AT THE TOP OF THE HILL above the harbor stands the huge square building that was once the barracks of the Turkish army, but is now the headquarters of Hell on Earth. The stench of the bloated corpses – cows, horses, humans – floating in the sea cannot compare to the stench inside this enormous stone cube. Side by side on its stone floors lie wounded, sick, or dying men, mostly young British soldiers, many without even a straw mattress to sit on or a blanket to cover themselves. A relative quiet prevails in Hell – the patients are so desperate, helpless, and weak that they suffer almost silently, dying by the thousands from infections, gangrene, and cholera.

One of those lying unconscious and likely not to survive the approaching night is a young man just twenty years old. Kneeling beside him is a frightened girl, even younger than him, his wife for less than a year, who came to this dreadful place with him. Most of the soldiers' wives have come with them, following the regiments with their babies in their arms, because there is no way for the soldiers to send their wages home, and if separated from their husbands, the women would starve.

Many of them starve anyway. While watching her husband die, the girl is marked by the mute, trembling, and mostly silent misery that characterizes Skutari, having seen too much death. She realizes that she herself may die and does not dare to hope that the new life she carries in her frail body might survive.