anyway, by a break-in into her apartment. While she was off helping deliver ababy at the home of the merchant Ahloo shik-Mhanukhee, three masked men knockedold Shmurt the doorkeeper out and broke down the door to her rooms. While thegirls and her mother cowered in a corner, the three ransacked the place, evenemptying the chamberpots on the floor to determine that nothing was hiddenthere. They didn't find what they were looking for, and one of the frustratedinterlopers knocked out two ofWallu's teeth in a rage. Masha was thankful,however, that they did not beat or rape the little girls. That may have been notso much because of their mercifulness as that the doorkeeper regainedconsciousness sooner than they had expected. He began yelling for help, and thethree thugs ran away before the neighbours could gather or the soldiers come.

Eevroen continued to come in drunk late at night. But he spoke very little, justusing the place to eat and sleep. He seldom saw Masha when she was awake. Infact, he seemed to be doing his best to avoid her. That was fine with her.

6

Several times, both by day and night, Masha felt someone was following her. Shedid her best to detect the shadower, but whether she got the feeling by day ornight, she failed to do it. She decided that her nervous state was responsible.

Then the great dog hunt began. Masha thought this was the apex of hysteria andsilliness. But it worried her. After all the poor dogs were gone, what wouldnext be run down and killed and gutted? To be more precise, who? She hoped thatthe who wouldn't be she.

In the middle of the week of the dog hunt, little Kheem became sick. Masha hadto go to work, but when she came home after sundown, she found that Kheem wassuffering from a high fever. According to her mother, Kheem had also hadconvulsions. Alarmed, Masha set out at once for Doctor Nadeesh's house in the