““MacGregor shrugged. 'More than the population are opium addicts,' he said. 'Don't dismiss it like that,' she told him impatiently. 'I'm not dismissing it,' he said softly. 'I'm trying to show you what it really means.' 'But are they all like that?' 'Not that bad.' 'But why....' He lifted his hands. 'To forget the difficulty of keeping alive. To keep out the cold, to forget their hunger and their misery.' 'They ought to prevent it,' she said. 'Who ought to prevent it?' he asked slowly. 'I don't know. Who allows it? Who is responsible?' 'The gentlemen in Teheran to whom we give our unqualified support. Opium helps to keep the population too stupefied and too broken to do anything about their miserable conditions. We support men here, knowing that opium is part of their means of maintaining position and authority. If you really want to know who is responsible, I suppose we are. Some of our most influential friends in the Government are landlords of large opium growing areas.””
