Way of Escape

by Ann Fillmore

  He sent Carin a short note to hold tight and wait and to tell Tahireh to do the same. Just a few hours more. He’d get back to Carin as soon as possible. As the messages went off into cyberspace, he looked around to find the professor hovering near. In a few words, he told her.

  “We will celebrate at dinner,” she said. “Now, you go rest along with that lovely wife of yours. Go! I will have a student guide you to your rooms.” She turned toward the hallway and a waiting student and hollered, “Kommen sie heir, Dagmar.”

  At dinner, Jani heard the news. She felt the hope rise in her and forced herself to put it on hold. She had known the man a mere two days. He had seen her as a spoiled rich man’s wife. Hadn’t he? A nuisance to be dealt with. His kindness was a part of his personality, something he lived and practiced. A rescuer. What right did she have to hope that his survival would mean more than his continued ability to rescue more women, like her?

  Morning found Tidewater standing near Norm’s cubby, reading over the young man’s shoulder. Slowly Tidewater turned and went back to his own office. He picked up the phone as it buzzed. He’d been waiting for this call. It was Darughih Sadiq-Fath.

  For fifteen long minutes the two men talked. Upon hanging up, Marion Tidewater asked Lily to get hold of an intelligence agent from the Kuwaiti embassy here in Washington, DC, and he ordered Norm to find all the information possible on Shamsi Granfa. Next, in the quiet fury that had begun last night on receiving the news from Interpol about his agents being in a drunk lockup in Sweden, Tidewater punched the extension for the special area of the Agency which only he, in this office, had access to.

  He had absolutely no qualms about ordering the disposal of Barbara Monday. In fact, his specific instructions were, “If she can’t be McCarthyed, then Silkwood her.”

  Carin’s ancient black Volvo chugged up to the imposing gate of the Hermelin castle. She didn’t have to get out, for which she was very thankful as the frigid fog was sticking to everything. Krister had raced to open the gates and as soon as she’d entered, he closed them, jumped into her passenger seat and they drove to the front parking area. Krister offered to take the old Volvo to the barn and plug it into a heater but Carin told him to leave it there in front.

  “It’s tough,” she said, patting the rusty fender.

  Gustav opened the front door and, after she’d shed her boots and heavy wool coat, she followed him to the nicely warmed television room. An extraordinarily tall, red-haired woman stood and held out her hand.

  “Hi, I’m Trisha Ixey. Bonnie’s daughter. The baron said you spoke pretty good English. Right?”

  “Yes, it is okay.” Carin pulled her knitted stocking cap off her frizzy brown hair. She was one of the dark Swedes. Her mother had explained to her as a child that the women of the family were descended from Lapps. Be proud, her mother had adjured, we are of the wolves and the reindeer. Still it hadn’t helped to have curly brown hair and gray-ashen eyes in classrooms of tall blonde kids. Carin had learned early about prejudice. Of course, that was before the surge of dark-skinned immigrants. Now brown, even black-haired children were not so unusual.

  “I told Astrid to get us some lunch. I know it’s early, but you gotta be hungry after that drive from Stockholm.” Trisha motioned Carin into a comfy chair.

  “Actually, I am famished. Coffee too would be wonderful.”

  “Yep, she’ll make coffee.” Trisha sat back down on the divan. “Mom says you need me to help with a rescue?”

  Carin loved the directness of the Americans. Had Trisha been British, they’d have been conversing politely for a half-hour before getting to the heart of the meeting. “Yes. You see, we, here in Sweden, have accepted our limit of…how shall I say? Hidden women? Women with no legal passports? For this month. I cannot arrange for any more.”

  “Mom explained that,” said Trisha as Marie brought in a large tray with Astrid’s delicious concoction of sandwiches and hot blueberry soup. Gustav followed with another tray bearing a thermos coffeepot, cups, cream, and sugar. “Want anything else? Astrid would be happy to make it.”

  Carin shook her head. “I am happy with this.”

  Trisha nodded at the servants who quietly disappeared. “Mom, or the baron told you that I’m going back to California tomorrow?”

  “Yes, and that is good. Ummm, yum,” Carin dug into the sandwiches and sipped the hot blueberry brew. “Excuse me, I have been awake since very early. I was responsible to transfer the woman from Uganda, with her daughters to shelter people who take her to Uppsala. Then I drive here.”

  “You must be bushed,” said Trisha with sympathy.

  “Bushed? Tired, yes.” Carin poured a cup of coffee and doctored it liberally with sugar. “Did your mother explain that we hope you can rescue two girls?”

  “From Thailand? They’re sitting in some building in Kuwait City and they need to get out really fast.”

  “Yes. We know now that this building is a medical facility, much like a mortuary, and the girls are hiding there. It is not a comfortable situation.”

  “I can believe that.” Trisha finished off three of the small salmon sandwiches. “You want me to house them on the Posey Farm? I can’t keep them in my apartment that’s for sure. But Mom thought they’d be safe on the farm.”

  “We can make up papers for them. They are only fifteen- and sixteen-years-old.” Carin sipped her coffee and groaned in pleasure. “Could they be students at your high school?”

  “Could the papers say they’re exchange students? Then it would be easy to register them and even get some money for their support.”

  “I see no problem with that. It is an excellent idea. Now, here is the tricky part. Can you wait in San Francisco and pick them up when they land? Can you make sure they get through immigration all right?” asked Carin. “It is possible to have someone from a local battered women’s support group there to help you.”

  Trisha rubbed her forehead. “I really should be back teaching in school by Monday. When can you get the girls into San Francisco?”

  Carin opened her notebook. “Depending on flight schedules, we should have them there no later than twelve hours after you arrive.”

  “And you let me know and I show up to get two foreign exchange students? That’s all?”

  “Yes. We will give you papers also. You must tell us what to say on the papers, what makes them legitimate,” the Swedish woman explained.

  Trisha nodded. “I can do that. I’ll call Misimoto, our caretaker, right away and have her get two cabins ready. Will the girls mind living in cabins? They were built years ago for workers. One room with a bachelor kitchen, not fancy but cozy, warm, and comfortable. We haven’t used them in years. Might have a mouse or two under the floor.”

  “They have a WC, bath, and everything?”

  “Toilet and shower. Yep.”

  Carin laughed, “You must understand, Trisha, these girls came from very poor families. To be on your farm, to go to a real American high school? They will be so happy.”

  “Neither of them speaks English.”

  “No, they do not.”

  “That’s okay. There’s a special class at school, English as a Second Language. We can handle it.” Trisha smiled. A sense of satisfaction washed over her. She had not felt such pleasure at helping in a long, long time. What her mother was doing was making much more sense to her. “Tell me exactly what will happen in San Francisco and I’ll get it done.”

  “I will outline every step and the women who help you at the airport have done this before,” said Carin. “Always remember that this work can be dangerous.”

  “I understand, really I do. I mean, I don’t understand why, but I understand that it is,” responded Trisha.

  ***

  Barbara Monday held her suit coat closer around her neck to keep the nasty, dirt-filled breeze from her silk blouse. In the same hand, she clutched her purse and with the other hand, she pushed her cash card into the machine. Moments later, Barbara was horrified to
read that her account was empty. To make matters worse, the machine refused to give back her card. Eight o’clock in the morning, the bank would not be open for another hour, what was she to do? She had only enough money for a taxi to work. She punched in the numbers for her savings account. Frozen.

  A scream of rage started up her throat. How could this happen? Since the machine would not give her card back, she thought for a moment about putting in the other charge card and taking some cash on account. But, slowly, like a painfully grinding clutch, her brain registered the fact that perhaps this was not a mistake made by the bank.

  Cautiously, carefully, she moved away from the ATM and made her way down the busy sidewalk and returned to her apartment building. Yes, there was someone following her. She slipped into the florist shop next door and immediately out the rear exit and into the locked back door of her building. She raced up the steps, into her apartment and picked up her phone. It was dead. She was not surprised.

  Quickly she went down the back stairs, through the alley and onto the corner where she caught a cab to her office. She didn’t dare use her cell phone. Too easy for someone to eavesdrop.

  Her office was in a highly secure part of the UN building. She would be safe there. Perhaps. To be doubly sure, she went to the accounting department in the basement and used their phone.

  In Haifa, Devi picked up. “Everyone else went home for a couple hours,” she said. “It’s suppertime. Hold on, I’ll get Siddhu.”

  A moment later, Siddhu clicked onto the line. Barbara could hear an Indian movie with loud music and screaming heroes as well as the sounds of children talking and Siddhu’s wife clinking dishes in the kitchen of their apartment. Siddhu listened to Barbara attentively. “We will send you money,” he said quickly. “Tell us a place to send it. Not your apartment or your office.”

  “Okay. How soon…?”

  “Immediately.” Siddhu asked, “Are you safe?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered.

  “Don’t take chances,” the little Indian man ordered her, “you leave New York if you have to. You still have all those passports and IDs?”

  “Yes, yes. But I should be safe in my office at the UN,” Barbara Monday assured him.

  “I will tell Baron Hermelin,” said Siddhu. “Perhaps also, there is a way to help you from here. Maybe. I will ask.”

  “Whatever you can do,” begged Monday. “I hate this.”

  “You will know within the hour,” Siddhu assured her.

  As soon as they hung up, Siddhu called the Nof Hotel and was rung through to the second floor suite. Stepping from the hot shower, Russ grabbed up the phone. As he rubbed his long black hair dry, he nodded, “I’ll take care of it. Someone’s zapped her financial records. I have to go back to headquarters. The hotel won’t give me a secure modem line. Can you tell Taqi to pick me up?”

  “Of course,” said Siddhu. “Do you need me?”

  “Nah. This’ll only take an hour or so. Don’t worry. I know how it was done and I’m darned certain who did it.”

  It was good Russ went back to the EW building because as he arrived, Devi was leaving. She smiled up at him, shyly, which didn’t suit her tough demeanor. She caught herself actually fluffing her very short hair with her free hand and made herself put that hand in her pants pocket where it wouldn’t give her away. Solemnly, with the other hand, she tossed her jacket over one shoulder and announced gravely, “Carin Smoland wants to talk to Siddhu about papers for the Thai girls. I called him just before I tried to get hold of you.”

  “Thanks,” said Russ, passing right by her and sitting down in his cubby. “Okay. Did Carin manage to arrange something?”

  Devi followed him into the office. “All done. As soon as they have ID and passports, they can go to California.” She looked over her shoulder. “You know, Tahireh won’t be coming back here. She’ll fly straight to Paris.”

  “Oh?”

  “She doesn’t…” the Israeli girl pursed her lips and shook out her jacket before putting it on. “ Is Taqi still out there? He can give me a ride home.”

  “Yes.” Russ stood and came to the desk. “She doesn’t what?”

  “Nothing.” With a skip, Devi slammed the front door and was gone.

  It took about the hour Russ said it would to find who had erased Barbara Monday’s life history. It was a thorough job, extremely well done. Nothing remained of the person known as Barbara Amy Monday. Her financial records he could redo because he tracked where the funds had been sent and retrieved them. Her birth records and Social Security he established from old bank records that had long ago been archived. At least she could have money back. Yet, the more he delved into the origins of this, the more he thought her reappearance was a bad idea. He had gone to the empty dining room for a soda when Siddhu entered. Russ shook his head at him. “Not wise, not wise at all.”

  “What is not wise?” asked Siddhu.

  “Tell Barbara to pack what she wants to keep with her, order the moving men to put her furniture in storage, and get the hell out of New York. In fact, it would be wisest to come directly here.”

  “She is in danger?”

  “Very much so.”

  “Oh, my,” said Siddhu. “But you can get her money back?

  “That’s the easy part and it’s already done. Whoever did this,” he rummaged in the fridge, “wants her gone, completely gone.”

  “I will tell her but she is not a lady who takes orders like that easily,” Siddhu related with doubt in his voice. “Come, help me arrange passage for the Thai girls. I show you how it is done. Also, we need to buy Tahireh a ticket back to Paris.”

  “So she really is going back there.” The disappointment was clear.

  Siddhu gazed steadily at his own shoes. “Ummm, yes. That is where she always goes after an assignment is finished. That is where she works and where she lives.”

  “I understand,” said Russ.

  Siddhu shook his head. “No, you don’t, really. But that is okay. One day you will.”

  As predicted, when Siddhu got Barbara on the phone again, she went ballistic. She shouted, “No! I won’t have this done to me. No! I’ll fight it. If they get away with this, they’ll do it to anyone who works at EW: you, the Ixeys…no!”

  Siddhu and Russ were standing by the speakerphone. Russ asked, “Can you stay in the UN? Or at a foreign government residence?”

  “Sure. That’s no problem. But you think I should put my stuff in storage? Get out of my apartment?”

  “Yes,” said Russ, simply.

  “I know you, don’t I?” she asked. “We met.”

  “Briefly, at Kennedy airport, sort of.”

  “Siddhu,” came Barbara’s voice, worried, “Baron Hermelin trusts Mr. Snow?”

  “Yes, Barbara. I am coming to trust him too.”

  “Okay,” she said with an enormous sigh. “Can I at least get my records and money back?”

  “That’s done,” said Russ, “and I’ve encrypted everything this time so that only you can have access. Barbara, do you really, really want to fight what they’ve done to you?”

  “Yes.” She sounded determined. “Siddhu, I’ll arrange to stay at the Ugandan consulate. Prince LaFoon isn’t there right now, but his assistant will gladly put me up in the guesthouse. Snow, you find out all the names of all the people who did this to me. Find the complete trail of evidence. Send it to me. All right? Is that clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am!” he responded with a surprised laugh of respect. It was like bargaining with his tough old grandmother.

  “Good. Talk to you later. Bye.” She hung up.

  Siddhu turned to Russ. “Now we make sure the two girls get out of Kuwait safely, as well as Tahireh.”

  “You got it,” said Russ, clicking off the speakerphone. His entire concept of women had taken a dramatic right-face turn.

  Blowing sand and dust glittered in the glow of the mercury lamps and made the tarmac around the transport planes almost invisible. It was as
if the jets and trucks and loading tractors and people were floating on a shimmering sea. Jet engines whined continuously. The smell of jet fuel hung low in the air. One plane was taxiing in as another pulled away from the loading area leaving thin trails through the dust sea. Two other jets waited for parking space.

  In the midst of this eerie scene of ordered hustle and bustle, Shamsi Granfa dropped off three young men wearing baseball hats and dressed in American style jeans and white T-shirts bearing the insignia of the air express company. He waited outside the gate long enough to see them met by one of the supervisors, a thickly muscled German fellow; then Shamsi Granfa with a smile on his face, drove away. His job was successfully completed.

  The three young men were handed clipboards with papers that looked exactly like bills of lading. They followed the supervisor to the plane they were to ride in.

  “Next stop Paris,” said the man in German. “Buckle up tight. These planes don’t coddle passengers. We don’t even serve drinks! All aboard!”

  The pilot and co-pilot, in their seats and going through the preliminary checklist, smiled and shouted a warm welcome as the three took off their hats, put on their seat belts and settled back. The navigator passed by them, saying to Dim and Milind, “We’ll make sure the two of you get onto the first flight to San Francisco. You may have to go via some other strange destination, but don’t worry. You’ll get delivered.”

  Tahireh translated and the girls grinned.

  “Thank you so much,” whispered Dim, just now coming to terms with being free. Her seatmate, Milind sighed and leaned back on a big box. “I will sleep,” she said as Tahireh translated their words to the navigator who nodded and continued on toward the cockpit.

  “I will be so glad to get back to Paris,” Tahireh said more to herself than the girls and shook her long hair out. “Oh! I can hardly wait!”

  The navigator took his seat, the engines roared, and not more than five minutes passed before the jet was airborne.