by Ken Follett
He put all that out of his mind. The decision was made. If you go through life thinking about all the bad things that can happen, you soon talk yourself into doing nothing at all. Concentrate on the problems that can be solved. The chips are on the table and the wheel is in spin. The last game has begun.
4______
On Tuesday the U.S. Embassy announced that evacuation flights for all Americans in Tehran would leave during the coming weekend.
Simons got Coburn and Poche in one of the bedrooms of the Dvoranchik place and closed the door. "This solves some of our problems," he said. "I want to split them up at this point in the game. Some can take the Embassy evacuation flight, leaving a manageable group for the overland trip."
Coburn and Poche agreed.
"Obviously, Paul and Bill have to go overland," Simons said. "Two of us three have to go with them: one to escort them across the mountains and the other to cross the border legitimately and meet up with Boulware. We'll need an Iranian driver for each of the two Range Rovers. That leaves us two spare seats. Who takes them? Not Cathy--she'll be much better off on the Embassy flight."
"Rich will want to go with her," said Coburn.
"And that fucking dog," Simons added.
Buffy's life is saved, Coburn thought. He was rather glad.
Simons said: "There's Keane Taylor, John Howell, Bob Young, and Bill Gayden. Here's the problem: Dadgar might pick people up at the airport, and we'll end up back where we started--with EDS men in jail. Who is at most risk?"
"Gayden," said Coburn. "He's president of EDS World. As a hostage, he'd be better than Paul and Bill. In fact, when Dadgar arrested Bill Gaylord, we wondered whether it was a mistake, and he really wanted Bill Gayden, but got confused because of the similarity of the names."
"Gayden comes out overland with Paul and Bill, then."
"John Howell is not even employed by EDS. And he's a lawyer. He should be all right."
"Howell goes out by air."
"Bob Young is employed by EDS in Kuwait, not Iran. If Dadgar has a list of EDS names, Young won't be on it."
"Young flies. Taylor drives. Now, one of us has to go on the evacuation flight with the Clean Team. Joe, that's you. You've kept a lower profile than Jay. He's been on the streets, at meetings at the Hyatt--whereas nobody knows you're here."
"Okay," said Poche.
"So the Clean Team is the Gallaghers, Bob Young, and John Howell, led by Joe. The Dirty Team is me, Jay, Keane Taylor, Bill Gayden, Paul, Bill, and two Iranian drivers. Let's go tell 'em."
They went into the living room and everyone sat down. As Simons talked, Coburn admired how he announced his decision in such a way that they all thought they were being asked for their opinions rather than being told what to do.
There was some discussion of who should be in which team--both John Howell and Bob Young would have preferred to be in the Dirty Team, feeling themselves vulnerable to arrest by Dadgar--but in the end they all reached the decision Simons had already made.
The Clean Team might as well move into the Embassy compound as soon as possible, Simons said. Gayden and Joe Poche went off to find Lou Goelz, the Consul General, and talk to him about it.
The Dirty Team would leave tomorrow morning.
Coburn had to organize the Iranian drivers. These were to have been Majid and his cousin, the professor, but the professor was in Rezaiyeh and could not get to Tehran, so Coburn had to find a replacement.
He had already decided on Seyyed. Seyyed was a young Iranian systems engineer like Rashid and the Cycle Man, but from a much wealthier family: relatives of his had been high in politics and the army under the Shah. Seyyed had been educated in England and spoke with a British accent. His great asset, from Coburn's point of view, was that he came from the northwest, so he knew the territory and he spoke Turkish.
Coburn called Seyyed and they met at Seyyed's house. Coburn told him lies. "I need to gather intelligence on the roads between here and Khoy," Coburn said. "I'll need someone to drive me. Will you do it?"
"Sure," said Seyyed.
"Meet me at ten forty-five tonight at Argentine Square."
Seyyed agreed.
Simons had instructed Coburn to go through all this. Coburn trusted Seyyed, but of course Simons did not; so Seyyed would not know where the team was staying until he got there, and he would not know about Paul and Bill until he saw them; and from that moment on he would not be out of Simons's sight.
When Coburn returned to the Dvoranchik place, Gayden and Poche were back from seeing Lou Goelz. They had told Goelz that a few EDS men were staying in Tehran to look for Paul and Bill, but the others wanted to leave on the first evacuation flight, and stay at the Embassy in the meantime. Goelz had said that the Embassy was full, but they could stay at his house.
They all thought that was pretty damn good of Goelz. Most of them had got mad at him once or twice over the last two months, and had made it pretty clear that they blamed him and his colleagues for the arrest of Paul and Bill: it was big of him to open his house to them after all that. As everything came unglued in Iran, Goelz was becoming less of a bureaucrat and showing that his heart was in the right place.
The Clean Team and the Dirty Team shook hands and wished each other luck, not knowing who needed it most; then the Clean Team left for Goelz's house.
It was now evening. Coburn and Keane Taylor went to Majid's house to pick him up: he would spend the night at the Dvoranchik place like Seyyed. Coburn and Taylor also had to get a fifty-five-gallon drum of fuel that Majid had been keeping for them.
When they got to the house Majid was out.
They waited, fretting. At last Majid came in. He greeted them, welcomed them to his home, called for tea, the whole nine yards. Eventually Coburn said: "We're leaving tomorrow morning. We want you to come with us now."
Majid asked Coburn to step into another room with him; then he said: "I can't go with you."
"Why not?"
"I have to kill Hoveyda."
"What?" said Coburn incredulously. "Who?"
"Amir Abbas Hoveyda, who used to be Prime Minister."
"Why do you have to kill him?"
"It's a long story. The Shah had a land-reform program, and Hoveyda tried to take away my family's tribal lands, and we rebelled, and Hoveyda put me in jail ... I have been waiting all these years for my revenge."
"You have to kill him right away?" said Coburn, astonished.
"I have the weapons and the opportunity. In two days' time all may be different."
Coburn was nonplussed. He did not know what to say. It was clear Majid could not be talked around.
Coburn and Taylor manhandled the fuel drum into the back of the Range Rover, then took their leave. Majid wished them luck.
Back at the Dvoranchik place, Coburn started trying to reach the Cycle Man, hoping he would replace Majid as driver. The Cycle Man was as elusive as Coburn himself. He could normally be reached at a certain phone number--some kind of revolutionary headquarters, Coburn suspected--just once a day. The regular time for him to drop by this place was now past--it was late in the evening--but Coburn tried anyway. The Cycle Man was not there. He tried a few more phone numbers without success.
At least they had Seyyed.
At ten-thirty Coburn went out to meet Seyyed. He walked through the darkened streets to Argentine Square, a mile from the Dvoranchik place, then picked his way across a construction site and into an empty building to wait.
At eleven o'clock Seyyed had not arrived.
Simons had told Coburn to wait fifteen minutes, no longer; but Coburn decided to give Seyyed a little more time.
He waited until eleven-thirty.
Seyyed was not coming.
Coburn wondered what had happened: given Seyyed's family connections, it was quite possible he had fallen victim to the revolutionaries.
For the Dirty Team this was a disaster. Now they had no Iranians to go with them. How the hell will we get through all those roadblocks? wondere
d Coburn. What a shitty break: the professor drops out, Majid drops out, the Cycle Man can't be found, then Seyyed drops out. Shit.
He left the construction site and walked away. Suddenly he heard a car. He looked back, and saw a jeep full of armed revolutionaries swinging around the square. He ducked behind a convenient bush. They went by.
He went on, hurrying now, wondering whether the curfew was in force tonight. He was almost home when the jeep came roaring back toward him.
They saw me last time, he thought, and they've come back to pick me up.
It was very dark. They might not have spotted him yet. He turned and ran back. There was no cover on this street. The noise of the jeep became louder. At last Coburn saw some shrubbery and flung himself into it. He lay there listening to his heartbeat as the jeep came closer. Were they looking for him? Had they picked up Seyyed and tortured him, and made him confess that he had an appointment with a capitalist American pig at Argentine Square at ten forty-five ... ?
The jeep went by without stopping.
Coburn picked himself up.
He ran all the way to the Dvoranchik place.
He told Simons they now had no Iranian drivers.
Simons cursed. "Is there another Iranian we can call?"
"Only one. Rashid."
Simons did not want to use Rashid, Coburn knew, because Rashid had led the jailbreak, and if someone who remembered him from that should see him driving a carload of Americans, there might be trouble. But Coburn could not think of anyone else.
"Okay," said Simons. "Call him."
Coburn dialed Rashid's number.
He was at home!
"This is Jay Coburn. I need your help."
"Sure."
Coburn did not want to give the address of the hideout over the phone, in case the line was wiretapped. He recalled that Bill Dvoranchik had a slight squint. He said: "You remember the guy with the funny eye?"
"With a funny eye? Oh, yeah--"
"Don't say his name. Remember where he used to live?"
"Sure--"
"Don't say it. That's where I am. I need you here."
"Jay, I live miles from there and I don't know how I'm going to get across the city--"
"Just try," Coburn said. He knew how resourceful Rashid was. Give him a task and he just hated to fail. "You'll get here."
"Okay."
"Thanks." Coburn hung up.
It was midnight.
Paul and Bill had each picked a passport from the ones Gayden had brought from the States, and Simons had made them learn the names, dates of birth, personal details, and all the visas and country stamps. The photograph in Paul's passport looked more or less like Paul, but Bill's was a problem. None of them was right, and he ended up with the passport of Larry Humphreys, a blond, rather Nordic type who really did not look like Bill.
The tension mounted as the six men discussed details of the journey they would begin within the next few hours. There was fighting in Tabriz, according to Rich Gallagher's military contacts; so they would stick to the plan of taking the low road, south of Lake Rezaiyeh, passing through Mahabad. The story they would tell, if questioned, would be as close to the truth as possible--always Simons's preference when lying. They would say they were businessmen who wanted to get home to their families, the airport was closed, and they were driving to Turkey.
In support of that story, they would carry no weapons. It was a difficult decision--they knew they might regret being unarmed and helpless in the middle of a revolution--but Simons and Coburn had found, on the reconnaissance trip, that the revolutionaries at the roadblocks always searched for weapons. Simons's instinct told him they would be better off talking their way out of trouble than trying to shoot their way out.
They also decided to leave behind the fifty-five-gallon fuel drum, on the grounds that they made the team look too professional, too organized, for businessmen quietly driving home.
They would, however, take a lot of money. Joe Poche and the Clean Team had gone off with fifty thousand dollars, but Simons's crew still had around a quarter of a million dollars, some of it in Iranian rials, deutsche marks, sterling, and gold. They packed fifty thousand dollars into kitchen Baggies, weighted the bags with shot, and put them in a gas can. They hid some in a Kleenex box and more in the battery hold of a flashlight. They passed the rest out for each to conceal about his person.
At one o'clock Rashid still had not arrived. Simons sent Coburn to stand at the street gate and watch for him.
Coburn stood in the darkness, shivering, hoping Rashid would show up. They would leave tomorrow, with or without him, but without him they might not get far. The villagers in the countryside would probably detain Americans just on general principles. Rashid would be the ideal guide, despite Simons's worries: the kid had a silver tongue.
Coburn's thoughts turned to home. Liz was mad at him, that he knew. She had been giving Merv Stauffer a hard time, calling every day and asking where her husband was and what he was doing and when he was coming home.
Coburn knew he would have to make some decisions when he got home. He was not sure that he was going to spend the rest of his life with Liz; and after this episode, maybe she would begin to feel the same way. I suppose we were in love, once upon a time, he thought. Where did all that go?
He heard footsteps. A short, curly-headed figure was walking along the sidewalk toward him, shoulders hunched against the cold.
"Rashid!" hissed Coburn.
"Jay?"
"Boy, am I glad to see you!" Coburn took Rashid's arm. "Let's go inside."
They went into the living room. Rashid said hello to everyone, smiling and blinking: he blinked a lot, especially in moments of excitement, and he had a nervous cough. Simons sat him down and explained the plan to him. Rashid blinked faster.
When he understood what was being asked of him, he became a little self-important. "I will help you on one condition," he said, and coughed. "I know this country and I know this culture. You are all important people in EDS, but this is not EDS. If I lead you to the border, you must agree always to do everything I say, without question."
Coburn held his breath. Nobody talked like this to Simons.
But Simons grinned. "Anything you say, Rashid."
A few minutes later Coburn got Simons in a corner and said quietly: "Colonel, did you mean that about Rashid being in charge?"
"Sure," said Simons. "He's in charge as long as he's doing what I want."
Coburn knew, better than Simons, how hard it was to control Rashid even when Rashid was supposed to be obeying orders. On the other hand, Simons was the most skilled leader of small groups Coburn had ever met. Then again, this was Rashid's country, and Simons did not speak Farsi.... The last thing they needed on this trip was a power struggle between Simons and Rashid.
Coburn got on the phone to Dallas and spoke to Merv Stauffer. Paul had encoded a description of the Dirty Team's proposed route to the border, and Coburn now gave Stauffer the coded message.
Then they discussed how they would communicate en route. It would probably be impossible to call Dallas from countryside pay phones, so they decided they would pass messages through an EDS employee in Tehran, Gholam. Gholam was not to know he was being used this way. Coburn would call Gholam once a day. If all was well he would say: "I have a message for Jim Nyfeler: We are okay." Once the team reached Rezaiyeh he would add: "We are at the staging area." Stauffer, in his turn, would simply call Gholam and ask whether there were any messages. So long as all went well, Gholam would be kept in the dark. If things went wrong, the pretense would be abandoned: Coburn would level with Gholam, tell him what the trouble was, and ask him to call Dallas.
Stauffer and Coburn had become so familiar with the code that they could hold a discussion, using mostly ordinary English mixed with a few letter groups and key code words, and be sure that anyone listening in on a wiretap would be unable to figure out what they meant.
Merv explained that Perot had contingency pl
ans to fly into northwest Iran from Turkey to pick up the Dirty Team if necessary. Perot wanted the Range Rovers to be clearly identifiable from the air, so he proposed that each of them should have a large "X" on its roof, either painted or made of black electrician's tape. If a vehicle had to be abandoned--because it broke down, or ran out of gas, or for any other reason--the "X" should be changed to an "A."
There was another message from Perot. He had talked with Admiral Moorer, who had said that things were going to get worse and the team should get out of there. Coburn told Simons this. Simons said: "Tell Admiral Moorer that the only water here is in the kitchen sink--I look out the window and I see no ships." Coburn laughed, and told Stauffer: "We understand the message."
It was almost five A.M. There was no more time to talk. Stauffer said: "Take care of yourself, Jay." He sounded choked up. "Keep your head down, y'hear?"
"I sure will."
"Good luck."
"Bye, Merv."
Coburn hung up.
As dawn broke, Rashid went out in one of the Range Rovers to reconnoiter the streets. He was to find a route out of the city avoiding roadblocks. If the fighting was heavy, the team would consider postponing their departure another twenty-four hours.
At the same time, Coburn left in the second Range Rover to meet with Gholam. He gave Gholam cash to cover the next payday at Bucharest, and said nothing about using Gholam to pass messages to Dallas. The object of the exercise was a pretense of normality, so that it would be a few days before the remaining Iranian employees began to suspect that their American bosses had left town.
When he got back to the Dvoranchik place, the team discussed who should go in which car. Rashid should drive the lead car, obviously. His passengers would be Simons, Bill, and Keane Taylor. In the second car would be Coburn, Paul, and Gayden.
Simons said: "Coburn, you're not to let Paul out of your sight until you're in Dallas. Taylor, the same goes for you and Bill."
Rashid came back and said the streets were remarkably quiet.
"All right," said Simons. "Let's get this show on the road."
Keane Taylor and Bill went out to fill the gas tanks of the Range Rovers from the fifty-five-gallon drum. The fuel had to be siphoned into the cars, and the only way to start the flow was to suck the fuel through: Taylor swallowed so much gasoline that he went back into the house and vomited, and for once nobody laughed at him.
