Page 106 of Cilka's Journey

Elena glares at Hannah.

“It’s all right, Elena,” Cilka says. “Anger is what we feel when we are helpless.”

Hannah pushes herself violently off the bed and spits at Cilka’s feet, before storming out of the hut. Elena balls her fists and goes to follow her.

“Don’t,” Cilka says. “Let her go.”

Over the next few days, the unrest grows. The number of prisoners on strike reaches the thousands. Calls for the ambulance at themine cease as the prisoners down tools. The machinery grinds to a halt. Thousands of prisoners sit in the compound, no one threatening to escape its confines. Just a passive, peaceful sit-down.

An orderly regales Cilka, Raisa and Lyuba with his version of a speech made by one of the leaders of the uprising.

“No matter our nationality or where we are from today, our fate is sealed. Very soon, brothers, we will know when we can return to our families.”

Raisa and Lyuba listen before hurrying away, anxious not to be involved.

“What else did he say?” Cilka asks, fired up. She may not have a family to go to but she could look for Josie, for Gita. Does she dare hope?

“Not much. He was asking everyone to stay sitting and not cause trouble, give the pigs no reason to attack us.”

“Us? Were you sitting with them?”

The orderly looks sheepish.

“For a while. I’m with them, I support them, but my work here is important.”

“Good for you,” Cilka says to him.

The rumors are rife. Cilka soaks up all the information she can. Each evening she relays what she knows. Elena does, too. Clandestine groups have been forming since the death of Stalin in March of this year; communication between camps has increased, spreading plans for a mass strike at Gulags across Siberia. A month earlier, they were told, strikes had occurred in East Berlin, and this convinced the organizers in Vorkuta to do something about their living and working conditions. Hannah has begun to sit very quietly during these conversations.

The doctors working with Cilka discuss the nonviolent nature of the strike, grateful bloodshed has been avoided. So far.

“They’ve stormed the jail!” an orderly runs into the ward screaming one morning.

The staff gather around him. His news is scant. Hundreds of men have stormed the area housing maximum-security prisoners and have released many. The newly freed prisoners have joined the others and the sit-in has resumed.

Five days later, guards move on the prisoners. Cilka is advised not to leave the hospital. Prisoners have erected barricades and concerns grow that the guards and camp authorities may be planning retaliation.

Cilka is terrified for her friends, hoping they are safe. And she fears for Alexandr, too.

The next day, the stalemate is broken.

“Prepare for casualties,” Yelena warns the staff.

Gunfire reverberates around the camp. Within minutes, Cilka and her colleagues are overrun with prisoners bringing in wounded men, and some women. The ward is awash with blood. The initial chaos is organized by one of the doctors like a military operation. No one gets past the treatment area at the front of the ward without being assessed by medical staff. Cilka works without stopping.

They keep coming. Many are dead on arrival and are quickly taken away by those who carried them in. Those with life-threatening injuries are sent immediately for treatment, the others ordered to wait in the reception room outside.

Like all the medical and nursing staff, Cilka is threatened verbally and pushed around by panicked men insisting she treat their comrade first. With no one to ensure their safety, she and her colleagues stand up for themselves, looking for and getting support from nearby prisoners.

With no change in the light outside, Cilka doesn’t know when day becomes night becomes day again.

“Take a break, have something to eat and drink,” a blood-splattered Yelena tells Cilka and Raisa, who together are bandaging the same badly wounded man.

“There’s too much still to do,” Raisa responds.

“Take a break, then come and relieve Lyuba and me,” Yelena says, and it’s the first time Cilka has heard her raise her voice like that. “It’s the only way we are going to cope. We have to look after ourselves.”

Cilka and Raisa get themselves a cup of tea and hunk of bread, bringing it back onto the ward. They sit with the less injured awaiting their turn for treatment. No one talks. Cilka dozes.