CHAPTER 1
The nightmare begins
I wish I knew who they meant. The one they think I am. Would know the places where I am said to have been, or that I know the people I am said to have visited. If only I knew all the names, the dates, the places and the faces!
How can it be that these people know my name, my address, my family and even my birthplace! …
And I don’t even know what they’re talking about…. They wanted me to speak quickly, think fast, answer quickly – all ten or twelve of them. Or were there more? Less? They were scattered all over the house, their voices like shattered glass, drilling into my pounding head. … The sounds of doors, furniture and other objects cut through my mind. My knees threatened to give way – here, right in front of my family… they just threatened to buckle under me. But I didn’t want to allow that to happen. Not in the presence of my family. Everyone, except the baby, sat in the living room, anxiously crouched in a corner and watched. I must not collapse! I have to force myself not to empty myself in the chair I’m sitting on. I couldn’t let the adrenaline shoot through my veins tear my guts and let my urine run down my trembling legs. I had to be a man and stand firm. So I pushed my heels into the ground, pulled myself up and pulled myself together – this morning in my house in Amsterdam-Zuidoost.
I now look back on that day, on the moment when a vehement hammering on my apartment door tore me out of bed… I remember the hour when the door flew open and dark figures stormed into the house and brutally pressed me against the wall behind the door entrance… I look back and ask myself: What would I have done if I had known then what I know now? Would I have run away? Would I have climbed out of the window to jump out of the three-story apartment? Or would I have stayed calm and taken courage – because I would have been aware that this morning in December had been the beginning of a special event that I will now tell about.