The Second Saladin by Stephen Hunter Page B

rocks—over a hundred people. We could see the shadow of the airplane passing over the ground and hear its roar, but could not see it because the sun was so bright. Apo, Ulu Beg’s oldest boy, hid with me.
    The nights were very cold. We huddled together in caves or ravines and were still afraid to light fires. It was at these moments I felt the most alone. I wasn’t really a Kurd. I was an American, a foolish one, caught where she had no business to be. I didn’t think we really had a chance. We were on foot, running out of food and energy. There were no donkeys. We had come a terrible distance, we had a terrible distance to go and we were being pursued by men in machines who wanted to kill us.
    I heard some men talking. They said we were doomed. It was all over. We’d never get out. Ulu Begsaid no. He said we had friends. Jardi’s friends. Jardi’s friends would help us.
    We were almost there. I asked Ulu Beg how much farther? He pointed to a gap just ahead between mountains.
    Ulu Beg asked me to come with him to talk to the Iranians.
    We went down the trail and over the dusty rock, the two of us. The trail began to rise to the pass and we climbed between the forbidding cliffs. I fought to keep up. I wondered how the children would make this last, hardest part of the climb.
    We were so close! The nightmare would soon be over! But I was also terrified that something would happen, so late, so close to survival.
    We came over the crest. The land here was scorched. Nothing grew. For miles and miles it looked dead. There was no vegetation, no anything. It was the defoliated zone where the Iraqis had poured chemical poisons on the earth to prevent border crossings and resupply from Iran. I looked and could see where a stream had been cemented over.
    We went ahead. If a Russian plane or helicopter came and caught us in the open, we’d be killed. Still, we didn’t have the luxury of waiting for nightfall. We picked our way through this wasteland until at last, several hours later, I could see the wire fence and the border station—and green plants again. The station was a low cinderblock building, with the Shah’s flag billowing on a pole near it. There were several military vehicles parked there too.
    We raced to the gate. They had seen us coming and were ready. The officer in charge was a young major of very stiff and correct bearing. His name was MajorMejhati—he wore it proudly on a tag on the chest of his battle tunic. His uniform was heavily starched.
    He asked me in Farsi if I was an American. I said yes. He thought I looked American, even though I was dressed like a Kurd. He had been in America for a year and knew what American women looked like.
    I explained to him that 100 people would be coming shortly, that some were wounded, some were children and all were hungry and exhausted. They were being pursued by Iraqis in Russian tanks, I told him.
    He asked me what part of America I was from. I don’t know why he asked that. Anyway I told him.
    He considered Boston a lovely town. He told me that he’d been to some Army college in Kansas. He told me he really liked America, America was a very great country and that he wished Iran was more like America.
    I was afraid we’d be there for hours. Iranians love to talk and move slowly. They hate to be confronted with an actual reality.
    Then he asked if these Kurds were of the Pesh Merga, the mountain fighters making a war against the Iraqis. I said yes. He said they could admit no Kurds. It was a new policy. He said he would be glad to have me come into his country but it was a new policy and the border was now closed to the Pesh Merga.
    I wasn’t sure I’d understood him. I thought I’d misheard. I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. I tried to get my composure back.
    “There’s an arrangement,” I said. “Between the governments. Between my government and your government and the Pesh Merga.”
    “There is no arrangement,” he said. Several of his