at the hands of the Gestapo. Claire could put weight on the soles of her feet again now, the scars from the beatings she’d endured having healed over leaving white wheals of thickened skin, and her toenails were starting to grow back where they’d been wrenched from the nail beds. Vivi’s face was healing, although her smile remained lopsided from the damage done to her jaw and the loss of a tooth. She had a cough that rattled in her chest especially in the mornings, having suffered from the dampness of her prison cell after her near-drowning at the Avenue Foch, but she insisted to Claire that she was fine. The two of them, together, kept each other going. Each night, as the train rattled onwards, the two friends would curl up side by side. And in the darkness, when the nightmares and the terror made Claire cry out, as she did in their attic bedrooms, Vivi would take her hand and whisper, ‘Hush, now. I’m here. And you’re here. We’re together. And everything will be alright.’
After several days, the train disgorged its surviving passengers at last, and the women clustered together on the platform of a strange station. The jagged, Gothic script painted on to the wooden signs read ‘Flossenbürg’.
Claire blinked in the late spring sunshine, lifting her light-starved face to the faint warmth of its rays. Although she was frightened, dreading whatever unimaginable trials might be coming next, she managed to muster a little inner strength, reminding herself that they had survived this far, that perhaps now the worst was over, and that – most importantly of all – she and Vivi were still together.
The train’s cargo – men, women and a few terrified children – was herded into long lines by SS officers and then they were ordered to begin walking. Hungry, thirsty and exhausted, the prisoners stumbled along a dusty road for almost an hour, with any stragglers being ordered back into line at one end or the other of a guard’s rifle.
Soon, Claire’s feet burned with flames of shooting pain that made her hobble. At one point, she faltered as her legs, which were unaccustomed to bearing her weight for such a long stretch of time after the months spent in a prison cell and cattle car, were seized with searing cramps and felt as if they would give way beneath her. But then Vivi linked an arm through hers and the reassurance of that contact helped Claire walk on.
At last they came to a forbidding-looking gatehouse and passed through a black metal gateway. To either side there stretched a high, razor-wire-capped fence which had guard towers set into it at regular intervals along its length. The muzzle of a machine gun, trained towards the interior of the camp, protruded from each one.
Claire lifted her bowed head to read the inscription set into one of the brick gateposts as they passed by: Arbeit Macht Frei. She frowned, trying to puzzle out the meaning. Vivi nudged her. ‘It says, work will set you free.’
The sickening irony of the message, as it hung over the heads of the frightened and exhausted prisoners, forced a gulp of astonished hysteria to escape from Claire’s mouth. It might almost have been laughter, had it not sounded so strangled and bleak amongst the scared whispers and shuffling footsteps of the crowd, like the involuntary yelp of an animal in pain.
‘Hush,’ whispered Vivi, as one of the guards craned his neck to try to pinpoint the source of the sound. ‘We must try not to draw attention to ourselves. Remember, I’m here. We’re together. We will be alright.’
The snaking line was sorted by the guards, who sent the men in one direction and the women in another. There was no sign of the children now, but Claire hadn’t seen where they’d been taken. The women were ushered into a long, low building which appeared to be staffed by female guards.
‘Line up here,’ one said, and gesticulated. ‘Single file. Remove your clothes.’
The women looked at one another in astonishment.
‘Hurry up! Clothes off.’ This time the command was a shout.
Slowly, in numb disbelief, the women began to undress until, at last, they stood shivering, clutching the clothing they’d removed. Then a door opened and, one by one, they were led into the next room.
‘Leave your clothes here, on the floor.’ The guard’s tone was as harsh as her words.
Ashamed, humiliated, exposed, Claire was made to stand before one of several desks that were arranged