Cilka's Journey(17)

It seems Josie does too.

“I tripped near the stove,” Josie says, “and put my hand out to break my fall.”

Antonina beckons Josie over to her, chin raised.

Josie approaches the brigadier, her bandaged hand outstretched.

“How do I know you’re not just trying to get out of work?”

Josie understands her. She begins unwrapping the bandage. She can’t stop the tears that accompany the pain as she removes the last layer, revealing the raw blistered hand.

Cilka steps forward so she’s beside Josie, not wanting to stand out but wanting her to know she is there, to comfort her. Antonina looks at the two of them, sizing them up.

“There’s not much to either of you zechkas, is there?” She looks at Cilka. “Take her back inside. I’ll be back for you.”

Cilka is startled. Worried. But she does what she’s told. They hurry back inside the building, Cilka casting a backward glance at the others as they shuffle off to work. The snow whips up, enveloping them, and they disappear from sight. What has she done now?

Cilka and Josie huddle by the stove, blankets wrapped around their shivering bodies. Cilka desperately hopes they will acclimatize. It’s not even winter yet. An icy blast smacks them from their contemplation. Antonina stands in the doorway.

Cilka nudges Josie and they walk quickly to the door and follow Antonina out, Cilka making sure the door is securely closed behind her.

She has often seen Antonina with another brigadier—with whom she shared a hut in the cluster of huts that make up their brigade—so she supposes they must share responsibility for the women. Or perhaps the other woman was an assistant to Antonina. Either way, she must be the one keeping track of the brigade in the field while Antonina takes on this duty.

While the distance to the sick bay and hospital is not far, the blizzard conditions make walking slow and painful as the snow is so deep they are forced to push their legs through it, rather than take steps. Cilka tries to gain an understanding of the size of the complex by the number of huts that resemble theirs. The other, larger buildings that stand a little apart must be administration or stores, but there is nothing to indicate their use. The hospital building Antonina points out to them also has no outward sign of its purpose.

A guard stands outside. Antonina, her eyes barely visible, is forced to remove the scarf wrapped around her face and shout into his face. Cilka wonders what he can possibly have done to be punished with this duty. It doesn’t seem much better than being a prisoner, though he probably has better living quarters and more food. With apparent reluctance, he opens the door and pushes the women unceremoniously inside. Presumably he is under instruction not to let any snow in.

The warmth of the building hits them immediately, and they unwrap their scarves, Josie using her good hand.

“Wait here,” Antonina tells them. They stand just inside the door, taking a first look at the room they have just entered.

It is some kind of waiting room. Prisoners—men and women—sit on the few available chairs, with more on the floor, hunched over, pain etched on their faces. Others are curled up, sleeping, unconscious, dead—it is not obvious which. Several groan quietly, a distressing sound, a too-familiar sound for Cilka. She looks away from them, up at the portrait of Stalin on the wall.

Antonina is at the desk at the front of the room, speaking quietly to the matronly figure seated behind it. With a nod of her head she returns to Cilka and Josie.

“You are number 509 when it is called.” She repeats the numbers slowly in Russian: “Pyat’sot devyat.”

Without further word, Antonina walks back to the door and is replaced by a sheet of fresh snow, which quickly melts into the puddle on the floor.

Cilka takes Josie’s arm and steers her to a small patch of bare wall they can sit against. It is only as they slide down to the floor that Cilka notices several heads lift and fearful eyes appraise the newcomers. Is there a hierarchy even here? Cilka meets their stares. They look away first.



* * *



Cilka hears their number, accompanied by some yelling.

She startles from a daze. “Last chance!” the matronly woman is saying.

Disoriented, she sees Josie is asleep, her head resting on Cilka’s outstretched legs.

“Here! We’re coming!” she calls as loudly as she can.

She shakes Josie and they scramble to their feet, heading quickly to the desk and the scowling woman behind it.

She stands, thrusts a clipboard at Josie, and walks to a door leading to the back of the room. Cilka and Josie follow.

Through the door, the woman leads them past beds that line both sides of the room. A ward. Cilka glances at them. The sheets are white. The blankets gray, but possibly thicker than those they have in their hut. Pillows are tucked beneath the heads of the men and women lying there.

Through the ward, they enter a clinical area screened off from the rest of the room. The smell of disinfectant assaults their nostrils.

Josie is shoved into a chair next to a table laden with bottles, bandages and instruments.

The woman indicates the clipboard Josie is holding, and hands Cilka a pen. Cilka understands that they are to fill it out. The woman turns away and is gone.

“I can’t do this,” Josie whispers. “I write with my right hand.”

“Let me,” says Cilka.

She takes the clipboard, pushes some of the instruments on the table to one side and places it down.