AS DAWN WAS breaking Nellie and her cellmates were woken by sudden gunfire, a whole volley of shots and then utter silence. It sounded close within the prison. The three women sat up in their cell, then got to their feet.
Nellie stood on the stool on tiptoe, peering out over the narrow windowledge, hoping to see anything outside in the prison yard other than the high stone walls and the grey-streaked dawn.
It sounded as if a few soldiers were shooting together. The women’s senses were on alert as they wrapped their blankets around them.
After what seemed only about fifteen or twenty minutes there was another loud volley of shots, then silence and stillness; and fifteen minutes later a repeat of loud simultaneous gunfire again.
She and Winnie and Julia all looked at each other, unwilling to say the words but each of the same mind.
The soldiers were shooting the prisoners one after another …