Mikhail Afanasievich Bulgakov
The Master and Margarita
PART TEN
Listen...
...you're an intelligent person and have never been crazy...
are you seriously convinced that we were...
...at Satan's yesterday?
Quite seriously!
Of course...
so now we have...
...instead of one madman - the two of us!
No, the devil knows what this is!
The devil, the devil...
I'm not sure this food...
...isn't about to fall through the floor...
...or fly out the window?
It won't fly out!
The devil...
The devil, how happy I am that I struck a bargain with him!
You'll have to, my dear...
...live...
...with a witch!
And you've really come to resemble a witch...
...you know?
I don't deny it!
I'm a witch!
...and I'm very glad of it!
Well, all right...
so you're a witch...
...splendid...
And I've been stolen...
...from the hospital.
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?
There, it's beginning!
Aloisy, are you home?
He was arrested yesterday!
Who's asking for him?
What's your name?
How you've suffered...
...my poor one.
...I'm the only one who knows it.
Look...
...you've got gray hair...
...and an eternal crease by your lips!
My dearest...
...my only one!
...don't think about anything!
You've had to think too much...
Now I'll think for you!
I promise!
I promise...
...that everything will be dazzlingly well!
I'm not afraid of anything, Margot...
...they tried too hard to frighten me, and cannot frighten me with anything any more!
But I pity you, Margot!
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 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...
...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...
Look what eyes you've got...
...There's a desert in them...
...and the shoulders...
...with their burden...
...crippled...
...crippled!
Enough...
...You've shamed me...
...Never again will I come back to this question...
...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...
I swear to you by your life...
I swear by the astrologer's son whom you guessed...
...that all will be well!
Of course!
When people have been robbed of everything, like you and me...
...they seek salvation from other-worldly powers...
Other-worldly or not other-worldly...
...isn't it all the same...?
I want to eat!
Peace be unto you!
Why, it's Azazello!...
Ah, how nice, how good!... You see?
...we're not abandoned!
Cover yourself at least!
Spit on it!
Forgive me, Azazello, for being naked!
Not to worry...
...I've seen not only naked women...
...but even women...
...with their skin flayed clean off!
A cozy 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!
Why do you trouble me, Azazello...?
...We'll live somehow or other!
Please, please!...
...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 ordered me to tell you that he invites you...
...to go on a little excursion with him!
If you wish, of course...
With great pleasure...
We hope that Margarita Nikolaevna...
...will also not decline the invitation?
I certainly will not!
A wonderful thing!
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!
You mustn't blame me too severely for it...
...you don't meet unclean powers...
...every day!
That you don't...
Wouldn't it be pleasant...
...if it was every day!
I like quickness myself...
...I like quickness and nakedness!
And again I forgot...
...I'm quite frazzled...
...Messire sends you a present!
Falernian wine!
I beg you to note that it's the same wine...
...the procurator of Judea drank!
To Woland's health!
Margot?!
Poisoner...!
somebody... come!
Everything's in order...
Why, Azazello?
...why?
What have you done to me?!
Ah, why are you so nervous?
I didn't expect this...
Murderer!
He'll rise presently...
Poisoner!
Ah, insults are the usual reward for a good job!
Are you blind?...
Well, quickly recover your sight!
Margot?
Margot!
What does this new thing mean?...
It means, that it's time for us to go!...
...The storm is thundering... getting dark...
...The steeds are pawing the ground...
...your little garden is shuddering!
Say farewell to your little basement...
Say farewell, quickly!
Ah, I understand!...
...you've...
...killed us!
We're dead...
Oh, how...
...intelligent that is!
Oh, for pity's sake, is it you I hear talking?...
Your friend calls you...
...a master?
If you can think...
...how can you be dead?
I understand everything you're saying...
You're a thousand times right!
Is it necessary, in order to consider yourself alive...
...to sit in a basement...
...dressed in a shirt and hospital drawers?
It's ridiculous!
Great Woland!...
Great Woland!
He thought it out much better than I did!
But the novel, the novel, take the novel with you wherever you fly!
No need...
...I remember it by heart.
Fire, then!...
Fire, with which all began...
...and with which we end it all.
Fire!
Burn, burn, former life!
Burn, suffering!
I'll cut your hand off!
I want to bid farewell...
I'll wait for you here!
Say your farewells, but be quick!
Ah, it's you!
And I kept waiting and waiting for you...
And here you are, my neighbor!
I'm here...
...but unfortunately I cannot be your neighbor any longer!
I'm flying away...
...forever!
I knew that...
...I guessed it...
You met him?...
Yes!
I've come to say farewell to you...
...because...
...you are the only person...
...I've talked with lately.
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...
I want to write something else.
You know, while I lay here...
...a lot became clear to me...
Ah, but that's good...
...that's good!
You'll write a sequel about him!
But won't you do that yourself?
Ah, yes...
...what am I asking.
I won't write about him any more now...
I'll be occupied with other things!
Do you hear?
The noise of the storm...
No...
I'm being called...
...it's time for me to go!
Wait...
One word more...
Did you find her?
Yes!
Did she remain faithful to you?
Here she is...
Poor boy, poor boy...
She's so beautiful!
How well everything has turned out for you...
But not so for me...
Or else...
...maybe it is so?
It is so, it is so...
I'm going to kiss you now on the forehead...
...and everything will be as it should be with you...
...believe me in that...
I've seen everything...
I know everything...
Farewell, disciple!
Praskovya Fyodorovna!
What? What is it?...
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...
...nothing especially the matter with me...
I can sort things out now...
Don't worry...
But you'd better tell me, Praskovya Fyodorovna...
...what just happened next door?
...what just happened in room one-eighteen?
Eighteen?... Why, nothing happened there!
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 directly...
...for I can feel everything through the wall...
Your neighbor has just passed away...
...a moment ago.
I knew it!
I assure you...
...that yet another person has just passed away in the city...
I even know who...
It's a woman.
Why has he changed so?
This knight once made...
...an unfortunate joke!
The pun he thought up...
...in a discussion about light and darkness...
...was not altogether good.
And after that the knight had to go on joking a bit more...
...and longer...
...than he supposed!
But this is one of the nights...
...when accounts are settled...
...The knight has paid up...
...and closed his account!
I wanted to show you...
...your hero...
For about two thousand years...
...he has been sitting on this platform...
...sleeping...
...but when the full moon comes,
...as you see, he is tormented by insomnia.
It torments not only him, but also his faithful guardian, the dog...
Well...
...he who loves must share the lot...
...of the one he loves!
What is he saying?
He says that even the moon...
...gives him no peace...
...and that his is a bad job!
That is what he always says...
...when he is not asleep...
...and when he sleeps...
...he dreams one and the same thing...
...there is a path of moonlight...
...and he wants to walk down it...
...and talk with the prisoner Ha-Nozri...
...because, as he insists, he never finished...
...then, on the fourteenth day of the spring month of Nisan.
But, alas...
...for some reason he never manages to get on to this path...
...and no one comes to him!
And to his talk about the moon he often adds...
...that of all things in the world, he most hates his immortality...
...and his unheard-of fame.
He maintains that he would willingly exchange his lot...
...for that of the ragged tramp Matthew Levi.
Let him go!
Don't shout in the mountains...
...he's accustomed to avalanches anyway, and it won't rouse him.
You don't need to ask for him, Margarita...
...because the one he so yearns to talk with...
...has already asked for him.
Well, now...
...you can finish your novel with one phrase!
Finish your novel!
You're free!...
You're free! He's waiting for you!...
I'm to follow him there?
No...
...why run after what is already finished?
...let's not interfere with them...
And maybe they'll still arrive at something?
There, then?
Not there, either...
...what are you going to do in the little basement...
Am I not right?...
What I am offering you...
...and what Yeshua has asked for you...
...is better still...
...oh, thrice-romantic master...
...can it be that you don't want to go...
...strolling with your friend in the daytime under cherry trees...
...just coming into bloom?
...and in the evening listen to Schubert's music?
Can it be that you won't like writing by candlelight...
...with a goose quill?
There! There!
The house and the old servant...
...are already waiting for you...
...the candles are already burning...
...and soon they will go out, because you will immediately meet the dawn.
Down this path, master...
...this one.
Farewell...
It's time for me to go!
Farewell!
Listen...
...to the stillness...
Listen...
...and enjoy...
...what you were not given in life.
Peace...
Look, there ahead...
...is your eternal home...
...which you have been given as a reward.
There, Venetian window...
...and the twisting vine...
...it climbs right up to the roof.
I know...
...that in the evenings you will be visited by those...
...you love...
...those who interest you...
...and who will never trouble you.
They will play for you...
...they will sing for you...
...you will see what light is in the room...
...when the candles are burning.
You will fall asleep with a smile on your lips...
Sleep will strengthen you.
You will reason wisely...
And you will no longer be able to drive me away...
I will watch over your sleep.
I feel like I'm being set free...
...as I myself had just set free...
...the hero I had created...
The hero had gone into the abyss...
...gone irrevocably...
...forgiven on the eve of Sunday...
...the son of the astrologer-king...
...the cruel fifth procurator of Judea...
...the equestrian Pontius Pilate.
Epilogue
Planetarium
The goal of our conference...
...organized in the Science Citadel...
...of the Moscow Planetarium...
...is the necessity of verifying...
...pulled out of thin air...
...anti-scientific...
...and politically harmful rumors...
...brewing for some time in Moscow and vicinity...
I should warn you...
...that our point of view, that will be presented here...
...is deemed one and only correct!
Spreading any other view points...
...by certain citizens...
...whether unintentional...
...or for any other purpose...
...will be treated as...
...as enemy action!
The general conclusions are these...
...there is a gang of hypnotists!
This is fully in agreement with materialistic...
...approach of Academician Pavlov.
Representatives of the investigation...
...and experienced psychiatrists established that...
...the criminal gang...
...whose members...
...or one of them perhaps...
...suspicion falls mainly on one called...
...Koroviev.
...were hypnotists of unprecedented power!
...who could show themselves not in the place where they actually were...
...but in imaginary...
...shifted positions.
In the light of such explanations, decidedly everything becomes clear...
...even what the citizens found most troublesome, the apparently quite inexplicable...
...invulnerability of the cat...
...shot at in apartment no. 50...
...during the attempt to put him under arrest!
There had been no cat on the chandelier!
...nor had anyone even thought of returning their fire...
...the shooters had been aiming at an empty spot...
...while Koroviev, having suggested...
...that the cat was acting up on the chandelier, was free...
...to stand behind the shooters' backs!
Mugging and enjoying his enormous...
...albeit criminally employed, capacity for suggestion!
Citizen Likhodeev had never gone to any Yalta.
...such a stunt...
...was beyond even Koroviev's powers!
After fainting in his apartment...
...scared of Koroviev's trick that had shown him a cat...
...holding a pickled mushroom on a fork!...
...he lay there until Koroviev...
...jeering at him, capped him with a shaggy felt hat...
...and sent him to the Moscow airport...
...having first suggested to the representatives of the investigation...
...That Likhodeev would be getting off the plane...
...from Sevastopol!
True, the criminal investigation department in Yalta maintained...
...that they had received the barefoot Likhodeev...
...and had sent telegrams concerning him to Moscow...
...but no copies of these telegrams were found in the files!
...from which the sad...
...but absolutely invincible conclusion...
...was drawn that the hypnotizing gang was able to...
...hypnotize at a great distance...
...at an enormous distance!...
...and not only individual persons...
...but even whole groups of them!
Under these circumstances...
...the criminals were able to drive people...
...of the most sturdy psychic make-up out of their minds!
One of the victims, was the professor of the Institute of Culture and Philosophy...
...formerly famous poet, Ivan Nikolaevich Ponyrev - "Homeless"
With great effort brought back to his senses...
...by the professor of the Institute of Experimental Psychiatry...
...Stravinsky.
To say nothing of such trifles...
...as the pack of cards in the pocket of someone...
...the women's disappearing dresses...
...or the meowing beret, or other things?
Such stunts can be pulled by any...
...professional hypnotist of average ability...
...on any stage!
...including the uncomplicated trick...
...of tearing the head off the master of ceremonies...
The meowing beret, the talking cat...
All sheer nonsense!...
To present people with such a cat...
...it is enough to have a command of the basic principles of ventriloquism...
...and scarcely anyone will doubt...
...that Koroviev's art...
...went significantly beyond those principles!
And with this conclusion, comrades...
...in my opinion, we can end this conference!
Beware of the tram!
Venus! Venus!
Ah, fool that I am...
Here is one more of the moon's victims...
Yes, one more victim...
...like me.
Ah, fool that I am...
Why?
...why didn't I fly off with her?
...What were you afraid of, old ass?
...Got yourself a certificate...
Ah, suffer now...
...you old cretin!
Nikolai Ivanovich, where are you?
What is this fantasy?
Want to catch malaria?
Come and have tea!
I wanted a breath of air, a breath of air...
...dearest!
The air is so nice...
Gods, gods...
Such a banal execution...
But, please, tell me it never happened!?
I implore you, tell me!...
...it never happened?
Of course it never happened...
...you imagined it.
And you can swear it to me?
I swear it...
I need nothing more!...
So then...
...it ended with that?...
It ended with that, my disciple...
Of course, with that...
Everything has ended, and everything ends...
And I will kiss you on the forehead...
...and until the next full moon...
...no one will trouble you.
...neither the noseless killer of Gestas...
...nor the cruel fifth procurator of Judea...
...the equestrian...
...Pontius Pilate.
THE END