She battled with nausea. Hot blood surged to her temples as if summoned by the devils and imps of injustice. She felt dizzy, increasingly unsettled as if hanging on a cliff, ready to drop into the void below it. She was being pushed, and she couldn’t resist, her feeble attempts came to nought.

She staggered as the feeling overcame her. She tried to steady herself to no avail, sobs and spasms racked her thin frail frame. She could have cried out in pain, she could have screamed or moaned loudly for her only son had there been hopes of his resurrection, but there were none.

She paced up and down on wobbly feet. Her eyes caught sight of a man sitting on the front bench. He sadly looked at her, slowly pulling at his pipe. He seemed to be staring on the crucifixion that hung loosely round her thin neck, perhaps a confession to the sorrows and tribulations she had gone through since the arrest of her son. The man looked at her once more and hauled her son away into the dark corridors ahead, into the trucks that carried remandees for the law courts that had no reason to hold onto him any longer.

‘Amadi’ he heard his mother’s voice like a breeze fading into the distance. He must have heard her collapse behind them as the warder led him away. A strange feeling settled upon his spirit as he sat in his cell like a clergyman’s cloak. He couldn’t speak, and hopes of ever breaking out had died with time. He couldn’t think, not because it was illegal but because there was everything, and again nothing to think about. He just sat until he heard his name once again. His body that had previously been numbed by the cell’s conditions now broke into a heavy sweat. It trickled down his spine to drench the ragged pants that served for part of the prison uniform. He hadn’t the money to bribe for a new one. Only fifty shillings would have seen him get a new uniform that would cover his nakedness.

Lice tasted the salty liquid and instead turned onto his flesh. They chewed into him anew as if preparing him for the coming event. He had tried to be or appear indifferent to it but no prisoner could stand the test. No prisoner could withstand the crucifixion.

Many had come in strong and defiant, yet had never again seen the world outside. They lay in unmarked graves all over the country. If only prayer could help! He remembered his religious mother and the many choruses they had sung together. If only these could count, if only the many bible readings they had shared in his childhood could save his body and soul, a strong feeling overcame him.

He wanted to speak to the lord one more time, to sing to the lord before the test, to defy the prearranged ceremony before him, to defy the gods of pain. Perhaps he should have broken into a long prayer there and then to frighten the masters into taking away the cup of suffering. Yet nothing stood in their way, nothing could. He had to go through the punishment; it was part of his rehabilitation. If he did anything like breaking into song or prayer, the act would only serve to frighten him and draw laughter and mockery from the brutes that now eagerly waited.

He shed all his clothes, the few that covered some parts of his body, ready to pass through the long cool corridor and found himself thinking of the past. Of his arrest, of what followed, the routine torture and all that pertained to this painful process.

Parting from his mother and bride, when all arrangements had been finalised was the most painful thing. Tears stung his eyes as he fought to withhold them. They came rushing in torrents. Hot, they scalded his chin like an aftershave as he staggered to the death chamber as prisoners called it. Tears blinded his way up to the well lit corridor so that he was there before he could realise it. He heard his name once more.

‘Amadi Yosefu!’ and his number followed. He hurried.