The Evil Apartment 67

so, it was still painful to look at Styopa: he had absolutely no recollection of a contract and could have sworn that he had not seen this Woland fellow yesterday. Yes, Khustov had been there, but Woland had not

" May I have a look at the contract, " asked Styopa softly.

" By all means, by all means..."

Styopa took a look at the paper and froze. Everything was in order. First, there was Styopa's own dashing signature! And then a note written slantwise in the margin in the financial director Rimsky's hand, authorizing an advance payment to Woland often thousand rubles from the thirty-five thousand due him for seven appearances. Finally, there was Woland's signature confirming his receipt of the ten thousand ruble advance!

" What is all this?! " thought the miserable Styopa, and his head began to spin. Was he beginning to have ominous memory lapses? But, it goes without saying, after he had been shown the contract, any further expression of surprise would be simply impolite. Styopa asked his guest's permission to step out for a moment and, as he was, in his socks, he ran to the phone in the front hall. On the way he shouted in the direction of the kitchen, " Grunya! "

But nobody answered. Here he glanced at the door to Berlioz's study, which was close to the front hall, and at that point, he was, as they say, struck dumb. There was a huge wax seal hanging on a string attached to the door handle. " Oh, great! " roared a voice in Styopa's head. " That's all I need! " And at this point Styopa's thoughts began racing down two tracks, but as always happens in a catastrophe, they were both going in the same direction, and only the devil knows where they were headed. It is hard even to convey the confusion that reigned in Styopa's head. First there was the devilish character with the black beret, the cold vodka, and the improbable contract, and now, if you please, to top it all off, a seal on the door! If you told anyone that Berlioz had done something bad, no one would believe it, truly, no one would believe it! But a seal is a seal! Yes indeed...

And here some highly unpleasant little thoughts began stirring in Styopa's brain regarding an article which, as luck would have it, he had recently foisted on Mikhail Alexandrovich for publication in his journal. And just between us, it was a stupid article! And pointless too, and it paid a pittance...

The recollection of the article triggered another recollection, of a questionable conversation which had taken place here in the dining room on the evening of April 24th when Styopa was having supper with Mikhail Alexandrovich. That is, of course, one would never call the conversation " questionable" in the full sense of the word (Styopa would never have entered into such a conversation), but it had been a conversation on a needless topic It would have been just as easy, citizens, for him not to have engaged in it at all. Before the seal appeared, that con-

68 The Master and Margarita