Fuck. Court leapt out of his seat, grabbed his bag from the rack over him, and began walking to the back of the train. If he was under threat here on board, he would rather be at one end of the train or the other so he would not have to defend in both directions.
As he began moving, Russ said, “Settle down. Nobody at Townsend knows. Only me.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I saw you. I didn’t see which train you got on, but there were only four that left around the time you left, and three went either north or west. I figure you’d want to head south; you’ll want to ditch Scandinavia totally at this point with all the heat on you so you can get back on the Continent and melt away.” He added, “That’s what I’d do. So that’s what you’re doing.”
Court moved through the gangway between two cars, entered a dining car, and continued on toward the rear. “Why were you at the station?”
“I told you. Townsend is suspicious of me, and they’ve cut me out of the op.”
“So?”
“So… I had to find another way to help you out.”
Court felt a cold unease welling up inside him. Something about the tone of the man’s voice, something about the realization that Dead Eye had been watching him. Something about Court’s more than intimate knowledge of the training, skills, and abilities of a man with Dead Eye’s background, all led to this sense of foreboding.
He passed through the second-to-last car now and asked, “How, exactly, did you help me?”
The dread he felt in the answer manifested itself into bile burning in his stomach.
“That’s irrelevant, Violator. You’re clear, and that’s all you need to—”
In a harsh whisper Court barked, “What the hell did you do?”
Ruth had spent the last ten minutes in the bathroom in the back of the rear car disguising herself so she could move through the train to find Gentry. She had slipped on a short black wig and put on even more dramatic makeup than she’d been wearing the evening before when she’d been face-to-face with him at the bar. She put on tortoiseshell eyeglasses, the frames uncorrected, and they added a studious, almost mousy quality to her disguise.
She also removed her coat. She’d worn the reverse side this morning, switching it from black to gray, but she knew a man with Gentry’s training would have probably noticed this feature to her coat, and he’d be on the lookout for both colors.
Finding Court on board without him seeing her would be a difficult task. Both the first— and second-class cars were divided with half the seats facing one way and the other half facing the other, with the dividing line in the center of the car. This meant each time she stepped into a new carriage there existed a fifty-fifty chance Gentry would be facing her direction, although if he were it would also mean he was at least forty feet away.
She put her hand on the door lever from the gangway to the first carriage and looked up through the glass, and there, on the far end of the car, Gentry approached, a mobile phone in his hand. He wore a black thermal undershirt and blue jeans, with his backpack slung over his shoulder and his coat lashed to it.
Ruth spun away, hoping like hell he either did not see her at all or only saw her short black hair and movement through the Plexiglas doorway.
She quickly stepped back into the bathroom, shut the door behind her, and locked it.
Just then, outside the door to the bathroom, she heard the unmistakable sound of the carriage door opening and closing. A moment later she heard the low mumbling of a male voice, and although she could not make out a word of it, she could tell Gentry was standing in the gangway, right outside her door, talking on his phone.
She fought a wave of panic. The man who had just killed Mike Dillman stood feet from her now. She did not think he knew she was in here — it seemed unlikely he would continue on with his call if he did — but she worried he would stand there for some time, see the OCCUPIED sign on the door, and begin to wonder why the person inside did not leave.
She reached into her purse for her Mace, although she had no real belief that she could incapacitate the legendary Gray Man with an aerosol spray.
Gentry leaned against the wall in the gangway of the rear train car, keeping his eyes on the passenger carriage in front of him in case any threats approached. He kept his voice down because someone was in the bathroom next to him.
“I’m not going to ask you again. What happened in Stockholm?”
Russ had been cagey, but with a long sigh he relented. “It was Mossad, dude. They weren’t going to let you just hop on a train and roll out of there.”
“And?”
“And there was one guy between you and freedom.” A short pause. “I neutralized him.”
“Killed him?”
“Only way, Court. I know that probably violates your weird moral code and fragile sensibilities, but he was as big a threat to you, more of a threat to you, in fact, than any of the Townsend guys or the Sidorenko guys you killed last week.”
Court slammed the back of his head against the wall of the train car in frustration.
“You murdered an Israeli intelligence officer? You stupid fuck!”
“Watch your tone, Violator! I saved your life. Just like I did in Tallinn. You should be kissing my ass for all I’ve done for you.”
Court understood now. Not everything, but enough. Russ wanted Gentry alive, because Russ needed Gentry alive. “This is about Kalb, isn’t it?” There was no answer, and Gentry banged the back of his head against the wall again. “It’s you. You’re the one after Kalb.”
After a short pause, Russ’s voice darkened as he replied, “I guess you and your Jew girlfriend had quite a conversation last night.”
“That was you in Nice, wasn’t it? You smoked Amir Zarini.”
“It wasn’t me, Court. Ask around. Ask anyone.” He laughed, then said, “It was you.”
“That was your plan?”
With a little chuckle he said, “Affirmative.”
“Why?”
“Think about it, genius.”
Court did, and it did not take long. “You want to kill Kalb. You needed my name to get the contract. And then to survive after the fact, you need me to take the fall.”
Russ said, “I thought I had myself a bulletproof plan. But it only works as long as you remain alive. Frankly, Violator, you have been the weak link in this whole thing. I guess I shouldn’t have believed all the hype about you. You’ve got the shakes, you’re talking about retirement, there are so many people following you right now it must look like you’re leading a Mardi Gras parade down the motherfucking street. The Gray Man legend is a goddamned joke.”
“What’s keeping me from calling the CIA, or Mossad, or Townsend, and telling them about this plot of yours?”
“Go ahead. I’m still going to get to Kalb, so you won’t prevent that. Sure, CIA might take me off their Christmas card list, but it’s not going to help your situation with them. Mossad won’t believe you; I’ve planted too many trackbacks to you, to where you can’t just call them up and say you’re an innocent bystander. And Townsend will be pissed, but they get paid to kill you, not me, so they’re still coming at you with everything they have.”
“Is all this just about money?”
Russ laughed out loud. “Ha! That’s pretty funny, coming from the most infamous killer-for-hire on the planet. Of course it’s about money.”
Court did not believe him. There was something more. There had to be. This guy was unstable. “How did you slip through the cracks? How did you make it through the AADP and into active duty with the agency? Did the standards drop after I went through?”