The Russian Century: A Hundred Years of Russian Lives

On the day of the arrival, Zoia went with half the gold, which they decided to turn in to the “Gold Purchasing” office. She handed in the gold successfully. Zoia said that a speculator approached her to whom she succeeded in passing the coupons. It seemed that this was the same Irkutsk speculator. But when she went outside, she sensed that she was being followed. She encountered a woman who began speaking to her. Wishing to save the woman from any unpleasantness, Zoia asked her to go away. When the woman had barely left, Zoia heard behind her the steps of a man overtaking her and a shout:

“Citizen, stop for one minute.”

Everything was finished.

Ekaterina Stepanovna was arrested the same day either on the street or at the purchasing office itself. The two of them had another agreement: in the event of arrest outside the house, under no circumstances were they to reveal the address of the apartment so that the remaining gold worth 300 thousand rubles would not be lost. However, in spite of the instructions to the landlady, when they both did not return that day for the night, the landlady fell into a panic and reported it to the police. In this way the remaining part of the gold was lost.

“Trifles,” laughed both Zoia and Ekaterina Stepanovna, saying, “Money will come with time! Money is a thing that is acquired. It was, and will be, and still be even more.”

I was delighted. Not every capitalist would be so cheerful about the loss of 600 thousand rubles!

For Zoia it was most important to have the investigation and trial proceed not in Novosibirsk but in Iakutsk. In Iakutsk she had a sister who was married to a public prosecutor, another prosecutor was her cousin, and a third was some sort of relative. With such a situation and the fact that the lost 600 thousand in gold did not make up all of their liquid capital, Zoia had good reason to think that if they succeeded in having the trial in Iakutsk they would manage to smother the case and obtain freedom.

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Chapter Twenty-Seven

And they succeeded. They were being sent to Iakutsk for trial. It was in the process of being moved to Iakutsk that they were quartered at the Irkutsk prison. Here they waited for the Iakutsk convoy, which was supposed to arrive specially for them, since there was no regular transfer of convicts to Iakutsk.

Among the female criminals Zoia was just like a tamer in a tiger’s cage. For them, I think, her calm and disdainful confidence had a most powerful effect, so that they did not dare touch her. In her, they also saw a procurer of material goods such as themselves, but on an immeasurably greater scale. Sometimes she liked to tease the “tigers,” when they were already gnashing their teeth, but she was far above their criminal ways.

At that time the cell captains were appointed rather than elected by the inmates as before, and one fine day Zoia was appointed captain. How quickly did order enthrone itself in our chaotic cell! There was no extortion, no getting rations out of turn, no special privileges, no fights. Even cursing occurred less frequently.

How did Zoia achieve this? She didn’t scream, as some captains did. She didn’t threaten to complain to the administration. This relative order seemed to come on its own.

I would end almost every one of my sketches about the Russian women whom I met in prisons and transfer points with a question of their destiny. I wanted to know whether they managed to mend the broken threads of their lives. And I would especially have liked to know about the future of Zoia Zhigaleva.

She undoubtedly was an extraordinary person. How often in the ensuing years in the camps would I remember seeing the helplessness of captains and sometimes even the brigadiers before the anarchic criminal convicts, plain hooligans and even those women who were convicted on article 58 [political prisoners]—not criminals, but more vile than the criminals. How often in the Akmolinsk camp during the wild screaming of obscenities and utter lawlessness frequently ending in injury and even murder did I think to myself: “If only Zoia were here!” With her mere presence, with her calm and derisive response to hooligan behavior, she brought order and organization where there had been rampage.

I would say to her: “Zoia, in an earlier time in Russia or in the West, you would have become one of the great agents in the nation’s industry or commerce. But here they consider you a transgressor of the law, a speculator, that is, an enemy of the people.” I didn’t notice that Zoia had any repentance or wish to stop her interrupted activity. On the contrary, temporary failure and a clash with the Soviet laws strengthened her daring and desire for success despite all obstacles.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Valerii Leviatov, My Path to God