The Peregrine Spy (44 page)

“The rubric, as they call it, where is it?” Frank skimmed through the cable on Kianouri and the
Tudeh
party. “Here … ‘an established source of known reliability’… that usually refers to a friendly security agency.”

“Certainty not Stasi.”

“Probably Mossad,” said Frank.

“These Jews are good,” said Lermontov. “Even in East Germany. Even here. All this is good. It will bring you a bonus.”

“I could sure use it,” said Frank as he skimmed through the material Lermontov had given him. It included a Soviet analysis of the shortcomings of the leftist coup that had taken over in Afghanistan, details on the limited support the Russians would provide to both the
Tudeh
party and the
Feda’iyan Khalq
in Iran, and an assessment of the imminent probability of Khomeini’s takeover. Knowing Lermontov wore a wire and would have to share the tape with his colleagues, Frank made no comment, but he pointed to the document on Khomeini and shrugged.

Lermontov smiled. “Have you spoken lately to your friend the former Shah?”

“Former Shah? I wouldn’t sell him short so soon. Remember 1953 when Mosaddeq came to power. People thought the Shah was washed up then. He even went into exile. But he came back, and Mosaddeq did a quick fade.”

“Like you, I’ve read about all that, but times change, and you are not Kermit Roosevelt.”

“No, I’m sure as hell not Kermit Roosevelt,” said Frank, remembering how Roosevelt, a high-level CIA officer, had taken credit for the overthrow of Mosaddeq. “And I haven’t seen the Shah in a week or so.”

“I would be curious to know his reaction to the marches. Did you watch them?”

“I did.”

“I hope you understood what you saw. And I hope the Shah understood. The masses, millions of marchers, acting in absolute obedience to Khomeini, acting in defiance of the former Shah and his useless government. When you see him, please ask your Shah what he thought.”

*   *   *

He had not wanted to do it, but he had Bill Steele patch through a call to Rocky, telling him Frank was coming in. They sat in the bubble. Even before Frank turned over the new material Lermontov had given him, he told Rocky what Lermontov had told him about Nazih.

“I was right,” said Rocky. “Someone was trying to set you up, but it wasn’t Kasravi. It was his fucking boss. Shit, if you got the prime minister that pissed off at you, maybe we better get your Irish ass outta here.”

“I knew you’d say that, but think about it. Maybe you were right about Lermontov. Maybe he is trying to set me up. Except instead of using Henry James as his weapon, he’s using you.”

“Me? What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I’ve been doing some good things here. Things that hurt the Russians. Lermontov puts me in a position to have to tell you the prime minister is pissed off at me, pissed off enough to torture a guy to say I recruited him. Maybe he figures he can count on you to have me shipped home.”

“He couldn’t be that fuckin’ devious,” said Rocky. “Shit. That’s what you said to me about him the other night, isn’t it?

“Yeah,” said Frank. “It is. Let’s give it some time. Maybe I can talk to General Merid tomorrow. See if he knows anything about what happened to his nephew. Or why.”

“Okay,” said Rocky. “Lermontov offer anything else on the mole?”

“No. Just a note asking if we heard anything from our shop.”

“He seem nervous?”

“No. When he’s worried, he doesn’t act nervous. Uptight, maybe, but not nervous.”

“He should be uptight. By now the Holy Ghost has a tight lid on this op, but that first cable would’ve hit Near East, Soviet Div, Covert Action. My own hunch, based on the agents Lermontov says got rolled up, the mole’s somewhere in Soviet Div.”

“Wherever he is,” said Frank, “he worries me.”

“He should,” said Rocky, “but for now there’s not much we can do about it. You told your Jayface buddies you got the okay on bein’ posted here as an adviser?”

Frank nodded. “Jayface. Kasravi. The Shah.”

“They all like it?”

“More or less. The Shah didn’t like the sound of ‘indefinite.’”

“Yeah, well, these days nothin’ much is definite. So you may as well stick around. We may all be gettin’ shipped outta here pretty soon. Lermontov have anything new to say about the Brits?”

“No.”

“He ain’t worth much, is he? When’s your next meet?”

“Thursday. His place. Daytime. He said he’s getting worried about the curfew. He set up the meet out loud, then gave me a note saying to wear a wire. There’s a video camera, so I can’t just lay my tape recorder on the table.”

“Fuckers. They got a guy into orbit before we did. Now they got video cameras in their safe houses before we do.”

“Have you got anybody who can handle a wire?”

“’Course I do.”

“Batteries included?”

“Fuck you, Sully.”

*   *   *

The general sat like a fleshy sphinx at the head of the table, flanked by the Iranian members of the Jayface team. Moist, flickering eyelashes softened the stone mask of his face. His forearms and palms rested on the smooth surface. Frank perceived a black armband on the general’s left arm. He looked again but saw no armband. Still, he was left with the sense there should be one.

“You’re late,” said the general, his eyes shifting to look directly into Frank’s.

“Heavy traffic,” said Frank. He did not want to ask what was wrong. Still in their coats, the three Americans stood in the doorway.

“I have some unhappy news I must share with you,” said the general. “Our colleague Major Hossein Nazih died sometime yesterday. On
Ashura,
the anniversary of the martyrdom of his namesake, Imam Hossein, on the plains of Karbala.” The general’s words seemed both rehearsed and heartfelt. “Our history has come full circle. My nephew also died a martyr, after suffering horrible tortures, refusing to confess some conspiracy invented by
Savak
that would implicate us.”

“Us?”

“Yes, Major Sullivan. Someone, I don’t know who, called me from the prison during the night. He told me
Savak
had invented a plot, saying the CIA wanted to take over the mass media and influence the people against the Shah, starting with your idea for a military newspaper. They tried to force Hossein to confess that you had recruited him to act as your spy. He refused.”

“Why would he go through torture to protect me?”

The general managed a faint smile. “Not you, Major Sullivan. He died to protect me. If he had implicated you, he would have implicated us all, especially me, as head of … our group.”

Frank had briefed Gus and Fred about what Lermontov had told him. Lermontov had known about Nazih’s interrogation hours before General Merid had received his phone call. Frank wondered if the story told to the general had been concocted as the next step in Lermontov’s version of the prime minister’s plot or if it represented someone’s honest effort to warn the general.

“I have put in a call to the prime minister’s office for an appointment. He must get to the bottom of this effort to undermine us and punish those responsible for the murder of Hossein.”

How can I stop him? thought Frank. I can’t tell him what Lermontov told me. I’m not even sure I believe it.

“If that fails,” said the general, “I will take it up with Colonel Kasravi.”

Frank hoped neither the prime minister nor Kasravi would see the general.

“In view of what has happened, I have canceled today’s meeting. We will convene here tomorrow morning at zero eight hundred hours, precisely. Major Sullivan, could you and I meet privately after the others have left? Your driver can return for you after he drops off Colonel Bunker and Commander Simpson.”

“Of course,” said Fred, taking command. “And General Merid, as head of our advisory group, may I express our sincere condolences at your loss.”

The general nodded.
“Allah-o akbar.”

The Iranians filed out, each stopping to embrace and console the general, each, as he passed, studying Frank, who did his best to appear saddened and otherwise expressionless. He did not have to fake the sadness. No one deserved to die as Nazih had. His refusal to tell the lies
Savak
wanted to force out of him made Frank wonder how badly he had misjudged the man.

“General,” said Fred, “would you mind if I had a word with Major Sullivan before we leave?”

“Of course,” said the general.

“I’ll walk you downstairs,” said Frank.

They’d reached the ground floor before Fred spoke, softly. “We’ll get off a cable on what the general had to say about Nazih. Anything you want us to get in?”

“No. I may have more when I get back, but you ought to get this off right away.”

“NE’s liable to shut us down if we’ve got our titty in a wringer with the PM,” said Gus.

“Maybe,” said Frank. But not likely, he thought, now that Henry James has his foot in the door. Maybe it’s Lermontov’s turn to keep me from getting kicked out.

*   *   *

The general stood where they had left him, near the head of the table, alone in the chill, concrete-walled room.

“Come sit by me,” said General Merid, nodding at the chair to his right. He eased himself into his own high-back chair. Frank sat beside him.

“I know you were very close,” said Frank.

The general gave up the effort to hold back his tears. He made no sound and did not try to wipe away the signs of sorrow that trickled over his puffy cheeks. “You probably guessed, and I know people gossiped about it. He called me Dari.”

Dariush, thought Frank. He’d almost forgotten that General Merid had a first name.

“It was our little joke. One of our little jokes. I hope you don’t judge us too harshly. Since he was my nephew, it might almost seem like incest. Relations between men are not unheard of in our circle, in our culture.” The tears had stopped, and the general’s dark, suddenly clear eyes probed Frank’s. “I thought you would understand. To lose someone you’re close to.” Frank nodded but could find no way to express his sympathy. “And to fear what may happen next.”

Okay, thought Frank. Let’s talk about that. “What do you fear, Dariush?”

“I am not as brave as Hossein. And I do not enjoy pain as he did.” A constricted laugh escaped the general’s lips. “You’ll think we were mad. He used to ask me to whip him. He was not devout, but he used to always march on
Ashura,
flogging himself. This
Ashura,
Hossein found himself flogged more … much worse. The
kafer
s killed Hossein again. Infidels. Someone truly devout like Captain Irfani would think that a sacrilege, to compare my Hossein with Imam Hossein, but we are all children of the same God.” He paused, drumming the fingers of his right hand on the table. “Most of the people taken away from the palace by
Savak
came from our town, Qazvin. I am from Qazvin. They may identify me with the others. Can you talk to His Imperial Majesty?”

“I don’t know,” said Frank. “It’s been a week since he summoned me. I’ve got a hunch he may have other things on his mind more … more urgent than talking to me.”

“But this is urgent. It could be the end of us all. The end of me. The end of your work here. I’ve been honest with you today. I must be honest with you. If they torture me and want me to name you in some plot, I will accuse you. I am not so brave as Hossein.”

“I understand.” Nazih may have saved my neck, thought Frank, but I may not be so lucky if they try the same godawful game with the trembling general. How do I get out of this?

“And I can’t be sure where His Excellency the prime minister, General Azhari, stands,” said General Merid. “I have not told the others, but I have tried to contact him on other matters, before this, and he does not return my calls. Colonel Kasravi also does not return my calls. He did send word, through a messenger, that he wants to meet with you upstairs at three this afternoon. I’m to call his office, not him but his office, if you can’t make it.”

“I’ll make it,” said Frank. “And, sir, if I should get the chance to meet with His Imperial Majesty, what would you want me to say?”

“Find out—he must know about this. Find out if he will protect me.”

“Sir, I hate to say this, but he did not protect Major Nazih.”

“Yes, but Hossein had been involved in a plot. The man who called me from Evin prison said Hossein had confessed to being involved with some Russian, a plot to spy on the palace. I have done nothing. No one has recruited me. I spy for no one.”

That may not be enough, thought Frank. For either of us. The general’s dark eyes pierced his. Frank looked away. He knew the room was bugged. Inefficiently, he hoped. The general might already have said enough to hang them both.

“If you find out the Shah might not protect me, I would know sooner or later they will come for me. And before they do, I can take my own life.”

Another suicidal wannabe, thought Frank. No, the Shah won’t protect you. Any more than he protected Nazih. Push come to shove, would he protect me?

“I can die like a soldier,” said the general. “Not tortured. Not humiliated. I can die like a man.”

*   *   *

Ali had managed to get back to the Supreme Commander’s Headquarters compound before Frank’s talk with General Merid had ended. After the long combination of the Thursday-Friday weekend and the successive days of mourning,
Tasu’a
and
Ashura,
early morning traffic had been heavy and slowed their trip to Supreme Commander’s Headquarters, but now the glut of cars and trucks and buses had thinned. Frank decided to have Ali drive him directly to the embassy. He slumped into the passenger’s seat beside Ali and pulled his stocking cap low over his forehead.

*   *   *

“Upstairs,” said Rocky as Frank entered his office. Frank nodded, and they climbed from the basement to the bubble. Frank unreeled all General Merid had told him.

“Why would he tell you all this?”

“I don’t know,” said Frank. “Maybe he senses the spoiled priest in me. I can’t give absolution, but I can hear confessions. People talk to me. I give good ear.”

“You better give good cable. All of it.”