In a moment of perspective, the Gray Man realized there were few people on earth more wanted than he, so Court allowed he was, by definition, likely a shadier fucker than either of these two Somalis.
Gentry banged on the little iron door with an open left hand. His right hovered above the Walther pistol in his waistband and hidden under his wet jacket. There was no answer after a minute and a further knock. Finally Court found a little plastic intercom button tucked into the upper left corner of the doorway, “Szabo? I need your help. I can pay.”
A tinny response through the intercom. “References?” His accent was unmistakably Hungarian, but his English was good. The tone of his voice was sheer boredom. A clerk in a paint store. Court was just the next of a long line of customers reaching the counter to inquire about goods.
“I’m one of Donald Fitzroy’s men.” Though Szabo was not a Network asset, he would certainly know of Sir Donald.
A pause just long enough for Court to worry ended with a buzz and the sound of remote-controlled door locks clicking open. Court pushed in the iron door warily, knelt, and entered a dark hall behind it, followed a pinprick of light fifty feet on. The light was another doorway, and through it Court found a large workshop, part science lab, part library, and part photo studio. Laszlo was there, sitting at a desk against the wall. He turned to face his visitor.
Szabo wore his gray hair long over his shoulders. His clothes were Hungarian drab, black jeans and a polyester shirt open halfway down to expose his rail-thin chest. He was sixty, but an East bloc sixty, which looked eighty in the face but thirty in the physique. A life of physicality, a life of hardship. He appeared to Court something like an aging rock star who still fancied himself a catch.
He stared at Court for a long time. “A familiar face,” he said. “Without the beard and the rainwater, perhaps I would know you?”
Court knew Szabo had never seen his face. He’d worn a balaclava mask when he took down Szabo’s lair with the Goon Squad in 2004, plus it had been dark and the action quick and confusing.
“Don’t believe so,” said Gentry, looking around the room for security threats. Wires hung off the walls like ivy, tables and shelves of equipment and boxes and books, locked file cabinets along the wall, a full-sized photography studio in the corner with a camera on a tripod facing a chair on a riser.
“An American. Thirty-five years old. Height five eleven, weight one seventy. You don’t carry yourself like a soldier or a cop, which is good.” Court remembered fragments from the man’s dossier. Szabo had been trained by the Soviets in electronic surveillance and forgery and other nonlethal black arts, he’d been used to spy on his own people by the Russians, but he had played for both teams, giving Moscow information on his countrymen while providing well-off Hungarians with escapes to get them through the Iron Curtain.
His marginal and conditional and halfhearted help of his own people had proven to be just enough to keep a knife out of his chest after the fall of the Soviet Union, though Gentry remembered reading that Laszlo had been no stranger to getting his ass kicked in retaliation for his association with Moscow.
“I’m just a man who needs some of your product. In a hurry,” Court said.
Laszlo stood up and reached for a cane leaning against the desk. He leaned heavily on it as he crossed the room to his visitor. Court noted the Hungarian’s slumped body and severe limp. This injury had developed since he last saw him five years ago.
After an eternity, Szabo arrived in front of Court, leaned well into his personal space. Put a hand up to the American’s chin and turned his head left and right.
“What sort of product?”
“A passport. Clean, not fake. I need it now. I’ll pay for the extra trouble.”
Laszlo nodded. “How is Norris?”
“Norris?”
“Sir Donald Fitzroy’s son, of course.”
“You mean Phillip.”
“Yes. Does Sir Donald still have the summer place in Brighton?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Neither would I, to be honest,” Szabo allowed with a sheepish shrug.
Court said, “I understand your need to establish my bona fides, but I am in a rush.”
Szabo nodded, hobbled to a little bench, one of a dozen in the room and each in front of a different table or desk covered with computers, microscopes, papers, cameras, and other gear. “Fitzroy has his own network. His own facilitators of documentation. Why would you be slumming with Laszlo?”
“I need someone good. And someone quick. Everyone knows you’re the best.”
The Hungarian nodded. “Maybe that’s just flattery, but you are exactly right. Laszlo is the best.” He relaxed. “I’ll do a great job for you; maybe you can speak to Fitzroy about the service. Put in a good word for Laszlo, you understand.”
Court knew to loathe men who referred to themselves in the third person. But he also knew to be polite when in need. “You get me out of here with clean papers in under an hour, and I will do just that.”
Szabo seemed pleased. He nodded. “I recently came into possession of a consignment of Belgian passports. New serial numbers, not reported stolen. Perfectly legitimate.”
Court shook his head emphatically. “No. Two-thirds of the stolen passports on the market are Belgian. They are guaranteed extra scrutiny. I need something less obvious.”
“An informed customer. I respect that.” Laszlo stood, leaned on his cane, and made his way to another desk. He strummed his fingers on a little notebook full of pencil scratches. Then he looked up. “Yes. I suppose you could pass as a Kiwi. I’ve had a few New Zealand passports for a long time. Most of my clients these days are Africans or Arabs… Can’t pull off a Kiwi, needless to say. Like I said, these books have been around a while, but Laszlo can doctor the serial number when I put in your information without tainting the hologram. No way it can be traced back to a missing lot.”
“Fine.”
Szabo sat back down and blew out a sigh that showed Gentry the movement was tiring and uncomfortable for him. “Five thousand euros.”
Gentry nodded, pulled the money from his pack, showed it to Laszlo, but did not hand it over.
“What about your appearance? I can photograph you as you are, or we can create something more professional.”
“I’d like to clean up first.”
“I’ve got a shower. A razor. A suit coat and tie that should fit you. You ready yourself while Laszlo works on the papers.”
Court walked down a hall and sniffed his way to a bathroom that reeked with body odor and mildew. The shower was equipped with soap and razors and shears, all laid out for operators and illegal immigrants and criminals who needed to camouflage their nastiness for a few minutes in order to pose for a photograph intended to portray them to cops and border control agents as little Lord Fauntleroys. For the first time in three months Gentry shaved his beard. He’d laid his Walther on the little shelf with the shampoo and the razors. It was covered with lather by the time he finished.
Gentry cleaned up his shavings. He saw each brown hair as DNA evidence, so he spent more time collecting his beard than he had cutting it off.
He looked at himself in the mirror while he combed his brown hair to the right in a wet part that would disappear when it dried. He was aging in the face, the creases of sun and wind and life itself deepening into his skin. He could tell he’d lost weight since he’d begun the Syrian operation, and soft bags of discoloration hung under his eyes.