VASILY GROSSMAN
29
grain of corn had been confiscated . He'd begun to cry as he talked
about one wonderful old man who'd given his life to save his wife
and granddaughter ... Not long afterwards, Krymov had read an
article by Koloskov on the wall-newspaper: apparently the kulaks
felt a violent hatred for everything new and were burying their grain
in the ground.
Why , after crying his heart out, had Koloskov written such
things? Why had Mostovskoy never said anything? Out of coward–
ice? Krymov had said things that went against his deepest feelings.
But he had always believed what he said in his speeches and articles;
he was still convinced that his words were a true rejection of his
beliefs . Though there had been times when he'd said: "What else can
I do? It's for the sake of the Revolution."
Yes, yes ... Krymov had indeed failed to defend friends whose
innocence he had felt sure of. Sometimes he had said nothing, some–
times he had mumbled incoherently, sometimes he had done still
worse . There were occasions when he had been summoned by the
Party Committee, the District Committee, the City Committee or
the
Oblast
Committee- by the security organs themselves. They had
asked his opinion about people he knew, people who were members
of the Party. He had never said anything bad about his friends, he
had never slandered them, he had never written denunciations ...
What about Grekov? But Grekov was an enemy. Where ene–
mies were concerned, Krymov had never felt a trace of pity . He had
never worn kid gloves in dealing with them.
But why had he had nothing more to do with the families of
comrades who had been arrested? He had stopped phoning or
visiting them. Of course , if he had met them by chance , he had
always said hello; he had never crossed over to the other side of the
street.
But then there were some people - usually old women, lower–
middle-class housewives - who would help you send parcels to some–
one in camp. You could arrange for someone in camp to write to you
at their address. And for some reason they were quite unafraid.
These same old women, these superstitious domestics and illiterate
nannies, would even take in children whose mothers and fathers had
been arrested, saving them from orphanages and reception-centers .
Members of the Party, on the other hand, avoided these children
like the plague . Were these old women braver and more honorable
than Old Bolsheviks like Mostovskoy and Krymov?
People are able to overcome fear: children pluck up their cour-
