It was late at night and the camp was very quiet. A warm wind moved gently up from the sea, moaning sadly as it moved through the cracks in the poorly sealed windows of the camp administration building. There was a smell of fresh rain in the air, and Raule couldn’t help but stop and take a deep breath. He glanced at his watch. Almost 4 A.M. He had napped quickly between 1 A.M. and 3 A.M., but the fire inside him kept him going now—that and a constant supply of harsh coffee, black, with huge spoonfuls of sugar, thick bread, and even an occasional cup of cheap wine from his secret stash in the bottom drawer of the file cabinet.
Raule sat back and rubbed his eyes, then glanced at his desk. The papers were piled high: thick government folders, excerpts from history books, newspaper clippings, files he had printed from the net (Khorramshahr had a single computer connected to the Internet, and the time on it was rationed and strictly enforced), transcripts of conversations with government representatives in Tehran, Belgium, Baghdad, and France, and notes from bankers in Europe, Iran and the United States. The paperwork spilled off his desk and onto the floor, arranged in a semicircle around and behind his chair. At first glance it appeared that Raule was surrounded by an indecipherable mess, but each pile had been neatly organized, alphabetized, and prioritized. Atop every pile were pages of his personal notes, each written in his careful script, a synopsis of the information that the separate stacks of papers contained.
Raule listened intently to the sound of the wind. He sniffed again, taking in the smell of the coming rain. In one sense, he hated the rain—it turned the camp into a muddy and miserable mess. But he did love the smell of the coming storm, which reminded him of his home and his years growing up on the small farm, the rolling hills around him, gray in the late winter but green as a postcard from early spring until fall.
He pushed his weight back and pictured his own fantasy farmhouse in his mind: small barns in the back, ducks in the yard, and two sheepdogs resting on the front porch. As his imagination wandered, he found himself almost slipping into a dream. There was light smoke from the chimney. A warm fire inside. Stacks of neatly cut wood near the front door. A small fishpond in back. A few cows, a few goats, a horse, maybe a sheep or two.
It was not enough land or animals to live off, but that was not the point. It was an ideal situation for a gentleman farmer, a man of means, a man who only raised things for the satisfaction of watching them grow, a man who needed nothing, not more money, not attention, not interaction with the world.
He shook his head again, bringing himself back to Khorramshahr.
His fantasy was reachable. If he could just make this work. He looked down at the papers and grunted again.
The death of Mr. al-Faruqi many years before had left an incredible mess. The years had tainted too many memories, and the paper trail had grown cold, but he thought that he had it. Most of it was here. He was close; he had the basis. Now he needed the lawyers and bankers to take it from here.
He squeezed his lips with his fingers as he thought. It was an incredible story. At one time, Pari’s husband, the late Mr. al-Faruqi, had been one of the most wealthy and ambitious men in all of Iran. Special assistant to the shah, responsible for developing the Parsi oil fields, some of the largest oil fields in all of Iran, he was rich and connected, which had been his downfall. Being too closely tied to the royal family was a dangerous thing in 1978, and when the shah had fled Iran, his friends had been left out to dry. Stripped of his power, wealth, position, and prestige, his in-country financial assets stolen by those men who had ousted the shah, his out-of-country assets frozen by every foreign bank, Mr. al-Faruqi had been left with nothing. He died soon thereafter, leaving his widow, Pari, utterly destitute.
Now many of his enemies had also passed away, and, thanks to pressure from the United States and U.N., what remained of his foreign assets, any money that had not been looted before, was being released to his widow, the longest tenured resident of Khorramshahr.
Raule considered the story while he studied the papers around him, then went back to work. He wasn’t focused any longer on locating the money left behind by Mr. al-Faruqi—that task was complete. He had accomplished all he could there.
He had more unpleasant work now: verifying the mistake he’d made with Azadeh’s release. Bending over his desk, he started reading again.
At 7 A.M., he sat back in his chair and stretched, lifting his hands high above him, then took a deep breath. He studied the papers, realizing there was nothing more he could do. It was what it was. His actions might kill the deal, but he couldn’t change that now.
He took a quick sip of coffee, and then headed down to Pari’s hut.
* * *
“You don’t know where she is?” Pari demanded an unbelieving tone in her voice. She was growing weaker, Raule could tell, but she was animated now, her eyes burning, her face agitated, her hands constantly moving in frustration and anger.
Raule hesitated, then answered, “No, Miss Pari, we do not where she is.”
“But you said she had been released to her uncle!”
“Yes, well, that was what we had been led to believe.” Raule’s voice had turned suddenly quiet, and he paused now too long. Pari stared at him, the heavy silence a great weight in the air. She had been in the camp long enough, had seen enough young girls come and go, that she immediately understood. Her face became tense with rage, her jaw set tight as she struggled against the emotions that were building inside.
“You knew, didn’t you, Sebastian?” She wasn’t accusing. She just wanted to know.
“No, Miss Pari, that simply isn’t true. Did I suspect? Yes, perhaps. But even if I did, there wasn’t a thing I could do. Our rules are straightforward and my superior is very demanding. I could not ignore our protocols. I had no choice. The man had documents proving the family relationship. He had the release forms; everything was in place. There was an uncle in Pakistan. We had to follow procedures—”
“What then is the problem? Go to her uncle and get her.”
Raule looked away. “He does not exist,” he explained. “Miss Azadeh Pahlavi has no uncle in Pakistan. We know that now.”
Pari shook her head and coughed weakly, keeping her eyes on the floor. She had to bite her tongue or she would regret what she might say. Money or no, she had a place in the world. She took a couple of deep breaths, pushing her anger down.
Raule watched her carefully, knowing he had to get everything out. This was his last chance at redemption, and he wanted to make a clean start. He had one chance to convince Miss Pari al-Faruqi that he was on her side. But to do that, he had to come clean and tell her everything.
He glanced at the close walls, the murals and flowers, and then turned back to Pari. “The documents he provided were forged,” he said. “We know that. He is gone; he took the girl. He didn’t go to Pakistan. He went to northern Iraq.”
Another long silence filled the air. Pari struggled to breathe, and then fell into a violent coughing fit. Raule looked away as she hacked, each lunge of her chest a little weaker than the one before. When her fit had passed, he stood, moved to her bed, and knelt on the floor. He handed her a handkerchief and wiped the cold sweat from her brow with another cloth.
She looked at him desperately, her anger having already slipped away. Dying had a way of softening one’s emotions, even the bitterest kind. They sat silently for a while, staring into each other’s eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Raule said in a soft voice. “I mean that, Miss Pari. It tears at my heart. Yes, I suspected. I thought that something wasn’t right, but please, you must believe me. I tried to help her. I did all I could. Was it enough? Clearly not. But I ask you to forgive me and let me help, if you will.”
Pari took his hand in hers. She held it a moment, measuring the feeling in his soul. Looking into his eyes, she saw the pain and anguish there. Was his disappointment for real? Was he a good man? Was he loyal? Was he a man she could trust?
She looked at him a long moment, then concluded that he was.