A Filipino ice-cream vendor was permitted to enter the camp with his push cart, and we flocked to him like eager kids.
On the third day, when he disposed of his wares, the Japanese guards took him to the Commandant’s office. After beating him up, they took away his earnings. When he left the camp, one side of his face was a bloody mess.
I glanced back at the notes I had made a month ago. At that time I had been in a state of mind bordering on fearful anxiety, panic, and resignation. The U. S. Army had left the city, and we were expecting the enemy. Kind and thoughtful Major Greene had given me a vial of luminal. Yes, I had been fortunate. I had had no need of it.
But there were other women. Had they known the shame, degradation, mutilation and madness that awaited them, they would have sought blessed oblivion in some fashion on the day the enemy reached the Philippines.