backtracking.” Gordon Jones, the copilot, was checking everything, setting up for their Tehran inbound. The wind was tugging at them, their wheels uncertain. Over at the terminal he saw the Rolls stop and men surround it. “Quick as you can - turn around, there’s plenty of runway,” Hashemi said. “Soon as I can, sir,” John Hogg said politely, but he was thinking, bloody twit, Colonel whoever you are, I’m more than a little anxious to be up in the Wild Blue myself but I’ve got to get a run at it. He had seen the hostility of the men in the car and, at Tehran, McIver’s nervousness. But Tehran Tower had cleared him instantly, given him priority as though he were carrying Khomeini himself. Bloody hell, what we do for England and a pint of beer! His hands and feet were feeling the snow and the ice and the slipperiness of the surface. He eased off the throttles a little. “Look!” the copilot said. A jet helicopter was crossing the airspace, low down a mile or so ahead. “A 212, isn’t she?”
“Yes. Doesn’t look like she’s inbound here,” Hogg said, his eyes sweeping constantly. At the terminal another car had joined the men near the Rolls; ahead to the left was a glint of light; now the 212 had gone behind a hill; to the right was a flock of birds; all needles safe in the Green; more men near the Rolls and someone on the roof of the terminal building; fuel fine; snow not too deep, sheet ice underneath; watch the drift ahead; go right a little; radio’s correctly tuned; wind’s still up our tail; thunderclouds building up to the north; back a hair on the left engine! Hogg corrected the lurching swing, the airplane overresponsive on the icy surface. “Perhaps you’d better go back to your seat, Colonel,” he said. “Get airborne as fast as possible.” Hashemi went back. Armstrong was peering out of the windows toward the terminal. “What’re they doing there, Robert? Any problem?” he asked.
“Not yet. Congratulations - you handled Abdollah brilliantly.” “If he delivers.” Now that it was over, Hashemi felt a little sick. Too close to death that time, he thought. He fastened his seat belt, then undid it, took the automatic from his side pocket, put the safety on, and slipped it into the shoulder holster. His fingers touched the British passport in his inner pocket. Perhaps I won’t need it after all, he thought. Good. I’d hate having to disgrace myself by using it. He lit a cigarette. “Do you think he’ll last till Saturday? I thought he was going to have a fit.”
“He’s been that fat and that foul for years.” Armstrong heard the violent undercurrent. Hashemi Fazir was always dangerous, always on the edge, his fanatic patriotism mixed with his contempt for most Iranians. “You handled him wonderfully,” he said and looked out of the window again. The Rolls and the other car and the men surrounding them were quite far and half-hidden by the snow dunes, but he could see many guns among them and from time to time someone would point in their direction. Come on, for God’s sake, he thought, let’s get aloft.
“Colonel” - Hogg’s voice came over the intercom - “could you come forward, please?”
Hashemi unlocked his belt and went to the cockpit.
“There, sir,” Hogg said pointing off to the right, past the end of the runway, to a clump of pines in front of the forest. “What do you make of that?” The tiny fleck of light began winking again. “It says SOS.” “Robert,” Hashemi called out, “look ahead and to the right.” The four men concentrated. Again the light repeated the SOS. “No mistaking it, sir,” Hogg said. “I could signal them back.” He pointed to the heavy-duty signal flash that was for emergency use to give a Green or a Red light in case their radios failed.
Hashemi called back into the cabin. “What do you think, Robert?” “It’s SOS all right!”
The 125 was hurrying down the runway toward the signal. They waited, then saw three tiny figures come out from the trees, two men and a woman in chador. And they saw their guns.
“It’s a trap,” Hashemi said at once, “don’t go any closer, turn around!” “I can’t,” Hogg said, “haven’t got enough runway.” He eased the throttles a little more open. The jet was taxiing very fast, paralleling their landing tracks. They could see the figures waving their guns.
Armstrong called out, “Let’s get to hell out of here!”
“Soon as I can, sir. Colonel, perhaps you’d better get back to your seat, this might be kind of bumpy,” Hogg said, his voice nerveless, then dismissed them both from his mind. “Gordon, keep your eye on those buggers out there and on the terminal.”
“Sure. No sweat.”
The captain turned momentarily to check the other end of the runway, judged they were not quite far enough yet, but eased back on the throttle and touched the brakes. The skid began so he loosed them, keeping the jet as straight as he could, the wind shifting. The figures near the trees were larger now.
“They look a ropy lot, tribesmen, I’d say. Two automatic carbines.” Gordon Jones squinted at the terminal. “Rolls’s gone but a car heading our way along the ramp.”
Pulling off the throttles now. Still too fast to turn.
“Christ, I think… I think one of the tribesmen fired a gun,” Jones said, his voice picking up.
“Here we go,” Hogg said into the intercom mike, braked, felt her slide, held it, then began his right turn onto the width of the runway, their momentum skidding them and the wind still hostile.
In the cabin Armstrong and Hashemi were hanging on grimly, peering out of the windows. They could see one of the figures running toward them, brandishing his gun. Armstrong muttered, “We’re bloody sitting ducks.” He felt the jet sliding in the turn, no traction, and he cursed. In the cockpit Hogg was whistling tonelessly. The jet surged over their landing tracks, still skidding, the far side of the runway banked by solid, heavy dunes. He did not dare to gun her yet and waited, mouth dry, willing her to come around faster and into the wind. But she didn’t, just continued to slide, wheels useless, brakes dangerous, engines growling, the subsurface ice.
Inexorably the snow dunes came closer and closer. He could see the jagged ice edges that would tear their thin skin asunder. Nothing to do but wait. Then a gust took her tail section and buffeted it around and now, though she was still sliding, she faced into the wind. Delicately he gunned both engines, felt the slide slowing, and at once began inching the throttles forward until he had some forward speed, more open and faster, and more control and now complete control and he shoved the throttles hard against the gate. The 125 surged ahead, his wheels left the surface, he touched the undercart retract, and they were soaring.
“You may smoke if you wish,” he said laconically into the intercom, totally pleased with himself.
On the airfield, not far from the trees, Ross had stopped running and waving, his chest hurting him. “Bloody bastard,” he shouted at the airplane. “Haven’t you any bloody eyes?”
Bitterly disappointed, he started walking back to the others who had obediently waited on the edge of the forest. Over all of them was a deep gloom. So near, he thought. Through his binoculars he had seen the Khan arrive, then go aboard, then, later, Armstrong come down the steps with the Khan, helping him. “Oh, let me look, Johnny.” Azadeh had said anxiously and refocused the lenses to suit her eyes. “Oh, dear, Father looks sick - I hope he’s all right,” she had said. “The doctor’s always telling him to diet and take his life easier.”
“He’s doing just fine, Azadeh,” he had said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. But she had heard it and flushed and she said, “Oh so sorry, I didn’t mean… I know he’s…”
“I meant nothing,” he had said and refocused on Armstrong, ecstatic that it was Armstrong, devising a plan how to get aboard. So easy. An S-G airplane - easy to see the decal - and Armstrong. We’re safe! But now we’re not safe, we’re in a mess, he told himself even more bitterly, trudging back in the snow, feeling filthy and wanting a bath and helpless with rage. They’ve got to have seen the SOS. Were their heads in their arses? Why the hell didn’t th - He heard Gueng’s keening danger signal and he whirled. A car was a few hundred yards away, heading their way. He ran back and pointed into the forest. “That way!”
Earlier he had made a plan. First the airport, then, if that didn’t work, they would head for Erikki’s base. The base was about four miles away, southeast of Tabriz. Covered by the trees, he paused and looked back. The car stopped at the end of the runway and men got out, started after them, but found the going too heavy through the drifts. They climbed back into the car and headed away. “They won’t catch us now,” Ross said. He led the way deeper into the forest, of necessity keeping to the crude path. On the edge of this clump of forest were frozen fields that in the summer would be abundant with crops, most of them belonging to a few landowners, in spite of the Shah’s land reforms. Beyond the fields were the outlying slums of Tabriz. They could see the minarets of the Blue Mosque and smoke from many fires, pulled away by the wind. “Can we skirt the city, Azadeh?” “Yes,” she said, “but it’s… it’s quite a long way.”
They heard her underlying concern. So far she had moved quickly and without complaint. But she was still a hazard. They wore their tribesmen’s clothes over their uniforms. Their scrubby boots would pass. So would their weapons. And her chador. He looked at her, still not used to the ugliness that it made of her. She felt his glance and tried to smile. She understood. Both about the chador and about being a burden.
“Let’s go through the town,” she said. “We can stay in the side streets. I have some… some money and we can buy food. Johnny, you could pretend to be Caucasian from, say, from Astara, I could pretend to be your wife. Gueng, you speak Gurkhali or a foreign tongue and be rough and arrogant like the Turkomans from the north - you’d
