First Grain of Sand — Page 111
CHAPTER TWELVE The Torture Begins t is natural that when a person is deeply distressed and consumed by grief and worry, their senses become unu- sually sharp, often heightened by a lack of food, allowing them to quickly grasp tasks with heightened sensitivity. In order to protect myself, I once jammed the ventilation windows from opening by blocking it on the inside with my coat or any other clothes so that the guards would be unable to throw in any piece of paper. When I did that, however, a guard or higher-ranking ser- geant would come into my room and remove those clothes from the window and order me not to do this again. Soon a night came when a Russian officer opened my door at 8 p. m. , seized hold of me, and yelled in Russian, 'Quickly throw in the paper' to the guard standing outside my window. When I saw the guard come towards the window, I screamed as loudly as I could for the highest-ranking officer. In this commotion, five more guards came into my room and together they dragged me to the dark confinement room. In the dark room, the guards held me down in order to tie my