Whirlwind

“Yes, but in the morning, Tom, nothing we can do now.”

“But I was going to go back to Zagros - I should have left today.” “I know. Stay tomorrow, go the next day. Nogger can do the charter, if the clearance conies through, which I doubt. Come around ten.” McIver saw the youths begin to walk toward them. “Around ten, Tom,” he said hurriedly, let in the clutch, and drove off cursing.

The youths saw them go and their leader, Ibrahim, was glad, for he did not want to clash with foreigners or to kill them - or to bring them to trial. Only SAVAK. And guilty police. And enemies of Iran, inside Iran, who wanted to bring back the Shah. And all traitorous Marxist totalitarians who opposed democracy and freedom of worship and the freedom of education and universities.

“Oh, how I’d like that car,” one of them said, almost sick with envy. “It was a sixty-eight, wasn’t it, Ibrahim?”

“A sixty-five,” Ibrahim answered. “One day you’ll have one, Ali, and the gasoline to put in it. One day you’ll be the most famous writer and poet in all Iran.”

“Disgusting of that foreigner to flaunt so much wealth when there’s so much poverty in Iran,” another said.

“Soon they’ll all be gone. Forever.”

“Do you think those two will come back tomorrow, Ibrahim?” “I hope not,” he said with a tired laugh, “If they do I don’t know what we’ll do. I think we scared them enough. Even so, we should visit this block at least twice a day.”

A young man holding a club put his arm around him affectionately. “I’m glad we voted you leader. You were our perfect choice.”

They all agreed. Ibrahim Kyabi was very proud, and proud to be part of the revolution that would end all of Iran’s troubles. And proud too of his father who was an oil engineer and important official in IranOil who had patiently worked over the years for democracy in Iran, opposing the Shah, who now would surely be a powerful voice in the new and glorious Iran. “Come along, friends,” he said contentedly. “We’ve several more buildings to investigate.”

Chapter 12

AT SIRI ISLAND: 7:42 P.M. A little over seven hundred miles southwest from Tehran, the loading of the 50,000-ton Japanese tanker, the Rikomaru, was almost complete. A good moon lit up the Gulf, the night was balmy with many stars above and Scragger had agreed to join de Plessey and go aboard for dinner with Yoshi Kasigi. Now the three of them were on the bridge with the captain, the deck floodlit, watching the Japanese deckhands and the chief engineer near the big intake pipe that led overboard to the complex of valves on the permanently anchored, floating oil-loading barge that was alongside and also floodlit.

They were about two hundred yards off the lowlying Siri island, the tanker anchored securely with her two bow chains fixed to buoys ahead and two anchors aft from the stern. Oil was pumped from the shore storage tanks through a pipe laid on the seabed up to the barge, thence aboard through their own pipe system into their tanks. Loading and unloading were dangerous operations because volatile, highly explosive gases built up in the tanks in the space over the crude - emptied tanks being even more dangerous until they were washed out. In the most modern tankers, for increased safety, nitrogen - an inert gas - was pumped into the space built up in the tanks, to be expelled at leisure. The Rikomaru was not so equipped. They heard the chief engineer shout down to the men on the barge, “Close the valve,” then turn to the bridge and give a thumbs-up that the captain acknowledged and said to Kasigi in Japanese, “Permission to sail as soon as we can?” He was a thin, taut-faced man in starched white shirt and shorts, with white socks and shoes, epaulets, and a naval style, peaked cap. “Yes, Captain Moriyama. How long will that be?”

“Two hours at the most - to clean up and to cat the moorings.” This meant sending out their motorboat to unshackle their bow anchor chains that were bolted to the permanent buoys, then reattach them to the ship’s anchors. “Good.” To de Plessey and Scragger, Kasigi said in English, “We’re full now and ready to leave. About two hours and we’ll be on our way.” “Excellent,” de Plessey said, equally relieved. “Now we relax.” The whole operation had gone very well. Security had been tightened throughout the island and throughout the ship. Everything that could be checked was checked. Only three essential Iranians had been allowed aboard. Each had been searched and were being carefully monitored by a Japanese crewman. There had been no signs of any hostiles among any of the other Iranians ashore. Every likely place had been searched that could hide explosives or arms. “Perhaps that poor young man off Siri One was mistaken, Scrag, mon ami.”

“Perhaps,” Scragger replied. “Even so, cobber, I think young Abdollah Turik was murdered - no one gets face and eye mutilation like that from falling off a rig in a calm sea. Poor young bugger.”

“But the sharks, Captain Scragger,” Kasigi said, equally disquieted, “the sharks could have caused those wounds.”

“Yes, they could. But I’ll bet my life it was because of wot he told me.” “I hope you’re wrong.”

“I’ll bet we’ll never know the truth,” Scragger said sadly. “Wot was your word, Mr. Kasigi? Karma. That poor young bugger’s karma was short and not sweet.”

The others nodded. In silence they watched the ship being detached from the barge’s umbilical cord.

To see better, Scragger went to the side of the bridge. Under more floodlights oilmen were laboriously unscrewing the twelve-inch pipe from the barge’s complex of valves. Six men were mere. Two Japanese crew, three Iranians, and a French engineer.

Ahead of him was the expanse and length of the flat deck. In the middle of the deck was his 206. He had landed there at de Plessey’s suggestion and with Kasigi’s permission. “Beaut,” Scragger had told the Frenchman; “I’ll fly you back to Siri, or Lengeh, just as you want.”

“Yoshi Kasigi suggests we both stay overnight, Scrag, and return in the morning. It’ll make a change for you. We can leave at dawn and return to Lengeh. Come aboard. I’d appreciate it.”

So he had landed on the tanker at sunset, not sure why he had accepted the invitation but he had made a pact with Kasigi and felt he should honor it. Too, he felt sickeningly responsible for young Abdollah Turik. The sight of the youth’s corpse had rocked him badly and made him want to be at Siri until the tanker left. So he had arrived and had tried to be a good guest, halfheartedly agreeing with de Plessey that perhaps, after all, the youth’s death was just a coincidence and that their security precautions would stop any sabotage attempt.

Since the loading had begun the day before, they had all been edgy. Tonight more so. The BBC news had again been very bad with reports of greatly increased confrontations in Tehran, Meshed, and Qom. Added to this was McIver’s report that Ayre had carefully relayed from Kowiss in French - news of the continuing investiture of Tehran’s International Airport, of the possible coup and about Kyabi. Kyabi’s murder had also shocked de Plessey. And all of this, along with the floods of rumors and counterrumors among the Iranians had made the evening somber. Rumors of imminent U.S. military intervention, of imminent Soviet intervention, of assassination attempts on Khomeini, on Bazargan his chosen prime minister, on Bakhtiar the legal prime minister, on the U.S. ambassador, rumors that the military coup d’état would happen in Tehran tonight, that Khomeini was arrested already, that all the armed services had capitulated and Khomeini was already de facto ruler of Iran and that General Nassiri, chief of SAVAK, had been captured, tried and shot.

“All the rumors can’t be true,” Kasigi had said for all of them. “There’s nothing we can do except wait.”

He had been a fine host. All the food was Japanese. Even the beer. Scragger had tried to hide his distaste for the hors d’oeuvre of sushi but he greatly enjoyed the barbecued chicken in a salty sweet sauce, the rice, and the deep-fried prawns and vegetables in batter. “Another beer, Captain Scragger?” Kasigi had offered.

“No, thanks. One’s all I allow myself though I’ll admit it’s good. Maybe not as good as Foster’s but close.”

De Plessey had smiled, “You don’t know what a compliment that is, Mr. Kasigi. For an Australian to say a beer’s ‘close to Foster’s’ is praise indeed.”

“Oh, yes, indeed I know, Mr. de Plessey. Down Under I prefer Foster’s.” “You spend a lot of time there?” Scragger had asked him.

“Oh, yes. Australia’s one of Japan’s main sources of all kinds of raw materials. My company has bulk cargo freighters for coal, iron ore, wheat, rice, soya bean,” Kasigi had said. “We import huge amounts of your rice though much of that goes into the manufacture of our national drink, sake. Have you tried sake, Captain?”

“Yes, yes I did once. But warm wine… sake’s not to my taste.” “I agree,” de Plessey said, then added hurriedly, “except in winter, like hot toddy. You were saying about Australia?”

“I enjoy the country very much. My eldest son goes to Sydney University too, so we visit him from time to time. It’s a wonderland - so vast, so rich, so empty.”

Yes, Scragger had thought grimly. You mean so empty and just waiting to be filled up by your millions of worker ants? Thank the Lord we’re a few thousand miles away and the U.S.‘ll never allow us to be taken over. “Bollocks!” McIver had said to him once during a friendly argument, when he, McIver, and Pettikin were on a week’s leave two years ago in Singapore. “If some time in the future Japan picked the right time, say when the U.S. was having at Russia, the States wouldn’t be able to do a thing to help Australia. I think they’d make a deal an - ”

“Dirty Duncan’s lost his marbles, Charlie,” Scragger had said. “You’re right,” Pettikin had agreed. “He’s just needling you, Scrag.” “Oh, no, I’m not. Your real protector’s China. Come hell or strawberries, China’s always going to be there. And only China will always be in a position to stop Japan if ever Japan got militant and strong enough to move south. My God, Australia’s the great prize in the whole Pacific, the treasure chest of the Pacific, The others nodded. In silence they watched the ship being detached from the barge’s umbilical cord.

To see better, Scragger went to the side of the bridge. Under more floodlights oilmen were laboriously unscrewing the twelve-inch pipe from the barge’s complex of valves. Six men were mere. Two Japanese crew, three Iranians, and a French engineer.

Ahead of him was the expanse and length of the flat deck. In the middle of the deck was his 206. He had landed there at de Plessey’s suggestion and with Kasigi’s permission. “Beaut,” Scragger had told the Frenchman; “I’ll fly you back to Siri, or Lengeh, just as you want.”

“Yoshi Kasigi suggests we both stay overnight, Scrag, and return in the morning. It’ll make a change for you. We can leave at dawn and return to Lengeh. Come aboard. I’d appreciate it.”

So he had landed on the tanker at sunset, not sure why he had accepted the invitation but he had made a pact with Kasigi and felt he should honor it. Too, he felt sickeningly responsible for young Abdollah Turik. The sight of the youth’s corpse had rocked him badly and made him want to be at Siri until the tanker left. So he had arrived and had tried to be a good guest, halfheartedly agreeing with de Plessey that perhaps, after all, the youth’s death was just a coincidence and that their security precautions would stop any sabotage attempt.

Since the loading had begun the day before, they had all been edgy. Tonight more so. The BBC news had again been very bad with reports of greatly increased confrontations in Tehran, Meshed, and Qom. Added to this was McIver’s report that Ayre had carefully relayed from Kowiss in French - news of the continuing investiture of Tehran’s International Airport, of the possible coup and about Kyabi. Kyabi’s murder had also shocked de Plessey. And all of this, along with the floods of rumors and counterrumors among the Iranians had made the evening somber. Rumors of imminent U.S. military intervention, of imminent Soviet intervention, of assassination attempts on Khomeini, on Bazargan his chosen prime minister, on Bakhtiar the legal prime minister, on the U.S. ambassador, rumors that the military coup d’état would happen in Tehran tonight, that Khomeini was arrested already, that all the armed services had capitulated and Khomeini was already de facto ruler of Iran and that General Nassiri, chief of SAVAK, had been captured, tried and shot.

“All the rumors can’t be true,” Kasigi had said for all of them. “There’s nothing we can do except wait.”

He had been a fine host. All the food was Japanese. Even the beer. Scragger had tried to hide his distaste for the hors d’oeuvre of sushi but he greatly enjoyed the barbecued chicken in a salty sweet sauce, the rice, and the deep-fried prawns and vegetables in batter. “Another beer, Captain Scragger?” Kasigi had offered.

“No, thanks. One’s all I allow myself though I’ll admit it’s good. Maybe not as good as Foster’s but close.”

De Plessey had smiled, “You don’t know what a compliment that is, Mr. Kasigi. For an Australian to say a beer’s ‘close to Foster’s’ is praise indeed.”

“Oh, yes, indeed I know, Mr. de Plessey. Down Under I prefer Foster’s.” “You spend a lot of time there?” Scragger had asked him.

“Oh, yes. Australia’s one of Japan’s main sources of all kinds of raw materials. My company has bulk cargo freighters for coal, iron ore, wheat, rice, soya bean,” Kasigi had said. “We import huge amounts of your rice though much of that goes into the manufacture of our national drink, sake. Have you tried sake, Captain?”

“Yes, yes I did once. But warm wine… sake’s not to my taste.” “I agree,” de Plessey said, then added hurriedly, “except in winter, like hot toddy. You were saying about Australia?”

“I enjoy the country very much. My eldest son goes to Sydney University too, so we visit him from time to time. It’s a wonderland - so vast, so rich, so empty.”

Yes, Scragger had thought grimly. You mean so empty and just waiting to be filled up by your millions of worker ants? Thank the Lord we’re a few thousand miles away and the U.S.‘ll never allow us to be taken over. “Bollocks!” McIver had said to him once during a friendly argument, when he, McIver, and Pettikin were on a week’s leave two years ago in Singapore. “If some time in the future Japan picked the right time, say when the U.S. was having at Russia, the States wouldn’t be able to do a thing to help Australia. I think they’d make a deal an - ”

“Dirty Duncan’s lost his marbles, Charlie,” Scragger had said. “You’re right,” Pettikin had agreed. “He’s just needling you, Scrag.” “Oh, no, I’m not. Your real protector’s China. Come hell or strawberries, China’s always going to be there. And only China will always be in a position to stop Japan if ever Japan got militant and strong enough to move south. My God, Australia’s the great prize in the whole Pacific, the treasure chest of the Pacific, but none of you buggers down there care to plan ahead or use your loaf. All you bloody want’s three days’ holiday a week, with more pay for less bloody work, free bloody school, free medical, free welfare, and let some other bugger man the ramparts - you’re worse than poor old bloody England who’s got nothing! The real tr - ” “You’ve got North Sea oil. If that’s not the luck of the devil I do - ” “The real trouble is you bloody twits Down Under don’t know your arse from a hole in the wall.”

“Sit down, Scrag!” Pettikin had said warningly. “You agreed no fighting. None. You try and thump Mac when he’s not smashed you’ll end up in the sewer. He may have high blood pressure but he’s still a black belt.” “Me thump Dirty Duncan? You must be joking, cobber. I don’t pick on old buggers….”

Scragger smiled to himself, remembering their bender to end all benders Singapore’s a good place, he thought, then turned his attention back to the ship, feeling better now, well fed and very glad that the loading was done. The night was grand. Far above him he saw the blinking navigation lights of an airplane heading westward and wondered briefly where its landfall was, what airline it was and how many passengers were aboard. His night vision was excellent and he could see that now the men on the barge had almost unscrewed the pipe. Once it had been winched aboard, the tanker could leave. At dawn the Rikomaru would be in the Strait of Hormuz and he would take off and fly home to Lengeh with de Plessey.

Then his sharp eyes saw some men running away from the semifloodlit pumping junction just ashore. His attention zeroed on them.

There was a small explosion, then a gush of flame as the oil caught fire. Everyone aboard watched aghast. The flames began to spread, and they heard shouting - Iranian and French - ashore. Men were running down from the barracks and storage tanks area. A sudden flicker of a machine gun in the darkness, the sharp ugly crackle following. Over the ship’s loudspeaker system came the captain’s voice in Japanese: “Action stations!” At once the men on the barge redoubled their efforts, petrified that somehow the fire might spread through the pipe to the barge and blow it up. The moment the nozzle fell away from the valve, the Iranians hastily jumped into their small motorboat and fled, their work completed. The French engineer and Japanese seamen ran up the gangplank as the tanker’s deck winch rattled into life, dragging the pipe aboard.

Belowdecks the crew had scurried to emergency positions, some to the engine room, some to the bridge, others to the main gangways. Momentarily the three Iranians monitoring the fuel flow in various parts of the ship were left alone. They rushed for the deck.

One of them, Saiid, pretended to stumble and fall near the main tank inlet. When he was sure he was not observed he hastily opened his trousers and brought out the small plastic explosive device that had been missed in the body search when he had come aboard. It had been taped to the inside of a thigh, high up between his legs. Hastily he activated the chemical detonator that would explode in about one hour, stuck the device behind the main valve, and ran for the gangway. When he came on deck he was appalled to find that the men on the barge had not waited and that now the motorboat was almost ashore. The other two Iranians were chattering excitedly, equally enraged to be left aboard. Neither were members of his leftist cell. Onshore the oil spill was blazing out of control but the oil supply had been cut and the break isolated. Three men had been badly burned, one French and two Iranians. The mobile fire-fighting truck poured seawater into the flames, sucking it up from the Gulf. There was no wind and the choking black smoke made fire fighting even more difficult.

“Get some foam onto it,” Legrande, the French manager, shouted. Almost beside himself with rage, he tried to get order, but everyone was still milling about in the floodlights not knowing what to do. “Jacques, round up everyone and let’s count heads. Fast as you can.” Their full complement was seven French and thirty Iranians on the island. The security force of three men hurried off into the darkness, unarmed except for hastily made batons, not knowing what further sabotage to expect or from where. “M’sieur!” The Iranian medic was beckoning Legrande.

He went down toward the shore to the complex of pipes and valves that joined the tanks to the barge. The medic was kneeling beside two of the injured men who lay on a piece of canvas, unconscious and in shock. One of them had had his hair completely singed off and most of his face severely burned; the other had been sprayed with oil in the initial explosion that had instantly conflagrated his clothes, causing first-degree burns over most of the front of his body.

“Madonna,” Legrande muttered and crossed himself, seeing the ugly charred skin, barely recognizing his Iranian foreman.

One of his French engineers sat hunched over and was moaning softly, his hands and arms burned. Mixed with his agony was a constant stream of expletives.

“I’ll get you to the hospital, fast as I can, Paul.”

“Find those fornicators and burn mem,” the engineer snarled, then went back into his pain.

“Of course,” Legrande said helplessly, then to the medic, “Do what you can, I’ll call for a CASEVAC.” He hurried away from the shore for the radio room that was in one of the barracks, his eyes adjusting to the darkness. Then he noticed two men on the far side of the tiny airstrip, running up the track on the slight bluff. Over that bluff was a cove with a small wharf used for sailing and swimming. I’ll bet the bastards have a boat there, he thought at once. Then, almost berserk with rage, he shouted after them into the night, “Bastardsssss!”

When the first explosion had occurred de Plessey had rushed for the ship-to- shore radio that was on the bridge. “Have you found that machine gun yet?” he asked the base submanager in French. Behind him, Scragger, Kasigi, and the captain were equally grim. Lights on the bridge were dimmed. Outside, the moon was high and strong.

“No, m’sieur. After the first burst, the attackers vanished.” “What about the damage to the pumping system?”

“I don’t know. I’m waiting for a… ah, just a moment, here’s M’sieur Legrande.” After a moment again in French: “This’s Legrande. Three burned, two Iranians very badly, the other’s Paul Beaulieu, hands and arms - call for a CASEVAC at once. I saw a couple of men heading for the cove - probably the saboteurs, and they’ve probably a boat there. I’m assembling everyone so we can see who’s missing.”

“Yes, at once. What about the damage?”

“Not major. With luck we’ll have that fixed in a week - certainly by the time the next tanker arrives.”

“I’ll come ashore as soon as I can. Wait a moment!” De Plessey looked at the others and told them what Legrande had said.

Scragger said at once, “I’ll take the CASEVAC, no need to call for one.” Kasigi said, “Bring the injured aboard - we’ve a surgery and a doctor. He’s very skilled, particularly with burns.”

“Good on you!” Scragger rushed off.

Into the mike de Plessey said, “We’ll deal with the CASEVAC from here. Get the men onto stretchers. Captain Scragger will bring them aboard at once. There’s a doctor here.”

A young Japanese deck officer came and spoke briefly to the captain who shook his head and replied curtly, then explained in English to de Plessey: “The three Iranians who were left aboard when the others on the barge fled want to be taken ashore at once. I said they could wait.” Then he called down to the engine room preparing to make way.

Kasigi was staring at the island. And at the tanks there. I need that oil, he thought, and I need the island safe. But it’s not safe and nothing I can do to make it safe.

“I’m going ashore,” de Plessey said and left.

Scragger was already at the 206, unhooking the rear doors. “What’re you doing, Scrag?” de Plessey said, hurrying up to him. “I can lay the stretcher on the backseat and lash it safe. Quicker than rigging an outside carry sling.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Hop in!” They glanced around at the noise behind them. The three Iranians had run over and were jabbering at him. It was clear they wanted to go ashore in the helicopter. “Shall we take them, Scrag?”

Scragger was already in the pilot’s seat, his fingers dancing over the switches. “No. You’re an emergency, they’re not. Get in, old sport.” He pointed at the right seat then waved the Iranians away. “Nah, ajaleh daram” - No, I’m in a hurry - he said, using one of the few expressions in Farsi he knew. Two of them backed off obediently. The third, Saiid, slid into the backseat and started to buckle up. Scragger shook his head, motioning him to get out. The man took no notice and spoke rapidly and forced a smile and pointed at the shore.

Impatiently Scragger motioned him out, one finger pressing the Engine Start button switch. The whine began instantly. Again the man refused and, angry now, pointed at the shore, his voice drowned by the cranking engine. For a moment Scragger thought, Okay, why not? Then he noticed the sweat dripping off the man’s face, his sweat-soaked overalls, and seemed to smell his fear. “Out!” he said, studying him very carefully.

Saiid paid no attention to him. Above them the blade was turning slowly, gaining speed.

“Let him stay,” de Plessey called out over. “We’d better hurry.” Abruptly Scragger aborted the engine start, and with very great strength for such a small man, had Saiid’s belt unbuckled and the man out on the deck, half unconscious, before anyone knew what was happening. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted up at the bridge. “Hey there, aloft! Kasigi! This joker’s too bloody anxious to go ashore - wasn’t he belowdecks?” Without waiting for an answer, he jumped back into the cockpit and jabbed Engine Start.

De Plessey watched him silently. “What did you see in that man?” Scragger shrugged. Long before the engine came to full power, seamen had grabbed the man and the other two and were herding them up to the bridge. The 206 went like an arrow for the shore. The two injured men were already on stretchers. Rapidly a spare stretcher was lashed in place across the backseat and the first stretcher lashed to this. Scragger helped the injured Frenchman, arms and hands bandaged, into the front seat alongside him, and trying to close his nostrils to the stench, eased her airborne and flew back, landing like gossamer. Medics and the doctor were waiting, plasma ready, morphine hypodermic ready.

In seconds Scragger darted shoreward again. In more seconds the last stretcher was in place and he was away, again to land delicately. Once more the doctor was waiting, needle ready, and again he ducked down and ran for the stretcher under the whirling blades. This time he did not use the needle. “Ah so sorry,” he said in halting English. “This man dead.” Then, keeping his head low, he scurried for his surgery. Medics took the body away.

When Scragger had shut down and had everything locked and safe, he went to the side of the ship and was violently sick. Ever since he had seen and heard and smelled a pilot in a crashed, burning biplane, years upon years ago, it had been an abiding horror of his to be caught in the same way. He had never been able to stomach the smell of burned human hair and skin. After a while he wiped his mouth, breathing the good air, and blessed his luck. Three times he had been shot down, twice in flames, but each time he had got out safely. Four times he had had to autorotate to save himself and his passengers, twice over jungle and into the trees, once with an engine on fire. “But my name wasn’t on the list,” he muttered. “Not those times.” Footsteps were approaching. He turned to see Kasigi walking across the deck, an ice-cold bottle of Kirin beer in each hand.

“Please excuse me, but here,” Kasigi said gravely, offering the beer. “Burns do the same for me. I was sick too. I… I went down to the surgery to see how the injured were and… I was very sick.” Scragger drank gratefully. The cool, hop-flavored liquid, bubbles tingling as he swallowed, rebirthed him. “Christ Jesus that was good. Thanks, cobber.” And having said it once it became easier to say it the second time. “Thanks, cobber.” Kasigi heard it both times and considered it a major victory. Both of them looked at the seaman hurrying up to them with a teleprinter message in his hand. He gave it to Kasigi who went to the nearest light, put on his glasses, and peered at it. Scragger heard him suck in his breath and saw him become even more ashen.

“Bad news?”

After a pause Kasigi said, “No - just, just problems.”

“Anything I can do?”

Kasigi did not answer him. Scragger waited. He could see the turmoil written in the man’s eyes though not his face, and he was sure Kasigi was trying to decide whether to tell him. Then Kasigi said, “I don’t think so. It’s… it’s about our petrochemical plant at Bandar Delam.”

“The one Japan’s building?” Along with most everyone else in the Gulf, Scragger knew about the enormous $3.5 billion endeavor that, when completed, would easily be the biggest petrochemical complex in Asia Minor and the Middle East, with a 300,000-ton ethylene plant as its heart. It had been building since ‘71 and was almost finished, 85 percent complete. “That’s some plant!”

“Yes. But it’s being built by Japanese private industry, not by the Japanese government,” Kasigi said. “The Iran-Toda plant’s privately financed.” “Ah,” Scragger said, the connection falling into place. “Toda Shipping - Iran-Toda! You’re the same company?”

“Yes, but we’re only part of the Japanese syndicate that put up the money and technical advice for the Shah… for Iran,” Kasigi corrected himself. All gods great and small curse this land, curse everyone in it, curse the Shah for creating all the oil crises, curse OPEC, curse all the misbegotten fanatics and liars who live here. He glanced at the message again and was pleased to see his fingers were not shaking. It was in private code from his chairman, Hiro Toda.

It read: “URGENT. Due to absolute and continuous Iranian intransigence, I have finally had to order all construction at Bandar Delam to cease. Present cost overruns total $500 million and would probably go to 1 billion before we could begin production.

Present interest payments are $495,000 daily. Due to infamous secret pressure by ‘Broken Sword,’ our Contingency Plan 4 has been rejected. Go to Bandar Delam urgently and give me a personal report. Chief Engineer Director Watanabe is expecting you. Please acknowledge.”

It’s impossible to get there, Kasigi thought crestfallen. And if Plan 4 is rejected, we’re ruined.

Contingency Plan 4 called for Hiro Toda to approach the Japanese government for low-interest loans to take up the shortfall, and at the same time, discreetly, to petition the prime minister to declare the Iran-Toda complex at Bandar Delam a “National Project.” “National Project” meant that the government formally accepted the vital nature of the endeavor and would see it through to completion. “Broken Sword” was their code name for Hiro Toda’s personal enemy and chief rival, Hideyoshi Ishida, who headed the enormously powerful group of trading companies under the general name of Mitsuwari. All gods curse that jealous, lying son of vermin, Ishida, Kasigi was thinking, as he said, “My company is only one of many in the Syndicate.” “I flew over your plant once,” Scragger said, “going from our base to Abadan. I was on a ferry, ferrying a 212. You’ve trouble there?” “Some temporary…” Kasigi stopped and stared at him. Pieces of a plan fell into place. “Some temporary problems… important but temporary. As you know we’ve had more than our fair share of problems since the beginning, none of them our fault.” First there was February ‘71 when twenty-three oil producers signed the OPEC price agreement, formed their cartel, and doubled the price to $2.16… then the Yom Kippur War of ‘73 when OPEC cut shipments to the United States and raised the price to $5.12. Then the catastrophe of ‘74 when OPEC shipments were resumed but again at over double the price, $10.95, and the world recession began. “Why the U.S. allowed OPEC to wreck the economy of the world when they alone had the power to smash it, we’ll never know. Baka! And now we’re all in a perpetual pawn to OPEC, now our major supplier Iran is in revolution, oil’s almost $20 a barrel and we have to pay it, have to.” He bunched his fist to smash it on the gunnel, then unclenched, disgusted with his lack of control. “As to Iran-Toda,” he said, forcing outward calm, “like everyone else we found Iranians very… very difficult to deal with in recent years.” He motioned at the message. “My chairman asked me to go to Bandar Delam.”

Scragger whistled. “That’s going to be dicey - difficult.” “Yes.”

“Is it important?”

“Yes. Yes, it is.” Kasigi left that hanging in the air, sure that Scragger would suggest the solution. Ashore the oil-soaked earth around the sabotaged valve complex still burned brightly. The fire truck was spreading foam now. They could see de Plessey nearby, talking to Legrande.

Scragger said, “Listen, old sport, you’re an important client of de Plessey, eh? He could fix a charter for you. We’ve a spare 206. If he agreed, all our aircraft are contracted to IranOil but to him in truth, perhaps we could get permission from air traffic control to fly you up the coast - or if you could clear Immigration and Customs at Lengeh, maybe we could nip you across the Gulf to Dubai or Al Shargaz. From there perhaps you could get a flight into Abadan or Bandar Delam. Whichever, old sport, he could let us get you started.”

“Do you think he would?”

“Why not? You’re important to him.”

Kasigi was thinking, Of course we’re very important to him and he knows it. But I’ll never forget that iniquitous $2-a-barrel premium. “Sorry? What did you say?”

“I said, wot made you start the project anyway? It’s a long way from home and had to be nothing but trouble. Wot started you?”

“A dream.” Kasigi would like to have lit a cigarette but smoking was only allowed in certain fireproofed areas. “Eleven years ago, in ‘68, a man called Banjiro Kayama, a senior engineer working for my company and kinsman of our president, Hiro Toda, was driving through the oil fields around Abadan. It was his first visit to Iran and everywhere he went he saw jets of natural gas being flared off. He had a sudden thought: why can’t we turn that wasted gas into petrochemicals? We’ve the technology and the expertise and a long-range-planning attitude. Japanese skill and money married to Iranian raw materials that presently are totally wasted! A brilliant idea - unique and another first! The feasibility planning took three years, quite long enough, though jealous rivals claimed we went too quickly, at the same time they tried to steal our ideas and tried to poison others against us. But the Toda plan correctly went forward and the $3.5 billion raised. Of course, we’re only a part of the Gyokotomo-Mitsuwari-Toda Syndicate, but Toda ships will carry Japan’s share of the products that our industries desperately need.” If ever we can finish the complex, he thought disgustedly.

“And now the dream’s a nightmare?” Scragger asked. “Didn’t I hear… wasn’t it reported that the project was running out of money?”

“Enemies spread all sorts of rumors.” Under the ever-present drone of the ship’s generators, his ears heard the beginning of a scream that he had been expecting - surprised it had been so long arriving. “When de Plessey comes back aboard, will you help me?”

“Glad to. He’s the man who c - ” Scragger stopped. Again the thin edge of the scream. “Burns must be terrible painful.”

Kasigi nodded.

Another gush of flame took their attention to the shore. They watched the men there. Now the fire was almost under control. Another scream. Kasigi dismissed it, his mind on Bandar Delam and the teleprinter reply he should make at once to Hiro Toda. If anyone can solve our problem it’s Hiro Toda. He has to solve it - if he doesn’t, I’m ruined, his failure becomes mine. “Kasigi-san!” It was the captain calling from the bridge. “Hai?”

Scragger listened to the stream of Japanese from the captain, the sound of the Japanese not pleasing to his ears.

Kasigi gasped. “Domo,” he shouted back, then, urgently to Scragger all else forgotten, “Come on!” He led the rush to the gangway. “The Iranian - you remember, the one you threw out of the chopper? He’s a saboteur and he’s planted an explosive device below.”

Scragger followed Kasigi through the hatchway, down the gangway two steps a time, rushed along the corridor, and down another deck and another and then he remembered the screams. I thought they came from the bridge and not from below! he told himself. Wot did they do to him?

They caught up with the captain and his chief engineer. Two angry seamen half shoved, half dragged the petrified Saiid ahead of them. Tears ran down his face and he was jabbering incoherently, one hand holding his pants up. He stopped, trembling and moaning, and pointed at the valve. The captain squatted on his haunches. Very carefully he reached behind the huge valve. Then he stood up. The plastic explosive just covered his hand. The timing device was chemical, a vial embedded in it and taped strongly in place. “Turn it off,” he said angrily in hesitant Farsi and held it out to the man who backed off, jabbering and screaming, “You can’t turn it off. It’s overdue to explode … don’t you understand!”

The captain froze. “He says it’s overdue!”

Before he could move, one of the seamen grabbed it out of his hand and half dragging Saiid with him, half smashing him ahead, rushed for the gangway - there were no portholes on this deck but there were on the next. The nearest porthole was in a comer of the corridor, clamped shut by two heavy metal wing nuts. He almost flung Saiid at it, shouting at him to open it. With his free hand he began unscrewing one of them. The swing bolt fell away, then Saiid’s. The seaman swung the port open. At that second the device exploded and blew both his hands off and most of his face and tore Saiid’s head apart and splattered the far bulkhead with blood.

The others charging up from below were almost blown backward down the gangway. Then Kasigi went forward and knelt beside the bodies. Numbly he shook his head.

The captain broke the silence. “Karma,” he muttered.

Chapter 13

AT TEHRAN: 8:33 P.M. After Tom Lochart had left McIver near their office he had driven home - a few diversions, some angry police but nothing untoward. Home was a fine penthouse apartment in a modern six-story building, in the best residential area - a wedding present from his father-in-law. Sharazad was waiting for him. She threw her arms around him, kissed him passionately, begged him to sit in front of the fire and take his shoes off, rushed to fetch some wine that was iced exactly as he liked, brought him a snack, told him that dinner would be ready soon, ran into the kitchen and in her lilting, liquid voice, urged their maid and the cook to hurry for the Master was home and hungry, then came back and sat at his feet - the floor beautifully and heavily carpeted - her arms around his knees, adoring him. “Oh, I’m so happy to see you, Tommy, I’ve missed you so much,” her English lovely. “Oh, I’ve had such an interesting time today and yesterday.” She wore light silk Persian trousers and a long loose blouse and was, for him, achingly beautiful. And desirable. Her twenty-third birthday was in a few days. He was forty-two. They had been married almost a year and he had been spellbound from the first moment he had seen her.

That had been a little over three years before, at a dinner party in Tehran that was given by General Valik. It was early September then, just at the end of English school summer vacations, and Deirdre, his wife, was in England with their daughter, holidaying and partying, and only that morning he had had another irate letter from her, insisting he write to Gavallan for an immediate transfer: “I hate Iran, don’t want to live there anymore, England’s all I want, all that Monica wants. Why don’t you think of us for a change instead of your damned flying and damned company? All my family’s here, all my friends are here, and all Monica’s friends are here. I’m fed up with living abroad and want my own house, somewhere near London, with a garden, or even in town - there are some super bargains going in Putney and Clapham Common. I’m totally fed up with foreigners and foreign postings, and absolutely chocker with Iranian food, the filth, the heat, the cold, their foul-sounding language, their foul loos and squatting like an animal, and foul habits, manners - everything. It’s time we sorted out things while I’m still young …”

“Excellency?”

The smiling, starched waiter had deferentially offered him a tray of drinks, soft drinks mostly. Many middle-and upper-class Muslims drank in the privacy of their homes, a few in public - liquor and wine of all sorts being on sale in Tehran, and also in bars in all modern hotels. There were no restrictions on foreigners drinking openly or privately, unlike in Saudi Arabia - and some of the Emirates - where anyone caught, anyone, was subject to Koranic punishment of the lash.

“Mamoonan,” thank you, he said politely and accepted a glass of the white Persian wine that had been sought after for almost three millennia, hardly noticing the waiter or the other guests, unable to shake off his depression and irritated that he agreed to join this party tonight, substituting for McIver who had had to go to their HQ base at Al Shargaz, the other side of the Gulf. “But, Tom, you can talk Farsi,” McIver had said airily, “and someone’s got to go…” Yes, he thought, but Mac could just as easily have asked Charlie Pettikin.

It was almost nine o’clock, still before dinner, and he had been standing near one of the open doorways that led to the gardens, looking out at the candlelights and at the lawns that were spread with fine rugs on which guests were sitting and reclining, others standing in groups under trees or near the little pond. The night was star-filled and kind, the house rich and spacious - in the district of Shemiran at the foot of the Elburz Mountains - and the party like most of the others that, because he could speak Farsi, he was usually welcomed to. All the Iranians were very well-dressed, there was much laughter and much jewelry, tables piled with an abundance of food, both European and Iranian, hot and cold, the conversation about the latest play in London or New York or “Are you going to St. Moritz for the skiing or Cannes for the season,” and about the price of oil and gossip about the Court and “His Imperial Majesty this or Her Imperial Majesty that,” all of it spiced with the politeness and flattery and extravagant compliment so necessary in all Iranian society - preserving a calm, polite, and gentle surface rarely penetrated by an outsider, let alone by a foreigner. At the time he was stationed at Galeg Morghi, a military airfield in Tehran, training Iranian Air Force pilots. In ten days he was due to leave for his new posting at Zagros, well aware that this tour with two weeks in Zagros, one week back in Tehran would further inflame his wife. This morning, in a fit of rage, he had answered her letter and sent it special delivery: “If you want to stay in England, stay in England but stop bitching and stop knocking what you don’t know. Get your suburban house wherever you want - but I’m not EVER going to live there. Never. I’ve a good job and it pays all right and I like it and that’s it. We’ve a good life if you’d open your eyes. You knew I was a pilot when we got married, knew it was the life I’d chosen, knew I wouldn’t live in England, knew it’s all I’m trained for so I can’t change now. Stop bitching or else. If you want to change so be it….”

The hell with it. I’ve had it. Christ, she says she hates Iran and everything about it but she knows nothing about Iran, has never been outside Tehran, won’t go, will never even try the food and just visits with those few Brit wives - always the same ones, the loud and bigoted minority, insular, equally bored and boring with their interminable bridge parties, interminable teas - “But, darling, how can you stand anything that’s not from Fortnums or Marks and Sparks” - who preen for an invitation to the British embassy for another stuffy roast beef and Yorkshire pudding dinner or tea party with cucumber sandwiches and seedcake, all of them totally convinced everything English is the best in the world, particularly English cooking: boiled carrots, boiled cauliflower, boiled potatoes, boiled Brussels sprouts, underdone roast beef or overdone lamb as the acme of goddamn perfection….

“Oh, poor Excellency, you don’t look happy at all,” she had said softly. He had looked around and his world was different.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, a tiny frown on her oval face. “Sorry,” he gasped, for a moment disoriented by her, his heart thumping and a tightness in his throat he had never experienced before. “I thought you were an apparition, something out of A Thousand and One Nights, a magical - ” He stopped with an effort, feeling like a fool. “Sorry, I was a million miles away. My name’s Lochart, Tom Lochart.”

“Yes, I know,” she said laughing. Tawny brown twinkling eyes. Her lips had a sheen to them, teeth very white, long wavy dark hair, and her skin was the color of Iranian earth, olive brown. She wore white silk and some perfume and she barely came up to his chin. “You’re the nasty training captain who gives my poor cousin Karim roastings at least three times a day.” “What?” Lochart found it difficult to concentrate. “Who?” “There.” She pointed across the room. The young man was in civilians, smiling at them, and Lochart had not recognized him as one of his students. Very handsome, dark curly hair, dark eyes, and well built. “My special cousin, Captain Karim Peshadi, of the Imperial Iranian Air Force.” She looked back at Lochart, long black lashes. And again his heart turned over. Get hold of yourself, for crissake! What the hell’s wrong with you? “I, er, well, I try not to roast them unless, er, unless they deserve it - it’s only to save their lives.” He was trying to remember Captain Peshadi’s record but couldn’t and in desperation switched to Farsi. “But, Highness, if you’ll give me the exquisite honor, if you’ll stay and talk to me and favor me by telling me your name I promise I will…” He groped for the right word, couldn’t find it and substituted, “I will be your slave forever and of course I will have to pass His Excellency your cousin one hundred percent before all others!”

She clapped her hands delightedly, “Oh, revered Excellency,” she replied in Farsi, “His Excellency my cousin did not tell me you spoke our language! Oh how beautiful the words sound when you say them….”

Almost outside himself, Lochart listened to her extravagant compliments that were normal in Farsi and heard himself replying likewise - blessing Scragger who had told him so many years ago when he had joined Sheik Aviation, after he had left the RAF in ‘65: “If you want to fly with us, cobber, you’d better learn Farsi ‘cause I’m not about to!” For the first time realizing how perfect it was a language of love, of innuendo.

“My name is Sharazad Paknouri, Excellency.”

“Then Her Highness is from the Thousand and One Nights after all.”

“Ah, but I cannot tell you a story even if you swear you will cut off my head!” Then in English, with a laugh, “I was bottom of my class in stories.” “Impossible!” he said at once.

“Are you always so gallant, Captain Lochart?” Her eyes were teasing him. In Farsi he heard himself say, “Only to the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.”

Color came into her face. She dropped her eyes, and he thought, aghast, he had destroyed everything, but when she looked up at him again her eyes were smiling. “Thank you. You make an old married lady happ - ” His glass slipped out of his hand and he cursed and picked it up and apologized but no one had noticed except her. “You’re married?” burst out of him, for it hadn’t occurred to him, but of course she would be married and anyway he was married with a daughter of eight and what right did he have to get upset? For God’s sake you’re acting like a lunatic. You’ve gone mad. Then his ears and eyes focused. “What? What did you say?” he asked.

“Oh. I said that I was married - well, I still am for another three weeks and two days and that my married name is Paknouri. My family name is Bakravan …” She stopped a waiter and chose a glass of wine and gave it to him. Again the frown. “Are you sure you’re all right, Captain?” “Oh, yes, oh, yes,” he said quickly, “You were saying? Paknouri?” “Yes. His Highness, Emir Paknouri, was so old, fifty, a friend of my father, and Father and Mother thought it would be good for me to marry him and he consented though I’m skinny, not plump and desirable, however much I eat. As God wants.” She shrugged then beamed and the world seemed to light up for him. “Of course I agreed, but only on condition that if I didn’t like being married after two years then our marriage would cease. So on my seventeenth birthday we were married and I didn’t like it at once and cried and cried and then, as there were no children after two years, or the extra year I agreed to, my husband, my Master, gratefully agreed to divorce me and now he is thankfully ready to remarry and I am free but unfortunately so old an - ”

“You’re not old, you’re as youn - ”

“Oh, yes, old!” Her eyes were dancing and she pretended to be sad but he could see that she was not and he watched himself talking to her, laughing with her, then beckoning her cousin to join them, petrified that this was the real man of her choice, chatting with them, learning that her father was an important b’azaari, that her family was large and cosmopolitan and well connected, that her mother was sick, that she had sisters and brothers and had been to school in Switzerland but only for half a year because she missed Iran and her family so much. Then eating dinner with them, genial and happy, even with General Valik, and it was the best time he had ever had. When he had left that night he had not gone home but had taken the road up to Darband in the mountains where there were many caf6s in beautiful gardens on the banks of the stream with chairs and tables and sumptuously carpeted divans where you could rest or eat or sleep, some of them esplanaded out over the stream so the water chattered and gurgled below you. And he lay there, looking up at the stars, knowing that he was changed, knowing he’d gone mad but that he would scale any hurdle, endure any hardship, to marry her.

And he had - though the way had been cruel and many times he had cried out in despair.

“What are you thinking about, Tommy?” she asked now, sitting at his feet on the lovely carpet that had been a wedding gift from General Valik. “You,” he said, loving her, his cares banished by her tenderness. The living room was warm like all of the huge apartment, and delicately lit, the curtains drawn and many rugs and lounging cushions scattered around, the wood fire burning merrily. “But then I think about you all the time!” She clapped her hands. “That’s wonderful.” “I’m not going to Zagros tomorrow but the next day.” “Oh, that’s even more wonderful!” She hugged his knees and rested her head against them. “Wonderful!”

He caressed her hair. “You said you had an interesting day?” “Yes, yesterday and today. I’ve been to your embassy and got the passport, just as you told me to do, th - ” “Great. Now you’re Canadian.”

“No, Beloved, Iranian - you’re Canadian. Listen, the best part is that I went to Doshan Tappeh,” she said proudly.

“Christ,” he said, not meaning to, for she did not like to hear him blaspheme. “Sorry, but that’s - that was crazy, there’s fighting going on there, you’re crazy to put yourself in such danger.”

“Oh, I wasn’t in the fighting,” she told him gaily, and got up and rushed out saying, “I’ll show you.” In a moment she was back in the doorway. She had put on a gray chador that covered her from head to toe and most of her face, and he hated it. “Ah, Master,” she said in Farsi, pirouetting in front of him. “You have no need to fear over me. God watches over me, and the Prophet whose Name be praised.” She stopped, seeing his expression. “What’s the matter?” she asked in English.

“I - I’ve never seen you in chador. It’s - it doesn’t suit you.” “Oh, I know it’s ugly and I’d never wear it at home, but in the street I feel better wearing one, Tommy. All those awful stares from men. It’s time we all went back to wearing them - and the veil.”

He was shocked. “What about all the freedoms you’ve won, freedom to vote, to take off the veil, freedom to go where you please, marry whom you please, no longer the chattel that you used to be? If you agree to the chador, you’ll lose everything else.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not, Tommy.” She was glad that they were talking in English so she could argue a little, unthinkable with an Iranian husband. And so glad that she had chosen to marry this man who, unbelievably, allowed her an opinion, and even more astonishing, allowed her to express it openly to him. This wine of freedom is very heady, she thought, very difficult, very dangerous for a woman to drink - like nectar in the Garden of Paradise. “When Reza Shah took the veil from our faces,” she said, “he should also have taken the obsession from the minds of men. You don’t go to market, Tommy, or ride in a car, not as a woman. You’ve no idea what it’s like. Men on the streets, in the bazaar, in the bank, everywhere. They’re all the same. You can see the same thoughts, the same obsession, in all of them - thoughts about me which only you should have.” She took off the chador, put it neatly on a chair, and sat down at his feet again. “From today on I will wear it on the street, like my mother and hers before me, not because of Khomeini, God protect him, but for you, my beloved husband.” She kissed him lightly and sat at his knee and he knew it was decided. Unless he ordered her not to. But then there would be trouble in the home, for it was truly her right to decide this matter here. She was Iranian, his home Iranian, and always would be in Iran - that was part of his bargain with her father - so the trouble would be Iranian and the solution Iranian: days of vast sighs and soul-filled glances, a little tear, abject, slavelike service, judicious sobs in the night, more tortured sighs, never a word or look in anger and all murderous to a husband’s or father’s or brother’s peace.

Lochart found her so hard to understand sometimes. “Do as you want, but no more Doshan Tappeh,” he said, caressing her hair. It was fine and silky and shone as only youth can shine. “What happened there?”

Her face lit up. “Oh, it was so exciting. The Immortals - even them, the Shah’s crack troops - couldn’t dislodge the Faithful. Guns were going off everywhere. I was quite safe, my sister Laleh was with me, my cousin Ali and his wife. Cousin Karim was there - he’s declared for Islam and the revolution with several other officers and he told us where to meet him and how. There were about two hundred other ladies, all of us in chador, and we kept up our chanting, God is Great, God is Great, then some of the soldiers came over to us. Immortals!” Her eyes widened. “Imagine, even the Immortals are beginning to see the Truth!”

Lochart was appalled at the danger of her going there without asking or telling him, even though she was accompanied. Thus far the insurrection and Khomeini had seemingly passed her by, except initially when the real troubles began and she was petrified over the safety of her father and relations who were important merchants and bankers in the bazaar, and well known for their connections at Court. Thankfully her father had dispelled all their concerns when he had whispered to Lochart that he and his brothers were secretly supporting Khomeini and the revolt against the Shah and had been doing so for years. But now, he thought, now if the Immortals are cracking and top-echelon young officers like Karim are openly supporting the revolt the bloodshed will be enormous. “How many came over?” he asked, trying to decide what to do.

“Only three joined us, but Karim said it’s a good beginning and any day Bakhtiar and his scoundrels will flee like the Shah fled.” “Listen, Sharazad, today the British and Canadian governments ‘ve ordered all dependents out of Iran for a while. Mac’s sending everyone to Al Shargaz till things cool down.”

“That’s very wise, yes, that’s wise.”

“Tomorrow the 125‘11 be in. She’ll take Genny, Manuela, you, and Azadeh tomorrow so pack a b - ”

“Oh, I won’t leave, my darling, no need for me to leave. And Azadeh, why should she go either? There’s no danger for us - Father would certainly know if there was any danger. No need for you to worry…” She saw his wineglass was nearly empty so she jumped up and refilled it and came back again. “I’m quite safe.” “But I think you’d be safer out of Iran for a wh - ” “It’s wonderful of you to think of me, my darling, but there’s no reason for me to go and I’ll certainly ask Father tomorrow, or you can…” A small ember of wood fell without danger into the grate. He started to get up but she was already there. “I’ll do it. Rest, my darling, you must be tired. Perhaps you’d have time tomorrow to see Father with me.” Deftly she tidied the fire. Her chador was on a nearby chair. She saw him glance at it. The shadow of a smile washed over her. “What?”

For answer she just smiled again, picked it up, and ran gaily across the room and down the corridor to the kitchen.

Unsettled, Lochart stared at the fire, trying to marshal his arguments, not wanting to order her. But I will if I have to. My God, so many troubles: Charlie vanished, Kowiss in a mess, Kyabi murdered, and Sharazad in the middle of a riot! She’s crazy! Mad to take such a risk! If I lost her I’d die. God, whoever you are, wherever you are, protect her… This living room was large. At the far end was a dining-room table and chairs that could seat twelve. Most times, they would use the room in Iranian style, sitting on the floor, a tablecloth spread for the dishes, lounging against cushions. Rarely did they wear shoes and never high heels that could damage the deep carpets. There were five bedrooms, three bathrooms, two living rooms - this one they used generally or with company, the other, much smaller at the far end of the apartment was, as customary, for her to go to when he had business to discuss, or when her sister or girlfriends or relations were visiting so their chatter would not disturb him. Around Sharazad was always movement, always family nearby, children, nannies - except after sunset, though frequently relations or close friends were staying in the guest bedrooms.

He never minded, for they were a happy, gregarious family, in front of him. It was also part of his bargain with her father that he would patiently learn Iranian ways> patiently live Iranian ways for 197 three years and a day. Then he could choose to live outside Iran temporarily with Sharazad if he needed to: “Because by then,” her father, Jared Bakravan, had said kindly, “with the Help of the One God and the Prophet of God, may His words live forever, by then you will have enough knowledge to make the correct choice, for surely by then you will have sons and daughters, for though my daughter is thin, divorced, and still childless, I do not think she is barren.”

“But she’s still so young, we may decide it is too soon to have children.” “It is never too soon,” Bakravan had said sharply. “The Holy Books are quite clear. A woman needs children. A home needs children. Without children a woman will get into idle ways. That’s the most of my beloved Sharazad’s problem, no children. Some modern ways I approve of. Some I do not.” “But if we agree, she and I, that it is too soo - ” “Such a decision would not be her business!” Jared Bakravan had been shocked. He was a small, paunchy man with white hair and beard and hard eyes. “It would be monstrous, an insult, even to discuss it with her. You must think like an Iranian or this possible marriage will never last. Or even begin. Never. Ah, is it that you don’t want children?”

“Oh, no, of course I want children, but per - ” “Good, then it’s settled thus.”

“Then can it be settled thus: for three years and a day may I decide if it is too soon?”

“Such an idea is foolish. If you don’t want chil - ” “Oh, but of course I do, Excellency.”

At length the old man had said, reluctantly, “One year and a day only - but only if you swear by the One God that you truly want children, that this astonishing request is completely temporary! Your head is truly filled with nonsense, my son. With the Help of God, such nonsense will vanish like the snow on desert sand. Of course women need children…”

Absently Lochart smiled to himself. That wonderful old man would bargain with God in the Garden of Paradise. And why not? Isn’t that the national pastime of Iranians? But what do I say to him in a few days now - the year and a day almost over? Do I want the burden of children? No, not yet. But Sharazad does. Oh, she went along with my decision, and she’s never mentioned it but I don’t think she ever approved it.

He could hear the muted sounds of her voice and the maid’s voice from the kitchen and the quiet it enhanced was, as always, wonderful - such a contrast to the cockpit that was his other life. His cushions were very comfortable and he watched the fire. There was some gunfire in the night but by now it was so commonplace that they hardly heard it.

I’ve got to get her out of Tehran, he thought. But how? She’ll never leave while her family’re here. Maybe she’s safer here than anywhere, but not if she joins the riots. Doshan Tappeh! She’s crazy, but then they all are at the moment. I wish to God I knew if the army’s really been ordered to crush the revolt. Bakhtiar has to move soon or he’s finished. But if he does there’ll be a bloodbath because Iranians are a violent people, death seekers - providing it’s in the service of Islam.

Ah, Islam! And God. Where’s the One God now? In all the hearts and heads of Believers. Shi’ites are Believers. So’s Sharazad. And all her family. And you? No, not yet but I’m working on it. I promised him I’d work on it, promised I’d read the Koran and keep an open mind. And?

Now’s not the time to think of that. Be practical, think practically. She’s in danger. Chador or not she’s not going to get involved, but then, why shouldn’t she? It’s her country.

Yes, but she’s my wife and I’ll order her to stay out of it. What about her father’s place on the Caspian Sea near Bandar-e Pahlavi? Maybe they’d take her there or send her there - the weather’s good now, not as rotten cold as it is here, though our home’s warm, the oil tank always full, wood for the fire, food in the icebox, thanks to her old man and the family. My God, I owe him so much, so very much. A slight noise distracted him. Sharazad was standing in the doorway wearing the chador and a light veil that he had never seen before. Her eyes were never more alluring. The chador was sibilant as she moved closer. Then she let it fall open. She wore nothing underneath. The sight of her made him gasp.

“So.” Her voice as always soft and throbbing, the Farsi sweet-sounding. “So, Excellency, my husband, so now my chador pleases you?”

He reached out for her but she darted back a step, laughing. “In the summer the public women of the night wear their chadors thus, so it is said.” “Sharazad…” “No.”

This time he caught her easily. The taste of her, the sheen of her, her softness. “Perhaps, Master,” she said between kisses, gently taunting him, “perhaps your slave will always wear her chador thus, in the streets, in the bazaar, many women do, so they say.” “No. The thought would drive me mad.” He began to pick her up but she whispered, “No, Beloved, let us stay here,” and he replied, “But the servants…” and again she whispered, “Forget them, they’ll not disturb us, forget them, forget everything, I beg you, Beloved, and only remember that this is your house, this is your hearth, and I am your eternal slave.” They stayed. As always her passion equaled his though he could not understand how or why, only that with her he went to Paradise, truly, stayed in the Garden of the Paradise with this nymph of Paradise and then returned with her safe to earth again.

Later, during dinner, the front doorbell disturbed their peace. Her servant Hassan answered it, then came back into the room, closing the door. “Master, it’s Excellency General Valik,” he said softly. “He apologizes that he arrives so late but it’s important and asks if Your Excellency would grant him a few minutes.”

Lochart’s irritation soared but Sharazad reached over and touched him gently and it went away. “See him, Beloved. I will wait for you in bed. Hassan, bring a fresh plate and heat up the horisht, His Excellency’s bound to be hungry.”

Valik apologized profusely for arriving so late, refused food twice but of course allowed himself to be persuaded and ate ravenously. Lochart waited patiently, fulfilling his promise to her father to remember Iranian ways - that family came first, that it was good manners to skirt an issue, never to be blunt, never to be direct. In Farsi it was much easier than in English. As soon as he could, he switched to English. “I’m very pleased to see you, General. What can I do for you?”

“I only heard half an hour ago that you were back in Tehran. This horisht is easily the best I’ve had in years. I’m so sorry to disturb you so late.” “No trouble.” Lochart left the silence to prosper. The older man ate without embarrassment that he ate alone. A piece of lamb attached itself to his mustache and Lochart watched it, fascinated, wondering how long it would remain there, then Valik wiped his mouth. “My compliments to Sharazad - her cook is well trained. I will tell my favorite cousin, Excellency Jared.” “Thank you.” Lochart waited.

Again the silence hung between them. Valik sipped some tea. “Did the clearance for the 212 come through?”

“Not by the time we’d left.” Lochart was unprepared for the question. “I know Mac sent a messenger to wait for it. I’d phone him but unfortunately our phone’s out. Why?” “The partners would like you to fly the charter.” “Captain McIver’s assigned Captain Lane, presuming there’s a clearance.” “It will be granted.” Valik wiped his mouth again and helped himself to more tea. “The partners would like you to fly the charter. I’m sure McIver will agree.”

“Sorry, but I’ve got to get back to Zagros, I want to make sure everything’s okay.” He told him briefly what had happened there.

“I’m sure Zagros can wait a few days. I’m sure Jared would be pleased you thought it important to do what the partners ask.”

Lochart frowned. “I’m happy to do anything. What’s so important to the partners about this charter, a few spares, a few rials?”

“All charters are important. The partners are very concerned to give the best service. So that’s all right, then?”

“I’d… first I’d have to take it up with Mac, second I doubt if the 212‘11 be cleared, third I really should get back to my base.”

Valik smiled his nicest smile. “I’m sure Mac will give his approval. You’ll have clearance to leave Tehran airspace.” He got up. “I’m going to see Mac now and I’ll tell him you’re agreeable. Thank Sharazad - again a thousand apologies for calling so late but these are troubled times.” Lochart did not move from the table. “I still want to know what’s so important about a few spares and a hundred thousand rials.” “The partners have decided it is, and so my dear young friend, hearing you were here and knowing your close relationship with my family, I presumed at once that you would be happy to do this if I asked you personally. We’re the same family. Aren’t we?” It was said flat now, though the smile remained. Lochart’s eyes narrowed. “I’m glad to do anything to help b - ” “Good, then it’s settled. Thank you. I’ll see myself out.” From the doorway Valik turned and pointedly looked around at the apartment. “You are a very lucky man, Captain. I envy you.”

When Valik had gone, Lochart sat by the dying fire, staring at the flames. Hassan and a maid cleaned away the dishes, said good night but he did not hear them - nor Sharazad who came back later, peered at him, then went quietly back to bed, dutifully leaving him to his reverie. Lochart was sick at heart. He knew that Valik was aware that everything of value in the apartment, along with the apartment itself, had been a wedding gift from Sharazad’s father. Jared Bakravan had even given him de facto ownership of the whole building - at least the rents thereof. Few knew of their argument: “As much as I appreciate your generosity I can’t accept all this, sir,” Lochart had said. “It’s impossible.” “But these are material things, unimportant things.”

“Yes, but this is too much. I know my pay’s not great, but we can manage. Truly.”

“Yes, of course. But why shouldn’t my daughter’s husband live pleasantly? How else can you be at peace to learn Iranian ways and fulfill your promise? I assure you, my son, these represent little value to me. Now you are part of my family. Family is most important in Iran. Family looks after family.” “Yes, but / must look after her - I must, not you.”

“Of course, and with the Help of God you will, in time, provide for her in the way she is used to. But now this is not possible for you with the support for your ex-wife and child which you must provide. Now it is my wish to arrange matters in a civilized way, our Iranian way. You have promised to live as we live, no?”

“Yes. But please, I cannot accept all this. Give her what you like, not me. I must be allowed to do the best I can.”

“I’m sure you will. Meanwhile, this is all my gift to you, not to her. This makes my gift of her to you possible.”

“Give it to her not t - ”

Jared Bakravan had said sharply, “It is the Will of God that man is the master of the house. If it is not your house then you will not be the master. I must insist. I am head of the family and Sharazad will do what I say and for Sharazad I must insist, or the wedding cannot take place. I realize your Western dilemma though I don’t understand it, my son. But here Iranian ways dominate all else, and family looks after family…” In the vast loneliness of the sitting room Lochart nodded to himself. That’s right and I chose Sharazad, chose to accept but … but that sonofabitch Valik threw it all in my face and made me feel dirty again and I hate him for it, hate not paying for everything, and know the only gift I can give her is freedom she would never otherwise have and my life if need be. At least she’s Canadian now and doesn’t have to stay.

Don’t fool yourself, she’s Iranian and always will be. Would she be at home in Vancouver, B.C., with all that rain, no family, no friends, and nothing Iranian? Yes, yes, I think so; for a time I’d make up for all the other. For a while, of course not forever.

It was the first time he had confronted the real problem looming between them. Our Iran’s gone forever, the old one, the Shah one. Never mind that perhaps the new will be better. She’ll adapt and so will I. I speak Farsi and she’s my wife and Jared’s powerful. If we have to leave temporarily, I’ll make up for the temporary parting, no problem there. The future’s still rosy and good and I love her so very much and bless God for her… The fire was almost finished now and he smelled the comforting, burned wood fragrance and, with it, a thread of her perfume. The cushions still held the indentations where they had lain and though he was totally satisfied and spent, he ached for her. She’s really one of the houris, the spirits of Paradise, he thought sleepily. I’m in her spell and that’s wonderful, I’ve no complaints and if I died tonight I know what Paradise is like. She’s wonderful, Jared’s wonderful, in due course her children will be wonderful and her family…

Ah, family! Family looks after family, that’s the law, I have to do what Valik asked, like it or not. Have to, her father made that clear. The last of the embers spluttered and, in dying, momentarily blazed up. “What’s so important about a few spares and a few rials?” he asked the flames.

The flames did not answer him.

Monday - February, 12

Chapter 14

AT TABRIZ ONE: 7:12 A.M. Charlie Pettikin was fitfully asleep, curled up on a mattress on the floor under a single blanket, his hands tied in front of him. It was just dawn and very cold. The guards had not allowed him a portable gas fire and he was locked into the section of Erikki Yokkonen’s cabin that would normally be a storeroom. Ice glistened on the inside of the panes of glass in the small window. The window was barred on the outside. Snow covered the sill.

His eyes opened and he jerked upright, startled, not knowing where he was for the moment. Then his memory flooded back and he hunched against the wall, his whole body aching. “What a damned mess!” he muttered, trying to ease his shoulders. With both hands he awkwardly wiped the sleep out of his eyes, and rubbed his face, feeling filthy. The stubble of his beard was flecked with gray. Hate being unshaved, he thought.

Today’s Monday. I got here Saturday at sunset and they caught me yesterday morning. Bastards!

On Saturday evening there had been many noises around the cabin that had added to his disquiet. Once he was sure he heard muffled voices. Quietly he doused the lights, slid the bolt back, and stood on the stoop, the Very pistol in his hand. With great care he had searched the darkness. Then he saw, or thought he saw, a movement thirty yards away, then another farther off.

“Who are you?” he called out, his voice echoing strangely. “What do you want?”

No one answered him. Another movement. Where? Thirty forty yards away - difficult to judge distances at night. Look, there’s another! Was it a man? Or just an animal or the shadow of a branch. Or perhaps - what was that? Over there by the big pine. “You! Over there! What do you want?” No answer. He could not make out if it was a man or not. Enraged and even a little frightened he aimed and pulled the trigger. The banggg seemed like a clap of thunder and echoed off the mountains and the red flare ripped toward the tree, ricocheted off it in a shower of sparks, sprayed into another to bury itself spluttering and spitting in a snowdrift. He waited. Nothing happened. Noises in the forest, the roof of the hangar creaking, wind in the treetops, sometimes snow falling from an overladen tree branch that sprang back, free once more. Making a big show he angrily stamped his feet against the cold, switched on the light, loaded the pistol again, and rebolted the door. “You’re getting to be an old woman in your old age,” he said aloud, then added, “Bullshit! I hate the quiet, hate being alone, hate snow, hate the cold, hate being scared and this morning at Galeg Morghi shook me, God curse it and that’s a fact - but for young Ross I know that SAVAK bastard would’ve killed me!”

He checked that the door was barred and all the windows, closed the curtains against the night, then poured a large vodka and mixed it with some frozen orange juice that was in the freezer and sat in front of the fire and collected himself. There were eggs for breakfast and he was armed. The gas fire worked well. It was cozy. After a while he felt better, safer. Before he went to bed in the spare bedroom, he rechecked the locks. When he was satisfied he took off his flying boots and lay on the bed. Soon he was asleep.

In the morning the night fear had disappeared. After a breakfast of fried eggs on fried bread, just as he liked it, he tidied the room, put on his padded flying gear, unbolted the door, and a submachine gun was shoved in his face, six of the revolutionaries crowded into the room and the questioning began. Hours of it.

“I’m not a spy, not American. I keep telling you I’m British,” over and over.

“Liar, your papers say you’re South African. By Allah, are they false too?” The leader - the man who called himself Fedor Rakoczy - was tough-looking, taller, and older than the others, with hard brown eyes, his English accented. The same questions over and over: “Where do you come from, why are you here, who is your CIA superior, who is your contact here, where is Erikki Yokkonen?”

“I don’t know. I’ve told you fifty times I don’t know - there was no one here when I landed at sunset last night. I was sent to pick him up, him and his wife. They had business in Tehran.”

“Liar! They ran away in the night, two nights ago. Why should they run away if you were coming to pick them up?”

“I’ve told you. I was not expected. Why should they run away? Where’re Dibble and Arberry, our mechanics? Where’s our manager Dayati and wh - ” “Who is your CIA contact in Tabriz?”

“I haven’t one. We’re a British company and I demand to see our consul in Tabriz. I dem - ”

“Enemies of the People cannot demand anything! Even mercy. It is the Will of God that we are at war. In war people get shot!”

The questioning had gone on all morning. In spite of his protests they had taken all his papers, his passport with the vital exit and residence permits, and had bound him and thrown him in here with dire threats if he attempted to run away. Later, Rakoczy and two guards had returned. “Why didn’t you tell me you brought the spares for the 212?”

“You didn’t ask me,” Pettikin had said angrily. “Who the hell are you? Give me back my papers. I demand to see the British consul. Undo my hands, goddamnit!”

“God will strike you if you blaspheme! Down on your knees and beg God’s forgiveness.” They forced him to kneel. “Beg forgiveness!” He obeyed, hating them. “You fly a 212 as well as a 206?” “No,” he said, awkwardly getting to his feet. “Liar! It’s on your license.” Rakoczy had thrown it on the table. “Why do you lie?”

“What’s the difference? You believe nothing I say. You won’t believe the truth. Of course I know it’s on my license. Didn’t I see you take it? Of course I fly a 212 if I’m rated.”

“The komiteh will judge you and sentence you,” Rakoczy had said with a finality that sent a shock wave up his spine. Then they had left him. At sunset they had brought him some rice and soup and gone away again. He had slept hardly at all and now, in the dawn, he knew how helpless he was. His fear began to rise up. Once in Vietnam he had been shot down and caught and sentenced to death by the Viet Cong but his squadron had come back for him with gunships and Green Berets and they had shot up the village and the Viet Cong with it. That was another time that he had escaped a certainty. “Never bet on death until you’re dead. Thataway, old buddy,” his young American commander had said, “thataway you sleep nights.” The commander had been Conroe Starke. Their helicopter squadron had been mixed, American and British and some Canadian, based at Da Nang. What another bloody mess that was!

Wonder how Duke’s doing now? he thought. Lucky bastard. Lucky to be safe at Kowiss and lucky to have Manuela. Now there’s one smasher and built like a koala bear - cuddly, with those big brown eyes of hers, and just the right amount of curves.

He let his mind wander, wondering about her and Starke, about where were Erikki and Azadeh, about that Vietnam village - and about the young Captain Ross and his men. But for him! Ross was another savior. In this life you have to have saviors to survive, those curious people who miraculously come into your life for no apparent reason just in time to give you the chance you desperately need, or to extract you from disaster or danger or evil. Do they appear because you prayed for help? At the very edge you always pray, somehow, even if it’s not to God. But God has many names. He remembered old Soames at the embassy with his, “Don’t forget, Charlie, Mohammed the Prophet proclaimed that Allah - God - has three thousand names. A thousand are known only to the angels, a thousand only to the prophets, three hundred are in the Torah, the Old Testament, another three hundred in the Zabur, that’s the Psalms of David, another three hundred in the New Testament, and ninety-nine in the Koran. That makes two thousand nine hundred and ninety nine. One name has been hidden by God. In Arabic it’s called: Ism Allah ala’zam: the Greatest Name of God. Everyone who reads the Koran will have read it without knowing it. God is wise to hide His Greatest Name, eh?”

Yes, if there is a God, Pettikin thought, cold and aching. Just before noon Rakoczy returned with his two men. Astonishingly, Rakoczy politely helped him to his feet and began undoing his bonds. “Good morning, Captain Pettikin. So sorry for the mistake. Please follow me.” He led the way into the main room. Coffee was on the table. “Do you drink coffee black or English style with milk and sugar?” Pettikin was rubbing his chafed wrists, trying to get his mind working. “What’s this? The prisoner was offered a hearty breakfast?” “Sorry, I don’t understand.”

“Nothing.” Pettikin stared at him, still not sure. “With milk and sugar.” The coffee tasted wonderful and revived him. He helped himself to more. “So it’s a mistake, all a mistake?”

“Yes. I, er, checked your story and it was correct, God be praised. You will leave immediately. To return to Tehran.”

Pettikin’s throat felt tight at his sudden reprieve - apparent reprieve, he thought suspiciously. “I need fuel. All our fuel’s been stolen, there’s no fuel in our dump.”

“Your aircraft has been refueled. I supervised it myself.” “You know about choppers?” Pettikin was wondering why the man appeared so nervous.

“A little.”

“Sorry, but I, er, I don’t know your name.”

“Smith. Mr. Smith.” Fedor Rakoczy smiled. “You will leave now, please. At once.”

Pettikin found his flying boots and pulled them on. The other men watched him silently. He noted they were carrying Soviet machine pistols. On the table by the door was his overnight bag. Beside it were his documents. Passport, visa, work permit, and Iranian CAA-issued flying license. Trying to keep the astonishment off his face, he made sure they were all there and stuck them in his pocket. When he went for the refrigerator, one of the men stood in his way and motioned him away. “I’m hungry,” Pettikin said, still very suspicious.

“There’s something to eat in your plane. Follow me, please.” Outside, the air smelled very good to him, the day crisp and fine with a clean, very blue sky. To the west more snow clouds were building. Eastward, the way over the pass was clear. All around him the forest sparkled, the light refracted by the snow. In front of the hangar was the 206, windshield cleaned, all windows cleaned. Nothing had been touched inside though his map case was now in a side pocket, not beside his seat where he normally left it. Very carefully he began a preflight check.

“Please to hurry,” Rakoczy said.

“Of course.” Pettikin made a great show of hurrying but he didn’t, missing nothing in his inspection, all his senses tuned to find a subtle sabotage, or even a crude one. Gas checked out, oil, everything. He could see and feel their growing nervousness. There was still no one else on the base. In the hangar he could see the 212 with its engine parts still neatly spread out. The spares that he had brought had been put on a bench nearby. “Now you are ready.” Rakoczy said it as an order. “Get in, you will refuel at Bandar-e Pahlavi as before.” He turned to the others, embraced both of them hastily, and got into the right seat. “Start up and leave at once. I am coming to Tehran with you.” He gripped his machine gun with his knees, buckled himself in, locked the door neatly, then lifted the headset from its hook behind him and put it on, clearly accustomed to the inside of a cockpit.

Pettikin noticed that the other two had taken up defensive positions facing the road. He pressed the Engine Start. Soon the whine and the familiarity - and the fact that “Smith” was aboard and therefore sabotage unlikely - made him light-headed. “Here we go,” he said into the boom mike and took off in a scudding rush, banked sweetly, and climbed for the pass.

“Good,” Rakoczy said, “very good. You fly very well.” Casually he put the gun across his knees, muzzle pointing at Pettikin. “Please don’t fly too well.”

“Put the safety catch on - or I won’t fly at all.”

Rakoczy hesitated. He clicked it in place. “I agree it is dangerous while flying.”

At six hundred feet Pettikin leveled off, then abruptly went into a steep bank and came back toward the field.

“What’re you doing?”

“Just want to get my bearings.” He was relying on the fact that though “Smith” clearly knew his way around a cockpit, he couldn’t fly a 206 or he would have taken her. His eyes were searching below for a clue to the man’s nervousness and his haste to leave. The field seemed the same. Near the junction of the narrow base road with the main road that went northwest to Tabriz were two trucks. Both headed for the base. From this height he could easily see they were army trucks.

“I’m going to land to see what they want,” he said.

“If you do,” Rakoczy said without fear, “it will cost you much pain and permanent mutilation. Please go to Tehran - but first to Bandar-e Pahlavi.”

“What’s your real name?”

“Smith.”

Pettikin left it at that, circled once, then followed the Tehran road southeast, heading for the pass and biding his time - confident now that somewhere en route his time would come.

Chapter 15

AT TEHRAN: 8:30 A.M. Tom Lochart eased his old Citroen through the debris of the night’s battles, heading for Galeg Morghi. The morning was sour and freezing and he was already late though he had started out just after dawn. He had passed many bodies and wailing mourners, many burned-out wrecks of cars and trucks, some still smoldering - flotsam from the night’s riots. Knots of armed or semiarmed civilians still manned balconies or barricades and he had had to make a dozen diversions. Many men wore the Khomeini green armband now. All Green Bands were armed. The streets were ominously empty of traffic. From time to time police trucks screamed past, a few cars and trucks, but they paid no attention to him except to sound their horns, cursing him out of the way. He cursed them back, almost not caring if he ever reached the airport that would be a perfect solution to his dilemma. Only the thought of Valik’s wife and their two children in SAVAK hands forced him onward.

How could such a wonderful woman as Annoush, who had been so kind to him since he came into the family, have married such a bastard? And how could the two wonderful kids who adored Sharazad and called him Excellency Uncle…

He swerved to avoid a car that charged out of a side street on the wrong side of the road. The car did not stop and he cursed it, and Tehran and Iran and Valik and said, “Insha’Allah,” out loud but it did not help him. Overhead was a dirty, snow-filled overcast that he did not like at all, and he had hated to leave the warmth of his bed and Sharazad. Just before dawn the alarm had startled them awake.

“I thought you weren’t going, my darling. I thought you said you were leaving tomorrow.”

“I’ve got a sudden charter, at least I think I have. That’s what Valik came about. I’ve got to see Mac first, but if I go I’ll be away for a few days. Go back to sleep, my darling.” He had shaved, dressed hurriedly, had a quick cup of coffee, and left. Outside it was still dark with just a sullen wisp of dawn, the air acrid and smoke heavy. In the distance was the inevitable, sporadic gunfire. Suddenly he was filled with foreboding. McIver lived only a few blocks away. Lochart was surprised to find him fully dressed. “Hello, Tom. Come on in. The clearance came through at midnight, delivered by hand. Valik’s got power - I never believed we’d get it. Coffee?” “Thanks. Did he see you last night?”

“Yes.” McIver led the way into the kitchen. Coffee was perking nicely. No sign of Genny, Paula, or Nogger Lane. He poured for Lochart. “Valik told me he’d seen you and that you’d agreed to go.”

Lochart grunted. “I said I’d go after you approved it and after I’d seen you - if we got the clearance. Where’s Nogger?”

“Back in his flat. I canceled him last night. He’s still pretty shook from being involved in that riot.”

“I can imagine. What happened to the girl? Paula?” “She’s in the spare room, her Alitalia flight’s still grounded, but she’ll probably be off today. George Talbot of the embassy dropped by last night and said he heard the airport’s been cleared of revolutionaries and today, with any luck, there’ll be a few flights in and out.”

Lochart nodded thoughtfully. “Then maybe Bakhtiar will win after all.” “Let’s hope, eh? The BBC this morning said Doshan Tappeh’s still in Khomeini hands and the Immortals are just ringing it, sitting on their tails.” Lochart shuddered at the thought of Sharazad there. She had promised not to go again. “Did Talbot say anything about a coup?”

“Only that the rumor is that Carter’s opposed to it - if I was Iranian, and a general, I wouldn’t hesitate. Talbot agreed, said the coup’ll happen in the next three days, it’ll have to, the revs are getting too many guns.” Lochart could almost see Sharazad chanting with the thousands, young Captain Karim Peshadi declaring for Khomeini and three Immortals deserting. “Don’t know what I’d do, Mac, if I was one of them.”

“Thank God we’re not and this’s Iran, not England with us at the barricades. Anyway, Tom, if the 125 comes in today I’ll put Sharazad on her. She’ll be better off in Al Shargaz, at least for a couple of weeks. Did she get her Canadian passport?”

“Yes, but Mac, I don’t think she’ll go.” Lochart told him about her joining the insurrection at Doshan Tappeh.

“My God, she needs her head examined. I’ll get Gen to see her.” “Is Genny going to Al Shargaz?”

McIver said testily, “No. If it was up to me she’d’ve been there a week already. I’ll do what I can. Sharazad’s all right?”

“Wonderful, but I wish to God Tehran’d settle down. I get worried sick about her here and me in Zagros.” Lochart gulped some coffee. “If I’m going I’d better get with it. Keep an eye on her, will you?” He looked at McIver, hard and straight. “What’s this charter about, Mac?”

Stonily McIver looked back at him. “Tell me exactly what Valik said to you last night.”

Lochart told him. Exactly.

“He’s a right bastard to try to make you lose face like that.” “He succeeded very well. Unfortunately he’s still family and in Iran - well, you know.” Lochart kept the bitterness out of his voice. “I asked him what’s so important about a few spares and a few rials and he sloughed me off.” He saw that McIver’s face was set and seemed older and heavier than he had ever known, yet tougher. “Mac, what is so important about a few spares and a few rials?”

McIver finished his coffee and poured some more. He dropped his voice. “Don’t want to wake Genny or Paula, Tom. This’s between us.” He told Lochart what had happened in the office. Exactly.

Lochart felt the sudden rush of blood to his face. “SAVAK? Him and Annoush and little Setarem and Jalal? Jesus wept!”

“That’s why I agreed to try. Have to. I’m equally trapped. We’re both trapped. But there’s more.” McIver told him about the money. Lochart gasped. “12 million rials, cash? Or the equivalent in Switzerland?” “Keep your voice down. Yes, 12 for me, and another 12 for the pilot. Last night he said his offer still stands and not to be ‘naive.’” McIver added grimly, “If Gen hadn’t been here, I’d’ve thrown him out.” Lochart was hardly listening. 12 million rials or cash elsewhere? Mac’s right. If Valik offered that here in Tehran what would he really pay when he’s in sight of the border? “Christ!”

McIver watched him. “What do you think, Tom? Do you still want to go.” “I can’t refuse. I can’t. Not now we’ve got the clearance.” It was on the kitchen table and he picked it up. It read: “EP-HBC cleared to Bandar Delam. Priority flight for urgent spares. Refuel at IIAF Base Isfahan. One crew: Captain Lane.” Lane had been crossed out, and marked, “Sick. Substitute pilot - - - ,” then a blank and it was not yet countersigned by McIver. McIver glanced at the kitchen door that was closed, then back to Lochart. “Valik wants to be picked up outside of Tehran, privately.” “This gets smellier and smellier. Where’s the pickup point?” “If you get to Bandar Delam, Tom, and that’s not even probable, he’ll pressure you to take them on to Kuwait.”

“Of course.” Lochart stared back at McIver.

“He’ll use any pressure, family, Sharazad, the lot. Particularly money.” “Millions. In cash - which we both know I can use.” Lochart’s voice was level. “But if I fly on to Kuwait without Iranian clearance, in an Iranian registered chopper, without Iranian or company approval, with unauthorized Iranian passengers trying to escape their still legal government, I’m a hijacker, subject to God knows how many criminal charges here and in Kuwait - the Kuwait authorities’d impound the chopper, shove me in jail, and certainly extradite me to Iran. In any event I’d’ve blown my future as a pilot and could never come back to Iran and Sharazad - SAVAK might even grab her so I’m not about to do that.”

“Valik’s a dangerous sod. He’ll come armed. He could put a gun to your head and force you to go on.”

“That’s possible.” Lochart’s voice stayed but his insides were churning. “I have no option. I’ve got to help him, and I will - but I’m not goddamn stupid.” After a pause, he added, “Does Nogger know about this?” “No.” In the watches of the night, after weighing possible plans, McIver had decided to go himself and not risk Nogger Lane or Lochart. The hell with the medical and that I’d be illegal, he had told himself - the whole flight’s mad so a little extra madness won’t hurt.

His plan was simple: after talking it out with Tom Lochart he would just say he had decided not to authorize the flight and would not countersign the clearance, that he would drive to the pickup point with enough gasoline for Valik to make the journey by road. Even if Lochart wanted to come with him, it would be easy to fix a rendezvous, then never go to it but just drive to Galeg Morghi, put his own name on the clearance as pilot and take off. At the pickup point…

“What?” he asked.

“There are only three possibilities,” Lochart said again. “You refuse to authorize the flight, you authorize me or you authorize someone else. You’ve canceled Nogger, Charlie’s not here, so that leaves you or me. You can’t go, Mac. You just can’t, it’s too dangerous.”

“Of course I wouldn’t go, my license h - ”

“You can’t go, Mac,” Lochart said firmly. “Sorry. You just can’t.” McIver sighed, his wisdom overcame his obsession to fly and he decided on his second plan. “Yes. Yes, you’re right. I agree. So listen carefully: if you want to do it, that’s up to you, I’m not ordering it. I will authorize you if you want but there are conditions. If you get to the pickup point and it seems clean, pick them up. Then go on to Isfahan. Valik said he’d fix that. If Isfahan’s okay, go on. Maybe Mr. Fixit Iran can do just that, all the way. That’s what we’d have to gamble on.”

“That’s what I’m gambling on.”

“Bandar Delam’s the end of the line. You don’t go over the border. Agreed?” McIver put out his hand.

“Agreed,” Lochart said, shaking hands with a prayer that he could keep his promise.

McIver told him the pickup point, signed the clearance, and noticed his hands were trembling. If anything goes wrong, guess who SAVAK‘11 come after? Both of us. And even maybe Gen, McIver thought, again filled with dread. He did not tell Lochart that she had overheard Valik last night and figured out the rest. “But I agree, Duncan,” she had said gravely. “It’s terribly risky but you’ve got to try to help them, Tom too, he’s equally trapped. There isn’t any option.” McIver handed Lochart the clearance. “Tom, you’re specifically ordered not to go over the border. If you do, I think you really will lose everything, including Sharazad.”

“This whole scheme’s crackpot, but, there you are.”

“Yes. Good luck.”

Lochart nodded, smiled back at him, and left.

McIver closed the front door. I hope that’s the right decision, he thought, his head aching. Madness to go myself, and yet… I wish I was going and not him. I wish …

“Oh,” he said, startled. Genny was standing by the kitchen door, a warm robe over her nightdress. She was not wearing her glasses and she peered at him. “I’m… I’m awfully glad you didn’t go, Duncan,” she said in a tiny voice. “What?”

“Oh, come on, silly, I know you too well. You hardly slept a wink trying to decide - nor did I, worrying about it for you. I know if I’d been you I’d’ve gone, or wanted to go. But, Duncan, Tom’s strong and he’ll be all right and I do so hope he takes Sharazad and never comes back…” The tears began running down her cheeks. “I’m ever so glad you didn’t go.” She brushed the tears away and went to the stove and put on the kettle. “Damn, sorry, I really do get into a tizzy sometimes. Sorry.”

He put his arms around her. “Gen, if the 125 comes today, will you get on it? Please.”

“Certainly, dear. If you get on it too.”

“But Gen. You must.”

“Duncan, listen a moment, please.” She turned and put her arms around him and rested her head against his chest and continued in the same small voice that troubled him greatly, “Three of your partners have already fled with their families and all the money they can, the Shah and his family’ve gone with all their money, thousands of others, most of the people we know’ve gone, you said so yourself and now if even the great General Valik’s running away, even with all his contacts and they’ve got to be on both sides of the fence, and … and if even the Immortals haven’t squashed the little rebellion at Doshan Tappeh of a few air force cadets and badly armed civilians - practically on their home ground - it’s time we should close down and leave.”

“We can’t, Gen,” he burst out, and she could hear his heart in his chest and her concern for him increased. “That’d be a disaster.”

“It’d only be for a short time, until things get better.” “If I scuttled Iran it’d ruin S-G.”

“I don’t know about that, Duncan, but surely the decision’s up to Andy, not you - he sent us here.”

“Yes, but he’d ask me what I thought and I couldn’t recommend quitting and leaving $20-to $30-odd million worth of choppers and spares behind - in this mess they wouldn’t last a week, they’d be looted or damaged, we’d lose everything, everything - don’t forget, Gen, all our retirement money’s tied up in S-G, everything.”

“But, Duncan, don’t you think th - ”

“I won’t leave our choppers and spares.” McIver felt flushed and in momentary panic at the thought. “I just can’t.”

“Then take them with you.”

“For God’s sake, we can’t get ‘em out, we can’t get the clearances, can’t get off Iranian registry - we can’t - we’re stuck here until the war’s over.”

“We’re not. Duncan, not you or me or our lads, you’ve got to think of them too. We have to get out. They’ll throw us out anyway, whoever wins, most of all Khomeini.” A tremor went through her as she thought of his first speech at the cemetery: “I pray God to cut off the hands of all foreigners …”

Chapter 16

AT TABRIZ ONE: 9:30 A.M. The red Range Rover came out of the gates of the Khan’s palace and headed down the rise toward Tabriz and the road for Tehran. Erikki was driving, Azadeh beside him. It had been her cousin, Colonel Mazardi, the chief of police, who had persuaded Erikki not to drive to Tehran on Friday: “The road would be highly dangerous - it’s bad enough during the day,” he said. “The insurgents won’t return now, you’re quite safe. Much better to go and see His Highness the Khan and ask his advice. That would be much wiser.”

Azadeh had agreed. “Erikki, of course we will do whatever you want but I would really feel happier if we went home for the night and saw Father.” “My cousin’s right, Captain; of course you may do as you wish, but I swear by the Prophet, God keep His words safe forever, that Her Highness’s safety is just as important to me as to you. If you still feel so inclined, leave tomorrow. I can assure you there’s no danger here. I’ll post guards. If this so-called Rakoczy or any other foreigner or this mullah comes within half a mile of here or the Gorgon palace they’ll regret it.”

“Oh, yes, Erikki, please,” Azadeh said enthusiastically. “Of course, my darling, we’ll do whatever you like but it might be you would want to consult His Highness, my father, about what you plan to do.” Reluctantly Erikki had agreed. Arberry and the other mechanic, Dibble, had decided to go into Tabriz to the International Hotel and spend the weekend there. “Spares’re due Monday, Captain. Old Skinflint McIver knows our 212’s got to be working by Wednesday or he’ll have to send another one and he won’t like that. We’ll just sit tight and get the job done and get her airborne. Our apology for a base manager can come and fetch us. We’re British, we’ve nothing to worry about - no one’s going to touch us. And don’t forget we’re working for their guver’ment, whoever’s the bleeding guver’ment, and we’ve no quarrel with any of these bleeding wo - these bleeders, begging your pardon. Now don’t you worry about us, you and the Missus. We’ll just sit tight and expect you back by Wednesday. Have a fun time in Tehran.”

So Erikki had gone in convoy with Colonel Mazardi to the outskirts of Tabriz. The sprawling palace of the Gorgon Khans was set in mountain foothills, in acres of gardens and orchards behind high walls. When they arrived, the whole house awoke and congregated - stepmother, half sisters, nieces, nephews, servants, and children of servants, but not Abdollah Khan, her father. Azadeh was received with open arms and tears and happiness and more tears, and immediate plans were made for a luncheon feast the next day to celebrate their good fortune in having her home at long last - “But, oh, how terrible! Bandits and a rogue mullah daring to come on your land? Hasn’t His Highness, our revered father, donated barrels of rials and hundreds of acres of land to various mosques in and around Tabriz!”

Erikki Yokkonen was welcomed politely, and guardedly. All of them were afraid of him, the enormity of his size, his quickness with a knife, the violence of his temper, and could not understand his gentleness toward his friends and the vast love he radiated for Azadeh. She was the fifth of six half sisters, and an infant half brother. Her mother, dead now many years, had been Abdollah Khan’s second, concurrent wife. Her own adored blood brother, Hakim, a year older than she, had been banished by Abdollah Khan and was still in disgrace at Khoi to the northwest - banished for crimes against the Khan that both Hakim and Azadeh swore he was not guilty of.

“First a bath,” her half sisters said gaily, “and you can tell us all that happened, every detail, every detail.” Happily, they dragged Azadeh away. In the privacy of their bathhouse, warm and intimate and luxurious and completely outside the domain of all men, they chatted and gossiped until the dawn. “My Mahmud hasn’t made love to me for a week,” Najoud, Azadeh’s eldest half sister, said with a toss of her head.

“It has to be another woman, darling Najoud,” someone said. “No, it’s not that. His erection is giving him trouble.”

“Oh, you poor darling! Have you tried giving him oysters …” “Or tried using oil of roses on your breasts …”

“Or rubbed him with extract of jacaranda, rhino horn, and musk…” “Jacaranda, musk with rhino horn? I haven’t heard of that one, Fazulia.” “It’s brand new from an ancient recipe from the time of Cyrus the Great. This is a secret but the Great King’s penis was quite small as a young man, but after he conquered the Medes, miraculously it became the envy of the host! It seems that he obtained a magic potion from the Medes that if rubbed on over a period of a month… Their high priest gave it to Cyrus in return for his life, providing the Great King swore to keep the secret in his family alone. It’s come down from father to son over the centuries and now, dear sisters, the secret’s in Tabriz!”

“Oh, who, dearest darling Sister Fazulia, who? The Blessings of God be upon thee forever, who? My rotten husband Abdullah, may his three remaining teeth fall out, he hasn’t had an erection for years. Who?”

“Oh, be quiet, Zadi, how can she talk if you talk! Go on, Fazulia.” “Yes, be quiet, Zadi, and bless your good fortune - my Hussan is erect morning, noon, and night and so filled with desire for me he gives me no time to even wash my teeth!”

“Well, the secret of the elixir was bought by the great-greatgrandfather of the present owner at a huge cost, I was told for a fistful of diamonds…” “Eeeeeeeeee…”

“… but now you can buy a small vial for fifty thousand rials!” “Oh, that’s too much! Where on earth can I get so much cash?” “As always you’ll find it in his pockets, and you can always bargain. Is anything too much for such a potion when we can’t have other men?” “If it works…”

“Of course it works, oh, where do we buy it, dearest dearest Fazulia?” “In the bazaar, in the shop of Abu Bakra bin Hassan bin Saiidi. I know the way! We’ll go tomorrow. Before lunch. You will come with us, darling Azadeh!”

“No thank you, dear sister.”

Then there was lots of laughter and one of the young ones said, “Poor Azadeh doesn’t need jacaranda and muck - she needs the opposite!” “Jacaranda and musk, child, with rhino horn,” Fazulia said. Azadeh laughed with them. They had all asked her, overtly or covertly, if her husband was equally proportioned and how did she, so skinny and so fragile, deal with it and bear his weight? “By magic,” she had told the young ones, “easily,” the serious ones, and “with unbelievable ecstasy as it must be in the Garden of Paradise,” the jealous ones and those she hated and secretly wanted to taunt.

Not everyone had approved of her marriage to this foreign giant. Many had tried to influence her father against him and against her. But she had won and she knew who her enemies were: her sex-mad half sister, Zadi, lying Cousin Fazulia with her nonsense exaggerations, and, most of all, the honeyed viper of the pack, eldest sister Najoud and her vile husband Mahmud, may God punish them for their evil ways. “Dearest Najoud, I’m so happy to be home, but now it’s time for sleep.”

And so to bed. All of them. Some happily, some sadly, some angrily, some hating, some loving, some to their husbands and some alone. Husbands could have four wives, according to the Koran, at the same time, provided they treated each with equality in every way - Mohammed the Prophet, alone of all men, had been allowed as many wives as he wished. According to legend, the Prophet had had eleven wives in his lifetime though not all at the same time. Some died, some he divorced, and some outlived him. But all of them honored him forever.

Erikki awoke as Azadeh slipped into bed beside him. “We should leave as early as possible, Azadeh, my darling.”

“Yes,” she said, almost asleep now, the bed so comfortable, him so comfortable. “Yes, whenever you like, but please not until after lunch because dearest Stepmother will weep buckets….”

“Azadeh!”

But she was asleep now. He sighed, also content, and went back to sleep. They did not leave Sunday as planned - her father had said it was inconvenient as he wished to talk to Erikki first. At dawn today, Monday, after prayers that her father had led, and after breakfast - coffee and bread and honey and yogurt and eggs - they had been allowed to leave and now swung off the mountainside road on to the main Tehran road and there ahead was the roadblock.

“That’s weird,” Erikki said. Colonel Mazardi had said he would meet them here but he was nowhere to be seen, nor was the roadblock manned. “Police!” Azadeh said, with a yawn. “They’re never where you want them.” The road climbed up to the pass. The sky was blue and clear and the tops of the mountains already washed with sunlight. Down here in the valley, it was still dark and chill and damp, the road slippery, snowbanked, but this did not worry him as the Range Rover had four-wheel drive and he carried chains. Later, when he came to the base turnoff he passed it by. He knew the base was empty, the 212 safe and waiting for repairs. Before leaving the palace he had tried unsuccessfully to contact his manager, Dayati. But that did not matter. He settled back in his seat, he had full tanks, and six spare five-gallon cans that he had got from Abdollah’s private pump. I can get to Tehran easily today, he thought. And back by Wednesday - if I come back. That bastard Rakoczy’s very bad news indeed.

“Would you like some coffee, darling?” Azadeh asked.

“Thanks. See if you can find the BBC or the VOA on the shortwave.” Gratefully he accepted the hot coffee from the thermos, listening to the crackle of static and heterodyning and loud Soviet stations and little else. Iranian stations were still strikebound and closed down, except the ones worked by the military.

Over the weekend friends, relations, tradesmen, servants had brought rumors and counterrumors of everything from imminent Soviet invasion to imminent U.S. invasion, from successful military coups in the capital to abject submission of all the generals to Khomeini and Bakhtiar’s resignation. “Asinine!” Abdollah Khan had said. He was a corpulent man in his sixties, bearded, with dark eyes and full mouth, bejeweled and richly dressed. “Why should Bakhtiar resign? He gains nothing so there’s no reason, yet.” “And if Khomeini wins?” Erikki had asked.

“It is the Will of God.” The Khan was lounging on carpets in the Great Room, Erikki and Azadeh seated in front of him, his armed bodyguard standing behind him. “But Khomeini’s victory will be only temporary, if he achieves it. The armed forces will curb him and his mullahs, sooner or later. He’s an old man. Soon he will die, the sooner the better, for though he has done God’s will and been the instrument to remove the Shah whose time had come, he’s vindictive, narrow-sighted, as megalomaniacal as the Shah, if not more so. He will surely murder more Iranians than the Shah ever did.” “But isn’t he a man of God, pious and everything an ayatollah should be?” Erikki asked warily, not knowing what to expect. “Why should Khomeini do that?”

“It’s the habit of tyrants.” The Khan laughed and took another of the halvah, the Turkish sweets he gorged on.

“And the Shah? What will happen now?” As much as Erikki disliked the Khan, he was glad for the opportunity to get his opinion. On him depended much of his and Azadeh’s life in Iran and he had no wish to leave. “As God wants. Mohammed Shah did incredibly well for Iran, like his father before him. But in the last few years he was totally curled up in himself and would listen to no one - not even the Shahbanu, Empress Farah, who was dedicated to him, and wise. If he had any sense he would abdicate at once in favor of his son Reza. The generals need a rallying point, they could train him until he’s ready to take power - don’t forget Iran’s been a monarchy for almost three thousand years, always an absolute ruler, some might say tyrant, with absolute power and removed only by death.” He had smiled, his lips full and sensuous, “Of the Qajar Shahs, our legitimate dynasty who ruled for a hundred and fifty years, only one, the last of the line, my cousin, died of natural causes. We are an Oriental people, not Western, who understand violence and torture. Life and death are not judged by your standards.” His dark eyes had seemed to grow darker. “Perhaps it is the Will of God that the Qajars will return - under their rule Iran prospered.” That’s not what I heard, Erikki had thought. But he held his peace. It’s not up to me to judge what has been or what would be here.

All Sunday the BBC and the VOA had been jammed which was not unusual. Radio Moscow was loud and clear, as usual, and Radio Free Iran that broadcast from Tbilisi north of the border also loud and clear as usual. Their reports in Farsi and English told of total insurrection against “Bakhtiar’s illegal government of the ousted Shah and his American masters, headed by the warmonger and liar President Carter. Today Bakhtiar tried to curry favor with the masses by canceling a total of $13 billion of usurious military contracts forced on the country by the deposed Shah: $8 billion in the U.S.A., British Centurion tank contracts worth $2.3 billion, plus two French nuclear reactors, and one from Germany worth another $2.7 billion. This news has sent Western leaders into panic and will undoubtedly send capitalist stock markets into a well-deserved crash…”

“Excuse me for asking, Father, but will the West crash?” Azadeh had asked. “Not this time,” the Khan had said and Erikki saw his face grow colder. “Not unless the Soviets decide this is the time to renege on the $80 billion they owe Western banks - and even some Oriental banks.” He had laughed sardonically, playing with the string of pearls he wore around his neck. “Of course Oriental moneylenders are much cleverer; at least they’re not so greedy. They lend judiciously and require collaterals and believe no one and certainly not in the myth of ‘Christian charity.’” It was common knowledge that the Gorgons owned enormous tracts of land in Azerbaijan, good oil land, a large part of Iran-Timber, seafront property on the Caspian, much of the bazaar in Tabriz, and most of the merchant banks there.

Erikki remembered the whispers he had heard about Abdollah Khan when he was trying to get permission to marry Azadeh, about his parsimony and ruthlessness in business: “A quick way to Paradise or hell is to owe Abdollah the Cruel one rial, to not pay pleading poverty, and to stay in Azerbaijan.”

“Father, please may I ask, cancellation of so many contracts will cause havoc, won’t it?”

“No, you may not ask. You’ve asked enough questions for one day. A woman is supposed to hold her tongue and listen - now you can leave.” At once she apologized for her error and left obediently. “Please excuse me.”

Erikki got up to leave too, but the Khan stopped him: “I have not dismissed you yet. Sit down. Now, why should you fear one Soviet?”

“I don’t - just the system. That man has to be KGB.”

“Why didn’t you just kill him then?”

“It would not have helped, it would have hurt. Us, the base, Iran-Timber, Azadeh, perhaps even you. He was sent to me by others. He knows us - knows you.” Erikki had watched the old man carefully.

“I know lots of them. Russians, Soviet or tsarist, have always coveted Azerbaijan, but have always been good customers of Azerbaijan - and helped us against the stinking British. I prefer them to British, I understand them.” His smile thinned even more. “It would be easy to remove this Rakoczy.”

“Good, then do it, please.” Erikki had laughed full-throated. “And all of them as well. That would really be doing God’s work.”

“I don’t agree,” the Khan said ill-temperedly. “That would be doing Satan’s work. Without the Soviets against them, the Americans and their dogs the British would dominate us and all the world. They’d certainly eat up Iran - under Mohammed Shah they nearly did. Without Soviet Russia, whatever her failings, there’d be no check on America’s foul policies, foul arrogance, foul manners, foul jeans, foul music, foul food, and foul democracy, their disgusting attitudes to women, to law and order, their disgusting pornography, naive attitude to diplomacy, and their evil, yes, that’s the correct word, their evil antagonism to Islam.”

The last thing Erikki wanted was another confrontation. In spite of his resolve, he felt his own rage gathering. “We had an agreem - ” “It’s true, by God!” Khan shouted at him. “It’s true!”

“It’s not, and we had an agreement before your God and my spirits that we’d not discuss politics - either of your world or mine.”

“It’s true, admit it!” Abdollah Khan snarled, his face twisted with rage. One hand went to the ornamental knife at his belt, and at once the guard unslung his machine pistol and covered Erikki. “By Allah, you call me a liar in my own house?” he bellowed.

Erikki said through his teeth, “I only remind you, Highness, by your Allah, what we agreed!” The dark bloodshot eyes stared at him. He stared back, ready to go for his own knife and kill or be killed, the danger between them very great.

“Yes, yes, that’s also true,” the Khan muttered, and the fit of rage passed as quickly as it had erupted. He looked at the guard, angrily waved him away. “Get out!”

Now the room was very still. Erikki knew there were other guards nearby and spyholes in the walls. He felt the sweat on his forehead and the touch of his pukoh knife in the center of his back. Abdollah Khan knew the knife was there and that Erikki would use it without hesitation. But the Khan had given him perpetual permission to be armed with it in his presence. Two years ago Erikki had saved his life. That was the day Erikki was petitioning him for permission to marry Azadeh and was imperiously turned down: “No, by Allah, I want no infidels in my family. Leave my house! For the last time!” Erikki had got up from the carpet, sick at heart. At that moment there had been a scuffle outside the door, then shots, the door had burst open and two men, assassins armed with machine guns, had rushed in, others fighting a gun battle in the corridor. The Khan’s bodyguard had killed one, but the other sprayed him with bullets then turned his gun on Abdollah Khan who sat on the carpet in shock. Before the assassin could pull the trigger a second time, he died, Erikki’s knife in his throat. At the same moment Erikki lunged for him, ripped the gun out of his hands and the knife out of his throat as another assassin rushed into the room firing. Erikki had smashed the machine gun into the man’s face, killing him, almost tearing off his head with the strength of his blow, then charged into the corridor berserk. Three attackers and two of the bodyguards were dead or dying. The last of the attackers took to their heels, but Erikki cut them both down and raced onward. And only when he had found Azadeh and saw that she was safe did the bloodlust go out of his head and he become calm again.

Erikki remembered how he had left her and had gone back to the same Great Room. Abdollah Khan still sat on the carpets. “Who were those men?” “Assassins - enemies, like the guards who let them in,” Abdollah Khan had said malevolently. “It was the Will of God you were here to save my life, the Will of God that I am alive. You may marry Azadeh, yes, but because I do not like you, we will both swear before God and your - whatever you worship - not to discuss religion or politics, either of your world or mine, then perhaps I will not have to have you killed.”

And now the same cold black eyes were staring at him. Abdollah Khan clapped his hands. Instantly the door opened and a servant appeared. “Bring coffee!” The man hurried away. “I will drop the subject of your world and go to another we can discuss: my daughter, Azadeh.”

Erikki became even more on guard, not sure of the extent of her father’s control over her, or his own rights as her husband while he was in Azerbaijan - very much the old man’s fief. If Abdollah Khan really ordered Azadeh back to this house and to divorce him, would she? I think yes, I’m afraid yes - she certainly will never hear a word against him. She even defended his paranoiac hatred of America by explaining what had caused it: “He was ordered there, to university, by his father,” she had told him. “He had a terrible time in America, Erikki, learning the language and trying to get a degree in economics which his father demanded before he was allowed home. My father hated the other students who sneered at him because he couldn’t play their games, because he was heavier than they which in Iran is a sign of wealth but not in America, and was slow at learning. But most of all because of the hazing that he was forced to endure, forced, Erikki - to eat unclean things like pork that are against our religion, to drink beer and wine and spirits that are against our religion, to do unmentionable things and be called unmentionable names. I would be angry too if it had been me. Please be patient with him. Don’t Soviets make a blood film come over your eyes and heart for what they did to your father and mother and country? Be patient with him, I beg you. Hasn’t he agreed to our marriage? Be patient with him.”

I’ve been very patient, Erikki thought, more patient than with any man, wishing the interview was over. “What about my wife, Highness?” It was custom to call him that and Erikki did so from time to time out of politeness.

Abdollah Khan smiled a thin smile at him. “Naturally my daughter’s future interests me. What is your plan when you go to Tehran?”

“I have no plan. I just think it is wise to get her out of Tabriz for a few days. Rakoczy said they ‘require’ my services. When the KGB say that in Iran or Finland or even America, you’d better clear the decks and prepare for trouble. If they kidnapped her, I would be putty in their hands.” “They could kidnap her in Tehran much more easily than here, if that is their scheme - you forget this is Azerbaijan” - his lips twisted with contempt - “not Bakhtiar country.”

Erikki felt helpless under the scrutiny. “I only know mat’s what I think is best for her. I said I would guard her with my life, and I will. Until the political future of Iran is settled - by you and other Iranians - I think it’s the wise thing to do.”

“In that case, go,” her father had said with a suddenness that had almost frightened him. “Should you need help send me the code words…” He thought a moment. Then his smile became sardonic: “Send me the sentence: ‘All men are created equal.’ That’s another truth, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know, Highness,” he said carefully. “If it is or if it isn’t, it’s surely the Will of God.”

Abdollah had laughed abruptly and got up and left him alone in the Great Room and Erikki had felt a chill on his soul, deeply unsettled by the man whose thoughts he could never read.

“Are you cold, Erikki?” Azadeh asked.

“Oh. No, no, not at all,” he said, coming out of his reverie, the sound of the engine good as they climbed up the mountain road toward the pass. Now they were just below the crest. There had been little traffic either way. Around the corner they came into sunshine and topped the rise; at once Erikki shifted gears smoothly and picked up speed as they began the long descent, the road - built at the order of Reza Shah, like the railway - a wonder of engineering with cuts and embankments and bridges and steep parts with no railings on the precipice side, the surface slippery, snowbanked. He changed down again, driving fast but prudently, very glad they had not driven by night. “May I have some more coffee?”

Happily she gave it to him. “I’ll be glad to see Tehran. There’s lots of shopping to be done, Sharazad’s there, and I have a list of things for my sisters and some face cream for Stepmother…”

He hardly listened to her, his mind on Rakoczy, Tehran, McIver, and the next step.

The road twisted and curled in its descent. He slowed and drove more cautiously, some traffic behind him. In the lead was a passenger car, typically overloaded, and the driver drove too close, too fast, and with his finger permanently on the horn even when it was clearly impossible to move out of the way. Erikki closed his ears to the impatience that he had never become used to, or to the reckless way Iranians drove, even Azadeh. He rounded the next blind corner, the gradient steepening, and there on the straight, not far ahead, was a heavily laden truck grinding upward with a car overtaking on the wrong side. He braked, hugging the mountainside. At that moment the car behind him accelerated, swerved around him, horn blaring, overtaking blindly, and hurtled down the wrong side of the curving road. The two cars smashed into each other and both careened over the precipice to fall five hundred feet and burst into flames. Erikki swung closer into the side and stopped. The oncoming truck did not stop, just lumbered past and continued up the hill as though nothing had happened - so did the other traffic.

He stood at the edge and looked down into the valley. Burning remains of the cars were spread over the mountainside down six or seven hundred feet, no possibility of survivors, and no chance to get down there without serious climbing gear. When he came back to the car he shook his head unhappily. “Insha’Allah, my darling,” Azadeh said calmly. “It was the Will of God.” “No, it wasn’t, it was blatant stupidity.”

“Of course you’re right, Beloved, it certainly was blatant stupidity,” she said at once in her most calming voice, seeing his anger though not understanding it as she did not understand much that went on in the head of this strange man who was her husband. “You’re perfectly right, Erikki. It was blatant stupidity but the Will of God that those drivers’ stupidity caused their deaths and the deaths of those who traveled with them. It was the Will of God or the road would have been clear. You were quite right.” “Was I?” he said wearily.

“Oh, yes, of course, Erikki. You were perfectly right.”

They went on. The villages that lay beside the road or straddled it were poor or very poor with narrow dirt streets, crude huts and houses, high walls, a few drab mosques, street stores, goats and sheep and chickens, and flies not yet the plague they would become in summer. Always refuse in the streets and in the joub - the ditches - and the inevitable scavenging packs of scabrous despised dogs that frequently were rabid. But snow made the landscape and the mountains picturesque, and the day continued to be good though cold with blue skies and cumulus building.

Inside the Range Rover it was warm and comfortable. Azadeh wore padded, modern ski gear and a cashmere sweater underneath, matching blue, and short boots. Now she took off her jacket and her neat woolen ski cap, and her full-flowing, naturally wavy dark hair fell to her shoulders. Near noon they stopped for a picnic lunch beside a mountain stream. In the early afternoon they drove through orchards of apple, pear, and cherry trees, now bleak and leafless and naked in the landscape, then came to the outskirts of Qazvin, a town of perhaps 150,000 inhabitants and many mosques.

“How many mosques are there in all Iran, Azadeh?” he asked. “Once I was told twenty thousand,” she answered sleepily, opening her eyes and peering ahead. “Ah, Qazvin! You’ve made good time, Erikki.” A yawn swamped her and she settled more comfortably and went back into half sleep. “There’re twenty thousand mosques and fifty thousand mullahs, so they say. At this rate we’ll be in Tehran in a couple of hours…” He smiled as her words petered out. He was feeling more secure now, glad that the back of the journey had been broken. The other side of Qazvin the road was good all the way to Tehran. In Tehran, Abdollah Khan owned many houses and apartments, most of them rented to foreigners. A few he kept for himself and his family, and he had said to Erikki that, this time, because of the troubles, they could stay in an apartment not far from McIver. “Thanks, thanks very much,” Erikki had said and later Azadeh had said, “I wonder why he was so kind. It’s… it’s not like him. He hates you and hates me whatever I try to do to please him.”

“He doesn’t hate you, Azadeh.”

“I apologize for disagreeing with you, but he does. I tell you again, my darling, it was my eldest sister, Najoud, who really poisoned him against me, and against my brother. She and her rotten husband. Don’t forget my mother was Father’s second wife and almost half Najoud’s mother’s age and twice as pretty and though my mother died when I was seven, Najoud still keeps up the poison - of course not to our face, she’s much more clever than that. Erikki, you can never know how subtle and secretive and powerful Iranian ladies can be, or how vengeful behind their oh so sweet exterior. Najoud’s worse than the snake in the Garden of Eden! She’s the cause of all the enmity.” Her lovely blue-green eyes filled with tears. “When I was little, my father truly loved us, my brother Hakim and me, and we were his favorites. He spent more time with us in our house than in the palace. Then, when Mother died, we went to live in the palace but none of my half brothers and sisters really liked us. When we went into the palace, everything changed, Erikki. It was Najoud.”

“Azadeh, you tear yourself apart with this hatred - you suffer, not her. Forget her. She’s got no power over you now and I tell you again: you’ve no proof.”

“I don’t need proof. I know. And I’ll never forget.”

Erikki had left it there. There was no point in arguing, no point in rehashing what had been the source of much violence and many tears. Better it’s in the open than buried, better to let her rave from time to time. Ahead now the road left the fields and entered Qazvin, a city like most every other Iranian city, noisy, cramped, dirty, polluted, and traffic-jammed. Beside the road were the joub that skirted most roads in Iran. Here the ditches were three feet deep, in parts concreted, with slush and ice and a little water trickling down them. Trees grew out of them, townsfolk washed their clothes in them, sometimes used them as a source of drinking water, or as a sewer. Beyond the ditches the walls began. Walls that hid houses or gardens, big or small, rich or eyesores. Usually the town and city houses were two floors, drab and boxlike, some brick, adobe, some plastered, and almost all of them hidden. Most had dirt floors, a few had running water, electricity, and some sanitation.

Traffic built up with startling suddenness. Bicycles, motorcycles, buses, trucks, cars of all sizes and makes and ages from ancient to very old, almost all dented and patched, some highly decorated with different-colored paints and small lights to suit the owners’ fancy. Erikki had driven this way many times over the last few years and he knew the bottlenecks that could happen. But there was no other way, no detour around the city though one had been planned for years. He smiled scornfully, trying to shut his ears to the noise, and thought, There’ll never be a detour, the Qazvinis couldn’t stand the quiet. Qazvinis and Rashtians - people from Rasht on the Caspian - were the butts of many Iranian jokes.

He skirted a burned-out wreck, then put in a cassette of Beethoven and turned the volume up to soothe the noise away. But it didn’t help much. “This traffic’s worse than usual! Where are the police?” Azadeh said, wide awake now. “Are you thirsty?”

“No, no thanks.” He glanced across at her, the sweater and tumbling hair enhancing her. He grinned. “But I’m hungry - hungry for you!” She laughed and took his arm. “I’m not hungry - just ravenous!” “Good.” They were content together.

As usual the road surface was bad. Here and there it was torn up - partially because of wear, partially because of never-ending repairs and road works though these rarely were signposted or had safety barriers. He skirted a deep hole then eased past another wreck that had been shoved carelessly into the side. As he did so a crumpled truck came from the other direction, its horn blaring angrily. It was brightly decorated, the fenders tied up with wire, the cab open and glassless, a piece of cloth the tank cap. On the flatbed was brushwood, piled high, with three passengers hanging on precariously. The driver was huddled up and wrapped in a ragged sheepskin coat. Two other men were beside him. As Erikki passed he was surprised to see them glaring at him. A few yards farther on a battered, overladen bus lumbered toward him. With great care he went closer to the joub, hugging the side to give the bus room, his wheels on the rim, and stopped. Again he saw the driver and all the passengers stare at him as they passed, women in their chadors, young men, bearded and clothed heavily against the cold. One of them shook his fist at him. Another shouted a curse.

We’ve never had any trouble before, Erikki thought uneasily. Everywhere he looked were the same angry glances. From the street and from the vehicles. He had to go very slowly because of the swarms of rogue motorcycles, bicycles, among the cars, buses, and trucks, in single lanes that fought for space - obedient to no traffic laws other than those which pleased the individual - and now a flock of sheep poured out of a side street to clutter the road, the motorists screaming abuse at the herdsmen, the herdsmen screaming abuse back and everyone angry and impatient, horns blaring. “Damned traffic! Stupid sheep!” Azadeh said impatiently, wide awake now. “Sound your horn, Erikki!”

“Be patient, go back to sleep. There’s no way I can overtake anyone,” he shouted over the tumult, conscious of the unfriendliness that surrounded them. “Be patient!”

Another three hundred yards took half an hour, other traffic coming from both sides to join the stream that got slower and slower. Street vendors and pedestrians and refuse. Now he was inching along behind a bus that took up most of the roadway, almost scraping cars on the other side, most times with one wheel half over the lip of the joub. Motorcyclists shoved past carelessly, banging the sides of the Range Rover and other vehicles, cursing each other and everyone else, pushing and kicking the sheep out of the way, stampeding them. From behind, a small car nudged him, then the driver jammed his hand on his horn in a paroxysm of rage that sent a sudden shaft of anger into Erikki’s head. Close your ears, he ordered himself. Be calm! There’s nothing you can do! Be calm!

But he found it increasingly difficult. After half an hour the sheep turned off into an alley, and traffic picked up a little. Then around the next corner the whole roadway was dug up and an unmarked ten-foot ditch - some six feet deep and half-filled with water - barred the way. A group of insolent workmen squatted nearby, hurling back abuse. And obscene gestures. It was impossible to go forward or back, so all traffic had to detour into a narrow side street, the bus ahead not making the turn, having to stop and reverse to more screams of rage and more tumult and when Erikki backed to give it room, a battered blue car behind him swerved around him on the opposite side of the road into the small opening ahead and forced the oncoming car to brake suddenly and skid. One of its wheels sank into the joub and the whole car tipped dangerously. Now traffic was totally snarled. Enraged, Erikki put on his brake, tore his door open, and went over to the car in the ditch and used his great strength to drag it back on the road. No one else helped, just swore and added to the uproar. Then he strode for the blue car. At that moment the bus made the corner and now there was room to move, the driver of the blue car let in his clutch and roared off with an obscene gesture.

With an effort Erikki unclenched his fists. Traffic on both sides of the road was honking at him. He got into the driver’s seat and let in the clutch.

“Here,” Azadeh said uneasily. She gave him a cup of coffee. “Thanks.” He drank it, driving with one hand, the traffic slowing again. The blue car had vanished. When he could talk calmly, he said, “If I’d got my hands on him or his car I’d have torn it and him to pieces.” “Yes. Yes, I know. Erikki, have you noticed how hostile everyone is to us? So angry?”

“Yes, yes, I have.”

“But why? We’ve driven though Qazvin twenty tim - ” Azadeh ducked involuntarily as refuse suddenly hit her window, then lurched across into his protection, frightened. He cursed and rolled up the windows, then reached across her and locked her door. Dung hit the windshield. “What the hell’s up with these matyeryebyets?” he muttered. “It’s as though we’ve an American flag flying and we’re waving pictures of the Shah.” A stone came out of nowhere and ricocheted off the metal sides. Then, ahead, the bus broke out of the narrow side-street diversion into the wide square in front of a mosque where there were market stalls and two lanes of traffic on either side. To Erikki’s relief they picked up some speed. The traffic was still heavy but it was moving and he got into second, heading for the Tehran exit the far side of the square. Halfway around the square the two lanes began to tighten as more vehicles joined those heading for the Tehran road.

“It’s never been this bad,” he muttered. “What the hell’s the holdup for?” “It must be another accident,” Azadeh said, very unsettled. “Or road works. Should we turn back - the traffic’s not so bad that way?” “We’ve plenty of time,” he said, encouraging her. “We’ll be out of here in a minute. Once-through the town we’ll be fine.” Ahead everything was slowing again, the din picking up. The two lanes were clogging, gradually becoming one again with much hooting, swearing, stopping, starting again and grinding along at about ten miles an hour, street stores and pushcarts encroaching the roadway and straddling the joub. They were almost at the exit when some youths ran alongside, began shouting insults, some foul. One of the youths banged on his side window. “American dog…”

“Pig Amer’can…”

These men were joined by others and some women in chador, fists raised. Erikki was bottled in and could not get out of the traffic or speed up or slow down nor could be turn around and he felt rage growing at his helplessness. Some of the men were banging on the hood and sides of the Range Rover and on his window. Now there was a pack of them and those on Azadeh’s side were taunting her, making obscene gestures, trying to open the door. One of the youths jumped on the hood but slipped and fell off and just managed to scramble out of the way before Erikki drove over him. The bus ahead stopped. Immediately there was a frantic melee as would-be passengers fought to get on and others fought to get off. Then Erikki saw an opening, stamped on the accelerator throwing off another man, got around the bus, just missing pedestrians who carelessly flooded through the traffic, and swung into a side street that miraculously was clear, raced up it and cut into another, narrowly avoided a mass of motorcyclists, and continued on again. Soon he was quite lost, for there was no pattern to the city or town except refuse and stray dogs and traffic, but he took his bearings from the sun’s shadows and at length came out onto a wider road, shoved his way into the traffic and around it, and soon came onto a road that he recognized, one that took him into another square in front of another mosque and then back on the Tehran road. “We’re all right now, Azadeh, they were just hooligans.” “Yes,” she said shakily. “They should be whipped.”

Erikki had been studying the crowds near the mosque and on the streets and in the vehicles, trying to find a clue to the untoward hostility. Something’s different, he thought. What is it? Then his stomach twisted. “I haven’t seen a soldier or an army truck ever since we left Tabriz - none. Have you?”

“No - no, not now that you mention it.”

“Something’s happened, something serious.”

“War? The Soviets have come over the border?” Her face lost even more color. “I doubt it - there’d be troops going north, or planes.” He looked at her. “Never mind,” he said, more to convince himself, “we’re going to have a fine time in Tehran, Sharazad’s there and lots of your friends. It’s about time you had a change. Maybe I’ll take the leave I’m owed - we could go to Finland for a week or two…”

They were out of the downtown area and into the suburbs now. The suburbs were ramshackled, with the same walls and houses and the same potholes. Here the Tehran road widened to four lanes, two each side, and though traffic was still heavy and slow, barely fifteen miles an hour, he was not concerned. A little way ahead, the Abadan-Kermanshah road branched off southwest, and he knew that this would bleed off a lot of the congestion. Automatically his eyes scanned the gauges as he would his cockpit instruments and, not for the first time, he wished he was airborne, over and out of all this mess. The gas gauge registered under a quarter full. Soon he would have to refuel but that would be no problem with plenty of spare fuel aboard. They slowed to ease past another truck parked with careless arrogance near some street vendors, the air heavy with the smell of diesel. Then more refuse came out of nowhere to splatter their windshield. “Perhaps we should turn around, Erikki, and go back to Tabriz. Perhaps we could skirt Qazvin.” “No,” he said, finding it eerie to hear fear in her voice - normally she was fearless. “No,” he repeated even more kindly. “We’ll go to Tehran and find out what the problem is, then we’ll decide.”

She moved closer to him and put a hand on his knee. “Those hooligans frightened me. God curse them,” she muttered, her other fingers toying nervously with the turquoise beads she wore around her neck. Most Iranian women wore turquoise or blue beads, or a single blue stone against the evil eye. “Those sons of dogs! Why should they be like that? Devils. May God curse them forever!” Just outside the city was a big army training camp and an adjoining air base. “Why aren’t soldiers here?”

“I’d like to know too,” he said.

The Abadan-Kermanshah turnoff came up on his right. Much of the traffic headed down it. Barbed-wire fences skirted both roads - as on most of the main roads and highways in Iran. The fences were needed to keep sheep and goats and cattle and dogs - and people - from straying across the roads. Accidents were very frequent and mortality high.

But that’s normal for Iran, Erikki thought. Like those poor fools who went over the side in the mountains - no one to know, no one to report them or even to bury them. Except the buzzards and the wild animals and packs of rotten dogs.

With the city behind them, they felt better. The country opened up again, orchards once more beyond the joub and the barbed wire. The Elburz Mountains north and undulating country south. But instead of speeding up, his two lanes slowed even more and congested, then reluctantly became one again, with more jostling, hooting, and rage. Wearily he cursed the inevitable roadworks that must be causing the bottleneck, shifted down, his hands and feet working smoothly of their own volition, hardly noticing the stopping and starting, stopping and starting, inching along again, engines grinding and overheating, noise and frustration building in every vehicle. Abruptly Azadeh pointed ahead. “Look!”

A hundred yards ahead was a roadblock. Groups of men surrounded it. Some were armed, all were civilians and poorly dressed. The roadblock was just this side of a nondescript village with street stalls beside the road and in the meadow opposite. Villagers, women and children, mingled with the men. All the women wore the black or gray chador. As each vehicle stopped, papers were checked and then it was allowed to pass. Several cars had been pulled off the road into the meadow where knots of men interrogated the occupants. Erikki saw more weapons among them.

“They’re not Green Bands,” he said.

“There aren’t any mullahs. Can you see any mullahs?”

“No.”

“Then they’re Tudeh or mujhadin - or fedayeen.”

“Better get your Identity Card ready,” he said and smiled at her. “Put on your parka so you won’t catch cold when I open the windows, and your hat.” It wasn’t the cold that worried him. It was the curve of her breasts, proud under the sweater, the delicacy of her waist and her free-flowing hair. In the glove compartment was a small, sheathed pukoh knife. This he concealed in his right boot. The other one, his big knife, was under his parka, in the center of his back.

When at last their turn came, the surly, bearded men surrounded the Range Rover. A few had U.S. rifles, one an AK47. Among them were some women, just faces in the chador. They peered up at her with beady eyes and grim disapproval. “Papers,” one of the men said in Farsi, holding out his hand, his breath reeking, the pervading smell of unwashed clothes and bodies coming into the car. Azadeh stared ahead, trying to dismiss the leers and mutterings and closeness that were totally outside her experience. Politely Erikki passed over his ID card and Azadeh’s. The man accepted them, stared at them, and passed them to a youth who could read. All the others waited silently, staring, stamping their feet in the cold. At length the youth said, his Farsi coarse, “He’s a foreigner from somewhere called Finland. He comes from Tabriz. He’s not American.”

“He looks American,” someone else said.

“The woman’s called Gorgon, she’s his wife… at least that’s what the papers say.”

“I’m his wife,” Azadeh said curtly. “Ca - ”

“Who asked you?” the first man said rudely. “Your family name’s Gorgon which is a landowning name and your accent’s high and mighty like your manner and more than likely you’re an enemy of the People.”

“I’m an enemy of no one. Pl - ”

“Shut up. Women are supposed to know manners and be chaste and cover themselves and be obedient even in a socialist state.” The man turned on Erikki. “Where are you going?”

“What’s he say, Azadeh?” Erikki asked.

She translated.

“Tehran,” he said quietly to the thug. “Azadeh, tell him we go to Tehran.” He had counted six rifles and one automatic. Traffic hemmed him in, no way to break out. Yet.

She did so, adding, “My husband does not speak Farsi.”

“How do we know that? And how do we know you’re married? Where is your marriage certificate?”

“I don’t have it with me. That I’m married is attested on my Identity Card.” “But this is a Shah card. An illegal card. Where is your new card?” “A card from whom? Signed by whom?” she said fiercely. “Give us back our cards and allow us to pass!”

Her strength had an effect on him and the others. The man hesitated. “You will understand, please, that there are many spies and enemies of the People that must be caught…”

Erikki could feel his heart pumping. Sullen faces, people out of the Dark Ages. Ugly. More men joined the group around them. One of them angrily and noisily waved the cars and trucks behind him ahead to be checked. No one was honking. Everyone waited their turn. And over the whole traffic jam was a silent brooding dread.

“What’s going on here?” A squat man shouldered his way through the crowd. The others gave way to him deferentially. Over his shoulder was a Czechoslovakian machine gun. The other man explained and gave over the papers. The squat man’s face was round and unshaven, his eyes dark, his clothes poor and filthy. A sudden shot rang out and all heads turned to look at the meadow.

A man was lying on the ground beside a small passenger car that had been pulled over by the hostiles. One of these men stood over him with an automatic. Another passenger was pressed against the side of the car with his hands over his head. Abruptly this man burst through the cordon and dashed away. The man with the gun raised it and fired, missed and fired again. This time the running man screamed and fell, writhing in agony, tried to scramble away, his legs useless now. Leisurely the man with the gun came up to him, emptied the magazine into him, killing him by stages. “Ahmed!” the squat man shouted out. “Why waste bullets when your boots would do just as well. Who are they?”

“SAVAK!” A murmur of satisfaction swept the crowd and villagers and someone cheered.

“Fool! Then why kill them so quickly, eh? Bring me their papers.” “The sons of dogs had papers claiming they were Tehrani businessmen but I know a SAVAK man when I see one. Do you want the false papers?” “No. Tear them up.” The squat man turned back to Erikki and Azadeh. “So it is that enemies of the People will be smoked out and done with.” She did not reply. Their own IDs were in the grubby hand. What if our papers are also considered false? Insha’Allah!

When the squat man finished scrutinizing the IDs he stared at Erikki. Then at her. “You claim you’re Azadeh Gorgon Yok… Yokkonen - his wife?” “Yes.”

“Good.” He stuffed their IDs in his pocket and jerked a thumb at the meadow. “Tell him to drive over there. We will search your car.”

“But th - ”

“Do it. NOW!” The squat man climbed onto the fender, his boots scratching the paintwork. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing to the blue cross on a white background that was painted on the roof.

“It’s the Finnish flag,” Azadeh said. “My husband’s Finnish.” “Why is it there?”

“It pleases him to have it there.”

The squat man spat, then pointed again toward the meadow. “Hurry up! Over there.” When they were in an empty spot, the crowd following them, he slid off. “Out. I want to search your car for arms and contraband.” Azadeh said, “We have no guns or contr - ”

“Out! And you, woman, you hold your tongue!” The crones in the crowd hissed approvingly. Angrily he jerked a thumb at the two bodies left crumpled in the trampled slush. “The People’s justice is quick and final and don’t forget it.” He stabbed a finger at Erikki. “Tell your monster husband what I said - if he is your husband.”

“Erikki, he says, the People’s … the People’s justice is quick and final and don’t forget it. Be careful, my darling. We, we have to get out of the car - they want to search the car.”

“All right. But slide over and come out my side.” Towering above the crowd, Erikki got out. Protectively, he put his arm around her, men, women, and some children crowding them, giving them little space. The stench of unwashed bodies was overpowering. He could feel her trembling, as much as she tried to hide it. Together they watched the squat man and others clambering into their spotless car, muddy boots on the seats. Others unlocked the rear door, carelessly removing and scattering their possessions, grubby hands reaching into pockets, opening everything - his bags and her bags. Then one of the men held up her filmy underclothes and night things to catcalls and jeers. The crones muttered their disapproval. One of them reached out and touched her hair. Azadeh backed away but those behind her would not give her room. At once Erikki moved his bulk to help but the mass of the crowd did not move though those nearby cried out, almost crushed by him, their cries infuriating the others who moved closer, threateningly, shouting at him. Suddenly Erikki knew truly, for the first time, he could not protect Azadeh. He knew he could kill a dozen of them before they overpowered and killed him, but that would not protect her.

The realization shattered him.

His legs felt weak and he had an overpowering wish to urinate and the smell of his own fear choked him and he fought the panic that pervaded him. Dully he watched their possessions being defiled. Men were staggering away with their vital cans of gasoline without which he could never make Tehran as all gas stations were struck and closed. He tried to force his legs into motion but they would not work, nor would his mouth. Then one of the crones shouted at Azadeh who numbly shook her head and men took up the cry, jostling him and jostling her, men closing on him, their fetid smell filling his nostrils, his ears clogged with the Farsi.

His arm was still around her, and in the noise she looked up and he saw her terror but could not hear what she said. Again he tried to ease more room for the two of them but again he failed. Desperately he tried to contain the soaring, claustrophobic, panic-savagery and need to fight beginning to overwhelm him, knowing that once he began it would start the riot that would destroy her. But he could not stop himself and lashed out blindly with his free elbow as a thickset peasant woman with strange, enraged eyes pushed though the cordon and thrust the chador into Azadeh’s chest, spitting out a paroxysm of Farsi at her, diverting attention from the man who had collapsed behind him, and now lay under their feet, his chest caved in from Erikki’s blow.

The crowd was shouting at her and at him, clearly telling her to put on the chador, Azadeh crying out, “No, no, leave me alone…” completely disoriented. In her whole life she had never been threatened like this, never been in a crowd like this, never experienced such closeness of peasants, or such hostility.

“Put it on, harlot…”

“In the Name of God, put on the chador…”

“Not in the Name of God, woman, in the name of the People …” “God is Great, obey the word…”

“Piss on God, in the name of the revolution…”

“Cover your hair, whore and daughter of a whore…”

“Obey the Prophet whose Name be praised…”

The shouting increased and the jostling, their feet trampling the dying man on the ground, then someone tore at Erikki’s arm that was around Azadeh and she felt his other hand go for the big knife and she screamed out, “Don’t, don’t, Erikki, they’ll kill you…”

In panic she pushed the peasant woman away and fought the chador into place, calling out repeatedly, “Allah-u Akbarrr,” and this mollified those nearby somewhat, their jeers subsiding, though people at the back shoved forward to see better, crushing others against the Range Rover. In the melee Erikki and Azadeh gained a little more space around them though they were still trapped on all sides. She did not look up at him, just clutched him, shivering like a frozen puppy, enveloped in the coarse shroud. A roar of laughter as one of the men held her bra against his chest and minced around. The vandalism went on until, suddenly, Erikki sensed a newness surrounding them. The squat man and his followers had stopped and they were looking fixedly toward Qazvin. As he watched he saw them begin to melt into the crowd. In seconds they had vanished. Other men near the roadblock were getting into cars and heading off down the Tehran road, picking up speed. Now villagers also stared toward the city, then others, until the whole crowd was transfixed. Approaching up the road, through the snarled lines of traffic, was another mob of men, mullahs at their head. Some of the mullahs and many of the men were armed. “Allah-u Akbar,” they shouted, “God and Khomeiniiiii!” then broke into a run, charging the roadblock. A few shots rang out, the fire was returned from the roadblock, the opposing forces clashed with staves, stones, iron bars, and some guns. Everyone else scattered. Villagers rushed for the protection of their homes, drivers and passengers fled from their cars for the ditches or lay on the ground. The cries and countercries and shots and noise and screams of this minor skirmish snapped Erikki’s paralysis. He shoved Azadeh toward their car, hastily picking up the nearest of their scattered possessions, throwing them into the back, and slammed the rear door. Half a dozen of the villagers began scavenging too but he shoved them out of the way, jumped into the driver’s seat and gunned the engine, jerked the car into reverse, then ahead, then roared off across the meadow, paralleling the road. Just ahead and to the right he saw the squat man with three of his followers getting into a car and remembered that the man still had their papers. For a split second he considered stopping but instantly rejected the thought and held course for the trees that skirted the road. But then he saw the squat man pull the machine gun off his shoulder, aim, and fire. The burst was a little high and Erikki’s maddened reflexes swung the wheel over and shoved his foot on the accelerator as he charged the gun. Their massive bumper rammed the man against the car broadside, crushing him and it, the machine gun firing until the magazine was spent, bullets howling off metal, splaying through the windshield, the Range Rover now a battering ram. Berserk, Erikki backed off then charged again, overturning the wreckage, killing them, and he would have got out and continued the carnage with his bare hands but then, in the rearview mirror, he saw men running for him and so he reversed and fled.

The Range Rover was built for this sort of terrain, its snow tires gripping the surface of the rough ground. In a moment they were in the trees and safe from capture, and he turned for the road, shifted into low, locked both differentials and clambered over the deep joub, ripping the barbed-wire fence apart. Once on the road he unlocked the differentials, changed gear, and whirled away.

Only when he was well away did the blood clear from his eyes. Aghast, he remembered the howl of the bullets spraying the car, and that Azadeh was with him. In panic he looked across at her. But she was all right though paralyzed with fear and hunched down in the seat, hanging on with both hands to the side, bullet holes in the glass and roof nearby, but all right though he did not recognize her for a moment, saw just an Iranian face made ugly by the chador - like any one of the tens of thousands they had all seen in the mobs.

“Oh, Azadeh,” he gasped, then reached over and pulled her to him, driving with one hand. In a moment he slowed and pulled over to the side and held her to him as the sobs tore her. He did not notice that the fuel gauge read near empty, or that the traffic was building up, or the hostile looks of the passersby, or that many cars contained revolutionaries fleeing their roadblock for Tehran.

Chapter 17

AT ZAGROS THREE: 3:18 P.M. The four men were lying on toboggans, racing down the slope behind the base, Scot Gavallan slightly in the lead of JeanLuc Sessonne who was neck and neck with Nasiri, their base manager, with Nitchak Khan trailing some twenty yards. This was a challenge match arranged by JeanLuc, Iran against the World, and all four men were excitedly trying to maximize their speed. The snow was virgin powder - very light snow on top of hard pack - and trackless. They had all climbed to the crest behind the base with Rodrigues and a villager as starting marshals. The winner’s prize was 5,000 rials - about $60 - and one of Lochart’s bottles of whisky: “Tom won’t mind,” JeanLuc had said grandly. “He’s having extra leave, enjoying the fleshpots of Tehran while we have to stay on base! Me, am I not in command? Of course. This commander is commandeering the bottle for the glory of France, the good of my troops, and our glorious overlords, the Yazdek Kash’kai,” he had added to general cheers.

It was a wonderful, sunny afternoon, here at seventy-five hundred feet, the sky cloudless and deep blue, air crisp. In the night the snow had stopped. Ever since Lochart had left to go to Tehran three days before, it had been snowing. Now the base and the bowl of mountains were a fairyland of pine and snow and crests soaring to thirteen thousand feet - with about twenty-four inches of fresh powder.

As the racers came lower, the slope steepened even more, a few unseen moguls bouncing them from time to time. They picked up speed, sometimes almost disappearing under the spray of snowflakes, all exhilarated, flat-out, and determined to win.

Ahead now were clumps of pine trees. Scot braked neatly with the toes of his ski boots, his mittened hands gripping the curved front supports, and arced gracefully around the trees, banked again, and began to swoop down the last great slope toward the finish line far below where the rest of the base and villagers were cheering them on. Nasiri and JeanLuc braked a fraction later, came around the trees just a fraction faster, banked in a cascade of snow and gained on him, now only inches between the three of them. Nitchak Khan did not brake at all, or make the diversion. He commended himself to God for the hundredth time, closed his eyes and went barreling into the pines. “Insha’Allahhhh!”

He passed the first tree safely by a foot, the next by half a foot, opened his eyes just in time to avoid a head-on collision by an inch, plowed through a dozen saplings gaining speed, abruptly soared into the air over a bump to clear miraculously a fallen tree, and slam back to earth once more in a chest-aching mump that almost crushed the air out of him. But he hung on, rearing up, heeled over on one runner for a second, got his balance back and now he burst out of the forest faster than the others, straighter than the others, ten yards ahead of the others to a roar from all the villagers. The four racers were converging now, hugging their toboggans for just that extra little speed, Scot, Nasiri, and JeanLuc gaining on Nitchak Khan, closer and closer. Here the snow was not so good and some small moguls bounced them, making them hold on tighter. Two hundred yards to go, one hundred - the men from the base and the villagers cheering and begging God for victory - now eighty, seventy, sixty, fifty, and then… The great mogul was well hidden. In the lead Nitchak Khan was the first to sail up out of control and come down broadside, the wind knocked out of him, then Scot and JeanLuc both whirled into the air to sprawl equally helpless, their toboggans upended in clouds of spray. Nasiri desperately tried to avoid mem and the mogul and wrenched his craft into a violent skidding turn but lost it and went tumbling down the mountainside to end up a little ahead of the others, gasping for breath.

Nitchak Khan sat up and wiped the snow out of his face and beard. “Praise be to God,” he muttered, astonished that no limbs were broken, and he looked around at the others. They were also picking themselves up, Scot helpless with laughter at JeanLuc who was also unhurt but still lying on his back letting out a paroxysm of French invective. Nasiri had ended up almost headfirst into a snowdrift and Scot, still laughing, went to help him. He, too, was just a little battered but no damage.

“Hey, you lot up there,” someone was shouting from the crowd below. It was Effer Jordon. “What about the bleeding race? It’s not over yet!” “Come on, Scot - come on, JeanLuc, for crissake!”

Scot forgot Nasiri and started to run for the winning post fifty yards away but he slipped and fell in the heavy snow, lurched up and slipped again, feet leaden. JeanLuc reeled up and charged in pursuit, closely followed by Nasiri and Nitchak Khan. The cheers of the crowd redoubled as the men fought through the snow, falling, scrambling, getting up and falling again, the going very rough, aches forgotten. Scot was still slightly in the lead, now Nitkchak Khan, now JeanLuc, now Nasiri - mechanic Fowler Joines, red in the face, urging them on, the villagers as excited.

Ten yards to go. The old Khan was three feet in the lead when he tripped and sprawled face forward. Scot took the lead, Nasiri almost beside him, JeanLuc just inches behind. They were all at a laboring, faltering, stumbling walk, dragging their boots up out of the heavy snow, then there was a mighty cheer as Nitchak Khan began to scuttle forward on all fours the last few yards, JeanLuc and Scot made one last desperate headlong dive for the line, and they all collapsed in a heap amid cheers and counter-cheers. “Scot won…”

“No, it was JeanLuc …”

“No, it was old Nitchak …”

When he had collected his breath, JeanLuc said, “As there is no clear opinion and even our revered mullah is not sure, I, JeanLuc, declare Nitchak Khan the winner by a nostril.” There were cheers and even more as he added, “And as the losers lost so

bravely, I award them with another of Tom’s bottles of whisky which I will commandeer to be shared by all expats at sundown!”

Everyone shook hands with everyone. Nitchak Khan agreed to another challenge match next month and, as he honored the law and did not drink, he haggled voraciously but sold the whisky he had won to JeanLuc at half its value. Everyone cheered again, then someone shouted a warning.

Northward, far up in the mountains, a red signal flare was falling into the valley. The silence was sudden. The flare vanished. Then another arced up and outward to fall again: SOS Urgent.

“CASEVAC,” JeanLuc said, squinting into the distance. “Must be Rig Rosa or Rig Bellissima.”

“I’m on my way.” Scot Gavallan hurried off.

“I’ll come with you,” JeanLuc said. “We’ll take a 212 and make it a check ride for you.”

In minutes they were airborne. Rig Rosa was one of the rigs they had acquired from the old Guerney contract, Bellissima one of their regulars. All eleven rigs in this area had been developed by an Italian company for IranOil, and though all were radio linked with Zagros Three, the connection was not always solid because of the mountains and scatter effect. Flares were a substitute.

The 212 climbed steadily, passing through ten thousand feet, snow-locked valleys sparkled in the sunshine, their operational ceiling seventeen thousand, depending on their load. Now Rig Rosa was ahead in a clearing on a small plateau at eleven thousand four hundred seventy. Just a few trailers for housing, and sheds scattered haphazardly around the tall derrick. And a helipad.

“Rig Rosa, this is JeanLuc. Do you read?” He waited patiently. “Loud and clear, JeanLuc!” It was the happy voice of Mimmo Sera, the “company man” - the highest rank on the site, an engineer in charge of all operations. “What you got for us, eh?”

“Niente, Mimmo! We saw a red flare and we’re just checking.” “Madonna, CASEVAC? It wasn’t us.” At once Scot broke off his approach, banked, and went on to the new heading, climbing farther into the mountain range. “Bellissima?”

“We’re going to check.”

“Let us know, eh? We haven’t been in contact since the storm came. What’s the latest news?”

“The last we heard was two days ago: the BBC said the Immortals at Doshan Tappeh had put down a rebellion of air force cadets and civilians. We haven’t heard from our Tehran HQ or anyone. If we do I’ll radio you.” “Eh, radio! JeanLuc, we’ll need another dozen loads of six-inch pipe and the usual of cement starting tomorrow. Okay?”

“Bien sur!” JeanLuc was delighted with the extra business and the opportunity to prove they were better than Guerney. “How’s it going?” “We’ve drilled to eight thousand feet and everything looks like another bonanza. I want to run the well next Monday, if possible. Can you order up Schlumberger for me?” Schlumberger was the worldwide firm that manufactured and supplied down-hole tools that sampled and electronically measured, with vast accuracy, oil-bearing capabilities and qualities of the various strata, tools to guide the drilling bits, tools to fish up broken bits, tools to perforate, by explosion, the steel casings of the hole to allow oil to flow into the pipe - along with the experts to work them. Very expensive but totally necessary. “To run a well” was the last job before cementing the steel casing in place and bringing the well on stream.

“Wherever they are, Mimmo, we’ll bring them Monday - Khomeini willing!” “Mamma mia, tell Nasiri we have to have them.” Reception was fading rapidly. “No problem. I’ll call you on the way back.” JeanLuc glanced out of the cockpit. They were passing over a ridge, still climbing, the engines beginning to labor. “Merde, I’m hungry,” he said, and stretched in his seat. “I feel like I’ve been massaged with a pneumatic drill - but that was a great race!”

“You know, JeanLuc, you were at the line a second before Nitchak Khan. Easily.”

“Of course, but we French are magnanimous, diplomatique, and very practical. I knew he’d sell us back our whisky for half price; if he’d been declared the loser, it would have cost us a fortune.” JeanLuc beamed. “But if it hadn’t been for that mogul, I would not have hesitated - I would have won easily.”

Scot smiled and said nothing, breathing easily, but conscious of his breathing. Above twelve thousand, according to regulations, pilots should be on oxygen if they were to stay up for more than half an hour. They carried none and never, yet, had any of the pilots felt any discomfort other than a headache or two, though it took a week or so to get acclimatized to living at seventy-five hundred feet. It was harder for the riggers at Bellissima.

Their own stopovers at Bellissima were usually very short. Just lumber up with maximum payload, inside or out, of 4,000 pounds. Pipes, pumps, diesel, winches, generators, chemicals, food, trailers, tanks, men, mud - the all-purpose name for the liquid that was pumped into the drill hole to remove waste, to keep the bit lubricated, in due course to tame the oil or gas, and without which deep drilling was impossible. Then lumber out, light, or with a full load of men or equipment for repair or, replacement. We’re just a jumped-up delivery van, Scot thought, his eyes scanning the skies, instruments, and all around. Yes, but how grand to be flying and not driving. Below, the crags were quite close, the tree line long since passed. They mounted the last ridge. Now they could see the rig.

“Bellissima, this is JeanLuc. Do you read?” Rig Bellissima was the highest of the chain, exactly at twelve thousand four hundred fifty feet above sea level. The base was perched on a ledge just below the crest. The other side of the ledge the mountain fell away seven thousand feet, almost sheer, into a valley ten miles wide and thirty miles long, a vast gash in the surface of the earth.

“Bellissima, this is JeanLuc. Do you read?” Again no answer. JeanLuc switched channels. “Zagros Three, do you read?”

“Loud and clear, Captain,” came the immediate answer of their Iranian base radio op Aliwari. “Excellency Nasiri’s beside me.”

“Stand by on this frequency. The CASEVAC’s at Bellissima, but we’ve no radio contact. We’re going in to land.” “Roger. Standing by.”

As always at Bellissima, Scot was awed at the vastness of the earth’s convulsion that had caused the valley. And, like all who visited this rig, again he wondered at the enormity of the gamble, labor, and wealth necessary to find the oil field, select the site, erect the rig, then to drill the thousands of feet to make the wells profitable. But they were, immensely so, as was this whole area with its huge oil and gas deposits trapped in limestone cones between seventy-five hundred and eleven thousand feet below the surface. And then the further huge investment and more gambling to connect this field to the pipeline that straddled the Zagros Mountains, joining the refineries at Isfahan in the center of Iran to those at Abadan on the Gulf - another extraordinary engineering feat of the old Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, now nationalized and renamed IranOil. “Stolen, Scot, laddie, stolen’s the correct word,” his father had told him many times. Scot Gavallan smiled to himself, thinking about his father, feeling a warm glow. I’m bloody lucky to have him, he thought. I still miss Mother but I’m glad she died. Terrible for a lovely, active woman to become a helpless, chair-ridden, palsied shell, still with her mind intact even at the end, the best mother a guy could have. Rotten luck, her death, particularly for Dad. But I’m glad he remarried, Maureen’s super, and Dad’s super and I’ve a smashing life and the future’s rosy - plenty of flying, plenty of birds and in a couple of years I’ll get married: how about Tess? His heart picked up a beat. Bloody nuisance Linbar’s her uncle and she his favorite niece, but bloody lucky I don’t have anything to do with him, she’s only eighteen so there’s plenty of time…

“Which way will you land, mon vieux?” came through his earphones. “From the west,” he said, collecting himself.

“Good.” JeanLuc was peering ahead. No sign of life. The site was heavily covered with snow, almost buried. Only the helipad was cleared. Threads of smoke came up from the trailer huts. “Ah! There!”

They saw the tiny figure of a man, bundled up, standing near the helipad and waving his arms. “Who is it?”

“I think it’s Pietro.” Scot was concentrating on the landing. At this height and because of the position on the ledge there were sudden gusts, turbulences, and whirlwinds within them - no room for mistakes. He came in over the abyss, the eddies rocking them, then corrected beautifully as he swooped over the land and touched down.

“Good.” JeanLuc turned his attention back to the bundled-up man he now recognized as Pietro Fieri, one of the “tool pushers,” next in importance to the company man. They saw him motion with his hand across his throat, the sign to cut engines, indicating the CASEVAC was not an immediate takeoff situation. JeanLuc beckoned the man to his side window and opened it. “What’s up, Pietro?” he shouted over the engines.

“Guineppa is sick,” Pietro shouted back - Mario Guineppa was the company man - and thumped the left side of his chest. “We think it may be his heart. And that’s not all. Look there!” He pointed aloft. JeanLuc and Scot craned to see better but could not see what was agitating him.

JeanLuc unbuckled and got out. The cold hit him and he winced, his eyes watering in the eddies caused by the rotors, his dark glasses helping only a little. Then he saw the problem, and his stomach twisted nastily. A few hundred feet above and almost directly over the camp, just under the crest, was an enormous overhang of snow and ice. “Madonna!”

“If that goes, it’ll avalanche the whole mountainside and maybe take us and everything into the valley along with it!” Pie-tro’s face was bluish in the cold. He was thickset and very strong with a dark grizzled beard, his eyes brown and keen but squinting now against the wind. “Guineppa wants to confer with you. Come to his trailer, eh?”

“And that?” JeanLuc jerked a thumb upward.

“If it goes, it goes,” Pietro said with a laugh, his teeth white against the darkness of his oil-stained parka. “Come on!” He ducked away from the rotors and trudged away. “Come on!”

Uneasily JeanLuc gauged the overhang. It could be there for weeks, or fall any second. Above the crest the sky was peerless, but little warmth came from the afternoon sun. “Stay here, Scot, keep her idling,” he called out, then followed Pietro awkwardly, the snow very deep.

Mario Guineppa’s two-room trailer was warm and untidy, charts on the walls, oil-stained clothes, heavy gloves, and hard hats on pegs with an oilman’s paraphernalia scattered about the office/living room. He was in the bedroom, lying on his bed fully dressed but for his boots, a big tall man of forty-five with an imposing nose, normally ruddy and weathered, but now pallid, a curious bluish tinge to his lips. The tool pusher from the other shift, Enrico Banastasio, was with him - a small, dark man with dark eyes and thin face.

“Ah, JeanLuc! Good to see you,” Guineppa said wearily.

“And you, mon ami.” Very concerned, JeanLuc unzipped his flying jacket and sat beside the bed. Guineppa had been in charge of Bellissima for two years - twelve hours on, twelve off, two months on site, two off - and had brought in three major producing wells here with space to drill another four. “It’s the hospital in Shiraz for you.”

“That’s not important, first there’s the overhang. JeanLuc, I wa - ” “We evacuate and leave that stronzo to the Hands of God,” Banastasio said. “Mamma mia, Enrico,” Guineppa said irritably, “I tell you again 1 think we can give God a hand - with JeanLuc’s help. Pietro agrees. Eh, Pietro?” “Yes,” Pietro said from the doorway, a toothpick in his mouth. “JeanLuc, I was brought up in Aosta in the Italian Alps so I know mountains and avalanches and I th - ”

“Si, e sei pazzo.” Yes, and you’re crazy, Banastasio said curtly. “Nel tuo culo.” In your ass. Pietro casually made an obscene gesture. “With your help JeanLuc, it’s easy to shift that stronzo.”

“What do you want me to do?” JeanLuc asked.

Guineppa said, “Take Pietro and fly up over the crest to a place he’ll show you on the north face. He’ll drop a stick of dynamite into the snow from there and that’ll avalanche the danger away from us.”

Pietro beamed. “Just like that and the overhang will vanish.” Banastasio said even more angrily, his English American-accented, “For crissake, I tell you again it’s too goddamn risky. We should evacuate first - then if you must, try your dynamite.”

Guineppa’s face screwed up as a spasm of pain went through him. One hand went to his chest. “If we evacuate we have to close everything down an - ” “So? So we close down. So what? If you don’t care about your own life, think of the rest of us. I say we evacuate pronto. Then dynamite. JeanLuc, isn’t it safer?”

“Of course it’s safer,” JeanLuc replied carefully, not wanting to agitate the older man. “Pietro, you say you know avalanches. How long will that hold?”

“My nose says it will go soon. Very soon. There are cracks below. Perhaps tomorrow, even tonight. I know where to blow her - and be very safe.” Pietro looked at Banastasio. “I can do it whatever this stronzo thinks.” Banastasio got up. “JeanLuc, me and my shift’re evacuating. Pronto. Whatever is decided.” He left.

Guineppa shifted in his cot. “JeanLuc, take Pietro aloft. Now.” “First, we’ll evacuate everyone to Rig Rosa, you first,” JeanLuc said crisply, “then dynamite. If it works you’re back in business, if not there’s enough temporary space at Rig Rosa for you.”

“Not first, last… there’s no need to evacuate.”

JeanLuc hardly heard him. He was estimating numbers of men to move. Each of the two shifts contained nine men - tool pusher, assistant, mudman, who monitored the mud and decided on its chemical constituents and weight, driller, who looked after the drilling, motorman, responsible for all winches, pumps, and so on, and four roustabouts to attach or unhook the pipes and drills. “You’ve seven Iranian cooks and laborers?”

“Yes. But I tell you it’s not necessary to evacuate,” Guineppa said exhaustedly.

“Safer, mon vieux” JeanLuc turned to Pietro. “Tell everyone to travel light and be fast.”

Pietro glanced down at Guineppa. “Yes or no?”

Disgustedly, Guineppa nodded, the effort tiring him. “Ask for a volunteer crew to stay. If no one will, Mother of God, close down.” Pietro was clearly disappointed. Still picking his teeth, he went out. Guineppa shifted in the cot again, trying to get more comfortable, and began to curse. He seemed more frail than before.

JeanLuc said quietly, “It’s better to evacuate, Mario.”

“Pietro is wise and clever but that porco misero, Banastasio, he’s fart up to his nostrils, always trouble, and it was his fault the radio was smashed, I know it!”

“What?”

“It was smashed on his shift. Now we need a new one, do you have a spare?” “No, but I’ll see if I can get you one. Is it reparable? Perhaps one of our mechanics c - ”

“Banastasio said he slipped and fell on it, but I heard he hit it with a hammer when it wouldn’t work… . Mamma mia!” Guineppa winced and clutched his chest and began to curse again.

“How long have you been having pains?”

“Since two days. Today has been the worst. That stronzo Banastasio!” Guineppa muttered. “But what can you expect, it runs in his family. Eh! His family are half-American, no? I heard the American side has mafioso connections.”

JeanLuc smiled to himself, not believing it, half listening to the tirade. He knew that they hated each other - Guineppa, the Portuguese-Roman patrician, and Banastasio, Sicilian-American peasant. But that’s not so surprising, he thought, locked up here, twelve hours on, twelve off, day after day, month after month, however good the pay.

Ah, the pay! How I could use their pay! Why even the lowest roustabout gets as much in one week as I get in a month - a miserable 1,200 pounds sterling monthly for me, a senior captain and training captain, with forty-eight hundred hours! Even with the miserly 500 pounds monthly overseas allowance, that’s not enough for the kids, school fees, my wife, the mortgage and filthy taxes… let alone the best food and wine and my darling Sayada. Ah, Sayada, how I’ve missed you! But for Lochart…

Piece of shit! Tom Lochart could have let me go with him and I could be in Tehran in her arms right now! My God how I need her. And money. Money! May the balls of all taxmen shrivel into dust and their cocks vanish! I’ve barely enough as it is and if Iran goes down the sewer, what then? I’ll bet S-G won’t survive. That’s their bad luck - there’ll always be chopper work for a pilot as excellent as I am somewhere in the world.

He saw Guineppa watching him. “Yes, mon vieux?” “I’ll go with the last load.” “Better to go first, there’s a medic at Rosa.” “I’m fine - honestly.” Then JeanLuc heard his name being called and put on his parka. “Can I do anything for you?”

The man smiled wearily. “Just take Pietro aloft with the dynamite.” “I’ll do that, but last, with any luck, before dusk. Don’t worry.” Outside the. cold hit him again. Pietro was waiting for him. Men were already grouped near the idling helicopter, with packs and duffel bags of various sizes. Banastasio went past leading a big German shepherd. “The man said to travel light,” Pietro told him. “I am,” Banastasio said equally sourly. “I’ve my papers, my dog, and my shift. The rest’s replaceable, on the goddamn company.” Then to JeanLuc, “You’ve a full load, JeanLuc, let’s get with it.”

JeanLuc checked the men aboard, and the dog, then called Nasiri on the radio and told him what they were going to do. “Okay, Scot, off you go. You take her,” he said and got out and saw Scot’s eyes widen. “You mean by myself?”

“Why not, mon brave. You’ve the hours. This’s your third check ride. You’ve got to start sometime. Off you go.”

He watched Scot lift off. In barely five seconds the chopper was over the abyss with a clear seventy-five hundred feet below and he knew how eerie and wonderful that first solo takeoff from Bellissima would be, envying the young man the thrill. Young Scot’s worth it, he thought, watching him critically. “JeanLuc!”

He took his eyes off the distant chopper and glanced around, wondering suddenly what was so different. Then he realized it was the silence, so vast that it almost seemed to deafen him. For a moment he felt weirdly unbalanced, even a little sick, then the whine of the wind picked up and he became whole again.

“JeanLuc! Over here!” Pietro was in a shadow with a group of men on the other side of the camp, beckoning him. Laboriously, he picked his way over to them. They were strangely silent.

“Look there,” Pietro said nervously and pointed aloft. “Just under the overhang. There! Twenty, thirty feet below. You see the cracks?” JeanLuc saw them. His testicles heaved. They were no longer cracks in the ice but fissures. As they watched, there was a vast groaning. The whole mass seemed to shift a fraction. A small chunk of ice and snow fell away. It gathered speed and substance and thundered down the steep slope. They were shock-still. The avalanche, now tons of snow and ice, came to rest barely fifty yards away from them.

One of the men broke the silence. “Let’s hope the chopper doesn’t come barreling back like a kamikaze - that could be the detonator, amico. Even a little noise could trigger that whole stronzo apart.”

Chapter 18

IN THE SKIES NEAR QAZVIN: 3:17 P.M. From the moment Charlie Pettikin had left Tabriz almost two hours ago with Rakoczy - the man he knew as Smith - he had flown the 206 as straight and level as possible, hoping to lull the KGB man to sleep, or at least off guard. For the same reason he had avoided conversation by slipping his headset onto his neck. At length Rakoczy had given up, just watched the terrain below. But he stayed alert with his gun across his lap, his thumb on the safety catch. And Pettikin wondered about him, who he was, what he was, what band of revolutionaries he belonged to - fedayeen, mujhadin, or Khomeini supporter - or if he was loyal, gendarmerie, army, or SAVAK, and if so why it was so important to get to Tehran. It had never occurred to Pettikin that the man was Russian not Iranian.

At Bandar-e Pahlavi where refueling had been laboriously slow, he had done nothing to break the monotony, just paid over his last remaining U.S. dollars and watched while the tanks were filled, then signed the official IranOil chit. Rakoczy had tried to chat with the refueler but the man was hostile, clearly frightened of being seen refueling this foreign helicopter, and even more frightened of the machine gun that was on the front seat. All the time they were on the ground Pettikin had gauged the odds of trying to grab the gun. There was never a chance. It was Czech. In Korea they had been plentiful. And Vietnam. My God, he thought, those days seem a million years ago.

He had taken off from Bandar-e Pahlavi and was now heading south at a thousand feet, following the Qazvin road. East he could see the beach where he had set down Captain Ross and his two paratroopers. Again he wondered how they had known he was making a flight to Tabriz and what their mission had been. Hope to God they make it - whatever they had to make. Had to be urgent and important. Hope I see Ross again, I’d like that…

“Why do you smile, Captain?”

The voice came through his earphones. Automatically on takeoff this time he had put them on. He looked across at Rakoczy and shrugged, then went back to monitoring his instruments and the ground below. Over Qazvin he banked southeast following the Tehran road, once more retreating into himself. Be patient, he told himself, then saw Rakoczy tense and put his face closer to the window, looking downward.

“Bank left… a little left,” Rakoczy ordered urgently, his concentration totally on the ground. Pettikin put the chopper into a gentle bank - Rakoczy on the low side. “No, more! Make a 180.”

“What is it?” Pettikin asked. He steepened the bank, suddenly aware the man had forgotten the machine gun in his lap. His heart picked up a beat. “There, below on the road. That truck.”

Pettikin paid no attention to the ground below. He kept his eyes on the gun, gauging the distance carefully, his heart racing. “Where? I can’t see anything…” He steepened the bank even more to come around quickly onto the new heading. “What truck? You mean…”

His left hand darted out and grabbed the gun by the barrel and awkwardly jerked it through the sliding window into the cabin behind them. At the same time his right hand on the stick went harder left then quickly right and left-right again, rocking the chopper viciously. Rakoczy was taken completely unaware and his head slammed against the side, momentarily stunning him. At once Pettikin clenched his left fist and inexpertly slashed at the man’s jaw to put him unconscious. But Rakoczy, karate-trained, his reflexes good, managed to stop the blow with his forearm. Groggily he held on to Pettikin’s wrist, gaining strength every second as the two men fought for supremacy, the chopper dangerously heeled over, Rakoczy still on the downside. They grappled with each other, cursing, seat belts inhibiting them. Both became more frenzied, Rakoczy with two hands free beginning to dominate.

Abruptly Pettikin gripped the stick with his knees, took his right hand off it, and smashed again at Rakoczy’s face. The blow was not quite true but the strength of it shifted him off balance, destroyed the grip of his knees shoving the stick left, and overrode the delicate balance of his feet on the rudder pedals. At once the chopper reeled onto its side, lost all lift - no chopper can fly itself even for a second - the centrifugal force further throwing his weight askew and in the melee the collective lever was shoved down. The chopper fell out of the sky, out of control.

In panic, Pettikin abandoned the fight. Blindly he struggled to regain control, engines screaming and instruments gone mad. Hands and feet and training against panic, overcorrecting, then overcorrecting again. They dropped nine hundred feet before he got her straight and level, his heart unbearable, the snow-covered ground fifty feet below.

His hands were trembling. It was difficult to breathe. Then he felt something hard shoved in his side and heard Rakoczy cursing. Dully he realized the language was not Iranian but did not recognize it. He looked across at him and saw the face twisted with anger and the gray metal of the automatic and cursed himself for not thinking of that. Angrily he tried to shove the gun away but Rakoczy stuck it hard into the side of his neck. “Stop or I’ll blow your head off, you matyeryebyets!”

At once Pettikin put the plane into a violent bank, but the gun pressed harder, hurting him. He felt the safety catch go off and the gun cock. “Your last chance!”

The ground was very near, rushing past sickeningly. Pettikin knew he could not shake him off. “All right - all right,” he said, conceding, and straightened her and began to climb. The pressure from the gun increased and with it, the pain. “You’re hurting me for God’s sake and shoving me off balance! How can I fly if y - ”

Rakoczy just jabbed the gun harder, shouting at him, cursing him, jamming his head against the doorframe.

“For Christ’s sake!” Pettikin shouted back in desperation, trying to adjust his headset that had been torn off in the struggle.

“How the hell can I fly with your gun in my neck?” The pressure eased off a fraction and he righted the plane. “Who the hell are you, anyway?” “Smith!” Rakoczy was equally unnerved. A split second later, he thought, and we would have been splattered like a pat of fresh cow dung. “You think you deal with a matyeryebyets amateur?” Before he could stop himself his reflexes took his hand and backhanded Pettikin across the mouth. Pettikin was rocked by the blow, and the chopper twisted but came back into control. He felt the burn spreading over his face. “You do that again and I’ll put her on her back,” he said with a great finality. “I agree,” Rakoczy said at once. “I apologize for… for that … for that stupidity, Captain.” Carefully he eased back against his door but kept the gun cocked and pointed. “Yes, there was no need. I’m sorry.” Pettikin stared at him blankly. “You’re sorry?”