The downpour broke out unexpectedly, and then the thunderstorm turned into a hurricane. On the very spot near the marble bench in the

The Master and Margarita

Garden where the procurator had conversed with the high priest around noontime, there was a crack of thunder like a canon shot, and a cypress tree broke in two like a cane. Mingling with watery dust and hail, torn roses, magnolia leaves, small twigs, and sand swept through the colonnade onto the balcony. The hurricane scourged the garden.

At this time there was only one man under the colonnade, and that man was the procurator.

Now he was not sitting in his chair, but was instead reclining on a couch next to a low table set with food and jugs of wine. Another couch, unoccupied, stood on the other side of the table. A red puddle, which looked like blood and had not been cleaned up, was spreading out from under the procurator's feet and in it were pieces of a broken jug. The servant, who had been setting the table before the storm, had become flustered by the procurator's stare and upset that he had displeased him in some way, and the procurator, angry at the servant, had smashed the jug on the mosaic floor, saying, " Why don't you look me in the eye when you serve me? Have you stolen something? "

The African's black face turned gray, mortal terror appeared in his eyes, he began to tremble, and almost broke the other jug; but for some reason the procurator's anger subsided as quickly as it had flared up. Just as the African was about to pick up the broken pieces and wipe up the puddle, the procurator waved him away, and the slave ran off. And the puddle remained.

Now, as the hurricane raged the African huddled near a niche, which held a statue of a white naked woman bowing her head—the African was afraid of showing himself at the wrong moment, yet also fearful lest he miss the procurator's summons.

Reclining on his couch in the semidarkness of the storm, the procurator poured himself some wine, drank it in long gulps, and reached occasionally for the bread, crumbling it, and swallowing it in small pieces. Now and again he would suck on an oyster, chew on a slice of lemon, and then take another drink.

Were it not for the roar of the water, the claps of thunder that threatened to smash in the palace roof, the clatter of hail that pounded against the balcony steps, it might have been possible to hear the procurator mumbling something as he talked to himself. And if the intermittent flickers of heavenly fire had been transformed into a steady light, an observer might have been able to see that the procurator's face, its eyes inflamed by wine and by recent bouts of insomnia, expressed impatience, that the procurator was not only gazing at the two white roses, which had drowned in the red puddle, but was constantly turning his face toward the garden and the onslaught of watery dust and sand, that he was waiting for someone, waiting impatiently.

A short time passed, and the veil of water before the procurator's eyes began to thin. As fierce as the hurricane had been, it was growing

How the Procurator Tried to Save Judas of Kerioth 257

Weaker. Branches no longer cracked and fell. The claps of thunder and flashes of lightning became less frequent. The violet coverlet with the white trim that had been floating above Yershalaim was gone, and all that remained was an ordinary gray, rear-guard cloud. The thunderstorm was moving out to the Dead Sea.

Now it was possible to hear the separate sounds of the rain and of the water as it streamed through the gutters and down the steps of the staircase which the procurator had traversed earlier that day when he had gone to announce the sentence in the square. And finally the gush of the fountain could be heard, which earlier had been drowned out. It was growing lighter. Dark-blue windows began to appear in the gray veil that was sweeping eastward.

Then from afar, breaking through the patter of the now utterly feeble drizzle, the faint sounds of trumpets and the clatter of several hundred hooves reached the procurator's ears. Hearing those sounds, the procurator shifted position, and his face became animated. The ala was returning from Bald Mountain. Judging by the sound, it was moving across the square where the sentence had been pronounced.

At last the procurator heard both the long-awaited footsteps, and the shuffling on the staircase that led to the garden's upper terrace right in front of the balcony. The procurator craned his neck, and his eyes began to sparkle with joy.

The first thing to appear between the two marble lions was a head in a hood, followed by a drenched man in a cloak that stuck to his body. It was the same man who had had a hushed conversation with the procurator in a darkened room of the palace before the pronouncement of the sentence and who, during the execution, had sat on a three-legged stool, playing with a twig.

Heedless of the puddles, the man in the hood cut across the garden terrace, stepped onto the mosaic floor of the balcony, and, raising his arm, said in a pleasant, high-pitched voice, " Health and happiness to the Procurator! " The newcomer spoke in Latin.

" Gods! " exclaimed Pilate. " You haven't a dry thread on you! What a hurricane! Eh? Please go to my room. Do me the favor of changing into dry clothes."

The visitor threw off his hood, revealing his completely soaked head, his hair plastered to his forehead, and with a polite smile on his cleanshaven face, he began to refuse a change of clothes, assuring the procurator that a litde rain would cause him no harm.

" I won't hear of it, " replied Pilate. He clapped his hands and summoned the servants, who had been hiding from him, to attend to the visitor's needs, and then to serve hot food at once. The procurator's visitor required very litde time to dry his hair, change his clothes and footwear, and tidy up in general, and he soon appeared on the balcony steps in dry sandals, a dry crimson military cloak, and with his hair smoothed down.