Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita (1997) -
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choirmaster:
'Hey, citizen, help me to detain the criminal! It's your duty!'
The choirmaster became extraordinarily animated, jumped up and
hollered:
'What criminal? Where is he? A foreign criminal?' The choirmaster's
eyes sparkled gleefully. That one? If he's a criminal, the first thing to do
is shout "Help!" Or else he'll get away. Come on, together now, one, two!'
-- and here the choirmaster opened his maw.
Totally at a loss, Ivan obeyed the trickster and shouted 'Help!' but
the choirmaster bluffed him and did not shout anything.
Ivan's solitary, hoarse cry did not produce any good results. Two girls
shied away from him, and he heard the word 'drunk'.
'Ah, so you're in with him!' Ivan cried out, waxing wroth. "What are
you doing, jeering at me? Out of my way!'
Ivan dashed to the right, and so did the choirmaster; Ivan dashed to
the left, and the scoundrel did the same.
'Getting under my feet on purpose?' Ivan cried, turning
ferocious.
'I'll hand you over to the police!'
Ivan attempted to grab the blackguard by the sleeve, but missed and
caught precisely nothing: it was as if the choirmaster fell through the
earth.
Ivan gasped, looked into the distance, and saw the hateful stranger. He
was already at the exit to Patriarch's Lane; moreover, he was not alone. The
more than dubious choirmaster had managed to join him. But that was still
not all: the third in this company proved to be a tom-cat, who appeared out
of nowhere, huge as a hog, black as soot or as a rook, and with a desperate
cavalryman's whiskers. The trio set off down Patriarch's Lane, the cat
walking on his hind legs.
Ivan sped after the villains and became convinced at once that it -
would be very difficult to catch up with them.
The trio shot down the lane in an instant and came out on