Everything I know about Algeria, I know from the media, from books, from talking to friends. Back when I lived with Uncle Ali on the estate, my impressions were too real to be true. On the estate, people played at being Algerian beyond what truth could bear. Nothing forced them to do this, but they conformed to tradition with consummate skill. Emigrants we are and emigrants we will be for all time. The country they spoke of with such emotion, such passion, doesn’t exist, the tradition that is the North Star of their memory still less so. It’s an idol with a stamp of tradition on its brow that reads ‘Made in Taiwan’, it’s phony, artificial and dangerous. Algeria was other, it had its own life, everyone knew its leaders had pillaged the country and were actively preparing for the end of days. The Algerians who still live there know all too well the difference between the real country and the one we live in. They know the alpha and the omega of the horror they are forced to live through. If it were left to them, the torturers would have been the only victims of their dirty deeds.

On 25 April 1994, the bled was the lead story on the eight o’clock news: ‘Fresh carnage in Algeria! Last night armed men stormed the little village of Aïn Deb and cut the throats of all of its inhabitants. According to Algerian television, this new massacre is the work of Islamic fundamentalists in the Armed Islamic Group . . .’

I jumped to my feet, screamed, ‘Oh God, this can’t be happening!’ What I had most feared had happened, the horror had finally found us. I slumped back, shell-shocked, I was sweating, I felt cold, I was shivering. Ophélie rushed in from the kitchen shouting, ‘What is it? What’s the matter? Talk to me, for Christ’s sake!’ I pushed her away. I needed to be on my own to take it in, to compose myself. But the truth was there before my eyes, in my heart, my parents’ faces, immeasurably old, immeasurably scared, pleading with me to help them, stretching out their arms towards me as ancient shadows brutally dragged them back, threw them to the ground, shoved a knee into their frail chests and slit their throats. I could see their legs judder and twitch as terrified life fled their aged bodies.