Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History (11 page)

Taylor had been in Tehran since 1977 and had garnered a reputation for being decisive and calm under pressure for his handling of the evacuation of a sizable contingent of Canadian nationals just weeks before the shah had abdicated.

Sheardown had been relatively certain that Taylor would support his decision to help the Americans. Like Sheardown, Taylor was disgusted by the notion that innocent diplomats should be taken hostage and used by a government as leverage. Almost immediately after the attack, Taylor had begun working with the heads of other foreign embassies in Tehran to try to lodge an official protest of some kind against the Iranian government. In addition, a few days after the takeover, he’d been asked by the U.S. State Department to liaise with Bruce Laingen at the Iranian foreign ministry, which he would eventually do a week later, bringing with him, among other things, books and a bottle of English Leather cologne that was actually filled with single-malt scotch.

Sheardown explained his phone call with Anders and brought Taylor up to speed. He reiterated that the Americans were safe for the moment but would probably need a place to stay very soon. Taylor, to his credit, didn’t hesitate, and agreed that they should do whatever they could to help. The two then began discussing the
best place to hide the Americans. The Canadian embassy had the benefit of security, but was heavily trafficked and didn’t have any living quarters. In addition, it was located downtown, close to the U.S. embassy. In the end they decided they would split the Americans between Sheardown’s and Taylor’s private residences. Both were in a quiet part of town and, more important, far away from the U.S. embassy. As an added bonus, the houses also fell under the protection of diplomatic immunity, not that that amounted to much in Iran. But it was something.

At that point, Taylor began working on a cable to send back to Ottawa, in the hopes of obtaining his government’s official permission. In it he outlined his own opinions on the matter and also the plan that he and Sheardown had just worked out.

Of America’s many allies, Canada had been one of the most outspoken in condemning Iran for the embassy attack, and it took only a day for Taylor to get his answer, which arrived the following morning. In the cable from Ottawa, he was told to use discretion, but was given a green light to do whatever he thought necessary to help the Americans. The approval had come directly from the Canadian prime minister, Joseph Clark.

The timing could not have been more fortuitous for the fugitive Americans. Bob Anders called Sheardown a second time from Kate Koob’s house Saturday morning just hours after Taylor had received the cable.

“Well, John,” Anders said. “I guess now’s the time.”

“Do you have a way of getting over here?” Sheardown asked.

“Not really,” Anders responded. He explained how the two British staffers had driven them over to Graves’s house, and Sheardown agreed to track them down.

“Sit tight,” he said.

The cars came to pick them up a little after one o’clock in the afternoon. Anders had explained to Sheardown that Koob’s was right down the street from Graves’s house and the drivers had no trouble finding the place. It wasn’t ideal to be navigating the afternoon traffic, but the British staffers knew the roads well and kept off the main avenues.

Sheardown’s house was located in the fashionable Shemiran district, Tehran’s version of Beverly Hills. Situated on the heights in the northern part of the city, the hilly neighborhood, with its large walled compounds and neatly trimmed gardens, was popular with senior diplomats, wealthy Iranians, and foreign businesspeople.

When the cars carrying the Americans arrived, Sheardown was waiting out front, watering the sidewalk with a garden hose. It might have seemed incongruous, but it gave him a plausible reason to keep an eye on the street. There was a construction site up the road and it was often crowded with young Iranian workers, some milling about with nothing to do. As the cars approached, John waved them into his detached garage and followed in after them, closing the door behind him.

Inside the safety of the garage, the Americans climbed out and John greeted everyone warmly. “It’s good to see you again,” Anders told him. After Anders had made the introductions, everyone followed Sheardown up a flight of stairs and into the main house.

Once inside, the group was introduced to Zena, as well as Ken Taylor, who had driven up while everyone was still in the garage. The Americans were instantly made to feel welcome. Zena had prepared some snacks and drinks, and everyone took a seat in the living room. They spent a few minutes chatting, relating the events of
their escape as well as the news about the hostage crisis. They were told that both of President Carter’s envoys, Ramsey Clark and William Miller, had been refused entry into Iran and their plane was sitting on the tarmac in Turkey. At one point Mark embarrassed himself by standing up and asking if the Canadian ambassador was aware of their situation. Mark was concerned that maybe Sheardown was acting on his own and they were in for a repeat of Gholhak Gardens if Sheardown lost his nerve. Taylor had introduced himself earlier by name only, and Mark hadn’t realized who he was. Sheardown couldn’t resist. “Of course the Canadian ambassador knows,” he responded. “He’s sitting right next you.”

Everyone shared a laugh at Mark’s expense, but it was a great relief to know that there was a government supporting them. For the first time since their escape they felt truly safe.

As planned, the group was to be divided up between the Sheardown and Taylor residences. The Lijeks and Bob Anders would stay with the Sheardowns while the Staffords would go with Taylor. Taylor explained that he had quite a large domestic staff and any more than two visitors would probably raise some suspicions. The group was somewhat unhappy about splitting up but understood the logic of why it was necessary. At this point, everyone was still thinking that the hostage crisis would be resolved in a matter of weeks, if not days, and they would all be able to go on with their everyday lives.

Cora, Mark, and Bob spent the remainder of the afternoon familiarizing themselves with the layout of the Sheardowns’ house. The place was palatial, seventeen rooms by one count. The house sat perched on a hillside, spilling down from a road above through a multitude of levels until it reached the street below. It was
actually possible to walk out onto the road above from the top floor, which would provide them with an escape route of sorts. The Americans were given their own rooms on an upper floor, separated from the master suite, which was on the top floor. The best part about the house, however, was that it contained an interior courtyard, which would allow the Americans to spend time outside without having to risk being seen on the street. Cooped up as they were, an hour of sunshine was priceless.

Sheardown explained that there was a local komiteh group that sometimes patrolled the neighborhood, but he told them not to worry as they seldom hassled the residents. However, he did warn them about his gardener, who also belonged to the komiteh. As long as they stayed out of sight when he was around, they should be fine.

Joe and Kathy, meanwhile, were driven by the Canadian ambassador over to his residence, an imposing white mansion with two-story columns marching across its facade, set back from the street and separated from it by an eight-foot wall. Waiting for them inside was Ken’s wife, Pat, who’d been born in Australia but was of Chinese ancestry. Pat was a woman with boundless energy, and in addition to her duties as the ambassador’s wife, she was a research scientist at Tehran’s national blood transfusion service. She showed the Staffords around the house, explaining to the Iranian staff that they were simply guests from out of town. Despite the fact that the house had a spacious back lawn, it was recommended that they stay inside as the neighbors might be able to see them.

The following day, Taylor cabled Ottawa to let them know that the Americans had been taken in and were safe. In order to be as discreet as possible, in the cable he referred to the five simply as the “houseguests.”

It wasn’t long before the Lijeks and Anders settled into a routine at the Sheardowns’. In the morning, everyone would tend to keep to themselves, waking up at different times and making their own breakfast. Early on this had been a challenge since the only way into the kitchen was past a large window and glass door, through which they could easily be seen by the gardener. Realizing it was going to be a long stay if they couldn’t use the kitchen, they devised a solution by smearing shoe polish on the glass, which obscured the view.

After breakfast they would either read or find other ways to pass the time. Anders took to sunning himself and exercising in the courtyard, and developed a surprisingly good tan. Cora, meanwhile, remembers sleeping a lot. Mark decided to try growing a beard, something he’d always wanted to do. In the early afternoon the group would congregate in the den to talk and wait for John to get home. Zena tended to stick to herself in the master bedroom.

The Staffords, for their part, followed a similar routine. After breakfast Joe would invariably gravitate toward the radio in the den, where he would listen to the hourly newscasts and jot down notes. In the afternoon Pat would come home and keep Kathy and Joe company until Ken came home later that evening. Shy at first, the rattled Staffords needed some time before they truly felt comfortable in front of their hosts. And even then, Joe was never quite able to get over the feeling that he and his wife were imposing on them.

In the early days of their stay, John Sheardown had a TV and so the Americans were introduced to the spectacle of the hostage crisis. As Anders and the Lijeks watched footage of their former colleagues being paraded in front of news cameras, the one salient
detail that became painfully apparent was how poorly treated the hostages looked. Cora found the images particularly disturbing. It was a real wake–up call—as if they needed one—that they were incredibly lucky to have gotten out.

Among those paraded across the TV screen were some of their colleagues working at the consulate the day it was captured. The other group of six Americans had been marched back to the ambassador’s residence, where they spent the first few days of their captivity bound hand and foot to chairs in the mansion’s formal dining room. They were not permitted to talk, or lie down, or even bathe, for that matter. Some, including Dick Morefield, were forced to undergo mock executions, while others underwent the indignity of being beaten and made to lie for long periods of time on cold, wet concrete without so much as a blanket. Eventually, one by one, they were brought before a group of militants, where they were interrogated and accused of being spies working for the CIA. Kathryn Koob and Bill Royer fared no better. All of them, with the exception of Richard Queen, who was released in July 1980 for health reasons, would remain in captivity for 444 days.

O
n November 21, Taylor received a curious phone call from the Swedish ambassador, Kaj Sundberg. The ambassador sheepishly explained that he had a bit of a problem that he was hoping Taylor could help out with.

Around this time, the militants had been able to find two alias passports made for two of the suspected CIA officers stationed at the embassy and were ramping up their rhetoric about trying the captured Americans as spies. The fact that the two passports were
found was a huge embarrassment to the U.S. government and the CIA. It was also a cause of great concern to the Swedish ambassador, who began to worry about the repercussions of harboring Lee Schatz. It was then that Sundberg thought of Taylor, and after explaining his situation, asked if the Canadian ambassador would be willing to help. Taylor didn’t bat an eye, telling the ambassador that since he already had five Americans, it would be easy to just add Schatz to the group. This news, and Taylor’s nonchalance, flustered the Swedish ambassador, who’d had no idea that there were other Americans who had escaped.

While the Americans staying with the Canadians had been on the run, Lee Schatz had passed the time at Cecilia Lithander’s high-rise apartment in northern Tehran. He spent his days reading and avoiding the housekeeper, who came practically every morning. Cecilia had explained to the housekeeper that Lee was a friend of hers who was visiting, but he found it awkward to be hanging around every day while she did her cleaning. In the evening, Cecilia would come home and they would eat dinner and talk about any new developments in the hostage crisis. Some days they would take walks in the neighborhood, wandering through the crowded local market. No one ever bothered him, and it didn’t occur to Lee that he might be running a risk. “When you are a diplomat, you never think it is going to happen to you,” he would later say. He had kept in constant touch with Joe Stafford by phone, and knew the other five Americans had found a home and were safe, but he didn’t know where. For security reasons, neither told the other where they were staying. After two weeks, however, what was initially looking like a temporary situation was becoming more and more permanent, and the Swedish government was growing nervous.

Schatz wasn’t told about the call between the Swedish ambassador and Ken Taylor, or the fact that he was going to be moved. He remembers being in Cecilia’s apartment one day when he suddenly heard a key jiggling in the lock. The sound startled him, since Cecilia had already gone off to work and the cleaning lady had the day off. He braced for the possibility that a crowd of angry Iranians might burst through the door. Instead it was just Cecilia, who told him she had some important news. “We made arrangements for you to leave and I really can’t tell you any more than that. Someone will be here in a few minutes and you are to go with them. Don’t worry—it’s okay,” she told him.

Schatz was instantly spooked.
Fuck me,
he thought.
This does not sound good.

He put the few things he had acquired into a backpack, including a sixteen-foot collapsible ruler, which for some reason he’d had with him on the day of the attack.