‘Who are you?’ shouts Magda as the noise of girls crying, men shouting and guns firing intensifies.
‘Resistance fighters!’ he yells back. ‘Word came through last night to begin our attack. This is happening all over Slovakia right now.’ With that, he disappears back into the crowd.
Magda looks around for Zuzana, for any familiar face, but it is chaos. On the street, she runs in the same direction as everyone else. Shop windows are smashed, cars overturned, a bullet screams by her ear. Magda stumbles into a small alleyway to avoid the gunfire. It is a dead end, with a large, foul-smelling dumpster parked outside some double doors at the end of the alley. She tries a handle, but the doors are locked. The noise from the street is getting louder. Men are shouting; are they Hlinka or Resistance fighters? She has no way of knowing. Magda hides behind the dumpster.
Curled up on the ground, hidden from view, she stays there until night falls. Whenever she creeps up the alleyway to peek out, the same scenes of chaos play over and over: people running in all directions, men and guards fighting with fists, with guns and knives, women still crying, screaming for help. Some have suitcases, some have pushchairs loaded with either babies or possessions. Don’t they know where to go? Magda wonders as she crawls back to the dumpster and allows sleep to overwhelm her senses.
The next morning it is quiet. Magda watches the street for long minutes, but no one passes and, finally, with a deep breath, she decides to leave the alleyway. There is their prison school at the end of the road and abruptly she turns to walk in the opposite direction. Rounding a corner, Magda finds herself on a large main road, and she is no longer alone. A German tank powers towards her, followed by armed soldiers marching alongside a large canvas-covered truck.
‘You there! Hold your ground.’ The soldiers raise their guns and Magda stumbles as her head begins to swim. She holds on to a wall for support and an image of the dumpster flashes through her mind. If only she had stayed put. Was it all for nothing in the end?
The guards fire questions at her, barely waiting for her answers.
‘Magda Meller,’ she replies. ‘I’m .?.?. I’m from Vranov. Yes, I’m a Jew.’
And then she finds herself being led away, a captive once more, to the truck. Pulling aside the canvas flaps, a guard nudges her in the ribs with his rifle. ‘Get in.’
The truck follows the tank, stopping every so often to take in new prisoners. Soon, it is full. Magda’s companions are men and women and children. All of them have the same terrified, exhausted expressions. Magda realises her own face is a mask of theirs. The truck speeds up now that its hold is full of cargo. When she pulls back the flaps she sees two German military vehicles sailing along behind them. There will be no escaping this time.
*
They reach their destination in the late afternoon.
This is no empty school – she hears the whine of iron gates creaking open before the truck pulls up and everyone is ordered out. The sun is still shining but it’s losing some of its heat. Magda is grateful for the cool breeze.
Razor wire runs along the perimeter of the high concrete walls of the compound. Large four-storey concrete buildings surround a central clearing. Everything is grey.
‘It’s a prison,’ a woman gasps.
A prison guard approaches, and to Magda’s horror, he is pointing at her. ‘Step forward, miss!’ he commands. ‘Welcome to Ilava prison.’ The officer smiles from ear to ear. ‘Your little insurrection has failed – the German Army will not be defeated by a rabble of untrained freedom fighters. You will now be our guests until we decide what to do with you.’ He turns away from Magda, to another guard. ‘Take them to their cells. But her’ – he points at Magda – ‘she is to have a cell of her own.’
The second guard grabs Magda’s elbow to lead her away, but she shrugs him off. He is taking her towards one of the grey blocks. Inside, the cavernous, echoing space is a hive of cells, metal walkways and fetid air. Magda is placed in a tiny room on the ground floor. As the door clangs shut behind her, she inspects her cell. A wire bed with a thin mattress is pushed up against one wall, a steel toilet without a seat is in the far corner, and there is a small table and a chair at the head of the room. She can almost touch both walls with her fingertips when she spreads her arms. Instead of processing where she is and what will happen to her, Magda lies down on the lumpy bed and loses herself to sleep.
*
Hours later, the sound of a heavy key turning in the lock startles her awake. Magda is not ready for this, whatever ‘this’ is. But it’s just a guard with her dinner, which he hands over without a word and leaves. She stares at the stew with its indistinguishable brown lumps, and the half loaf of soft bread. For a moment the sight of the food banishes all other thoughts. She eats fast, not tasting the stew or the bread and it is over all too soon. This is the most substantial meal she has eaten in days, in months.