Yashka by Maria Bochkareva

I spent nearly two months travelling homeward from Yakutsk, by water, rail and foot. The war was everywhere. The barge on the Lena was filled with recruits. In Irkutsk the uniform was much in evidence, and every now and then a regiment of soldiers would march through the streets on the way to the station, arousing one's martial spirit. My convoy left me upon my arrival there, and I had to appeal to the authorities for funds to continue my journey.

My heart was beating furiously when I reached Tomsk, after an absence of about six years. Tears dimmed my eyes as I walked the familiar streets. Here, in this two-storied house, I had first learned the fickleness of man's love. That was ten years ago, during the Russo-Japanese War, when I was only fifteen years old. There, in that dilapidated little shop, where I can see the figure of Nastasia Leontievna bent over the counter, I spent five years of my early youth, waiting on customers, scrubbing floors, cooking, washing and sewing. That long apprenticeship, under the stern eyes of Nastasia Leontievna, served me in good stead in later years, I must admit. The smoking chimney yonder belongs to the house in which I was married, some eight years ago, only to gain experience at first hand of man's brutality. And here, in this basement, my father and mother have been dwelling for seventeen years.