As the snow continued to fall, the drifts became higher and more inpenetrable. There was no one to clear them from the roads and pathways. Children who used to enjoy playing in the snow, making snowmen, skating and skiing, were nowhere to be seen. Cats used to purr more loudly, and dogs used to bark more lustily in winter. But, by the end of February our village had no pets left: all of them had either starved, become meals for starving families, or been shot by Thousanders. The barns and barnyards had been empty since most of the domestic animals were confiscated by the state and transferred to the kolhosp. A few cows that still remained in the possession of the farmers were well-kept under lock and key as some kind of fabulous treasure. Indeed, even the farm buildings that used to house the domestic animals or serve as storage places, were now practically gone. They had been torn down long ago to be used as firewood. People burned everything in sight to keep warm: even fences, and furniture. In desperation, people dismantled abandoned houses or parts of living quarters.
Death had established its kingdom in our village. No human or animal voices were to be heard. The inhabitants inside their homes were either dead, or barely alive and paralyzed by starvation. Outside, everything was frozen and covered by snow and ice. The only sound that could be heard from time to time was that of the wind howling and whistling. What a contrast from the songs of our nightingales who were destroyed by the Thousanders.
There were other atrocities that no one wanted to talk about. Everyone knew that they occurred, but there seemed to be some taboo about discussing them openly. One of them was the terrible curse of cannibalism. It still is something very difficult to think or talk about.
One must consider the inexorable pressure of hunger under which a person can completely become bereft of his or her senses and sink to an absolute animallike level. That happened to many of our villagers. The more resistant ones who kept on living with minimal or no food at all for some time, felt no more of the initial hunger pangs. They either lapsed into comas, or existed in a semicomatose, lethargic stupor. But some reacted differently. They became like madmen. They lost all traces of compassion, honor, and morality. They suffered from hallucinations of food, of something to bite into and chew, to satisfy the gnawing pains of their empty stomachs. Intolerable cravings assailed them; they were ready to sink their teeth into anything, even into their own hands and arms, or into the flesh of others.
The first rumors of actual cannibalism were related to the mysterious and sudden disappearances of people in the village. Such was the case of Maria and her eleven-year old brother, children of Boris who had been deported long ago as an “enemy of the people.” They disappeared without a trace. Their sick mother plodded from house to house through the deep snow searching for them. They had gone out to bring back firewood but had never returned. The neighbors had not seen the children and did not know anything about their whereabouts. No one was able to help the distraught mother. Then there was a widow who had been existing only on beggar’s handouts. She too disappeared with her daughter, never to be seen again. Soon after that, two other women and a girl were reported missing.
As the cases of missing persons grew in number, an arrest was made which shook us to our souls. A woman was taken into custody, charged with killing her two children.
Another woman was found dead, her neck contorted in a crudely made noose. The neighbors who discovered the tragedy also found the reason for it. The flesh of the woman’s three-year old daughter was found in the oven.
One morning, my friend Ivan, who had been living with us, left our house and did not return that day or that night. Days passed and we never heard from him nor found him. Ivan and I had been schoolmates and good friends for a long time. Shost, his father, had never returned from the village jail where I had last seen him. From there, he had been taken to the county center, and then to Siberia. Ivan’s mother also was denounced and arrested only a few days later. Their farm and belongings had been turned over to the kolhosp. The children, Ivan (fifteen) and his pretty nineteen-year old sister, had been left homeless and at the mercy of their neighbors.
As often happened in such cases, the sister soon married. It was the only way for her to find a home and some measure of security for herself and her brother. Her neighbors thought that she acted wisely, and they admired her for her love and consideration of her young brother. They all moved into a house on a small hill near the forest, and for a while it seemed that her action had brought happiness commensurate with those times, to all of them.
But the marriage, unfortunately, was of brief duration. Only a few months later, she was arrested as the daughter of a kurkul, and was herself labeled a “dangerous element in the socialistic society.” So great was the kolhosp organizers’ fear of farmers’ resistance that they tried to destroy not only stubborn farmers but also their wives and children. They did it lest some tiny spark of love of freedom remain that might be fanned into flames of revolt.
The daughter followed the trail of her parents into oblivion, and young Ivan was again on his own. He didn’t wish to remain with his sister’s husband, so my mother invited him to live with us. Thus he became a member of our family, and we obviously missed him after his disappearance and became very apprehensive about his fate.
As the days passed with no sign of Ivan, our anxiety grew. Mykola and I finally decided to undertake a thorough search for him.
Although Ivan had a strong dislike of his sister’s husband and even for his house, there were several reasons why it was possible for him to have gone there. Before collectivization, Antin, Ivan’s brother-in-law, was known in the village as an industrious and respectable young farmer. He was very good-natured and happy, and especially well liked by children, to whom he was very friendly. We had known him since early childhood, and in winter we used his hill for skiing. Antin encouraged this by keeping the hill in good skiing condition, and he even built a ski slide for us. When someone’s skis broke, he would repair them, and after skiing, we would warm our frost-nipped hands and feet by his fire. Although the hillside often became noisy with the shouts and cries of children, he didn’t mind it. On the contrary, he obviously enjoyed our frolicking in the snow.
But now, as the famine worsened, strange rumors began spreading about Antin’s house on the hill. Someone heard a woman scream in his house. Then a second more dreadful tale went around. It was alleged that the smoke coming out of his chimney bore the odor of roasting human flesh. Thinking of these rumors now, we began to see some connection between them and Ivan’s disappearance.
Could all these rumors have some truth in them? And even if true, could he have done such an unspeakable thing to his own wife’s brother? We had to find out once and for all. With these terrible ideas in our minds, we slowly pushed our way towards the hill. Mykola, much younger than I, was pale with fright. He tried to persuade me to return home, but my feeling and concern for my friend Ivan were stronger than my fears. I had to find out whether Ivan was still alive and if he needed help.
I trudged on further while Mykola reluctantly followed me. We got nearer through an unbroken blanket of snow. Upon reaching the house, we thought of Mother’s warnings to take certain precautions. She advised us that Mykola should stay outside, and that I should scream for help if someone inside should attack me. This would divert the attention of the attacker, and signal to Mykola to bring whatever assistance he could.