The Moving Prison Read online

  As she approached the doorway of her classroom, she froze. Khosrow was there, surrounded by five or six other boys who were shoving and slapping him. Just as she was about to whirl and race in search of a teacher, a school principal came from the far end of the corridor, and Khosrow’s attackers vanished.

  “Khosrow!” she screamed, dropping her books in a clattering pile as she rushed to him. He leaned against the wall by the doorway, panting. His shirt was torn and blood seeped from the corner of his mouth. “I was going to surprise you here, instead of by the stairway,” he gasped. A curious crowd began to gather, students pausing on their way to classes to observe the unusual scene.

  Her eyes wide in shock, Sepi gazed about her. Then she saw her desk, just inside the doorway. Someone had carved a series of jagged, angry letters across the wooden desktop: Infidel Jew.

  The bell for classes rattled in the hallway, but the silent ring of students gathered about Khosrow and Sepi made no move toward their rooms.

  Down the hall, the principal took in the scene. He watched them for a moment, then walked away.

  In a daze, Khosrow said, “I saw what they were doing, and I yelled at them, but there were too many. One of them I have known since first grade….”

  Sepi walked blindly into the classroom, oblivious in her shock to the stares as she passed through the students. She rubbed the heel of her hand across the splintered defacement on her desk, vainly trying to scrub the damning slogan from her life. But the boys had carved far too deeply for such easy removal. This would never be erased, she realized. She looked about her in consternation. Mute, unreadable faces returned her gaze. They seemed to be closing in on her, threatening her. She raced for the nearest door.

  “Sepi, Sepi, come back!” Faintly she heard Khosrow’s voice through the fog of her panic. Then she was outside.

  Esther tipped the threadbare delivery man, took the letter from his hand, and watched as he walked slowly away. Closing the gate behind him, she glanced down at the return address. The writing was in Moosa’s familiar, hurried hand, and she smiled as she eagerly tore open the thin red-and-blue-bordered airmail envelope.

  Dear Mother and Father,

  Each day the news from Iran is more and more disturbing. On the TV they show scenes of rioting in the streets of Tehran, of chanting crowds holding up posters of Khomeini. I am worried sick about you and Sepi.

  I think you should all leave Iran at once. I will help you arrange everything. In fact, I will come there and help you get your affairs in order.

  Please write me soon and let me know how you are. And think seriously about what I have said.

  Love,

  Moosa

  Esther crumpled the envelope in her fist as angry tears stung her eyes. Now Moosa too! He wanted her to discard everything, as though their lives here were shed as easily as a worn garment! She teased at the thought that Ezra had written their son, enlisting his support in persuading her to accept this hateful uprooting.

  Behind her, the gate rattled open and clanged shut. She turned just as Sepi, her chest heaving with great, wet sobs, flung herself into her mother’s astonished arms.

  “Sepi! What is the matter, my darling? Why are you not in school?”

  A wordless wail of fear and pain was her only answer, as Sepideh clutched herself tightly to her mother, her face buried in Esther’s shoulder.

  Ezra stood on the sidewalk outside the mosque, feeling more conspicuous by the minute. Anxiously he scanned the faces of those entering and leaving the house of worship, searching for Mullah Hafizi. At last the aged clergyman came into view, rounding a corner and crossing the courtyard of the mosque toward Ezra, who now breathed a little easier. Then he remembered why he was here and again felt the bands of apprehension tighten about his chest.

  Hafizi walked up to Ezra, carefully studying the nervous face of his Jewish friend. “Are you certain you are prepared to go through with this?” he asked.

  Ezra nodded. “I am, baradar. I think it is necessary.”

  A moment more the mullah searched the eyes of the druggist. “It is possible that your proposal may be received with suspicion, despite all demonstrations to the contrary,” he said. “I will do what I can, but …” Hafizi shrugged.

  Ezra’s mind whirled. Like a sheep treading among wolves, he was about to enter the presence of a senior official of Islam. Would Hafizi betray the tenuous confidence placed in him? Would he revoke his intention to aid Ezra, or did he merely try to warn of the very real possibility of failure? Ezra took a deep, quavering breath before speaking.

  “My friend,” he began in a low voice, “I have opened my mind to you. Already you know enough to cause the failure of my plans. When I spoke with you in your house, by that very act I was committed to this attempt.” His eyes darted nervously, then came to rest imploringly on Hafizi’s face.

  The mullah again shrugged and beckoned Ezra inside. “Wait!” hissed Hafizi, pointing at Ezra’s feet. “You must not enter holy ground wearing shoes!”

  “Of course,” laughed Ezra nervously, when he regained his voice. “You would think a descendant of Moses would remember such a thing!” Cautiously he retraced his steps to the outside, removed his shoes, and reentered the mosque, placing first his right foot inside the portal, then his left, in accordance with Islamic custom. Hafizi took his arm and led him toward the chambers of the mojtahed. “In the name of Allah the Merciful and Compassionate,” Ezra whispered under his breath as they walked down the colonnade.

  The phone jangled in its cradle. Firouz paused in his sweeping, leaning the broom against a wall. He picked up the receiver, waiting for the caller to identify himself.

  “This is Nijat,” crackled the voice on the other end. “I am calling to inquire about the ad placed in the newspaper. Is this the Nasser Pharmacy?”

  “Yes,” replied Firouz cautiously, “but I am Marandi, the assistant. The owner is not here. What ad is it you speak of?”

  “The ad in this morning’s paper,” said the caller, impatiently. “When will your boss be back?”

  “I don’t know,” said Firouz, cradling the phone with his shoulder as he opened the desk drawer. The newspaper was gone—the old Jew had taken it with him. “He left about an hour ago—he had to meet someone. He said he would be back before closing time.”

  After a few seconds of silence the caller said, “All right. Tell your boss that I called. Here is my telephone number.” Firouz scribbled a note on the blotter pad atop the desk. The line went dead. His eyes squinted in thought. Firouz replaced the phone in its cradle.

  “… and so, Ayatollah,” finished Hafizi, “I have brought Aga Solaiman to you, for I felt confident you would want to know of his generosity.”

  The mojtahed crouched on his carpet like a wizened old lizard. He might have been a painted statue but for his dark eyes that flickered between Hafizi and Ezra in a mute appraisal that seemed to last for hours. Finally, from within the tangled white bush of his beard, a raspy voice issued.

  “You are here of your own free will?” The dark eyes squinted calculatingly at Ezra.

  Hesitantly, Ezra cleared his throat, glancing at Hafizi before replying, “Yes, Ayatollah, I am.” He fell quiet, his eyes resting on the feet of the mojtahed. He reminded himself not to look directly into the eyes of the mullah, for this was considered ill manners.

  After another eternal silence, the old mullah asked, “And why should a Jew suddenly have a burning desire to donate one million tomans for the expansion of a Muslim graveyard?” The suspicion made the old man’s voice brittle. Ezra entreated Hafizi with his eyes.

  “As I told you, Ayatollah Kermani,” Hafizi said, “Aga Solaiman has for some time been known to me for his generosity. I have told you of his kindness to me.”

  “… and that is why I wish to help, Ayatollah,” inserted Ezra earnestly. “I have always respected the servants of Allah, whether they study the Koran, the Towrat—the Torah, or the Injeel—the Gospels or New Testament. When Mullah H
afizi told me of the need, I asked him to bring me here.”

  Another uncomfortable hush fell in the room as the mojtahed, still unmoving as a piece of masonry, turned Ezra’s proposal over in his mind. Outside in the street, the faint sounds of traffic could be heard. But here, in the darkened room of the mullah, Ezra fancied he could hear the sweat trickling down his back as he awaited the all-important decision of the senior cleric.

  Finally the old man stirred enough to signal an attendant who had waited, unseen, behind them during the interview. “Ahmad,” he said in his rusty voice, “bring me the stamp and a receipt book.”

  Ezra felt his insides unwinding with relief. Trying not to grin, he reached into his coat for his wallet. He saw that Hafizi was smiling.

  Ezra returned from the appointment with the mojtahed to find Firouz’s scribbled note on the blotter pad. Not recognizing the name “Nijat,” but surmising the call was in response to his ad, he grabbed the phone and dialed the number.

  From just inside the storeroom, Firouz listened carefully as the old Jew began speaking.

  “This is Solaiman. I believe you called while I was out today…. Yes, I placed the ad concerning the Nasser Pharmacy. I see. Yes, Aga Nijat, I would most certainly like to meet with you.” Ezra glanced toward the storeroom.

  Firouz quickly turned away from the doorway, loudly shuffling the invoices on his clipboard. He heard Ezra continue in a lowered voice.

  “Perhaps you could care to come to my house? We can discuss the matter at greater leisure. After all, this is a very busy place—customers coming in and out all the time.” Ezra gave a small chuckle. “Very good, then. I will look forward to your call.” He gave the caller his home telephone number and hung up. Again he glanced toward the storeroom, but Firouz had his back turned, busily matching invoices with shipping labels. Ezra was ecstatic. Two strokes of good fortune in a single day!

  In the storeroom, Firouz looked again at the classified section of the paper he had purchased while Ezra was out. He had circled one ad: “For Sale: Profitable Business in a Prime Location.”

  SIX

  The taxi neared the entrance to Mehrabad International Airport. Two armed pasdars stood on either side of the gate, looking inside each vehicle as it passed through. The taxi slowed. One of the pasdars leaned through the rear window, in Ezra’s face. “Who are you, and what is your business?” demanded the scraggly bearded guard, scarcely more than a boy, his eyes suspiciously flickering between Ezra and the carrying case.

  Just as Ezra opened his mouth to reply, Hafizi spoke from the front seat. “This man is a friend of mine. He and his wife are accompanying me to the gate where I must meet a plane. Please do not delay us—my business is urgent.”

  The pasdar looked at his partner, across the car, and received a slight nod in reply. He stepped back and impatiently waved the taxi through. He glared after them as they drove toward the customs building.

  “Didn’t I warn you something like this would happen? Didn’t I tell you it was unwise to continue seeing her?” Khosrow’s father spoke quietly, but the anger in his tone was unmistakable. Khosrow kept his face lowered, holding the ice pack to his forehead as much to avoid his father’s ire as to reduce the swelling above his left eyebrow.

  “Father,” he said, “what they were doing was wrong.”

  “That is not what I’m saying, Khosrow. No one knows better than I the injustices being committed in the name of Allah and the so-called Imam Khomeini. Believe me, I know what’s going on out there! I deal with it every day at work. It takes all the tact and caution I have to keep my job and stay off the mullahs’ purge lists, to survive the craziness in one piece and keep this family from starvation. I only hope you will learn from this, Khosrow. I hope it can teach you the danger of being conspicuous in times such as these. I have learned that I cannot afford rugged individualism just now. You must learn this too.”

  Khosrow said nothing. His father’s advice was nothing new. Since the tide first began to turn against the Shah, most of his parents’ conversations with each other, with him, and with his brothers had been variations on a similar theme. He suppressed the flare of indignation burning in his chest. It angered him that he was being chastised for taking a stand. What about the thugs who had carved on Sepi’s desk? What were they? Heroes?

  “I know you care for this Solaiman girl,” his father was saying, “but I am not sure you understand the price you may have to pay for your affection. And not only you, Khosrow. Whole families have been blacklisted because of the activities of a single member.”

  The silence that followed was a no man’s land. Khosrow felt the cold weight of his father’s disapproval pressing upon him and knew he was expected to make some apology, some admission of guilt or, at least, of carelessness. He sternly shoved any such words from his mind, his jaw clenched in resentment.

  “Think about what I have said,” his father finished at last. “Perhaps you will one day see that I have your interest at heart.”

  As his father rose and walked away, Khosrow slumped lower in the chair, absorbed in the dull ache in his head and the frustration in his mind. When his mother fluttered into the room and fussed over him a bit, he endured it sullenly. He felt relieved when she was gone; right now, he didn’t want anyone near him. No one else understands anyway, he thought, grimacing as he shifted the ice pack to a tender place on his cheekbone.

  Reuben Ibrahim had barely finished securing his rugs for the night. He was just replacing the padlock on his storage closet when a shadow fell across the threshold of his market stall.

  “Oh, hello, Hosseini,” he said, looking over his shoulder as the lock clicked into place. “I didn’t hear you coming. I trust your day was profitable?”

  “Not as much so as it might have been,” muttered the other man. “But I noticed your trade was respectable, if not brisk.”

  Reuben tried not to notice the resentment in the other man’s tone. “Well, God be praised, yes, it wasn’t bad. I sold a number of rugs today, mostly of the smaller sizes. Perhaps, with all the difficulties, the faithful are spending more time on their prayer mats, eh?” He smiled and shrugged.

  Hosseini wasn’t smiling. He regarded Reuben with a strange, evaluating expression. “These are days when more prayer would not be amiss,” he said finally. “In these times, the name of Allah would do well to be on every man’s tongue.”

  Reuben felt his smile wilting. “Of course, my friend,” he said, nervously shifting his vision from Hosseini to the briefcase containing the day’s receipts. He closed and latched it with more care than he usually felt necessary. “I had no intention of making light of—”

  “Of course not,” Hosseini remarked in a more normal tone. “You were merely being your usual humorous self. Now, when are you going to sell me this excellent space?”

  Reuben gave a mock grimace and held his head in his hands. “Again, Hosseini! Twice you have put me on the spot!” He picked up the briefcase, walked to the entrance and squeezed Hosseini’s shoulder good-naturedly. “And if I sell it to you, my friend, what excuse would you then have to come and talk? I’m afraid I’d grow lonely during the days without your visits.”

  Hosseini gave him a grudging smile as the two men walked together toward the bus stop.

  Ameer Nijat pressed the electric button in the brick wall by the gate. As he waited, he looked about him in the gathering twilight. Nice area, he thought. The fellow who lives in such a place has obviously done well for himself. Nijat blew into his cold hands as he studied the immaculate grounds of the man with whom he was about to negotiate. He wondered if Solaiman would be difficult to deal with. His son had now learned all he could from the druggist he was apprenticed to, and he would certainly not get wealthy working for the penurious old scoundrel. The boy needed to try his wings, and the sooner the better. Nijat only hoped that all the money he had poured into the boy’s education could someday bear as much fruit as Solaiman’s efforts apparently had.

  The front do
or opened and a slender, middle-aged man walked down the brick walk toward him. With the practiced eye of an experienced trader, Nijat began sizing him up.

  He was clean-shaven in the Western style, wearing only a neatly trimmed moustache. He had the dapper air of one accustomed to the finer things. As he walked, he studied the ground in front of him, as if to avoid any potholes that had arrived since the last time he trod this way. Careful—that was the main impression Nijat had of the well-manicured man who opened the gate and invited him inside with a genteel bow and spoke in a low, cultured voice, “Aga Nijat, I am Ezra Solaiman.”

  Nijat returned the bow. “And I am your servant, Ameer Nijat.” The two men straightened and briefly observed each other, while shaking hands.

  Worry. Nijat saw worry unmistakably etched in the creases at the corners of Solaiman’s eyes. Then his host turned away, beckoning Nijat toward the house. “Please, Aga Nijat. My wife has fresh tea brewing, and some dried figs and almonds. Come in and make yourself comfortable.”

  Nijat sat at ease in Solaiman’s study. As he waited for his host to return, he gazed about appreciatively at the dark paneling, the shelves of richly bound books. Indeed, Solaiman had done well. As Nijat took a deep drag on his Turkish cigarette, Solaiman’s wife entered, carrying a tea service for two on a silver tray. Nijat smiled at her. “Thank you, khanom—lady,” he said.

  She nodded in return and left the room without further gesture or word. Nijat shrugged. Somehow he had expected a warmer greeting from the wife of a prospective seller. The woman—and handsome she was too—had seemed put off, somehow. Oh, well. She no doubt knew why he was here; and if not, no matter. His business was with the husband.