The Corporal's Wife (2013) (35 page)

‘Ask questions. I don’t answer.’

Either Tadeuz had called him on the secure link with a commentary on everyday life along the Qazvin to Tabriz road, Route 2 or Route 32, or Sara Rogers had taken over, allowing the boss to cat-nap.

‘No answer, because it is lies I have been told.’

He sat opposite Mehrak and more coffee steamed in his mug. Father William and Nobby had recognised they were at the critical moment, and hovered close to the back of the corporal’s chair. The man’s chin jutted, and the eyes were no longer evasive.

He said again, loudly, ‘No. I have nothing to talk of. No.’

Petroc knew that a helicopter had been fired on, that road blocks had intercepted an identified vehicle, that grenades had been used, that the local force had suffered two fatalities, that a Stinger had been laid across the road, that the vehicle had broken through it, and that a larger force was now deployed. He knew also that the director had been briefed and would want more that morning, that Tadeuz Fenton was shivering at the implications of what faced him.

‘You said you would bring her out. I do not believe you.’

He worked for a respected intelligence-gathering organisation. It walked – almost – in step with the great agencies of the United States, the new Russia and China. The crowd at Vauxhall Cross were at least the equal of the French and the Germans. They had a tradition of success and had accumulated bucket loads of hostility from opponents and yet . . . For want of a bloody tyre. Men and women in workshops, in the building’s basements or elsewhere, turned out some of the most high-tech products used anywhere in the world: audio stuff with long-range pick-up, cameras with extraordinarily powerful zoom qualities, telephone intercept equipment backed by unique software, but ‘little things’ had the potential to screw all the pricey gear available. A ‘little thing’ was a shredded tyre. They would have one spare wheel but a Stinger would have taken out two tyres on one side, or the front two, or all four. They had the skills at Vauxhall Cross, and the kit, but none of it was relevant to the plight of three men, a language student and a woman who photographed like a dream.

‘We’ve been entirely truthful to you.’

‘I do not believe you. I will never see her. It was a lie.’

‘We’re doing what we can.’

‘You talked but you cannot act. She will not be able to leave Iran. It cannot happen. It was your trick to deceive me. I say nothing.’

It took a moment of supreme control. Petroc could have leaned across the table and slapped the corporal’s face. It had come through during the night, coded, a mass of questions to which the analysts wanted answers: the location of missile silos, IRGC contingent readiness plans, airfield security.

‘I urge you not to take that sort of attitude, Mehrak. We’re bending over backwards to reunite you with your wife and —’

‘I think you lie.’

Father William caught Petroc’s eye and gestured towards the door. They went out. Father William, eyes cold, made a suggestion. Petroc nodded and went to call his sage.

‘Nice of you to ask, Petroc, but, sadly, no news. We were out at first light, Stephie and I, with plenty of volunteers, but there’s no sign of him. The trouble is, you can ask the farmers, “Have you seen him?” and you won’t get a straight answer.

‘So, your defector . . . What you need, Petroc, is discipline for him and a completely predictable road along which he can walk. The discipline must be the rock. Remember, most of these creatures are utterly boring and totally limited: they are third-rate or fourth. We used to have the Irish coming through our hands, supposedly hard men from the Provisionals, but they were so easy to turn. Just had to stop them blubbing about their kids. All the old Soviets wanted was a bottle of ten-year-old malt by the bed each morning . . .

‘Now, the wife. You’ve given your word that you’ll bring her out. Until, on the other side of that border, she’s in handcuffs, with the people you sent to fetch her, your promise is alive. The proposition of an excursion is acceptable but it’s not a jolly in the countryside. He must be left in no doubt that he has to earn such privileged treatment. Then, when you have him back, you squeeze and squeeze until you have the final drop of useful information from him. After that, well . . . Call me tomorrow. We’re both suffering. Petroc. I know the ways of that damn building you belong to. Praise and reward when success blooms, but a more vicious place when a coming man falls on his face I’ve never known. Brutal when confronted with failure. So, remember, discipline.’

There was a place, Kourosh knew, where the dawn light didn’t reach. More than fifty kilometres south of Tehran, but north of Qom, there were two hills. The rail track ran between them and a cutting had been opened. He had been on the train that went from Tehran to Isfahan and Yazd, and remembered the place. He didn’t think that the early brightness of the sun, fierce after the rain, would penetrate there.

He had been to the briefing, had heard what was said. He had been to the repair yard and seen the workbenches, the scattered parts of scooters and motorbikes. He had climbed the steps and entered the upper room. Before, it had been a shrine. Some days, going there, he had thought she almost welcomed him. On others he had believed her expression was of resignation, as if she didn’t know how to rid herself of him. He couldn’t stay away. He was there mostly every third day, and certainly every fifth. She made tea, and he ate cake, and sometimes she let him fondle or kiss her. It was a drug.

There had been a time when the surveillance team was deployed to Ahvaz to search out a Jew who had come into Iran to build a team of spies, bomb-layers and assassins from among the Arab population. They had been in Ahvaz, billeted inside the IRGC garrison camp on the Chahar-Shir Circle, also a prison, and after a week there – seven nights away from her – he had told his commander that his wife was ill and requested leave to return to Tehran. He had seen the room, had seen all of her, except the small place that, for modesty, was denied him. There, he was now forgotten, and the photographs of his rivals had been removed.

He held her. The picture was small. She had given it to him. The light was sufficient, just, for him to see the dark cloth covering her face and hair, the slash in the veil and the brightness of her eyes. He listened.

He was crouched beside a cement-block shed, where workmen repairing the track might have stored tools. He was out of sight. The near rail was some three metres from where he crouched. Kourosh knew the train’s schedule. The system had a reputation for punctuality. He could have drawn a pistol from the armoury and a magazine of ammunition, or he could have gone in the small hours to one of the city’s parks, thrown a rope over an upper branch and made a noose at one end.

It was because he had seen men shot and had witnessed hangings that Kourosh did not feel certain of his courage. He had never seen the aftermath of what he intended, couldn’t picture the final moments, and trusted that his nerve would hold. It was not a picture of his wife that he held, or of his child, but of the woman who had played with him, dancing near but never close.

The sound was clear, unmistakable. A whistle blast penetrated the grey shaded walls of the cutting. He had to wait, couldn’t move too quickly.

He glanced up once, held tighter to the photograph and imagined the face beneath the veil. He saw the lights at the front of the engine. He would take three steps forward, then duck down and his knees would settle on the sharp stones into which the sleepers were laid. An alternative? He couldn’t think of one. She had destroyed him. He ground the photograph between his fingers, praying he wouldn’t lose it.

The noise hammered in his ears. He went forward. The pain pinched in his knees, through his trousers, as he knelt on the sharp edged stones and he laid his head on the rail. It was cold against his throat and his eyes were closed. The scrap of paper, her picture, was locked in his fist.

He heard a low whistle from among the trees, and Zach looked back. He saw a shadow flit between the trunks, as light as a feral animal.

He had brought her back. Wally and Ralph were already by the van and they’d had it jacked up. The flooring at the back had been lifted aside and the spare was out – to no purpose: the Stinger had shredded the two nearside tyres. He had put her down. The other two had been sitting on their haunches, their weapons close to them, smoking. Their faces showed their feelings. Now, they cared less for the money than for their safety, their survival. They hadn’t said anything as the smoke had played in front of their faces. She hadn’t cowered but had stared at them. She was, Zach had reckoned, a cornered cat but wouldn’t back off. He thought they could have said
something
.

He’d taken water from the van, torn off a piece of blanket and cleaned her foot. She hadn’t flinched. The boot she had taken off had nails protruding through the heel.

Zach wouldn’t try to start a conversation, either serious or humorous, that might lift his morale and help her. He was fucked if they’d beat him. He aped her, and kept his eyes on them. He realised he hadn’t tried to evaluate their personalities, their skills, or to wonder what lay in the depths of their minds. He’d had no interest in the other students at the School, or in his fellow workers on the sites. He could survive alone.

It was different with her, though. He was fascinated by her.

The whistle came again.

Mikey materialised through the trees, soft tread, fast and hard to follow.

He wore a cheeky grin as he came over to them. He looked at her and nodded, then sat down. The grin widened.

‘The news, guys, is that Christmas has come early. It’s gift-wrapped, and it’s what I’ve always wanted. Christmas with all the trimmings.’

Chapter 12

They approached the camper van. There was no cover – a featureless landscape, the salt crystals crunching under their feet. Zach had watched Wally and Mikey, observed the way they moved and realised that the crunching was unavoidable. He observed also that a hierarchy existed between the two men, without the military style recognition of rank: Mikey wasn’t ‘sir’, not even ‘guv’nor’ or ‘boss’. Mikey set the pace and Wally followed; Mikey spoke briefly on the line of approach they’d take, and Wally grunted acceptance.

Mikey had a pistol. Wally had a pistol and grenades in his anorak pocket. Mikey said they would be tourists. Closer, Wally had identified the sticker on a back window as the flag of Australia or New Zealand. Ralph and the woman had been left behind, but Zach had been told to come. Why?

Mikey gestured for Zach to catch up, close the gap. Mikey said, ‘We’re all in this together.’

‘Meaning what?

‘All in this together – you and the lady, Wally, Ralph, and me. We’re all in this together and we’re all going out together. That means we have to have their vehicle. We can do it gently, or with whatever unpleasantness is required, but we’ll have it. You, Zach, are educated and may be a little more fluent with an explanation than me. You may be able to smooth it. I don’t want anyone hurt, but I must have the vehicle. You’ll explain better than I can that argument isn’t the way for them to go.’

‘Do they come with us?’

‘No.’

‘What do they do?’

‘They walk.’

‘Is that reasonable, in the back of beyond?’

‘I’m not asking you if it’s reasonable. You do as I tell you.’

Zach buttoned it. In a former life, as a student, he would have argued the toss. In the days when he was at the School, and riots had disfigured the streets of Tehran, other kids had made excuses for the regime – foreign intelligence, international banks, Tel Aviv, Arab despots – but Zach had stood his ground. He’d argued that the Supreme Leader and his gang, the corruption of the élite, deserved trial and conviction. It had been different on the building sites. Sometimes he’d heard rubbish spouted, and opinions that made him cringe inwardly, but he’d kept quiet. Now he pressed his hands together and walked towards the camper.

He saw a black bin liner, partially filled, with a stone on it to stop the wind blowing it away. A string hung between the front windscreen and the back hatch; pegs held a row of socks and underpants, knickers, a bra and some T-shirts. Beside a blackened place there was an old grill pan and a water bucket. He had come into their lives – Zach almost despised himself. Their footprints were marked in the salt and went towards the shore.

Beyond where their feet had gone – two of them, a boy and a girl, from the clothing that dried and stiffened with the salt and the wind – there was a group of flamingos. The men’s approach had spooked the birds, which edged away, beautiful, elegant, the pinkish feathers clear against the salt white, and headed towards a capsized boat, once a ferry across the lake but now abandoned as the water level dropped. He was surprised that no one came out to greet them, but music was playing, soft and indistinct, likely from a foreign station – Turkey or Armenia. Perhaps they had done their washing, had their breakfast and were snoozing . . . Mikey prodded him. ‘Do the talk.’

Zach nodded.

‘Tell them we want the vehicle, and they have five minutes to get their stuff out. Then I want their mobiles.’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m behind you, and if I have to show a weapon I will. Wally’s a few paces further back and he won’t tolerate anyone bolting. Bad idea for them to try. Go for it.’