And in front of each of us was placed a small earthen cup, relics from Pourat’s family in Isfahan. A box of long Havana cigars lay closed, for we never smoked until our host did first, nor did we dip our two fingers into the chaser, as Americans might call it, the bowl of mastvakhiar—that wonderful sour yogurt mixed with bits of cucumber—that moment would not come until after our first drink of cold Russian vodka, which Pourat would pour as soon as he entered in a smoking jacket, silk pants, and fine Parisian socks. He was a handsome man, khosh teep, and bald with wide shoulders and a flat belly. Of course we would stand, but Pourat would wave us back to the floor and he would make a joke about one of us, something he may have heard that week at Mehrabad, and we always laughed at Pourat’s jokes, not out of respect, but because he was truly an amusing man. Sometimes he would tease one of the younger or more ambitious men by passing his cup over while pouring the very first drink, something a saghi rarely did, for the main purpose of a saghi is to keep a man from drinking more than he is able. The young senior officer with the empty cup might lower his head out of shame, his face a reddened study in concentration as he attempted to remember how he may have insulted the general. But then Pourat would laugh quite loudly, as would the rest of us, and he would pour the vodka for the relieved and smiling young man, then fill all our cups.
When we toasted our health, each man, including Pourat, attempted to tap his cup beneath those of the others, which is a true sign of respect in Persia. “Man nokaretam,” we say, meaning: I am your servant. And of course each man wants to honor another more than himself, if it is truly deserved, so he will not allow his cup to stay higher when they touch; he will instantly lower his cup to the bottom of the other man’s as if to say, “No, I am your servant.” But the other will sometimes insist by lowering his again and more than once I have seen grown men lower their cups in this fashion, each after the other all the way to the floor, then stand to fistfight over who respects whom the most. But at Pourat’s this would never occur. We prided ourselves on being not simply high officers, but Persian gentlemen as well.
One winter evening, General Pourat invited a seventh man to his home, his nephew. He was dark-skinned and younger than us all, with not more than thirty-three or thirty-four years. He possessed good looks, the wide jaw, small nose, and deep eyes I would see in film actors, and his physique was quite fit and powerful-looking beneath his finely tailored dark suit. Each time he raised his vodka cup to drink, his upper arm muscle would bunch into a round stone, and when one of the men commented on the young man’s power, Pourat said, “Yes, Bijan outlasts them all at the zur khaneh.”
One of the older gentlemen seated beside me began to speak of his boyhood in Rasht, how he would go with his father to the zur khaneh and witness all the large men there, half naked and sweating, lifting the milos over their heads while the chanter sang and played the domback drum in front of a fire and the hot stones a boy would pour water over to bring on more steam. And I did not care for the fashion in which Pourat’s nephew listened to this story; he drank his vodka and dipped three fingers, not two, into the mastvakhiar, and as he licked his fingers clean he would not even look at the older man speaking of his boyhood in Rasht. The young man kept his eyes on his stocking feet in front of him as if he were hearing something for the five hundredth time, something he of course knew completely before he’d heard it the first. When the gentleman beside me finished telling the story of his father and the zur khaneh, Pourat poured each of us more vodka and when we raised our cups in a toast to our past and to our traditions, I watched to make sure the younger man, this Bijan, held his cup low out of respect, which he did, though his face appeared impassive, and it was plain for me to see that here was a boy who was not only accustomed to being admired and looked at and listened to, he expected it as well.
“What is your nephew’s position, Genob General Pourat?” This was asked amiably by Mehran Hafsanjani, a small man who held a high rank and was a specialist in radar communications. The young man looked directly at Hafsanjani and he insulted Pourat, his uncle and host, by answering ahead of him: “I am with SAVAK, sir.”
Pourat immediately made a joke to us all to watch our manners, you never know what secrets these policemen have, but his nephew did not smile; he sat with his back erect, his thick arms resting at the wrist upon both knees, and he absently tapped two fingers on the carpet.
“My Bijan was trained in America, in New York.”
The handsome Savaki shook his head in a pretended show of modesty. I leaned forward. “And what did they teach you there, young Mr. Pourat?” I did not try to disguise the contempt in my voice, and my use of the word young, javoon, came out sounding like an insult, but I did not care; General Pourat was my oldest friend, the vodka was warm in my belly, I was a colonel. The handsome nephew looked directly at my eyes. “They taught us techniques, Genob Sarhang.”
“What sort of techniques?”
The young man surprised me; he glanced at his uncle to see if he should answer. Pourat nodded slightly, the light of the fire behind him in his eyes.
“Torture, Genob Sarhang.”
“They teach you this in America?” said another gentleman, a big radish of a bureaucrat named Ali.
“Among other things.” The trace of a smile passed over the young man’s face.
“I have heard some stories,” said Ali. “We all have.” He regarded General Pourat and cleared his throat. “I heard of a man in the Tudeh Party who was forced to watch his wife raped at the city prison.”
Young Pourat waved his hand as if at a fly upon his nose. “That is only effective for so long. If you want real information, you must take their children. Make a subversive watch his little one lose a hand or arm and they will tell you everything.” He smiled, his eyes on his vodka cup upon the floor. “But the difficult part of the work is knowing whom to arrest.”
Two men laughed.
I had heard these stories as well. We all had. But I felt the vodka inside me turn cool. “Do you enjoy your work, Mr. Pourat?”
The Savaki narrowed his eyes immediately. “Enjoyment has nothing to do with it. I serve Shahanshah, sir. I can only assume you do as well.”
The musicians had just completed a song and the room was quiet. A dry log crackled in the fire, then shifted in the coals. I felt the heat of my heart drop to my hands and for a brief moment I imagined my thumbs buried in the young policeman’s eyes.
General Pourat clapped his hands twice. “All right, all right, enough of this talk. You two surprise me. You are colleagues, you should act as such.” He turned to the musicians. “Play something festive!”
The general poured us all more vodka, and the moment passed. Soon I was mast, half drunk, with the others and we lay back upon our elbows on the carpet to smoke cigars and listen to the music. Occasionally I would look over at the young torturer and see him gazing into the fire, his eyes empty, and I wished he would leave our group early and not come back, for I did not like to be reminded of the secret police and all the people they made disappear in our land, these students and professionals, wives, mothers, husbands, fathers, children, illiterate cargars living in small homes of mud and wood scraps less than a kilometer from the grand palace with all of its fine ornaments imported from around the world; I did not like to think once again that America, with whom I did close business in the purchase of fighter jets, had such a hand in all this; I did not like to think this was the manner in which our king retained his throne and our way of life; but, most of all, I did not want to accept that General Pourat was correct when he said the young policemen and I were colleagues, so, once more, I drank more vodka than I should have, and the rest of the evening I did not dip my two fingers into the same bowl of mastvakhiar as the young torturer Bijan.