Voschev returns to the worksite with all of the collectivize property, including its previous owners. He doesn't know how to react to Nastya's death but tells Chiklin that the peasants would like to enroll as regular workers. They realize this means that the foundation pit will have to be built even larger. Zhachev, who at the beginning of the novel vowed to kill all of the adults at Nastya's coming of age, refuses to help reconstruct the foundation pit. "Communism's something for the kids," Zhachev says. He leaves the worksite and never returns.