you say?" "..." "And where do you see any cats!" "?" "We only accept currency!" "My dear man, how do you know I don't have any?" "Are you judging by my clothes?" "Never do so, my most precious custodian..." "You may make a mistake, and a big one at that!" "Maybe I've got a whole primus full of currency!" "?" "A wonderful store!" "A very, very fine store!" "Yes!" "Mommy, buy me some candy!" "Let's go sweetie, we have no money!" "Is good?" "Top-notch!" "Good I like bad I don't!" "This department is splendid, too!" "... ...and the foreigner is a likeable fellow!" "No, Fagott, no!" "...you're mistaken, the gentleman's face lacks something, in my opinion!" "Here you are!" "How many for you?" "One!" "How much are the mandarins?" "Three rubles a kilo!" "I'd like a bite..." "Eat up." "Behemoth!" "What are you doing?" "You're out of your mind!" "I, I will just wait..." "He's eating right here!" "Don't swallow!" "Eat like a normal person nobody's taking them away!" "...why, you!" "Palosich!" "Palosich!" "Give me the receipt!" "My darling, my beauty we're out of currency today!" "... ...what can we do?" "But I swear to you, by next time and no later than Monday we'll pay it all in pure cash!" "It's ok, yes?" "We're from near by, on Sadovaya where they're having the fire." "Call the police!" "Palosich!" "What's this you're up to, vermin?" "Palosich!" "..." "Palosich!" "Whistle!" "Citizens!" "...what's going on here?" "Allow me to ask you that what's going on here?" "The poor man!" "The poor man spends all day reparating primuses!" "He got hungry!" "and where's he going to get currency?" "!" "You just stop that!" "Where?" " I ask you all this question?" "Where" " I ask?" "..." "True!" "He's languishing with hunger and thirst he's hot!" "He took and sampled a mandarin and worth of that mandarin is five rubles..." "And here they go whistling like spring nightingales!" "bothering the police, tearing them away from their business!" "But he's allowed, eh...?" "...he's allowed?" "!" "Who are you?" "Who is he...?" "Where did he come from?" "Why?" "Couldn't we do without him..." "Did we invite him, or what!" "Of course!" "Just look at him, in his smart suit all swollen with salmon!" "...all stuffed with currency!" "and us what about the likes of us..." "I'm bitter, comrades!" "...Bitter, bitter..." "What are you doing citizen?" "!" "Help me!" "Murder!" "Police!" "...they are murdering me!" "Open the door!" "Freeze..." "Don't make a move!" "Calm down citizens calm down!" "Everybody back, Halt!" "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 resolved to devote their lives to the service of Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Thalia." "Like pineapples in a greenhouse!" "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?" "Frightful to think of!" "Yes but!" "..." "But, I say and I repeat this but if they don't rot?" "And it does happen with pineapples!" "Oh, my, does it..." "Incidentally, what are they doing on the veranda?" "Having dinner!" "...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..." "Your identification cards!" "A thousand pardons, but what identification cards?" "You're writers?" "Unquestionably - take of your hat!" "Your identification cards!" "My sweetie..." "I'm no sweetie!" "More's the pity, more's the pity!" "Well, so 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!" "...And I don't think he even had any identification card!" "What do you think?" "I'll bet he didn't!" "You're not Dostoevsky!" "Well, who knows, who knows..." "Dostoevsky's dead!" "What?" "!" "I protest!" "Dostoevsky is immortal!" "Let them pass, Sofya Pavlovna!" "What is your name?" "Panaev..." "Skabichevsky!" "Just take a look!" "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?" "I understand!" "I might recommend a little fillet of hazel-grouse..." "Excuse me!" "One moment..." "I'll see to the fillets personally!" "Miss, get me NKVD!" "...right now!" "Here's the grouse!" "Don't move!" "Oh... just like children!" "In connection with the case we detained in Leningrad, the citizens Wolman and Wolper ...in Saratov, Kiev and Kharkov, three Volodins ...in Kazan, one Volokh ...and in Penza, for totally unknown reasons doctor of chemical sciences Vetchinkevich" "...True, he was enormously tall, very swarthy and dark-haired!" "In various places, besides that nine Korovins, four Korovkins and two Karavaevs were caught" "A certain citizen was taken off the Sebastopol train at the Belgorod station This citizen had decided to entertain his fellow passengers with card tricks." "In Yaroslavl, a citizen came to a restaurant at lunch-time carrying a primus in his hand which he had just picked up from being repaired." "The moment they saw him, the two doormen abandoned their posts in the coatroom and after them fled all the restaurant's customers and personnel." "...With that, the girl at the cash register had all the money disappear on her..." "But there were other victims as well, sadly enough, black cats were rounded up..." "For instance in Armavir one of these perfectly guiltless beasts was brought to the police by some citizen with its front paws tied!" "Get out!" ""A lot of them sits on these floors... "" ""Society helps the commission in cleanup. "" ""Workers of the Electric Plant GET take part in the cleanup of NKF SSSR"" ""Chairman of the Central Cleanup Commission comrade Peters"" ""Member of the commission" " GET worker - comrade Tamarina"" ""Former eser" " Segal - cleared. "" ""Court sentenced the following citizens to death by a shooting squad and forfeiture of all possessions"" ""Medical News"" "Such an interesting city, is it not?" "I like Rome better, Messire..." "Yes, it's a matter of taste" "And what is that smoke there on the boulevard..." "That is Griboedov's burning!" "It must be supposed that that inseparable pair Koroviev and Behemoth stopped by there?" "!" "Of that there can be no doubt, Messire!" "Leave us!" "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!" "If you've come to see me why didn't you wish me a good evening, former tax collector?" "Because I don't wish you a good anything!" "But you'll have to reconcile yourself to that..." "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 also have shadows and living beings too." "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!" "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!" "I'm his disciple." "You and I speak different languages, as usual but the things we say don't change for all that!" "And so...?" "He has read the master's work 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 you know that very well." "But why don't you take him with you into the light?" "He does not deserve the light he deserves peace." "Tell him it will be done..." "And leave me immediately!" "He asks that she who loved him and suffered because of him also be taken with him!" "We would never have thought of it without you!" "Go!" "Messire...?" "Fly to them and arrange it all!"