“Where we going?” said Flash, following.

“Just walk like you belong here,” said Nuri.

It was a good, time-tested strategy, but it wasn’t foolproof. Not ten feet from the baggage area a soldier suddenly stepped into the space. He looked quizzically at Nuri and Flash. He wavered for a moment, unsure whether he should say something. Nuri smiled, but before he could get past, the soldier put out his hand.

“W.C.,” said Nuri in English. “Restroom? We need.”

The soldier demanded, in Farsi, to know what he was doing in the corridor.

“W.C., W.C.,” said Nuri. “Restroom.”

The soldier didn’t understand. Nuri pointed downward, gesturing that he was desperate for some relief.

“W.C.?”

The soldier shrugged. Nuri switched to Italian.

“The man said it was there but I can’t find it. I must go. Is it back there?” Nuri turned and pointed in the direction he had come. “Or this way?”

The soldier finally understood.

“You want the restroom?” he asked in Farsi.

“W.C., W.C.,” repeated Nuri, deciding to stick with the ignorant tourist routine.

“Passport,” demanded the soldier, using the only English word he knew.

Nuri reached into his pocket and took it out. The soldier held his hand out to Flash, who gave him his as well.

Nuri did everything but cross his legs, trying to convey a sense of urgency and even desperation. The soldier looked at the passports closely. He had seen only a few from the European Union, as his job ordinarily did not involve inspecting documents. The ink on the Iranian visas was a bit blurry, making it difficult to see which dates they were for—they might have been stamped for entry today, or three days before, a strategic error Nuri had arranged to cover any contingency. The soldier tried to decipher the date, then gave up.

“W.C.?” asked Nuri as the passport was handed back.

The soldier pointed across the hall.

“Grazie, grazie,” said Nuri.

Nuri walked so quickly across the hall that Flash had trouble keeping up.

“What was he all bugged up about?” Flash asked in the restroom.

Nuri pointed upward and shook his head. A year before, a CIA agent had discovered that one of the restrooms at Mehrabad Airport was bugged; he didn’t want to take any chances here.

Flash waited while Nuri used the commode—all that acting had actually encouraged his bladder.

“I’m thirsty,” he said when Nuri emerged.

“Don’t drink this water,” said Nuri. “Buy some outside.”

He took a medicine bottle from his pocket—it was the vial for the biomarker, disguised as eyedrops—and applied a healthy bit to his left hand. Outside, he slipped Flash a pair of video bugs.

“Put them on the wall opposite the ramp up to the customs station, in case we have to move,” he told him. He pulled out a stick of gum. “Put a little gum on as adhesive.”

“These are tiny.”

“If they were big, they’d be easy to spot,” said Nuri. “Is your sat phone on?”

“Yeah.”

“In case we get split up, I’ll call you. We can always meet outside, near the bus stop.”

Nuri took the bag and walked toward the conveyor belt. Half a dozen passengers from the plane had come off and were looking for their bags. They eyed Nuri’s jealously, wondering how he had managed to secure his when the belt wasn’t even working.

The door from the gate opened and another group of passengers came out, walking quickly toward customs. Tarid was with them, looking straight ahead.

He had a carry-on, no other luggage.

Nuri swung into action immediately, turning abruptly and walking toward the ramp. He kept his pace slow, wanting the others to scoot around him. As Tarid passed, he would reach out and touch him.

But the man behind him slowed down, and the crowd clogged behind Nuri. Realizing Tarid would never catch up now, Nuri angled toward the side wall.

I’ll tie my shoe, he thought, and wait for him to come.

Just as he stepped over, the soldier who had accosted him earlier walked up the wide gangway toward him. Nuri decided his shoe could wait and picked up his pace, nodding as he passed him.

Once again the soldier stopped him, holding out his hand.

“Sir?” asked Nuri.

“W.C.,” said the soldier.

“Yes, I found it.”

“Why are you coming to Iran?” asked the soldier in Farsi.

“Io, no capisco.” Nuri knew he couldn’t just start speaking Farsi, when he’d been pretending earlier not to understand a word. “I don’t understand. Where is customs? Passport area?”

“Go down that way,” said the soldier, quite a bit of disdain in his voice. He couldn’t understand why visitors didn’t take the trouble to learn the language.

“Grazie,” said Nuri. He could see Tarid passing at the other side of the wide ramp.

“Stop!” said the soldier.

Nuri turned around.

“Where is your friend?”

Nuri gestured that he didn’t understand. The soldier held up two fingers.

“He’s coming, he’s coming,” said Nuri in Italian, pointing. “He needs his bag.”

“You should be together. It’s easier for the official.”

It was all Nuri could do to stop himself from throttling him. He made a sign that he didn’t understand, and turned around. But it was too late—a flood of other passengers had come up, and now Tarid was far ahead. Nuri scrambled, but before he could close the gap, Tarid had gone off to the lane with Iranian passport holders.

There were two lines for foreigners. Both were moving quickly, which gave Nuri some hope. He got on the one at the left, then turned around to look for Flash. He saw him—with the soldier who had just accosted him.

Flash didn’t have to pretend he didn’t understand what the Iranian was saying; he didn’t speak any Farsi, nor could he figure out what the soldier was complaining about. He simply shrugged and pointed toward the exit. The soldier told him that his friend was a jerk, and that he should find better people to travel with.

Flash nodded, because it seemed like the right thing to do.

“Go,” said the soldier. “Go.”

Flash saw Nuri near the front of the line on the left. He steered to the right, figuring that if there was a jam-up for some reason, at least one of them would get through quickly. Nuri spotted him and nodded.

The customs officers were in their sixties, men who had first gone to work for the government when the Shah was still in power. They were honest, not especially officious, and above all deliberate. Each had a list of people who were not to be allowed in the country on his desk. The list was 375 pages long, with the names from each country listed separately. When they received a visitor’s passport, they dutifully checked it against the list. They did this because it was their job, and also because the government had recently established a bonus system for customs officials who identified anyone on the list. Especially prized were men—all but two of the names were male—who had received judgments in suits against Iran over the years. In those cases, the men were allowed into the country—then detained and, essentially, blackmailed into paying some or all of the money before being put back on a plane and sent home.

These names were identified by small daggers. While most of the names were American, there were quite a few Italians as well.

“Why are you coming to Iran?” asked the customs officer in English as Nuri stepped up.

“I have business,” said Nuri, answering in Farsi because he hoped it would get him through the line quicker. “I am involved in the pipeline construction for the government’s new wells in the south.”

The customs officer was impressed. He took Nuri’s passport and cracked it open.

“So you are working here? This is a business trip?”

“There are some matters that have to be attended to,” said Nuri.

“You are fixing the pipeline?”

“Actually, the derricks,” said Nuri. “The pipelines are another department.”