The Master and Margarita / Мастер и Маргарита. Книга для чтения на английском языке

“The trouble is,” continued the bound man, whom nobody was stopping, “you’re too self-contained, and you’ve utterly lost your faith in people. I mean, you must agree, you really shouldn’t make a dog the sole object of your affection. Your life is a poor one, Hegemon,” and at this point the speaker permitted himself a smile.

The secretary was thinking about only one thing now: should he believe his own ears or not? He had to believe them. Then he tried to imagine in precisely[74 - to imagine in precisely – детально вообразить] what whimsical form the anger of the hot-tempered Procurator would express itself at this unheard-of impertinence from the prisoner.

And this the secretary was unable to imagine, although he knew the Procurator well.

At that moment there rang out the cracked, rather hoarse voice of the Procurator, who said in Latin:

“Untie his hands.”

One of the legionaries in the escort struck his spear on the ground, handed it to another one, went forward and took the ropes off the prisoner.

The secretary picked up the scroll and decided not to record anything for the time being, nor to be surprised at anything.

“Confess: are you a great doctor?” Pilate asked quietly in Greek.

“No, Procurator, I’m not a doctor,” replied the prisoner, rubbing a twisted and swollen purple wrist in delight.

From under his brows Pilate’s eyes bored sternly into the prisoner, and those eyes were no longer lacklustre; the sparks that everyone knew had appeared in them.

“I didn’t ask you,” said Pilate, “perhaps you know Latin too?”

“Yes, I do,” replied the prisoner.

Colour appeared in Pilate’s yellowish cheeks, and he asked in Latin:

“How did you happen to know I wanted to call my dog?”

“It’s very simple,” the prisoner replied in Latin, “you were moving your hand through the air” – and the prisoner repeated Pilate’s gesture – “as though you wanted to stroke something, and your lips…”

“Yes,” said Pilate.

They were silent for a moment. Pilate asked a question in Greek:

“And so are you a doctor?”

“No, no,” replied the prisoner animatedly, “believe me, I’m not a doctor.”

“Well, all right. If you want to keep it a secret, do so. It has no direct bearing on the case. So you claim you didn’t call on anyone to demolish.