Follett, Ken - On Wings of Eagles.txt
Page 10
that the Ministry of Health would not sign the contract unless EDS made him
happy.
EDS had a series of stormy negotiations with Mahvi. EDS still refused
point-blank to share profits with him. In the end there was a face-saving
compromise: a joint company, acting as subcontractor to EDS, would recruit
and employ all EDS's Iranian staff. In fact, the joint company never made
money, but that was later: at the time Mahvi accepted the compromise and
the Ministry contract was signed.
So EDS had not paid bribes, and the Iranian government knew it; but Henry
Precht did not, nor did Lou Goelz. Consequently their attitude to Paul and
Bill was equivocal. Both men spent many hours on the case, but neither gave
it top priority. When EDS's combative lawyer Tom Luce talked to them as if
they were idle or stupid or both, they became indignant and said they might
do better if he would get off their backs.
Precht in Washington and Goelz in Tehran were the crucial, ground-level
operatives dealing with the case. Neither of them was idle. Neither was
incompetent. But they both made mistakes, they both became somewhat hostile
to EDS, and in those vital first few days they both failed to help Paul and
Bill.
THREE
A guard opened the cell door, looked around, pointed at Paul and Bill, and
beckoned them.
Bill's hopes soared. Now they would be released.
They got up and followed the guard upstairs. It was good to see daylight
through the windows. They went out the door and across the courtyard to the
little one-story building beside the entrance gate. The fresh air tasted
heavenly.
It had been a terrible night. Bill had lain on the thin mattress, dozing
fitfully, startled by the slightest movement from the other prisoners,
looking around anxiously in the dim light from the all-night bulb. He had
known it was morning when a guard came with glasses of tea and rough hunks
of bread for breakfast. He had not felt hungry. He had said a rosary.
Now it seemed his prayers were being answered.
Inside the one-story building was a visiting room furnished with simple
tables and chairs. Two people were waiting. Bill recognized one of them: it
was Ali Jordan, the Iranian who worked with Lou Goelz at the Embassy. He
shook hands and introduced his colleague, Bob Sorenson.
"We brought you some stuff," Jordan said. "A battery shaver -you'll have to
share it--and some dungarees. "
Bill looked at Paul. Paul was staring at the two Embassy men, looking as if
he were about to explode. "Aren't you going to get us out of here?" Paul
said.
"I'm afraid we can't do that."
"Goddammit, you got us in here!"
Bill sat down slowly, too depressed to be angry.
"We're very sorry this has happened," said Jordan. "It came as a complete
surprise to us. We were told that Dadgar was
74
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 75
favorably disposed toward you ... The Embassy is filing a very serious
protest. "
"But what are you doing to get us out?"
"You must work through the Iranian legal system. Your attorneys-"
"Jesus Christ," Paul said disgustedly.
Jordan said: "We have asked them to move you to a better part of the jail."
"Gee, thanks.
Sorenson asked: "Uh, is there anything else you need?"
"There's nothing I need," Paul said. "I'm not planning to be
here very long."
Bill said: "I'd like to get some eye drops."
"I'll see that you do," Sorenson promised.
Jordan said: "I think that's all for now . He looked at the
guard.
Bill stood up.
Jordan spoke in Farsi to the guard, who motioned Paul and Bill to the door.
They followed the guard back across the courtyard. Jordan and Sorenson were
low-ranking Embassy staff, Bill reflected. Why hadn't Goelz come? It seemed
that the Embassy thought it was EDS's job to get them out: sending Jordan
and Sorenson was a way of notifying the Iranians that the Embassy was
concerned but at the same time letting Paul and Bill know that they could
not expect much help from the U.S. government. We're a problem the Embassy
wants to ignore, Bill thought angrily. ,
Inside the main building the guard opened a door they had not been through
before, and they went from the reception area into a corridor. On their
right were three offices. On their left were windows looking out into the
courtyard. They came to another door, this one made of thick steel. The
guard unlocked it and ushered them through.
The first thing Bill saw was a TV set.
As he looked around he started to feel a little better. This part of the
jail was more civilized than the basement. It was relatively clean and
light, with gray walls and gray carpeting. The cell doors were open and the
prisoners were walking around freely. Daylight came in through the windows.
They continued along a hall with two cells on the right and, on the left,
what appeared to be a bathroom: Bill looked forward to a chance to get
clean again after his night downstairs. Glancing
76 Ken Follen
through the last door on the right, he saw shelves of books. Then the guard
turned left and led them down a long, narrow corridor and into the last
cell.
There they saw someone they knew.
It was Reza Neghabat, the Deputy Minister in charge of the Social Security
Organization at the Ministry of Health. Both Paul and Bill knew him well
and had worked closely with him before his arrest last September. They
shook hands enthusiastically. Bill was relieved to see a familiar face, and
someone who spoke English.
Neghabat was astonished. "Why are you in here?"
Paul shrugged. "I kind of hoped you might be able to tell us that. -
"But what are you accused of?"
"Nothing," said Paul. "We were interrogated yesterday by Mr. Dadgar, the
magistrate who's investigating your former Minister, Dr. Sheik. He arrested
us. No charges, no accusations. We're supposed to be 'material witnesses,'
we understand."
Bill looked around. On either side of the cell were paired stacks of bunks,
three high, with another pair beside the window, making eighteen
altogether. As in the cell downstairs, the bunks were furnished with thin
fbam-rubber mattresses, the bottom bunk of the three being no more than a
mattress on the floor, and gray wool blankets. However, here some of
the-prisoners seemed to have sheets, as well. The window, opposite the
door, looked out into the courtyard. Bill could see grass, flowers, and
trees, as well as parked cars belonging, he presumed, to guards. He could
also see the low building where they had just talked with Jordan and
Sorenson.
Neghabat introduced Paul and Bill to their cellmates, who seemed friendly
and a good deal less villainous than the inmates of the basement. There
were several free bunks-the cell was not as crowded as the one
downstairs-and Paul and Bill took beds on either side of the doorway.
Bill's was the middle bunk of three, but Paul was on the floor again.
Neghab
at showed them around. Next to their cell was a kitchen, with tables
and chairs, where the prisoners could make tea and coffee or just sit and
talk. For some reason it was called the Chattanooga Room. Beside it was a
hatch in the wall at the end of the corridor: this was a commissary,
Neghabat explained, where from time to time you could buy soap, towels, and
cigarettes.
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 77
Walking back down the long corridor, they passed their own cell-Number
5--and two more cells before emerging into the hall, which stretched away
to their right. The room Bill had glanced into earlier turned out to be a
combination guard's office and library, with books in English as well as
Farsi. Next to it were two more cells. Opposite these cells was the
bathroom, with sinks, showers, and toilets. The toilets were Persian style-
like a shower tray with a drain hole in the middle. Bill learned that he
was not likely to get the shower he longed for: normally there was no hot
water.
Beyond the steel door, Neghabat said, was a little office used by a
visiting doctor and dentist. The library was always open and the TV was on
all evening, although of course programs were in Farsi. Twice a week the
prisoners in this section were taken out into the courtyard to exercise by
walking in a circle for half an hour. Shaving was compulsory: the guards
would allow mustaches, but not beards.
During the tour they met two more people they knew. One was Dr. Towliati,
the Ministry data-processing consultant about whom Dadgar had questioned
them. The other was Hussein Pasha, who had been Neghabat's financial man at
the Social Security Organization.
Paul and Bill shaved with the electric razor brought in by Sorenson and
Jordan. Then it was noon, and time for lunch. In the corridor wall was an
alcove screened by a curtain. From there the prisoners took a linoleum mat,
which they spread on the cell floor, and some cheap tableware. The meal was
steamed rice with a little lamb, plus bread and yogurt, and tea or Pepsi-
Cola to drink. They sat cross-legged on the floor to eat. For Paul and
Bill, both gourmets, it was a poor lunch. However, Bill found he had an
appetite: perhaps it was the cleaner surroundings.
After lunch they had more visitors: their Iranian attorneys. The lawyers
did not know why they had been arrested, did not know what would happen
next, and did not know what they could do to help. It was a desultory,
depressing conversation. Paul and Bill had no faith in them anyway, for it
was these lawyers who had advised Lloyd Briggs that the bail would not
exceed twenty thousand dollars. They returned no wiser and no happier.
They spent the rest of the afternoon in the Chattanooga Room, talking to
Neghabat, Towliati, and Pasha. Paul described his interrogation by Dadgar
in detail. Each of the Iranians was highly interested in any mention of his
own name during the
78 Ken Follett
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interrogation. Paul told Dr. Towliati how his name had come up, in
connection with a suggested conflict of interest. Towliati described how he,
too, had been questioned by Dadgar in the same way before being thrown in
jail. Paul recollected that Dadgar had asked about a memorandum written by
Pasha. It had been a completely routine request for statistics, and nobody
could figure out what was supposed to be special about it.
Neghabat had a theory as to why they were all in jail. "The Shah is making
scapegoats of us, to show the masses that he really is cracking down on
corruptio"ut he picked a project where there was no corruption. There is
nothing to crack down on--but if he releases us, he will look weak. If he
had looked instead at the construction business, he would have found an
unbelievable amount of corruption. . . ."
It was all very vague. Neghabat was just rationalizing. Paul and Bill
wanted specifics: who ordered the crackdown, why pick on the Ministry of
Health, what kind of corruption was supposed to have taken place, and where
were the informants who had put the finger on the individuals who were now
in jail? Neghabat was not being evasiv"e simply had no answers. His vague-
ness was characteristically Persian: ask an Iranian what he had for
breakfast and ten seconds later he would be explaining his philosophy of
life.
At six'o'clock they returned to their cell for supper. It was pretty
grim-no more than the leftovers from lunch mashed into a dip to be spread
on bread, with more tea.
After supper they watched TV. Neghabat translated the news. The Shah had
asked an opposition leader, Shahpour Bakhtiar, to form a civilian
government, replacing the generals who had ruled han since November.
Neghabat explained that Shahpour was leader of the Bakhtiar tribe, and that
he had always refused to have anything to do with the regime of the Shah.
Nevertheless, whether Bakhtiar's government could end the turmoil would
depend on the Ayatollah Khomeini.
The Shah had also denied rumors that he was leaving the country.
Bill thought this sounded encouraging. With Bakhtiar as Prime Minister the
Shah would remain and ensure stability,. but the rebels would at last have
a voice in governing their own country.
At ten o'clock the TV went off and the prisoners returned to their cells.
The other inmates hung towels and pieces of cloth
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 81
across their bunks to keep out the light: here, as downstairs, the bulb
would shine all night. Neghabat said Paul and Bill could get their visitors
to bring in sheets and towels for them.
Bill wrapped himself in the thin gray blanket and settled down to try to
sleep. We're here for a while, he thought resignedly; we must make the best
of it. Our fate is in the hands of others.
2
Their fate was in the hands of Ross Perot, and in the next two days all his
high hopes came to nothing.
At first the news had been good. Kissinger had called back on Friday,
December 29, to say that Ardeshir Zahedi would get Paul and Bill released.
First, though, U.S. Embassy officials had to hold two meetings: one with
people from the Ministry of Justice, the other with representatives of the
&n
bsp; Shah's court.
In Tehran the American Ambassador's deputy, Minister Counselor Charles
Naas, was personally setting up those meetings.
In Washington, Henry Precht at the State Department was also talking to
Ardeshir Zahedi. Emily Gaylord's brother-in-law, Tim Reardon, had spoken to
Senator Kennedy. Admiral Moorer was working his contacts with the Iranian
military government. The only disappointment in Washington had been Richard
Helms, the former U.S. Ambassador to Tehran: he had said candidly that his
old friends no longer had any influence.
EDS consulted three separate Iranian lawyers. One was an American who
specialized in representing U.S. corporations in Tehran. The other two were
Iramans: one had good contacts in pro-Shah circles, the other was close to
the dissidents. AD three had agreed that the way Paul and Bill had been
jailed was highly irregular and that the bail was astronomical. The
American, John Westherg, had said that the highest bail he had ever heard
of in Iran was a hundred thousand dollars. The implication was that the
magistrate who had jailed Paul and Bill was on weak ground.
Here in Dallas, EDS's chief financial officer Tom Walter, the slow-talking
Alabaman, was working on how EDS might-if necessary-go about posting bail
of $12,750,000. The lawyers had advised him that bail could be in one of
three forms: cash; a letter of credit drawn on an Iranian bank; or a lien
on property in
82 Ken Follett
Iran. EDS had no property worth that much in Tehran--the computers actually
belonged to the Ministry--and with the Iranian banks on strike and the
country in turmoil, it was not possible to send in thirteen million dollars
in cash; so Walter was organizing a letter of credit. T. J. Marquez, whose
job it was to represent EDS to the investment community, had warned Perot
that it might not be legal for a public company to pay that much money in
what amounted to ransom. Perot deftly sidestepped that problem: he would pay
the money personally.
Perot had been optimistic that he would get Paul and Bill out of jail in
one of the three ways-legal pressure, political pressure, or by paying the