time, we didn’t require an order. We fell to our knees and then lay face down. Soldiers moved us with their feet until they had arranged us on the diagonal, clearing a lane on the dock for foot traffic.
“What in the world is going on?” I said, my head turned toward Winnie, each of us lying prone on the cold, dingy dock.
“Oh, God,” Winnie said. “Oh, God, no.”
“What?” I asked.
“Silence!” one of them barked at me.
Winnie closed her eyes, and the chaos escalated around us. She complied with the wishes of the French soldier, not speaking but simply mouthing the words.
Oh, no.
CHAPTER 19
TEN, TWENTY MINUTES passed. I was lying flat, my head turned toward Winnie and beyond her, to the harbor. A French soldier stood only a few feet away. Soldiers and people in civilian clothes ran back and forth. I heard several splashes, telling me that people were diving into the water. Some of the soldiers entered our yacht again. Troopers were boarding yachts with dogs, German shepherds, who wore large blue vests that covered their torsos.
What had happened?
“Talk to me, Winnie,” I said, but a boot came down between our faces.
“Une arme!” The shout came from someone standing at the door of our yacht.
“Qui est le propriétaire du yacht? Celui-ci?” shouted a man whose boots were inches from my face. “Qui est le—”
“I am,” the fat American said. “It’s my yacht.”
“Levez-vous!” A soldier grabbed me by the wrist restraints and lifted me to my feet. “Allez-vous! Allez, allez!” All of us, the four of us ladies and the fat American, started marching toward the harbor.
“What’s going on?” Serena said in a hushed tone.
“Don’t worry, sweetie, this is some kind of mistake,” I called back with no conviction whatsoever.
Commandos had raided every boat. The parking lot was swarming with officials, mostly in plain clothes, not in uniform. An area around one particular car, a black convertible, was cordoned off with barricades.
Soldiers were lifting everyone to their feet and lining them up single file on the dock. But we were getting the royal treatment. We were marching ahead of them, all by ourselves.
We were being singled out.
CHAPTER 20
THE DIN IN the parking lot had reached near-deafening levels—everyone was shouting over each other and barking orders, sirens were blaring, helicopters were hovering. The four of us were each placed into a separate unmarked black SUV. Slowly, the vehicles started to move in a caravan. A helicopter flew overhead, trailing us. Soldiers jogged alongside the procession, holding their machine guns in ready position. A series of large vans passed us going the other way on a narrow road, heading back toward the dock, presumably to transport the occupants of the other yachts. Why, I had no idea.
“I’m an American citizen and I have rights,” I said to the driver and the soldier seated next to him in the front seat. “I demand to know what’s going on.”
They didn’t respond. They didn’t even look back at me.
We pulled into the same airport in Nice where we landed only two short days ago, the Aéroport Nice Côte d’Azur. But this time it was lined with military vehicles and armed soldiers. I was led into a small plane, where I was placed in a seat and my handcuffs were fastened to something else, locking me into the chair. Then a blindfold was placed over my eyes.
“Is that really necessary? For God’s sake, I’m handcuffed and—”
“Silence!” someone yelled in my face.
I heard others board the plane. My friends. I heard sobbing. I thought it was Winnie but I couldn’t be sure. I couldn’t even be sure that the sobs weren’t my own.
I couldn’t be sure of anything right now.
We sat in stunned silence. I could hear the rapid breathing of my friends, all of us bound and blindfolded and clueless.
Then some more men jumped onto the plane and said something that I missed. The plane soon moved down the runway.
Donna Augustine
Jendai Rilbury
Joan Didion
Di Morrissey
Daniel Abraham
Janette Kenny
Margaret Elphinstone
Lili Valente
Nancy E. Krulik
Jennifer Malin