“Excuse me for asking, Father, but will the West crash?” Azadeh had asked. “Not this time,” the Khan had said and Erikki saw his face grow colder. “Not unless the Soviets decide this is the time to renege on the $80 billion they owe Western banks - and even some Oriental banks.” He had laughed sardonically, playing with the string of pearls he wore around his neck. “Of course Oriental moneylenders are much cleverer; at least they’re not so greedy. They lend judiciously and require collaterals and believe no one and certainly not in the myth of ‘Christian charity.’” It was common knowledge that the Gorgons owned enormous tracts of land in Azerbaijan, good oil land, a large part of Iran-Timber, seafront property on the Caspian, much of the bazaar in Tabriz, and most of the merchant banks there.
Erikki remembered the whispers he had heard about Abdollah Khan when he was trying to get permission to marry Azadeh, about his parsimony and ruthlessness in business: “A quick way to Paradise or hell is to owe Abdollah the Cruel one rial, to not pay pleading poverty, and to stay in Azerbaijan.”
“Father, please may I ask, cancellation of so many contracts will cause havoc, won’t it?”
“No, you may not ask. You’ve asked enough questions for one day. A woman is supposed to hold her tongue and listen - now you can leave.” At once she apologized for her error and left obediently. “Please excuse me.”
Erikki got up to leave too, but the Khan stopped him: “I have not dismissed you yet. Sit down. Now, why should you fear one Soviet?”
“I don’t - just the system. That man has to be KGB.”
“Why didn’t you just kill him then?”
“It would not have helped, it would have hurt. Us, the base, Iran-Timber, Azadeh, perhaps even you. He was sent to me by others. He knows us - knows you.” Erikki had watched the old man carefully.
“I know lots of them. Russians, Soviet or tsarist, have always coveted Azerbaijan, but have always been good customers of Azerbaijan - and helped us against the stinking British. I prefer them to British, I understand them.” His smile thinned even more. “It would be easy to remove this Rakoczy.”
“Good, then do it, please.” Erikki had laughed full-throated. “And all of them as well. That would really be doing God’s work.”
“I don’t agree,” the Khan said ill-temperedly. “That would be doing Satan’s work. Without the Soviets against them, the Americans and their dogs the British would dominate us and all the world. They’d certainly eat up Iran - under Mohammed Shah they nearly did. Without Soviet Russia, whatever her failings, there’d be no check on America’s foul policies, foul arrogance, foul manners, foul jeans, foul music, foul food, and foul democracy, their disgusting attitudes to women, to law and order, their disgusting pornography, naive attitude to diplomacy, and their evil, yes, that’s the correct word, their evil antagonism to Islam.”
The last thing Erikki wanted was another confrontation. In spite of his resolve, he felt his own rage gathering. “We had an agreem - ” “It’s true, by God!” Khan shouted at him. “It’s true!”
“It’s not, and we had an agreement before your God and my spirits that we’d not discuss politics - either of your world or mine.”
“It’s true, admit it!” Abdollah Khan snarled, his face twisted with rage. One hand went to the ornamental knife at his belt, and at once the guard unslung his machine pistol and covered Erikki. “By Allah, you call me a liar in my own house?” he bellowed.
Erikki said through his teeth, “I only remind you, Highness, by your Allah, what we agreed!” The dark bloodshot eyes stared at him. He stared back, ready to go for his own knife and kill or be killed, the danger between them very great.
“Yes, yes, that’s also true,” the Khan muttered, and the fit of rage passed as quickly as it had erupted. He looked at the guard, angrily waved him away. “Get out!”
Now the room was very still. Erikki knew there were other guards nearby and spyholes in the walls. He felt the sweat on his forehead and the touch of his pukoh knife in the center of his back. Abdollah Khan knew the knife was there and that Erikki would use it without hesitation. But the Khan had given him perpetual permission to be armed with it in his presence. Two years ago Erikki had saved his life. That was the day Erikki was petitioning him for permission to marry Azadeh and was imperiously turned down: “No, by Allah, I want no infidels in my family. Leave my house! For the last time!” Erikki had got up from the carpet, sick at heart. At that moment there had been a scuffle outside the door, then shots, the door had burst open and two men, assassins armed with machine guns, had rushed in, others fighting a gun battle in the corridor. The Khan’s bodyguard had killed one, but the other sprayed him with bullets then turned his gun on Abdollah Khan who sat on the carpet in shock. Before the assassin could pull the trigger a second time, he died, Erikki’s knife in his throat. At the same moment Erikki lunged for him, ripped the gun out of his hands and the knife out of his throat as another assassin rushed into the room firing. Erikki had smashed the machine gun into the man’s face, killing him, almost tearing off his head with the strength of his blow, then charged into the corridor berserk. Three attackers and two of the bodyguards were dead or dying. The last of the attackers took to their heels, but Erikki cut them both down and raced onward. And only when he had found Azadeh and saw that she was safe did the bloodlust go out of his head and he become calm again.
Erikki remembered how he had left her and had gone back to the same Great Room. Abdollah Khan still sat on the carpets. “Who were those men?” “Assassins - enemies, like the guards who let them in,” Abdollah Khan had said malevolently. “It was the Will of God you were here to save my life, the Will of God that I am alive. You may marry Azadeh, yes, but because I do not like you, we will both swear before God and your - whatever you worship - not to discuss religion or politics, either of your world or mine, then perhaps I will not have to have you killed.”
And now the same cold black eyes were staring at him. Abdollah Khan clapped his hands. Instantly the door opened and a servant appeared. “Bring coffee!” The man hurried away. “I will drop the subject of your world and go to another we can discuss: my daughter, Azadeh.”
Erikki became even more on guard, not sure of the extent of her father’s control over her, or his own rights as her husband while he was in Azerbaijan - very much the old man’s fief. If Abdollah Khan really ordered Azadeh back to this house and to divorce him, would she? I think yes, I’m afraid yes - she certainly will never hear a word against him. She even defended his paranoiac hatred of America by explaining what had caused it: “He was ordered there, to university, by his father,” she had told him. “He had a terrible time in America, Erikki, learning the language and trying to get a degree in economics which his father demanded before he was allowed home. My father hated the other students who sneered at him because he couldn’t play their games, because he was heavier than they which in Iran is a sign of wealth but not in America, and was slow at learning. But most of all because of the hazing that he was forced to endure, forced, Erikki - to eat unclean things like pork that are against our religion, to drink beer and wine and spirits that are against our religion, to do unmentionable things and be called unmentionable names. I would be angry too if it had been me. Please be patient with him. Don’t Soviets make a blood film come over your eyes and heart for what they did to your father and mother and country? Be patient with him, I beg you. Hasn’t he agreed to our marriage? Be patient with him.”