On Wings of Eagles (37 page)

    college and found his contemporaries getting an excited about gambling,

    drinking, and going with women. He knew all about gamblers, drunks, and

    whores already: he dropped out of college and joined the air force.

    In nine years in the air force he had never seen action, and while he was

    on the whole glad about that, it had left him wondering whether he had what

    it took to fight in a shooting war. The rescue of Paul and Bill might give

    him the chance to find out, he had thought; but Simons had sent him from

    Paris back to Dallas. It looked as though he was going to be ground crew

    again. Then new orders came.

    They came via Merv Stauffer, Perot's right-hand man, who was now Simons's

    link with the scattered rescue team. Stauffer went to Radio Shack and

    bought six five-channel two-way radios, ten rechargers, a supply of

    batteries, and a device for running the radios off a dashboard cigar

    lighter. He gave the equipment to Boulware and told him to meet Sculley and

    Schwebach in London before going on to Istanbul.

    Stauffer also gave him forty thousand dollars in cash, for expenses,

    bribes, and general purposes.

    The night before Boulware left, his wife started giving him a hard time

    about money. He had taken a thousand dollars out of the bank, without

    telling her, before he went to Pan"e believed in carrying cash money--and

    she had subsequently discovered how little was left in their account.

    Boulware did not want to explain to her why he had taken the money and how

    he had spent it. Mary insisted that she needed money. Boulware was not too

    concerned about that: she was staying with good friends and he knew she

    would be looked after. But she didn't buy his

    ON WINGS OF EAGLES 229

brush-off, and-as often happened when she was really determined-he decided

to make her happy. He went into the bedroom, where he had left the box

containing the radios and the forty thousand dollars, and counted out five

hundred. Mary came in while he was doing it, and saw what was in the box.

    Boulware gave her the five hundred and said: "Will that hold YOUT'

"Yes," she said.

    She looked at the box, then at her husband. "I'm not even going to ask,"

    she said; and she went out.

    Boulware left the next day. He met Schwebach and Sculley in London, gave

    them five of the six radio sets, kept one for himself, and flew on to

    Istanbul.

    He went from the airport straight to the office of Mr. Fish, the travel

    agent.

    Mr. Fish met him in an open-plan office with three or four other people

    sitting around.

    "My name is Ralph Boulware, and I work for EDS," Boulware began. "I think

    you know my daughters, Stacy Elaine and Kecia Nicole." The girls had played

    with Mr. Fish's daughters during the evacuees' stopover in Istanbul.

Mr. Fish was not very warm.

"I need to talk to you," Boulware said.

"Fine, talk to me."

    Boulware looked around the room. "I want to talk to you in private. "

"Why?99

"You'll understand when I talk to you."

"These are all my partners. There are no secrets here."

    Mr. Fish was giving Boulware a hard time. Boulware could guess why. There

    were two reasons. First, after all that Mr. Fish had done during the

    evacuation, Don Norsworthy had tipped him $150, which was derisory, in

    Boulware's opinion.'(1 didn't know what to do!" Norsworthy had said. "The

    man's bill was twenty-six thousand dollars. What should I have tipped

    him---ten percent?")

    Secondly, Pat Sculley had approached Mr. Fish with a transparent tale about

    smuggling computer tapes into Iran. Mr. Fish was neither a fool nor a

    criminal, Boulware guessed; and of course he had refused to have anything

    to do with Sculley's scheme.

230 Ken Follett

    Now Mr. Fish thought EDS people were (a) cheapskates and (b) dangerously

    amateurish lawbreakers.

    But Mr. Fish was a small businessman. Boulware understood small

    businessme"is father had been one. They spoke two languages: straight talk,

    and cash money. Cash money would solve problem (a), and straight talk,

    problem (b).

    "Okay, let's start again," Boulware said. "When EDS was here you really

    helped those people, treated the children nice, and did a great deal for

    us. When they left there was a mix-up about showing you our appreciation.

    We're embarrassed that this was not handled properly and I need to settle

    that score."

-It's no big deal-"

    "We're sorry," Boulware said, and he gave Mr. Fish a thousand dollars in

    hundred-dollar bills.

The room went very quiet.

    "Well, I'm going to check in to the Sheraton," Boulware said. "Maybe we can

    talk later."

"I'll come with you," said Mr. Fish.

    He personally checked Boulware into the hotel, and ensured that he got a

    good room, then agreed to meet turn for dinner that night in the hotel

    coffee shop.

    Mr. Fish was a high-class hustler, Boulware thought as he unpacked. The man

    had to be smart to have what appeared to be a very prosperous business in

    this dirt-poor country. The evacuees' experience showed that he had the

    enterprise to do more than issue plane tickets and make hotel bookings. He

    had the right contacts to oil the wheels of bureaucracy, judging by the way

    he had got everyone's baggage through customs. He had also helped solve the

    problem of the adopted Iranian baby with no passport. EDS's mistake had

    been to see that he was a hustler and overlook the fact that he was high

    clas"eceived, perhaps, by his unimpressive appearance: he was rather fat

    and dressed in drab clothes. Boulware, learning from past mistakes, thought

    he could handle Mr. Fish.

    That night over dinner Boulware told him he wanted to go to the Iran-Turkey

    border to meet some people coming out.

    Mr. Fish was horrified. "You don't understand," he said. "That is a

    terrible place. The people are Kurds and Azerbaij*aiu*s-wild mountain men,

    they don't obey any government. You know how they live up there? By

    smuggling, robbery, and murder. I personally would not dam to go there. If

    you, an American, go there, you will never come back. Never."

    ON WINGS OF EAGLES 231

    Boulware thought he was probably exaggerating. "I have to go there, even if

    it's dangerous," he said. "Now, can I buy a light plane?"

    Mr. Fish shook his head. "It is illegal in Turkey for individuals to own

    airplanes."

"A helicopter?"

"Same thing."

"AD right, can I charter a plane?"

    "It is possible. Where there is no scheduled flight, you can charter. It

"Are there scheduled flights to the border area?" No."

"All right."

    "However, chartering is so unusual that you will surely attract the

    attention of the authorities . . ."

    "We have no plans to do anything illegal. AD the same, we don't need the

    hassle of being investigated. So let's set up the option of chartering.

    Find out about price and availability, but hold off from making any kind of

    booking. Meanwhile, I want to know more about getting there by land. If you

    don't want to escort me, fine; but maybe you can find somebody who will.

"I'll see what I can do."

    They met several times over the next few days. Mr. Fish's initial coolness

    totally disappeared, and Boulware felt they were becoming friends. Mr. Fish

    was alert and articulate. Although he was no criminal, he would break the

    law if the risks and rewards were proportionate, Boulware guessed. Boulware

    had some sympathy with that attitude-he, too, would break the law under the

    right circumstances. Mr. Fish was also a shrewd interrogator, and bit by

    bit Boulware told him the full story. Paul and Bill would probably have no

    passports, he admitted; but once in Turkey they would get new ones at the

    nearest American Consulate. Paul and Bill might have some trouble getting

    out of Iran, he said, and he wanted to be prepared to cross the border

    himself, perhaps in a light airrraft, to bring them out. None of this fazed

    Mr. Fish as much as the idea of traveling in bandit country.

    However, a few days later he introduced Boulware to a who had relatives

    among the mountain bandits. Mr. Fish whispered that the man was a criminal,

    and he certainly looked the part: he had a scar on his face and little

    beady eyes. He said he could guarantee Boulware safe passage to the border

    and back,

232 Ken Follett

and his relatives could even take Boulware across the border into Iran, if

necessary.

    Boulware called Dallas and told Merv Stauffer about the plan. Stauffer

    relayed the news to Coburn, in code; and Coburn told Simons. Simons vetoed

    it. If the man is a criminal, Simons pointed out, we can't trust him.

    Boulware was annoyed. He had gone to some trouble to set it up--did Simons

    imagine it was easy to get these people? And if you wanted to travel in

    bandit country, who else but a bandit would escort you? But Simons was the

    boss, and Boulware had no option but to ask Mr. Fish to start all over

    again.

Meanwhile, Sculley and Schwebach flew into Istanbul.

    The deadly duo had been on a flight from London to Tehran via Copenhagen

    when the Iranians had closed their airport again, so Sculley and Schwebach

    joined Boulware in Istanbul. Cooped up in the hotel, waiting for something

    to happen, the three of them got cabin fever. Schwebach reverted to his

    Green Beret role and tried to make them all keep fit by running up and down

    the hotel stairs. Boulware did it once and then gave up. They became

    impatient with Simons. Coburn, and Poch6, who seemed to be sitting in

    Tehran doing nothing: why didn't those guys make it happen? Then Simons

    sent Sculley and Schwebach back to the States. They left the radios with

    Boulware.

    When Mr. Fish saw the radios he had a fit. It was highly illegal to own a

    radio transmitter in Turkey, he told Boulware. Even ordinary transistor

    radios had to be registered with the government, for fear their parts would

    be used to make transmitters for terrorists. "Don't you understand how

    conspicuous you are?" he said to Boulware. "You're running up a phone bill

    of a couple of thousand dollars a week, and you're paying cash. You don't

    appear to be doing business here. The maids are sure to have seen the

    radios and talked about it. By now you must be under surveillance. Forget

    your friends in Iran--you are going to end up in jail."

    Boulware agreed to get rid of the radios. The snag about Simons's

    apparently endless patience was that further delay caused new problems. Now

    Sculley and Schwebach could not get back into Iran, yet still nobody had

    any radios. Meanwhile, Simons kept saying no to things. Mr. Fish pointed

    out that there were two border crossings from Iran to Turkey, one at Sero

    and the other at Barzagan. Simons had picked Sero. Barzagan was a

    ON WINGS OF EAGLES 233

bigger and more civilized place, Mr. Fish pointed out; everyone would be a

little safer there. Simons said no.

    A new escort was found to take Boulware to the border. Mr. Fish had a

    business colleague whose brother-in-law was in the Milli Istihbarat

    Teskilati, or MIT, the Turkish equivalent of the CIA. The name of this

    secret policeman was Ilsman. His credentials would secure for Boulware army

    protection in bandit country. Without such credentials, Mr. Fish said, the

    ordinary citizen was in danger not only from bandits but also from the

    Turkish Army.

    Mr. Fish was very jumpy. On the way to meet lisman, he took Boulware

    through a whole cloak-and-dagger routine, changing cars and switching to a

    bus for part of the journey, as if he were trying to shake off a tail.

    Boulware could not see the need for all that if they were really going to

    visit a perfectly upright citizen who just happened to work in the

    intelligence community. But Boulware was a foreigner in a strange country,

    and he just had to go along with Mr. Fish and trust the man.

    They ended up at a big, run-down apartment building in an unfamiliar

    section of the city. The power was off-just like Tehran!--so it took Mr.

    Fish a while to find the right apartment in the dark. At first he could get

    no answer. His attempt to be secretive fell apart at this point, for he had

    to hammer on the door for what seemed like half an hour, and every other

    inhabitant of the building got a good look at the visitors in the meantime.

    Boulware just stood there feeling like a white man in Harlem. At last a

    woman opened up, and they went in.