Haggai Harmon - The Chameleon Conspiracy

There was no point in arguing. My instructions were to take my contact’s advice in case of emergency. From what I’d heard, I was convinced that this was an emergency. I wondered how Erikka would react.

“Can I call Erikka and tell her we must leave? She knows nothing about the carpets. She may not believe you.”

“Just tell her you have to leave,” he said. Apparently he didn’t know that Erikka wasn’t in the loop.

I couldn’t risk using the phone. I went up to her room after making sure the hallway was empty. I knocked lightly on her door. After a few minutes of per sis tent knocking, she opened the door dressed in a white nightgown. I slipped inside her room before she could resist.

“Erikka, please listen to me,” I said in a calm voice, although I wasn’t calm inside. “We must leave Iran immediately. A person will come to your room in a few minutes and will instruct you. Please do exactly as he says.”

“Ian, what are you talking about?” She sounded frightened.

“It has nothing to do with me or you. But the Iranian VEVAK is very nervous. They think Hasan Lotfi disappeared. Anyone who’s been in contact with him will be questioned.”

“But we only spoke about our school days.”

“I’m sure you did, but I think we should protect ourselves from any forthcoming investigation. Remember how upset you were after the Komiteh stopped you? That was ten minutes. This time it could last weeks or months. Take nothing but your money and documents, and a few things for overnight. The rest can be sent for later. Start packing, and don’t call or talk to anyone.”

“How do you know all this?” she asked, and for the first time I sensed doubt in her voice.

“The bank called me. They bought an all-risks policy to cover our visit in Iran, a standard procedure of risk management. A security advisory company, hired by the insurance company, just alerted them of these developments and suggested they remove all their insured individuals from Iran. That means you and me, and maybe others.”

“But Ian, you aren’t working for the bank. I am.” Her brow furrowed.

“Right, I asked them the same question. Lucky for me, the insurance policy said ‘Erikka Buhler and Ian Pour Laval, companion’- so they called me.”

“OK,” she said faintly, “I’ll be ready.”

I returned to my room. “Go ahead,” I told the man. “Go to her room. She’s in 411. I’ll be ready in ten minutes.”

“OK, she’ll be taken by another member of our team who’s waiting outside. I’ll bring her over to him.”

I quickly filled a small backpack and waited for Sammy. He arrived sooner than I expected, tapping lightly, and when I let him in, he slipped inside like a shadow. His voice was low.

“Please follow me. And make sure you have your documents and your money.”

He opened the door cautiously and, after checking the hallway, signaled me to follow him. When the elevator arrived, he ducked in and pressed a series of buttons for higher floors. “We’re taking the stairs,” he said brusquely, allowing the elevator door to close behind him. We took them all the way to the ground floor. “Where’s Erikka?” I asked, catching my breath.

“She’s OK. My man is moving her now.”

He used a key card to open a ground-level bedroom, and when I followed him in, I saw that it was empty. He strode across the room to a sliding door, which he thrust open, peering out at the swimming pool. Walking out calmly, as if he were the maintenance man, he motioned unobtrusively for me. I followed him through the bushes surrounding the pool area into the parking lot. A sleepy guard didn’t even raise his head. Sammy opened a car door and I jumped in.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Isn’t this my rental car?”

“Indeed it is. We’ve left a bunch of brochures in your room suggesting that you left early and drove to Mashhad.”

“But I was going to go to Mashhad anyway. How did you know?”

“When you rented the car you told them you were going there. Your shadow was standing right next to you in the line.”

I never bothered asking him how he got my car keys.

I learned to drive a car in Tel Aviv, where drivers fully believe they’re driving tanks, and the Mediterranean hand gestures make steering secondary. I live in New York, where stoplights are informational only, and anarchic taxi drivers set their own traffic rules every minute. But driving in Tehran made those cities look like Des Moines. Nothing had prepared me for the dangers of Tehran traffic in the early-morning hours. Heavy trucks, small cars, motorbikes, and even horse-drawn carts cross through all directions, honking their horns, regardless of any reason or rule. It seemed to be one of the few places in Iran where you could break the law and get away with it. No wonder Tehran ranks at the top of the list of world vehicle-fatality rates. I thought of a saying I’d heard from my driving instructor: “A man who drives like hell is bound to get there.”

Sammy glanced at the rearview mirror. “We’ve got company,” he said. “This time they’re not our men.”

He jerked open the glove compartment and tossed a. 38 gun into my lap. I grabbed it between my fingers. Our car suddenly tilted and stopped. We had been broadsided. Heart racing, I swiveled my head to see what had happened. A small car with what looked like two passengers had hit us. I slipped the gun under my windbreaker and took a better look. The other car wasn’t badly damaged.

Sammy, swearing under his breath, swung open the door and jumped out to examine the car. I heard the shouting, but understood nothing, staying in the car even as a small crowd quickly assembled to watch. Traffic whizzed by, and the Iranians shook their fists, their voices escalating.

With a shrug and an angry gesture, Sammy turned away from them and jumped back into our car. “They’re just con men,” he told me, starting the engine. The damage wasn’t that bad after all. “They stage accidents and try to blackmail unsuspecting drivers. Let’s go.” As he accelerated and pushed through, he nearly ran over one of the men, who was still yelling.

“Better to leave before the police get here,” Sammy explained tersely. “That’ll start a silent bidding war-who’s gonna bribe the cop with more money. We can’t risk that.” He made a left turn into another busy street and maneuvered through commercial areas. After driving for ten minutes in the congested streets, I noticed through the side-view mirror a beige sedan following us. I saw two men in the front seat, but there could have been others in the back seat.

“Sammy, are these guys behind us your men?”

He glanced at his mirror. “Shit. No, they’re the VEVAK. I recognize their car.”

It was a challenge to get through the thicket of jaywalkers, bike riders, and reckless car drivers, but Sammy found a way. Nonetheless, it was a grotesquely slow chase, at no more than ten or fifteen miles an hour. The VEVAK car was about six or seven car distances behind us. Through a quick and abrupt maneuver Sammy managed to pass a big truck, leaving our followers behind it, blocking their view. He continued passing cars on their right and left, stealing quick glances at the rearview mirror.

“I think we lost them,” he said. About two miles later he suddenly turned right into a large unpaved parking lot. “Come on, quick,” he said. “We’ll leave the car here.”

“Are we walking?” I asked, swinging the door closed.

“Not to worry, we won’t be overexerting ourselves,” he said wryly, pointing to a beat-up blue sedan, Japanese made, parked at the corner of the lot. “Jump in, and keep down.” I complied, watching Sammy with head down and eyes raised as he put a hat on and tore off a fake mustache. He started the engine and drove away through the other end of the parking lot, spraying gravel and leaving a cloud of dust behind us.