Follett, Ken - On Wings of Eagles.txt

by On Wings of Eagles [lit]

  nursery rhymes. Dadgar was immovable.

  Paul was deeply depressed. He lay on his mattress, looking at the pictures

  of Karen and Ann Marie that he had stuck on the underside of the bunk above

  him. He missed the girls badly. Being unable to see them made him realize

  that in the past he had taken them for granted. Ruthie, too. He looked at

  his watch: it was the middle of the night in the States now. Ruthie would be

  asleep, alone in a big bed. How good it would be to climb in beside her and

  hold her in his arms. He put the thought out of his niind: he was just

  making himself miserable with self-pity. He had no need to worry about them.

  They were out of Iran, out of danger, and he knew that whatever might

  happen, Perot would take care of diem. That was the good thing about Perot.

  He asked a lot of you--boy, he was just about the most demanding employer

  you could have-but when you needed to rely on him, he was like a rock.

  Paul lit a cigarette. He had a cold. He could never get warm in the jail.

  He felt too down to do anything. He did not want to go to the Chattanooga

  Room and drink tea; he did not want to watch the news in gibberish on TV;

  he did not want to play chess with Bill. He did not want to go to the

  library for a new book. He had been reading The Thorn Birds by Colleen

  McCullough. He had found it a very emotional book. It was about several

  generations of families, and it made him think of his own family. The

  central character was a priest, and as a Catholic, Paul had been able to

  klentify with that. He had read the book three times. He had also read

  Hawaii by James Michener, Airport by Arthur Hailey, and the Guinness Book

  of World Records. He never wanted to read another book for the rest of his

  life.

  Sometimes he thought about what he would do when he got out, and let his

  mind wander on his favorite pastimes, boating and fishing. But that could

  be depressing.

  He could not remember a time in his adult life when he had been at a loss

  for something to do. He was always busy. At the office he would typically

  have three days' work backed up. Never, never, did he lie down smoking and

  wondering how on earth he could keep himself amused.

  But the worst thing of all was the helplessness. Although he had always

  been an employee, going where his boss sent him and doing what he was

  ordered to do, nevertheless he had always

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 159

  known that he could at any time get on a plane and go home, or quit his job,

  or say no to his boss. Ultimately the decisions had been his. Now he could

  not make any decisions about his own life. He could not even do anything

  about his plight. With every other problem he had ever had, he had been able

  to work on it, try things, attack the problem. Now he just had to sit and

  suffer.

  He realized that he had never known the meaning of freedom until he lost

  it.

  3

  The demonstration was relatively peaceful. There were several blazing cars

  but otherwise no violence: the demonstrators were marching up and down

  carrying pictures of Khomeini and putting flowers in the turrets of tanks.

  The soldiers looked on passively.

  The traffic was at a standstill.

  It was January 14, the day after Simons and Poch6 flew in. Boulware had

  gone back to Paris, and now he and the other four were waiting there for a

  flight to Tehran. Meanwhile Simons, Coburn, and Poch6 were heading

  downtown, to reconnoiter the jail.

  After a few minutes Joe Poch6 turned off the car engine and sat there,

  silent, showing as much emotion as he always did, which was none.

  By contrast Simons, sitting next to him, was animated. "This is history

  being made in front of our eyes!" he said. "Very few people get to observe

  firsthand a revolution in progress. "

  He was a history buff, Coburn had gathered, and revolutions were his

  specialty. Coming through the airport, on being asked what was his

  occupation and the purpose of his visit, he said he was a refired fanner

  and this was the only chance he was ever likely to get of seeing a

  revolution. He had been telling the truth.

  Coburn was not thrilled to be in the middle of it. He did not enjoy sitting

  in a little car-they had a Renault 4-surrounded by excitable Muslim

  fanatics. Despite his new-grown beard he did not look Iranian. Nor did

  Pochi. Simons did, however. his hair was longer now, he had olive skin and

  a big nose, and he had grown a white beard. Give him some worry beads and

  stand him

  160 Ken Folleu

  on a corner and nobody would suspect for a minute that he was American.

  But the crowd was not interested in Americans, and eventually Coburn became

  confident enough to get out of the car and go into a baker's shop. He

  bought barbari bread, long, fiat loaves with a delicate crust that were

  baked fresh every day and cost seven rials---ten cents. Like French bread,

  it was delicious when new but went stale very quickly. It was usually eaten

  with butter or cheese. Iran was run on barbari bread and tea.

  They sat watching the demonstration and chewing on the bread until, at

  last, the traffic began to move again. Poch6 followed the route he had

  mapped out the previous evening. Coburn wondered what they would find when

  they reached the jail. On Simons's orders he had kept away from downtown

  until now. It was too much to hope that the jail would be exactly as he had

  described it eleven days ago at LAke Grapevine: the team had based a very

  precise attack plan on quite imprecise intelligence. Just how imprecise,

  they would soon find out.

  They reached the Ministry of Justice and drove around to Khayyam Street,

  the side of the block on which the jail entrance was located.

  PocM drove slowly, but not too slowly, past the jail.

  Simons said, "Oh, shit."

  Coburn's heart sank.

  'Me jail was radically different from the mental picture he had built up.

  71be entrance consisted of two steel doors fourteen feet high. On one side

  was a single-story building with barbed wire along its roof. On the other

  side was a taller building of gray stone, five stories high.

  There were no iron railings. There was no courtyard.

  Simons said: "So where's the fucking exercise yard?"

  Poch6 drove on, made a few turns, and came back along Khayyam Street in the

  opposite direction.

  This time Coburn did see a little courtyard with grass and trees, separated

  from the street by a fence of iron railings twelve feet high; but it

  plainly had nothing to do with the jail, which was farther up the street.

  Somehow, in that telephone conversation with Majid, the exercise yard of

  the jail had got mixed up with this little garden.

  Pochd made one more pass around the block.

  Simons was thinking ahead. "We can get in there," he said.

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 161

  "But we have to know what we'll be up against once we're over the wall.

  Someone will have to go in and reconnoiter."

  "Who?" said Coburn.

  "You," said Simons.

  Coburn walked up to the jail entrance with Rich Gallagher and Majid. Majid<
br />
  pressed the bell and they waited.

  Coburn had become the "outside man" of the rescue team. He had already been

  seen at Bucharest by Iranian-employees, so his presence in Tehran could not

  be kept secret. Simons and Poch6 would stay indoors as much as possible and

  keep away from EDS premises: nobody need know they were here. It would be

  Coburn who would go to the Hyatt to see Taylor and switch cars. And it was

  Coburn who went inside the jail.

  As he waited he ran over in his mind all the points Simons had told him to

  watch out for--security, numbers of guards, weaponry, layout of the place,

  cover, high ground ... it was a long list, and Simons had a way of making

  you anxious to remember every detail of his instructions.

  A peephole in the door opened. Majid said something in Farsi.

  The door was opened and the three of them went in.

  Straight ahead of him Coburn saw a courtyard with a grassed traffic circle

  and cars parked on the far side. Beyond the cars a building rose five

  stories high over the courtyard. To his left was the one-story building he

  had seen from the street, with the barbed wire on its roof. To his right

  was another steel door.

  Coburn was wearing a long, bulky down coat-Taylor had dubbed it the

  Michelin Man coat-under which he could easily have concealed a shotgun, but

  he was not searched by the guard at the gate. I could have had eight

  weapons on me, he thought. That was encouraging: security was slack.

  He noted that the gate guard was armed with a small pistol.

  The three visitors were led into the low building on the left. The colonel

  in charge of the jail was in the visiting room, along with another Iranian.

  'Me second man, Gallagher had warned Coburn, was always present during

  visits, and spoke perfect English: presumably he was there to eavesdrop.

  Coburn had told Majid he did not want to be overheard while talking to

  Paul, and Majid agreed to engage the eavesdropper in conversation.

  Coburn was introduced to the colonel. In broken English the man said he was

  sorry for Paul and Bill, and he hoped they

  162 Ken Folleu

  would be released soon. He seemed sincere. Coburn noted that neither the

  colonel nor the eavesdropper was armed.

  The door opened, and Paul and Bill walked in.

  They both stared at Coburn in surprise-neither of them had been forewarned

  that he was in town, and the beard was an additional shock.

  "What the hell are you doing here?" Bill said, and smiled broadly.

  Coburn shook hands warmly with both of them. Paul said: "Boy, I can't

  believe you're here.

  "How's my wife?" Bill said.

  "Emily's fine, so is Ruthie," Coburn told them.

  MaJid started talking loudly in Farsi to the colonel and the eavesdropper.

  He seemed to be telling them a complicated story with many gestures. Rich

  Gallagher began to speak to Bill, and Coburn sat Paul down.

  Simons had decided that Coburn should question Paul about routines at the

  jail, and level with him about the rescue plan. Paul was picked rather than

  Bill because, in Coburn's opinion, Paul was likely to be the leader of the

  two.

  "If you haven't guessed it already," Coburn began, .4we're going to get

  y'all out of here by force if necessary."

  "I guessed it already," Paul said. "I'm not sure it's a good idea. ' 9

  :'What?"

  'People might get hurt."

  "Listen, Ross has retained just about the best man in the whole world for

  this kind of operation, and we have carte blancho-"

  "I'm not sure I want it."

  "You ain't being asked for your permission, Paul."

  Paid smiled. "Okay."

  "Now I need some information. Where do you exercise?"

  ::Right there in the courtyard." 10*7hen?"

  6671bursdays."

  Today was Monday. The next exercise period would be January 18. "How long

  do you spend out there?"

  "About an hour."

  64,VVIM time Of day?91

  44it varies."

  "Shit." Coburn made an effort to look relaxed, to avoid

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 163

  lowering his voice conspicuously or glancing over his shoulder to see

  whether anyone might be listening: This had to look like a normal friendly

  visit. "How many guards are there in this jail?"

  "Around twenty."

  "All uniformed, all armed?"

  "All uniformed, some armed with handguns."

  "No rifles?"

  "Well ... none of the regular guards have rifles, but

  See, our cell is just across the courtyard and has a window. Well, in the

  morning there's a group of about twenty different guards, like an elite

  corps, you might say. They have rifles and wear kind of shiny helinets. They

  have reveille right here, then I never see them for the rest of the day-I

  don't know where they go. 11

  I 'Try and find out. 91

  "I'll try."

  -%ich is your cell?"

  "When you go out of here, the window is more or less opposite you. If you

  start in the right-hand comer of the courtyard and count toward the left,

  it's the third window. But they close the shutters when there are

  visitom-so we can't see women coming in, they say."

  Coburn nodded, trying to memorize it all. "You need to do two things," he

  said. "One: a survey of the inside of the jail, with measurements as

  accurate as possible. I'll come back and get the details from you so we can

  draw a plan. Two: get in shape. Exercise daily. You'll need to be fit."

  "Okay. -

  "Now, tell. me your daily routine."

  "They wake us up at six o'clock," Paul began.

  Coburn concentrated, knowing he would have to repeat all this to Simons.

  Nevertheless, at the back of his mind one thought nagged: If we don't know

  what time of day they exercise, how the hell do we know when to go over the

  wall?

  "Visiting time is the answer," Simons said.

  "How so?" Coburn asked.

  "It's the one situation when we can predict they will be out of the actual

  jail and vulnerable to a snatch, at a definite moment in time. I I

  Coburn nodded. The three of them were sitting in the living room of Keane

  Taylor's house. It was a big room with a Persian

  164 Ken Follett

  carpet. They had drawn three chairs into the middle, around a coffee table.

  Beside Simons's chair, a small mountain of cigar ash was growing on the

  carpet. Taylor would be furious.

  Coburn felt drained. Being debriefed by Simons was even more harrowing than

  he had anticipated. When he was sure he had told everything, Simons thought

  of more questions. When Coburn could not quite remember something, Simons

  made him think hard until he did remember. Simons drew from him information

  he had not consciously registered, just by asking the right questions.

  46 The van and the ladder--4hat scenario is out," Simons said. "Their weak

  point now is their loose routine. We can get two men in there as visitors,

  with shotguns or Walthers under their coats. Paul and Bill would be brought

  to that visiting area. Our two men should be able to overpower the colonel

  and the eavesdropper without any trouble-and without making enough noise to


  alarin anyone else in the vicinity - Then

  :.Then what?"

  'That's the problem. The four men would have to come out of the building,

  cross the courtyard, reach the gate, either open it or climb it, reach the

  street, and get in a car . . . "

  "It sounds possible," Coburn said. "There's just one guard at the gate . .

  ."

  "A number of things about this scenario bother me," Simons

  . " - the windows in the high building that overlooks the

  said One, courtyard. While our men are in the courtyard, anyone looking out

  of any one of those windows will see them. Two: the elite guard with shiny

  helmets and rifles. Whatever happens, our people have to slow down at the

  gate. If there's just one guard with a rifle looking out of one of those

  high windows, he could pick off the four of them like shooting fish in a

  barrel."

  :*We don't know the guards are in the high building."'

  'We don't know they're not. -

  "It seems like a small risk-"

  "We're not going to take any risks we don't have to. Three: the traffic in

  this goddam city is a bastard. You just can't talk about jumping in a car

  and getting away. We could run into a demonstration fifty yards down the

  street. No. This snatch has got to be quiet. We must have time. What is

  that colonel like, the one in charge of the place?"

  "He was quite friendly," Coburn said. "He seemed genuinely sorry for Paul

  and Bill. -

  ON WINGS OF EAGLES 165

  "I wonder whether we can get to him. Do we know anything at all about

  him?"

  'No."

  "Let's find out."

  "I'll put Majid on it."

  ,,The colonel would have to make sure there were no guards around at

  visiting time. We could make it look good by tying him up, or even

  knocking him out.... If he can be bribed, we can still bring this thing

  off."

  "I'll get on it right away," said Coburn.

  4

  On January 13 Ross Perot took off from Amman, Jordan, in a Lear jet of Arab

  Wings, the charter operation of Royal Jordanian Airlines. The plane headed

  for Tehran. In the baggage hold was a net bag containing half a dozen

  professional-sized videotapes, the kind used by television crews: this was