EMPTY HANDED
I escaped successfully only in my second year at the Molotov orphanage. As I had done originally, according to my old scheme: in a goods wagon. But my goods wagon stopped somewhere on the border with Udmurtia. I succeeded, almost on the move, in jumping onto a passenger train on its way to Izhevsk, and again I hid in the boiler room. Here I passed several stations, before we reached Chepsta. There the conductor noticed me as I left the boiler-room that she had shut. Thank God it happened when the train stopped at a platform, and I escaped her clutches by joining the passengers who were getting out. After struggling through a crowd of people with bags, baskets and suitcases to the end of the platform, I was about to feel safe, when suddenly someone grabbed my wrist. I turned a
