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Saudi Arabia and Iran
Saudi Arabia and Iran
Friends or Foes?

Banafsheh Keynoush
SAUDI ARABIA AND IRAN
Copyright © Banafsheh Keynoush 2016
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2016 978-1-137-57627-9
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication
may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication
may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission. In
accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
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EC1N 8TS.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication
may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
First published 2016 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
The author has asserted their right to be identified as the author of this
work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke,
Hampshire, RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of Nature America, Inc., One
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Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
ISBN 978-1-349-99536-3 ISBN 978-1-137-58939-2 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-58939-2

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Keynoush, Banafsheh, author.
Title: Saudi Arabia and Iran : friends or foes? / Banafsheh Keynoush.
Description: New York, NY : Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015028785 |
Subjects: LCSH: Saudi Arabia—Foreign relations—Iran. | Iran—Foreign
relations—Saudi Arabia. | Middle East—Politics and government—
1979– | BISAC: POLITICAL SCIENCE / International Relations /
Diplomacy. | POLITICAL SCIENCE / Political Freedom & Security /
International Security. | POLITICAL SCIENCE / Peace. | SOCIAL
SCIENCE / Regional Studies.
Classification: LCC DS228.I7 K47 2016 | DDC 327.538055—dc23 LC record
available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015028785
A catalogue record for the book is available from the British Library.
 In loving memory of:
My grandmother, Effat, who raised me on her lap
My grandfather, Ebrahim Keynoush, a charitable man
and
To my father, for teaching me that the best political
analyst is the most impartial one
 Contents

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction 1

Part I A Historical Overview of Saudi–Iranian

Relations
Chapter 1 Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations 9
Chapter 2 How Religion Shaped the Saudi–Iranian Relations 21

Part II Early, Middle, and Post Mid-Twentieth

Century Saudi–Iranian Relations
Chapter 3 Saudi Arabia and Iran in Early Twentieth Century 39
Chapter 4 Early Diplomatic Relations 53
Chapter 5 Diplomatic Relations: 1955–1963 67
Chapter 6 Epoch of Saudi–Iranian Cooperation and Rivalry 85

Part III Saudi–Iranian Relations after the 1979

Iranian Revolution
Chapter 7 Saudi Arabia and Revolutionary Iran 109
Chapter 8 Saudi–Iranian Détente 131

Part IV How Current Conflicts between Saudi Arabia

and Iran Impact the State of the World
Chapter 9 Saudi Arabia’s and Iran’s Quest for Stability after 9/11 153
viii ● Contents

Chapter 10 Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Gulf Geopolitics:

The Case of Iraq 175
Chapter 11 Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Levant Geopolitics:
The Cases of Lebanon, Syria, Palestine 203
Conclusion 227

Notes 239
Bibliography 261
Index 265
 Acknowledgments

A
book of this scale, covering the full history of relations between
Saudi Arabia and Iran, could not have happened without the support
of a few key individuals. I was fortunate that chance, destiny, and
hardwork allowed me to meet them, and I have attempted to remain impar-
tial in the delivery of the message that these individuals with diverse under-
standings of the issue have each imparted to me.
As a sign of respect for Saudi Arabia and its people who hosted me, I
mention them throughout this book before my native land Iran and its peo-
ple who also helped with this research. At the King Faisal Center for Islamic
Studies and Research, I am indebted to its chairman Turki bin Faisal Al Saud
whose vision on the importance of the Saudi–Iranian partnership enabled
me to conduct the field research for this book. The center generously hosted
my umrah trip, enabling me to travel to Makkah and Madinah, and interact
with colleagues in Jeddah. It was, beyond doubt, the most important trip of
my life. My profound gratitude goes to Secretary-General Yahya Mahmoud
bin Jonaid and Dalal Mukhlid Al Harbi. Abdulaziz Sager, chairman of the
Gulf Research Center, and his dedicated staff, Bandar and Sonya, helped ease
my trip to Saudi Arabia. I am deeply grateful to Abd al Rahman Al Shobeily,
for his wisdom and support, and to Sami Angawi. There are many others
who have enlightened and informed this book: Abd al-Muhsin Al Akhlas,
Ibrahim Hadlaq, Abdul Rahman Al Hadlaq, Mashaal Al Shemaishy, Saad
Al Ammar, Mishary Al Nuaim, Gaafar M. Al Lagany, Nasser Al Braik,
Osamah Ahmad Al Sanosi, Abdulrahman Al Suhaibani, Awadh Al Badi,
Abdullah Al Shamri, and Basel Raouf Khatib. I am thankful for the friend-
ship of two fellow Fletcher graduates, Jamil Al Dandani who hosted my visit
to Dhahran, and the late Major General Abdulrahman Abdulwahid. Two
Saudi scholars, whose earlier books on the Saudi–Iranian relationship made
the present work possible, deserve special mention: Saeed Badeeb and Faisal
bin Salman Al Saud. The latter along with Abdul Rahman Al Hadlaq and
Saleh bin Suleiman Al Wahaibi, generously gave me their time to meet in
x ● Acknowledgments

person, but I regrettably could not due to conflicting schedules. There are
many other Saudi friends who have helped, by reminding me that I should
say things as they were, and sharing their exceptional hospitality.
I am equally indebted to several key figures in Iran. At the Institute for
Political and International Studies, I am thankful to the former head of the
institute, Abbas Maleki. The magnificent building where the institute is at,
in the foothills of Tehran, was an exclusive membership-based club before
the 1979 Iranian revolution, built then by government funds overseen by my
grandfather for the families of Iran’s foreign ministry employees to enjoy. I
spent some of the best times of my childhood there, and was heartbroken
when it was closed down after the revolution. However, when I saw it years
after while attending a conference there, I was relieved to find that it was put
to good use, serving as a premier foreign policy research institute. Thanks
to the vision of its new leadership, it hired many of Iran’s former diplomats
from before the revolution. I am grateful to Ahmad Danielli, chief of proto-
col to Mohammad Khatami, with whom I briefly discussed the topic of this
book before making a decision to write about it. In the process of compiling
the research, several individuals were instrumental: Mohammad Khazaee,
Ali Asghar Khaji, Hussein Amir Abdullahian, Mohammad Reza Fayyaz,
Mostafa Zahrani, Abolfazl Mehrabadi, and Mohammad Ali Fatollahi
who patiently explained the key drivers of Iran’s foreign policy behavior.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Manuchehr Mottaki granted me three inter-
views each. I am thankful to Mohammad Mousavi Bojnurdi, Mostafa
Mohaghegh Damad, and Ahmad Iravani for our brief conversations. Javad
Rasouli, a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, gave me an appointment
to meet him in Riyadh, which I regrettably could not, due to conflicting
schedules.
This book was primarily researched in Saudi Arabia and in Iran and
through some 50 interviews with senior-ranking officials and policy makers,
but written in the United States, thanks to which I could aim to develop a
detached understanding of the key drivers of the Saudi–Iranian partner-
ship. In the United States, I thank the The Fletcher School of Law and
Diplomacy. I am indebted to Andrew Hess, Kathleen Bailey, David Deese,
and the late William Martell and John Galvin. I am grateful for support
from Gregory Gause, Elaine Papoulias, Elizabeth Prodromou, Leigh Nolan,
Geoffrey Gresh, Bernadette Kelley-Leccesse, Roschanack Shaery-Eisenlohr,
Majid Rashidi, Charles Freeman, Thomas Mattair, Flyntt Leverett, Gwenn
Okruhlik, Mohsen Kadivar, Mohammad Taqi Sept, Dan Grey, and Thomas
Pickering. I thank R. K. Ramazani for our brief conversation. The team
at Palgrave Macmillan made the experience of publishing a book a joy. In
London, Reza Ghasemi, and Mohammad Khakpour were always happy to
lend a helping hand. My editor Mitch Albert was a friend in the trying times
it took to write this book.
 Acknowledgments ● xi

There are some good friends I wish to thank: Kristin, Najla, Arwa, Dalia,
Joyce, Parisa, Nic, Mike, Bruce, Marcos, and Peter. I thank my parents, who
always step in to support me. My father provided good insights into Iran’s
diplomatic history and the people who shaped it. Ida, Nilou, Maryam and
their families were constant supports. A very heartfelt thanks goes to my
son; wise beyond imagination, and who told me not to give up, otherwise
“all that ignoring” that I had levied in the course of writing the book “would
go to waste.” I sacrificed too many weekends, evenings, and family time,
to produce this work, and never faced complaints, and always saw a happy
face.
This book is a labor of love, and I wrote it listening to traditional music
by the great Persian master Gholam Hussein Banan, and to a selection of
Arabian tribal songs hand-picked by General Abdulwahid. I also incorpo-
rated in the original manuscript prior to publication, in every chapter and its
sections, lines of poetry relevant to the content, derived from works by Saudi
and Persian poets, as well as the rich tradition of Nabati poetry. Due to com-
plications regarding copyright, they had to be deleted. But there is, beyond
doubt, a rich poetic tradition in Saudi Arabia and Iran, two countries that
have a great deal in common, despite their differences.
Banafsheh Keynoush
San Francisco,
November 2015
 Introduction

I
n November 2001, I shared a ride in an elevator in the United Nations
building with Iran’s former reformist president, Mohammad Khatami. I
was his interpreter in New York, had received a master’s degree in inter-
national affairs, and was preparing for my PhD oral exams. Iran’s president
inquired what my research interest was. I replied vaguely that I wanted to
write about Iran’s foreign policy in the Persian Gulf. Years earlier, during the
course of the Iran–Iraq war, I had made the decision to write about this topic
someday. Yet even back then, Iraq did not fascinate me as much as Saudi
Arabia, which seemed a world apart. I knew very little about the Kingdom
and it felt strange that the rare first-hand accounts of it that I received from
Iranian pilgrims or politicians focused on one narrow experience or interac-
tion. In fact, in all the years that I lived in Iran, not once did I hear a traveler
speak about Saudi Arabia’s people, culture, or natural environment, or pres-
ent a holistic opinion of Saudi society and politics.
As Iran’s president commended my choice of topic, I recalled that he
had overseen the rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran in 1997.
I now contemplated studying the connection between these two states, but
I dismissed the idea quickly, convinced that the rapprochement would not
last. Nonetheless, having spent most of my life outside America and lived
through the war, I recognized the importance of writing about the topic
from the Saudi and Iranian perspectives: much had already been said about
the security of the Gulf region from the vantage point of the United States.
Later that day, I discussed the idea with an aide to the president, who
invited me to observe a meeting held on the sidelines of the annual UN
General Assembly between Saudi Arabia’s then-Crown Prince Abdullah
bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud and President Khatami. The conversation between
the two leaders, whose friendliness could not conceal the distance between
them, focused on the topic of women. I was impressed that women’s activ-
ism had succeeded in bringing the question of equal rights to the forefront
of the political debate between the two countries. Prince Abdullah inquired
of President Khatami about the restrictions that women faced in Iran in
2 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

advancing their rights. President Khatami spoke about women’s achieve-

ments in Iran. The irony of the exchange did not negate its significance:
women’s demands for increased rights had, even then, become impossible
for the leaders of these countries to ignore. Since then, women in Saudi
Arabia and Iran have continued demanding change.
I left the meeting determined to write about the relationship between
Saudi Arabia and Iran, but soon discovered that it encompassed broader
research than I had planned in light of developments after September 11,
2001 and the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. As the first full-scale work on
interstate politics between Saudi Arabia and Iran, this work’s scope was
extended to an examination of the impact of international relations on the
politics of these two states.
The study of the Saudi–Iranian relations presents an interesting ques-
tion: Is the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran the cause of regional
instability, or is it a consequence of that instability? I argue that this rivalry
is caused by regional instability generated by foreign interventions in the
Gulf, which disrupt the balance of power between the two local states. This
implies a break with previously hegemonic conceptions of Saudi Arabia
and Iran, in which the two states compete for influence based on narrowly
defined ideological and/or nationalistic worldviews. The ideological and/
or national divide may serve to explain the two states’ contentious relation-
ship, but it does not grasp the multiple dimensions of their security concerns
against the backdrop of international developments where the United States
remains the most powerful player.
The three states may have conflicting interests, but I have set out to explore
their common interests—which have largely been ignored to date—by describ-
ing how the security they all seek, though viable, has eluded them. Unless
the United States is able to contribute to the building of a stable balance of
power between Saudi Arabia and Iran, one that provides mutual security
guarantees to both, it will be unable to advance peace in the Gulf region and
beyond that in the Middle East. This task has become more urgent since the
Arab Spring given that the regional balance is increasingly defined by a more
restricted US role. This should allow interactions among regional states to
take center stage, and demonstrate how US involvement might better adapt
to local regional security concerns. As valid as the US point of view is where
the Saudi–Iranian relations are concerned, it cannot grasp the full range of
the two states’ shared experience, or local concerns and interests.

A Note on History
The holy Qur’an is one of the early texts that links the history of Arabia to
Persia. The book, revealed to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)
 Introduction ● 3

in the Arabian heartland, speaks of the Persian Empire in its battles with the
Roman Empire. In 621 ad, the Romans attacked the Persian heartland, and
were defeated. Muhammad was believed to have adopted some of Persia’s
combat techniques, including the building of trenches around Yathreb
(now Madinah) where he migrated to in 622 ad, and defended it in the
famous Battle of the Trenches ( ghazwa al-khandaq) in 627 ad. In 628 ad,
the prophet sent a message to Khusrau II, the Sassanid emperor of Persia,
to embrace Islam, which the latter rejected. Later historical events that have
connected Arabia to the Persians are about the split between Ali’s followers,
known as Shi‘is, from other Muslims—Sunnis—over the question of the
prophet’s rightful successor following his death in 632 ad. Although many
link Shi‘is with Persia, Arab Shi‘is had settled in the eastern Arabian penin-
sula, Iraq, Bahrain, and Yemen, before Persia adopted Shiism.
The decline of the Persian empire around the time of the prophet’s death
led to the loss of control over the territories surrounding the Gulf, while
increasing number of Arabs including Shi‘is began to migrate to the area.
The Arab invasion two years after Muhammad’s death finalized the con-
version of Persia’s Zoroastrian population to Islam by 645 ad. Historians
believe that Islam appealed to the Persians, but the invasion was at times
equated with a decline of Persian culture and civilization, and brought along
a deep resentment of Arabs even among the Persian clerical establishment.
Over the following centuries, Persia was ruled by Arabs or their Ottoman
patrons at various junctures and followed the Sunni school of faith. By the
early sixteenth century, central Persia’s ruling Safavids had adopted Shi‘ism,
which had spread to areas surrounding Persia, and built a new Persian
“nation-state” with a distinct identity that could protect their empire from
further Arab invasions. The Safavids converted Persian Sunnis to Shi‘ism,
and allowed clerics to develop a new national narrative as well as a dif-
ferent interpretation of Islamic history. The clerics established judicial and
religious institutions, and a hierarchy that granted them power within the
new state.
Two centuries later, in present-day Saudi Arabia, Muhammad ibn Abd
al-Wahhab who was believed to have traveled widely across the Middle East
including Persia, and may have witnessed Persia’s religious transformation
and successful state-building under the Safavids, decided to counter the
dominant Ottoman power and its distortion of religious practices in his
native Najd in the Arabian mainland by preaching a unitarian brand of
Islam to bring its tribes together. Abd al-Wahhab formed an alliance with
Muhammad ibn Saud to build the first Saudi “nation-state” in 1744. The
realm collapsed in 1818, but clerics realigned with the Al Saud clan to form
the second Saudi realm in 1824 and the third in 1902, out of which the
modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia emerged in 1932.
4 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

As important as these historical events are, they were not major factors in
the formation of the twentieth-century diplomatic relations between Saudi
Arabia and Iran. When Reza Shah and Abd al-Aziz Al Saud assumed power
in modern-day Iran and Saudi Arabia respectively, religious fervor in the
lands over which they reigned (before the establishment of the modern states
they were to build) had nominal influence over their decision to establish
ties. The two rulers sought to control territory that had been under the
influence of foreign powers for centuries; the Saudi–Iranian relationship
had no other formative connection but for the religious memories of the
past, which these leaders ignored.
To reflect this early diplomatic history, I focus less on such memories and
more on the evolution of the “reason of state” in the Saudi–Iranian relation-
ship, which, from its inception, was subject to foreign interventions.

Names and Methodology

A symbol of the misunderstanding that has come to define the Saudi–Iranian
partnership is the failure to arrive at a consensus on the name of the vital
waterway between them. Is it the “Persian Gulf” or the “Arabian Gulf”?
The debate perpetuates the myth of the inevitability of the Saudi–Iranian
rivalry, although it represents a superficial understanding of the far deeper
realities that shape this relationship. More interestingly, it reflects the cen-
tral theme of this book that without a stable balance of power in the Gulf
region between Iran and its Arab neighbors, even differences over names
cannot be resolved.
Historical documents and maps have used both names, in fact. The term
“Arabian Gulf” derives from the Ancient Greek Arabios Kolpos, which for-
merly referred to what is now the Red Sea. (The later Latin term, influenced
by the Greek, was Sinus Arabicus.) The term “Persian Gulf” derives from the
ancient Greek Persikos Kolpos (later Latin: Sinus Persicus), as well as the ancient
Persian Parsa Darya. These names reflected the dominant geographical view
of the area when the Greeks and Persians were the two major regional empires.
The Persians laid claim to being the earliest settlers around the coastal areas
of the Gulf. The Gulf was also referred to as the “Basra Gulf” and the “Arab
Gulf” by later settlers. In the early Islamic era, Muslim geographers called the
body bahr/khalig faris —hence the term “Persian Gulf.”
Over the past two centuries, most historical documents in Iranian and
Saudi archives refer to the waterway as the “Persian Gulf.” Internal UN direc-
tives use the same name. Some Arab historians argue that it is best to retain
that name, while others insist on “Arabian Gulf,” which is the official Saudi
title for the waterway. Meanwhile, alternative names were proposed at dif-
ferent junctures by both Arabs and Iranians, including the “Arabo–Persian
Gulf” and the “Islamic Gulf.” Iran insists on “Persian Gulf,” however.
 Introduction ● 5

The dispute over the nomenclature of the Gulf was invariably exploited.
In 1958, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser promoted the term
“Arabian Gulf” after the Shah of Iran granted de facto recognition to the
state of Israel. In the 1960s, rising pan-Arab sentiments across the Middle
East encouraged other Arab leaders to dispute the name “Persian Gulf.”
Former Syrian President Hafez al-Assad insisted on the term “Arabian Gulf”
so to carve out a nominal leadership role for Syria in the Arab world, and to
challenge the shah over Iran’s better ties with Syria’s rivals, Egypt and Saudi
Arabia. Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein used “Arabian Gulf” to indicate his
displeasure with the shah’s efforts to project superior Iranian power in the
region, and later to provoke Iran in the course of the Iran–Iraq war.
Rather than heeding the advice of his veteran diplomats in the Arab
world to resolve this issue with the Arab states, the shah opted to avoid
acknowledging Arab competition—a typical response that continues to
characterize Iran’s apathetic outlook toward its non-Persian neighbors. To
make matters worse, the shah used Iran’s historic claims over the Persian
Gulf to drive nationalistic sentiments whenever he struggled at home to
advance his policies. This practice was repeated by Iranian governments fol-
lowing the Islamic revolution in 1979. Iran’s embattled President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad rallied public support by encouraging the composition of
national hymns celebrating the name “Persian Gulf.” At the height of his
unpopularity, he declared April 29 “Persian Gulf Day” to mark the anniver-
sary of the expulsion of the Portuguese military by Persia, albeit with British
aid, from the Strait of Hormuz in 1622.
Moreover, many Iranians have refrained from using the term “Shatt
al-Arab” to refer to the waterway that runs between Iran and Iraq, prefer-
ring “Arvand Rud”—despite the fact that “Arvand” is another name for the
Tigris, which is a confluent of the Shatt al-Arab. Abol-Ghassem Ferdowsi,
the great poet credited with reviving Persian from Arabic linguistic influ-
ences, and whose work is widely cited to validate Iran’s historical territorial
claims, seems to have used “Arvand” in his poems. It is, however, unclear
if he meant to refer to the entire river or simply to the Tigris. Ferdowsi’s
poems are still studied, centuries after they were first produced, to arrive at
conclusive opinions including whether or not many of the poems attributed
to him were indeed his. Nonetheless, according to the following lines attrib-
uted to him, it appears that—by mentioning Arvand—he actually refers to
the Tigris: “If you are Pahlavani [i.e., a speaker of the Old Persian Pahlavi
language], then you may not know that the Arvand is called the ‘Tigris’ in
Arabic.”
Arab and Iranian geographers and historians can resolve the issue of what
to name these contentious bodies of water only when the balance of power in
the region is restored. This book uses the term “Persian Gulf” in deference
to historical precedence. It refers to the “Gulf” on a discretionary basis or
6 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

as a defining noun, for ease and flow of language. In return, I use the term
“Shatt al-Arab” when referring to the waterway, in an effort to ensure partial
balance between the Arab and Iranian views.
The book’s methodology is historical, as per its chapter breakdown and
the chronology of events. Important timelines are identified to trace the
shifting balance of power that defines Saudi–Iranian ties. This permits a
subtle understanding of how that balance conditions ties over time, and
with varying degrees of force.
Part I offers an overview of the book. Chapter 1 examines the emergence
of bilateral ties. A theoretical perspective is offered to address how concerns
about the regional balance of power shape Saudi–Iranian relations in more
recent times, providing the analytical framework for the book. Chapter 2
reviews the religious dimension of relations to offer a historical context for
the book’s key argument that religious differences are a variable of political
and strategic determinants.
Part II examines the Saudi–Iranian relations in its formative stages.
Chapter 3 documents the geopolitical considerations in the early twentieth
century that impact the position of the two regional powers internally and
in their interactions with external actors in the Persian Gulf—namely the
British, Ottomans, and Russians. It concludes by examining the nature of
the balance of power in the Persian Gulf prior to the inception of formal
ties between Saudi Arabia and Iran in 1929. Chapter 4 examines the early
diplomatic history, and relations during World War II and in the immedi-
ate postwar period. Chapters 5 and 6 explain the evolution of the regional
balance of power through various phases of the emerging Saudi–Iranian
partnership, including the Cold War impact on ties from 1954–1978.
Part III reviews Saudi–Iranian ties following the Iranian revolution.
Chapter 7 looks at the impact of revolution on the regional balance of power,
and investigates how that balance evolved through the Iran–Iraq war and
the Gulf War. Chapter 8 looks at ties after the Gulf War until 9/11.
Part IV reviews the current conflicts between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Chapter 9 looks at the multiple challenges confronting them after 9/11, and
the evolution of Iran’s political decisions behind its nuclear activities and
the impact and strain on Saudi Arabia. Chapters 10 and eleven explore the
reasons behind the Saudi–Iranian responses to a series of regional issues,
including in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and over Palestine. These cases under-
score the leverage that Riyadh and Tehran have over the Middle East region.
The conclusion reviews Saudi–Iranian ties in the aftermath of the Arab
Spring. This period is unique in that it has witnessed an uncharacteristically
assertive Saudi foreign policy, while Iran has largely been on the defensive
despite its outwardly confrontational rhetoric. The chapter returns to the
examination of balance of power theory, offering an overview as well as
some considerations for the future of this critical partnership.
 PART I

A Historical Overview of
Saudi–Iranian Relations
 CHAPTER 1

Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations

B
efore World War II, Saudi Arabia and Iran had limited exchanges,
except over the regulation of the annual pilgrimage to the holy cities
of Makkah and Madinah in the Hijaz region of western Arabia. The
pilgrimage encouraged small-scale trade of Persian goods, mainly carpets,
and the settlement of a small Persian community in Jeddah. Meanwhile,
boundary disputes, which included several joint oilfields, remained dormant
when the challenge of internal state security was a more urgent concern.1
Saudi Arabia and Iran relied on the British Residency in the Persian Gulf
to ensure stability along their borders in this period.2 But as British power
waned during the war, critical US financial aid helped Saudi Arabia and
Iran cope with severe wartime economic afflictions. During the Cold War,
US military arms imports to the two countries increased; it was expected
that they would help fight the spread of communism in the Middle East.
In 1971, the “Twin Pillars” policy, developed under the Nixon Doctrine but
conceived by the British, accelerated arms sales to Saudi Arabia and Iran.
The policy allowed Washington to keep an “over-the-horizon” posture in
the Persian Gulf to avoid direct combat in the region with the Soviet Union.
Iran’s larger economy and well-trained army compared to Saudi Arabia, and
proximity to the Soviet Union, made its role central to the success of the
policy.
Saudi Arabia was uncomfortable with Iran’s new role, and believed that
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi’s susceptibility to US coaxing permitted Iran
to be the favored partner under the policy.3 The shah suffered from the need
for excessive US attention; in private, however, he scorned the Americans
for intervening in Iran’s affairs, although he was careful not to upset them
in public. Moreover, Washington was aware of his agenda to rid the Gulf of
foreign presence, and it relied on Riyadh’s cautious foreign policy toward big
10 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

powers to temper the shah’s ambition. Iran’s exposure to Russian influence

turned Saudi Arabia into the preferred US ally.
Nonetheless, the shah’s personal friendship with President Richard
Nixon, who encouraged arms deals with Iran’s leader, sustained the criti-
cal US–Iranian partnership. Under President Gerald Ford, the partner-
ship deteriorated, and the anguished shah who was losing US backing on
account of disagreements over his drive for higher oil prices, became vulner-
able to domestic opposition, frequent strikes, and high inflation rates of
over 30–40 percent. By the time Jimmy Carter assumed the US presiden-
tial office in January 1977, US diplomats were in direct contact inside Iran
with dissidents who stood to inherit the shah’s sophisticated army.4 Despite
repeated protests from the shah, who aimed to appease dissent by revamping
the faltering Iranian economy through higher oil prices, Saudi Arabia lever-
aged the oil supply market to keep prices steady and help the United States
in the midst of a presidential election and a global recession.
The Islamic revolution of Iran overthrew the Pahlavi dynasty in 1979.
The balance of power the “twin pillars” policy helped build between Saudi
Arabia and Iran subsequently collapsed. The revolution’s leader, Ayatollah
Ruhollah Mostafavi Mousavi Khomeini, asserted that the region should be
free of Western influences; unlike the shah, however, he made no false pre-
tenses about his intentions. Khomeini called for the overthrow of pro-Amer-
ican Arab rulers. When Saddam Hussein invaded Iran on September 22,
1980, he asserted that it was a Saudi and US ploy. Rumors in Iran quickly
spread that Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the United States had offered financial
support in the tune of some USD 800 million to the shah’s young son, Reza
Pahlavi, to lead a coup, which he declined. Meanwhile, Iraq’s victory over
Iran proved elusive. The Shi‘i clerical establishment mobilized volunteers
for the war front, and Khomeini insisted on removing Iraq’s Baath regime.
When Iran advanced into Iraq two years later, Saddam’s resolve to fight back
strengthened. Iraq received substantial financial support from Saudi Arabia
and other Arab Gulf states, followed by US wartime aid. Nonetheless,
Ayatollah Khomeini refused to accept a ceasefire agreement until August
1988.
On August 2, 1990, over a year after Ayatollah Khomeini’s death, Saddam
invaded Kuwait. Iraqi troops were repelled after Saudi Arabia funded a US-led
coalition to rescue Kuwait. The Gulf War ended on February 21, 1991, but it
dismayed Tehran to see US troops stationed in the region. Tehran remained
neutral in the war, nonetheless, to deflect potential military threats. Even so,
it quietly felt justice had been served to Saudi Arabia and the United States
for supporting Saddam in the course of the Iran–Iraq war.
According to a senior Saudi diplomat Gafaar Al Laghani, the kingdom
thought Iran took an “honorable position” by remaining neutral in the Gulf
 Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations ● 11

War. Yet when he was dispatched to Tehran to reopen the Saudi embassy,
which was closed down after Saudi security forces killed Iranian pilgrims
charged with stirring riots in Makkah in 1987, a Saudi diplomat was attacked
by a mob and lost an eye.5 (Another mob attacked the Saudi embassy in
Tehran following the Makkah incident; a Saudi diplomat jumped from an
embassy window, plunging to his death.)
Not surprisingly, Saudi–Iranian interactions remained minimal in the
aftermath of the war. Tehran, meanwhile, decided to resume diplomatic rela-
tions with Baghdad and expand trade with Iraq’s northern Kurdish region,
declared a no-fly zone since the Gulf War, by a coalition of military forces
from Britain, France, and the United States. The zone kept Iraqi troops out
of the area, and allowed coalition forces to conduct regular military opera-
tions to contain Baghdad, conditions ripe enough to allow Iran to gradu-
ally expand its influence over Iraq. Tehran expanded trade, the exchange
of seminary students, and it bolstered support for Iraqi dissidents. It also
proceeded to resume pilgrimage to the Shi‘i holy sites in Najaf, Karbala, and
Samara, despite the public apathy among Iranians toward Iraq as a result of
the Iran–Iraq war.
The internal debate in Riyadh over Tehran’s decision to resume ties with
Baghdad was mute. The decision by the coalition to sanction Baghdad’s gov-
ernment meant that Tehran could not expand meaningful ties with it, and
the kingdom chose not to openly react. It also decided not to resume formal
diplomatic relations with Baghdad. But Saudi businesses were allowed into
Iraq in 1998 as part of the UN-sponsored oil-for-food program designed to
alleviate the impact of sanctions, in place since August 1990.6
The US policy of nonengagement with Iran and Iraq, however, dis-
turbed the relative peace in the region that was obtained after the Gulf War.
Furthermore, although Washington adopted an “offshore balancing strat-
egy” to avoid large-scale troop deployments to the Gulf, it maintained forces
in Saudi Arabia, which unnerved Iran. In February 1994, the United States
officially announced the “dual containment policy” against Iran and Iraq.
Saudi Arabia’s leverage with the United States grew, but Iran and Iraq became
increasingly isolated. The kingdom faced internal opposition for hosting US
troops itself—a fact conceded in private by Crown Prince Abdullah to Iran’s
president, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, at a meeting of the Organization
of the Islamic Conference (OIC) held in Pakistan in 1995.7
Regional concerns over Iraq’s stability, also discussed at the meeting,
mounted when Washington shifted its policy to a “forward military strat-
egy” in the Gulf after 9/11. The strategy was shortsighted: in its haste to
protect US interests through preemptive military strikes, it failed to consider
the concerns by local states that the region could not absorb a new war.
These concerns were exacerbated by the fact that Saddam could not directly
12 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

be linked to the terrorist attacks, and despite Washington’s assertions, posed

no immediate threat to American interests.
President Mohammad Khatami paid a short visit to Crown Prince
Abdullah in Jeddah while on pilgrimage, to discuss the pending war. The
two leaders agreed that the war could have grave consequences for the
region. However, mindful of its inevitability, Iran decided to view the war
as an opportunity to reconnect with Iraqi Shi‘is. Saudi officials forewarned
the United States that an invasion of Iraq would lead to increased Iranian
regional interventions, which the United States ignored.
The US decision to invade Iraq defied a sacrosanct tenet in international
relations: when local states are sensitive to the balance of power as a result of
prevailing insecurity, they become uncomfortable whenever one state—in-
cluding an extra-regional power such as the United States—becomes signifi-
cantly stronger.8 The general consensus in the Gulf was that the US invasion
aimed to turn Iraq into an ally, and into a new energy hub. This could con-
tain Iran, and reduce US reliance on Saudi Arabia from where most of the
9/11 terrorists had come. Subsequent Saudi and Iranian efforts to use ideol-
ogy (in this case the Shi‘i–Sunni dichotomy) to broaden their power base in
Iraq proved the extent of their determination to stall US efforts.
Iraq turned into the second country after Iran in the Gulf region to elect
a Shi‘i-dominated government. It also became the first Arab Gulf state to
draw closer to the non-Arab state of Iran than to its Arab neighbors. Iraqi–
Saudi relations rapidly deteriorated. Although Tehran asserted that with an
ally in Baghdad, Riyadh could never again consider itself in a position to
rival the Iranian influence in the region, the kingdom disagreed and strove
to ensure the survival of friendly governments elsewhere across the Middle
East.

Dissecting a Difficult Union: Saudi Arabia, Iran,

and the United States
The endurance of the US–Saudi alliance combined with US–Iranian ten-
sions make Iran’s relationship with Saudi Arabia seem secondary to the
international politics that prevail in the Persian Gulf. This has represented
the dominant mindset in Iran and among the many Western-based Iranian
scholars who attempted to discourage the writing of this book. Iran’s
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s political advisor, Mohammad Ali
Fatollahi, was more encouraging. But he told me in an interview: “When
US–Iranian ties normalize, so will the Saudi–Iranian relations.”9 The presi-
dent of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, also told me in an interview that he
doubted if the relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran could shape itself
independently of the US factor.10
 Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations ● 13

The prevalence of this mindset has allowed Iran’s relationship with the
United States to overshadow the question of the important regional bond
with Riyadh. Furthermore, it has perpetuated Iran’s historical fear that
Saudi Arabia has jeopardized a US–Iranian détente in order to ensure the
robustness of the US–Saudi “special partnership”—making Iran accord-
ing to its politicians, the “second wife” in the critical relationship with the
United States. From Tehran’s perspective, the Saudi endorsement of mea-
sures to contain the Iranian role in the region aim to perpetuate hostility
in the US–Iranian ties and marginalize Iran in the region’s relationship
with the West. As a result, Tehran has never been too serious in efforts to
reach out to Riyadh, preferring to invest in the elusive idea of improved
ties with the United States. To achieve regional strategic parity with the
United States, moreover, Iran has frequently jeopardized Saudi security
interests.
The Saudi stance toward Iran reflects the kingdom’s difficult position of
needing to balance its interests against the competing, and potent, Iranian
and US interests. Saudi Arabia regards itself as the weaker state, and unlike
Iran, it is not inclined to challenge US dominance in the region directly.
Yet, it seeks to assert its position in the Gulf by rejecting the United States
or Iran as regional hegemons given their power to contain the Saudi influ-
ence. Therefore, while as the so-called weaker link, the kingdom follows the
powerful trends that shape US–Iranian relations, it seeks to influence those
trends on its own terms. For example, Saudi Arabia rejected US and Iranian
interests when they converged over Iraq in 2005; the kingdom did not fully
endorse the Iraqi political process and elections, which the United States
called for and which Iran endorsed.
The challenge to maintain an interdependent relationship as an equal
partner with the United States and Iran is not easy, requiring the king-
dom to adapt to centrifugal political trends in the US–Iranian relationship.
The kingdom is also required to abandon a traditionally cautious foreign
policy—the result of a nascent national identity and foreign diplomacy—in
favor of proactive measures, without the time to build consensus within the
Royal Family or the religious establishment over those measures. Even then,
Saudi Arabia lacks sufficient guarantees that its interests will converge with
those of either the United States or Iran. In those instances, it depends on
its partnership with the United States to sideline Iranian interests, and uses
the religious establishment to demonize the Iranian role. All too frequently,
it also reacts to Iranian provocations to the detriment of longer-term strate-
gies toward Tehran. The result often leads to a diminished Saudi position in
the region, which the kingdom tries to restore, through aggressive posturing
toward Iran and winning over US support for the kingdom’s massive arms
build-up.
14 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

This commonly leads to mixed policies on the question of the US–Iranian

relationship as well. For example, like most other Gulf states, Saudi Arabia is
concerned over any so-called grand bargain between the United States and
Iran, which might resolve their differences but marginalize Saudi interests
in the process. At the same time, the kingdom has at times dispelled tensions
in the context of Iran’s discussions with the West over the Islamic Republic’s
nuclear program, by proposing measures that allow Iran to develop nuclear
technology for peaceful purposes. In this process, Saudi Arabia attempts to
safeguard its own interests, by reducing the possibility of a US war with Iran
that can destabilize the Gulf region.
As it pursues its national interests in response to US threats, Iran is inca-
pable of separating Saudi Arabia’s indifference from the kingdom’s inability
to summon adequate responses to the crisis in the US–Iranian ties. Instead,
Tehran frequently takes the easy path, faulting the Saudi alliance with the
United States, despite its full awareness that US–Saudi interests are not
always compatible. Even when Iran detects signs of desire for change in
Saudi Arabia’s behavior toward it, it responds cautiously, fearing that the
kingdom might at any time trump up the Iranian threat if it needs the US
attention.

The Need for a Balanced Point of View

The long-term partnership between Saudi Arabia and Iran is governed by
the geographic factors that make the two countries permanent neighbors. As
permeated as security is given the constant conflicts in the Persian Gulf, its
pursuit has often allowed Saudi Arabia and Iran to avoid irreparably disturb-
ing their relationship for the simple fact that they are neighbors that must
live together; that is, of course, unless the severance of ties is perceived to
pose a lesser security threat than its continuation. Hence, hardly have they
severed bilateral relations even in the worst of times. It is noteworthy that to
preserve their immediate border security, even when Saudi Arabia and Iran
disagree on policy issues, their preference is to avoid open confrontation.
Instead they rely on indirect, covert, or proxy operations, no matter how
evasive the goal of reaching political solutions through these means are.
Since Saudi–Iranian politics are volatile, navigating it requires caution.
As a result—despite the kingdom’s concerns over Iran’s nuclear program—
senior Gulf official Saad Al Ammar told me when we met in Riyadh that
the Arab Gulf states did not wish to see Iran attacked over its nuclear pro-
gram.11 Such an attack would disrupt the regional status quo and bring
unintended consequences. In fact, policies that disturb the status quo are
not the best choices for Saudi Arabia, and the kingdom is keenly aware of it.
In a brief interview, the former head of Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence
 Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations ● 15

Directorate (GID) Prince Muqrin bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud underscored the
kingdom’s hope that Iran would be the one to make positive changes and
ward off fears about its nuclear ambitions.12 Otherwise, Saudi Arabia and
the Gulf states would be placed in the difficult position of choosing between
two evils depending on which is less threatening to their security: a nuclear-
powered Iranian military capability, or war with Iran to prevent it from
acquiring nuclear weapons.
Thus Saudi Arabia is unwilling to challenge Iran directly over the issue,
but has, at the same time, taken measures to change Iranian behavior. Such
measures include indirectly supporting UN sanctions, which, although
Prince Muqrin was personally opposed to them (and no Saudi officials have
spoken in favor of them either), have been advocated unofficially by Prince
Turki bin Faisal Al Saud, who for decades headed the GID before his resig-
nation in 2001. More recently, Saudi Arabia worked closely with France, a
negotiating partner in the nuclear talks with Iran, to ensure Iranian compli-
ance with a strictly peaceful nuclear program.
In pursuing their relations, Saudi Arabia and Iran are restrained in
their ability to act independently without taking into account US interests.
Generally, they tend to muster resources to make autonomous foreign-policy
choices where they can, for example, their policies toward Iraq after the
US-led invasion. Post-invasion, through its controlling presence in Iraq, the
United States replaced the Iraqi state in the balance of power equation with
Saudi Arabia and Iran; but it was unable to independently force either to
comply with its goals. Against this backdrop, US strategies that can rein-
force the balance of power in the Persian Gulf will enhance the region’s
stability. This power has historically been distributed between Iran, Iraq,
and Saudi Arabia since the inception of the modern Iraqi and Saudi states
in 1921 and 1932 respectively. Foreign threats or interventions, such as the
US invasion of Iraq, tend to exacerbate anti status quo behavior, as these
regional states will attempt to change developments in their favor.
The balance of power approach does not guarantee peace given the con-
stant presence of policies that disturb the status quo in the Persian Gulf.
But with skilled statesmanship, it might serve as a better safeguard against
future wars.13 Other factors that partially help explain the Saudi–Iranian
relationship—ideological, leadership, and domestic factors—as indicated
in the following sections, are relevant. But they are secondary to the vital
impact of international politics on Gulf affairs.
Saudi Arabia and Iran use ideology to influence the Islamic world. The
application of ideology to politics is appealing when regional power imbal-
ances prevail. In such cases, religion becomes a powerful tool to advance state
decisions in the face of insecurity. Hence, ideology can further the state’s
decision-making power.14 At the same time, as relatively new formations,
16 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

Saudi Arabia more, and Iran to a lesser extent, are incapable of subordinat-
ing ideology to rational decision making. They are driven by ideology as
opposed to possessing the ability to drive it. Hence, the state’s relationship
with religion is complicated. On the one hand, neither state is able to turn
the religious establishment into an actor capable of making rational choices
at all times. On other hand, the religious establishments frequently, if not
always, follow state policies, because the state possesses enough wealth and
power to control and guide religious forces. Therefore, in both countries,
ideology can simultaneously impede and advance state goals.15
The boundaries between the state and the religious establishment in
Saudi Arabia and Iran wane when they are faced with increased regional
insecurity. This confuses their foreign policy roles and empowers the reli-
gious establishment to direct foreign policy. With fewer instruments to
advance foreign policy goals, the state enables the religious constituencies
to shape foreign policy, which also helps reduce domestic tensions with the
radical religious establishment in both societies. This issue is poignant in
the Saudi–Iranian connection, where the Shi‘i–Sunni dichotomy frequently
plays out to advance political goals.
Yet, this acute religious-ideological rivalry is not itself a source of conflict
in the region. In the past, Saudi Arabia and Iran have forsaken tensions aris-
ing from their different religious perspectives by addressing the geopoliti-
cal considerations that help restore the regional balance of power between
them. For example, when the Middle East enjoyed a relatively stable period
in the decade after the end of the Gulf War, they expressed mutual concern
over Washington’s anti status quo policies toward Iraq in the 1990s and
after 9/11.
However, there is no doubt that the strong Islamic identities adopted
by Saudi Arabia and Iran have often led to competition for leadership of
the Islamic world. Moreover, Saudis and Iranians have been indoctrinated
around differences between Arabs versus Persians over centuries which,
along with the Shi‘i–Sunni rivalry, serves to separate them from each other
emotionally. It was my observation that the Saudi people appeared keener
to have contacts with the Iranian people than the reverse. After all, Iran’s
Persian Shi‘i identity has, in part, been construed as a reaction against the
core states constituting the Sunni Arab world. In Saudi Arabia, during times
of internal crisis the state compensates for the incongruity between a weak
national identity and a powerful ultra national Arab and Islamic identity in
part by rejecting the Persian Shi‘i paradigm.
The Shi‘i–Sunni rivalry is often a symptom of dire regional circum-
stances in which the United States frequently plays a controversial role.
Though Saudi–Iranian interests are instrumental in shaping strategic and
political developments in the region, it is the United States that acts as the
 Overview of Saudi–Iranian Relations ● 17

principal foreign power capable of reshaping those developments and defin-

ing the external threats that partially inform the Saudi and Iranian ideologi-
cal orientations. Even when the United States is not directly involved in a
regional conflict, such as in Bahrain or Yemen since the Arab spring, the
ripple effects from its grand regional policies—in the case of the spring,
to reshape events in a manner inclusive of the US presence in the Middle
East—exert an impact on the ideological orientations of the Saudi and
Iranian states. This is exacerbated by the fact that Washington chooses to
side with Riyadh—not always, but more than often—on account of its lack
of relations with Tehran. However, it does not ponder the long-term conse-
quences sufficiently when it boosts the Saudi regional position to the detri-
ment of ignoring Iran, and thereby inadvertently or not, enables the growth
of radical ideological orientations in Saudi Arabia that are designed to con-
tain Iran. Moreover, the Iranian ideological orientation is somewhat valid,
to the extent that it can encourage the Shi‘i dissidents in the Arab Gulf
states to constructively engage with their Sunni leaderships, or to counter
the growth of radical Saudi-led ideologies, which Washington fails to suffi-
ciently take into account in this process. The violent bombing, for example,
of a Shi‘i mosque in Kuwait in June 2015 (which killed 27 including three
Iranians) by a Saudi man loyal to the self-proclaimed political entity, the
“Najd Velayat,” and the uproar among Kuwaiti Sunnis who insisted that
the Shi‘is who constitute a third of Kuwait’s population were their broth-
ers, serves to demonstrate that Iran and its Arab neighbors have more in
common than we acknowledge in the fight against growing radical trends
within the Sunni world.
In the end, Iran’s and Saudi Arabia’s ideological campaigns in places such
as Bahrain or Yemen are part-and-parcel of the balance of power paradigms
that shape their relations.16 Careful examination reveals that the Islamic
identity of both countries is informed by realist interests—although it also
shapes and constrains those interests, depending on the level of external
threat to the individual state and the degree of internal cohesion at any given
time. The Shi‘i–Sunni dichotomy is relevant to their foreign policy behav-
iors, but it is not the chief driver of foreign policy at all times and on every
issue, which after all, is dominated by sovereignty concerns.
Saudi and Iranian elites play a key role in advancing the state’s sover-
eignty concerns. But they do not represent cohesive bodies to be able to
articulate state concerns clearly. In fact, the self interest exhibited by various
political actors that are associated with the main power centers often prevails
over long-term policy objectives to prevent meaningful discussions on the
Saudi–Iranian partnership. Disputes among different political actors can
also have an impact on state foreign policy, making it harder for the Saudi
and Iranian leaders to identify their two country’s mutual interests. In Iran,
18 ● Saudi Arabia and Iran

parallel official power centers compete to advance state agendas that, at times,
conflict. For example, the Iranian constitution grants overlapping foreign
policy prerogatives to the offices of the supreme leader and the president.
Following Ahmadinejad’s election in 2005, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei
appointed special envoy Ali Akbar Velayati to establish a direct line of com-
munication with Saudi Arabia; the initiative was silently halted. The former
Saudi ambassador to Iran, Nasser Al Braik, told me in an interview that
Riyadh was dismayed, and failed to fully grasp the reason for the com-
munication breakdown—which Iran never disclosed.17 (Velayati declined
to answer my inquiry on the subject.) Later developments in Iran revealed
that Ahmadinejad was determined to make his own mark on foreign policy
by placing key figures from among his staunchest supporters, which did not
include Velayati, in critical offices. The move preempted the supreme leader
from taking charge of the Saudi–Iranian file. In Saudi Arabia, where for-
eign policy is developed by a small group of royals, frequent family schisms
can influence the kingdom’s position on how real or perceived the Iranian
regional threat actually is. The king is the ultimate decision maker, although
he may follow the advice of a small group of royals, close ministers, or other
political appointees. Nonetheless, the Iranians are left to speculate about
the actual impact of schisms on Saudi policy toward Iran. For example, it
was commonly believed in Iran that the late defense minister, Crown Prince
Sultan bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud, opposed close Saudi–Iranian ties because
of his superior connections with the US defense establishment—notwith-
standing efforts by then Crown Prince Abdullah to restore the relation-
ship. Resumption of relations did go ahead despite the Iranian perception.
This led a few seasoned Iranian diplomats with long experience of living
in the kingdom to argue that, ultimately, personal differences within the
royal family would not intrude upon overall policy adopted toward Iran.18
However, many Iranian diplomats have frequently failed to grasp this argu-
ment, which may have enabled them to better reach out to the various politi-
cal actors in Saudi Arabia without prior biases.
This is complicated by the relatively opaque domestic decision making
processes in Saudi Arabia, not to mention in Iran. Ultimately, however,
these processes also serve the primary function of promoting state agendas
and preferences for the advancement of foreign policy. Since leaders’ roles in
Saudi Arabia and Iran are subject to pressures exerted by foreign forces—
including, specifically, the reality of the large US presence in the Persian
Gulf, their foreign policy is not merely shaped by their individual tastes,
ideological choices or leadership styles. Owing to significant state wealth,
at the same time, Saudi Arabia and Iran can make foreign policy choices
based on “reasons of state.” State power thus directs the leadership, rather
than the reverse.19
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 Hän katsoi minuun kierosti silmälasiensa lävitse, tutkiakseen
ranskalaisella viekkaudella ajatukseni, ennenkun vastasi.

»Hm. Tietysti meillä on huoneita; mutta monsieurin tapainen mies

tuskin tahtoisi…»

»Tavat eivät aina ole suhteelliset rahakukkaron kanssa»,

huomautin.

»Se on totta», sanoi hän hymyillen ja maisteli viiniänsä.

»Monsieur haluaa siis huonetta?»

»Voinhan katsoa, mitä teillä on tarjottavana.»

»Monsieur ymmärtää», selitti hän, »että tämä on hyvä

kaupunginosa, ja meidän huoneemme eivät ensinkään ole tavallista
lajia, ei, ne ovat paljon paremmat! Ne ovat hyvin haluttuja — meillä
on vain yksi huone vapaana tällä kertaa — niin, enkä ole aivan
varma, onko sekään enää vapaana. Kutsun vaimoni.»

Hän huusi vaimoansa, joka seisoi valvomassa tarjoilupöydän

takana, ja esitti madame Jourdainin minulle. Tarjosin hänelle lasin.

»Tämä monsieur etsii huonetta», aloitti hän. »Onko se toisessa

kerroksessa pihan puolella oleva huone vielä tyhjänä, Cécile?»

Hänen vaimonsa mietti hetkisen ja katseli minua terävillä pienillä

silmillään.

»En tiedä oikein», sanoi hän vihdoin. »Meidän täytyy kysyä

monsieur
Bethunelta ensin. Hän sanoi, että hän ehkä tarvitsisi sen uudelleen.
Hän on maksanut siitä viidenteentoista päivään asti.»

Se säpsäytti minua, tämä nimi. Ajattelin, että oli taottava raudan

kuumana ollessa ja että viisainta oli esiintyä rohkeasti; sillä jos he
saisivat aikaa puhua vainoojani kanssa, niin en saisi koskaan niitä
tietoja, joita olin etsimässä.

»Juuri monsieur Bethunen kautta olen saanut teidän osoitteenne»,

sanoin rohkeasti. »Hän sairastui pahoin aamulla, sydän,
tiedättehän…»

Kopautin rintaani.

He nyökäyttivät, mutta katsoivat minuun silti epäilyksestä siristävin

silmin.

»Niin, tiedän, monsieur», sanoi Jourdain, »meille ilmoitettiin heti

sairaalasta».

»Se ei ole ensimmäinen kohtaus», jatkoin edelleen

välttämättömyyden pakottamalla julkeudella. »Hänellä on ollut
sellaisia ennenkin, vaikkei koskaan niin vakavalaatuisia kuin tämä.»

He nyökkäsivät taas osaaottavasti. Selvästi vuokralainen oli tehnyt

hyvän vaikutuksen heihin.

»Niin että hän tietää nyt vihdoinkin», jatkoin kuten ennen, »että
hänen tilansa on paljon huolestuttavampi, ja aikoo viipyä sairaalassa
muutamia päiviä, kunnes on täysin tointunut. Voinhan sillä aikaa
ottaa toisessa kerroksessa pihan puolella olevan huoneen, joka oli
naisilla.»
 Viimeiset sanat lausuin teeskennellyllä välinpitämättömyydellä,
ilman että olisin silmääkään räpäyttänyt, vaikka vapisin sisällisesti,
sillä panin niillä sanoilla kaikki peliin. Mutta jo seuraavana hetkenä
hengitin keveämmin. Huomasin, että olin osunut maaliin ja että
heidän epäluulonsa katosi.

»He eivät luonnollisesti tule takaisin», lisäsin, »ainakaan ei pitkään

aikaan, niin että hän ei voi enää käyttää huonetta. Tänään on
neljästoista päivä — minä voin sitten muuttaa huomenna.» He
vaihtoivat silmäyksiä, ja madame Jourdain nousi ylös.

»Kuten tahdotte, monsieur», sanoi hän. »Olkaa hyvä ja tulkaa

katsomaan huonetta.»

Hyvän onnen ilosta puolihuumaantuneena seurasin häntä portaita

ylös.
Hän avasi erään oven ja sytytti kaasuliekin seinänviereen.

»Olen varma siitä, että tulette pitämään huoneesta, monsieur!

Kuten näette, se on suuri ja hyvin mukava.»

Huone oli todellakin suuri ja hyvin kalustettu. Vuode oli

jonkinlaisessa sänkykomerossa ja sen edessä oli kylpyhuone,
odottamaton ylellisyys! Mutta eräs asia oli minusta kummallinen.
Ikkunat olivat varustetut paksuilla luukuilla, jotka olivat suljetut
sisäpuolelta, ja haat olivat lukitut munalukoilla.

»Luonnollisesti haluan saada ikkunat auki», huomautin. »Ovatko

ne teillä aina tuolla tavoin suljetut.»

Hän epäröi sekunnin ajan ja näytti vähän neuvottomalta.

 »Niin, nähkääs, minä sanon miten se oli», selitti hän vihdoin.
»Monsieur Bethune on itse pannut niihin munalukot, sillä hän
pelkäsi, että hänen sisarparkansa heittäytyisi ulos pihalle, joka on
kivetty, ja silloin hän olisi tietysti loukannut itsensä kuoliaaksi. Hän oli
hyvin pahassa pulassa muutamia päiviä, raukka. Minä olin oikein
iloinen, kun he veivät hänet pois, sillä paljas ajatuskin hänestä teki
minut murheelliseksi. Huomisaamuna avaan ikkunat ja tuuletan
huoneen kunnollisesti.»

»Siitä tulee hyvä», sanoin niin huolettomasti kuin voin. Tiesin

tehneeni sattuman avulla uuden havainnon, vaikka minulla ei vielä
ollut aavistusta sen laajuudesta ja merkityksestä. »Mitä te vaaditte
huoneesta?»

»Kymmenen dollaria viikolta, monsieur», vastasi hän ja katsoi

minuun silmiään siristäen.

Tiesin, ettei se ollut sen arvoinen, ja muistaen osani, peräydyin

ensimmäisestä aikeestani päättää kauppa.

»Se on liian paljon», sanoin epäröiden. »Eikö teillä ole

huokeampia huoneita, madame Jourdain?»

»Tämä tässä on ainoa huone, joka nyt on vapaana, monsieur»,

vakuutti hän.

Menin ovea kohti vähän huoaten.

»Pelkään, etten voi ottaa sitä», sanoin.

»Monsieur ei ymmärrä», intti hän. »Siihen hintaan tulee aamiainen

myös, nähkääs.»
 »Ja päivällinen?»

Hän oli kahden vaiheella ja katsoi taaskin terävästi minuun.

»Dollarilla lisää tulee päivällinenkin.»

»Olkoon menneeksi, madame!» huudahdin. »Maksan yhden viikon

etukäteen.» Suoritin summan heti. »Mutta», lisäsin sitten,
»muistakaa tuulettaa huone hyvin huomenna, täällä on niin
ummehtunutta. Vaikka toisaalta Bethune teki luonnollisesti oikein
varoessaan, ettei hänen sisarensa tekisi itselleen mitään pahaa.»

»Niin», vastasi hän nyökäyttäen päätään pistäessään huolellisesti

ja ahnein ilmein rahat vanhaan kukkaroonsa. »Niin — se oli niin
äkillistä hänelle — kaiketikin se oli äidin poismatkustaminen, joka
sen sai aikaan, niin luulen.»

Nyökkäsin miettiväisenä.

»Kun he ensin tulivat tänne, kuusi viikkoa sitten, niin oli hän aivan
terve. Mutta sitten hänen äitinsä sai jonkun paikan ja muutti pois; ja
sen perästä hän ei mennyt koskaan ulos, vaan istui täällä ja itki tai
ravisteli ovia ja ikkunoita. Hänen veljensä oli aivan epätoivoinen
hänen suhteensa — hän ei antanut kenenkään muun hoitaa häntä.
Mutta toivoakseni hän on nyt jo terve, lapsi raukka, sillä nyt hän on
äitinsä luona taas.

»Tuliko äiti noutamaan häntä?» kysyin.

»Kyllä, vähän enemmän kuin viikko sitten, ja he lähtivät yhdessä.

Tähän aikaan he ovat kyllä taas kotona rakkaassa Ranskassa.»
 Olin näyttävinäni henkilöltä, johon asia ei lainkaan kuulunut, sillä
pelkäsin, että kasvojeni ilme ilmaisisi minut. Salamannopeasti
ymmärsin kaikki. Ei ollut enää mitään asiaa koskevaa, josta madame
Jourdain olisi voinut minulle kertoa.

»Niin», toistin koettaen tehdä ääneni vakavaksi. »Niin, rakkaassa

Ranskassa!»

»Monsieur Bethune on itse ollut poissa viikon ajan», lisäsi hän

»liikeasioissa. Hän ei ollut varma tulisiko enää takaisin, mutta maksoi
kuitenkin meille viidenteentoista päivään asti.»

Nyökkäsin hänelle.

»Niin, huomenna siis muutan.»

»Laitan sen kuntoon, monsieur.»

Hetkisen olin kahden vaiheella. Käyttäisinkö hyväkseni valokuvaa?

Oliko se välttämätöntä? Miten selittäisin, että se oli minun
hallussani? Enkö jo tiennyt kaikkea, mitä madame Jourdain voi
sanoa minulle? Menin portaita kohti.

»Nyt minun täytyy mennä», sanoin, »minulla on vähän asioita

toimitettavana».

Ja me laskeusimme alakertaan yhdessä.

Ravintola oli juuri täyttymäisillään päivällisvieraiden sekalaisella

joukolla, mutta pysähdyin ainoastaan vaihtamaan päännyökkäyksen
monsieur Jourdainin kanssa ja riensin sitten pois. Pakolaiset olivat
luonnollisesti käyttäneet ranskalaista höyrylaivalinjaa, ja kiiruhdin
Morton kadulle, jonka päässä ranskalaisen linjan laituri oli. Erästä
höyrylaivaa lastattiin juuri parhaallaan matkalle lähtöä varten, ja
laiturikatos oli vielä avoinna. Eräs virkamies näytti minulle
purjehduslistaa, ja silmäys siihen vahvisti arveluni. Torstaina
huhtikuun kolmantena päivänä kello kymmenen oli La Savoie
lähtenyt Hovreen.

»Saanko nähdä La Savoien matkustajaluetteloa?» kysyin.

Hän antoi sen minulle.

Luonnollisesti en odottanutkaan löytäväni neiti Holladayn nimeä

siitä, mutta kuitenkin toivoin tarkastuksen palkitsevan vaivan, enkä
siinä erehtynytkään. Eräällä rouva G. R. Folsomilla kahden
tyttärensä kanssa oli loistohytti 436, 438, 440; höyrylaivayhtiön
luettelosta, joka minulle annettiin, näin sitäpaitsi nuoremman tyttären
nimen perään merkittynä sanan »sairas».

»La Lorraine lähtee kai ylihuomenna, vai kuinka?» kysyin.

»Niin, sir.»

»Ovatko kaikki paikat jo myydyt?»

»Ei, vuodenaika on vielä liian varhainen.» Ja hän otti esiin hyttien

luettelon ja näytti minulle niitä, jotka olivat vapaita. Valitsin
kaksoishytin ulkosivulta ja maksoin puolen lipun hinnan varatakseni
sen.

Ei ollut enää mitään tekemistä tänä iltana, sillä katsahtaessani

kelloon huomasin olevan jo myöhän. Tultuani ulos laiturikatoksesta
tunsin äkkiä olevani sekä nälkäinen että väsynyt, niin että otin ajurin
ja ajoin suoraan kotiin. Kylpy ja pieni päivällinen virkistivät minua
jälleen ja lopuksi istuuduin piippuineni levossa muistelemaan'päivän
tapauksia.

Olin kieltämättä edistynyt. Ei ollut epäilemistäkään ettenkö ollut

päässyt pakolaisten jäljille; olin saanut selon kaikesta, jota olin voinut
toivoa saavani. Ja sittenkin oli iloni lyhytaikainen. Vaikka olinkin
heidän jäljillään, niin kuinka paljon lähempänä olin itse asiassa
onnistumista? Tiesin heidän lähteneen Ranskaan, mutta mihin
osaan Ranskaa? He nousisivat maihin Hovressa — miten voisin,
tultuani parin viikon perästä Hovreen, saada selon minne päin he
olivat siitä lähteneet? Oletetaan, että he olivat matkustaneet Pariisiin,
joka oli uskottavinta, niin kuinka voin toivoa saavani heistä siellä
milloinkaan tietoa? Ja jospa vielä olisin tiedonkin saanut, niin miten
ennättäisin estää Martignyn toteuttamasta suunnitelmiaan? Pääni
meni pyörälle ajatellessani sitä tehtävää, joka nyt oli edessäni —
tavoittaa kolme henkilöä suuressa Ranskassa! Mutta ehkäpä se ei
kaikissa tapauksissa ollut »kovin suuri». Luultavasti olivat nuo naiset
jostakin niistä kaupungeista, joissa Holladay vaimoineen oli käynyt
Ranskassa oleskellessaan. Mitä kaupunkeja ne olivat, sitä en minä
luonnollisesti tiennyt, mutta sittenkin olin varma siitä, että keksisin
jonkun keinon niiden selville saamiseksi. Se oli oleva tehtäväni
seuraavana päivänä.

Puoli tuntia kului, ja istuin vielä turhissa mietteissä, katseeni

seuratessa sinisiä sikaarinsavun ylöskohoavia renkaita. Sillä olin
yhtä kaukana arvoituksen ratkaisusta kuin ennenkin. Keitä olivat
nämä ihmiset? Mikä heidän tarkoituksensa oli? Miten he olivat
voineet voittaa neiti Holladayn puolellensa kuuntelemaan
houkutusta, seuraamaan heitä, pakenemaan ystäväinsä luota —
ennen kaikkea päällikköni Roycen luota? Miten olivat he voineet
saada aikaan sellaisen muutoksen hänessä Roycea kohtaan? Taikka
olivatko he todellakin vieneet hänet pois vastoin tahtoaan? Oliko
todellakin vaara uhkaamassa, vaara, että hän samoin kuin isänsäkin
joutuisi heidän konnamaisten suunnittelujensa uhriksi? Kuka oli
Martigny? Ja ennen kaikkea, mikä oli tämän salahankkeen
tarkoituksena? Mitä hän toivoi hyötyvänsä? Mitä ajoi hän takaa?
Mikä oli se korkea tarkoitusperä, jonka eteen hän niin paljon näki
vaivaa?

Näihin kysymyksiin en voinut löytää oikeaa vastausta; harhailin

vielä pimeydessä, ja pelkässä neuvottomuudessa panin vihdoin pois
piipun, sammutin valon ja menin levolle.
XIII

Matkalla

Grahamin onnentoivotukset seuraavana aamuna ihan yllättivät

minut.

»En odottanut milloinkaan sellaista perinpohjaista ja nopeata

edistymistä, herra Lester», sanoi hän lämpimästi. »Olette suorittanut
suurtyön!»

Viittasin hänelle, että kun kaikki kävi ympäri, niin menestykseni oli
vain sattuman tulos. Jos olisin todellakin ollut terävä-älyinen, niin
olisin heti ymmärtänyt tuon asemasillalla tapahtuneen äkillisen
sairastumisen merkityksen, kiiruhtanut takaisin paikalle ja seurannut
Martignya — kuten häntä vielä ajatuksissani kutsuin — sairaalaan
hankkiakseni mahdollisesti hänen alkuperäisen osoitteensa. Jos
sallimus ei olisi suosinut minua, niin olisin ollut yhtä kaukana
arvoituksen ratkaisusta kuin ennen. Minä ihan värisin ajatellessani,
miten heikosta langasta voittoni oli riippunut.

Mutta Graham ei halunnut kuullakaan minua; hän selitti, että

ihmistä on arvosteltava hänen toimiensa mukaan ja että hän
arvosteli minua ponnistusteni tulosten mukaan.

»Otetaanpas selvä, miten ystävämme voi!» sanoi hän vihdoin ja

soitti sairaalaan.

Vastaukseksi tiedusteluumme ilmoitettiin, että potilas oli terveempi,

mutta ei pääsisi sängystä kahteen kolmeen päivään.

»Jourdainin väki kertoo hänelle kyllä, että olen ollut heidän

luonaan», sanoin. »He alkavat epäillä, ettei kaikki ole oikein, kun en
tule tänään takaisin — vaikka toisaalta voivathan he myöskin odottaa
minua pari päivää — heillähän on rahojani, ja yksi päivä on kaikki
mitä minä tarvitsen. On sitäpaitsi mahdollista, etteivät he puhu
asiasta mitään. He eivät hyödy siitä mitään — muuten heillä ei
varmaan ole mitään tekemistä salajuonen kanssa. Joka tapauksessa
en ole heidän ylettyvissään huomenna.»

Graham nyökäytti päätään.

»Niin, se on selvästi seuraava askel. Teidän on seurattava heitä

Ranskaan, mutta mistä paikoista Ranskassa etsitte heitä? Sitä en
ole ennemmin ajatellut. Vasta nyt luulen varsinaisen etsimisen
alkavankin. Pidin mahdottomana saavuttaa sitä tulosta, jonka te jo
olette saavuttanut, mutta se näyttää nyt helpolta tämän uuden
tehtävän rinnalla.»

»Niin», myönsin, »on koetettava saada selvä, minne naiset ovat

lähteneet, ja toivoakseni voi Rogers auttaa meitä siinä. Uskoni on,
että he ovat jossakin niistä kaupungeista, joissa Holladay kävi
oleskellessaan ulkomailla, ja Holladayn on täytynyt olla enemmän
taikka vähemmän yhteydessä konttorinsa kanssa siihen aikaan.»
 Päällikköni hypähti seisomaan ja otti hattunsa.

»Juuri niin, niin!» huudahti hän. »Se perustelu ei ainakaan riipu

mistään hyvästä onnesta, Lester! Tulkaa, minä seuraan teitä!»

»Pelkään, vain», lisäsin mennessämme yhdessä alas, »että

etsiskely johtaa Pariisiin, sillä Martigny on pariisilainen».

»Ja löytää joku henkilö Pariisista…»

En vastannut; purin ainoastaan hampaitani ja sanoin itsekseni

sadannen kerran, että minun täytyi onnistua.

Rogers oli edelleen hoitanut jokapäiväisiä liiketehtäviä isäntänsä

kuoleman jälkeen ja valvoi, että kaikki laskut tulisivat perityiksi sekä
piti huolta niistä moninaisista pikkuseikoista, joista oli huoli pidettävä
ennenkuin liike voi lakata. Tapasimme hänet yksityiskonttorissa ja
puhuimme hänelle heti asiamme.

»Niin, luonnollisesti herra Holladay oli yhteydessä konttorin

kanssa», sanoi hän. »Katsokaamme päivämääriä.»

»Jos alkaisimme tarkastaa kirjeenvaihtoa ensimmäiseltä

puolivuodelta vuonna 1876», esitin.

Hän otti esiin kirjesäiliön tältä ajalta ja tarkisti kirjeet.

»Niin, tässä ne ovat», sanoi hän hetken kuluttua. »Tammikuussa

hän kirjoittaa Nizzasta, jossa he näyttävät viipyneen myöskin helmi-
ja maaliskuun. Huhtikuun puolivälissä lähtivät he pohjoiseen — tässä
on kirje päivättynä Pariisissa huhtikuun 19 päivänä — ja Pariisista
menivät he erääseen Etretat nimiseen paikkaan. Siellä he viipyivät
touko-, kesä- ja heinäkuun ajan. Kaikki nämä kirjeet ovat niiltä ajoilta.
Otanko esille uuden nipun?»

»Ei, kiitos», vastasin, »mutta pyytäisin teitä tekemään luettelon

kaikista paikoista, joissa Holladay oleskeli koko ulkomailla olonsa
aikana ja lähettämään sen konttoriimme ennen iltaa, ei
myöhemmin.»

»Kyllä», sanoi hän, sitten hyvästelimme ja poistuimme.

»Mutta miksi ette antanut hänen tarkastaa pitemmälle?» kysyi

Graham ulosmennessämme.

»Siksi, että luulen löytäneeni paikan», vastasin. »Ettekö

huomannut — se aika, jolloin he oleskelivat Etretatissa, on juuri neiti
Holladayn syntymäaika, ja olen varma siitä, että näillä ihmisillä on
jotakin sen kanssa yhteistä. Meidän on haettava kartalta Etretat.»

Teimme niin, heti kun olimme tulleet takaisin konttoriin, ja saimme

selville, että se oli pieni kalastus- ja kylpypaikka Englannin kanavan
rannalla, ei kaukana pohjoiseen Hovresta.

»Arvelen, että kun lapsen syntymisen aika läheni», sanoin,

»matkusti Holladay vaimoineen Pariisiin hankkimaan ehkä kokeneen
lääkärin apua taikka ehkä sairaanhoitajaa tai liinavaatteita tai muuta
sellaista. Kun se oli tehty, he jatkoivat matkaansa Etretatiin, jossa he
kenties olivat olleet jo ennenkin ja tiesivät sen olevan hiljaisen ja
rauhallisen paikan, jossa oli vahvistava ja hyvä ilmanala — juuri
sellainen paikka, jota he aivan luonnollisesti halusivat. Täällä syntyi
tyttö, ja täältä, siitä olen vakuutettu, tulemme löytämään arvoituksen
avaimen, vaikka en nyt voi arvioida, miten asia sittemmin kehkeytyy.
Mutta minulla on muuan aavistus — naurakaa vain jos haluatte —
minulla on aavistus siitä, että löydän Etretatista etsimäni
johtolangan.»

Kun nyt muistelen noita sanoja, tuntuu minusta siltä kuin en olisi
ollut aivan vähän narrimainen ja itseeni luottava; mutta kun katsoo
tulosta… No niin, missään tapauksessa ei päällikölläni ollut halua
nauraa, vaan hän istui muutamien silmänräpäysten ajan syviin
ajatuksiin vaipuneena.

»En epäile, etteikö perustelunne ole oikea», sanoi hän vihdoin.

»Olipa miten oli, joka tapauksessa luotan teidän kokemukseenne,
varsinkin kun minulla itselläni ehdottomasti ei sitä ole tällaisissa
asioissa. Minun ei tarvitse sanoa, että minulla on rajaton luottamus
teihin. Järjestän heti niin, että saatte rahojennostovaltuuden, niin
ettei teidän tarvitse kärsiä rahanpuutetta — sanommeko viisituhatta
dollaria aluksi?»

Änkytin jotakin, että mielestäni siinä oli enemmän kuin tarpeeksi,

mutta hän keskeytti minut viittauksella.

»Saatte nähdä, että ulkomaanmatkat maksavat enemmän kuin

luulettekaan», sanoi hän. »Ja voihan tapahtua, että rahoista on teille
aineellista hyötyäkin tiedusteluissanne. Teillä pitää olla kaikkea mitä
tarvitsette, älkää siis säästäkö! Kun tarvitsette lisää, niin älkää
epäröikö kääntyä puoleemme!»

Kiitin häntä ja olin juuri ottamaisillani hyvästit, sillä minulla oli

vähän matkatavaroiden järjestämistä ja yksityisasioita hoidettavana,
kun tuli kirje tohtori Jenkinsonilta. Graham hymyili sitä lukiessaan.

»Royce on parempi», sanoi hän, »paljon parempi. Hän kysyy teitä,

ja Jenkinsonin mielestä olisi hyvä, jos menisitte hänen luokseen,
varsinkin jos teillä on hyviä uutisia mukananne.»

»Juuri niitä, niin!» huudahdin. »Kaikessa tapauksessa minun on

mentävä sanomaan hänelle jäähyväiset.»

Ja puolen tunnin kuluttua minut vietiin Roycen huoneeseen. Hän

oli puoleksi makaavassa asennossa suuressa lepotuolissa ja näytti
kalpealta ja heikolta, mutta sai väriä niin pian kuin näki minut ja
ojensi minulle innokkaasti kätensä.

»En voinut kauemmin odottaa, Lester», alkoi hän. »Minusta tuntuu

siltä kuin olisi kulunut kokonainen ihmisikä siitä kun olen nähnyt
teidät. Olisin lähettänyt noutamaan teitä jo ennemminkin, mutta
tiesin, että aikanne oli varattu.»

»Niin», sanoin hymyillen, »aikani on ollut todellakin varattua».

»Käykää istumaan ja kertokaa!» pyysi hän. »Kaikki, joka ainoa

pikku asia!»

Ovi avautui hänen puhuessaan, ja tohtori Jenkinson tuli sisään.

»Tohtori», kysyin, »kuinka paljon voi tälle sairaalle tehdä mieliksi?

Hän pyytää minua kertomaan erään jutun hänelle.»

»Onko se hupainen?» kysyi tohtori.

»Kyllä, sangen hupainen.»

»Kertokaa sitten! Saanko viipyä ja kuunnella myöskin?»

»Kernaasti», sanoimme Royce ja minä samalla kertaa, ja tohtori

siirsi tuolinsa esiin.
 Kerroin niin lyhyesti kuin voin kaiken, mitä oli tapahtunut viimeisinä
kahtena päivänä sekä siitä sattumankaupasta, jolla olin saanut
hakemani osoitteen. Roycen katse säteili, kun olin lopettanut.

»Ja te matkustatte Ranskaan huomenna?» kysyi hän.

»Huomisaamuna, laiva lähtee kello kymmenen.»

»Minä tulen mukaanne!» virkkoi hän.

»Mutta», änkytin hämmästyneenä hänen innostaan, »onko teillä

voimia siihen? Olisin hyvin iloinen saadessani seuraa, mutta
luuletteko todellakin voivanne? Mitä sanotte, tohtori?»

Jenkinson hymyili.

»Se ei ole mikään typerä ajatus», sanoi hän. »Herra Royce

tarvitsee lepoa ja rauhaa enemmän kuin mitään muuta, ja hänen
täytyy saada viikon lepo merellä, mikä on paljon enemmän kuin hän
voi täällä saada. Hänen aivonsa eivät voi pysyä hiljaa, olisipa hän
missä tahansa. Täällä hän vain huolittelisi, mutta yhdessä teidän
kanssanne hän olisi tyytyväinen. Sitäpaitsi on hänen oltava muassa,
sillä aavistan löytöretken onnistuvan!»

Minäkin uskoin samoin; mutta Jenkinsonin sanoissa huomasin

vain sen houkuttelevan, miellyttävän optimismin, joka oli auttanut
häntä niin paljon tullakseen siksi taitavaksi lääkäriksi, joka hän oli.
Puristin taas Roycen kättä ilosta saada hänet mukaani. Mitä häneen
tulee, niin hän näytti aivan kuin muuttuneen, ja Jenkinson katsoi
häneen hiljaisen tyytyväisyyden ilmein.

»Teidän on laitettava matkatavarat kuntoon», sanoin. »Voinko

minä olla mitenkään apunanne?»
 »Ette, sairaanhoitajatar saa sen tehdä tämän tohtorin avulla»,
vastasi hän nauraen. »Teidän on pidettävä huoli omista
matkatavaroistanne ja varmaan ajateltava kaikkea muuta
mahdollista. Sitäpaitsi ei meistä kumpikaan tarvitse paljon
matkatavaroita. Älkää unohtako varata tuota toista hyttinne kojua
minulle.»

»En», sanoin ja nousin. »Tulen noutamaan teitä huomisaamuna.»

»Hyvä; olen silloin matkakunnossa.»

Tohtori seurasi minua ulos antaakseen muutamia varovaisuutta

tarkoittavia hyviä neuvoja. Royce oli vielä kaukana
parantumisestaan; hän ei saanut vaivata itseään ylenmäärin; häntä
oli niin paljon kuin mahdollista pidettävä iloisella mielellä ja hyvissä
toiveissa; ennen kaikkea hän ei saanut olla huolissaan; levollisuus ja
meri-ilma saisivat aikaan muun.

Kiiruhdin takaisin konttoriin ilmoittautuakseni viimeisen kerran

päällikölleni ja saadakseni sen otteen, jonka Rogers oli luvannut
lähettää minulle ja joka jo odotti minua työpöydälläni. Graham oli
oikein iloinen saadessaan tietää kumppaninsa tekevän minulle
seuraa, vaikka hän meidän poissaolomme vuoksi selvästi sai itse
lisätyötä. Tiedustelut vuokra-ajuritoimistoissa olivat olleet
tuloksettomat, mutta epäilin nyt, että Martigny oli itse vuokrannut
vaunut ja ehkäpä vielä itse ollut ajurina — niin helppoa ja käsillä
olevaa keinoa meidän eksyttämiseksemme vakoiluissa hän tuskin
olisi päästänyt käsistänsä.

Suoritin loppuun eräät tehtävät, jotka vielä vaativat huomiotani,

jonka jälkeen vihdoin sanoin jäähyväiset Grahamille lähtien kotiini.
Tavaroiden kuntoonlaittaminen oli pian suoritettu, ja heittäydyin
mukavaan tuoliini ajatellakseni viimeisen sikaarin kanssa asemaa.

Edellisenä päivänä olin kuullut jotakin, jota en voinut ymmärtää.

Olin saanut toteen, että kaksi naista oli sekaantuneena asiaan, ja
uskoin heidän olevan äidin ja tyttären, mutta minun oli mahdotonta
käsittää, minkä vuoksi nuorempaan heistä oli koskenut niin kipeästi
se, että vanhempi oli lähtenyt pois neiti Holladayn kanssa. Mietin
kaikin tavoin, mutta en voinut keksiä mitään uskottavaa syytä. Olihan
tosin mahdollista, että tuo nuorempi oli jo alkanut katua
osallisuuttansa salaliitossa (ei ollut epäilemistäkään, etteikö se ollut
hän, joka oli riistänyt Holladayn hengen), vieläpä, että hän oli
kieltäytynyt olemasta enää mukana hankkeessa ja että hänen
rikostoverinsa näkivät välttämättömäksi sulkea hänet sisään, mutta
sittenkin se näytti niin epätodenmukaiselta, että minun oli vaikea
uskoa sitä. Kuta enemmän punnitsin asiaa, sitä enemmän aloin
epäillä Godfreyn selityksen paikkansa pitävyyttä, vaikka minulla ei
ollut mitään muuta selitystä asetettavana tilalle; hukuin arvailujen
sokkeloihin, ja lopuksi minun täytyi luopua yrityksestä ratkaista
arvoitus ja mennä levolle.

Sopimuksen mukaan noudin Roycen, ja yhdessä ajoimme Morton

kadulle. Hänkin oli tyytynyt vain yhteen laukulliseen matkatavaroita.
Tapasimme erään merimiehen, joka kantoi ne hyttiimme, menimme
sen jälkeen ulos kannelle katselemaan viimeisiä lähtövalmistuksia.
Laiturilla vallitsi sellainen melu, jota saa nähdä vain Atlantin-laivan
lähtiessä. Viimeiset lastitavarat vietiin laivaan vimmaisella kiireellä:
laiva ja laituri olivat ahdetut täyteen kansaa, joka oli tullut
hyvästelemään ystäviään; kaksi hinaajalaivaa puhkui valtamerilaivan
vieressä, valmiina auttamaan meitä ulos virralle. Matkatoverini näytti
aivan terveeltä, ja häntä tuntui huvittavan hyörinä ja pyörinä yhtä
paljon kuin minuakin. Hän punehtui ilosta, kun sai nähdä Grahamin
tunkeutuvan luoksemme ihmisjoukon läpi.

»Oletpa kovin ystävällinen!» huudahti hän ja tarttui Grahamin

käteen. »Tiedän, kuinka paljon tekemistä konttorissa nyt on, kun me
molemmat hylkäämme sinut tällä tavoin.»

»Sh! sh!» vaiensi Graham hänet hymyillen. »Sinä tarvitset hetken

vapautta, vai kuinka? En voinut antaa sinun lähteä jäähyväisittä.
Sitäpaitsi», lisäsi hän, »sain juuri tänä aamuna tietää, että kaksi
hyvin rakasta ystävääni matkustaa tällä laivalla — rouva Kemball ja
hänen tyttärensä — Jim Kemballin leski, sinä tiedät».

Royce nyökäytti päätään. »Minäkin muistin nimen — Jim Kemball

oli ollut New Yorkin parhaita lakimiehiä kaksikymmentä vuotta sitten
ja olisi varmasti tehnyt nimensä kuuluisaksi, jollei olisi ennen
aikojaan kuollut. Olin kuullut satoja kertomuksia hänestä.»

»Esittelisin teidät mielelläni», jatkoi Graham katsellen ympärilleen

joka suunnalle. »Ah, tuolla he ovat!» ja hän veti kumppaniaan
mukanaan laivan keulaan päin.

Näin hänen kumartavan eräälle harmaapäiselle, pienelle

rouvashenkilölle sekä eräälle nuoremmalle ja pitemmälle, joka seisoi
selkä minuun päin. He tarinoivat ja nauroivat yhdessä hetkisen,
kunnes soitettiin viimeisen kerran ja laivan virkailijat alkoivat poistaa
vieraita laivasta. Suuntasin uudelleen huomioni laiturille, mutta sain
heti paikalla taas aiheen kääntyä ympäri, sillä Graham huusi minua.

»Luulin, että olimme kadottaneet teidät, hyvä Lester», sanoi hän

leppeästi. »Saanko esittää teidät rouva Kemballille ja hänen
tyttärelleen, jotka tulevat olemaan matkatovereitanne! Herra Lester
on tavattoman hauska ja kekseliäs nuori mies», lisäsi hän kääntyen
naisiin. »Antakaa hänen hauskuttaa teitä!»

Ja sen sanottuaan kiiruhti hän matkaansa ennättääkseen

rantaportaan yli, ennenkuin se vedettiin sisään.

Kumarsin rouva Kemballille ja ajattelin itsekseni, etten ollut

koskaan nähnyt rakastettavampia, miellyttävämpiä kasvoja. Hetkisen
sen jälkeen katsoin siniseen silmäpariin, jotka kerrassaan
hurmasivat minut.

»Älkäämme unohtako herra Grahamin neuvoa», sanoi hilpeä ääni.

»Siispä valmistautukaa kohtaloonne, herra Lester!»

Samassa kuului kovaa parkunaa takaani rantalaudalta, ja siniset

silmät katsoivat ohi olkapääni ylitse.

»Katsokaa», sanoi hän, »ihmisparkaa, joka näkyy tulleen liian

myöhään».

Käännyin ympäri ja katsoin rautaportaalle päin. Sen toinen pää oli

juuri heitetty irti, mutta kaksi merimiestä oli kuitenkin auttamassa
uutta matkustajaa pääsemään sille. Hän näytti heikolta ja
avuttomalta, ja he tukivat häntä, yksi kummaltakin puolelta.
Väkinäinen huudahdus nousi huulilleni saadessani nähdä hänet;
tukehdutin sen. Sillä se oli Martigny, joka oli noussut
sairasvuoteestaan seuratakseen meitä.