JК
Diaboliad :: Булгаков Михаил Афанасьевич
Страница: 24 из 30I refuse! Give me backmy documents. My precious surname. Reinstate me!»
«That's a matter for the matrimonial department, Comrade,» squeaked the secretary. «We can't do anything about that.»
«Silly boy!» exclaimed the brunette, peeping in again. «Say yes! Say yes!» she hissed in a prompter's whisper. Her head kept darting in and out.
«Comrade!» Korotkov sobbed, rubbing his tear-stained face. «Comrade! Give me my documents, I beseech you. Be a friend. Please, I beg you with all the fibres of my soul, and I'll go into a monastery.»
«Cut out the hysterics, Comrade! Kindly inform me concretely and abstractly, in writing and by word of mouth, urgently and confidentially — Poltava or Irkutsk? Don't waste a busy person's time! No walking along the corridors! No spitting! No smoking! No asking for small change!» Blondy thundered, losing his temper.
«All handshaking abolished!» the secretary cuckooed.
«Long live clinches!» the brunette whispered passionately and rushed round the room like a gust of wind, wafting lilies-of-the-valley over Korotkov's neck.
«The thirteenth commandment says: thou shalt not go in to thy neighbour without notification,» muttered the glossy old man and fluttered around in the air, flapping the edges of his cloak. «I'm not going in. No, sir. But I'll palm a memo off on you all the same. Here you are, plop! You'd sign anything. And land up in the dock too.» He tossed sheets of paper out of his wide black sleeve, and they floated about, settling on the desks like gulls on seashore cliffs.
The room turned dark and the windows rocked.
«Comrade Blondy,» the exhausted Korotkov wept. «You can shoot me on the spot, but please issue me some kind of document. And I'll kiss your hand.»
In the darkness Blondy began to swell and grow, frantically signing the old man's sheets of paper and tossing them to the secretary, who caught them with a happy gurgle.
«To hell with him!» Blondy thundered. «To hell with him! Typists, hey!»
He waved an enormous hand, the wall disintegrated before Korotkov's eyes, and the thirty typewriters on the desks rang their bells and began to play a foxtrot. Swaying their hips, shaking their shoulders sensuously and kicking up a white foam with their cream legs, thirty women did a conga round the desks.
White snakes of paper slithered into the typewriters' jaws and were joined, cut out and sewn into a pair of white trousers with violet side-stripes which said «The bearer of this really is the bearer, and not just a worthless scallywag.
«That's a matter for the matrimonial department, Comrade,» squeaked the secretary. «We can't do anything about that.»
«Silly boy!» exclaimed the brunette, peeping in again. «Say yes! Say yes!» she hissed in a prompter's whisper. Her head kept darting in and out.
«Comrade!» Korotkov sobbed, rubbing his tear-stained face. «Comrade! Give me my documents, I beseech you. Be a friend. Please, I beg you with all the fibres of my soul, and I'll go into a monastery.»
«Cut out the hysterics, Comrade! Kindly inform me concretely and abstractly, in writing and by word of mouth, urgently and confidentially — Poltava or Irkutsk? Don't waste a busy person's time! No walking along the corridors! No spitting! No smoking! No asking for small change!» Blondy thundered, losing his temper.
«All handshaking abolished!» the secretary cuckooed.
«Long live clinches!» the brunette whispered passionately and rushed round the room like a gust of wind, wafting lilies-of-the-valley over Korotkov's neck.
«The thirteenth commandment says: thou shalt not go in to thy neighbour without notification,» muttered the glossy old man and fluttered around in the air, flapping the edges of his cloak. «I'm not going in. No, sir. But I'll palm a memo off on you all the same. Here you are, plop! You'd sign anything. And land up in the dock too.» He tossed sheets of paper out of his wide black sleeve, and they floated about, settling on the desks like gulls on seashore cliffs.
The room turned dark and the windows rocked.
«Comrade Blondy,» the exhausted Korotkov wept. «You can shoot me on the spot, but please issue me some kind of document. And I'll kiss your hand.»
In the darkness Blondy began to swell and grow, frantically signing the old man's sheets of paper and tossing them to the secretary, who caught them with a happy gurgle.
«To hell with him!» Blondy thundered. «To hell with him! Typists, hey!»
He waved an enormous hand, the wall disintegrated before Korotkov's eyes, and the thirty typewriters on the desks rang their bells and began to play a foxtrot. Swaying their hips, shaking their shoulders sensuously and kicking up a white foam with their cream legs, thirty women did a conga round the desks.
White snakes of paper slithered into the typewriters' jaws and were joined, cut out and sewn into a pair of white trousers with violet side-stripes which said «The bearer of this really is the bearer, and not just a worthless scallywag.