‘I glimpsed the ground beneath us only for a few precious moments – the sun rising like a perfect crimson ball, spilling its light through the little windows. I sat and prayed, held my brother, felt the world right itself as the wheels bounced down on the precious ground. And then Pelletier was shouting at us to follow him and the rear of the plane was slowly opening and there were soldiers waiting for us: men in black, hats down low, as terrifying as those who come in the night to do the slaughter that their leader demands. I feared Pelletier betrayed us – that these men were Kaibiles and we were to be handed over to those who would butcher us for their own amusement. Instead we met the little man you saw. He promised us that we were safe, that we were here for our own protection. I saw only some brick buildings and the morning mist and then we were being hurried in to a building with an oval roof where we were given coffee and bread and permitted to curl up on a low bed with green blankets and I slept. Woke to find myself being photographed. Woke again to hear my brother demanding to see Pelletier, telling them he knew that they had lied. And finally we were hurried to a big black car and told to sit in the back beside the little man who spoke to us in Spanish and in Q’eqchi’. I saw little except for these great walls of trees – trees like those from the Christmas cards we used to receive from the father churches in Europe and America – and then we were told to put our heads down. We had not travelled for very long. Nine miles, perhaps less. The house looked like something from a ghost story. Pelletier was waiting here. He and the little man exchanged a few words. They spoke of our “other guests”. And then we were brought inside. We drank water. Prayed, my brother and I. Waited to be told who else was lingering in the other rooms; who we were to tell our truths to. We had not been here very long when we saw the car. Your car. The little man was expecting you to be somebody else.’

I realized I’d been holding my arms in tightly at my sides, corsets of skin and bone squeezing me tight. I barely dared breathe in case she stopped talking. I didn’t always mind not understanding what was happening but suddenly I wanted to tip her upside down and shake every last scrap of information from her. My mind felt like it was dribbling out my ears. None of it made sense. Why here? Why Cordelia’s place? She knew people were coming, that’s why she’d asked me and John to come retrieve the things that mattered. But she’d never have sent us into this.