Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita -
96 >
'Are you in charge here? ' Ivan went on.
To this, too, Stravinsky nodded.
'I must talk to you,' said Ivan Nikolayich in a significant tone.
'That's why I'm here,' answered Stravinsky.
'Well this is the situation,' Ivan began, sensing that his hour had
come. ' They say I'm mad and nobody wants to listen to me!'
'Oh no, we will listen very carefully to everything you have to say,'
said Stravinsky seriously and reassuringly, ' and on no account shall we
allow anyone to say you're mad.'
'All right, then, listen: yesterday evening at Patriarch's Ponds I met
a mysterious person, who may or may not have been a foreigner, who knew
about Berlioz's death before it happened, and had met Pontius Pilate.'
The retinue listened to Ivan, silent and unmoving.
'Pilate? Is that the Pilate who lived at the time of Jesus Christ?'
enquired Stravinsky, peering at Ivan. ' Yes.'
'Aha,' said Stravinsky. ' And this Berlioz is the one who died falling
under a tram? '
'Yes. I was there yesterday evening when the tram killed him, and this
mysterious character was there too .'
'Pontius Pilate's friend? ' asked Stravinsky, obviously a man of
exceptional intelligence.
'Exactly,' said Ivan, studying Stravinsky. ' He told us, before it
happened, that Anna had spilt the sunflower-seed oil ... and that was the
very spot where Berlioz slipped! How d'you like that?!' Ivan concluded,
expecting his story to produce a big effect.
But it produced none. Stravinsky simply asked :
'And who is this Anna? '
Slightly disconcerted by the question, Ivan frowned.
'Anna doesn't matter,' he said irritably. ' God knows who she is.
Simply some stupid girl from Sadovaya Street. What's important, don't you
see, is that he knew about the sunflower-seed oil beforehand. Do you follow
me? '
'Perfectly,' replied Stravinsky seriously. Patting the poet's knee he