"Mikhail Bulgakov. The Fateful Eggs ("Роковые яйца")" - читать интересную книгу автора

certainly not... And I'm extremely busy. I really must ask you to..."
"Any old one will do. And we'll return it straightaway." "Pankrat!" the
Professor yelled in a fury. "Your humble servant," said the young man and
vanished. Instead of Pankrat came the strange rhythmic scraping sound of
something metallic hitting the floor, and into the laboratory rolled a man
of unusual girth, dressed in a blouse and trousers made from a woollen
blanket. His left, artificial leg clattered and clanked, and he was holding
a briefcase. The clean-shaven round face resembling yellowish meat-jelly was
creased into a welcoming smile. He bowed in military fashion to the
Professor and drew himself up, his leg giving a springlike snap. Persikov
was speechless.
"My dear Professor," the stranger began in a pleasant, slightly throaty
voice, "forgive an ordinary mortal for invading your seclusion."
"Are you a reporter?" Persikov asked. "Pankrat!"
"Certainly not, dear Professor," the fat man replied. "Allow me to
introduce myself-naval captain and contributor to the Industrial Herald,
newspaper of the Council of People's Commissars."
"Pankrat!" cried Persikov hysterically, and at that very moment a red
light went on in the corner and the telephone rang softly. "Pankrat!" the
Professor cried again. "Hello."
"Verzeihen Sie bitte, Herr Professor," croaked the telephone in German,
"das ich store. Ich bin Mitarbeiter des Berliner Tageblatts..."
"Pankrat!" the Professor shouted down the receiver. "Bin momental sehr
beschaftigt und kann Sie deshalb jetzt nicht empfangen. Pankrat!"
And just at this moment the bell at the main door started ringing.
"Terrible murder in Bronnaya Street!" yelled unnaturally hoarse voices,
darting about between wheels and flashing headlights on the hot June
roadway. "Terrible illness of chickens belonging to the priest's widow
Drozdova with a picture of her! Terrible discovery of life ray by Professor
Persikov!"
Persikov dashed out so quickly that he almost got run over by a car in
Mokhovaya and grabbed a newspaper angrily.
"Three copecks, citizen!" cried the newsboy, squeezing into the crowd
on the pavement and yelling: "Red Moscow Evening News, discovery of X-ray!"
The flabbergasted Persikov opened the newspaper and huddled against a
lamp-post. On page two in the left-hand corner a bald man with crazed,
unseeing eyes and a hanging lower jaw, the fruit of Alfred Bronsky's
artistic endeavours,
stared at him from a smudged frame. The caption beneath it read: "V I.
Persikov who discovered the mysterious ray." Lower down, under the heading
World-Wide Enigma was an article which began as follows:
"'Take a seat,' the eminent scientist Persikov invited me
hospitably..."
The article was signed with a flourish "Alfred Bronsky (Alonso)".
A greenish light soared up over the University roof; the words "Talking
Newspaper" lit up in the sky, and a crowd jammed Mokhovaya.
"Take a seat!' an unpleasant thin voice, just like Alfred Bronsky's
magnified a thousand times, yelped from a loudspeaker on the roof, "the
eminent scientist Persikov invited me hospitably. 'I've been wanting to tell
the workers of Moscow the results of my discovery for some time...'"