I suddenly found myself contemplating our situation. Until that moment, I’d simply endured it without thinking about it, as if it were a natural state. Do we wonder why we’re sleepy at night, or hungry when we wake up? I knew, as did the others, that suicide was one of the things that was prohibited. At first, some of the more desperate or more active women had tried the knife or the rope, and that showed how closely the guards were watching us, because they immediately heard the crack of the whip. The guards were excellent marksmen, reaching their target from a distance, slashing the belts the women were planning to use as ropes, or jerking the crudely sharpened knife from the hands that held it. They wanted to ensure we stayed alive, which made the women believe that they wanted to use us in some way, that there were plans. They imagined all sorts of things, but nothing ever happened. We were fed, not over-generously, which caused those who were too fat to lose weight, and we didn’t really lack for anything. We had to cook our meals in huge pots and to hand back the two blunt knives when the vegetables were peeled. Occasionally, we were given a few lengths of fabric to make clothes. They were crudely fashioned since we had no scissors and we had to tear the fabric very carefully. I wrote a moment ago that nothing ever happened, but that’s not exactly true: the arrival of the pieces of material created great excitement. We knew which dresses were worn out beyond repair, and which ones could still be salvaged, and we’d embark on complicated calculations to enable us to make the best use of the new cotton. We had to take into account the quantity of thread that came with it; sometimes there were remnants of fabric but we had nothing with which to sew them together. One day, Dorothy came up with the idea of using hair as thread. She recalled how, a very long time ago, hair had been used for embroidery. Anna and Laura had the longest hair, which we used for our first attempts. These were unsuccessful because the hairs snapped. Then someone suggested plaiting several hairs and we achieved a certain degree of success: the stitches didn’t hold for long, but there was plenty more hair to redo them.

The guards didn’t give us sanitary towels or toilet paper, which the women complained about a great deal. I had no recollection of ever using either, so I managed very well with running water, which was in plentiful supply, and, since I didn’t have periods, I didn’t have the worry of what to do about the blood. The women collected the tiniest scraps of material and used them for their periods, then rinsed them thoroughly in the water, because we received very little soap, which was black and runny, and we kept it for washing our bodies.

This almost total lack of physical activity would have made us weak, but we forced ourselves to do exercises every day, which was the most boring thing in the world, but even I put up with it because I realised it was necessary. Once or twice a woman was ill: a thermometer was included in the supplies and the whip made it clear that she was to take her temperature. Medicine would arrive if she was feverish. We seem to have been in rather good health. What with the food and the continuous lighting and heating, we must have been costing someone or something a lot of money, but we didn’t know why they were going to so much trouble. In their previous lives, the women had worked, borne children and made love. All I knew was that these things were greatly valued. What use were we here?