7

Interrogation

 

These men speak much better English than the island dwellers. It is not perfect but it is good enough. They are older than the other men. They are calmer. They do not carry Kalashnikovs but they are armed. Pistols nestle in holsters at their waists. I feel with them in charge we are unlikely to be harmed—at least not in the foreseeable future. Then I stop myself. What a ludicrous concept! The future is normally something we think we can influence if not control. (I’m well aware that this is not the case for many people. The ability to control our future is a middle-class, First World conceit, but it is one that is based on the very real power that we abrogate to ourselves via education, money and status.) But this is way outside my control. I really cannot foresee what is going to happen.

We are told to sit round the table. In a surreal parody of a social dinner, the men take their seats. The questions begin.

‘Who are you? Why are you here? What is your business?’

And to me specifically:

‘Why did you expose the film? What pictures did you take? What did you see?’ Over and over again the same questions. Over and over we give the same answers.

They are particularly exercised about the fact that our ship to shore radio does not work. They tell us in their calm, measured voices that the base on the island had repeatedly radioed asking us to identify ourselves, telling us not to come any closer, that if we did so we would be shot.

Rupert and I and Brad exchange glances. How close had we come to being blown out of the water without even knowing it? While we sailed in towards the island, looking at the gun emplacements, men manning those emplacements were looking back at us. Like something out of a film noir, we were in their sights without knowing it.

As I had stood in my bikini fantasising about jumping over the side and swimming, my body had been picked out in that circular scope. Head to toe, shoulder to shoulder, I had been standing in a ring of death.

But we had heard none of the requests, the demands, the threats. Viewed in that light, our arrival could be seen as threatening. Again, it’s all about perspective.

You would like to think that you had some sixth sense, some presentiment of ultimate peril. My instincts were kicking up but the thing is, you just don’t think anything that bad can happen when you’re brought up in our fine First World cultures. In our world, this sort of thing really does not happen unless you deliberately put yourself in harm’s way, unless you go into the armed forces or the security services.

The questions continue. These men are naval officers and they cannot understand why our captain could have put out to sea with a malfunctioning ship-to-shore radio. They seem to see in that negligence a deliberate conspiracy.

Middle Easterners are notorious conspiracy theorists. They thrive on intrigue. Perhaps it is the legacy of courtly rule and censorship. This leads to rampant speculation and foments a vivid imagination. And when you are the Evil Empire you are particularly paranoid. Most of the world really is out to get you.

The questions continue into the night. We are exhausted. Our defrosting lasagna lies sweltering in the heat. While we are being interrogated, our boat is searched by the island dwellers. They find our whisky. They display it triumphantly to our interrogators.

‘What is this? Alcohol? You are bringing alcohol into the Islamic Republic of Iran?’ Demand the naval officers.

‘This is not Iran!’ we protest. ‘This island is owned by the United Arab Emirates!’

The men raise their eyebrows. Their lips twitch. They look vaguely amused. They do not engage in this surreal debate. Never has there been a clearer example of possession equalling ownership.

‘It is an offence to bring alcohol into the Islamic Republic of Iran,’ they declare. ‘You are breaking the law.’

It is obvious at this stage that they are looking for justifications to hold us hostage. Anything will do.

‘We are not breaking the law, because this is not Iran,’ I persist, perpetuating the fiction, at least in my own mind.

They do not dignify my comment with a response. I ask them what they are doing with us. Rupert asks for our phones so that we might ring our embassies. The answer is a shake of the head. It is very obvious that the rules of normal engagement do not apply here. There is no phone call to a lawyer, no emergency call to an embassy. (Then again in distressingly many cases in the bastions of Civil Liberties of the West those calls are not permitted either. Though let me add, those imperfect democracies are a hell of a lot better than the alternatives.)

With instructions in Farsi to the island dwellers, the naval officers leave us, promising to return tomorrow.

Brad goes off to his cabin, Rupert and I go to ours and we lie in the darkness and we try to sleep while above deck the men with guns keep watch.

I think of my children. I think of them sleeping at home in their beds. They are safe and that gives me comfort. I wonder when I will see them again.