Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita -
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Grunya's--it was the visitor speaking from the bedroom. ' The cat is mine.
Don't be nervous. And Grunya's not here--I sent her away to her family in
Voronezh. She complained that you had cheated her out of her leave.'
These words were so unexpected and so absurd that Stepa decided he had
not heard them. In utter bewilderment he bounded back into the bedroom and
froze on the threshold. His hair rose and a mild sweat broke out on his
forehead.
The visitor was no longer alone in the bedroom. The second armchair was
now occupied by the creature who had materialised in the hall. He was now to
be seen quite plainly--feathery moustache, one lens of his pince-nez
glittering, the other missing. But worst of all wa:s the third invader : a
black cat of revolting proportions sprawled in a nonchalant attitude on the
pouffe, a glass of vodka in one paw and a fork, on which he had just speared
a pickled mushroom, in the other.
Stepa felt the light in the bedroom, already weak enough, begin to
fade. ' This must be what it's like to go mad . . .' he thought, clutching
the doorpost.
'You seem slightly astonished, my dear Stepan Bogdanovich,' said
Woland. Stepai's teeth were chattering. ' But I assure you there is nothing
to be surprised at. These are my assistants.'
Here the cat drank its vodka and Stepa's hand dropped from the
doorpost.
'And my assistants need a place to stay,' went on Woland, ' so it
seems that there is one too many of us in this flat. That one, I rather
think, is you.'
'Yes, that's them! ' said the tall man in a goatish voice, speaking of
Stepa in the plural. ' They've been behaving disgustingly lately. Getting
drunk, carrying on with women, trading on their position and not doing a
stroke of work--not that they could do anything even if they tried because
they're completely incompetent. Pulling the wool over the boss's eyes,