These were my last meetings with my brother Kolya. Once I was sitting in the garden in August. Major Nikolai came up to the fence and said that he was being sent to the front. "Then goodbye," I said without getting up. I never saw him again.

In Grebnev. Acquaintance with Volodya

When I was working hard in the Eggerts' garden, I was noticed by their neighbor, Father Boris V. He knew my father and told him: "Take care of Natasha. I have a son in the army, and when he comes back, we will marry them." Boris's father had an only son, Gleb, and his father was going to inherit his beautiful rich house, a huge plot with a garden, a yard with a cow, geese, chickens - in general, his entire household. Father Boris brought me milk in cans, talked to me, praised his son. He said: "My son is in Alma-Ata, we got him a job there as a teacher at a military school. Bombs will not fall there, German planes will not fly there. Glebushka is wonderful, he answers our letters. His wife wrote to him that she had already looked for a bride for him. And Gleb replied: "The war will end, I will return home, and everything, mommy, will be your way."

However, Gleb became ashamed to sit in the far rear. Disabled war veterans entered the school: shell-shocked, wounded, who did not regret giving their young lives for the salvation of the Motherland. And Gleb had not yet sniffed gunpowder, so he was ashamed to look into their eyes. And so Gleb, of his own free will, asked to join the active troops, submitted an application for this and was soon enlisted in the unit that was sent to liberate Kiev from the Germans. In his last letter, Gleb informed his parents that he was traveling by train in the direction of Kiev. The parents were terrified, but they firmly hoped for God's mercy and prayed. His mother had a dream from which they decided that Gleb wanted his father to take the priestly rank. Father Boris graduated from the seminary before the revolution, and then (during the persecution of the Church) worked as a teacher of mathematics. During the war, when the Soviet government began to allow the opening of churches, Boris Andreevich easily received the rank of priest and parish. I responded to Father Joris's kind words with a smile, and my father thanked me for the honor. But we did not know Gleb at all, and therefore we could only sympathize with single parents.

I did not believe that Gleb would return, because there had been no letters from him for a long time. But the hope of the parents could not but be supported, they lived by it. Noticing that I was going to paint landscapes with a sketchbook, Father Boris once said: "I serve in a magnificent church, which is located not far from here, in the village of Grebnevo. And the nature there is of wondrous beauty, not like in Valentinovka, where there are only clearings and forests. And in Grebnevo there is a huge pond with islands, an old manor estate with towers, an arch, a fence. There, Natasha, you would have something to draw." I promised to come to Father Boris at the parish.

In the spring of 1946, I came to Grebnevo for the first time. I was amazed by the beauty of the area and decided to rent a room for July and August, that is, during the holidays in the Stroganov School. Father Boris pointed me to the hut in which my grandmother lived with her orphan granddaughter. Her father had not yet been demobilized, her mother had died, and there was a twelve-year-old girl and a grandmother who were in great need. They willingly let me into the room, from the windows of which there was a wonderful view of the island and Shishkina Mountain. Dad saw me off, carrying a heavy suitcase with things and food for the summer.

After the dusty noisy Moscow, the company of students and acquaintances, there is complete silence and desolation. I was like in heaven. The girl ran away for a day to her relatives or friends, her grandmother stoked a Russian stove, then slept. And I chose beautiful places for myself with a sketchbook over my shoulder and painted them in oil with such inspiration that even my mother, who was suspicious of my talents, liked them.

The rain poured down. In the Sloboda, where I lived, I heard the ringing of a bell from the church. Putting on my coat and a wide-brimmed panama hat, I ran to the church. "I'll get there quickly, in eight or ten minutes, I won't have time to get wet," I decided. Taking off my hat and coat, I began to shake off the drops of moisture on the floor. But then the left door to the altar opened. From the ambo, a young man walked towards me with a quick, light step. I froze with wet things in my hands, and the young man, passing by, nodded his head slightly and said: "Hello." His gaze, friendly and cheerful, pierced my heart like an arrow from a fairy tale. And it was on the feast of the Vladimir Mother of God, my patroness, since on the day of this icon I was born.

From Father Boris I learned that the young man was a psalmist, he had just been demobilized from the army, that he lived next to the church, that he knew the service very well from his father, who served here for thirty years in the rank of deacon, until he was arrested and died in prison. Only then did I learn that it would be possible to ordain a psalmist to the deacon if he were married. "But Volodya does not even look at girls, he is too modest, shy," said Father Boris. This was confirmed by his respectable wife-mother, who dreamed of seeing me as her daughter-in-law.

And I had a thought: "Although I dream of going to a monastery somewhere, my mother does not want to hear about it. And without the blessing of parents, it is impossible. But to sacrifice my virginity in order to open the way to the Throne of God for a man, I would agree to this." It is clear that I was now drawn to church like a magnet, and I no longer missed church services. And after the Vladimir service, there was a Saturday service, then a Sunday service, and then the Tikhvin Icon of the Mother of God, for which a service was also announced in Grebnevo.

It was raining again. Again the church was empty, only a dozen old women came, and those who were younger went to a neighboring parish about twenty kilometers away, where the patronal feast day was held. Only Volodya sang on the kliros, and a little hunched old woman came out to read the Six Psalms. Rain, thunder, clouds are moving, it is dark in the church. The old woman began to turn the page, the candle in her hand went out, the book slammed shut, and its quiet reading stopped. Volodya came down from the ambo, lit a candle, opened the book, and grandmother continued reading. In Moscow churches, I have not seen such a break in the service. In the evening, discussing the service with Father Boris, I said:

"I could also read the Six Psalms.

"All right," said Father Boris, "go to the kliros."