Greg Egan: Zendegi

The receptionist typed something into her computer, then glanced up at Omar. ‘Shokouh Jabari?’ She gave a date of birth.

‘Dorost, dorost,’ Omar replied impatiently, as if these details were trivially familiar to him. Martin waited to see if the receptionist would ask Omar to confirm his own name against a recorded next of kin, but she had better things to do. ‘Bekhosh shishom,’ she said. Ward six? Omar was already walking.

Martin caught up with him. ‘Your first wife will be thrilled by this addition to the family,’ he joked.

‘Fuck you!’ Omar snapped back angrily. Martin was startled by the intensity of his reaction, but on reflection he realised that he had no right to be surprised. Omar loathed political and religious extremism, but the DVDs under his counter tended more to Rambo than Transamerica; on this issue he was probably to the right of the ayatollahs. He was here for the sake of political expediency; this was not some humanitarian rescue mission.

At the entrance to the ward, Omar spoke with the nurse on duty; she glanced inquiringly at Martin, and Omar said something that sounded like dayeam: my uncle. The nurse summoned someone else to organise the visit; fifteen minutes later the two of them were led into a small, curtained-off space, where a figure dressed in a baggy grey manteau and a black shawl and head-scarf sat in a wheelchair, one foot bandaged and elevated. For a moment Martin thought there’d been a mistake, but the hospital must have supplied the modest clothing. The angular face beneath the scarf was the face from the emailed image of the crash site.

The three of them were left alone.

‘Salaam khanom,’ Omar greeted Shokouh nervously. ‘Chetorin?’

‘Bad nistam,’ Shokouh replied. ‘Shoma chetorin?’ Martin found it hard to judge how her voice would sound to a native speaker; she spoke quietly in a slightly reedy falsetto, but it was not forced or uneven.

‘Tell her we’re her friends,’ Martin said, ‘or she’ll think Jabari sent us.’ Shokouh looked up at him, startled, and he realised he’d just managed to put that idea right out of her head. ‘Ruznaame negaaram,’ he explained. I’m a journalist.

Omar spoke in a low voice; Martin could follow only a small part of what he was saying. Shokouh replied, heatedly, at length.

‘She wants to go to Europe,’ Omar announced, dismayed. ‘She’ll only come with us if we es-wear to get her to la France.’ On their drive into the city Omar had mentioned safe houses, but his plans clearly hadn’t stretched as far as Paris.

Martin said nothing. He still had the phone numbers of some people-smugglers in Quetta he’d interviewed for a story a few years before, but he decided against offering Omar an introduction; the smugglers had sometimes dealt with Iranian clients, but he doubted that Shokouh would be safe travelling through Baluchistan, even fully veiled in a burqa. In any case, he was meant to be covering this story, not orchestrating it.

‘Maybe there’s a way,’ Omar mused. He sounded doubtful, but then he added decisively, ‘If we do it, we should do it quickly. Before everyone wakes up and knows what they’re missing.’ He spoke with Shokouh again, and they seemed to reach an agreement. He told Martin, ‘I get the-’ He mimed crutches, and disappeared in search of a nurse.

‘Ingilisi baladin?’ Martin asked Shokouh.

‘Very less,’ she replied. ‘Parlez-vous français?’

‘Une petite peu.’ He’d studied it in high school, but by now his French was probably worse than his Farsi.

Shokouh lowered her gaze to the floor. Martin set his frustration aside; if Omar could pull off this miracle, Sandra Knight in the Paris bureau could interview her face-to-face in a language they both spoke fluently. Even if he’d had Behrouz beside him it would have made little difference; whatever promises of discretion he’d offered, Shokouh would have to be crazy to disclose a long list of potentially suicidal details while she was still in the country.

Omar returned with a pair of crutches and together they helped Shokouh to her feet. There was some paperwork to complete, but Shokouh had already been medically cleared to be discharged.

As they were leaving the ward, the nurse stopped them. There was a brief exchange before they moved off down the corridor. Once the nurse was out of sight, Omar’s forced smile evaporated, and he urged them forward.

‘What was that about?’ Martin asked.

‘She said Khanom Jabari’s cousin has arrived at reception, wanting to make a visit. I said tell him we’ll meet him there. But maybe he doesn’t want to wait.’

‘Okay.’ Martin digested the news. ‘At least it wasn’t another husband; that would have been awkward.’

They reached an intersection with a side corridor; Omar tilted his head and Martin took Shokouh’s arm and helped her to make a sharp right turn.

They should have borrowed the wheelchair, Martin realised belatedly. This was hopeless; the ‘cousin’ would reach the ward and double back to find them before they could get even halfway to the car park, and if he had colleagues covering the exits-

‘We’re screwed,’ he said.

‘Not yet,’ Omar declared.

Martin glanced at Shokouh. She was hobbling as quickly as she could, but her face was tensed against the pain. They’d moved away from the wards into some kind of service area, and only every third of the ceiling bulbs were lit.

Omar tried a series of doors in succession until he found one that opened into a tiny utilities room. There was a mop, bucket, cleaning products, and a small sink. Omar and Shokouh had a terse exchange.

Martin said, ‘What’s the plan? We can’t hide in here all night.’

‘You hide. I’ll send someone to get you.’

‘Me? It’s not me they’re looking for.’

‘We need your ca-lothes,’ Omar explained. ‘For disguise.’

Martin’s stomach clenched painfully. ‘No, no, no!’ He gestured at Shokouh. ‘It won’t work! Look at her eyebrows!’

Omar addressed her in Farsi. Shokouh took off her scarf and shawl; the earrings from the crash were long gone. She went to the sink and, with the aid of a few drops of floor-cleaner, washed off every trace of make-up. Then she ran wet fingers through her thick black hair, quickly reshaping it. The end result was a slightly dated male Persian pop-star look, the fringe flopping down to all but conceal her forehead. With no pencil darkening her plucked eyebrows, close up she looked more like a burn victim than anything else.

Martin said, ‘Whoever’s looking for her, they’ll know she can pass as a man.’

‘But if we’re quick,’ Omar countered, ‘they won’t expect it. The nurse will tell them one woman, two men.’

There was no denying that a rapid switch could improve the odds. Tehran had dozens of crashes every night; the injured would be coming and going until morning. So long as they could sneak out of the wing unseen, a young man on crutches crossing the car park with a male friend would not be an obvious target – and anyone trying to maintain a low profile for Jabari could hardly throw a cordon around the hospital and check everyone’s sex before letting them pass.

Martin steeled himself. He couldn’t tell Omar to do the swap himself; it was clear which one of them was the better fit. Lurking half-naked in the women’s wing of an Iranian hospital was not a risk-free proposition, but the truth was, he was more afraid of humiliation than any actual physical harm.

‘Okay,’ he said.

Omar left them. Martin turned his back on Shokouh as they undressed. When he handed her his clothes it was impossible not to notice her breasts, but the sweater he’d worn was loose, and would be looser still on her; this was not a lost cause, not yet. She handed him her own trousers and manteau, and after a moment’s hesitation he put them on; it was worth it for the warmth alone, and there was nothing blatantly effeminate about the garments to creep him out. In fact, he could have walked down any street in Pakistan dressed like this; it was almost the same as a unisex shalwar kameez.