Meshang.”
“Yes. Yes, it is. It’s working out just as I planned.”
NEAR JALEH: To reach the small grass airstrip, once the home of an impoverished aero club now disused, Lochart had skirted the city and kept low to come under any radar. All the way in from D’Arcy 1908 he had tuned his radio to Tehran International but the airwaves were silent, the airport closed down for Holy Day, no flights permitted. He had been careful to arrive at sunset. When he cut the engine and heard the muezzins he was pleased. So far so good.
The hangar door was rusty. With some difficulty he managed to open it and wheeled the 206 inside. Then he reshut the door and began the long walk. He wore his flight clothes and, if he was stopped, he planned to say that he was an airline pilot whose car had broken down and was going to spend the night with friends.
As he reached Tehran’s outskirts, the roads became more and more crowded, people going home or coming from the mosques, no color or laughter among them, only a brooding apprehension.
There was not much traffic except army vehicles crammed with Green Bands. No troops or uniformed police. Traffic wardens were young Green Bands. The city was coming back into order. Never a woman in Western dress, all chadors. A few curses followed him, not many. A few greetings - his pilot’s uniform gave him standing. Deeper into the city he found a good place to wait for a taxi near a street market. While he waited he bought a bottled soft drink, took a wedge of warm fresh bread and munched it. The night wind picked up a little but the brazier was cheerful and inviting.
“Greetings. Your papers, please.”
The Green Bands were youths, polite, some with the beginnings of beards. Lochart showed them his ID that was stamped and current and they handed it back to him after some discussion. “Where are you going, may we ask?” Deliberately in atrocious Farsi he said, “Visit friends, near bazaar. Car break down. Insha’Allah.” He heard them talking among themselves, saying that pilots were safe, that this one was Canadian - isn’t that part of the Great Satan? No, I don’t think so. “Peace be with you,” they said and wandered off.
He went to the comer and watched the traffic, the smell of the city strong - gasoline, spices, rotting fruit, urine, body odor, and death. His sharp eyes saw a taxi with only two men in the back and one in the front at an intersection now blocked by a truck making a turn. Without hesitation he ducked through the cars, shouldered another man out of the way, jerked the back door open, and crammed himself inside, apologizing profusely in good Farsi, and begged the occupants to allow him to accompany them. After some cursing, some haggling, the driver discovered the bazaar was directly on the route that he had arranged with the others, all individual travelers who had also fought their way in. “With the Help of God, yours will be the second stop, Excellency.”
I’ve made it, he told himself exultantly, then allowed the other thought to surface: hope the others made it too. Duke and Scrag, Rudi, all of them, Freddy and good old Mac.
* BAHRAIN - INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT: 8:50 P.M. JeanLuc stood at the helipad and trained his binoculars on the two 212s that were over the end of the apron now, navigation lights winking. They had been cleared for a straight-in and approached fast. Beside him was Mathias, also using binoculars. Nearby was an ambulance, a doctor, and the Immigration officer, Yusuf. The sky was clear and star-filled, the night good with a warm fine wind. The lead 212 turned slightly and now JeanLuc could read the registration letters. G-HUVX. British. Thank God, they had time at Jellet, he thought, recognized Pettikin in the cockpit, then turned his glasses back to the other 212 and saw Ayre and Kyle, the mechanic.
Touchdown for Pettikin. Mathias and JeanLuc converged, Mathias for Pettikin and JeanLuc for the cabin door. He swung it open. “Hello, Genny, how is he?”
“He can’t seem to breathe.” Her face was white.
JeanLuc caught a glimpse of McIver stretched out on the floor, a life jacket under his head. Twenty minutes before, Pettikin had reported to Bahrain Tower that one of his crew, McIver, seemed to be having a heart attack, urgently requested a doctor and ambulance meet them. The tower had cooperated instantly.
The doctor hurried past him into the cabin and knelt beside McIver. One look was sufficient. He used the hyperdermic he had prepared. “This will settle him quickly and we’ll have him in the hospital in a few minutes.” In Arabic he called to the paramedics and they came on the run. He helped Genny down into the light, JeanLuc now with them. “I’m Dr. Lanoire, please tell me what happened.”
“Is it a heart attack?” she asked.
“Yes, yes, it is. Not a bad one,” the doctor said, wanting to gentle her. He was half-French, half-Bahrain, very good, and they had been fortunate to get him at such short notice. Behind them the paramedics had McIver on a stretcher and were easing him gently out of the helicopter. “He… my husband, he suddenly gasped and sort of croaked, ‘I can’t breathe,’ then doubled over in pain and fainted.” She wiped the sweat off her upper lip and continued in the same flat voice: “I thought it must be a heart attack and I didn’t know what to do, then I remembered what old Doc Nutt had said when he gave all us wives a lecture once and I loosened Duncan’s collar and we put him on the floor, then I found the… the capsules he’d given us and put one under his nose and crushed it…”
“Amyl nitrite?”
“Yes, yes that was it. Doc Nutt gave us each two of them and told us to keep them safe and secret and how to use them. It smelled awful but Duncan groaned and half came around then went off again. But he was breathing, kind of breathing. It was hard to hear or to see in the cabin but I thought he stopped breathing once and then I used the last capsule and that seemed to make it better again.”
The doctor had been watching the stretcher. As soon as it was safely in the ambulance, he said to JeanLuc, “Captain, please bring Madame McIver to the hospital in half an hour, here’s my card, they’ll know where I am.” Genny said quickly, “Don’t you think th - ”
The doctor said firmly, “You’ll help more by letting us do our job for half an hour. You’ve done yours, you’ve saved his life, I think.” He rushed off.
Chapter 67
TEHRAN - AT THE BAKRAVAN HOUSE: 8:59 P.M. Zarah was at the dining table, making a last check that all was ready. Plates and cutlery and napkins of white linen, bowls of various horisht, meats and vegetables, fresh breads and fresh fruits, sweetmeats and condiments. Only the rice left to arrive and that would be brought when she called for dinner. “Good,” she said to the servants and went into the other room.
Their guests were still chattering, but she saw that now Sharazad was standing by herself, near Daranoush who was deep in conversation with Meshang. Hiding her sadness, she went over to her. “My darling, you look so tired. Are you feeling all right?”
“Of course she’s all right,” Meshang called out with loud, brittle humor. Sharazad put a smile on a face that had become very pale. “It’s the excitement, Zarah, just all the excitement.” Then to Farazan, “If you don’t mind, Excellency Daranoush, I won’t join you for dinner tonight.” “Why, what’s the matter?” Meshang said sharply. “Are you sick?” “Oh, no, dearest brother, it’s just the excitement.” Sharazad put her attention back on the little man. “Perhaps I may be allowed to see you tomorrow? Perhaps dinner tomorrow?”
Before Meshang could answer for him, Daranoush said, “Of course, my dear,” and went closer, and kissed her hand, and it took all of her willpower not to heave. “We’ll have dinner tomorrow. Perhaps you and Excellency Meshang and Zarah will honor my poor house.” He chuckled. His face became even more grotesque. “Our poor house.”
“Thank you, I will treasure the thought. Good night, peace be with you.” “And with you.”
She was equally polite with her brother and Zarah, then turned and left them. Daranoush watched her walk away, the sway of her boyish hips and her buttocks. By God, look at her, he told himself with relish, imagining her naked, cavorting for him. I’ve made an even better arrangement than I imagined. By God, when Meshang proposed the marriage I was only persuaded by the dowry, along with the promises of political partnership in the bazaar - both substantial, which of course they should be for a woman pregnant with a foreigner’s child. But now, by God, I don’t think it will be so difficult to bed her, have her service me as I want to be served, and sometimes to make children of my own. Who’knows, perhaps it will be as Meshang said, “Perhaps she’ll lose the one she carries.” Perhaps she will, perhaps she will. He scratched absently until she left the room. “Now, where were we, Meshang?”
“About my suggestion for a new bank…”
Sharazad closed the door and ran lightly up the stairs. Jari was in her room, dozing in the big chair. “Oh Princess, how d - ”
