Mikhail Bulgakov. The Master and Margarita

headache will go.'

     The secretary stared at the prisoner, his note-taking abandoned. Pilate

raised his martyred eyes to the prisoner and saw how high the sun now  stood

above the hippodrome, how a ray had penetrated the arcade, had crept towards

Yeshua's patched sandals  and how the man moved aside from the sunlight. The

Procurator stood  up and clasped his head in his hands. Horror came over his

yellowish,  clean-shaven  face. With  an effort  of  will he  controlled his

expression and sank back into his chair.

     Meanwhile the prisoner continued talking, but the secretary had stopped

writing, craning his neck  like a goose  in the effort not to miss  a single

word.

     '  There,  it  has  gone,' said the  prisoner,  with a kindly glance at

Pilate. ' I am so glad. I would advise you, hegemon, to leave the palace for

a while and take a walk somewhere nearby, perhaps in the gardens or on Mount

Eleona. There will be thunder . . .' The prisoner turned and  squinted  into

the sun .  . . ' later, towards evening. A walk would do you a great deal of

good  and I should be happy to go with you. Some new thoughts have just come

into my head which you might, I think, find interesting and I should like to

discuss  them  with you,  the  more so as you  strike me  as a  man of great

intelligence.' The secretary turned mortally  pale and dropped his scroll to

the  ground. '  Your trouble is,' went  on the  unstoppable prisoner, ' that

your  mind  is  too closed and  you have finally  lost your  faith in  human

beings. You must admit  that no one ought to lavish all their devotion on  a

dog. Your life is a cramped one, hegemon.' Here  the speaker allowed himself

to smile.

     The  only  thought in the  secretary's  mind  now was whether  he could

believe his  ears. He had to  believe them. He then  tried to guess in  what

strange form the Procurator's fiery temper might break out at the prisoner's

unheard-of insolence. Although he  knew the Procurator well  the secretary's

imagination failed him.

     Then the hoarse, broken voice of the Procurator barked out in Latin:

     ' Untie his hands.'

     One of the legionary escorts tapped the ground with his  lance, gave it

to his neighbour, approached and removed the prisoner's bonds. The secretary

picked up his scroll, decided  to take no more notes for  a while  and to be

astonished at nothing he might hear.

     ' Tell me,' said Pilate softly in Latin, ' are you a great physician?'

     ' No, Procurator, I am no physician,' replied the  prisoner, gratefully

rubbing his twisted, swollen, purpling wrist.

     Staring from beneath his eyelids, Pilate's eyes bored into the prisoner

and those eyes  were no  longer dull. They  now flashed with their  familiar

sparkle. ' I did not ask you,' said Pilate. ' Do you know Latin too? '

     ' Yes, I do,' replied the prisoner.

     The  colour flowed  back into Pilate's yellowed cheeks and he  asked in

Latin:

     ' How did you know that I wanted to call my dog? '

     ' Quite simple,' the prisoner answered in  Latin. ' You moved your hand

through the air  . . . ' the  prisoner repeated Pilate's gesture .  . . ' as

though to stroke something and your lips . . .'

     ' Yes,' said Pilate.

     There was silence. Then Pilate put a question in Greek :

     ' So you are a physician? '

     ' No, no,' was the prisoner's eager reply. ' Believe me I am not.'

     ' Very well,  if you wish to keep it a secret, do so. It has  no direct

bearing on the case. So you maintain  that  you never incited people to tear

down ... or burn, or by any means destroy the temple?'

     ' I repeat,  hegemon, that I  have  never tried to  persuade  anyone to

attempt any such thing. Do I look weak in the head? '

     '  Oh no, you  do not,' replied the  Procurator quietly, and  smiled an

ominous smile. ' Very well, swear that it is not so.'

     ' What would you have me swear by? ' enquired the unbound prisoner with

great urgency.

     '  Well, by your  life,' replied  the Procurator. ' It is high  time to

swear by it because you should know that it is hanging by a thread.'

     ' You do not believe,  do you, hegemon, that  it is you who have strung

it up?' asked the prisoner. ' If you do you are mistaken.'

     Pilate shuddered and answered through clenched teeth :

     ' I can cut that thread.'

     ' You  are  mistaken  there  too,'  objected  the prisoner, beaming and

shading himself from the sun with his hand. ' You  must agree, I think, that

the thread can only be cut by the one who has suspended it? '

     ' Yes, yes,' said Pilate, smiling.  ' I now have no doubt that the idle

gapers of Jerusalem have been pursuing you. I do not know who strung up your

tongue, but  he  strung it  well. By the  way. tell me, is it true that  you

entered Jerusalem  by the Susim Gate  mounted on a donkey, accompanied by  a

rabble who greeted you  as though you were a prophet? '  Here the Procurator

pointed to a scroll of parchment.

     The prisoner stared dubiously at the Procurator.

     '  I  have  no  donkey, hegemon,'  he  said.  ' I  certainly  came into

Jerusalem through the  Susim  Gate,  but I came  on  foot  alone  except for

Matthew the  Levite  and nobody shouted a word to me  as no one in Jerusalem

knew me then.'

     '  Do you happen to know,' went on  Pilate without taking  his eyes off

the prisoner, ' anyone called Dismas? Or Hestas? Or a third--Bar-Abba? '

     ' I do not know these good men,' replied the prisoner.

     ' Is that the truth? '

     ' It is.'

     ' And now tell me why you  always use that expression " good  men "? Is

that what you call everybody? '

     ' Yes, everybody,' answered the prisoner. ' There are no evil people on

earth.'

     ' That is news to me,' said Pilate with a laugh. ' But perhaps I am too

ignorant of life. You need take no further notes,' he said to the secretary,

although  the man had taken  none for some time. Pilate turned back  to  the

prisoner :

     ' Did you read about that in some Greek book? '

     ' No, I reached that conclusion in my own mind.'

     ' And is that what you preach? '

     ‘ Yes.'

     ' Centurion Mark Muribellum, for instance--is he good? '

     '  Yes,' replied the  prisoner. ' He  is, it is  true,  an unhappy man.

Since  the  good people disfigured him he has become harsh  and callous.  It

would be interesting to know who mutilated him.'

     ' That I  will  gladly  tell you,' rejoined Pilate, '  because  I was a

witness to it. These  good men threw  themselves at him like dogs at a bear.

The Germans clung to his neck, his arms, his  legs. An  infantry maniple had

been  ambushed and had it not  been for  a troop of cavalry breaking through

from  the flank--a troop  commanded by me--you,  philosopher, would not have

been talking to Muribellum just now. It happened at the battle of Idistavizo

in the Valley of the Virgins.'

     ' If I were to talk to him,' the prisoner suddenly said in a reflective

voice, ' I am sure that he would change greatly.'

     ' I suspect,' said Pilate, ' that the Legate of the Legion would not be

best pleased if you took it into your head to talk to one of his officers or

soldiers. Fortunately for us all  any such thing is  forbidden and the first

person to ensure that it cannot occur would be myself.'

     At  that moment a swallow  darted into the  arcade,  circled  under the

gilded ceiling, flew lower, almost brushed its pointed wingtip over the face

of  a bronze statue  in  a niche and  disappeared behind  the  capital of  a

column, perhaps with the thought of nesting there.

     As it flew an  idea formed  itself in the  Procurator's mind, which was

now bright and clear. It was thus : the hegemon had examined the case of the

vagrant philosopher Yeshua, surnamed  Ha-Notsri, and  could not substantiate

the  criminal  charge made against him. In particular he could not find  the

slightest  connection between Yeshua's actions  and the  recent disorders in

Jerusalem.  The vagrant  philosopher was mentally ill, as a  result of which

the sentence  of death pronounced on Ha-Notsri by the Lesser Sanhedrin would

not be confirmed. But in view of the danger of unrest liable to be caused by

Yeshua's mad, Utopian preaching, the Procurator would  remove  the  man from

Jerusalem and  sentence him to imprisonment  in Caesarea  Stratonova  on the

Mediterranean--the place of the Procurator's own residence. It only remained

to dictate this to the secretary.

     The  swallow's wings fluttered  over  the hegemon's head, the bird flew

towards the fountain and out into freedom.

     The Procurator raised his eyes to the prisoner and saw that a column of

dust had swirled up beside him.

     ' Is that all there is on this man? ' Pilate asked the secretary.

     '  No, unfortunately,' replied the secretary  unexpectedly, and  handed

Pilate another parchment.

     ' What else is there? ' enquired Pilate and frowned.

     Having  read the further evidence  a change  came over his  expression.

Whether it  was blood flowing back into his neck and  face or from something

else that  occurred,  his skin changed from yellow to red-brown and his eyes

appeared to collapse. Probably caused by the increased blood-pressure in his

temples, something happened to the Procurator's  sight. He seemed to see the

prisoner's head vanish  and  another appear in  its place,  bald and crowned

with a spiked golden diadem. The skin  of the forehead was split by a round,

livid  scar  smeared  with  ointment.  A  sunken,  toothless  mouth  with  a

capricious, pendulous lower  lip.  Pilate had  the  sensation  that the pink

columns of his balcony  and the roofscape of Jerusalem below and  beyond the

garden had all vanished, drowned in the thick foliage of cypress groves. His

hearing, too,  was  strangely  affected--there  was a  sound  as of  distant

trumpets,  muted and threatening, and  a nasal voice could clearly be  heard

arrogantly intoning the words: ' The law pertaining to high treason . . .'

     Strange, rapid, disconnected thoughts passed through his mind. '  Dead!

'  Then  :  '  They  have  killed him! . .  .' And  an absurd  notion  about

immortality, the thought of which aroused a sense of unbearable grief.

     Pilate straightened  up, banished the vision, turned his  gaze back  to

the balcony and again the prisoner's eyes met his.

     '  Listen,  Ha-Notsri,' began  the Procurator, giving  Yeshua a strange

look. His expression was grim but his eyes betrayed anxiety. ' Have you ever

said anything about great Caesar? Answer! Did you say anything of the  sort?

Or did you  . . . not?  '  Pilate gave the word 'not' more emphasis than was

proper  in  a  court of law and his  look  seemed  to be trying to project a

particular thought into the prisoner's mind. ' Telling the truth is easy and

pleasant,' remarked the prisoner.

     ' I do  not want to know,'  replied  Pilate  in  a voice of  suppressed

anger, ' whether you enjoy telling the truth or not. You are obliged to tell

me  the truth. But  when you speak weigh every word, if  you wish to avoid a

painful death.'

     No one knows what passed through the  mind of the Procurator of Judaea,

but he permitted himself to raise  his hand as though shading himself from a

ray of sunlight and, shielded by  that hand, to throw the prisoner  a glance

that conveyed a hint.

     ' So,' he said, ' answer this question : do you know a certain Judas of

Karioth and  if you have  ever  spoken to him  what did you say to him about

Caesar? '

     '  It happened  thus,'  began  the prisoner readily.  ' The day  before

yesterday,  in the evening,  I met a young man  near the  temple  who called

himself Judas, from the town of Karioth.  He invited  me to  his home in the

Lower City and gave me supper...'

     ' Is he a good man? ' asked Pilate, a diabolical glitter in his eyes.

     '  A very  good  man and eager to learn,'  affirmed the prisoner.  ' He

expressed the greatest interest in my ideas and welcomed me joyfully .. . '

     ' Lit the  candles. . . .' said  Pilate through  clenched teeth  to the

prisoner, his eyes glittering.

     ' Yes,' said Yeshua, slightly astonished that the Procurator  should be

so  well  informed,  and  went  on  : ' He  asked  me  for  my views on  the

government. The question interested him very much.'

     '  And so what did you say? ' asked Pilate. ' Or are you going to reply

that  you have  forgotten what you said? '  But  there was already a note of

hopelessness in Pilate's voice.

     ' Among other  things I said,' continued the prisoner, ' that all power

is a form of violence exercised over people and that the time will come when

there will be no rule by Caesar nor any other form  of  rule. Man will  pass

into  the kingdom of  truth and  justice where no  sort  of  power  will  be

needed.'

     ' Go on!'

     ' There is no more to tell,'  said the  prisoner. ' After that some men

came running in, tied me up and took me to prison.'

     The  secretary,  straining not to miss  a  word, rapidly scribbled  the

statement on his parchment.

     ' There never  has been, nor  yet shall  be a greater and  more perfect

government  in this world than the rule  of the emperor  Tiberius!' Pilate's

voice rang out harshly and painfully. The Procurator stared at his secretary

and at the  bodyguard with what seemed like hatred. ' And what business have

you, a criminal lunatic, to discuss such matters! ' Pilate shouted. ' Remove

the  guards from the  balcony! '  And turning to his  secretary he added:  '

Leave me alone with this criminal. This is a case of treason.'

     The bodyguard raised their lances  and with the measured tread of their

iron-shod  caligae  marched from the balcony towards the garden  followed by

the secretary.

     For  a  while the  silence  on  the  balcony was  only disturbed bv the

splashing of the fountain. Pilate watched the water splay out at the apex of

the jet and drip downwards.

     The prisoner was the first to speak :

     ' I see that there has been some trouble as a result of my conversation

with that young man from Karioth. I have a presentiment,  hegemon, that some

misfortune will befall him and I feel very sorry for him.'

     ' I  think,' replied the Procurator with a strange smile, '  that there

is someone  else  in this  world for whom you should feel  sorrier than  for

Judas of Karioth and who is destined for  a fate much worse than Judas'! ...

So  Mark  Muribellum, a coldblooded killer,  the  people  who I  see  '--the

Procurator  pointed  to  Yeshua's disfigured face--'  beat  you for what you

preached, the robbers Dismas and  Hestas who with  their confederates killed

four soldiers, and finally this dirty informer Judas--are they all good men?

'

     ' Yes,' answered the prisoner.

     ' And will the  kingdom of  truth come? ' '  It will, hegemon,' replied

Yeshua with conviction.

     '  It will never come! ' Pilate suddenly shouted in a voice so terrible

that  Yeshua staggered  back. Many years ago  in  the Valley  of the Virgins

Pilate had shouted in that same voice to his horsemen : ' Cut them down! Cut

them down! They have caught  the  giant Muribellum!' And again he raised his

parade-ground voice,  barking out  the words so that  they would be heard in

the garden :  ' Criminal! Criminal!  Criminal! ' Then lowering his voice  he

asked : ' Yeshua Ha-Notsri, do you believe in any gods?'

     ' God is one,' answered Yeshua. ' I believe in Him.'

     '  Then pray to him! Pray hard! However,' at  this Pilate's voice  fell

again, ' it will do no  good. Have you  a wife? ' asked Pilate with a sudden

inexplicable access of depression.

     ' No, I am alone.'

     '  I  hate this city,' the  Procurator suddenly  mumbled,  hunching his

shoulders as though from cold and wiping his hands as though washing them. '

If they had murdered you before your meeting with Judas of Karioth  I really

believe it would have been better.'

     ' You  should  let  me  go,  hegemon,' was  the  prisoner's  unexpected

request, his voice full of anxiety. ' I see now that they want to kill me.'

     A spasm distorted  Pilate's  face as he turned his blood-shot  eyes  on

Yeshua and said :

     ' Do you imagine, you miserable creature, that a Roman Procurator could

release a man who has said what you have said to me? Oh gods, oh gods! Or do

you think I'm  prepared to take your  place? I  don't believe in your ideas!

And listen  to me : if from this  moment onward you say so much as a word or

try to talk to anybody, beware! I repeat--beware!'

     ' Hegemon . ..'

     '  Be  quiet!  '  shouted Pilate,  his  infuriated stare following  the

swallow which had flown on to the balcony again. ' Here!' shouted Pilate.

     The  secretary  and  the  guards  returned  to their  places and Pilate

announced that he confirmed  the sentence of death pronounced by  the Lesser

Sanhedrin  on  the  accused  Yeshua  Ha-Notsri  and the  secretary  recorded

Pilate's words.

     A minute  later centurion Mark Muribellum  stood before the Procurator.

He  was ordered by the Procurator to hand the  felon over  to the captain of

the secret service and in  doing  so to  transmit the Procurator's directive

that  Yeshua  Ha-Notsri was to  be segregated from  the other convicts, also

that  the captain  of  the  secret  service was forbidden on pain  of severe

punishment to talk to Yeshua or to answer any questions he might ask.

     At a signal from Mark the guard closed ranks around Yeshua and escorted

him from the balcony.

     Later the Procurator received a call from a  handsome man with  a blond

beard,  eagles'  feathers in  the  crest of  his helmet,  glittering  lions'

muzzles on his  breastplate,  a  gold-studded sword belt, triple-soled boots

laced to the knee and a purple cloak thrown over his left shoulder.  He  was

the commanding officer, the Legate of the Legion.

     The Procurator asked him where  the Sebastian cohort was stationed. The

Legate reported that the Sebastian was on cordon duty in the square in front

of the hippodrome, where the sentences on the prisoners would  be  announced

to the crowd.

     Then the Procurator  instructed the Legate to detach two centuries from

the  Roman  cohort. One of  them, under the  command of Muribellum,  was  to

escort the convicts,  the carts transporting the executioners' equipment and

the executioners themselves to Mount  Golgotha and on arrival  to cordon off

the  summit area. The other was to proceed at once to  Mount Golgotha and to

form a cordon immediately on arrival. To assist in the task of guarding  the

hill,  the Procurator asked the Legate  to  despatch  an  auxiliary  cavalry

regiment, the Syrian ala.

     When  the  Legate  had  left  the balcony, the  Procurator ordered  his

secretary to summon to the palace the president of the Sanhedrin, two of its

members and the captain of  the Jerusalem temple  guard, but  added that  he

wished arrangements to be made which would allow him, before conferring with

all  these  people,  to have a  private  meeting with  the president  of the

Sanhedrin.

     The Procurator's orders were carried out rapidly and precisely and  the

sun,  which had  lately  seemed to scorch  Jerusalem  with  such  particular

vehemence, had  not  yet reached its  zenith when  the  meeting  took  place

between the Procurator  and the president of  the Sanhedrin, the High Priest

of Judaea,  Joseph Caiaphas. They  met on  the upper  terrace  of the garden

between two white marble lions guarding the staircase.

     It was quiet in the garden. But as he emerged from the arcade on to the

sun-drenched  upper  terrace of the garden with its palms on their monstrous

elephantine legs, the terrace from which the whole of Pilate's detested city

of  Jerusalem  lay  spread  out  before  the Procurator with its  suspension

bridges, its fortresses and over it all  that  indescribable  lump of marble

with a golden dragon's scale instead of a roof--the temple of Jerusalem--the

Procurator's sharp hearing detected far below, down there where a stone wall

divided the lower  terraces of the palace garden from the city square, a low

rumbling broken now and again by faint sounds, half groans, half cries.

     The Procurator realised that already there was assembling in the square

a numberless crowd of  the inhabitants of Jerusalem, excited  by  the recent

disorders; that this crowd was waiting impatiently for the pronouncement  of

sentence and that the water-sellers were busily shouting their wares.

     The Procurator began by inviting the High Priest on  to  the balcony to

find  some shade  from  the  pitiless heat,  but  Caiaphas politely  excused

himself, explaining that he could not do that on the eve of a feast-day.