In the chap­ter titled “THE TIME MACHINE,” the nar­ra­tor reflects on the idea of his wife, Hel­ga, and the pas­sage of time. He describes a hand on a rail­ing, which he believes might belong to Hel­ga, who is now a mid­dle-aged woman, aged forty-five. The nar­ra­tor grap­ples with the thought of what Hel­ga might have expe­ri­enced dur­ing her six­teen years as a pris­on­er fol­low­ing the Russ­ian inva­sion of the Crimea. He express­es dis­be­lief that the vibrant and joy­ful Hel­ga he once knew could still exist after such har­row­ing expe­ri­ences.

His mus­ings become dark­er as he con­sid­ers the fate that befell women pris­on­ers on the Russ­ian front, hint­ing at a grim real­i­ty where sur­vival meant being sub­ject­ed to dehu­man­iz­ing labor and oppres­sive con­di­tions. The nar­ra­tive paints a vivid pic­ture of the hard­ships women faced in a war that trans­formed them into mere shad­ows of their for­mer selves—diggers in frosty fields, pullers of carts, devoid of iden­ti­ty and joy.

As he con­tin­ues down the stairs, the nar­ra­tor’s dis­be­lief leads him to con­front the woman in ques­tion. Upon see­ing her, he is met with an unex­pect­ed sight: she smiles at him with a famil­iar warmth, rais­ing her chin to reveal her fea­tures clear­ly. Despite her snow-white hair, she embod­ies the essence of his beloved Hel­ga, appear­ing untouched by the pas­sage of time. The con­trast between his mem­o­ries and the real­i­ty before him is strik­ing; she retains the lithe and bloom­ing spir­it he remem­bers from their wed­ding night. This encounter inten­si­fies the emo­tion­al jour­ney of the nar­ra­tor, illus­trat­ing the com­plex­i­ties of love, loss, and the endur­ing pow­er of mem­o­ry amid the unfor­giv­ing real­i­ties of life and war.