Escape Read online

  ‘You’re serious?’

  ‘Our advice to evacuate all unessential personnel still stands the moment the airport opens which is God knows when but promised for Saturday—we’ve got BA to cooperate with chartered 747s. Be prepared to get out fast.’

  ‘But what about our aircraft and spares and hangars for God’s sake! Our whole corporate capital is tied up here.’

  ‘Ours not to wonder, old boy. As to the illustrious Ali Kia, he’s very minor indeed, with no power and a good weather friend to all sides. By the way we’ve just heard that the U.S. ambassador in Kabul was abducted by anti-communist, Shi’ite fundamentalist mujhadin who tried to exchange him for other mujhadin held by the pro-Soviet government. In the following shoot-out he was killed. Things are heating up rather nicely. . .’

  The telex clicked on, their attention zeroed, but the machine did not function. Both of them cursed.

  McIver glanced at the door as it opened. To their surprise it was Erikki—he and Azadeh had been due to meet them for dinner. Erikki was smiling his usual smile but there was no light behind it.

  ‘Hi, Erikki. What’s up?’ McIver looked at him keenly.

  ‘Slight change of plan. We’re, er, well, Azadeh and I are going back to Tabriz first.’

  Yesterday evening McIver had suggested that Erikki and Azadeh take immediate leave. ‘We’ll find a replacement. Go tomorrow—we’ve got clearance for the company 125 to land and, hopefully, to maintain a shuttle to Al Shargaz across the Gulf—we’re sending out everyone not essential. No sweat. Perhaps we could get Azadeh replacement papers in London. . .’

  ‘Why the change, Erikki?’ he asked. ‘Azadeh’s had second thoughts about leaving Iran without Iranian papers?’

  ‘No. An hour ago we got a message—I got a message from her father. Here, read it for yourself.’ Erikki gave it to McIver. The handwritten note said: ‘From Abdollah Khan to Captain Yokkonen: I require my daughter to come back here at once and ask you to grant her permission.’ It was signed, Abdollah Khan. The message was repeated in Farsi on the other side.

  ‘You’re sure it’s his handwriting?’

  ‘Azadeh’s sure, and she also knew the messenger.’ Erikki added, ‘The messenger told us nothing else, only that there’s lots of fighting going on there.’

  ‘By road’s out of the question.’ McIver turned to Pettikin. ‘Maybe our mullah Tehrani’d give Erikki a clearance? According to Nogger, he was like a dog-eating wallah after his joyride this morning. We could fit your 206 with long-range tanks. Erikki could take her, maybe with Nogger or one of the others to bring her right back?’

  ‘Erikki, you know the risk you’re taking?’

  ‘Yes.’ Erikki had not yet told them about the killings.

  ‘You’ve thought it through—everything? Rakoczy, the roadblock, Azadeh herself? We could send Azadeh back alone and you could get on the 125 and we’d put her on Saturday’s flight.’

  ‘Come on, boss, you’d never do that and neither will I—I couldn’t leave her.’

  ‘Of course, but it had to be said. All right. Erikki, you take care of the long-range tanks, we’ll try for the clearance. I’d suggest you both come back to Tehran as quickly as possible and take the 125 on Saturday. Both of you. It might be wise for you to transfer and do a tour somewhere else—Australia, Singapore perhaps—or Aberdeen, but that might be too cold for Azadeh, you let me know.’ McIver cheerfully stuck out his hand. ‘Happy Tabriz, eh?’

  ‘Thanks.’ Erikki hesitated. ‘Any news of Tom Lochart?’

  ‘No, not yet—still can’t raise Kowiss or Bandar-e Delam. Why? Sharazad’s getting anxious?’

  ‘More than that. Her father’s in Evin Jail an—’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ McIver exploded, Pettikin equally shocked, knowing the rumours of arrests and firing squads. ‘What for?’

  ‘For questioning—by a komiteh—no one knows what for or how long he’ll be held.’

  ‘Well, if it’s only for questioning. . . what happened?’

  ‘Sharazad came home half an hour or so ago in tears. When she went back last night after dinner to her parents’ house all hell had broken loose. Apparently some Green Bands went into the bazaar, grabbed Emir Paknouri, a friend of his, for “crimes against Islam” and ordered Bakravan to appear at dawn for questioning—for what reason no one knows.’ Erikki took a breath. ‘They went with him to the prison this morning, she, her mother, sisters and brother. They got there just after dawn and waited and waited and would be still waiting if they hadn’t been told to clear off around 2 p.m. by Green Bands on guard there.’

  There was a stunned silence.

  Erikki broke it. ‘Mac, try Kowiss. Get them to contact Bandar-e Delam—Tom should know about Sharazad’s father. Well, I’ll be off. Sorry for bringing bad news but I thought you’d better know.’ Erikki forced a smile. ‘Sharazad wasn’t in good shape. See you in Al Shargaz!’

  ‘Sooner the better, Erikki. Listen, if the stuff hits the fan—for ANY reason—go over the border to Turkey by any way you can.’

  ‘I will, don’t worry about me.’

  ‘These are lousy times—choppers and pilots are gold dust in a revolution. Just in case, if I send you a message, Take a powder, that means drop everything at once, grab Azadeh and go over the border because it’s really going to hit the fan. At once, okay?’

  ‘All right. Don’t worry about me.’

  McIver said, ‘If you bump into Gen—don’t mention about Sharazad’s father, eh?’

  ‘Of course,’ Erikki said and left.

  McIver broke the silence. ‘Bakravan’s a pretty important bazaari to summarily arrest.’

  ‘I agree.’ After a pause Pettikin said, ‘Hope to God Erikki’s not going into a trap. That message bit’s very smelly, very sm—’

  The telex chattering made them both jump. They read the telex, line by line, as it came through.

  It read: Duncan, sorry to advise a top secret Foreign Office directive says all our aircraft in Iran will be impounded and all pilots refused permission to leave without new special visas, within five or six days.

  I will go to Al Shargaz. Sorry, but prepare to evacuate all personnel as soon as possible.

  The signature was Andy Gavallan, chairman of S-G Helicopters.

  McIver felt his heart pumping. That’s it, he thought. Twenty years up the spout. Everything we’ve worked for, Andy and Gen and me. We’re dead. . ..

  ‘Duncan?’

  He looked up and he saw it was Genny, Pettikin by the door, both of them watching him. ‘Oh, hello, Genny, sorry, I was a million miles away.’ He got up. ‘It—I think it was the Avisyard that set me thinking.’

  Genny’s eyes widened. ‘Oh, an Avisyard telex? Not a bird down?’

  ‘No, no, thank God.’

  ‘Oh, thank God too,’ Genny said, openly relieved. She was dressed in a heavy coat and nice hat. ‘Can I read it?’ she asked, concerned with her husband’s pallor, at once understanding why. She put the telex back on the table. ‘I’ll make a cuppa.’

  The two men went through their options. Each time they came back to the same gloomy conclusion: they had to hope the situation came back to normal, the banks reopened, they got the money owing to them, that their joint venture was exempt and they weren’t nailed, and the Foreign Office were wrong.

  Genny listened attentively, also more than a little worried. It’s obvious there’s no future for us here, and I’d be very glad to leave—provided Duncan comes too. Even so, we can’t just meekly run away with our tails between our legs and let all of Duncan’s work and life’s nest egg be stolen, that’d kill him as certainly as any bullet. Ugh! I do wish he’d do what he’s told—he should have retired last year when the Shah was still in power. Men! Bloody stupid, the whole lot of them! Christ Almighty! What fools men are!

  She started pouring the tea into the three cu
ps. The silence tightened. Seeing her husband’s misery a tear trickled down her cheek. She added condensed milk to the tea and gave one cup to Pettikin. Then she took the other cup to McIver.

  ‘Thanks, Gen.’ Tenderly he brushed away her tears. ‘Come Saturday, Gen, when the 125 goes you’re on it,’ he told her gently. ‘I promise only until we sort this all out—but this time you must go.’

  She nodded. He drank his tea. It tasted very good. He smiled down at her. ‘You make a damn good cuppa, Gen,’ he said, but that did not take away her fear or her misery—or her fury at all the killing and uselessness and tragedy and the blatant usurping of their livelihood, or the age that it was putting on her husband. The worry’s killing him. It’s killing him, she thought with growing rage. Then all at once the answer came to her.

  ‘Duncan,’ she whispered, ‘if you don’t want those bastards to steal our future, why don’t we leave and take everything with us?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Planes, spares and personnel.’

  ‘We can’t do that, Gen, I’ve already told you fifty times.’

  ‘Oh, yes, we can if we want to and if we have a plan.’ She said it with such utter confidence it swept him. ‘There’s Andy to help. He’s going to Al Shargaz. Andy can make the plan, we can’t. You can carry it out, he can’t. They don’t want us here, so be it, we’ll leave—but with our planes and our spares and our self-respect. We’ll have to be very secretive but we can do it. We can do it, I know we can.’

  BOOK TWO

  Saturday

  Chapter 8

  Near Tabriz 11:49 A.M. Erikki was climbing the 206 through the high pass that led at length to the city, Nogger Lane beside him with Azadeh in the back. She wore a bulky flight jacket over her ski clothes, but in the carryall beside her was a chador: ‘Just for safety,’ she had said. On her head was a third headset that Erikki had rigged for her.

  ‘Tabriz One, do you read?’ he said again. They waited. Still no answer and well within range. ‘Could be abandoned, could be a trap, like with Charlie.’

  ‘Best take a jolly good look before we land,’ Nogger said uneasily, his eyes scanning the sky and the land.

  The sky was clear. It was well below freezing, the mountains heavy with snow. They had refuelled without incident at an IranOil depot just outside Bandar-e Pahlavi—already renamed—by arrangement with Tehran ATC. ‘Khomeini’s got everything by the short and curlies, with ATC helpful and the airport opened up again,’ Erikki had said, trying to shove away the depression that sat heavily on all of them.

  Azadeh was still badly shaken by the news of Emir Paknouri’s execution for crimes against Islam and by the even more terrible news about Sharazad’s father, also executed. ‘That’s murder,’ she had burst out, horrified, when she had heard. ‘What crimes could he commit, he who has supported Khomeini and mullahs for generations?’

  None of them had had any answers. The family had been told to collect the body and now were in deep and abject mourning, Sharazad demented with grief—the house closed even to Azadeh and Erikki. Azadeh had not wanted to leave Tehran but a second message had arrived from her father to Erikki, repeating the first: ‘Captain, I require my daughter in Tabriz urgently.’

  And now they were almost home.

  Once it was home, Erikki thought. Now I’m not so sure.

  Near Qazvin he had flown over the place where his Range Rover had run out of petrol and Pettikin and Rakoczy had rescued Azadeh and him from the mob. The Range Rover was no longer there. Then over the miserable village where the roadblock had been, and he had escaped to crush the fat-faced mujhadin who had stolen their papers. Madness to come back, he thought.

  ‘Mac’s right,’ Azadeh had pleaded with him. ‘Go to Al Shargaz. Let Nogger fly me to Tabriz and fly me back to get on the next shuttle. I’ll join you in Al Shargaz whatever my father says.’

  ‘I’ll take you home and bring you back,’ he had said. ‘Finish.’

  They had taken off from Doshan Tappeh just after dawn. The base was almost empty, with many buildings and hangars now burned-out shells, wrecked Iranian Air Force airplanes, trucks, and one fire-gutted tank with the Immortals emblem on its side. No one cleaning up the mess. No guards. Scavengers taking away anything burnable—still hardly any fuel oil for sale, or food, but many daily and nightly clashes between Green Bands and leftists.

  The S-G hangar and repair shop were hardly damaged. Many bullet holes in the walls but nothing had been looted yet and it was operating, more or less, with a few mechanics and office staff about their normal work. Some back salary from the money McIver had squeezed from the partners had been the magnet. He had given some cash to Erikki to pay the staff at Tabriz One: ‘Start praying, Erikki! Today I’ve an appointment at the Ministry to iron out our finances and the money we’re owed,’ he had told them just before they took off, ‘and to renew all our out-of-date licences. Talbot at the embassy fixed it for me—he thinks there’s a better than good chance Bazargan and Khomeini can get control now and disarm the leftists. We’ve just got to keep our bottle, keep our cool.’

  Easy for him, Erikki thought.

  Now they crested the pass. He banked and came down fast. ‘There’s the base!’ Both pilots concentrated. The wind sock was the only thing that moved. No transport parked anywhere. No smoke from any of the cabins. ‘There should be smoke.’ He circled tightly at 700 feet. No one came out to greet them. ‘I’ll take a closer look.’

  They whirled in quickly and out again. Still nothing moved so they went back up to a thousand feet. Erikki thought a moment. ‘Azadeh, I could set her down in the forecourt of the palace just outside the walls.’

  At once Azadeh shook her head: ‘No, Erikki, you know how nervous his guards are and how, how sensitive he is about anyone arriving unasked.’

  ‘But we’re asked, at least you are. Ordered is the real word. We could go over there, circle and take a look, and if it seems all right, we could land.’

  ‘We could land well away and walk in t—’

  ‘No walking. Not without guns.’ He had been unable to obtain one in Tehran. Every damned hooligan has as many as he wants, he thought irritably. Have to get one. Don’t feel safe any more. ‘We’ll go and look and then I’ll decide.’ He switched to the Tabriz Tower frequency and called. No answer. He called again, then banked and went for the city. As they passed over their village of Abu Mard, Erikki pointed downward and Azadeh saw the little schoolhouse where she had spent so many happy hours, the glades nearby and there, just by the stream, was where she had first seen Erikki and thought him a giant of the forest and had fallen in love, miracle of miracles, to be rescued by him from a life of torment. She reached forward and touched him through the small window.

  ‘You all right? Warm enough?’ He smiled at her.

  ‘Oh, yes, Erikki. The village was so lucky for us, wasn’t it?’ She kept her hand on his shoulder. The contact pleased both of them.

  Soon they could see the airport and the railway that went north to Soviet Azerbaijan a few miles away, then on to Moscow, southeast it curled back to Tehran, three hundred and fifty miles away. The city was large. Now they could pick out the citadel and the Blue Mosque and polluting steel factories, the huts and hovels and houses of the 600,000 inhabitants.

  ‘Look over there!’ Part of the railway station was smouldering, smoke billowing. More fires near the citadel and no answer from Tabriz Tower and no activity on the airfield apron, though some small, feeder airplanes were parked there. A lot of activity at the military base, trucks and cars coming and going, but as far as they could see, no firing or battles or crowds in the streets, the whole area near the mosque curiously empty. ‘Don’t want to go too low,’ he said, ‘don’t want to tempt some trigger-happy crackpot.’

  ‘You like Tabriz, Erikki?’ Nogger asked, to cover his disquiet. He had never been here before.

  ‘It’s a grand city, old
and wise and open and free—the most cosmopolitan in Iran. I’ve had some grand times here, the food and drink of all the world cheap and available—caviar and Russian vodka and Scottish smoked salmon and once a week, in the good times, Air France brought fresh French breads and cheeses. Turkish goods and Caucasian, British, American, Japanese—anything and everything. It’s famous for its carpets, Nogger, and the beauty of its girls. . .’ He felt Azadeh pinch his earlobe and he laughed. ‘It’s true, Azadeh, aren’t you Tabrizi? It’s a fine city, Nogger. They speak a dialect of Farsi which is more Turkish than anything else. For centuries it’s been a big trading centre, part Iranian, part Russian, part Turkish, part Kurd, part Armenian, and always rebellious and independent and always wanted by the tsars and now the Soviets. . .’

  Here and there knots of people stared up at them. ‘Nogger, see any guns?’

  ‘Plenty, but no one’s firing at us. Yet.’

  Cautiously Erikki skirted the city and headed eastward. There the land climbed into close foothills and there was the walled palace of the Gorgons on a crest with the road leading up to it. No traffic on the road. Many acres of land within the high walls: orchards, a carpet factory, garages for twenty cars, sheds for wintering herds of sheep, huts and outhouses for a hundred-odd servants and guards, and the sprawling main cupolaed building of fifty rooms and small mosque and tiny minaret. A number of cars were parked near the main entrance. He circled at 700 feet.