For a moment I forgot my aches and pains. I wanted to know who this person was. How did an utter stranger happen to be with me? How did I get here? How long ago had things happened? Perhaps several days, since I felt crusted dry blood on the left side of my eyebrow, nose and cheek. My hair was matted and stiff with blood, crumbs of dried blood covered my pillow. My left leg was so sore I could hardly move it. My finger nails were packed with stained matter. But where was my family? I was afraid to think. My head hammered, my jaws ached, my ears rang. Every little emotion--every motion--was an agonizing experience. I must have cried myself to sleep, for I awoke sobbing. Perhaps it was a nightmare. It could not be that I, the little one, always protected and spared could be alone. Now the woman was moving about near me. Were _they_, too, being cared for by strangers? I sobbed until sleep overtook me. There was no way of measuring time. I wept until I slept to wake up sobbing until I wept myself to sleep again. After the sobbing a violent nausea seized me and the woman rushed up the ladder to bring me a drink of water. She sponged my lips and fed me with a spoon. All too soon I discovered why my lip was sore. My two upper front teeth were broken and driven almost through the upper lip. One of these front teeth had been filled in Tobolsk by Dr. Kostritsky who took care of Mother’s false tooth and Father’s teeth. Several of my teeth, in the lower left jaw, were also loose; they merely were in place. There was a small hole in my right cheek and a piece of flesh was missing. Sleep was the only respite. Wakefulness brought nothing but horror and haunting thoughts. I welcomed sharp pain as it distracted my thinking. How long this orgy of weeping and sleeping kept up I have no idea. Occasional moments of composure wedged themselves in as I realized I felt better. Immediately desperation drove me into fresh weeping. I wanted to die. I was afraid to think. All the time the woman worked tirelessly to make me comfortable. I could not help but feel sorry to see her climb up and down the ladder to bring me something when her efforts seemed to do me so little good. She was thorough but gentle. She changed my dressings often. While she busied herself with me, I kept my eyes closed--the sight of her accentuated my loneliness. She seemed cruelly impersonal as she worked over me. She wanted to do a good and thorough job. If she would only speak to me, give me some sign of sympathy, that I might know she felt friendly! She always avoided meeting my eyes, eyes that now squinted through smarting slits, so sore were they from constant crying.