‘Infidels! murderers!’ the distraught woman was shrieking. ‘We worked all our lives for our house! You won’t have it. The flames will have it!’ Her cries turned suddenly into crazy laughter. Peasants rushed into the burning house and began to drag out furniture. There was something macabre, unreal, about the whole scene – the fire, the wailing, the demented woman, the peasants being dragged through the mud and herded together for deportation. The most unearthly touch, for me, was the sight of Arshinov and the GPU officer looking on calmly, as if this were all routine, as if the burning hut
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