The next day, we were very busy. We made several trips down into the bunker to stock up on food; we divided the tools, the shovels and the saucepans into forty piles. Ten women sewed the rucksacks, making them as sturdy as possible. We wanted to take the trolley, but it would slow us down considerably. Thinking back, I can’t see why it seemed so obvious that we had to keep it with us. It was as if we all had a foreboding of what lay in store and were determined to deny it. Anthea particularly wanted to keep the wheels. She gave me some complicated explanation about wheels being the origin of all technical processes. Eventually, she found a way of dismantling it. Everyone took a part of it. We would also take the chair with us.

Our progress was fairly slow because of Dorothy and the other two elderly women, Elizabeth and Margaret. We had to stop every hour for them to rest, and when there was an incline, no matter how gentle, they could never make it to the top in one go. I went on ahead, impatient to find out what was on the other side, and was always disappointed, because there was nothing but the plain, a gentle dip and then the next rise. The women watched me return, hoping that I’d have seen houses, a road, a sign, but I shook my head. We made our way across three large undulations, and the sun was going down when we saw another river, smaller than the first, and we decided to stop for the night. We quickly set up camp—the hearth made of stones, a hole in the middle of some shrubs for a latrine, and three blankets for privacy. The meal was relatively silent, disappointment already setting in.

‘We should have expected it,’ said Anthea. ‘They built the prison far from everything, it was probably supposed to remain a secret.’

The women immediately seized on this idea. They didn’t want to be sad, and soon found a way of starting a new discussion on the old theme of our captivity. After a while, they even began laughing again. When the sun went down, Rose began to sing.

I was amazed. I’d never heard music before, I was barely aware of its existence. ‘Look how beautiful the sky is!’ Annabel exclaimed, and everyone turned to watch the sunset. The few cries of delight soon died away, faced with the unexpected splendour of the colours. I didn’t recognise them, I’d never seen those shades of pink and mauve, only the grey of the bunker. Long trails of purple tinged with violet … some clouds had a greenish hue, shot through with golden light. The sight took my breath away and I was about to question Anthea when Rose’s voice soared up, clear and strong, breaking the silence. I felt a sort of tremor, like a distant echo of the eruption, but it lasted longer and brought tears to my eyes. She sang for a long time, and the other women mouthed the words. The sun disappeared in a sort of long, gentle ovation and dusk settled over the plain.