Way of Escape

by Ann Fillmore

  “Yes,” said Bar-Fischer grabbing Halima’s hand to silence her. “Yes. Go buy the computer.”

  “I will go with you,” insisted Siddhu.

  “You don’t know a modem from a monkey,” laughed Devi.

  “I want to come,” insisted the little man.

  “Don’t argue,” said Russ and led the way out the door.

  Gently, firmly, Rachel pulled Halima into Halima’s office and impelled her into a chair at the desk. Rachel sat down beside her, leaned toward her, and put a hand on the telephone. “My friend, it is time to call Carl-Joran.” Halima looked at her with so much pain in her eyes that Rachel began to cry.

  ***

  They were sitting down to lunch when the call came. Gustav, on his creaky old legs, hurried to Carl-Joran’s side and in a whisper told him that Dr. Legesse was on the phone. Carl-Joran glanced at the assembled family, Bonnie, Trisha, Sture, and said, “Be right back.”

  Trish was sitting across from Sture and they glanced at each other with another of those inquiring dart-like looks that indicated their complete puzzlement over their new status. Bonnie and Carl-Joran had told them last night. Trisha had taken the news with high amusement and, with a loud braying laugh, promptly slapped Sture on the shoulder. He had turned beet-red and croaked, “Far, hur kann det ga?”

  His father had smiled sadly and responded, “So war det.”

  Reluctantly, Sture hugged Trisha, released her quickly saying, “Mina nya syster.” To his father he said, shaking his head, “I wondered that she acted so much like a Swedish woman.”

  “Ja so,” his dad agreed sagely and broke out the konjak, a particularly good five-star brand from Armenia. The toasts went on until they were all tipsy.

  The next morning had been met with good cheer. Sture announced at breakfast that he was finished with being on a forced vacation and would return to the Karolinska Institute that evening. Trisha decreed her intention to go back to California within the week. She had already put too much of a burden on the substitute teacher and besides, there was a very important basketball game coming up the end of the month. Trisha loved all this adventure, true, but her true role in life was to coach. So she announced.

  Bonnie and Carl-Joran just grinned with that look satisfied lovers have the morning after and held hands.

  That the newly conjoined family had all gathered for lunch was an accident of timing. Astrid had fixed her split pea soup, the thick kind that almost had to be cut with a knife to eat, and Sture had returned from skiing with Katarina early. He told them that the Arab contingent of agents had followed him and he had felt very uncomfortable putting Katarina in harm’s way.

  Wanting exercise but not wanting to go skiing again, Trisha had found a basketball in the stables. After only a few minutes outside in the bitter cold, she had discovered to her consternation that the basketball froze and cracked and her eyelids and nose hairs were frosted. Krister had come out and shaken his head at her, indicating that she was crazy. He had laughed at the basketball’s plight.

  Bonnie and Carl-Joran spent the morning talking with Inge Person. No words could describe the look on the advokat’s face when she walked into the baron’s office to discover him alive. When power of speech finally returned to her, she shook Bonnie Ixey’s hand with appreciation saying, “It is good to put a face to the voice.” Signing the accounts into Bonnie’s name, with an addendum that the will had not yet been probated, therefore such action was only temporary to release funds, took merely a little over an hour. Inge Person promised to deal with the hated Algbak herself. “It would be a pleasure,” said the advokat, “to straighten out that woman. Of course I will not tell her about your being alive, my dear Baron, but I will be more than happy to install Bonnie as heir apparent…fur narvarande…a little while.”

  Now, Carl-Joran rose from the lunch table and strode ahead of Gustav leaving the retainer to make his halting way down the long hall. Sitting at his desk in his big office, he gingerly picked up the receiver. Halima told him immediately, without preamble.

  Carl-Joran was only able to say, “I want to see any photos Snow is able to retrieve.”

  “I will tell him that,” Dr. Legesse agreed, “He can e-mail them, I am sure.”

  “That should be no problem,” said Carl-Joran softly. “And Tahireh said Yusef couldn’t take the body? They say it’s still with the Bedouin?”

  “That’s what she told us.”

  “Okay. Maybe we can find that tribe. Now you tell Miss Tahireh Ibrahim that I insist she come back to Haifa and not go to help Shamsi. She is not to try to rescue that Thai girl. We cannot lose another fine operative.”

  “I have told her and I will tell her you have ordered it,” Halima Legesse sighed, “but you know as well as I how headstrong that girl is.”

  “Ah, yes, that is why she is one of our best people. Okay. One question more. May I come alive? Enough of this being dead. I will take Bonnie to Switzerland and we will see the bankers. We will meet Freda Englich and the women. I want to hear the mother’s story for myself.”

  There was silence on the other end of the phone. The doctor had been struck when she was too weak to retaliate with strength against this very powerful man. Slowly she managed to say, “No.”

  He swore in Swedish, “Fy fan!”

  “Don’t you swear!” Halima Legesse came to, shaken awake by the words. “Listen to what I say: not yet. We are very close, Carl-Joran, but not yet. We want to have Sadiq-Fath out in the open and if you move too soon, all our work, Habib’s sacrifice will have been in vain.”

  “That’s a low blow,” growled Carl-Joran.

  “The truth though, it is the truth.” She was regaining her determination. “Still, if you can go to Switzerland incognito, you and Bonnie, you could meet the princess and her mother. Then you could come here. Can you do that and not be caught? Or recognized?”

  “Certainly.” He sounded insulted by her doubt.

  The sigh of resignation that came over the phone was almost palpable. “I will agree to your doing that, Baron. Nothing more. Straight to Geneva. Straight here.”

  “I promise,” said the big man.

  “Until we see each other,” the doctor said and hung up.

  Bonnie was standing in the doorway. The look in her eyes told Carl-Joran that she had been there some time. He motioned to her to come to him, which she did. “A very good friend of mine has been murdered,” he whispered, “doing work for Emigrant Women.”

  Bonnie threw her arms around his neck. “It wasn’t me, was it? It wasn’t because I didn’t arrive sooner and get money to him?”

  “No, no, no.” He pulled her close. “Money would have made no difference. The Arab commander simply shot him down. That is all. He shot down two other holy men who were with Habib, just like that. No compunction.”

  “How horrible!” said Bonnie in shock.

  “We are leaving for Geneva.”

  “We?”

  “You and I, tonight. Rather, we will take the four a.m. shuttle from Vasteras to Oslo and the SwissAir from there to Geneva. You must pack.” Carl-Joran stood up. He had also decided that the time had come to clean up the local environment. His son’s medical studies were important and his new daughter should not be bothered by those pesky agents following them around. He rang for Krister and started for the door. He paused to hug Bonnie. “Don’t take much and don’t pack anything you would miss if we cannot retrieve the baggage or if we get picked up. All right?”

  “I understand,” said Bonnie, hugging him in return. She laughed sharply. “Two weeks ago I would have been outraged at being told such a thing. I guess it takes only once to learn the reality of being stalked, of having someone hate you enough to kill you. An enlightenment I owe all to you, my dear…husband.”

  He shrugged. “It is the Iranian Darughih Sadiq-Fath who has the more murderous operatives tracking us. He does not hate us. He does not have that kind of emotion. It is business for him. Strictly business. His pride has be
en hurt because we in EW, especially I, have been able to elude him for so long. No, not hatred.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Bonnie as they walked down the long hallway.

  Carl-Joran’s face became somber, “Don’t try. This kind of hell and deceit does not become you.”

  “Lies do not become you either,” she said up to him.

  A crooked smile spread across his face, “All of my life is true.”

  “Even the lies?”

  “Especially the lies.”

  Darughih Quddus Sadiq-Fath gloated. “Are the agents in place?” he asked Muhit, stepping into the bulletproof Mercedes. The car still dripped steaming water from its morning wash. The driver closed the door behind the darughih.

  As the car pulled away from the heavily guarded residence, Muhit, bundled in a thick bomber jacket, turned in his seat to look at his boss. “We have reached an understanding with the judges who are to try the Milind Pandharpurkar case. The verdict, and the punishment, should be swift.”

  “That was a given regardless of our interference,” said Sadiq-Fath, wishing he had put on his warm overcoat. “Driver, turn on some heat back here.” Around them, covering the higher suburbs of Tehran, a thin layer of snow frosted the lovely gardens and trees. House servants were busily sweeping steps and patios. A few maids were slipping and sliding their way to market. Here and there, the big black Mercedes had to circumvent cars and trucks that had not made it up, or down, an incline.

  Almost immediately, warm air filled the back of the Mercedes and Sadiq-Fath relaxed. He hated to be cold. “We have information from the prison guards that there is a man who is trying to rescue the Pandharpurkar girl, he’s been dealt with?”

  “Shamsi Granfa is his name. He is under constant surveillance and his phone is tapped.” Ali Muhit watched the road.

  “Is this man connected to EW? That isn’t clear to me,” Sadiq-Fath commented.

  The old soldier pushed his chin down onto his chest. “It isn’t clear to us either.” His hand lay, out of long habit, on the butt of the 9mm pistol in the holster on his belt. “We don’t believe he is one of their regular operatives. He’s new on the scene and his calls to them just began with this case. In fact, his calls went first to Lori Dubbayaway in Bangkok, whom we are certain is EW. We do believe he will be contacted by the EW administrator, Prakash, about the Pandharpurkar girl and that EW money will be put in Granfa’s hands sometime this afternoon. Of course, that will be too late for Milind.” Muhit leaned onto his hand on the gun butt at this waist. “There is another servant girl in prison. One EW will feel compelled to try and rescue. We’re hoping this Granfa bloke will also want her.”

  “Why?”

  “She is pregnant by a Kuwaiti dignitary who has asked that she disappear.”

  “This dignitary can’t send the girl home?” The question was mere curiosity. Certainly Sadiq-Fath did not care one way or another.

  “Too dangerous. Her father is a low-wage clerk in the Thai government, Bureau of Parks, I believe, and the mother is a teacher. He and his wife might come after the baby’s father for money, not that they would be able to collect. Still, it would get to Amnesty and the other humanitarian organizations and cause unpleasantness for the dignitary.” The car was pulling into the courtyard of the security agency office building. Muhit unlocked his seat belt and put on his hat.

  The driver parked and jumped out to open the darughih’s door. Together, Sadiq-Fath and the aged assistant walked into the tightly guarded building. It was cold in here also and Sadiq-Fath grumbled, “Why must I be chilled everywhere I go?” He shouted at a nearby secretary, “Have the heat turned up.”

  Eyes averted, the man replied, “The furnace is not working, sir, we have been freezing all morning.”

  “Has a repair man not been called?” asked Sadiq-Fath in astonishment.

  “I believe so, sir, yessir,” said the secretary, cringing, “I can check to see what is happening if you want?”

  “Find the building manager. You aren’t responsible for heat, he is. Have him report to me.”

  “Immediately, sir,” the man responded and scurried away.

  As they entered the darughih’s office, two other male secretaries were plugging in space heaters. It was a couple degrees warmer in this room already. “Thank you,” Sadiq-Fath acknowledged as the two men left. Turning his rear end to a heater, Quddus Sadiq-Fath looked at his assistant. “So it is all in place?”

  “We will plan to pick up Granfa, and whoever else we can catch, interrogate them, and hold them until the people at EW give us the location of the women they have taken from Iran.”

  The darughih nodded. “And then we execute Granfa and this whomever person, perhaps after a trial of some sort?”

  “That’s the plan, sir,” smiled Muhit. “I personally will bring Granfa and any associate here to Iran and we will execute them.”

  Jani’s hair had been cut and bleached and dyed a charcoal salt and pepper. Tahireh had expertly applied makeup and Captain Maxwell had chosen an ostentatious pantsuit that screamed Rodeo Drive. The addition of oversized earrings and a clunky necklace finished the job. When Jani stepped in front of the full-length mirror, she gasped.

  Zhara covered her mouth to keep from exploding in laughter.

  “But look at you!” exclaimed Jani. The two stood side by side. Zhara’s long dark hair was sun-bleached blonde with a streak of flashy silver and perfectly straight, her exposed skin a creamy tan. She looked like a teenage model right off Malibu beach. Her attire consisted of tights and an open-knit, baby doll top over a turtleneck jersey and high-heeled sandals. There was an engagement ring and a wedding ring on her finger. She hugged her mom with one arm and peered into her passport with the other hand. “Mrs. Zoë Feldenstein. Eighteen…no, just turned nineteen. Born in Hollywood, California on Christmas day. What a blast!”

  Lonnie Maxwell handed Jani her passport. “You are Mrs. Myrna Feldenstein. A widow from West Hollywood, you and your daughter-in-law are going home after a visit to your son Paul, who’s a pilot serving in the air force. Memorize everything. Your birthday, birthplace, all the countries you’ve visited. Do those rings fit?”

  Jani…a.k.a. Mrs. Feldenstein Sr. twisted the diamond ring on her ring finger and then flicked through the stamped pages of her new passport. “My goodness, I have certainly traveled a lot!”

  “You’ll notice that most of them are takeoff points for cruises. You’re husband hunting.” Lonnie grinned. “Think you can manage that?”

  “No more husbands, thank you,” Jani laughed in return and picked up the large handbag to sort through the rest of her stuff. There were also two entire carryon backpacks for Jani and Zhara to explore.

  Zhara had shaken out her small fanny pack purse and was going through her new possessions. “When do we leave?”

  “In an hour. You’ll be flying out on a military transport to Frankfurt, Germany. There you’ll go by taxi to the civilian Frankfurt airport and get onto a Lufthansa flight to Geneva. Mrs. Englich will meet you in Geneva. She’ll take you to her private school and there you’ll stay.”

  Tahireh, who had gone to the commissary after finishing Jani’s makeup, came back. She dropped a couple newspapers onto the table. “The Saudi newspaper has an article about the death of the hajis. Only two paragraphs and it says they were murdered by Bedouin discontents. Sort of a silly thing to say since two of the hajis are known to be Bedouins.” She pointed down at the women’s photos on the front page of the paper. Jani was in full mufti standing next to her husband and the one of Zhara showed her in school uniform. Tahireh smiled with satisfaction. “You turned out well. No one could possibly recognize you. Come on, we better get you to the plane.”

  “I can take them,” Lonnie Maxwell said and gathered up her uniform jacket and jeep keys. “Do up those packs, put the passports in your purses, let’s go!”

  “God, I have butterflies in my stomach again,” exclaimed Zhara-Zoë.

  Jani-Myrna had
no time to grieve any more. A flash of emotional pain went through her and that was all she allowed herself. Quickly, she zipped up the packs and loaded them onto the wheeled carryall. “Ready to go!”

  Captain Maxwell turned to Tahireh Ibrahim. “You need sleep. You need rest. I expect to find you doing both when I get back.”

  Tahireh smiled and nodded. The moment the jeep engine started, Tahireh picked up the phone and dialed Granfa’s cell phone number.

  Shamsi Granfa sweated. In his late thirties, he looked years older. Overweight, flushed, he came away from the small grocery store that was his secret currency exchange depot. Anyone who did business in Arab countries had their source for receiving and sending foreign currency. It was a necessity. He had thought about running a money exchange from his own business location, but exchanges were often raided by the security forces. His business affairs had to be kept absolutely free of government interference, and so far, because of the clientele who sought him out, he had been left strictly to his own devices. This was good for what he called his extracurricular activity of rescuing victims of the Kuwaiti purges.

  His familiarity with the word extracurricular came from a long career as a student at the University of Washington. Of all things, he had a doctor of science in nursing and pathology. Years he’d spent in Seattle attending university—years! to keep himself from being thrown out by the American HS, back to Iraq and certain death as a Kurd. When he did get his final degree, he also picked up American citizenship, which allowed him to come to Kuwait as an investor three years ago. He still felt like a foreigner in Kuwait and he probably always would.

  Sometimes memories assailed him. He would watch his mother dying in the gas attack on that lonely mountain pass in north Iraq while he and his younger sister hid in a tiny hole in the cliff. Everyone in the group perished. He and his mother and his older sister, Rané, were trying to join up with his father and his two brothers in Turkey. But his two brothers never made it out of Turkey; they were shot as spies. Shamsi and Rané nearly starved on that cold pass. Only by the grace of some higher power did a herdsman find them and feed them. That amazing man managed to slip them over the Turkish border disguised as sheep. Allah be blessed, that herdsman had wrapped sheepskins over them and had them crawl, in the dark, past distant border guards and into a border village to the man’s cousin’s house. To this day, Shamsi retched at the smell of raw lanolin.