“Each concentration camp forms a sort of ‘commune’ where everyone lives comparatively free, not imprisoned, but compelled to work for the good of the community. They are fed and housed gratis and receive pay for their work . . . They are certainly not convicts in the American sense of the word.”20 Of course it was a strange coincidence that out of all the millions of young women in Russia, Thomas Sgovio’s friend Marvin Volat had chosen to romance the daughter of Matvei Berman, the Gulag chief recently awarded the Order of Lenin for the “glorious” construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal.
