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

He arrested his gaze on the top storeys, in whose window panes there were dazzling reflections of the broken sunlight that was leaving Mikhail Alexandrovich for ever, then he moved it down to where the window panes had started darkening, as they do towards evening; he grinned condescendingly about something, screwed up his eyes, put his hands on the handle of the walking stick and placed his chin on his hands.

“Ivan,” said Berlioz, “your depiction of, for example, the birth of Jesus, the Son of God, was very good and satirical, but the real point is that a whole series of sons of god had already been born before Jesus – like, let’s say, the Phoenician Adonis, the Phrygian Attis, the Persian Mithras.

To put it briefly, not one of them was ever born and none of them existed, including Jesus too, and it’s essential that, instead of depicting the birth or, let’s suppose, the visit of the Magi, you should depict the absurd rumours about that visit. Otherwise, according to your narrative, it turns out that he was actually born!”

At this point Bezdomny made an attempt to stop the hiccups that had him in agony and held his breath, and as a result he emitted a louder and more agonizing hiccup, and at that same moment Berlioz interrupted his speech, because the foreigner suddenly rose and headed towards the writers.

They looked at him in surprise.

“Excuse me, please,” he began on coming up, with a foreign accent, but without garbling the words, “if I permit myself, without being acquainted… but the topic of your learned conversation is so interesting that.

”

Here he politely removed his beret, and nothing remained for the friends but to half-stand and exchange bows[32 - to exchange bows – раскланиваться].

“No, more likely French…” thought Berlioz.

“Polish?.” thought Bezdomny.

It is essential to add that from his very first words the foreigner made an abominable impression on the poet, yet was found by Berlioz rather to be pleasant – that is, not exactly pleasant, but.

how can one put it. interesting, perhaps.

“May I take a seat?” asked the foreigner politely, and the friends, involuntarily somehow, moved apart; the foreigner settled in neatly between them and immediately entered the conversation.

“If I heard correctly, you were so good as to say there was never any Jesus on earth?” asked the foreigner, turning his green left eye towards Berlioz.