TWO

They ran past a sequence of small cells, some little larger than a man. Each cell had a metal door with a peephole let into it.

‘They can get to us down here, Nalan. We’ll be sitting ducks.’

‘Wait.’

The young soldier, too, seemed content to follow Nalan’s lead. She’s a guide, thought Hart. It’s not surprising she knows this place. I understand nothing of her language. Perhaps she knows this soldier? Knew the man in the suit who was lying dead just beyond the grille. That would explain things.

Nalan pointed behind him. ‘Now. We shut this connecting door and barricade it. Here. There are wedges. And a bar. The door is made of sheet metal. It was built to keep prisoners in. They will not blow it without dynamite. Grenades will not work against it. Our soldiers will be here soon. If they come quickly, we shall be safe.’

Hart and the young soldier began barricading the door. How certain this young woman was of herself, Hart found himself thinking. How secure in her knowledge. Looking at her, it was hard to believe that she’d been the near victim of a car bombing ten minutes before. Had seen people killed before her eyes. Had run down a street awash with blood and body parts while the bombers had used her as a moving target. From where had she derived her courage? From what source?

‘What is this, Nalan? What is this figure of a man?’ Hart was looking at a life-sized plaster model of a prisoner in one of the cells flanking the doorway. The man was chained to the wall by one hand in a purposefully uncomfortable position, so that he could neither stand fully upright nor lie stretched out on the floor to sleep.

‘He is a Kurd. Like me. It is what they did. They made this model to remind the Kurdish people of all that happened to them during Saddam’s time.’

In a further room, another full-sized model of a man hung from a pipe in the strappado position: his arms stretched out behind him, the full weight of his body bearing down onto his shoulders. An electrical cord, attached to a magnetic field telephone, hung from around his neck.

‘I can tell you who this man is.’

Hart inclined his head. Nalan’s face had taken on a haunted aspect, as of someone who senses a malevolent presence just beyond them, but still marginally out of sight.

‘This is my father, John. And many others like him. Men and women both. This is what Hassif did to them. His favourite places to electrocute you were the tongue, the fingers, the little toe, and the sexual organs. He spread the places he electrocuted you as far apart as possible so as to cause the most extreme spasms. The muscles themselves conducted the electricity. So you were electrocuting yourself, so to speak. When this happens you cannot think. You cannot breathe. Your heart goes into spasms. They wet your body with salt water so as to better distribute the current. They even use luxury gels and creams so that the skin is not burnt at the point of contact, giving the torturers away if the prisoner is ever released. This is what they did to my father over many weeks so that he could no longer use his arms.’

‘How do you know about this? Did they release your father? Did he tell you?’

‘He told me this before he died. Yes. He wished me to remember. To carry the memory of it in me.’

She ushered Hart ahead of her. The young Kurdish soldier hung back, as though he suspected what Nalan was telling this English stranger who had intruded on his life, and did not wish to interfere.

‘I want you to look in here, John.’

Nalan stood back and pointed to the entrance to a cell. The steel door was open, but this cell was darker than the others – the only light that entered came from out in the corridor. It illuminated the life-sized model of a woman leaning against a concrete pillar. Her head was thrown back and her eyes were shut. A young girl, less than half her size, was clinging to her legs and looking down at the ground.

‘This is my mother. The young girl is me. I was five years old in March 1991 when they came to liberate Amna Suraka. I had been here since I was three.’

Hart couldn’t take his eyes from the two female figures. ‘This is you? This little girl?’

Nalan nodded. ‘This is my mother, yes. And this is me.’

‘So this is how you know this place? This is how you knew to bring us here?’

‘This is how I know this place. There were forty women and children imprisoned in this room. You see those blankets on the floor? The dog bowl over there to drink from? That is how they saw us. As dogs. The women left those behind when they were released by the Peshmerga following a two-day gun battle. You saw the bullet marks outside in the courtyard where we came in? The shell holes? Our soldiers found the rape rooms and the torture chambers and the isolation cells when they broke in. It sent them crazy. They killed 700 Ba’athists in this place. It was far too few. Guards. Torturers. Rapists. Spies. But not Hassif. No. That man managed to get away. Later, when the Allies eased off their air attack, Saddam came back. For a while it looked like he would get his revenge. That Hassif would return to torment us. But the no-fly zone was implemented. For the first time in a hundred years, the Kurds were free.’

‘And your mother?’

‘They raped her too many times. Humiliated her too many times. It was too much for her to bear. She and my father committed joint suicide in 1993. I was brought up by my uncle and aunt. They were very kind to me. I am very lucky.’