“Where does it hurt you?” she said in Russian, but with a foreign accent. I wanted to answer, but no words came. I pointed to my stomach and gagged a little. It was too much effort. I began to feel ill, writhing in nausea. I felt a thin slice of preserved lemon thrust through my lips. My lips smarted. I clutched them with my hand. There was something wrong with my lips, my left arm, my head, my ankle and nose. She had bandaged my abdomen. I was too miserable to care. The lemon preserve soothed the nausea. I sucked it eagerly but hardly tasted it, it was so washed with tears. I lay there stupefied as my eye fastened on the lighted candle. It was so frightening, so bewildering: the tomb, the candle, the woman. The flame flickered and almost went out as she moved. Again startled, my eye moved around to find that once more the woman was creeping down the wall; a few steps and she was at my side. She lifted the candle nearer, placed it on the little table beside my bed, set down a basin of water, threw back my covers, and began to undo the bandage about my stomach. Without a glance at my face she washed my wound and deftly rebandaged it. Still without looking at my face, she unbandaged my leg, bathed and bandaged it again. She dressed my head wounds, washed my face and hands, picked up her basin and disappeared up the wall and through the ceiling. Fascinated and yet horrified, I stared at the spot where she disappeared. Suddenly two feet appeared again, a skirt, a woman coming down. She was at my side and placed another thin slice of this rare lemon preserve to my lips. She looked at me for a minute. Then she climbed up the wall and was gone. I did not know where I was, but now I could see a trap door and a ladder of not too many rungs leading up to it. I have a clear picture of the woman’s face as she nursed me. She had nice features, black eyes; the hair, perhaps dark brown once was now partly gray and pulled back tight into a knot at the back of her head. She seemed no older than my Mother. Her hands were long and slender; she was tall and thin. She did not look like a peasant, but her general appearance told me she was no stranger to hardship. She was confident and efficient but did not seem to be a professional nurse.