Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita -
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courtyard, under the arcade and up to the balcony, where they placed him
before the Procurator's chair. The man was dressed in a shabby, torn blue
chiton. His head was covered with a white bandage fastened round his
forehead, his hands tied behind his back. There was a large bruise under the
man's left eye and a scab of dried blood in one corner of his mouth. The
prisoner stared at the Procurator with anxious curiosity.
The Procurator was silent at first, then asked quietly in Aramaic:
'So you have been inciting the people to destroy the temple of
Jerusalem? '
The Procurator sat as though carved in stone, his lips barely moving as
he pronounced the words. The Procurator was like stone from fear of shaking
his fiendishly aching head.
The man with bound hands made a slight move forwards and began
speaking:
'Good man! Believe me . . . '
But the Procurator, immobile as before and without raising his voice,
at once interrupted him :
'You call me good man? You are making a mistake. The rumour about me
in Jerusalem is that I am a raving monster and that is absolutely correct,'
and he added in the same monotone :
'Send centurion Muribellum to me.'
The balcony seemed to darken when the centurion of the first century.
Mark surnamed Muribellum, appeared before the Procurator. Muribellum was a
head taller than the tallest soldier in the legion and so broad in the
shoulders that he completely obscured the rising sun.
The Procurator said to the centurion in Latin:
'This criminal calls me " good man ". Take him away for a minute and
show him the proper way to address me. But do not mutilate him.'
All except the motionless Procurator watched Mark Muribellum as he
gestured to the prisoner to follow him. Because of his height people always
watched Muribellum wherever he went. Those who saw him for the first time