care about it enough to offer serious concessions. So what did he care
about?
Howell thought of Lucio Randone, the former cellmate of Paul and Bill.
Randone's offer of help had been followed up by EDS manager Paul Bucha, who
had gone to Italy to talk to Randone's company, Condotti d'Acqua. Bucha
reported that the company had been building apartment blocks in Tehran when
their Iranian financiers ran out of money. The company naturally stopped
building; but many Iramans; had already paid for apartments under
construction. Given the present atmosphere, it was not surprising that the
foreigners got blamed, and Randone had been jailed as a scapegoat. The
company had found a new source of finance and resumed building, and Randone
had got out of jail at the same time, in a package deal arranged by an
Iranian lawyer, Ali Azmayesh. Bucha also reported that the Italians kept
saying: "Remember, Inn will always be Iran, it never changes." He took this
to be a hint that a bribe was part of the package deal. Howell also knew
that a traditional channel for paying a bribe was a lawyer's fee: the
lawyer would do, say, a thousand dollars' worth of work and pay a
ten-thousand-dollar bribe, then charge his client eleven thousand dollars.
This hint of corruption in&& Howell nervous, but despite that he had gone
to see
188 Ken Follett
Azmayesh, who had advised him: -EDS does not have a legal problem, it has a
business problem." If EDS could come to a business arrangement with the
Ministry of Health, Dadgar would go away. Azmayesh had not mentioned
bribery.
All this had started, Howell thought, as a business problem: the customer
unable to pay, the supplier refusing to go on working. Might a compromise
be possible, under which EDS would switch on the computers and the Ministry
would pay at least some money? He decided to ask Dadgar directly.
"Would it help if EDS were to renegotiate its contract with the Ministry of
Health?"
"This might be very helpful," Dadgar answered. "It would not be a legal
solution to our problem, but it might be a practical solution. Otherwise,
to waste all the work that has been done in computerizing the Ministry
would be a pity. "
Interesting, thought Howell. They want a modem social-security system--or
their money back. Putting Paul and Bill in jail on thirteen million dollars
bail was their way of giving EDS those two option&-and no others. We're
getting straight talk, at last.
He decided to be blunt. "Of course, it would be out of the question to
begin negotiations while Chiapparone and Gaylord are still in jail."
Dadgar replied: "Still, if you commit to good-faith negotiations, the
Ministry will call me and the charges might be changed, the bad might be
reduced, and Chiapparone and Gaylord might even be released on their
personal guarantees."
Nothing could be plainer than that, Howell thought. EDS had better go see
the Minister of Health.
Since the Ministry stopped paying its bills there had been two changes of
government. Dr. Sheikholeslamizadeh, who was now in jail, had been replaced
by a general; and then, when Bakhtiar became Prime Munster, the general had
in turn been replaced by a now Minister of Health. Who, Howell wondered,
was the new guy; and what was he like?
"Mr. Young, of the American company EDS, is calling you, Minister," said the
secretary.
Dr. Razmara took a deep breath. "Tell hirn that American businessmen may no
longer pick up the phone and call ministers of the Ionian government and
expect to talk to us as if we were
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 189
their employees," he said. He raised his voice. "Those days are over!' 9
Then he asked for the EDS file.
Manuchehr Razmara had been in Paris over Christmas. Frencheducated-he was
a cardiologist-and married to a Frenchwoman, he considered France his
second home, and spoke fluent French. He was also a member of the Iranian
National Medical Council and a friend of Shahpour Bakhtiar, and when
Bakhtiar had become Prime Minister he had called his friend Razmara, in
Paris and asked him to come home to be Minister of Health.
The EDS file was handed to him by Dr. Emrani, the Deputy Minister in chap
of Social Security. Emrani had survived the two changes of government: he
had been here when the trouble had stated.
Razmara read the file with mounting anger. The EDS project was insane. The
basic contract price was forty-eight million dollars, with escalators
taking it up to a possible ninety million. Razmara recalled that Iran had
twelve thousand working doctors to serve a population of thirty-two
million, and that there were sixty-four thousand villages without tap
water; and he concluded that whoever had signed the deal with EDS were
fools or traitors, or both. How could they possibly justify spending
millions on computers when the people lacked the fundamental necessities of
public health like clean water? There could only be one explanation: they
had been bribed.
Well, they would suffer. Emrain had prepared this dossier for the special
court that prosecuted corrupt civil servants. Three people were in jail:
former Minister Dr. Sheikholeslan-iizadeh, and two of his Deputy ministers,
Reza Neghabat and Nih Arame. That was as it should be. The blame for the
mess they were in should fall primarily on Iranians. However, the Americans
were also culpable. American businessmen and their government had
encouraged the Shah in his mad schemes, and had taken their profits: now
they must suffer. Furthermore, according to the, file, EDS had been
spectacularly incompetent: the computers were not yet working, after two
and a half years, yet the automation pvject had so disrupted Emrani's
department that the old-fashioned systems were not working either, with the
result that Emrani could not monitor his department's expenditure. This was
a principal cause of the Ministry's overspending its budget, the file said.
Razmara noted that the U.S. Embassy was protesting about
190 Ken Folleu
the jailing of the two Americans, Chiapparone and Gaylord, because there was
no evidence against them. That was typical of the Americans. Of course there
was no proof- bribes were not paid by check. Ile Embassy was also concerned
for the safety of the two prisoners. Razmara found this ironic. He was
concerned for his safety. Each day when he went to the offee he wondered
whether he would come home alive.
He closed the file. He had no sympathy for EDS or its jailed executives.
Even if he had wanted to have them released, he would not have been able
to, he reflected. The anti-American mood of the people was rising to fever
pitch. The government of which Razmara was a part, the Bakhtiar regime, had
been installed by the Shah and was therefore widely suspected of being
pro-American. With the country in such turmoil, any Minister who concerned
himself with the welfare of a couple of greedy American capitalist lackeys
would be sacked if not lynched---and quite rightly. Razmara turned his
attention to more important matters.
The next day his secretary said: "Mr. Young, of the American company EDS,
is here asking to see you, Minister."
The arrogance of the Americans was infuriating. Razmara said: "Repeat to
him the message I gave you yesterday-then give him five minutes to get off
the premises."
14
For Bill, the big problem was time.
He was different from Paul. For Paul--restless, aggressive, strong-willed,
ambitiou"e worst of being in jail was the helplessness. Bill was more
placid by nature: He accepted that there was nothing to do but pray, so he
prayed. (He did not wear his religion on his sleeve: he did his praying
late at night, before going to sleep, or early in the morning before the
others woke up.) What got to Bill was the excruciating slowness with which
time passed. A day in the real world-a day of solving problems, making
decisions, taking phone calls, and attending meetings-was no time at all:
a day in jail was endless. Bill devised a formula for conversion of real
time to jail time.
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 191
Real Time Jail Time
I second I minute
I minute I hour
I hour I day
1 week I month
1 month I year
Time took on this new dimension for Bill after two or three weeks in jail,
when he realized there was going to be no quick solution to the problem.
Unlike a convicted criniinal, he had not been sentenced to ninety days or
five years, so he could gain no cowdort from scratching a calendar on the
wall as a countdown to freedom. It made no difference how many days had
passed: his remaining time in jail was indefinite, therefore endless.
Fhs Persian cellmates did not seem to feel this way. It was a revealing
cultural contrast: the Americans, trained to get fast results, were
tortured by suspense; the Iranians were content to wait forfardah,
tomorrow, next week, sometime, eventuallyjust as they had been in business.
Nevertheless, as the Shah's grip weakened, Bill thought he saw sips of
desperation in some of them, and he came to mistrust them. He was careful
not to tell them who was in town from Dallas or what progress was being
made in the negotiations for his release: he was afraid that, clutching at
straws, they would have tried to trade information to the guards.
He was becoming a well-adjusted jailbird. He learned to ignore dirt and
bugs, and he got used to cold, starchy, unappetizing food. He learned to
live within a small, clearly defined personal boundary, the prisoner's
"turf." He stayed active.
He found ways to fill the endless days. He read books, taught Paul chess,
exercised in the hall, talked to the Iranians to get every word of the
radio and TV news, and prayed. He made a minutely detailed survey of the
jail, measuring the cells and the corridors and drawing plans and sketches.
He kept a diary, recording every trivial event of jail life, plus
everything his visitors told him and all the news. He used initials instead
of names and sometimes put in invented incidents or altered versions of
real incidents, so that if the diary were confiscated or read by the
authorities it would confuse them.
Like prisoners everywhere, he looked forward to visitors as eagerly as a
child waiting for Christmas. The EDS people brought decent food, warm
clothing, new books, and letters from home.
192 Ken Folleu
One day Keane Taylor brought a picture of Bill's six-year-old son,
Christopher, standing in front of the Christmas tree. Seeing his little boy,
even in a photograph, gave Bill strength: a powerful reminder of what he had
to hope for, it renewed his resolve to hang on and not despair.
Bill wrote letters to Emily and gave them to Keane, who would read them to
her over the phone. Bill had known Keane for ten years, and they were quite
close--they had lived together after the evacuation. Bill knew that Keane
was not as insensitive as his reputation would indicate-half of that was an
act-but still it was embarrassing to write "I love you" knowing that Keane
would be reading it. Bill got over the embarrassment, because he wanted
very badly to tell Emily and the children how much he loved them, just in
case he never got another chance to say it in person. The letters were like
those written by pilots on the eve of a dangerous mission.
The most important gift brought by the visitors was news. The all-too-brief
meetings in the low building across the courtyard were spent discussing the
various efforts being made to get Paul and Bill out. It seemed to Bill that
time was the key factor. Sooner or later, one approach or another had to
work. Unfortunately, as time passed, Iran went downhill. The forces of the
revolution were gaining momentum. Would EDS get Paul and Bill out before
the whole country exploded?
It was increasingly dangerous for the EDS people to come to the south of
the city, where the jail was. Paul and Bill never knew when the next visit
would come, or whether there would be a next visit. As four days went by,
then five, Bin would wonder whether all the others had gone back to the
United States and left him and Paul belund. Considering that the bad was
impossibly high, and the streets of Tehran impossibly dangerous, might they
all give up Paul and Bill as a lost cause? They niight be forced, against
their wills, to leave in order to save their own fives. Bill recalled the
American withdrawal from Vietnam, with the last Embassy officials being
lifted off the roofs by helicopter, and he could imagine the scene repeated
at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.
He was occasionally reassured by a visit from an Embassy official. They,
too, were taking a risk in coming, but they never brought any hard news
about government efforts to help Paul and Bill, and Bill came to the
conclusion that the State Department was inept.
ON WINGS OF EAGLES 193
Visits from Dr. Houman, their Iranian attorney, were at first highly
encouraging; but then Bill realized that in typically Iranian fashion
Hournan was promising much and producing little. The fiasco of the meeting
with Dadgar was desperately depressing. It was frightening to see how
easily Dadgar outmaneuvered Houman, and how determined Dadgar was to keep
Paul and Bill jailed. Bill had not slept that night.
When he thought about the bail he found it staggering. No one had ever paid
that much ransom, anywhere in the world. He recalled news stories about
American businessmen kidnapped in South America and held for a million or
two million dollars. (They were usually killed.) Other kidnappings, of
millionaires, politicians, and celebrities, had involved demands for three
or four million-never thirteen. No one would pay that much for Paul and
Bill.
Besides, even that much money would not buy them the right to leave the
country. They would probably be kept under house arrest in Tehran-while the
mobs took over. Bail sometimes seemed more like a trap than a way of
escape. It was a catch-22.
The whole experience was a lesson in values. Bill le
arned that he could do
without his fine house, his cars, fancy food, and clean clothes. It was no
big deal to be living in a dirty room with bugs crawling across the walls.
Everything he had in life had been stripped away, and he discovered that
the only thing he cared about was his family. When you got right down to
it, that was all that really counted: Emily, Vicki, Jackie, Jenny, and
Chris.
Coburn's visit had cheered him a little. Seeing Jay in that big down coat
and woolen hat, with a growth of red beard on his chin, Bill had guessed
that he was not in Tehran to work through legal channels. Coburn had spent
most of the visit with Paul, and if Paul had learned more, he had not
passed it on to Bill. Bill was content: he would find out as soon as he
needed to know.
But the day after Coburn's visit there was bad news. On January 16 the Shah
left Iran.
The television set in the hall of the jail was switched on, exceptionally,
in the afternoon; and Paul and Bill, with all the other prisoners, watched
the little ceremony in the Imperial Pavilion at Mehrabad Airport. There was
the Shah, with his wife, three of his four children, his mother-in-law, and
a crowd of courtiers. There, to see them off, was Prime Minister Shahpour
194 Ken Folleu
Bakhtiar, and a crowd of generals. Bakhtiar kissed the Shah's hand, and the
royal party went out to the airplane.
The Ministry people in the jail were gloomy: most of them had been friends,
of one kind or another, with the royal family or its immediate circle. Now
their patrons were leaving. It meant, at the very least, that they had to
resign themselves to a long stay in jail. Bill felt that the Shah had taken
with him the last chance of a pro-American outcome in Iran. Now there would
be more chaos and confusion, more danger to all Americans in Tehranand less
chance of a swift release for Paul and Bill.
Soon after the television showed the Shah's jet rising into the sky, Bill
began to hear a background noise, like a distant crowd, from outside the
jail. The noise quickly grew to a pandemonium of shouting and cheering and
hooting of homs. The TV showed the source of the noise: a crowd of hundreds
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