"Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita (англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

The foreigner scowled, looked at the poet as if he were seeing him for
the first time, and answered inimically:
'No understand ... no speak Russian. ..'
The gent don't understand,' the choirmaster mixed in from the bench,
though no one had asked him to explain the foreigner's words.
'Don't pretend!' Ivan said threateningly, and felt cold in the pit of
his stomach. 'You spoke excellent Russian just now. You're not a German and
you're not a professor! You're a murderer and a spy! ... Your papers!' Ivan
cried fiercely.
The mysterious professor squeamishly twisted his mouth, which was
twisted to begin with, then shrugged his shoulders.
'Citizen!' the loathsome choirmaster butted in again. "What're you
doing bothering a foreign tourist? For that you'll incur severe punishment!'
And the suspicious professor made an arrogant face, turned, and walked
away from Ivan. Ivan felt himself at a loss. Breathless, he addressed the
choirmaster:
'Hey, citizen, help me to detain the criminal! It's your duty!'
The choirmaster became extraordinarily animated, jumped up and
hollered:
'What criminal? Where is he? A foreign criminal?' The choirmaster's
eyes sparkled gleefully. That one? If he's a criminal, the first thing to do
is shout "Help!" Or else he'll get away. Come on, together now, one, two!'
-- and here the choirmaster opened his maw.
Totally at a loss, Ivan obeyed the trickster and shouted 'Help!' but
the choirmaster bluffed him and did not shout anything.
Ivan's solitary, hoarse cry did not produce any good results. Two girls
shied away from him, and he heard the word 'drunk'.
'Ah, so you're in with him!' Ivan cried out, waxing wroth. "What are
you doing, jeering at me? Out of my way!'
Ivan dashed to the right, and so did the choirmaster; Ivan dashed to
the left, and the scoundrel did the same.
'Getting under my feet on purpose?' Ivan cried, turning ferocious.
'I'll hand you over to the police!'
Ivan attempted to grab the blackguard by the sleeve, but missed and
caught precisely nothing: it was as if the choirmaster fell through the
earth.
Ivan gasped, looked into the distance, and saw the hateful stranger. He
was already at the exit to Patriarch's Lane; moreover, he was not alone. The
more than dubious choirmaster had managed to join him. But that was still
not all: the third in this company proved to be a tom-cat, who appeared out
of nowhere, huge as a hog, black as soot or as a rook, and with a desperate
cavalryman's whiskers. The trio set off down Patriarch's Lane, the cat
walking on his hind legs.
Ivan sped after the villains and became convinced at once that it -
would be very difficult to catch up with them.
The trio shot down the lane in an instant and came out on
Spiri-donovka. No matter how Ivan quickened his pace, the distance between
him and his quarry never diminished. And before the poet knew it, he
emerged, after the quiet of Spiridonovka, by the Nikitsky Gate, where his
situation worsened. The place was swarming with people. Besides, the gang of