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"What are we going to do?" said Mairls were all in bed

"About what?" asked Dasha

"About Babushka," she said "Now that she doesn’t go across the Neva anymore, she’s home all day"

"Yes," said Marina, "and now that she’s home all day, she eats what’s left of Alexander’s flour one spoonful at a time"

"Marina, shut up," said Tatiana "We have no flour left Babushka eats the sweepings froed the subject "Tania, do you think it’s true? Have all the rats left the city?"

"I don’t know, Marina"

"Have you seen any cats or dogs?"

"There aren’t any left," Tatiana said "That I know" She had looked

Co beside it, Mama shook her head "Listen to me, all of you," she said Mama’s voice was not boisterous anymore; it was not strident, it was not loud It was barely even a voice, certainly not a voice Tatiana recognized as being her mother’s The kerchief still tied Ma about the cold She is here all day; do we have enough wood to heat the bourzhuika for her all day?"

"No," said Dasha, propping herself up on one elbow "I knoe don’t We need all the e have to heat the bourzhuika at night We barely have enough for that Look how long it’s been since we properly heated our rooht Tatiana He always gets the wood and builds the fire and oing to have to tell her to keep the bourzhuika on all day"

"We’ll tell her that Mama," said Tatiana, "but soon ill have no wood"

"Tania, she is freezing in the apart?"

Dasha nodded "She used to go to the public canteen and spend all day there waiting for soet up from the couch once, not even to eat dinner with us Tania, can we get her into your hospital?"

"We can try," said Tatiana from her wall "But I don’t think there are any spare beds The children have theht?" said Mama "At least in the hospital she’ll be warht?"

"They’ve closed three wings of the hospital," Tatiana replied, crawling out of bed "They’re keeping just one open And it’s full"

She went to see her grandmother The blankets had fallen off Babushka Maya, who lay on the sofa covered by just her coat Tania picked up the blankets and covered Babushka thoroughly, up to her neck, tucking the blankets all around her She knelt on the floor "Babushka," she whispered, "talk to randth left?" she asked

"Not ed a s by you when you painted; the s, and you were always covered with it, and I used to sit so close to you that I would become covered by it, too Do you remember?"

"I remember, sunshine You were the sweetest child" She sht me how to draw a banana when I was four I had never seen a banana and couldn’t draw one, reood banana," Babushka said, "even though you had never seen one Oh, Tanechka" She broke off

"What, Babushka?"

"Oh, to be young again"

"I don’t know if you’ve noticed," Tatiana whispered, "but the young ones aren’t doing so well either"

"Not the her eyes briefly "You"

The nextTatiana fetched the two buckets of water and then went to get the rations, and when she ca on the couch, covered by Tatiana’s blankets and a coat, still and cold Marina, crying, said, "I went in to wake her, and she wasn’t "

Tatiana and her fa toward the dining table, Marina said, "Co herself, agreed "Yes, let’s have thebread I already made a little chicory to drink Sarkova warmed up the kitchen stove for breakfast with her oood There was a little heat left for me"