The King

40. The Telegraph Service

Malijak became the shah’s pet. His sister cared for the boy and was given a separate room with the servants, which she shared with her brother. During meals Malijak was allowed to sit on the floor next to the shah, just where Sharmin used to sit. At first the women took pity on Malijak and treated him kindly. But before a year had passed the child became troublesome. He hit the other children and pestered the women of the harem. No one dared say anything, and the shah let Malijak do whatever he liked. He poured out his heart to the boy.

Malijak ate more than was good for him and soon became big and fat. The undernourished child had disappeared. The servants kept out of his way, and the women of the harem popped sugar cubes in his mouth whenever he unexpectedly made an appearance. The boy always wore exactly the same clothes as the shah: the same jacket, the same boots and the same hat. In the evening Malijak played in the shah’s company until it was time for him to go to bed.

The stories about Malijak spread across the land. You never knew what was true and what was false. It was said that whenever Malijak began to cry because he missed his mother and father, the shah would get down on all fours like a donkey and give the boy a ride around the hall of mirrors.

No one ever saw the shah without his tall cylindrical hat, but it was said that Malijak was allowed to grab the shah’s hat and play with it. The child was always dirty and he stank. He was afraid of water and never let anyone wash him.

‘The shah washes him himself in a big tub,’ people said. ‘And he cuts his hair with a pair of scissors, since Malijak doesn’t even let his own sister touch his hair.’

It was said that the shah didn’t want Malijak to learn to read and write. Education was unnecessary because he regarded the boy as a pet. The only thing the shah taught him was to play a good game of chess so he could keep the shah amused.

Malijak also liked to play tricks on Sheikh Aqasi. The shah enjoyed it whenever anyone teased the sheikh, and Malijak quickly caught on. As soon as the sheikh came into the room Malijak would run up to him, hang on his clothes and search his pockets for sweets. He loosened the scarf that Sheikh Aqasi used as a belt and ran through the room with it. The poor man would have to chase him to get his scarf back — but carefully, so his trousers wouldn’t fall down. The shah enjoyed this immensely and laughed out loud, and his pleasure egged Malijak on.

The shah felt good when Sheikh Aqasi was around. By getting rid of the vizier he had the freedom to be himself again. He had always felt inferior to the vizier, and the words of his mother echoed in his head: ‘You act like the vizier’s errand boy.’

With Sheikh Aqasi the roles were reversed. Now Sheikh Aqasi was the errand boy, and that gave the shah a tremendous sense of satisfaction. He could make decisions on his own.

There was only one thing that kept the shah from being fully himself: his mother. With her he was powerless. After all, you can’t send your mother home, you can’t sack her and you can’t kill her. With his mother the shah would just have to be patient.

Now that Sheikh Aqasi was vizier, England had more room to manoeuvre, although he was not an easy man to work with. He was not a trustworthy partner. To maintain firmer control over developments in the country, London decided to replace its ambassador in Tehran with the gifted politician Sir John Malcolm. He was fascinated by Persian history and he spoke reasonably good Persian. He knew that the country’s coffers were empty and that the shah’s personal expenses were inordinately high.

At his official introduction to the shah Sir John made a good impression from the minute he walked in. He presented the shah with a hunting rifle, and the shah in turn invited him to go hunting.

Both men had a feel for language, and both loved poetry. During one of Sir John’s tea visits to the palace the shah entrusted the ambassador with one of his poems:

O wretched heart, I hear thy piteous groan,

Since thou must pay for what the eyes have done,

For had mine eyes not gazed on love’s sweet face

How could love by an innocent heart be known?

‘It is a most regal poem,’ Sir John had remarked.

One of the first things Sir John arranged for the shah was to cancel the construction of the domestic telegraph system. London had resisted the plan from the beginning, and Sir John promised the shah a monthly bonus in exchange for dropping it.

To avoid any appearance of bribery he replaced the word ‘bonus’ with ‘tax’, thereby obliging England to pay a monthly telegraph tax to the shah. The shah beamed with happiness. He was being given a large sum of money, right out of the blue. It was as if God were rewarding him for his deeds.

Sir John Malcolm realised that without the cooperation of the elite, England would not be able to maintain its position. So he invited the influential princes to the embassy and asked them for their support. He gave them all positions in the national telegraph scheme, which existed only on paper, and arranged monthly salaries for them.

This enabled England to make more headway with the activities arising from the plans it had agreed on with the vizier concerning the telegraph line to India. Several thousand men from the countryside were put to work chopping down trees, and hundreds of young men from Tehran learned how to install telegraph poles and cables. Experienced masons from throughout the land were called on to build scores of telegraph offices along the India line.

The shah had hoped that by scrapping the national telegraph system his subjects would be cut off from news of the latest developments. But this was far too simplistic. The merchants who travelled abroad kept coming back with impressive tales of new products, companies, cities, squares, bridges and newspapers. Wherever the shah went he heard people talking about these things. Even the royal circles were all abuzz.

The princes tried to add prestige and panache to their conversations by peppering them with the latest English and French terminology. Everyone was trying to give others the impression that they had seen or heard something new.

While travelling to Isfahan for a working visit the shah happened upon a group of Persian men in blue work clothes who were installing cables and insulators on telegraph poles. He saw policemen at the Isfahan gate walking about in uniforms that were unfamiliar to him. He was not aware of the existence of these officers, which surprised him. Upon enquiring he was told they weren’t policemen at all but guards for the telegraph offices then under construction.

Curious, he spent some time visiting a company where the cables were cut to measure and insulators were fixed to iron bars. The country was changing before his very eyes. It distressed him, and he remembered how often the murdered vizier had told him he ought to go to France or England to see the industrial developments there first-hand. He had always dismissed the idea. How could he have travelled with an easy mind when the fate of Herat was hanging in the balance, and when people were lying in wait, ready to seize power from him?

During his visit to the villages around Isfahan he noticed that the villagers were gathering round the telegraph poles and debating with each other. How could a handful of poles and a few cables cause such a commotion?

‘It’s a miracle. They put your words in the cable, and in a flash it gets sent to the other side of the world.’

‘What words do they send?’

‘English words, I think, or Russian ones.’

‘What about Persian words, then?’

‘I don’t think it works with Persian.’

‘It’s orders from the king of England. He says something and then they send it out to the whole world through these cables.’

‘Can our king use the cables, too?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Why not?’

‘They’re not for us. The cables belong to the British. The shah has only leased out the land to them to put their poles in.’

The peasants admired the shah for his wisdom, and the shah made it seem as if he was riding along the telegraph route to inspect the operations in person.

When it came to the telegraph system Sheikh Aqasi was of the same mind as the shah’s mother.

‘The British have laid more than two thousand kilometres of cable across our country,’ she said. ‘They’ve chopped down thousands of trees to make telegraph poles. Are they doing this for our benefit? No, they’re marching down our back in order to reach India faster. Why are we letting them do this? I asked this question once, and I’ll keep on asking it until I get an answer.’

‘Mother, you’re forgetting that England was in possession of the south. We had to negotiate. You have to see this collaboration on the telegraph project as a symbol of the changing times,’ said the shah, and he ended the discussion.

The cables were laid with incredible speed. The British had gas lanterns, which meant that the work could go on all night. When people got up in the morning they saw that the workers were already hundreds of poles further along.

When the telegraph headquarters in Tehran was finished, Sir John Malcolm asked the shah to officiate at the opening. The shah was extremely pleased with the invitation. He rode to the ceremony with his attendants and his cannon. A group of Indian army musicians welcomed him with a jolly victory march. Sir John received the shah, took from his inside pocket a piece of chocolate wrapped in gold paper, and gave it to Malijak.

The entrance to the headquarters was decorated with Persian wall tapestries as well as British flags. Beneath the admiring glances of the distinguished guests, Sir John gave a speech in Persian in which he praised the shah for his exceptional cooperation and his friendship with the British royal family. He handed the shah a pair of scissors on a gold tray and invited him to cut the ribbon. This was followed by a tour through the building and past the telegraph equipment.

Over a glass of fresh English tea in the garden of the headquarters, Sir John Malcolm had a surprise in store for the shah.

‘On the occasion of this historic event, England would like to offer a present to the children of the shah — especially Malijak, but His Majesty’s other children may also make use of it, of course.’

‘We are very pleased,’ said the shah.

‘The present symbolises progress,’ continued Malcolm. ‘It is an apparatus that has only recently been installed in the parks of London. It’s meant for children, but it has been noticed that in London it is being used by both children and their mothers.’ With this remark Sir John was suggesting that the present was also meant for the women of the harem.

‘I don’t know what the Persian word is for this apparatus, but in English we call it a “slide”.’

‘We shall see,’ said the shah, and he looked around to see if the apparatus was in sight.

‘The present will be delivered to the palace.’

The next week two large carts carrying elongated objects arrived at the palace. A British engineer and five Indian technicians had made sure the large iron plates were not damaged as they were being transported over the bumpy streets. No one knew what the shining plates were for, and everyone began making wild guesses: ‘Maybe they’re parts of a telegraph.’

‘Looks like the shah is getting a telegraph of his own.’

‘This has nothing to do with a telegraph. I think the iron plates are meant to replace the wooden gate of the palace.’

‘If they carried these big pieces of iron all the way through the country, it must be something important.’

The shah had decided to have the present placed in the harem, for if the women of London could enjoy it, the women of the harem could entertain themselves with it as well. In the meantime he had come up with a Persian name for the apparatus, an almost literal translation of the English word ‘slide’: ‘sor-soreh’. A nice discovery, he thought — a word that describes exactly what the apparatus does. ‘Sor-soreh: you slide and you keep on sliding.’

All the women of the harem were sent on a pilgrimage to the tomb of the holy Abdoldawood. When they returned late that evening the shah was going to surprise them with his sor-soreh.

The British engineer and his Indian assistants spent a whole day completing their work. They anchored the gigantic slide firmly to the floor and secured it to the walls with iron cables. It was as solid as a house. When all was ready the engineer tested the slide by climbing up the steps and sliding down himself. He was followed by the five giggling Indians.

The present was ready for use and the shah was extremely pleased with this extraordinary piece of British equipment. He gave three gold coins to the British engineer and one apiece to the Indians. Now he was standing all alone beside the massive slide. He had a number of mattresses placed at the lower end. Standing with arms akimbo he cast a glance at his sor-soreh. It was perfect. With great care he climbed to the top, sat down and slid solemnly to the bottom.

‘Fantastic!’ he said, landing gently on the mattresses.

He waited impatiently for the women to return. The shah received them with a lantern in his hand, and they wondered why all the lights in the harem had been extinguished.

‘Ladies,’ he shouted proudly, ‘the sor-soreh awaits you. Follow me!’

Leading the way he opened the door of the harem. ‘After you, ladies!’

The women went inside. By the light of that one lantern, and with the shadows caused by the reflection of the light on the surfaces of the slide, all the women could see was a mysterious monster in the middle of the harem. An extra lantern was brought in. Malijak appeared at the top of the slide, and to everyone’s astonishment he slid to the bottom, crowing with pleasure, and flopped onto the mattresses. The shah left the women and went outside.

Behind him he heard his wives screaming and laughing. Two big tears of happiness rolled down his cheeks. ‘Maybe it’s time we took that trip to England,’ he said to Malijak, who was pulled away from the slide with difficulty.