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The bartender looked around wryly and miserably, but said nothing.






" Can they really have been swindlers? " the magician asked his guest anxiously. " Can there really be swindlers in Moscow? "

The bartender smiled so bitterly in reply that no doubts remained: there were indeed swindlers in Moscow!

" That's beneath contempt! " said Woland in outrage. " You're a poor man... you are a poor man-aren't you? "

The bartender drew his head into his shoulders, so that it would become obvious that he was a poor man.

" How much do you have in savings? "

Although the question was asked sympathetically, it was impossible not to view a question like that as indelicate. The bartender squirmed.

" Two hundred and forty-nine thousand rubles in five separate savings accounts, " came a cracked voice from the next room. " And two hundred ten-ruble gold pieces under the floor at home."

The bartender seemed to be riveted to his stool.

" Well, that isn't so large a sum, of course, " said Woland indulgently to his guest. " Although, strictly speaking, it is of no use to you. When will you die? "

Here the bartender became indignant.

" Nobody knows that and it's nobody's business, " he replied.

" True, nobody knows, " came the same noxious voice from the study, " but it's hardly Newton's binomial theorem! He'll die in nine months,


1 76 The Master and Margarita

that is, next February, from cancer of the liver, in the First Moscow State University Clinic, Ward No. 4." The bartender's face turned yellow.

" Nine months, " Woland calculated thoughtfully. " 249, 000... In round numbers that comes out to 27, 000 a month, isn't that right? Not a lot, but enough if one lives modestly... And there's still the gold rubles..."

" He won't manage to cash those in, " broke in the same voice, sending a chill through the bartender's heart " After Andrei Fokich dies, they'll tear down the house right away and the gold rubles will be sent to the State Bank."

" And I wouldn't advise you to go to the clinic either, " the artiste continued. " What point is there in dying in a ward, listening to the moans and rasps of the terminally ill? Wouldn't it be better to spend the twenty-seven thousand on a banquet, then, after taking poison, depart for the other world to the sound of violins, surrounded by intoxicated beautiful women and dashing friends? "

The bartender sat motionless, and seemed to have gotten much older. His eyes had dark circles around them, his cheeks drooped, and his lower jaw sagged.

" But we've gotten off the track, " exclaimed the host. " Back to business. Show me your strips of paper."






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