administrative hassle.
The distant shouting grew louder, and a crowd appeared at the end of the street.
In the rear car Coburn said: 'What the hell is this?'
The Kurds jumped out of their ambulance and surrounded the two Range Rovers, forming a wedge in front of the lead car. One of them pointed to Coburn's door and made a motion like turning a key. 'Lock the doors,' Coburn said to the others.
The crowd came closer. It was some kind of street parade, Coburn realized. At the head of the procession were a number of army officers in tattered uniforms. One of them was in tears. 'You know what I think?' said Coburn. 'The army just surrendered, and they're running the officers down Main Street.'
The vengeful crowd surged around the vehicles, jostling the Kurdish guards and looking through the windows with hostile glares. The Kurds stood their ground and tried to push the crowds away from the cars. It looked as though it would turn into a fight at any moment. 'This is getting ugly,' said Gayden. Coburn kept an eye on the car in front, wondering what Simons would do.
Coburn saw the snout of a gun aimed at the window on the driver's side. 'Paul, don't look now, but someone's pointing a gun at your head.'
'Jesus ...'
Coburn could imagine what would happen next: The mob would start rocking the cars; then they would turn them over...
Then, suddenly, it ended. The defeated soldiers were the main attraction, and as they passed on, the crowd followed. Coburn relaxed. Paul said: 'For a minute there ...'
Rashid and the interpreter came out of the hotel. Rashid said: 'They don't want to know about a bunch of Americans going into their hotel--they won't take the risk.' Coburn took that to mean that feelings were running so high in the town that the hotel could get burned by the mob for taking in foreigners. 'We have to go to revolutionary headquarters.'
They drove on. There was feverish activity in the streets: lines of pickup trucks of all shapes and sizes were being loaded with supplies, presumably for the revolutionaries still fighting in Tabriz. The convoy stopped at what appeared to be a school. There was a huge, noisy crowd outside the courtyard, apparently waiting to get in. After an argument, the Kurds persuaded the gate sentry to admit the ambulance and the two Range Rovers. The crowd reacted angrily when the foreigners went in. Coburn breathed a sigh of relief as the courtyard gate closed behind him.
They got out of the cars. The courtyard was crammed with shot-up automobiles. A mullah was standing on a stack of rifle crates conducting a noisy and passionate ceremony with a crowd of men. Rashid said: 'He is swearing in fresh troops to go to Tabriz and fight for the revolution.'
The guards led the Americans toward the school building on one side of the courtyard. A man came down the steps and started yelling at them angrily, pointing at the Kurds. 'They must not go into the building armed,' Rashid translated.
Coburn could tell the Kurds were getting jumpy: to their surprise, they found themselves in hostile territory. They produced the note from the Mahabad mullah. There was more argument.
Eventually Rashid said: 'You all wait here. I'm going inside to talk to the leader of the revolutionary committee.' He went up the steps and disappeared.
Paul and Gayden lit cigarettes. Paul felt scared and dejected. These people were bound to call Tehran, he felt, and find out all about him. Getting sent back to jail might be the least of his worries now. He said to Gayden: 'I really appreciate what you've done for me, but it's a shame--I think we've had it.'
Coburn was more worried about the mob outside the gate. In here at least someone was trying to maintain order. Out there was a wolf pack. What if they persuaded some goofy guard to open the gate? It would be a lynch mob. In Tehran a fellow--an Iranian--who had done something to anger a crowd had been literally pulled apart, his arms and legs torn off by people who were just crazed, hysterical.
The guards jerked their weapons, indicating that the Americans should move to one side of the courtyard and stand against a wall. They obeyed, feeling vulnerable. Coburn looked at the wall. It had bullet holes in it. Paul had seen them, too, and his face was white. 'My God,' he said. 'I think we bought the farm.'
Rashid asked himself: What will be the psychology of the leader of the revolutionary committee?
He has a million things to do, Rashid thought. He has just taken control of this town, and he has never been in power before. He must deal with the officers of the defeated army, he must round up suspected SAVAK agents and interrogate them, he must get the town running normally, he must guard against a counterrevolution, and he must send troops to fight in Tabriz.
All he wants to do, Rashid concluded, is
He has no time or sympathy for fleeing Americans. If he must make a decision, he will simply throw us in jail for the time being, and deal with us later, at his leisure. Therefore, I must make sure that he does not decide.
Rashid was shown into a schoolroom. The leader was sitting on the floor. He was a tall, strong man with the thrill of victory in his face; but he looked exhausted, confused, and restless.
Rashid's escort said in Farsi: 'This man comes from Mahabad with a letter from the mullah--he has six Americans with him.'
Rashid thought of a movie he had seen in which a man got into a guarded building by flashing his driving license instead of a pass. If you had enough confidence you could undermine people's suspicions.
'No, I come from the Tehran Revolutionary Committee,' Rashid said. 'There are five or six thousand Americans in Tehran, and we have decided to send them home. The airport is closed, so we will bring them all out this way. Obviously we must make arrangements and set up procedures for handling all these people. That is why I am here. But you have many problems to deal with--perhaps I should discuss the details with your subordinates.'
'Yes,' said the leader, and waved them away.
It was the technique of the Big Lie, and it had worked.
'I'm the deputy leader,' said Rashid's escort as they left the room. They went into another room where five or six people were drinking tea. Rashid talked to the deputy leader, loud enough for the others to hear. 'These Americans just want to get home and see their families. We're happy to get rid of them, and we want to treat them right so they won't have anything against the new regime.'
'Why do you have Americans with you now?' the deputy asked.
'For a trial run. This way, you know, we find out what the problems are ...'
'But you don't have to let them cross the border.'
'Oh, yes. They are good men who have never done any harm to our country, and they have wives and children at home--one of them has a little child dying in the hospital. So the Revolutionary Committee in Tehran has instructed me to see them across the border ...'
He kept talking. From time to time the deputy would interrupt him with a question: Whom did the Americans work for? What did they have with them? How did Rashid know they were not SAVAK agents spying for the counterrevolutionaries in Tabriz? For every question Rashid had an answer, and a long one. While he was talking, he could be persuasive; whereas if he were silent, the others would have time to think of objections. People came in and went out continually. The deputy left three or four times.
Eventually he came in and said: 'I have to clear this with Tehran.'
Rashid's heart sank. Of course nobody in Tehran would verify his story. But it would take forever to get a call through. 'Everything has been verified in Tehran, and there is no need to reverify,' he said. 'But if you insist, I'll take these Americans to a hotel to wait.' He added: 'You had better send some guards with us.' The deputy would have sent the guards anyway: asking for them was a way of allaying suspicion.
'I don't know,' said the deputy.
'This is not a good place to keep them,' Rashid said. 'It could cause trouble. They might be harmed.' He held his breath. Here they were trapped. In a hotel they would at least have the chance to make a break for the border...
'Okay,' said the deputy.
