Shukhov covers his face with a rag while walking toward their work site at the power station on the barren steppe: “Bare white snow stretched to the horizon, to the left, to the right, and not a single tree could be seen on the whole expanse of the steppe” (48). The men walk in silent contemplation, and Shukhov, hungry since he did not have his bread at breakfast, focuses on the letter home he will soon write. He is allowed to write two letters that year (1951). Shukhov would not write more often if he had the chance because he does not have much to tell his family and he gleans little from his wife’s letters. She has written that men returned from the war do not farm but live in the village and take other work including painting carpets, which is lucrative. Shukhov’s wife hopes Shukhov will get a job painting carpets when he returns home, but he feels the work would be demeaning.

The prisoners are stopped outside the gatehouse to wait for guards to fill the empty watch towers. Shukhov looks to Tiurin, whom he first met at another labor camp, Ust-Izhma. Tiurin is an adept squad leader, and Shukhov is loyal to him, receiving protection in return.