“Stronzo,” Jesper said agreeably, motioned to his assistant and the roustabout and went forward. “We’ll just shut it down, no capping.” The snow crunched underfoot. Wind rustled the treetops and then they heard the incoming engine of the chopper back from the base. “Let’s get with it.” They were hidden from the helipad and main buildings of Rosa, half a mile away. Irritably, Mimmo lit a cigarette and leaned against the hood and watched the three men work diligently, fighting the valves, some stuck, then fetching the huge wrench to unglue them, then the bullet ricocheted off the Christmas Tree and the following crackkkkkkkkk echoed through the forest. All of them froze. They waited. Nothing.
“You see where it came from?” Jesper muttered. No one answered him. Again they waited. Nothing. “Let’s finish,” he said and again put his weight onto the wrench. The others came forward to help. At once mere was another shot and the bullet went through the windshield of the truck, tore a hole in the cabin wall, and ripped a computer screen and some electrical gear apart before going out the other side. Silence.
No movement anywhere. Just wind and a little snow falling, disturbed by the wind. Sound of the chopper jets shrieking now in the landing flare. Mimmo Sera shouted out in Farsi, “We just shut down the well, Excellencies, to make it safe. We shut it down and then we leave.” Again they waited. No answer. Again, “We only make the well safe! Safe for Iran - not for us! For Iran and the Imam - it’s your oil not ours!”
Waiting again and never a sound but the sounds of the forest. Branches crackling. Somewhere far off an animal cried. “Mamma mia,” Mimmo said, his voice hoarse from shouting, then walked over and picked up the wrench and the bullet sang past his face so close he felt its wake. His shock was sudden and vast. The wrench slipped from his gloves. “Everyone in the truck. We leave.”
He backed away and got into the front seat. The others followed. Except Jesper. He retrieved the wrench and when he saw the havoc the errant bullet had caused in his cabin, to his equipment, his face closed, his anger exploded, and he hurled the wrench impotently at the forest with a curse and stood there a moment, feet slightly apart, knowing he was an easy target but suddenly not caring. “Forbannades shitdjavlarrrrrrr!”
“Get in the car,” Mimmo called out.
“Forbannades shitdjavlar,” Jesper muttered, the Swedish obscenity pleasing him, then got into the driver’s seat. The truck went back the way it had come and when it was out of sight a fusillade of bullets from both sides of the forest slammed into the Christmas Tree, denting parts of the metal, screaming away into the snow or sky. Then silence. Then someone laughed and called out, “Allahhhh-u Akbarrr…” The cry echoed. Then died away.
AT ZAGROS THREE: 6:38 P.M. The sun touched the horizon. Last of the spares and luggage being put aboard. All four choppers were lined up, two 212s, the 206, and the Alouette, pilots ready, JeanLuc stomping up and down - departures delayed by Nitchak Khan who had, earlier, arbitrarily ordered all aircraft to leave together which had made it impossible for JeanLuc to make Al Shargaz, only Shiraz, there to overnight as night flying was forbidden in Iranian skies.
“Explain to him again, Tom,” JeanLuc said angrily.
“He’s already told you no, told me no, so it’s no and it’s too goddamn late anyway! You all set, Freddy?”
“Yes,” Ayre called out irritably. “We’ve been waiting an hour or more!” Grimly Lochart headed for Nitchak Khan who had heard the anger and irritation and saw with secret delight the discomfiture of the strangers. Standing beside Nitchak Khan was the Green Band Lochart presumed was from the komiteh, and a few villagers. The rest had drifted away during the afternoon. Into the forest, he thought, his mouth dry. “Kalandar, we are almost ready.”
“As God wants.”
Lochart called out, “Freddy, last load, now!” He took off his peaked cap and the others did likewise as Ayre, Rodrigues, and two mechanics carried the makeshift coffin out of the hangar across the snow and carefully loaded it into JeanLuc’s 212. When it was done, Lochart stepped aside. “Shiraz party board.” He shook hands with Mimmo, Jesper, the roustabout, and Jesper’s assistant as they climbed aboard, settling themselves amid the luggage, spares, and coffin. Uneasily Mimmo Sera and his Italian roustabout crossed themselves, then locked their seat belts.
JeanLuc climbed into the pilot’s seat, Rodrigues beside him. Lochart turned back to the rest of the men. “All aboard!”
Watched carefully by Nitchak Khan and the Green Band, the remainder went aboard, Ayre flying the Alouette, Claus Schwartenegger the 206, all seats full, tanks full, cargo belly full, external skid carriers lashed with spare rotor blades. Lochart’s 212 was crammed and over maximum: “By the time we get to Kowiss we’ll’ve used a lot of fuel so we’ll be legal - anyway it’s downhill all the way,” he had told all pilots when he had briefed them earlier.
Now he stood alone on the snow of Zagros Three, everyone else belted in and doors closed. “Start up!” he ordered, his tension mounting. He had told Nitchak Khan he had decided to act as takeoff master.
Nitchak Khan and the Green Band came up to Lochart. “The young pilot, the one who was wounded, where is he?”
“Who? Oh, Scot? If he’s not here, he’s in Shiraz, Kalandar,” Lochart said and saw anger rush into the old man’s face and the Green Band’s mouth drop open. “Why?”
“That’s not possible!” the Green Band said.
“I didn’t see him board so he must have gone on an earlier flight…” Lochart had to raise his voice over the growing scream of the jets, all engines now up to speed, “… on an earlier flight when we were at Rig Rosa and Maria, Kalandar. Why?”
“That’s not possible, Kalandar,” the Green Band repeated, frightened, as the old man turned on him. “I was watching carefully!”
Lochart ducked under the whirling blades and went to the pilot’s window of JeanLuc’s 212, taking out a thick white envelope. “Here, JeanLuc, bonne chance,” he said and gave it to him. “Take off!” For an instant he saw the glimmer of a smile before he hurried to safety, JeanLuc shoved on maximum power for a quick takeoff, and she lifted and trundled away, the wash from the blades ripping at his clothes and those of the villagers, the jets drowning out what Nitchak Khan was shouting.
Simultaneously - also by prearrangement - Ayre and Schwartenegger gunned their engines, easing away from each other before lumbering in a slow labored climb for the trees. Lochart held on to his hope and then the furious Green Band caught him by the sleeve and pulled him around. “You lied,” the man was shouting, “you lied to the kalandar - the young pilot did not leave earlier! I would have seen him, I watched carefully - tell the kalandar you lied!”
Abruptly Lochart ripped his sleeve away from the young man, knowing that every second meant a few more feet of altitude, a few more yards to safety. “Why should I lie? If the young pilot’s not in Shiraz then he’s still here! Search the camp, search my airplane - come on, first let us search my airplane!” He stalked off toward his 212 and stood at the open door, from the corners of his eyes seeing JeanLuc’s 212 now over the tree line, Ayre so overloaded barely making it, and the 206 still climbing. “In all the Names of God, let’s search,” he said, willing their attention onto him and away from the escaping choppers, willing them not to search his airplane but the camp itself. “How can a man hide here? Impossible. What about the office or the trailers, perhaps he’s hiding…”
The Green Band pulled the gun off his shoulder and aimed at him. “Tell the kalandar you lied or you die!”
With hardly any effort, Nitchak Khan angrily ripped the gun out of the youth’s hands and threw it into the snow. “I’m the law in Zagros - not you! Go back to the village!” Filled with fear, the Green Band obeyed instantly. The villagers waited and watched. Nitchak Khan’s face was graven and his small eyes went from chopper to chopper. They were away now, but not yet out of range of those he had posted around the base - to fire only on his signal, only his. One of the smaller choppers was banking, still climbing as fast as possible, coming around in a big circle. To watch us, Nitchak Khan thought, to watch what happens next. As God wants.
“Dangerous to shoot down the sky machines,” his wife had said. “That will bring wrath down upon us.”
“Terrorists will do that - we will not. The young pilot saw us, and the Farsispeaking kalandar pilot knows. They must not escape. Terrorists have no mercy, they care nothing for law and order, and how can their existence be disproved? Aren’t these mountains ancient havens for brigands? Haven’t we chased these terrorists to the limit of our power? What could we do to prevent the tragedy - nothing.”
And now before him was the last of the Infidels, his main enemy, the one who had cheated him and lied and whisked the other devil away. At least this one will not escape, he thought. The barest tip of the sun was just above the horizon. As he watched, it vanished. “Peace be with you, pilot.” “And with you, Kalandar, God watch you,” Lochart said thinly. “That envelope I gave to my French pilot. You saw me give it to him?”
