JOURNEYS Mennonite Stories of Faith and Survival in Stalins Russia, John B. Toews, 1998

sent to the prison in Dnepropetrovsk. I was placed in the basement interrogation cells of the NKVD. A deathly silence reigned and people only spoke in whispers. A guard signalled for me to follow him. He stopped in front of cell number eight and opened the door. There were four iron bed 104 JOURNEYS frames. Both the floor and the walls were of concrete. The beds consisted of mattresses, straw pillows, grey sheets and army blan¬ kets. The cells inhabitants were sitting in their beds. The guard showed me an empty bed and whispered “sit down.” Then he locked the door and the small shutter on the door opened. I introduced myself to my cell mates. The first, an old black¬ smith from a village, sat quietly almost without moving. From time to time he sighed deeply. The second was a young farmer named Balzen. He was making small chess figures out of wet bread. The third was a young, handsome Jew. 1 later learned he was charged with smuggling currency. Ever so quietly they acquainted me with prison regulations: no loud speaking; no lying on the beds during the day; do not approach the window; do not tap on the walls. I was also in¬ formed of the pail in the corner. Interrogations took place during the night. Parcels as well as books were allowed. A newspaper, The Evening Dnepropetrovsk , arrived daily. There was also a can¬ teen. Twice a week an old prisoner came by and sold food, tooth¬ paste, etc. I learned several other things: no knives were allowed; the sau¬ sage and bread were pre-cut by the guard; there was a barber in one of the small cells; periodic medical inspections took place; they allowed a daily five minute exercise period for each cell sepa¬ rately. I concluded that it was possible to survive here. The basement interrogation cells also had their rules: absolute silence, broken only by the opening and closing of iron doors. Above the door a light bulb burned day and night. It flickered whenever the elevator was in use and hurt our eyes .... Every cell was designed for four people, but by 1937 - 38 they pushed up to thirty people into them. Naturally they all sat on the cement floor. Sometimes we were fortunate. During rainy days inmates occa¬ sionally refused to go outside, which meant we could stay out an extra five minutes. The cell was about seven by three and a half footsteps, which limited our freedom of movement. The only free space was between the beds and we used this alternately. The inhabitants of the cells were always changing. Our cur¬ rency speculator vanished and a young engineer from Dnepropetrovsk named Vengolovski took his place. He was very agitated and constantly repeated, “This is all a mistake. Every¬ thing will be clarified and I will be freed.” We knew better. Fi¬ nally after seventeen days he was interrogated and accused of be- ISLAND IN THE STEPPE 105 ing a Trotskyite. He told us what had happened. He was sent on a business trip to Czechoslovakia i