There was clear, practical sense in the interpreter’s proposal; the proposal was very sound, but there was something amazingly unsound in the way the interpreter spoke and in his clothing, and in that loathsome, utterly useless pince-nez. As a consequence of this, there was some vague thing tormenting the Chairman’s soul, yet he nonetheless decided to accept the proposal. The fact of the matter is that the Housing Association was, alas, very much in deficit. Oil for the central heating needed to be laid in before the autumn, and where the money was to come from was unclear. But with the foreign tourist’s money they could quite likely manage.
Still, the businesslike and cautious Nikanor Ivanovich declared that first of all he would have to tie things up[228] with the Foreign Tourist Office.
“I understand!” exclaimed Korovyev. “It’s got to be tied up! Without fail! Here’s the telephone, Nikanor Ivanovich, you tie things up straight away! And regarding the money, don’t be shy,” he added in a whisper, drawing the Chairman towards the telephone in the hall, “who on earth are you to take from, if not him? If you could see what a villa he has in Nice! When you go abroad next summer, make a special trip to take a look – you’ll be amazed!”
The business with the Foreign Tourist Office was settled over[229] the telephone with an extraordinary speed that staggered the Chairman. It turned out that they already knew there of Mr Woland’s intention to stay in Likhodeyev’s private apartment, and had not the slightest objection to it.
“Well, marvellous!” yelled Korovyev.
Somewhat battered by his jabbering, the Chairman declared that the Housing Association agreed to let apartment No. 50 to the artiste Woland for a week for a payment of… Nikanor Ivanovich stumbled a little and said:
“For five hundred roubles a day.”
At this point Korovyev stunned the Chairman conclusively. With a furtive wink in the direction of the bedroom, from where the soft jumping of a heavy cat could be heard, he croaked:
“So, over a week, that works out as three and a half thousand?”
Nikanor Ivanovich thought he would add on: “Well, that’s quite an appetite you have there, Nikanor Ivanovich!” but Korovyev said something else entirely:
“What sort of sum is that? Ask for five, he’ll give it.”
Smirking in bewilderment, Nikanor Ivanovich himself failed to notice how he came to be at the dead man’s desk, where Korovyev, with the greatest speed and dexterity, drew up two copies of a contract. After that he flew into the bedroom with it and returned, whereupon both copies proved already to have been signed with a flourish by the foreigner. The Chairman too signed the contract. Here Korovyev asked for a receipt for five…
“In full, in full, Nikanor Ivanovich!.. Thousand roubles…” And with the words, unsuitable somehow for a serious matter, “Eins, zwei, drei!"[230][231] he laid out five wads of nice new banknotes for the Chairman.
Counting took place, interspersed with Korovyev’s little jokes and silly remarks, such as “cash loves to be counted[232]", “your own eye’s the best spy[233]" and others of a similar kind.
When he had finished counting the money, the Chairman received the foreigner’s passport from Korovyev for the temporary registration, put it, and the contract, and the money away in his briefcase, and, somehow unable to restrain himself, asked bashfully for a complimentary ticket.
“Why of course!" roared Korovyev. “How many do you want, Nikanor Ivanovich, twelve, fifteen?"
The stunned Chairman explained that he only needed a couple of tickets, for himself and Pelageya Antonovna, his wife.
Korovyev immediately whipped out a notepad and dashed off[234] a complimentary pass for two persons in the front row for Nikanor Ivanovich. And with his left hand the interpreter deftly thrust this pass upon Nikanor Ivanovich, while with his right he placed in the Chairman’s other hand a thick wad that made a crackling noise. Casting a look at it, Nikanor Ivanovich blushed deeply and began pushing it away.
“That’s not appropriate…” he mumbled.
“I simply won’t hear of it,” Korovyev started whispering right in his ear. “It’s not appropriate here, but it is among foreigners. You’ll offend him, Nikanor Ivanovich, and that’s awkward. You took the trouble[235]…”
“It’s strictly prohibited,” whispered the Chairman very, very quietly, and he looked behind him.
“And where are the witnesses?” Korovyev whispered in the other ear. “I’m asking you, where are they? What’s the matter?”
It was then, as the Chairman subsequently maintained, that a miracle took place: the wad crawled into his briefcase all by itself. And next, somehow weak and even worn out, the Chairman found himself on the stairs. A whirlwind of thoughts was raging in his head. There, spinning around, were that villa in Nice and the trained cat, and the thought that there had indeed been no witnesses, and that Pelageya Antonovna would be pleased about the complimentary tickets. They were incoherent thoughts, but, all in all, pleasant ones. And nevertheless, from time to time, somewhere in the very depths of his soul some sort of needle would prick the Chairman. This was the needle of disquiet. Apart from that, right there on the stairs the Chairman was struck, as if by a seizure, by the thought: “But how on earth did the interpreter get into the study if there was a seal on the doors?! And how had he, Nikanor Ivanovich, not asked about it?” For some time the Chairman gazed like a lost sheep at the steps of the staircase, but then he decided to give it up as a bad job and not torment himself with such a complicated question.
As soon as the Chairman had left the apartment, a low voice was heard from the bedroom:
“I didn’t like that Nikanor Ivanovich. He’s a rogue and a cheat[236]. Can something be done so he doesn’t come here again?”
“Messire, you only have to give the order!” Korovyev responded from somewhere, only not in a jangling, but in a very clear and sonorous voice.
And straight away the accursed interpreter turned up in the hall, dialled a number there and began speaking for some reason very piteously into the receiver:
“Hello! I consider it my duty to inform you that the Chairman of our Housing Association at No. 302 bis on Sadovaya, Nikanor Ivanovich Bosoi, is speculating in foreign currency.[237] At the present moment in his apartment, No. 35, there’s four hundred dollars wrapped in newspaper in the ventilation pipe in the lavatory. This is Timofei Kvastsov speaking, a tenant from apartment No. 11 of the aforesaid building. But I conjure you to keep my name a secret. I fear the revenge of the aforementioned Chairman.”
And he hung up, the villain!
What happened thereafter in apartment No. 50 is unknown, but what happened at Nikanor Ivanovich’s is known. Locking himself in his lavatory, he pulled the wad thrust upon him by the interpreter from his briefcase and checked that there were four hundred roubles in it. Nikanor Ivanovich wrapped this wad in a scrap of newspaper and stuck it into the ventilation passage.
Five minutes later the Chairman was sitting at the table in his little dining room. His wife brought in from the kitchen a neatly sliced herring, liberally sprinkled with spring onion. Nikanor Ivanovich poured out a wineglassful of vodka, drank it, poured out a second, drank it, caught up three pieces of herring on his fork… and just then there was a ring. But Pelageya Antonovna brought in a steaming saucepan, from a single glance at which it could immediately be guessed that inside, at the heart of the fiery borsch, was to be found the thing than which there is nothing more delicious in the world