“What for?”
The major shrugged and walked out.
Starke said quietly to Ayre, “Better alert all our guys. And Manuela. Huh?” “Got it,” Ayre said, then muttered, “Christ.”
As Starke walked across the street and up the stairs, he felt the eyes on him as a physical weight. Thank God I’m a civilian and work for a British company and not in the U.S. Army anymore, he thought fervently. “Goddamn,” he muttered, remembering his year’s stint in Vietnam in the very early days when there were no U.S. forces in Vietnam, “only a few advisers.” Shit! And that sonofabitching spit-and-polish meathead Captain Ritman who ordered all our base’s helicopters - in our jungle base a million miles from anywhere, for crissake - to be painted with bright red, white, and blue stars and stripes: “Yes, goddamnit, all over! Let the gooks know who we are and they’ll rush their asses all the way to goddamn Russia.” The Viet Cong could see us coming from fifty miles and I got peppered to hell and back and we lost three Hueys with full crews before the sonofabitch was posted to Saigon, promoted and posted. No wonder we lost the goddamn war. He went into the office building and up the stairs, past the three petrified villagers who had been banished to the outer office, into the camp commandant’s lair. “Morning, Colonel,” he said cautiously in English. “Morning, Captain Starke.” Peshadi switched to Farsi. “I’d like you to meet the mullah, Hussain Kowissi.”
“Peace be upon you,” Starke said in Farsi, very conscious of the speckles of blood from the dead youth that still marred the man’s white turban and black robe.
“Peace be upon you.”
Starke put out his hand to shake hands as was correct custom. Just in time he noticed the coagulated rips in the man’s palms that the barbed wire had caused. He made his grip gentle. Even so he saw a shaft of pain go across the mullah’s face. “Sorry,” he said in English.
The mullah just stared back and Starke felt the man’s hatred strongly. “You wanted me, Colonel?”
“Yes. Please sit down.” Peshadi motioned at the empty chair opposite his desk. The office was Spartan, meticulously tidy. A photograph of the Shah and Farah, his wife, in court dress was the only wall decoration. The mullah sat with his back toward it. Starke took the chair facing the two men. Peshadi lit another cigarette and saw Hussain’s disapproving eyes drop to the cigarette, then glare into his face. He stared back. Smoking was forbidden in the Koran - according to some interpretation. They had argued this point for over an hour. Then he had said with finality, “Smoking is not forbidden in Iran, not yet. I am a soldier. I have sworn to obey orders. Ir - ”
“Even the illegal ord - ”
“I repeat: the orders of His Imperial Majesty, Shahinshah Mohammed Pahlavi or his representative, Prime Minister Bakhtiar, are still legal according to the law of Iran. Iran is not yet an Islamic state. Not yet. When it is I will obey the orders of whoever leads the Islamic state.” “You will obey the Imam Khomeini?”
“If Ayatollah Khomeini becomes our legal ruler, of course.” The colonel had nodded agreeably, but he was thinking: before that day comes there’s going to be a lot of blood spilled. “And me, if I’m elected leader of this possible Islamic state, will you obey me?”
Hussain had not smiled. “The leader of the Islamic state will be the Imam, the Whirlwind of God, and after him another ayatollah, then another.” And now the stony, uncompromising eyes still glared at him, and Peshadi wanted to smash the mullah into the ground and take his tanks and smash everyone else who would not obey the orders of the Shahinshah, their God-given ruler. Yes, he thought, our God-given leader who like his father stood against you mullahs and your grasp for power, who curbed your archaic dogmatism and brought Iran out of the Dark Ages into our rightful greatness, who single-handedly bulldozed OPEC to stand up to the enormous power of the foreign oil companies, who slung the Russians out of Azerbaijan after World War II and has kept even them at bay, licking his hands like lapdogs. By God and the Prophet, he told himself, enraged, staring back at Hussain, I cannot understand why fornicating mullahs don’t recognize the truth about that senile old man Khomeini who screams lies from his deathbed, won’t realize that the Soviets are sponsoring him, feeding him, protecting him, to stir them up to enflame the peasants to wreck Iran and make it a Soviet protectorate?
We only need one single order: Stamp out rebellion forthwith! With that order, by God, within three days I’d have Kowiss and a hundred miles around quiet, peaceful, and prosperous, mullahs happily in the mosques where they belong, the Faithful praying five times a day - within a month the armed forces’d have all Iran as it was last year and Khomeini solved permanently. Within minutes of the order I’d arrest him, publicly shave off half his beard, strip him naked, and trundle him through the streets in a dung cart. I’d let the people see him for what he is: a broken, beaten old man. Make him a loser and all the people would turn their faces and ears from him. Then accusers would come from the ayatollahs who adore life and love and power and land and talking, accusers would come from the mullahs and bazaaris and from the people and together they would snuff him out. So simple to deal with Khomeini or any mullah - by God if I’d been in charge I’d’ve dragged him from France months ago. He puffed his cigarette and very carefully kept his thoughts off his face and out of his eyes. “Well, mullah, Captain Starke is here.” Then he added, as though it was unimportant. “You can speak to him in Farsi or English, as you wish - he speaks Farsi as you speak English. Fluently.”
The mullah turned on Starke. “So,” he said, his English American accented, “you are CIA.”
“No,” Starke said, instantly on his guard. “You were at school in the States?”
“I was a student there, yes,” Hussain said. Then, because of his pain and tiredness, his temper snapped. He switched to Farsi and his voice harshened. “Why did you learn Farsi if not to spy on us for the CIA - or your oil companies, eh?”
“For my interest, just for my interest,” Starke replied politely in Farsi, his knowledge and accent good, “I’m a guest in your country, invited here by your government to work for your government in partnership with Iranians. It’s polite for guests to be aware of their hosts’ taboos and customs, to learn their language, particularly when they enjoy the country and hope to be guests for many years.” His voice edged. “And they’re not my companies.” “They’re American. You’re American. The CIA’s American.
All our problems come from America. The Shah’s greed’s American. All our problems come from America. For years Iran’s been spat on by Americans.” “Bullshit,” Starke said in English, now equally angry, knowing the only way to deal with a bully was to come out swinging. At once. He saw the man flush. He looked back, unafraid, letting the silence hang. The seconds ticked by. His eyes held the mullah’s. But he couldn’t dominate him. Unsettled but trying to appear calm, he glanced at Peshadi who waited and watched, smoking quietly. “What’s this all about, Colonel?” “The mullah has asked for one of your helicopters to visit all the oil installations in our area. As you’re aware we don’t plan your routes or participate in your operations. You will arrange for one of your best pilots to do this. Today, starting at midday.”
“Why not use one of your airplanes? Perhaps I could supply a navig - ” “No. One of your helicopters with your personnel. At midday.” Starke turned to the mullah. “Sorry, but I only take orders from IranOil, through our base manager and their area rep, Esvandiary. We’re under contract to them and they’re exclus - ”
“The airplanes you fly, they’re Iranian,” the mullah interrupted harshly, his exhaustion and pain welling up again, wanting a finish. “You will provide one as required.”