Andrew Graham-Vooll
A MATTER OF FEAR*
The car coasted to the curb moving apace with my steps on
the sidewalk. It nosed ahead slowly. The hood moved into the field of
vision of the corner of one eye, then the brilliance of the windshield
came into view. A glance around brought the sight of the small dark
hole of a gun muzzle resting on the window frame ... aimed at me.
My knees reacted first; they did not bend properly. Guilt, due to
the existence of a pursuer, gave rise to the feeling, the certainty, that
each awkward step was as noticeable as the impeded gait of a severely
handicapped person. My feet trod with short hurried steps on a cushion
of air, hesitant
to
touch the ground, to run, or to slow down without a
suitable order from me. The men in the car were watching me. The
man at the wheel called out something about my beard. I began to turn
my head, slowly, stiffly. The car drove away. It was not me they wanted
this time.
It was not much more than an instant. There were other, longer,
more frightening episodes, but none so acute.
An image of fear is never lost. It is merely filed away for haunting,
embarrassing recall at the pass of a car. We all have, perhaps, at least
one personal image of fear. This one is with me, from Buenos Aires,
where my fear starts, to London; from Madrid to Managua. Terror is
paralyzing; hysteria, embarrassing; fear , humiliating. The former two
are incidental and fade; the latter, fear, is a constant companion.
When did this fear begin? In 1971, after an article published in the
Buenos Aires newspaper described the rape in a bathroom of a girl, a
guerrilla accomplice, by one of her guards. The details were supplied
by two lawyers, verbatim from her statement to the judge. The article
was not signed, but word got around that I had written it-probably by
lawyers defending political prisoners.
A man who said he was the girl's boyfriend, but somehow had the
look of a policeman, called on me in the newsroom. He sat by my desk
·to be included in
Portrait of an Exile,
by Andrew Graham· Yooll, to be published by
Junction Books, London, England.
