The King

52. The Constitution

The shah had been gone for a few months and everyone really did believe he was on a long journey to the holy cities. When his stay lasted longer than anyone expected they speculated that he had gone to Mecca to take part in the annual hajj. As a wealthy believer you had to travel to Mecca at least once and participate in the traditional Sugar Feast.

The shah was now halfway through his travels, and he had sent a few brief letters to Tehran. To his mother he wrote:

Mother, we were received by our neighbour Russia like a great Persian king. They told us they still have fond memories of your visit to Moscow. They showed us a couple of portraits of you. You never told us that the royal artist had painted your picture. I asked if I could take your portrait with me. Alas, they like you so much that they want to keep the painting in their own collection.

To Taj Olsultan he wrote:

How I wish I had brought you with us. It is more a journey for you than for us. The women, the cafés, the bridges, the lamps, the churches, the bakeries and the theatres. But it doesn’t matter. You are still young, and we will send you to Moscow some day.

We miss our little Ahmad Mozafar, our crown prince. Take good care of him. Feed him with your own milk. Hold him close to your body and talk to him in complete sentences. Don’t tell him any foolish stories and don’t sing him any common lullabies. Read to him from Hafez. Teach him French songs.

Until we meet again. We are coming soon.

To keep the women of the harem from getting jealous he wrote one letter to all of them:

Wives! The shah misses his harem. We were duty bound to make this journey or we wouldn’t have done it at all. The distances are great, the roads are impassable and danger is lurking at every turn. Thank God we didn’t bring you with us or it would have been a miserable expedition. We ask you to pray for us. We are coming home soon.

To his vizier he wrote:

The way the people live and work here is completely different from anything we are used to. I keep wondering whether such a life is suitable for our subjects. I am afraid that if we were to adopt all the manners of these people we would end up neglecting our own religion, traditions and customs.

When I come back we will discuss this at length. It has certainly been a useful journey. We have bought cannons and ordered rifles for the country, and we have signed many contracts.

We received a short note from Eyn ed-Dowleh. He writes to us in no uncertain terms that the presence of the shah is essential, which is why we believe it is unwise to stay away any longer. We have decided to cut the trip short. As far as we can judge, we have achieved our goal. The next time we make this journey it will be much longer.

Vizier Mostovi Almamalek suspected he knew what Eyn ed-Dowleh’s short note was all about. He had probably told the shah that although everything in the country seemed peaceful, his opponents were busily building up a solid network.

Eyn ed-Dowleh had also warned the vizier: ‘You must not think they are gone, or that they have changed their way of thinking. By no means. I have proof that they are preparing to seize power at a suitable moment.’

Mostovi Almamalek had hoped to be able to carry out some of his plans in the shah’s absence, but it proved almost impossible to get anything done without royal approval. Eyn ed-Dowleh was a hundred times worse than the shah. He was the ideal watchdog. He had summed up the vizier’s position in a single sentence: ‘You are not to come up with any new ideas until the shah is back!’

Eyn ed-Dowleh had put together a special military unit to arrest or eliminate opponents in Tehran. He wanted to complete the mission with which he had been charged before the shah returned, but that, as he was gradually learning, would be no easy task. He even believed that Mostovi Almamalek was maintaining contact with the opposition. Almamalek did speak occasionally with Jamal Khan and Amir Nezam, but he was planning nothing against the shah. His purpose in doing so was to win the young intellectuals over to his ideas.

When the vizier had taken office the shah had asked to be shown all legal documents and contracts so he could study them. But because of the sheer volume involved, and because the shah simply didn’t want to be bothered most of the time, the papers tended to accumulate on his desk. The vizier had little patience with what he called the shah’s lack of responsibility.

Later he would be confronted with the mountain of contracts that the shah had signed unilaterally with European companies and merchants.

The members of the resistance committee had long been convinced that the shah was the biggest obstacle to real change, so they worked steadily on. At the last meeting of the resistance committee in Tehran, the following men were present:

Jamal Khan

Mirza Reza Kermani

Prince Malkum Khan

Abdolrahim Talebof

Haj Zeinolabedin Maraghei

Sheikh Ahmad Ruhi

Mirza Muhammad Hassan Ashtiani

Sheikh Abolhasan

Mirza Soleyman Khan

Mirza Yahya Dolatabadi

Mirza Muhammad Alikhan

Sheikh Ahmad Gherkhani

Mirza Mohsen Sadolama

Mirza Soleyman Khad Dehkade

Mirza Isa Ghaemmagham

Amir Nezam

Abolghasem Lahuti

Mostashar Aldoleh

Most of them were involved in culture, literature, politics or science. Some of them lived in Tehran and the rest came from the other large cities. Their meeting was something like a small national congress at which they attempted to combine their forces.

Jamal Khan opened the meeting.

‘Welcome, friends! I consider myself fortunate to see you all here. The fact that we are able to come together this evening is undoubtedly a gift from God. A number of you have travelled a few days to get here, and some of you a week. Once again, welcome.

‘Each and every one of you is important for our homeland. Sometimes I worry that our dream will never be fulfilled, that we are doomed to endless misery. But at other moments I feel a glimmer of hope in my heart.

‘My friends, I recently went to the south of the country to see what the British are up to. It was not possible to set foot in their territory, but I posed as an interpreter for one of the local officials. What is taking place there is a miracle. The British have erected new installations, machines, engines, appliances and pumps. They have built a long wall and have laid claim to everything, but that wall will not last long. Sooner or later they’ll have to work with our graduates and our workers. But right now, we ourselves are the biggest problem. What we need are laws, set down in a statute book. And the power of the shah must be drastically curtailed. We have a long way to go. But when I look at you now, I am looking at the future.

‘My friends, when the murdered vizier was still alive he translated the French constitution bit by bit and made a specially adapted version for our own country. I have been able to get hold of the complete text and have had a number of copies printed. It gives me great pleasure to give everyone here a copy as a never-to-be-forgotten gift. Let us study it and make any necessary corrections. This is a dream that will become reality.

‘My friends, I thank you for your attendance.’

Mirza Reza left the room and came back carrying a heavy wooden box. He opened the box and handed everyone the first edition of the provisional Persian statute book. Everyone cheered and clapped enthusiastically.

Jamal Khan had set aside one book to take to the house of Ayatollah Tabatabai. He was the cleric who had served as an envoy of the aged Ayatollah Shirazi and had gone with a group of merchants from the bazaar to speak with the shah. After that meeting he had become one of the most important political figures in the land.

The aged ayatollah of Shiraz had retreated completely from public life after the victory of his tobacco fatwa. He wanted to spend his last days in peace and in prayer. All eyes were now on Ayatollah Tabatabai. He had a good relationship with Jamal Khan and had let him know that he could always be counted on. On the evening of the meeting Jamal Khan handed the statute book to Ayatollah Tabatabai.

Someone had also slipped a copy to Eyn ed-Dowleh. Seated among the cushions he thumbed through the book, boiling with rage. The man who had brought him the book had also reported on the meeting of the group. One of its members had probably spilled the beans.

The next day Eyn ed-Dowleh went to the office of the Mostakhberat, the secret service, to discuss recent developments.

‘Twenty-five copies of this book have been printed,’ said the head of the secret service.

‘Where did they have the printing done?’ asked Eyn ed-Dowleh.

‘They were printed in Bombay and smuggled into the country via Herat.’

Eyn ed-Dowleh had a feeling that this was the work of Jamal Khan. Jamal Khan was often cited as the brains behind all the unrest in the country. But the name of Mirza Reza, the son of the late Ayatollah Kermani, was also being heard with greater frequency.

There had been nothing personal about Mirza Reza in the report, so Eyn ed-Dowleh was unable to form a clear picture of the man. He had never seen Jamal Khan either, but he had a fairly good idea what he looked like: a man with a drooping moustache who wore a black cap and a black coat.

‘A copy of that statute book is lying next to the Quran on the mantelpiece in the living room of Ayatollah Tabatabai,’ the head of the Mostakhberat told Eyn ed-Dowleh.

Eyn ed-Dowleh drank his tea in silence.

‘The ayatollah has made notes on almost every page,’ the man continued. ‘This is the latest news, but we also have an unconfirmed report about their statute book. Each one of them was given a copy to take home. They were told to study the text and to come back with the notes they had taken. The ayatollah’s copy is proof. We know for sure they’re going to meet again, but we don’t know exactly when.’

Eyn ed-Dowleh put his tea glass down. This statute book was making the problem more complicated than he and the shah had imagined. That evening he sent a short letter to the shah suggesting that it might be wise for the shah not to extend his journey any longer than was absolutely necessary.

About three months later the members of the committee got together again to talk about the statute book. The head of the Mostakhberat had been informed that the meeting would take place in Tehran, but he was unable to find out the day or the location.

Eyn ed-Dowleh applied pressure. ‘These facts are useless. I need concrete information. I want them all behind bars before the shah comes home. I want to show them off to the shah. Think of something. Do something. Give me an address. If we don’t arrest them now they’ll just grow and grow and we won’t be able to stop them. Give me something specific and I’ll close all the gates and search all the houses one by one until I get them. I want that Jamal Khan! Pick a day and I’ll chain him to the wall with iron shackles round his neck before the shah arrives. I’ll smash his face with his own statute book. And the same goes for Mirza Reza.’

The head of the Mostakhberat sent a number of spies to the local inns and stationed his men at the city gates to spot any strangers entering the city and follow them. From all the information they received they concluded that the members of the committee would be gathering within a few days. Eyn ed-Dowleh immediately barred all the gates of Tehran and sent troopers to the inns outside the city. He ordered them to arrest every traveller with a book or even just a piece of paper in his luggage and to put him in chains. The troopers rode as far as the city of Qazvin. They stopped at every caravanserai and arrested anyone who looked suspicious. They found not a single book, but they brought a long row of men into the city in chains. Eyn ed-Dowleh interrogated them one by one and had them locked up.

‘If Jamal Khan’s men aren’t outside the city, they must be inside,’ reasoned Eyn ed-Dowleh.

His troopers swept into all the guesthouses unannounced and locked up all the travellers until Eyn ed-Dowleh could question them personally. But they found no suspicious travellers. Everyone had a good reason for staying in Tehran.

On the third day Eyn ed-Dowleh was given a tip concerning the presence of several strangers staying in the imam boarding school behind the Jameh mosque. Accompanied by his troopers Eyn ed-Dowleh entered the building and forced the doors of all the rooms. In one of the rooms was a man who pushed Eyn ed-Dowleh over and jumped out the window into the garden. It was Jamal Khan. He ran to the gate, but Eyn ed-Dowleh stood up and began shooting at the fleeing man. Jamal Khan stumbled and disappeared into the bushes.

‘He’s wounded. Get him!’ shouted Eyn ed-Dowleh, who still didn’t know who the escaped man was.

Three armed officers ran to the place where Jamal Khan had fallen and began shooting blindly in every direction. Just then, from out of the darkness, shots were fired at the officers. They dived to the ground and shot back. Their attacker was Mirza Reza. He was in another room in the building and had opened fire on them, shooting until all the other members of the committee had escaped through the windows and across the roofs.

Eyn ed-Dowleh crept to the room from which he had heard the shots. He kicked the door in and emptied his pistol. Mirza Reza got away just in time. He jumped into the courtyard and hid behind a couple of trees. A few of the officers saw where Mirza Reza had taken cover. Suspecting he had run out of ammunition they ran after him in order to arrest him. One of them struck him hard with his gun and the other two pushed him to the ground.

Jamal Khan managed to escape, but the agents had arrested several members of the group. Eyn ed-Dowleh led Mirza Reza away in chains and had him locked up.