On the bus home, Maria scanned the list. There were over a hundred homes and hospitals, stretching from Arkhangelsk in the north to Kiev in the south, and west as far as Moscow. It was daunting but she knew she must check them all. Maybe there was a reason the children had not returned. Maybe one was sick and the other had refused to leave without them. She would find them herself, no matter how long it took.

Back in the apartment, she marked each location on a map. She decided to start with the closest ones and gradually extend her search area. She had two days off work every week, so she could stay overnight and travel back the following evening.

Stepan tried to talk her out of it. “They could be anywhere, Mama. Better to send out letters of inquiry and wait for news.”

She knew he meant well, but they were not his children. One day he would realize what it was like to be a parent; one day he would feel the visceral tug on your heartstrings when you were apart from any one of them.

* * *

On her first day of searching, Maria took the train around Lake Ladoga, then transferred to a local bus. Her broken leg had set badly and she limped heavily, but that was always useful for getting seats on buses. She had sketched images of Katya and Mikhail—good likenesses, if she said so herself—in case they helped to jog someone’s memory, because there must have been hundreds of children passing through each institution.

She visited three separate homes that day, and each time she knocked on the door, a member of the staff looked at her drawings, checked the names, then shook her head. From what Maria could see, the homes did not have many comforts: long corridors, wooden chairs and tables, harsh overhead lights. But at least the children had food, she comforted herself. At least they were safe in their beds.

One woman told her they had several younger Leningrad children whose parents had not responded to letters asking that they collect them. Maria took a list of names and addresses from her and promised to hunt for their parents. More likely than not they had perished during the war years, but if she could reunite even one family, it was worth the trouble.

When she visited hospitals, she tensed as they checked the records of children who had died there. She wasn’t ready for that kind of news and knew she never would be, but she had to explore every possibility.

Each time she approached a new home, she felt a skip of excitement. Let this be the one, she prayed. Then came the shake of the head, the sympathetic look that dissolved her optimism. Not this one; not yet.