Gentry sat shivering on a wooden bench on the one platform of the small train station. His left hand had been cuffed to the bench’s iron armrest. Five municipal cops stood around him in the light snowfall; the rest had stayed on the train.
He’d gotten the idea that his description had been distributed after the morning ruckus in Guarda. He guessed the stolen bike showing up at the train station in Ardez earned the ticket girl a questioning by the police. She would have remembered a foreigner on the first train to Zurich that morning. Zurich being the main transportation hub in the tiny nation, it was just a matter of alerting every cop to check every train, bus, and aircraft out of Zurich for a brown-haired male in his thirties traveling alone.
The sign on the platform said Marnand. He had no idea where this burg was on the map, but his body felt like he may have gotten a couple of hours of sleep, so he suspected he was not far from Geneva. He had to find a way to get free from these guys and get back on the road. In the back of his head a clock was ticking.
The lead policeman sat down next to him. His hair was white like a snow-capped mountain peak, and he smelled of fresh aftershave.
“We wait for a car from Lausanne. They take you to the station. Detectives come and talk to you about the fight in Guarda and the gun you have on train.”
“Yes, sir.” Gentry was trying on the friendly approach now, his strategy blowing around like a summer wind because he did not know what else to do. It wouldn’t win him release, but it easily could help him get the upper hand with the police, cause them to lower their guard just enough for him to find a window of opportunity to exploit. Still, carrying a gun in your pants in Switzerland was an outrage with nearly the gravitas of mass murder in America.
“Can I go to the bathroom?”
“No. Hold your piss.”
The younger cops around laughed.
Court sighed. It was worth a shot.
Off to his left, down the platform, a two-lane road twisted up and over a rise. The road was wet and clean and black like liquorice, bisecting the white snowfall on the hill. A dark green panel truck was parked high up on the hill, fifty yards from the station’s edge and a hundred yards or so from where Court sat and his police guards stood on the station’s single platform. Exhaust vapors blew out from the muffler, rose into the air behind the vehicle.
Court looked to his right now, still trying to find a way to gain the advantage before more cops showed up. To his right was the edge of the village proper. Gingerbread homes were sprinkled in among more modern structures. Plumes of woodsmoke floated into the air above the homes and dissipated in the gray sky above.
A green truck, identical to the one on his right, rolled slowly out of the village and pulled into a gas station thirty yards from where Court sat. It jolted to a stop in the parking lot, away from the pumps.
The Gray Man decided in seconds that he had just been surrounded.
“Sergeant!” he called quickly to the cop in charge.
The older man was speaking with his subordinates, but he walked over towards Court on the bench.
“Please listen carefully. We have a problem. On both sides of us are green trucks. In or near those vehicles are men who have been sent to kill me. They will not hesitate to kill you and your men to get to me.”
The policeman looked to his left and right at both of the vehicles, then back to Gentry.
“What is this shit you are saying?”
“They will be well-trained killers. You need to move us all inside the station. Hurry!”
Slowly, the policeman pulled his walkie-talkie from his belt and brought it to his mouth. His eyes did not leave Gentry’s. In German he instructed his men behind him to come over.
He switched to English. “Two green vehicles. One to the north, one to the south. This man tells me they are men here to rescue him.”
“Not rescue! Kill!”
All five looked up and down the platform at the vans. There was still no movement from either.
“It’s a trick,” said a young blond officer as he unfastened the retention restraint over the tang of his pistol.
“Who are you?” asked another man.
Court didn’t answer. Instead he said, “We need to go inside. Quickly.”
The lead policeman told his officers, “Watch him. I’ll check this out.” He turned and began walking up the platform towards the van to the south at the gas station.
“Sergeant! You really do not want to do that.” Court called out but was ignored by the silver-headed policeman in the heavy coat.
The cop descended the platform steps and onto the property of the little gas station. The green van had tinted windows. It sat at idle, steam pouring from its exhaust and drifting away in the air behind.
