Diary of Captivity

A SENSE of cold coming from under the floor awakened me. There were broad cracks in the floor, from which cold air was blowing. My neck was stiff, my bones ached, my feet were icy cold; only my head was hot. Besides, the skin of my hands was cracked and hurt me. The floor was covered with a gritty dust and I felt as if my whole body were covered with it.

Carefully, so as not to awaken anybody, I slipped out of the room, to the corridor, then to the kitchen — in search of water to wash in. I had to shake off that night at all costs.

Luck helped me. Through the window I spied my rubber tub hanging on the hedge, and in the corridor I found two pails full of water. I had hardly brought it all into the kitchen when the door opened and Olesia entered.

‘Zosia, are you mad? What are you going to do?’ Really I could not imagine what upset Olesia in that way.

‘ Well, as you see, I am doing my hair and afterwards I mean to wash and change my dress. After that night spent on our parquets, I feel as if something were creeping all over me. Have you any objections?’

‘Upon my word, the girl is crazy. She is going to wash and dress her hair and make herself look pretty, when a woman in her senses would only think of how to make herself look the worst she can. Do you want a Bolshevik to fall in love with you and carry you off to Moscow? Look at me! I have not curled my locks and I hide my hair under my cap and don’t mean to wash my face until this captivity is over.’ Here Olesia lifted up her eyes to the ceiling and sighed: ‘The worse we look, the better for our virtue.’

In spite of the tragic circumstances, I burst out laughing. Looking at Olesia, I could not help thinking that really there was little risk that even a Bolshevik would run away with her.

Olesia looked offended. She continued in a serious voice: —

‘It seems to me, Sister Zosia, that jokes are quite out of place at this time, and that you might once in a while listen to your sisters, who, being older in years than you are, have more sense. Instead of washing, you would do better to rub your face with soot. See how provoking you look!’

Olesia took a small mirror out of her pocket and poked it under my nose. I could not see anything wrong about my face. Surely I looked pretty much as usual; only fever and exertion had made my eyes larger and unnaturally bright, and circled them with dark blue lines. I should like to be able to write that ‘marble whiteness clothed my face’; unfortunately it was not so. My cheeks were as regularly rosy as could be. The flush on my cheeks was a little unnatural, hectic, but anyway quite out of place, in my opinion, after the dreadful things we had passed through.

Olesia, I am sure, scolded me out of sheer kindness, and her grumbling only showed her good feeling for me. It was awfully ungrateful of me to laugh at her.

I was very sorry, and kissed her heartily.

‘ Don’t be angry, Olenka — I really look dreadful — but just let me wash, and afterwards you may rub soot or ink or anything you like over my face.’

And, to prevent further discussion, I quickly threw off my clothes and jumped into my tub, a delicious splash in the icy water. Olesia had modestly covered her eyes.

I then dressed, following Olesia’s instructions, my hair lightly twisted under my cap. Olesia smoothed it herself, so that no lock should stick out. I rebelled against putting on that apron I wore yesterday, which was all drenched with blood; but Olesia never asked my opinion, just forced it on me and buttoned it up to my neck, saying that my apron might frighten away the Bolsheviks if my face wouldn’t.

On waking, the patients began to complain of hunger. As a matter of fact, they had not had anything to eat all the day before. Fine nurses we were! But where were we to get anything? The larder and our stores had been thoroughly plundered. Besides, the Bolsheviks were watching us very closely. True, they did not come into our izolatka, but they spied our movements through the window and did not allow us to go out of the house. After holding a short council, we distributed charges. Halka became commander of our garrison. Peo took up the department of provisions. Olesia, who was afraid to quit the sickroom and had most experience in nursing, remained to take care of the patients. I, liking to move about and being, as Olesia said, very giddy and sure to do something foolish, had to promise to do nothing without consulting Halka, who appointed me to help Peo and Olesia.

So Peo took me with her to look for something to eat. We searched the kitchen and larder a long while in vain, but at last, on the very highest shelf, in a dark corner of the kitchen, we spied a large box. I climbed up to it in a moment, and, in the joy of seeing what it contained, nearly broke my leg jumping down. We had found a whole case of peas and half a loaf of bread. We took all that treasure to the little kitchen of our izolatka, but we found not a drop of water, not one piece of wood. ‘Look what you have done! You have used up all the water for washing!’

‘Peo darling, I see in you beginnings of Bolshevik influence if you consider washing a crime. Don’t scold, and we shall have everything directly.’

I snatched the two empty pails and wanted to run to the well near the stables, but was stopped in the doorway by a Bolshevik.

‘Where are you going, Sister? Please go back.’ I explained to him that I must go and fetch water, and that if he would let me pass we would give him some of the peas we were going to cook. The Bolshevik smiled and let me pass on, but obviously he did not trust me completely, as he insisted on escorting me to the well and back, gun in hand. He was not particularly gallant either, because, although he saw perfectly well how I bent under the weight of the pails full of water, he did not help me. I am not weak generally, but my back and arms ached awfully that morning, after the carrying of corpses. My hands were frostbitten, too. They were quite blue, cracked and bleeding, and we had a very keen frost that day again. Really, I can say I thoroughly earned my pea soup, because I had to cut wood as well, with an axe borrowed from the Bolsheviks.

They had already grown used to seeing me about and did not stop me. Peo got permission from them to bring some potatoes from the cellar. We took two bags full of them and went up. We found out they were quite rotten, but nevertheless we took as many of them as we could. Anything was better than nothing.

After a dinner of peas and frozen potatoes, which we shared with our patients, the awful reality came back to us again. We had forgotten it in the everyday business and in the everyday joy of being alive. Those dead were still lying under our windows and we were still in ignorance of what had become of the other Sisters.

Halka, our chief, took me with her to the commander of the detachment which had ‘conquered’ Cichinicze. He had put up his headquarters in the schoolhouse. Many soldiers and civilians were bustling round. Sticky mud covered the floor.

The reception was rather ceremonious. The ‘commander,’ a man of about thirty years of age, with a simple clear face, sunburnt and healthy, the type of a corporal of the regular army, could not apparently decide what ‘style’ to assume. He tried to ‘keep form,’ but could not make up his mind whether he had to be a ‘venger of the bourgeois’ or a representative of the ‘severe authority.’

He received us with his cap on, sitting on a chair, very full of himself and his position — apparently enjoying himself very much. On our request to give orders to bury the dead, he replied that ‘ his soldiers were no gravediggers.’

With such a type one must speak in a very scientific style, a language full of pretentious words, rendered familiar by political meetings and propaganda brochures.

So Halka began to expound ‘on principle,’ that ‘the decomposition of bodies’ threatens with ‘infections’ and ‘epidemics,’ which, from the point of view of the sanitary condition, may be ‘undesirable,’ and suchlike nonsense.

All that was graciously listened to, with comprehension, the result being that the commandant promised us to ‘practise no sabotage’ and not to oppose the peasants of Cichinieze who would bury the bodies if we came to an understanding with them. We then went out to the president of the local ‘committee,’ under escort.

This president was apparently the poorest peasant of Cichinieze, dwelling in a half-decayed hut. He was drunk. On hearing our business, he put on a face of shocked and scandalized horror.

‘What are you thinking about?’he said in perfect Russian. ‘Bury the “White Guardsmen”? That must not be.’

When Halka had cleared his doubts by telling him that we had come at the commander’s order, the viceroy of Cichinieze put the whole affair on a business basis, demanding sixty rubles for the digging of the grave. A hard condition it was, considering that our money had been stolen together with our other things, but Halka accepted it.

Two men with spades followed us. After a couple of hours, a broad and deep ditch was ready in the middle of the park, under an ash tree.

When it came to paying, Halka suddenly discovered that she had only twenty rubles in her pocket; I found ten in mine, Peo and Olesia only two or three. Unexpectedly our patients came to our rescue. One after the other began to pull out money from under his pillow and give it to us without counting: ‘Take it, take it all, Sisters, as much as you want. Today you bury these, tomorrow it may be our turn.’

Having collected sufficient money, we left the patients under the care of Staszewicz, and all four of us set to work to carry our dead over to the ash tree.

We found a whole crowd standing waiting for us in front of the house. They went in and out among the litters, lifting up the sheets and discussing the wounds amid laughter and jeers. They went to look at the grave and were constantly going to and fro between the ash tree and the house. There was a holiday air among them, an air of expectation, as if waiting for some performance. The soldiers were walking about with the Cichinieze beauties, pretending to want to push them on to the dead, and the ‘belles’ squealed and pretended to be afraid.

Leaning against the pillars of the porch, waiting for Olesia to join us, we felt that our hardest moments were approaching. We tried to look away from the crowd.

A little aside, the peasants and soldiers were gathering. In the middle a small wiry typical Russian soldier related some story with lively gestures. No, he did not relate it; actually, rather, one might say he acted some scene, changing gestures and poses. It is a special talent, cultivated among the Russian people — a sort of rudimentary comedy. Every detachment of the Russian army had its lomaka or narrator. Every incident used to be transformed by him into a grotesque of words and mimicry.

We looked on this performance, because it distracted some of the attention of the crowd and put off for a little the moment which was approaching.

‘What is he narrating?’ I wondered lazily, and my tired eyes felt as if they pierced the Bolsheviks and passed on to the wide, wide fields beyond, where long golden rays of the setting sun were spreading.

Suddenly the Bolshevik made a movement as if shielding himself with his arm from a blow and uttered an awful cry. We started and caught each other’s hands. It was Henrietta’s scream of yesterday. . . . After that cry the man made a movement as of cutting through the air and uttered at the same time an enormous curse at which all the listeners shook with laughter.

We fixed our eyes on the pantomime which was to reveal to us the secret of yesterday’s events. This man had seen, and knew.

But the narrator, encouraged by success, repeated the scene over and over, the slashing first, then the scream, and last the curse, which had to be different every time and every time more picturesque, for the crowd burst out laughing, always more and more.

Then it was our turn to begin our performance. All muddy and dirty, with disheveled hair, breathing heavily and bending under the awful weight, we carried to the ash tree the bodies of our dead. The crowd stared at us in a shameless, aggressive, stupid way. We feared some outrage against the bodies, so one of us remained on guard near the ash tree, another near the house, while two carried the litters. The crowd thickened; fresh bands drew on towards us from Cichinicze. The people became more and more aggressive. They had become tired of just looking on. From the rows on either side of our way, remarks and jests began to fall. The jests soon changed into insults, which grew sharper every moment.

The narrator, having finished his tale, was now preceding us every time we went with our loaded stretcher, imitating a military band. Everybody laughed and applauded.

We tried not to show our feelings, but we felt that our grave faces as a contrast to the foolery only made the situation more ridiculous.

Above the grave, on the mound of sand dug out of the ditch, we laid the eleven bodies, in order to lower them together into the grave. We had no coffins. In the hands or on the breast of every one we put a holy picture, and then we wrapped him up in a clean sheet. Halka descended into the ditch to receive the bodies.

The crowd pressed on more and more. One Bolshevik fired three shots from his gun — ‘so that everyone might hear it is nothing less than a bourgeois funeral.’

We saw clearly that the crowd was becoming exasperated at our not taking any notice. The men became more and more insolent.

‘Well, Sisters, how is it that you are not sobbing? You do not regret your boys. One can see directly they are Polish women. Neither heart nor soul in them; only pride — nothing else.’

‘They know we are looking at them and so they do not even weep. Polish ladies, “white-handers,” bourgeouiky!’

Fury was roused. The beasts wanted to humble us, to trample us down. A young man, with a red band on his arm, kicked at the body lying nearest to the edge of the ditch till it rolled down, nearly smothering Halka. Now all set to kicking down the dead into the grave. ‘Look, how good we are! We help you, though you did not even ask us to!’ This was a little too much. Beside myself with rage, I seized a litter and hurled it at the crowd. ‘Get out!’ I shouted. The mob retreated a step, but came back the next moment. We were standing on the very edge; another moment and they would push us into the grave. Peo drew herself up and, standing in front of me, called out: —

‘You can kill us, but we shall not let you dishonor our dead as long as we are alive!’

‘Poles,’ jeered somebody in the midst of the mob.

‘Yes, Poles!’ cried Peo defiantly, and took a step forward into the crowd, which retreated involuntarily before her.

‘She has a temper!’ remarked a voice approvingly.

I looked at Peo out of the corner of my eye, because I did not want to turn my face away from the crowd. I saw a face as if cut of stone, with slightly drawn eyebrows and a beautiful look in her eyes, of calm contempt. Beside her the head of Olesia, whose pale lips and cheeks had taken a greenish hue,

‘Down into the ditch with them!’ called somebody from the rear.

‘Of course, make an end of them. Why all that ceremony?’ shouted the mob.

‘Eat earth together with your boys!'

But they dared not quite yet. I knew that our minutes were counted. Those behind would push on those in front and it would be the end of everything. Only one desire remained: ‘O God, let us die looking them straight in the eyes — die and not be afraid and not scream!’ I could trust Peo and myself, and, luckily, Olesia was perfectly petrified. She did not make a movement, only became more and more pallid.

At that moment unexpected help came. Things apparently happen in life as they do in novels. A Bolshevik Commissar began shaming the crowd for quarreling with women, and, when this was of no avail, he threatened them with his revolver and drove the mob away, putting two soldiers on guard, gun in hand, to maintain order.

Now that calm was restored, we jumped down into the grave to help Halka put the bodies into position. At this moment a sledge drew near. Two peasants threw down the body of a man and drove off. I caught up with them and plied them with questions. They told me that it was a Polish soldier, who had been killed at the entrance of Cichinicze; he had lain two days in a ditch, because people had been afraid to bury him.

He was a young man in underclothes only — no distinguishing marks, no papers or initials, nothing to show his identity. His fine brown face, which death had frozen into a stern expression, was lighted by kindly childish lips and open eyes naively staring at the clouds above.

We quickly covered the bodies of the twelve men with sand, but first Halka took a pinch of earth and threw it into the grave. We did the same. Our lips trembled, as if those unknown women they had left at home were bidding them farewell through us.

When the grave was filled in with earth, we knelt down to pray. We recited the ‘Angelus’ aloud. It was dark, and no one was left in the garden except the sentries, but it seemed to me as if here once again a bit of Poland had grown into the earth.

The third day of captivity

Three days of captivity have passed. Life has become systematic. Olesia is with the patients all day and we three watch all night a couple of hours each. We never undress, and sleep on the floor — a waiting dawn as we would salvation. The night is always like some awful nightmare. The patients are more feverish; sometimes I think one of them is dying. I am so nervous I can hardly find his pulse. I save myself by writing this diary. Towards morning everybody falls asleep. I take the opportunity of that moment to bring water and cut wood and take my bath, unseen by Olesia.

Today a new band of Bolsheviks arrived at Cichinicze, all sailors — dark, hostile, and mute. They turned all the house upside down, searching it through from cellar to attic, pulling out all the patients’ belongings and sticking bayonets through the straw beds. I wonder if they knew themselves what they were looking for. Each of us was called separately to be questioned.

At last they left us in peace. Peo and I went to the kitchen to cook our eternal peas.

Suddenly three marines entered, led by a peasant, short guns in their hands, all of them very well equipped. Generally speaking, the sailors have a style of their own, but they are coldly cruel and more difficult to manage than all the rest.

They ordered us to come out. Before the house we saw Staszewicz and his two companions, Halka and Olesia, standing in a row against the wall — in front of them a group of marines, guns in hand, and in the position of ‘ready.’ We were told that we were going to be shot for hiding healthy soldiers.

Staszewicz, in his white underclothes, was trembling from cold and partly from fear, swearing that he did not know the peasant who had led us from the kitchen here — that he had never seen him in his life.

‘Oh, my God!’ groaned the Cichinicze Don Juan sweetly. ‘Am I quite dumb? Why, that gentleman — damn him — punched my very nose.’

‘Well, Sisters,’ — the chief Bolshevik turned to us,— ‘speak out: is he ill or not? Speak the truth and we will let you go free — if not, you die together with those men.’

We looked at each other, our eyes fixed on those of Halka standing against the wall. How we understood each other I do not know — but we did. Yes, at a glance we know: we should lie!

Halka spoke out first, in a bold, calm, positive way, without a quaver in her voice — explaining that Staszewicz was one of our oldest patients. Peo offered to bring the hospital diary (she counted on the probability that the marines did not understand Polish). I began to enumerate volubly the possible and impossible diseases those men had gone through.

‘So, you — —, you wanted to cheat us, to cause the death of those people!’ Shaking the traitor with his right hand, and pounding the man’s face with his left till it grew red and swollen, he gave him at last one blow on the nose and, with a push, sent him sprawling on the snow, where he lay motionless like a beetle, pretending to be dead.

The severe and upright judge was very much satisfied with himself and his verdict. He even wanted to show off his graciousness: Staszewicz and his companions were ordered back to the hospital. He then turned to us, asking who was the head nurse. We pointed to Halka. He ordered her to follow him. Halka returned after a moment and behind her Bolsheviks, carrying a pail full of herrings and a bag of sugar. In exchange the Commissar asked for cocaine, of which we gave him two boxes.

Our fare is getting varied. Beans with herrings, and herrings with sugar! A wonderful diet for typhoid and dysentery!

Fourth day of captivity

We have doctored in the village today. Anczew — the Commissar who saved us when they wanted to bury us alive together with our dead — came this morning and told Halka to take everything wanted for dressing wounds and follow him.

‘Where is ho leading Halka?’ I wondered, and ran after them. I caught up with them on the road. He consented to take me with him too. It appeared that he was taking us to a cottage where a child of four had been badly hurt, playing with a hand grenade.

There were a number of patients in the hut, mostly surgical cases. It was dark when we had finished. The women were kissing Anczew’s hands and heaping blessings on his head.

On our return we were astonished not to find Peo. Olesia said that she had gone to look for bread, because she could not bear any longer to look at the sick men who had had nothing to eat but herring and peas for three days.

She had taken a bag, had thrown it on her back, and had walked from cottage to cottage. Sister Peo, who had proudly challenged the crowd who wanted to push her into the grave! We saw her as she came back, with her bag full, her face looking as if covered with ashes. She threw off her bag and sat down heavily.

She had been after bread, knocking at every door. She did not know how to beg. Standing on the threshold, she would speak out in the loud tones of a charity bazaar collector: ‘Please, give some bread for the sick.’ The men generally received her with mocking and jeers. A boy threw a dead mouse into the bag she was holding up.

But some of the women cut quite large chunks of bread and put them into the bag. And so she had walked on through the village street, as through a street of shame. But the number of life-giving slices grew.

We made bread soup for the less ill. For the others we cut the bread in very thin slices and made toast. It was only black bread, but to us healthy, hardworking girls it smelt — oh, so good. Halka had said the bread was only for the patients, because it might run short.

We agreed and did not eat it. We went about the work silently, amid the calm of our little kitchen, lighted dimly by a lamp. For the first time, after three days, we began to feel animal hunger. But we understood instinctively that though there might be enough bread for us four — only a tiny bit each — it was better not to touch it.

Sister Olesia simplified our feelings, expressing them in her own way: ‘I don’t want any of your beggars’ bread.’

She wrapped herself tightly in her warm shawl and sat down on a log of wood, very cross.

I went up to her and kissed her very hard. Dear, good old Olesia!

Fifth day of captivity

All the Bolshevik staff is in a great commotion today, ever since this morning. They curse the ‘damned Poles’ and throw at us looks full of hate. But in general they seem uneasy.

Good old Anczew, who had got somehow accustomed to us, came several times during the day, in a state of great distress which he naively shared with us — the news of Bolshevik defeat. As if we could take part in his sorrow!

It appears that the Polish army has gone forward. The first regiment of Uhlans is marching on to Cichinicze.

They have occupied Mr. Bulhak’s estate on the other side of the river, four kilometres from here. Four kilometres only, behind that forest — why, we can almost touch them! They may be here at any time! This band will not hold against their attack.

We are out of our wits for joy. In a few hours perhaps I may see Maurice, Dziewanowski, Rostropowicz. . . .

Every now and then one of us ran in front of the house to look out into the distance, beyond the river.

And so everybody in the house, we and the Bolsheviks, spent the whole day in a state of great emotion. By the evening, only a handful of them remained; and they were preparing to depart.

It was quite dark outside and we could see nothing of the fields. So we sat round our smoking lamp, speaking in whispers and trying to calm the wild beating of our hearts, in which hope was beginning to awake.

We understood that the worst would be the peasant interregnum. The peasants hated us, and, what was more, the beast in them was roused by the massacre of the hospital and the impunity of plunder.

So that now, listening to the sounds of evacuation, we rejoiced; but at the same time we prayed that the Bolsheviks would remain. No, not exactly that —if somebody wished to picture our inmost desire it would happen thus: the Bolsheviks guard us faithfully to the last moment and give us herring and sugar; suddenly the Polish Uhlans fall on us, kill the Bolsheviks, and burst into our izolatka.

But those daydreams were very far from the minds of the Bolsheviks, who fled as fast as they could. Fear for ourselves and our patients weighed upon our hearts as with a hundred-ton weight — on that evening so joyous on the one hand, and so full of apprehension on the other.

While we were thus talking together, Anczew came to see us for the fourth or fifth time during the day. We were glad to see him, hoping to get news. But he, contrary to his habit, remained on the threshold and only beckoned to me to go out with him.

I went out, and noticed directly that he was fully armed, with all the straps fastened and his Commissar’s badge, a red band, on his left arm (he had not worn it the other times).

He told me briefly that he had some business with me and started walking towards the river. I did not understand, but followed him. During the past days we had learned to trust Anczew.

‘But why is he leading me towards the Polish army?’ I wondered, walking uneasily in Anczew’s huge strides.

When we were out of the park, he stopped a moment and asked: ‘Sister Zosia, do you want to go back to your own people?’

Not thinking much, as usual, I answered that I did, very much indeed.

Then he started to walk on very fast again.

The snow was not so deep in the fields — I caught up with him. Without slowing his pace for one moment, Anczew began telling me that they were all leaving Cichinicze in an hour’s time. They must hurry, because the Polish soldiers generally attacked in the night, and most certainly they would be in Cichinicze towards morning. ‘But you, Sisters, and your patients have nothing to rejoice about,’ he said, and went on explaining that we should remain guarded by armed peasants, to whom the Bolsheviks had given guns and ammunition with orders to ‘liquidate the hospital and everybody’ at the approach of Polish soldiers. The peasants would be on guard within an hour.

Anczew suddenly stopped and turned to me.

‘You are so young, Sister Zosia. My daughter is exactly your age — and she remained alone in Petrograd. Perhaps she has nothing to eat. . . . And — I thought — it is a pity you should die, Sister Zosia.’

A light breeze lifted a cloudlet of snow and carried it over the fields. I looked back. Our house in Cichinicze was far away. I could only just see the windows of our ward dimly lighted. It was dark on the Bolshevik side (they were probably making preparations for departure in the courtyard).

In front of us we suddenly saw appearing the light of some distant village. Beyond the village I could distinguish the dark outline of a forest. . . .

‘Look here, Sister Zosia,’ Anczew went on; ‘I will lead you through that village and forest. Your soldiers are beyond. I will show you their village and then you will go up to them yourself!’

I was by now perfectly aware of what Anczew was aiming at, and I was struggling with myself. I note this because I resolved to write down everything, even though I am very much ashamed of it.

I struggled with myself, although I knew without the slightest doubt that I ought to remain, but I did not want to acknowledge it. Anczew went on saying something, and whilst he was speaking I sought feverishly, desperately, for some unrefutable argument which would tell me that I must seize the opportunity offered to me.

My head was empty. Not one thought! Only that consciousness that I must make up my mind quickly, quickly, and that certainty that my duty was to remain in Cichinicze, and that desperate searching.

‘Well, come along, Sister Zosia,’ said Anczew, taking my hand impatiently. A flow of blood rose to my head. I had not found anything — I had not had time to find it. Then suddenly I realized something as if with a blow: I Shall Remain.

Pulled on by Anczew, I stumbled against a root and lost my balance. Mechanically I followed him a few steps, knowdng that I would not go and subconsciously hoping for some miracle. What if suddenly we were surrounded by our soldiers and an act of God laid itself across my own will?

But the fields were silent. I stopped after a few steps. I understood clearly that I must not go and would not go.

A sudden animal fear seized me. I stiffened with horror, because my awakened imagination set before my eyes clearly and distinctly, with every detail, the scene of how we were going to be murdered. Why, our death was certain and I wanted to live! What good would it do if I died?

No, I did not want to die, with Maurice only a few steps away from me. Suddenly I seemed to see my darling Maurice with perfect clearness.

Our quiet sunny drawing-room at home. Maurice, aged ten, is playing at soldiers with me. The piano is a cannon. ‘Now, attention!’ calls Maurice, and aims his toy pistol at me. He does not allow me to wink when the cartridge is fired.

No, that is clear — how could I shake hands with him? What would our relations be? How could I live at all after such a shameful deed?

I stopped Anczew. I told him that I had made up my mind and resolved to remain; I began to walk very fast in the direction of Cichinicze. I made no answer to his arguments, only shook my head.

He was angry. At a certain moment, when the road branched off to the farm, he made an impatient movement with his hand and left me without saying a word of farewell.

I went on alone towards the dull light of our window. My heart felt warm and happy, as if I were going back to my own home and to those who were dearest to me.

On approaching our door, I came across a few village ragamuffins already on guard. They held their guns like sticks, but they might shoot us with them all the same.

Some of them sat on our threshold. They never took the trouble to get up, only one of them leaned aside a little and muttered, ‘Pass on.’ There was a fathomless hatred in the words; a threat sounded in them, and at the same time the lazy security of a beast which is in no hurry, knowing that its prey cannot escape.

That night in the stuffy air of the izolatka was the worst we had passed. Worse even than the one in which the moon shone upon the faces of the dead men lying under our window. It was the sixth night we had spent without undressing, sleeping on the floor. All that time we lived only on peas and herrings. No wonder our power of resistance had greatly diminished.

Every now and then one of the sentinels would come into our ward and with his finger count us like sheep. I could not sleep, and sat writing this diary of mine all night. Once Peo woke up and asked me if I was writing my will.

At last, when it was already dawn, I couldn’t keep quiet any longer, and I woke Halka and Peo.

‘Look, girls, it is morning and we are still alive. Isn’t it funny? Do you know, I always feel courage coming into me in the morning. After all, we are not going to let ourselves be butchered like sheep in clear daylight, for no reason whatever.’

We kissed each other heartily, for good morning.

This sixth day was marked by the fact that we had ceased to make ready for the other world. We had got quite bored with it. All the week through, over and over again, no result. Anybody’s patience would be at an end. So we gave it up and resolved to remain in this vale of tears.

It must be admitted, however, that, although belonging to this earth, we all look like ghosts from the other world, owing partly to our salt-herring cure, in addition to other pleasures. Herring for breakfast, herring for dinner, herring for supper, and not even a bit of bread with it. Afterwards each of us drinks at least a bucketful of water, which I must fetch.

It is true that Peo got some tea for our patients; there is the bag of bread; besides, we have obtained permission to milk two or three cows in the stables. But that is for the sick. Peo won’t even have the first look at all these delicacies.

But I forget, to write about the most important thing. The Bolsheviks have returned this morning and have taken command over Cichinicze again. The news about the Poles’ attack seems to have been false. Our hopes fall. We return to our everyday occupations. Olesia doctors, washes, scrubs and sweeps and dusts, and is, in spite of her little oddities, a splendid nurse.

Many new Bolsheviks have come, together with the old ones. There are some horrible types among them — drunken faces with a completely animal expression in them. The first thing they did on arriving was to dash into the laboratory, looking for alcohol. Luckily there was not any left, but what they did find was a large bottle of valerian on ether. One of them poured out a large tumblerful and wanted to drink it up. It occurred to me that the pure ether would burn his stomach. I stopped him, saying that he would kill himself. I did it not out of pity for him. My heart has grown so hard now that if I had been told about his death post factum I should even have been glad. But, as it was in my presence, I felt it my duty to warn him. It would have been inhuman to look on calmly when a man was taking his life out of stupidity and ignorance and do nothing to prevent, him.

The Bolshevik stared at me as if he understood my thoughts and said: ‘What does my life matter to you, Sister? You should be glad there will be one Bolshevik less!’

That was it — why should I not permit myself to be frank? I answered that of course I should be glad of it, but I am a Christian and this was why I had warned him.

The Bolshevik twisted his head to one side, then the other, listening. Finally he put out his large paw to me. ‘Well, then, shake hands, comrade-Sister,’ said he.

I pretended not to see him, extremely busy with tidying up the medicine bottles on the shelves. I did not care at all for a handshake with such a brute. Nevertheless I observed him with a corner of my eye, and saw that my warning had been given in vain. The Bolshevik poured out half the contents of the glass, which he then filled with water. After that he swallowed it. Even that dilution must have been very strong, because the beast lay for twentyfour hours on the floor dead drunk, but he got up quite well.

At last we know what has happened to the other Sisters.

Anczew told us today that directly after taking possession of Cichinicze the Bolsheviks sent them to Mohilev and that certainly no evil will come to them. He said that only one of them, the ‘woman doctor’ (probably Mrs. Jozka), fired at the escorting Bolsheviks and was going to be shot. Saying that, he laughed, so perhaps it was not true. They often tell us stupid stories on purpose to annoy us, as they did yesterday, for example, telling us that the first regiment of Uhlans was completely smashed. But I do not believe a word of it.

We learned also that when the Bolsheviks were shooting the head doctor one of the Sisters knelt before the soldiers, begging them to shoot her too (it must have been Henrietta), and another one, ‘tall and dark,’ probably Lala Landsberg, covered the head doctor with her body when one Tartar had sprung at him with his sword, so that the sword slipped on her shoulder without touching the doctor. After that, all the Sisters were surrounded and sent to the station, because ‘we do not kill women! But with the rest we made order!’

That Anczew seems a good man; and yet he can say in such a matter-of-fact way that they have been murdering defenseless men. I felt quite beside myself with indignation listening to him — and yet had to pretend to be calm so as to hear everything.

We have a new trouble. One of the soldiers wo have hidden is ill. Probably he caught something from the other patients — the worst of it is that we don’t know what is the matter with him. It is awful that we have no doctor.

We assemble for a great consultation and decide that the patient must have pneumonia, because he breathes so heavily.

We apply compresses, inject camphor every hour. We force into his mouth milk, tea, or bread soaked with milk, in spite of his resistance. Unfortunately we have nothing else to give him, and the worst of it is that our medicine score is coming to an end.

What shall we do afterwards?

We resolved to go to the Head Commissar and ask him to give us horses and the permission to take the patients to some hospital in Rohaczew.

Halka was elected for that mission. I followed her, of course. The Commissar occupies a large room downstairs. It was beautifully warm and there was a fire burning in the stove. In the middle of the room a large barrel full of lard was standing; in the corner loaves of bread were heaped up, and there were bags full of sugar and flour.

All the treasures , of Ali-Baba seemed to us nothing beside this. I felt a painful contraction inside — hunger probably.

The Commissar was unexpectedly gracious and, when we had made our request, promised to give us sledges for transporting the patients. He calmly stated that he would probably send us Sisters from Rohaczew to Tula, or to Smolensk, because they are in want of educated women workers in Russia. ‘Confound you,’ I thought. Halka kicked me under the table to prevent, my saying something unnecessary, and thanked the Commissar.

The horses were ready at five o’clock in the afternoon instead of two. The peasants did not want to give us horses until they were compelled to by the Bolsheviks, who in fact are glad to get rid of us, because there are many among them who are in constant fear of our typhus and other diseases.

We wrapped the patients in blankets, put pillows round them, and covered them with straw, because the thermometer marked twenty degrees below zero centigrade.

It was almost dark when we started. There was no room for us in the sledges and we followed on foot. Three Bolsheviks, armed to the teeth, escorted us. They had guns, swords, revolvers, and such a lot of cartridges that one would think they were escorting the most dangerous criminals. We were rather lightly dressed for such cold. I stamped, rubbed my hands, and, when that proved useless, started running.

Suddenly I heard a shot fired behind me, then another. I looked round and saw Anczew aiming his revolver at me a third time. Was he mad?

Halka and Peo were making desperate signs to me to come back to them. They had lingered behind a little. I went to them and they told me that the man was drunk. They explained that, as I ran, he had probably thought I wanted to run away. Well, he was only aiming at my feet, but, being very tipsy, he might have hit where he did not mean to.

Halka confessed to having done a very stupid thing. Throughout our captivity she had kept a bottle of alcohol, hidden very carefully, thinking it might be wanted in some critical moment for the patients. No such critical moment demanding alcohol occurred, so just before starting she had offered the bottle to Anczew, as a token of gratitude, to thank him for his protection and help and for the safety we owed him. He drank up all the contents on the spot, after which he declared that he would escort us. And this was the result.

It was eleven o’clock when we reached Rohaczew. Those twenty miles took us six hours. And now the tragedy began, because we could not find a hospital which would take us in.

In one they did not accept Poles, in another they would not have contagious cases. The Epidemic Hospital refused, saying there was no room.

The peasant drivers were angry at being forced to go from one end of the town to the other. They threatened to throw the patients out of the sledges into the street, and go home to Cichinicze. The frost was growing sharper every minute. You felt as if you were breathing some thick mass. The horses were quite white with frost and could hardly drag along their legs. What about ourselves?

It was one o’clock and we were still in the street. I kept on eating snow, although I was quite stiff with cold, because I could not quench my horrible thirst.

There was only one hospital left in the neighborhood near the station. If it would not take us in, we should return to Cichinicze, Halka decided. I did not contradict her, although I knew half of us would die somewhere on the way and that probably I should be one of them. I should even like to. And then I did not desire even that, because it was all the same to me. If only they would allow me not to move from here. I was sitting on the ground, beside one of the sledges, awaiting the moment when Halka would come back from the hospital saying that they did not want us here either. But no, Halka came out followed by some men bearing litters who carried the patients indoors. Olesia pulled my hand and led me to a large building, then upstairs. I smelled medicine, so we were in the hospital.

When the transporting of the patients was over and the confusion and hurlyburly had subsided, I began slowly to shake off that strange coma which had overcome me outside; although I could move and see and hear everything, I did not understand what was happening around us. Before an hour had elapsed I felt quite well again.

We were given one very large room. Unluckily it was not heated. Our patients were given fresh linen, and a few minutes later were lying in fresh white beds, drinking hot tea. Halka told us that the doctor agreed to take us in, but on condition that we would remain on duty with our sick tonight, because his staff and all the hospital service were indignant that he had taken in Poles and they might do them some harm.

So we prepared to sit up all night on guard. We barricaded the door with empty beds, on one of which we all four sat down, with our feet tucked up, huddled together to keep each other warm. We talked to one another in sleepy voices so as not to fall asleep, but it did not help much, so every minute we had to shake each other.

Morning came at last, and no one had even looked into our ward.

We found a Polish Sister that morning and she took our patients and us under her care very kindly and heartily. She brought a doctor at our request and he said nearly all of our patients had passed the crisis and were out of danger. We learned from him that the soldier we were treating for pneumonia had typhoid fever. But we did not really do him any harm; it was all right.

At last the moment came when we could go to sleep for some hours quietly, for the first time. The kind Sister put us into an empty room, beside our ward, and even served us dinner in bed. I remember having written in an autograph album that happiness is inner contentment— what nonsense! Happiness is dinner in bed, when somebody serves you and shifts your pillows. We were so hungry that if it had not been for the presence of the Sister, and some remains of good manners, we should have swallowed our plates and forks together with the food.

When dinner was over I saw that Peo was going to sleep again. I pulled at her sleeve, because I felt quite wide awake and rested. ‘Peo, wake up. I just wanted to ask you to give us some herring for dessert. I don’t believe that you haven’t got one in store. You must have taken at least the tail of a herring for a keepsake.’

At five o’clock Halka awoke us and told us to dress. We glanced into our ward and at our patients. They looked beautiful: clean, rested, and fed. Two Sisters and a hospital orderly nursed them, all Poles.

Feeling quite secure as to their fate, we went out into the town. There we found the Head Commissar of Rohaczew, quite a decent and even an elegant man, who made no difficulties about our permission to go to Minsk, which was now in the hands of the Bolsheviks. We might start directly if we wanted to.

But when we told our patients about it on our return to the hospital, such a lamentation arose that we resolved to stay for another day.

We spent all the next day with our patients. Before starting, we recommended them to one of the doctors, who promised to take care of them until they should be strong again, and then added in a low voice a hope that by that time Rohaczew would be in Polish hands once more.

The worst of all was the moment of departure. The patients, in thanking us for our care, stooped to our feet and kissed our hands. Some of them were sobbing quite loudly. We could not tear ourselves out of the room, because they held us back by our dresses — imploring us to stay only one moment longer. One or two who could walk accompanied us to the staircase.

One more sleepless night in the cattle truck. A compact crowd of soldiers surrounded the smoking stove in the middle of the wagon. The frost was biting sharply in the farther corners. We huddled together and tried to warm one another.

A funny nation, the Russians! That passiveness of theirs, often terrible in its thoughtless cruelty, becomes sometimes a mercy. For instance, now they never even noticed us. Curled up in a dark corner, we listened greedily to the lazy talk of the crowd in the middle. We had been cut off from the world for eight long days.

As was natural, the conversation ran on the doings of the Polish First Corps, because the soldiers were returning from the ‘Polish front.’ From their words we understood that the process of exterminating our Corps was almost at an end.

It was more than we could bear. To go through such suffering, to hang between life and death for so many days, with only that one hope for our Corps, and now to learn that all the hardships, the deaths, all the blood, all the sacrifices had been in vain, that this group of Polish soldiers had been submerged and drowned in the sea of barbarism and injustice and crime!

We had never shed one tear all the time of our captivity, but now our moral strength was gone. I sobbed aloud. Halka and Peo, weeping themselves, did all they could to calm me, by burying my head in the folds of their dresses.

The soldiers noticed us.

‘What are you blubbering for, Sisters?’ asked one of them.

‘Poles,’ explained a lazy hostile voice.

‘That means they are sorry for their countrymen,’ concluded the first. ‘Yes, yes, they were soundly beaten.’

‘Look here,’ said another, producing a paper with a headline shouting: ‘Final Liquidation of White Guardsman Dowbor.’

There was no more doubt. We drew ourselves up and looked with dry eyes at the Bolsheviks, who had meanwhile turned to other subjects of conversation. We never spoke to each other during the rest of the journey.

It was ten o’clock in the evening when we arrived at Minsk. Directly at the station we learned not only that the First Corps had not been defeated, but that it was advancing.

We drove straight to our homes, too tired to make plans except that we should meet next day.

Home at last!

In the morning I was awakened by the news that Minsk was free! I jumped out of bed and ran to the window. The streets were crowded and throbbing with movement. That crowd with its holiday air, its bright colors, how unlike the population of Minsk in the days of the Bolsheviks, when everybody tried to look as gray as possible! Many of the men were wearing Polish eagles on their caps. There were no Polish soldiers, but the civilians were mostly carrying guns.

Suddenly there was a movement in the crowd, and the corner of the street brightened with the yellow caps of the Uhlans of the Third Regiment. Funny soldiers they were — in fur coats, sheepskin-lined jackets, and black civilian coats!

It appeared that during the night the Poles had taken up arms. With fifteen men they took the arsenal, in which 14,000 guns were found. Those guns were distributed in motorcars to the population all over the town, and in a few hours several thousand volunteers stood in readiness. And so, by morning, we had a ‘regular army.’

In the year 1920 our army again reached Cichinicze.

The grave, clumsily built up by our hands under the ash tree in the park, was still there, and remains there to this day, as a bloody seal of the Republic of Poland. . . . There are many such graves around. . . .