Follett, Ken - On Wings of Eagles.txt Read online

  Looking out the window, Bill saw that there was some excitement down on

  Eisenhower Avenue. Some distance along the street, dissidents were stopping

  cars and putting Khomeini posters on the windshields. The soldiers guarding

  the Ministry Build-

  38 Ken Follett

  ing were stopping the cars and tearing the posters up. As he watched, the

  soldiers became more belligerent. They broke the headlight of a car, then

  the windshield of another, as if to teach the drivers a lesson. Next they

  pulled a driver out of a car and punched him around.

  The next car they picked on was a taxi, a Tehran orange cab. It went by

  without stopping, not surprisingly; but the soldiers seemed angered and

  chased it, firing their guns. Cab and pursuing soldiers disappeared from

  Bill's sight.

  After that the soldiers ended their grim game and returned to their posts

  inside the waited courtyard in front of the Ministry Building. The

  incident, with its queer mixture of childishness and brutality, seemed to

  sum up what was going on in Iran. The country was going down the drain. The

  Shah had lost control and the rebels were determined to drive him out or

  kill him. Bill felt sorry for the people in the cars, victims of

  circumstance who could do nothing but hope that things would get better. If

  Iranians are no longer safe, he thought, Americans must be in even more

  danger. We've got to get out of this country.

  Two Iranians were hanging about in the same corridor, watching the fracas

  on Eisenhower Avenue. They seemed as appalled as Bill at what they saw.

  Moming turned into afternoon. Bill got more tea and a sandwich for lunch.

  He wondered what was happening in the interrogation room. He was not

  surprised to be kept waiting: in Iran "an hour" meant nothing more precise

  than "later, maybe." But as the day wore on he became more uneasy. Was Paul

  in trouble in there?

  The two Iranians stayed in the corridor all afternoon, doing nothing. Bill

  wondered vaguely who they were. He did not speak to them.

  He wished the time would pass more quickly. He had a reservation on

  tomorrow's plane. Emily and the kids were in Washington, where both Emily's

  and Bill's parents lived. They had a big party planned for him on New

  Year's Eve. He could hardly wait to see them all again.

  He should have left Iran weeks ago, when the firebombing started. One of

  the people whose homes had been bombed was a girl with whom he had gone to

  high school in Washington. She was married to a diplomat at the U.S.

  Embassy. Bill had talked to them about the incident. Nobody had been hurt,

  luckily, but it

  oN WINGS OF EAGLES 39

  had been very scary. I should have taken heed, and got out then, he thought.

  At last Abolhasan opened the door and called: "Bill! Come in, please-11

  Bill looked at his watch. It was five o'clock. He went in.

  "It's cold," he said as he sat down.

  "It's warm enough in this seat," Paul said with a smained smile. Bill

  looked at Paul's face: he seemed very uncomfortable.

  Dadgar drank a glass of tea and ate a sandwich before he began to question

  Bill. Watching him, Bill thought: look out--this guy is trying to trap us

  so he won't have to let us leave the country. . Tbe interview started. Bill

  gave his full name, date and place of birth, schools attended,

  qualifications, and experience. Dadgar's face was blank as he asked the

  questions and wrote down the answers: he was like a machine, Bill thought.

  He began to see why the interview with Paul had taken so long. Each

  question had to be translated from Farsi into English and each answer from

  English into Farsi. Mrs. Nourbash did the translation, Abolhasan

  interrupting with clarification and corrections.

  Dadgar questioned Bill about EDS's performance of the Ministry contract.

  Bill answered at length and in detail, although the subject was both

  complicated and highly technical, and he was pretty sure that Mrs. Nourbash

  could not really understand what he was saying. Anyway, no one could hope

  to grasp the complexities of the entire project by asking a handful of

  general questions. What kind of foolishness was this? Bill wondered. Why

  did Dadgar want to sit all day in a freezing cold room and ask stupid

  questions? It was some kind of Persian ritual, Bill decided. Dadgar needed

  to pad out his records, show that he had explored every avenue, and protect

  himself in advance against possible criticism for letting them go. At the

  absolute worst, he might detain them in Iran a while longer. Either way, it

  was just a matter of time.

  Both Dadgar and Mrs. Nourbash seemed hostile. The interview became more

  like a courtroom cross-examination. Dadgar said that EDS's progress reports

  to the Ministry had been false, and EDS had used them to make the Ministry

  pay for work that had not been done. Bill pointed out that Ministry

  officials, who were in a position to know, had never suggested that the

  reports were inaccurate. If EDS had fallen down on the job, where were the

  complaints? Dadgar could examine the Ministry's files.

  Dadgar asked about Dr. Towliati, and when Bill explained Tow- 40 Ken Follett

  liati's role, Mrs. Nourbash--6peaking before Dadgar had given her anything

  to translater-replied that Bill's explanation was untrue.

  There were several miscellaneous questions, including a completely

  mystifying one: did EDS have any Greek employees? Bill said they did not,

  wondering what that had to do with anything. Dadgar seemed impatient.

  Perhaps he had hoped that Bill's answers would contradict Paul's; and now,

  disappointed, he was just going through the motions. His questioning became

  perfunctory and hurried; he did not follow up Bill's answers with further

  questions or requests for clarification; and he wound up the interview

  after an hour.

  Mrs. Nourbash said: "You will now please sip your names against each of the

  questions and answers in Mr. Dadgar's notebook. "

  "But they're in Farsi-we can't read a word of it!" Bin protested. It's a

  trick, he thought; we'll be signing a confession to murder or espionage or

  some other crime Dadgar has invented.

  Abolhasan said: "I will look over his notes and check them."

  Paul and Bill waited while Abolhasan read through the notebook. it seemed

  a very cursory check. He put the book down on the desk. "I advise you to

  sign."

  Bill was sure he should not-but he had no choice. If he wanted to go home,

  he had to sign.

  He looked at Paul. Paul shrugged. "I guess we'd better do it."

  They went through the notebook in turn, writing their names beside the

  incomprehensible squiggles of Farsi.

  When they finished, the atmosphere in the room was tense. Now, Bill

  thought, he has to tell us we can go home.

  Dadgar shuffled his papers into a neat stack while he talked to Abolhasan

  in Farsi for several minutes. Then he left the room. Abolhasan turned to

  Paul and Bill, his face grave.

  "You are being arrested," he said.

  Bill's heart sank. No plane, no Washington, no Emily, no New Year's Eve

  party ...

  "Bail has bee
n set at ninety million tomans, sixty for Paul and thirty for

  Bill. "

  "Jesus!" Paul said. "Ninety million tomans is .

  Abolhasan worked it out on a scrap of paper. "A little under thirteen

  million dollars."

  "You're kidding!" Bill said. "Thirteen million? A murderer's bail is twenty

  thousand."

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 41

  Abolhasan said: "He asks whether you are ready to post the bail."

  Paul laughed. "Tell him I'm a little short now, I'm going to have to go to

  the bank."

  Abolhasan said nothing.

  "He can't be serious," Paul said.

  "He's serious," said Abolhasan.

  Suddenly Bill was mad as hell-mad at Dadgar, mad at Lou Goelz, mad at the

  whole darnn world. It had been a sucker trap and they had fallen right into

  it. Why, they had walked in here of their own free will, to keep an

  appointment made by the U.S. Embassy. They had done nothing wrong and

  nobody had a shred of evidence against thern-yet they were going to jail,

  and worse, an Iranian jail!

  Abolhasan said: "You are allowed one phone call each."

  Just like the cop shows on TV---one phone call then into the slammer.

  Paul picked up the phone and dialed. "Lloyd Briggs, please. This is Paul

  Chiapparone ... Lloyd? I can't make dinner tonight. I'm going to jail."

  Bill thought: Paul doesn't really believe it yet.

  Paul listened for a moment, then said: "How about calling Gayden, for a

  start?" Bill Gayden, whose name was so similar to Bill Gaylord's, was

  president of EDS World and Paul's immediate boss. As soon as this news

  reaches Dallas, Bill thought, these Iranian jokers will see what happens

  when EDS really gets into gear.

  Paul hung up and Bill took his turn on the phone. He dialed the U.S.

  Embassy and asked for the Consul General.

  "Goelz? This is Bill Gaylord. We've just been arrested, and bail has been

  set at thirteen million dollars."

  "How did that happen?"

  Bill was infuriated by Goelz's calm, measured voice. "You arranged this

  meeting and you told us we could leave afterward!"

  "I'm sure, if you've done nothing wrong-"

  "What do you mean ip. " Bill shouted.

  "I'll have someone down at the jail as soon as possible," Goelz said.

  Bill hung up.

  The two Iranians who had been hanging about in the corridor 0 day came in.

  Bill noticed they were big and burly, and realized they must be

  plain-clothes policemen.

  42 Ken FoUeu

  Abolhasan said: "Dadgar said it would not be necessary to handcuff YOU. 11

  Paul said: "Gee, thanks."

  Bill suddenly recalled the stories he had heard about the torturing of

  prisoners in the Shah's jails. He tried not to think about it.

  Abolhasan said: "Do you want to give me your briefcases and wallets?"

  They handed them over. Paul kept back a hundred dollars.

  To you know where the jail is?" Paul asked Abolhasan.

  'You're going to a Temporary Detention Facility at the Ministry of Justice

  on Khayyam Street."

  -Get back to Bucharest fast and give Lloyd Briggs all the details. "

  "Sure.

  One of the plain-clothes policemen held the door open. Bill looked at Paul.

  Paul shrugged.

  They went out.

  The policemen escorted them downstairs and into a little car. "I guess

  we'll have to stay in jail for a couple of hours," Paul said. "It'll take

  that long for the Embassy and EDS to get people down there to bail us out."

  'They might be there already," Bill said optimistically.

  The bigger of the two policemen got behind the wheel. His colleague sat

  beside him in the front. They pulled out of the courtyard and onto

  Eisenhower Avenue, driving fast. Suddenly they turned into a narrow one-way

  street, heading the wrong way at top speed. Hill clutched the seat in front

  of him. They swerved in and out, dodging the cars and buses coming the

  other way, other drivers honking and shaking their fists.

  They headed south and slightly east. Bill thought ahead to their arrival at

  the jail. Would people from EDS or the Embassy be there to negotiate a

  reduction in the bail so that they could go home instead of to a cell?

  Surely the Embassy staff would be outraged at what Dadgar had done.

  Ambassador Sullivan would intervene to get them released at once. After

  all, it was iniquitous to put two Americans in an Iranian jail when no

  crime had '6een committed and then set bail at thirteen million dollars.

  The whole situation was ridiculous.

  Except that here he was, sitting in the back of this car, silently looking

  out of the windows and wondering what would happen next.

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 43

  As they went farther south, what he saw through the window frightened him

  even more.

  In the north of the city, where the Americans lived and worked, riots and

  fighting were still an occasional phenomenon, but here-Bill now

  realized--4hey must be continuous. The black hulks of burned buses

  smoldered in the streets. Hundreds of demonstrators were running riot,

  yelling and chanting, setting fires and building barricades. Young

  teenagers threw Molotov cocktails--bottles of gasoline with blazing rag

  fuses-at cars. Their targets seemed random. We might be next, Bill thought.

  He heard shooting, but it was dark and he could not see who was firing at

  whom. The driver never went at less than top speed. Every other street was

  blocked by a mob, a barricade, or a blazing car: the driver turned around,

  blind to all traffic signals, and raced through side streets and back

  alleys at breakneck speed to circumvent the obstacles. We're not going to

  get there alive, Bill thought. He touched the rosary in his pocket.

  It seemed to go on forever-then, suddenly, the little car swung into a

  circular courtyard and pulled up. Without speaking, the burly driver got

  out of the car and went into the building.

  The Ministry of Justice was a big place, occupying a whole city block. In

  darkness-the streedights were all off-Bill could make out what seemed to be

  a five-story building. The driver was inside for ten or fifteen minutes.

  When he came out he climbed behind the wheel and drove around the block.

  Bill assumed he had registered his prisoners at the front desk.

  At the rear of the building the car mounted the curb and stopped on the

  sidewalk by a pair of steel gates set into a long, high brick wall.

  Somewhere over to the right, where the wall ended, there was the vague

  outline of a small park or garden. The driver got out. A peephole opened in

  one of the steel doors, and there was a short conversation in Farsi. Then

  the doors opened. The driver motioned Paul and Bill to get out of the car.

  They walked through the doors.

  Bill looked around. They were in a small courtyard. He saw ten or fifteen

  guards armed with automatic weapons scattered around the courtyard. In

  front of him was a circular driveway with parked cars and trucks. To his

  left, up against the brick wall, was a single-story building. On his right

  was another steel door.

  The driver went up to the second steel door and knocked. There was another

  exch
ange in Farsi through another peephole. Then the door was opened, and

  Paul and Bill were ushered inside.

  44 Ken Folleu

  They were in a small reception area with a desk and a few chairs. Bill

  looked around. There were no lawyers, no Embassy staff, no EDS executives

  here to spring him from jail. We're on our own, he thought, and this is

  going to be dangerous.

  A guard stood behind the desk with a ball-point pen and a pile of forms. He

  asked a question in Farsi. Guessing, Paul said: "Paul Chiapparone," and

  spelled it.

  Filling out the forms took close to an hour. An Englishspeaking prisoner

  was brought from the jail to help translate. Paul and Bill gave their

  Tehran addresses, phone numbers, and dates of birth, and listed their

  possessions. Their money was taken away and they were each given two

  thousand rials, about thirty dollars.

  They were taken into an adjoining room and told to remove their clothes.

  They both stripped to their undershorts. Their clothing and their bodies

  were searched. Paul was told to get dressed again, but not Bill. It was

  very cold: the heat was off here, too. Naked and shivering, Bill wondered

  what would happen now. Obviously they were the only Americans in the jail.

  Everything he had ever read or heard about being in prison was awful. What

  would the guards do to him and Paul? What would the other prisoners do?

  Surely any minute now someone would come to get him released.

  "Can I put on my coat?" he asked the guard.

  ne guard did not understand.

  "Coat," Bill said, and mimed putting on a coat.

  The guard handed him his coat.

  A little later another guard came in and told Bill to get dressed.

  They were led back into the reception area. Once again, Bill looked around

  expectantly for lawyers or friends; once again, he was disappointed.

  They were taken through the reception area. Another door was opened. They

  went down a flight of stairs into the basement.

  It was cold, dim, and dirty. There were several cells, all crammed with

  prisoners, all of them Iranian. The stink of urine made Bill close his

  mouth and breathe shallowly through his nose. The guard opened the door to

  Cell Number 9. Paul and Bill walked in.

  Sixteen unshaven faces stared at them, alive with curiosity. Paul and Bill