The Hiding Place - Ch. 14 Reading Guide

As you read and annotate Ch. 14 of The Hiding Place,complete the reading guide below by filling in the blanks. When you are done be sure to submit your work. This assignment is due by the start of class on Friday. At the start of the chapter, Corrie is thankful that Betsie doesn't have to stand outside. On that day there was a fog hanging over Ravensbruck and Corrie was working on potato detail helping to haul them and bury them in a trench to keep them safe from the freezing weather that was coming. When the guard weren't watching she would sneak a bite of raw potato. The next day Corrie was missing Betsie very much and said she decided to do a desperate thing. Mien told Corrie a way to get into the hospital without the guards seeing her by sneaking through a window that did not close correctly. When Corrie got through the window, she saw a sight that shocked her - a dozen naked corpses, some of which had their eyes open. Corrie described the sight as making her flesh crawl. When Corrie finds Betsie she is sitting in a cot near the window, and Corrie described her as having a touch of color in her sunken cheeks. She had not seen a doctor or a nurse, but the chance to rest had already made a difference. Three days later Betsie returned to the barracks even though she received no examination or medicine of any kind and Corrie described her forehead as feeling feverish. After her stay in the hospital, Betsie is given a permanent assignment as part of the "knitting brigade" which were the women they saw on the first day who knitted socks. Betsie was so quick she would complete her quota of socks before noon. She would spend hours a day reading aloud from the Bible as she moved among the platforms. One night when Corrie returns from work she describes Betsie as looking "extraordinarily pleased with yourself." Betsie tells her it's because that afternoon there was confusion in her knitting group about sock sizes and they called a supervisor to come in, but she would not because of the fleas. The supervisor said "that place is crawling with fleas!" As time went on and the reached the month of December, Corrie described roll calls as becoming "true endurance "tests that many did not survive. One morning when a feeble-minded girl soiled herself during roll call, a guard nicknamed "The Snake" hit the girl with a leather crop as she "shrieked in pain and terror." Corrie asks Betsie "what can we do for these people?" and she says they can pray every day. While Corrie was referring to the feeble-minded, she realized later Betsie was thinking of their persecutors. Several days later Corrie is part of a group called to the hospital for "transport inspection." Corrie did not want to be sent away because she did not want to leave Betsie. When she got to the station to check her eyes she is told to "read the lowest line you can." Corries lies and says she can only read the top line. The woman asked her is she wants to be rejected and Corrie replies yes. Instead of getting orders for a transport, she is told to come back the next morning to be fitted for glasses. Because Corrie does not get transported she no longer has a work assignment. She ends up as part of knitting group that Betsie is also part of. They work together in the dormitory and Corrie describes that time as "the closest, most joyous weeks of all the time in Ravensbruck." During these joyous weeks that Corrie describes, the women pray for prisoners as well as the guards, and for the healing of Germany, Europe and the whole world. Betsie describes a world after the war where she and Corrie will live in a beautiful house with inlaid floors and a sweeping staircase. Corrie realizes that this is just a dream, and their reality is the "cramped, filthy barracks." Days later roll call is started early and Corrie says they were "driven from our bunks at 3:30 am" Trucks come up through the camp over the snow, and Corrie and the women see the old and the ill being put into the back of the trucks by nurses. Corrie said they knew when overcrowding reached a certain point the sickest would be taken to the brick building at the bottom of the great square smokestack. As the weather got colder, the prisoners started to stamping their feet to help not feel the cold during roll call. As the cold of winter increased, Corrie said so did the "special temptation of concentration camp life" to think only of oneself. Corrie describes the selfishness as having "a life of its own." The prisoners are each issued an extra blanket in December, and when new prisoners come, Betsie insists they give them one of the blankets. Corrie says that evening she lent her the blanket but did not give it to her. As the winter goes on, Corrie struggles with her "worship and teaching" Until one afternoon she reads Paul's account of "the thorn in the flesh." Corrie realizes the sin she has been committing is thinking that any power to transform things came from her, but it actually came from Christ. Corrie writes that the cold seemed to be effecting Betsie's legs. Sometimes in the morning she could not move at all and would have to be carried. The week before Christmas, Betsie could not move her arms or legs. Corrie tries to take her to the hospital, but the guards tell her "all prisoners must report for the count." When Corrie and another prisoner carry Betsie to the hospital after roll call, they find a line "stretched to the end of the building and out of sight around the corner." When they get Betsie back into bed, Corrie says he speech is slow and blurred but she was trying to say something. Betsie talked about a vision of a camp where they were in charge, where there were "no barbed wire, and the barracks had windowboxes and people could learn to love." Corrieand Maryke tried to take Betsie again the next morning but "The Snake" was standing in the street and told them to take her back. Corrie comes back from roll call and finds The Snake and two orderlies setting down a stretcher and saying "the prisoner is ready for transfer." Betsie is taken to the hospital where Corrie tries to stay with her as long as she can. At noontime Corrie gets a pass from The Snake to visit the hospital. Corrie cannot go to the hospital again until the next morning after roll call. When she looks in, she describes what she sees as "It was a carving in old yellow ivory. There was no clothing on the figure. I could see each ivory rib, and the outline of the teeth through the parchment cheeks." Corrie realizes the figure is Betsie. The nurses take Betsie's body to the washroom and Corrie follows. Betsie looks at the row of bodies against the wall to find Betsie. She describes her as "her eyes closed as if in sleep, her face full and young. This was the Betsie of heaven bursting with joy and health." On her way out, Corrie's notices Nollie's blue sweater and stops to pick it up, but it is covered in black lice and Mien tells her not to take it. As she leaves Corrie says she has "left behind the last physical tie" to Betsie.