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
