On Wings Of Eagles (1990)

Coburn was wearing a long, bulky down coat--Taylor had dubbed it the Michelin Man coat--under which he could easily have concealed a shotgun, but he was not searched by the guard at the gate. I could have had eight weapons on me, he thought. That was encouraging: security was slack.

He noted that the gate guard was armed with a small pistol.

The three visitors were led into the low building on the left. The colonel in charge of the jail was in the visiting room, along with another Iranian. The second man, Gallagher had warned Coburn, was always present during visits, and spoke perfect English: presumably he was there to eavesdrop. Coburn had told Majid he did not want to be overheard while talking to Paul, and Majid agreed to engage the eavesdropper in conversation.

Coburn was introduced to the colonel. In broken English the man said he was sorry for Paul and Bill, and he hoped they would be released soon. He seemed sincere. Coburn noted that neither the colonel nor the eavesdropper was armed.

The door opened, and Paul and Bill walked in.

They both stared at Coburn in surprise--neither of them had been forewarned that he was in town, and the beard was an additional shock.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Bill said, and smiled broadly.

Coburn shook hands warmly with both of them. Paul said: "Boy, I can't believe you're here."

"How's my wife?" Bill said.

"Emily's fine, so is Ruthie," Coburn told them.

Majid started talking loudly in Farsi to the colonel and the eavesdropper. He seemed to be telling them a complicated story with many gestures. Rich Gallagher began to speak to Bill, and Coburn sat Paul down.

Simons had decided that Coburn should question Paul about routines at the jail, and level with him about the rescue plan. Paul was picked rather than Bill because, in Coburn's opinion, Paul was likely to be the leader of the two.

"If you haven't guessed it already," Coburn began, "we're going to get y'all out of here by force if necessary."

"I guessed it already," Paul said. "I'm not sure it's a good idea."

"What?"

"People might get hurt."

"Listen, Ross has retained just about the best man in the whole world for this kind of operation, and we have carte blanche--"

"I'm not sure I want it."

"You ain't being asked for your permission, Paul."

Paul smiled. "Okay."

"Now I need some information. Where do you exercise?"

"Right there in the courtyard."

"When?"

"Thursdays."

Today was Monday. The next exercise period would be January 18. "How long do you spend out there?"

"About an hour."

"What time of day?"

"It varies."

"Shit." Coburn made an effort to look relaxed, to avoid lowering his voice conspicuously or glancing over his shoulder to see whether anyone might be listening: This had to look like a normal friendly visit. "How many guards are there in this jail?"

"Around twenty."

"All uniformed, all armed?"

"All uniformed, some armed with handguns."

"No rifles?"

"Well ... none of the regular guards have rifles, but ... See, our cell is just across the courtyard and has a window. Well, in the morning there's a group of about twenty different guards, like an elite corps, you might say. They have rifles and wear kind of shiny helmets. They have reveille right here; then I never see them for the rest of the day--I don't know where they go."

"Try and find out."

"I'll try."

"Which is your cell?"

"When you go out of here, the window is more or less opposite you. If you start in the right-hand comer of the courtyard and count toward the left, it's the third window. But they close the shutters when there are visitors--so we can't see women coming in, they say."

Coburn nodded, trying to memorize it all. "You need to do two things," he said. "One: a survey of the inside of the jail, with measurements as accurate as possible. I'll come back and get the details from you so we can draw a plan. Two: get in shape. Exercise daily. You'll need to be fit."

"Okay."

"Now, tell me your daily routine."

"They wake us up at six o'clock," Paul began.

Coburn concentrated, knowing he would have to repeat all this to Simons. Nevertheless, at the back of his mind one thought nagged: if we don't know what time of day they exercise, how the hell do we know when to go over the wall?

"Visiting time is the answer," Simons said.

"How so?" Coburn asked.

"It's the one situation when we can predict they will be out of the actual jail and vulnerable to a snatch, at a definite moment in time."

Coburn nodded. The three of them were sitting in the living room of Keane Taylor's house. It was a big room with a Persian carpet. They had drawn three chairs into the middle, around a coffee table. Beside Simons's chair, a small mountain of cigar ash was growing on the carpet. Taylor would be furious.