“I have a play about to open,” said Bulgakov.
“You do,” said Ilya. His tone was neutral, and Bulgakov wondered what he might know about its fate.
“I have—” Bulgakov was suddenly reluctant to continue. “I have—someone.”
Ilya did not answer immediately. “You do.” His skepticism was gone, as though he’d been momentarily disarmed by the words. “In some ways, it would be easier for me if you were to leave.”
Bulgakov was uncertain of what he meant. He remembered the night in the restaurant when they’d met Ilya. He’d had an inhuman quality, and perhaps that was the nature of one in his occupation. Only now there was a sense of regret, a reluctant acceptance of personal loss that was very human. Not all desires were going to be pursued in this lifetime. Did he have a woman? There was no way such a question could be posed.
“I’m not trying to make things difficult for you,” said Bulgakov.
With that, Ilya seemed restored. “Perhaps you believe that only in this country writing is respected,” he said.
There was an echo of Mandelstam. Bulgakov spoke carefully. “Respected or not, it is my home.”
Ilya then seemed to change the subject. “I’ve always wondered: what is the writer’s inspiration? How do you choose which imaginative peak to scale on any given day?”
Again, Bulgakov was surprised by this turn of conversation. “I can’t speak for everyone,” he said. “I suppose it’s an observation of some incongruity in life. Some paradox that I want to explore. The answer to what would happen if…” Ilya’s expression was unreadable. “Perhaps it has to do with my scientific training,” he added weakly.
“Of course,” said Ilya. “You were first a physician. A venereologist—your specialty in syphilis? Your practice in Kiev. Given up, because—why?”
“I suppose I lost my ambition for it.” He’d done nothing to prepare for these questions.
Ilya seemed ready to ask another, then appeared to change his mind. “I feel we have this in common,” he said. “I too pose such questions to the world—questions of what if. For example, what if a passably successful playwright met with such censorship that none of his plays could be produced?”
Bulgakov felt his chest contract slightly. “I should have no idea of that outcome,” he said.
“No? Then here’s another—what if a physician of comfortable means, bourgeoisie means, was faced with the loss of these luxuries at the hands of an invading proletariat army? What then—would he enlist in a failing Nationalist cause in order to protect the old ways? Would he betray his country’s destiny? That should be a fine plot for a story.”
Bulgakov’s mouth went dry. “It sounds rather flat, actually.”
Ilya went on. “And what if this physician, this traitor, seeking to hide from his past, left his home, and turning to another career, found himself still frustrated and pining for the old life—his petitions to emigrate refused again and again. What if he then took every opportunity to infuse his writings with seditious ideas, cloaking them in some guise of literature?” He leaned forward slightly, and now, for the first time, seemed agitated. The ash from his neglected cigarette fell to the table’s surface and noiselessly shattered.
Bulgakov grew strangely calm, even as the waves of accusation became stronger. They had nothing. Otherwise there would have been not a telegram, but agents at his door. This would be not an interview but an interrogation.
The ruddiness of Ilya’s face had deepened. “And what if—Writer—what if the leader of this great country was so taken in that even he failed to see these obvious sentiments, even he was blind to the treachery in the words. What if he protected this writer because he found him entertaining, unknowing of the real damage this spoiler caused? What would happen if this was revealed to him? What then—”
The room seemed to collapse, losing air, until there was space for only the two of them, their faces inches apart. Bulgakov gathered his breath. “Perhaps you should be the fiction writer,” he said.
“You think it fiction?”
“I love my country,” said Bulgakov.
“You love yourself,” said Ilya. His voice dripped with disgust.
CHAPTER 16
Ilya got up abruptly and left the room, jostling the table with the force of his departure. The unseen door from the other office closed in succession. Bulgakov was alone.
No instruction had been given; was he to wait and for who? Would the officer who’d brought him come to fetch him? The one who wanted to write? Or the secretary from the foyer who’d thought him a criminal? Or were there others at that moment being summoned to imprison him? Had Ilya been so angered that he’d gone to procure some contingent of guards? Could Bulgakov find his way on his own? Would it be labeled an escape attempt when he’d come in the first place of his own choice?
The door opened and Vasily appeared. He sat down, positioned the cart, lifted its side arms which provided a broader table, and removed a thick folder from the shelf below. In a manner that appeared well practiced, he placed the ream of pages to the left and the folder to the right. He fed the first page into the machine’s roll, then rubbed his hands together. He was there to take his confession, Bulgakov thought.
Vasily began. “Name?”
“I told you already,” said Bulgakov. Then he gave his name again.
“Place of domicile,” said Vasily.
“What is this for?” Bulgakov would have asked if he’d been arrested, but the words were too terrible to speak.
“We need to update your file,” said Vasily.
He had a file? For what purpose, he thought miserably.
Vasily seemed preoccupied with adjusting the paper on the stenotype’s roll.
“May I smoke?” said Bulgakov, feeling depressed.
“Do I look like a Committee member?” said Vasily.
The questions began with his parents; the concrete statistics of their existence—their place of birth and death, their education, the condition of their health, their travels and occupation; as well as their interests, their beliefs, their politics, and their prejudices. Had anyone in his family been a priest? A teacher? A writer? An artist? What views did they maintain about the Tsar? The West? The East? Karl Marx? The war? One by one, they went through his siblings as well. At first, Bulgakov had been somewhat lengthy in his responses, but it seemed Vasily was incapable of paraphrasing and progressively his answers shortened.
The pages to his left seemed not to diminish. After several hours, and with the alignment of a fresh form, Vasily smiled at Bulgakov. “Now we may commence with you,” he said. Bulgakov felt sickened; this wasn’t an interview, but a slow and meticulous evisceration.
When Bulgakov left Lubyanka, it was late in the afternoon. Vasily had asked about Mandelstam and Stanislawski, Poprikhen and Likovoyev. He’d asked about his current and former neighbors. About their wives, their lovers, their parents, and their children. He’d asked about Tatiana. Then, about Margarita. In the fading light, Lubyanka seemed no longer a building; Bulgakov had been given a pinhole’s view of the machinations of the universe. He could not get away fast enough.
He only wanted to write. Such was his desperate truth, he thought. Had that as well been left behind?
Despite the hour he went to the theater.
The marquee was dark, yet his name remained, side-by-side with Molière’s. He recognized the cashier in the ticket office; she gestured from her slotted window as he passed through the lobby as though to dissuade him from going further. Of the series of doors along the far wall he knew the one on the end would be unlocked. It was late; he wanted only to see the set; his set. She called out his name as the door closed behind him.