Escapes! (9 page)

The staff huddled closer together. The group of visiting Iranians spoke little English, but the anxious looks on their faces showed they understood the situation. They were about to be caught in the den of the enemy by the most extreme of the revolutionaries. How would the militants deal with them?

Outside, the roar of the mob, now three to five hundred strong, was frighteningly loud. Over his two-way radio, Lopez learned that the main embassy building, the chancery, had already been stormed by the revolutionaries. But so far no one else was trying to get into the consulate.

“They've forgotten about us,” Anders thought aloud. “For now.”

Suddenly the room went dark. “The lights! They've cut the electricity!” Panicked voices filled the darkened room. Lopez talked rapidly into his walkie-talkie, but received no answer. He tried again. Still nothing.

His face was in darkness, but the others could tell how he felt by the grim tone of his voice. “They must have captured the other marines. We're cut off.”

Slowly the words sunk in. The handful of staff understood: they were on their own.

“We've got to get out now, before they find us!” someone wailed.

“Our best chance is the exit on the north side,” Anders reasoned. On the side of the building facing away from the demonstrators in the compound, a sliding door opened directly onto the street.

Two by two, the Americans and Iranians filed down the stairs toward the north door. Close behind Anders were two young couples: Joe and Kathy Stafford, and Mark and Cora Lijek. Lopez followed at the rear, locking doors behind them, buying time for their escape. He stayed behind on the ground floor to smash visa plates, so no forgeries could be made by the invaders. He would leave last — if at all.

At the north door, Anders raised a hand to signal everyone to wait. Slowly he slid the door open a few inches and peered up and down Bist Metri Street.

To his surprise, he saw no one. No protesters, not even any passersby.

“Okay, move out in small groups. That will attract less attention.”

The Iranian visa seekers slipped out first, followed by Iranians who worked at the embassy. Anders led the Staffords and the Lijeks out next. The rest followed behind.

All was quiet outside, but for the heavy rain. They dashed down the wet street, the sounds of protest faint in the background.

“Where to now?” Breathless, Joe Stafford voiced the question on everyone's minds. The nearby British embassy was the safest bet, they agreed. But to avoid the protesters they'd have to stick to the back streets — a confusing maze of alleys in the ancient city. They'd be lost in minutes.

Most of the Iranians in the group were already out of sight, but one woman had stayed behind. “I can show you the way,” she bravely offered. The Americans nodded, grateful. Picking up some newspapers to protect their heads from the rain, they began to weave their way through the alleys, turning their faces away whenever they passed anyone.

Coming out of a lane, they stopped across from the square that separated them from the British embassy. Their hearts sank: it was full of protesters.

The Americans slunk back into the alley. They thanked their Iranian guide, and she slipped away. One of the men urged them all to go to the house of the consul general. But Anders shook his head. It was too obvious a hiding place. And it would mean backtracking toward the American embassy, something no one wanted to do.

Unable to agree, the group split up. Five of them — Anders, the Staffords, and the Lijeks — began a long walk across the city to Anders's apartment. Creeping through the alleys, they arrived there by mid-afternoon, drenched and exhausted.

Anders quickly got on the phone, calling the homes of other embassy staff in the city — surely someone else had slipped out. But no one answered.

“Does that mean we're the only ones who got away?” Cora Lijek asked.

Growing frantic, Anders called every contact he could think of. Then, in the middle of a call, the telephone line clicked and went dead.

Anders slowly replaced the receiver. “Calls always get cut off in Tehran, it could mean nothing,” he told the others. But they looked unconvinced.

Joe Stafford pulled out a radio, one that all the diplomats carried, and tried to contact the embassy. But on the crackling line they heard only shouting in Farsi, the Iranian language. The embassy was under the students' control.

Why hasn't the government sent in troops? Anders wondered. A sudden realization made him turn cold. Because they support the takeover, that's why. Or else they know they're powerless to do anything.

The five Americans looked at each other in silence. They were far from home in a hostile place, and a revolution had stripped away their last shreds of protection. Everyone was thinking the same thing: Where can we go?

Robert Anders was running out of ideas. The American fugitives had been on the run for days, moving from place to place. Revolutionary Guards were combing the city, picking up Americans on the streets and in offices. Anders and the others had spent a few days hiding with British diplomats, but their hosts grew uneasy, so they left. Servants had let them into the empty apartments of Americans trapped on the compound. But everywhere they had sensed they were being watched. At night they lay awake, jumping at every little sound. Sometimes they felt sure the servants were whispering about them.

Within hours of taking over the embassy — or the “Den of Spies” as the militants called it — the armed students released their demands to the media. They would hold the 60-odd trapped Americans hostage until the United States returned the exiled Shah to Iran to stand trial. If not, they would put the hostages on trial for spying.

To make matters worse, Iran's moderate prime minister, Mehdi Bazargan, had resigned. The country was now being run by the Revolutionary Council and the Islamic clergy it looked to for guidance — in particular, the Ayatollah Khomeini. There would be no help from such a government.

Anders knew the American government was in a tough position. Agreeing to the demands would not only mean handing over their ally for certain execution. It would be saying to the world, If you seize our embassies, we'll do what you want.

And where did that leave the five of them? Was it just a matter of time before they were dragged back to the compound to join the rest? That's what must have happened to Lopez and the others who'd split from their group. Anders was sure of that by now.

Desperate, Anders called an old friend — John Sheardown, Canada's chief immigration officer in Tehran.

“Why did you wait so long to call me?” Sheardown blurted out before Anders could finish his story.

The next day a car pulled into Sheardown's driveway, and inside the five fugitives sighed with relief. Finally a safe haven — for the moment, at least.

Sheardown quickly ushered them inside, where his wife Zena was waiting. Within seconds Canada's ambassador, Ken Taylor, arrived as well. When Sheardown had told Taylor about Anders's phone call, the ambassador had responded without hesitating: “Okay, where will we hide them?”

It was the kind of reaction Sheardown expected from his boss, who was energetic and unconventional, eager to cut through red tape to get to the heart of a matter. After a speedy coded message to the Ministry of External Affairs in Ottawa, Taylor got the official go-ahead to help the Americans.

As the fugitives gathered in Sheardown's living room, the Canadian ambassador went over the situation with them.

“We can't hide you at the embassy — downtown is too dangerous. So we'll be splitting you up. The Staffords will come to my house in the north of the city. The Lijeks and Bob Anders will stay here with the Sheardowns. No one will expect you to hide in our homes.”

“How about extra security? Can any Canadian military be posted to the houses?” Sheardown asked.

Taylor shook his head. “No, that would only draw attention. It would give us away in a second. Life has to go on normally. No changes.”

“But you must have Iranian staff at your homes — servants. Can we trust them?” Joe Stafford asked.

“We'll tell them you're Canadian tourists, friends of mine,” Taylor said. “But you'll have to stay inside, especially during the day. You mustn't be spotted by the
komitehs,
the patrols who make the rounds of the neighborhood. Remember — stay out of sight.”

After some hurried goodbyes, the Staffords left for the Taylor residence, and the Lijeks and Anders followed Zena Sheardown to their rooms. Cora carried all they'd brought with them in one small suitcase. They'd fled their last hiding place in such a panic, the clothes were still running in the washing machine.

Mark Lijek sat chin in hand, drumming his fingers on his cheek and staring at the Scrabble board. Now and then he glanced up at Cora, who sat across the coffee table, waiting for his move. Nearby, Anders was sunk in an armchair, reading a magazine. The silence in the house seemed to wrap around them.

I can't take much more of this, Mark thought. Reading, playing cards — it was all they could do to pass the long hours trapped inside the Sheardowns' house. For the first weeks they slept in, but still the days seemed endless. Mark and Cora were playing three hours of Scrabble a day! Cora had started running up and down the stairs to blow off steam. Anders had told them to pretend they were at a luxury resort, with a storm keeping them inside. But it hadn't helped. It's feeling so helpless and nervous, Mark thought, with nothing to take your mind off the fear — that's what's unbearable.

At Ken Taylor's house, the Staffords had the same cabin fever. Joe, who spoke some Farsi, listened all day to local radio, desperate for information on the hostages at the embassy and what — if anything — was being done to free them. What if the American government doesn't give in? he wondered. Will the militants start executing the hostages for spying?

Worst of all, he knew the Iranian staff at the Taylor home were getting suspicious. He'd overheard questions from the head servant and the cook — Why would tourists have so little luggage and never go out? They like to travel light, Taylor's wife, Pat, had answered. They're resting before they start sightseeing. But even to Joe the excuses sounded lame.

Then, a few weeks into their hiding, Taylor sprung some good news on them. Someone else had slipped through the students' fingers. Lee Schatz, an American attaché who leased space at the Swedish embassy, had been there when the takeover happened. He'd been hiding with the Swedes ever since.

The Swedish ambassador had called Taylor. Sounding apologetic, he asked if Canada could possibly hide Schatz — he wasn't likely to pass as a Swede, but he might have better luck posing as a Canadian. Taylor, with his mischievous sense of humor, had savored the moment. No problem, he'd told the shocked Swedish ambassador, we're already hiding five!

Schatz's arrival at the Sheardowns' gave everyone something new to talk about. As American Thanksgiving approached at the end of November, Taylor decided it was worth the risk to sneak Schatz and the Staffords over for a reunion dinner with the Lijeks and Anders. It would help keep everyone's spirits up. When the turkey was finished, someone joked, “Let's hope we're not all here for Christmas!”

There was silence around the table. That was a possibility no one wanted to talk about.