the youth nodded and raised his hand in salute. "khoda haefez, agha," then moved his horse to safety and stood there watching him. when the engines were up to power, mciver waved once and left. all the way to the rendezvous he had thought about the youth. no reason for that youth not to shoot me, or perhaps no reason to shoot me. did i dream him, dream the pain? no, i didn't dream the pain. did i have a heart attack?
now, ready to leave for kuwait, for the first time he faced the question. disquiet returned and he glanced at wazari who was staring disconsolately out the side window at the sea. how dangerous am i now? he asked himself. if i
had one attack, even a mild one, i could have another, so am i risking his life as well as my own? i don't think so. i've only high blood pressure and that's under control, i take the two pills a day and no problem. i can't leave a 212 just because tom's gone mad. i'm tired, but okay, and kuwait's only a couple of hours. i'd be happier not to be flying. my god, i never thought i'd ever feel that. old scrag can have the flying, i'm done with it forever.
his ears were listening to the pitch of the engines. ready for takeoff now, no real need to check the instruments. through the rain speckles on his windshield he saw ayre give him a thumbs-up, also ready. down the beach he could see lochart in the 206. poor old tom. bet he's cursing us to hurry, anxious to refuel and rush north to a new destiny. hope he succeeds at least he'll have a following wind.
"okay to switch on the vhf'!" wazari asked, distracting him. "i'll tune into military frequencies."
"good." mciver smiled at wazari, pleased to have him for company.
lots of static in his headphones, then farsi voices. wazari listened awhile then said throatily, "it's the fighters talking to kowiss. one of them said, 'in all the names of god, how're we going to find two choppers in this pool of dog shit?"
"they won't, not if i have anything to do with it." mciver tried to sound confident over a sudden tide of foreboding. he got ayre's attention, pointed upward, indicating the fighters and motioned across his throat. then he pointed a last time out into the gulf and gave a thumbs-up. a glance at his watch: 2:21 rm.
"here we go, sergeant," he said and twisted the throttles full open, "next stop kuwait. eta 4:40 p.m., or thereabouts."
at kuwait airport: 2:56 p.m. genny and charlie pettikin were sitting in the open-air restaurant on the upper level of the sparkling, newly opened terminal. it was a grand, sunny day, sheltered from the wind. bright yellow tablecloths and umbrellas, everyone eating and drinking with enjoyment and gusto. except for them. genny had hardly touched her salad, pettikin had picked at his rice and curry.
"charlie," genny said abruptly, "i think i'll have a vodka martini after all."
"good idea," pettikin waved for a waiter and ordered for her. he would have liked to join her but he was expecting to replace or spell either lochart or ayre on the next leg down the coast to jellet island at least one refueling stop, perhaps two, before reaching al shargaz god curse this sodding wind. "won't be long now, genny."
oh, for christ's sake, how many times do you have to say it, genny wanted to scream, sick of waiting. stoically she kept up her pretence of calm. "not long, charlie. any moment now." their eyes went seaward. the distant seascape was hazed, visibility poor, but they would know the instant the choppers came into kuwait radar range. the imperial air rep was waiting in the tower.
how long is long? she asked herself, trying to pierce the heat haze, all her energy pouring out, seeking duncan, sending prayers and hopes and strengths that he might need. the word that gavallan had passed on this morning had not helped: "what on earth's he flying kia for, andy? back to tehran? what does that mean?"
"don't know, genny. i'm telling you as he said it. our interpretation is that freddy was sent to the fuel rendezvous first. mac took off with kia he's either taking him to the rendezvous or he'll put him off enroute. tom's holding the fort for a time to give the others a breathing space, then he'll head for the rv. we got mac's initial call at 10:42. give him till 11:00 a.m. for him and freddy to take off. give them another hour to get to the rv and refuel, add two hours thirty flight time, they should arrive kuwait around 2:30 at the earliest. depending on how long they wait at the rv it could be anytime, from 2:30 onwards..."
she saw the waiter bringing her drink. on the tray was a mobile phone. "phone call for you, captain pettikin," the waiter said as he put the glass in front of her. pettikin pulled out the antenna, held the phone to his ear. "hello? oh, hello, andy." she watched his face, "no... no, not yet... oh?..." he listened intently for a long time, just an occasional grunt and nod, nothing showing outwardly, and she wondered what gavallan was saying that she was not supposed to hear. "... yes, sure... no... yes, everything's covered as far as we can... yes, yes, she is... all right, hang on." he passed the phone over. "he wants to say hello."
"hello, andy, what's new?"
"just reporting in, genny. not to worry about mac and the others no telling how long they had to wait at the rv."
"i'm fine, andy. don't worry about me. what about the others?"
"rudi, pop kelly, and sandor are enroute from bahrain they refueled at abu dhabi and we're in contact with them john hogg's our relay station their eta here's in twenty minutes. scrag's me, ed and willi no problem, duke's sleeping and manuela's here. she wants to say hello..." a moment and then manuela's voice: "hi, darling', how are ye, and don't say great!"
genny smiled halfheartedly. "great. is duke all right?"
"sleepin' like a baby, not that babies sleep quiet all the time. just wanted you to know we're sweating it out too. i'll pass you back to andy."
a pause, then: "hello, genny. johnny hogg'll be in your area about now and he'll be listening too. we'll keep in touch. can i speak to charlie again, please."
"of course, but what about marc dubois and fowler?"
a pause. "nothing yet. we're hoping they've been picked up rudi, sandor, and pop backtracked and searched as long as they could. no wreckage, there're lots of ships in those waters and platforms. we're sweating them out."
"now tell me what charlie's supposed to know but i'm not." she scowled into the dead silence on the phone, then heard gavallan sigh.
"you're one for the book, genny. all right. i asked charlie if any telex had arrived from iran yet, like the one we got here, in dubai and bahrain. i'm trying to pull all the strings i can through newbury and our kuwaiti embassy in case of a foul-up, though newbury says not to expect much, kuwait being so close to iran and not wanting to offend khomeini and petrified he'll send or allow a few export fundamentalists to stir up the kuwaiti shi'as. i told charlie that i'm trying to get word to ross's parents in nepal and to his regiment. that's the lot." in a more kindly voice, "i didn't want to upset you more than necessary. okay?"
"yes, thanks. yes, i'm... i'm fine. thanks, andy." she passed the phone back and looked at her glass. beads of moisture had formed. some were trickling. like the tears on my cheeks, she thought and got up. "back in a sec."
sadly pettikin watched her go. he listened to gavallan's final instructions. "yes, yes, of course," he said. "don't worry, andy, i'll take care of... i'll take care of ross, and i'll call the very moment we have them on the screen. bloody awful about dubois and fowler, we'll just have to think good thoughts and hope. great about the others. 'bye."
finding ross had shattered him. the moment he had got gavallan's call this morning he had rushed to the hospital. today being friday, with minimum staff, there was just one receptionist on duty and he spoke only arabic. the man smiled and shrugged and said, "bohrah," tomorrow. but pettikin had persisted and eventually the man had understood what he wanted, and had made a phone call. at length a male nurse arrived and beckoned him. they went along corridors and then through a door and there was ross naked on a slab.
it was the suddenness, the totality of nakedness, of seeming defilement, and the obliteration of any shred of dignity that had torn pettikin apart, not the fact of death. this man who had been so fine in life had been left like a carcass. on another slab were sheets. he took one and covered him and that seemed to make it better.
it had taken pettikin more than an hour to find the ward where ross had
been, to track down an english-speaking nurse and to find his doctor.
"so very sorry, so very sorry, sir," the doctor, a lebanese, had said in halting english. "the young man arrived yesterday in a coma. he had a fractured skull and we suspected brain damage; it was from a terrorist bomb we were told. both eardrums were broken and he had a number of minor cuts and bruises. we x-rayed him, of course, but apart from binding his skull there was little we could do but wait. he had no internal damage or hemorrhage. he died this morning with the dawn. the dawn was beautiful today, wasn't it? i signed the death certificate would you like a copy? we've given one to the english embassy together with his effects."
"did he... did he recover consciousness before he died?"
"i do not know. he was in intensive care and his nurse... iet me see." laboriously the doctor had consulted his lists and found her name. "sivin tahollah. ah, yes. because he was english we assigned her to him."
she was an old woman, part of the flotsam of the middle east, knowing no forebears, part of many nations. her face was ugly and pockmarked but she was not, her voice gentle and calming, her hands warm. "he was never conscious, effendi," she said in english, "not truly."
"did he say anything particularly, anything you could understand, anything at all?"
"much that i understood, effendi, and nothing." the old woman thought a moment. "most of what he said was just mind wanderings, the spirit fearing what should not be feared, wanting that which could not he had. he would murmur 'azadeh' azadeh means 'born free' in farsi though it is also a woman's name. sometimes he would mutter a name like 'err)' or 'ekki' or 'kookri,' and then again 'azadeh.' his spirit was at peace but not quite though he never wept like some do, or cry out, nearing the threshold."
"was there anything more anything?"
she toyed with the watch she wore on her lapel. "from time to time his wrists seemed to bother him and when i stroked them he became calm again. in the night he spoke a tongue i have never heard before. i speak english, a little french, and many dialects of arabic, many. but this tongue i have never heard before. he spoke it in a lilting way, mixed with wanderings and 'azadeh," sometimes words like..." she searched her memory. "like 'regiment' and 'edelweiss' and 'highlands' or 'high land,' and sometimes, ah, yes, words like 'gueng' and 'tensing,' sometimes a name like 'roses' or 'rose mountain' perhaps it was not a name but just a place but it seemed to sadden him." her old eyes were rheumy. "i've seen much of death, effendi, very much, always different, always the same. but his passing was peaceful and his going over the threshold without hurt. the last moment was just a great sigh i think he went to paradise, if christians go to paradise, and found his azadeh..."
l81~.~21415
tabri~at the khan's palace: 3:40 p.m. azadeh walked slowly along the corridor toward the great room where she was meeting her brother, her back still troubling her from the grenade explosion yesterday. god in heaven, was it only yesterday that the tribesmen and erikki almost killed us? she thought. it seems more like a thousand days, and a light- year since father died.
it was another lifetime. nothing good in that lifetime except mother and erikki and hakim, erikki and... and johnny. a lifetime of hatreds and killings and terrors and madness, madness living like pariahs, hakim and i, surrounded by evil, madness at the qazvin roadblock and that vile, fat-faced mujhadin squashed against the car, oozing like a swatted fly, madness of our rescue by charlie and the kgb man what was his name, ah yes, rakoczy rakoczy almost killing all of us, madness at abu mard that has changed my life forever, madness at the base where we'd had so many fine times, erikki and i, but where johnny killed so many so fast and so cruelly.
she had told erikki everything last night almost everything. "at the base he... he became a killing animal. i don't remember much, just flashes, giving him the grenade in the village, watching him rush the base... grenades and machine guns, one of the men wearing a kookri, then johnny holding up his severed head and howling like a banshee... i know now the kookri was gueng's. johnny told me in tehran."
"don't say any more now. leave it until tomorrow, leave the rest until tomorrow, my darling. go to sleep, you're safe now."
"no. i'm afraid to sleep, even now in your arms, even with all the glorious news about hakim, when i sleep i'm back in the village, back at abu mard and the mullah's there, cursed of god, the kalandar's there and butcher's got his carving knife."
"there's no more village or mullah, i've been there. no more kalandar, nor butcher. ahmed told me about the village, part of what had happened there."
"you went to the village?"
"yes, this afternoon, when you were resting. i took a car and went there. it's a heap of burned rubble. just as well," erikki had said ominously.
