Home Run

The road was quite straight and it ran bisecting a wide green valley. To his left was Ararat, magnificent in the sunlight. To his right was the lower summit of Tenduruk Dag. There were grazing sheep alongside the road, and when they were clear of the town they passed the folly palace of Ishak Pasha. He glanced at it. The building was above the road, dominating.

He had read in the guide book that a Kurdish chieftain in the last century had wanted the finest palace in the wide world, and he had had an Armenian architect design it and build it.

And when it was completed then the chieftain had had the Armenian architect's hands cut off, so that he could never design another that was as fine… Rough old world, Mr Armenian architect… Rough old world, Mr Charlie Eshraq.

Far ahead, where the haze of the shimmered heat had begun to settle, he could see the flat-roofed buildings of the Turkish Customs building, and he could just make out the blood red of the Turkish flag.

Amongst the fields stretching to the foothills of Ararat that was to his left and Tenduruk Dag that was to his right, he could see the brilliant scarlet oases of poppies. Where the poppy flowers were, that was a good place for the burying of Charlie Eshraq.

He eased down through the gears.

The Turkish Customs post was one old building of two stories and a sprawl of newer, more temporary, buildings. A wind lifted the flag. There were troops there, pretty lackadaisi-cal bunch, too, and there was a Customs official in the centre of the road who seemed to stop, briefly, each lorry, speak to the driver, then wave it on. On the other side of the road was the queue of vehicles travelling the other way, coming out from Iran, stopped and waiting for clearance. No delays for the lorries going into Iran. The Transit was two lorry lengths ahead of him. And the going was slower. One hand on the wheel, and his thumb was inches from the horn. One hand on the gear stick, and his fingers were inches from the arm that could have flashed his lights.

The Transit was stationary.

The Customs official was walking down the length of a lorry and trailer, and heading for the cab of the Transit. Park watched. It was what they had sent him to do. He watched the Customs official peer into the driver's window, then nod his head, then step back, then cheerfully wave the Transit forward.

The lorries in front of him nudged forward. Park swung his wheel. He drove off the metalled surface and on to the stone grit of the hard shoulder.

He walked away from his car. He walked towards the buildings and the soldiers who were already seeking what shade was offered. His shirt stuck to his back, there was the shiver in his legs as he walked. He took as his place the flagpole. The wind pushed his hair across his face.

He estimated that the Iranian flag and the Iranian buildings were 500 metres down the road. He thought that the border was at a point that was halfway between the two where a small stream crossed under the road through culvert tunnels. The road fell on its way to the tunnels, then climbed on a gradual gradient towards the Iranian buildings and the Iranian flag.

The Transit was slipping away down the slope, going steadily for the dip where the culverts were set under the road. The wind in his hair, the sun in his eyes, the roar of the heavy engines in his ears.

A young officer, regular army, had strolled to stand beside him, would have seen a foreigner at the post, and wondered, been interested. There were binoculars hanging loosely at his neck. Park didn't ask. A fast, sharp smile, his finger pointing to the binoculars. He knew nothing of the Turkish, nothing of their generosity. His gesture was enough. He had the binoculars in his hand.

The Transit was climbing up the slope from the stream.

His vision roved ahead.

He saw the buildings of the Customs post, and huge on the wall facing the oncoming road was the image of the Imam.

Past the buildings, uniformed and armed men held back a line of lorries from further movement towards Turkey. From a side door in the largest of the buildings he saw three men duck out and run, crouching and doubled, to take up positions behind parked cars. On the far side of the road, the far side to the buildings, was a heap of sandbags, inexpertly stacked and no more than waist height. With the glasses, through the power of the binoculars, he saw the sun flash on belted ammunition. There was a man standing beside the building closest to the roadway. He wore sandals and old jeans and his shirt tails weren't tucked in. He was not a young man. He was talking into a personal radio.

The Transit was into Iran, heading up the shallow slope of the road.

There was the crash of the gunfire.

He started up. He clasped his hands to halt the shaking.

"It's alright, dear, just the Pottinger boy… I don't mind him shooting pigeons, and I suppose I can't object at carrion crows, but I do think that killing rooks is the limit. I hope that you'll have a word with his father… Here's your coffee.

Mattie, darling, you look frozen. I'll get you a warmer sweater, and when you've had your coffee, you're coming straight in."

The sun was sharp on his forehead. There was the distortion of the binoculars and from the heat on the ground, but he could see well enough.

The road was clear ahead and in front of the Transit, and a man in dun uniform had emerged from the ditch that ran alongside the road as soon as the Transit had passed him and he was waving down the following lorry. There was a moment, as the Transit came to an easy and unhurried stop beside the building, that it was the only vehicle within 100 yards in front or behind.

Quick, fast movements. The van surrounded. He saw the men who ran forward towards the back of the van, and he saw their weapons raised to their shoulders and aimed at the Transit. Carried on the wind, must have been a megaphone, he heard a shouted order. They were closing on the cab. He saw the door of the cab open. He saw the barrel shape, the tube shape, jutting out from the opened door.

There was the fire squirt.

There was the following thunder hammer of the recoil of the LAW