had probably fallen in some wild storm, which made for me the deep hole
as the room for my house and flanked this on one side with a wall of
mud held fast among the upturned roots. Overhanging ones formed also
the framework into which we interlaced the poles and branches to make
a roof, finished off with stones for stability and snow for warmth.
The front of the hut was ever open but was constantly protected by the
guardian naida. In that snow-covered den I spent two months like summer
without seeing any other human being and without touch with the outer
world where such important events were transpiring. In that grave under
the roots of the fallen tree I lived before the face of nature with my
trials and my anxiety about my family as my constant companions, and in
the hard struggle for my life. Ivan went off the second day, leaving for
me a bag of dry bread and a little sugar. I never saw him again.


CHAPTER III

THE STRUGGLE FOR LIFE


Then I was alone. Around me only the wood of eternally green cedars
covered with snow, the bare bushes, the frozen river and, as far as I
could see out through the branches and the trunks of the trees, only
the great ocean of cedars and snow. Siberian taiga! How long shall I be
forced to live here? Will the Bolsheviki find me here or not? Will my
friends know where I am? What is happening to my family? These questions
were constantly as burning fires in my brain. Soon I understood why Ivan
guided me so long. We passed many secluded places on the journey, far
away from all people, where Ivan could have safely left me but he always
said that he would take me to a place where it would be easier to live.