surprised, for the sophistication of documents had changed markedly over the last twelve years, and Rahim would have been keeping up.
No, it wasn’t so much the printer as the fact that Rahim had left it, especially since he’d so obviously cleaned the apartment of everything else. If it had been me, I thought, and I’d been running, I might not have taken it with me, but I wouldn’t have left it behind, either.
Crossing the room, I lifted the lid and checked the scanner plate again, then pulled out the tray and leafed through the blank sheets of paper. Nothing. I put the tray back and pressed the power button, watched the little green light blink on.
The machine was silent at first, but as I moved to stand, some internal mechanism clicked inside. There was a hum and then the sound of paper sliding from the tray. Whatever Rahim’s last command to the machine had been, he’d turned off the power prematurely. Now, back online, the printer spit out its long-hoarded task.
Taking the document from the tray, I switched on one of the swing-arm lamps and set the paper on the makeshift desk. It was a shipping bill of some sort. An invoice, though for what I couldn’t be sure. The bulk of the document was printed in Russian, but the letterhead stood out in English. BSW AIR CARGO INTERNATIONAL, it read. And the address: a post office box in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. The date at the top of the page read April 11, 2001.
Language is an integral part of forgery— I’ve worked in dozens of languages in my time— but fluency is never a requirement. Where opera singers learn their parts phonetically, I’ve often learned mine by shape, perfecting whole documents without ever deciphering their meaning.
Russian had been a minor exception; I’d attained what I called bar fluency, enough knowledge to order a drink. And, from my few forays into Soviet commerce, the basics of official language. But all that had been a long time ago. I didn’t work in Cyrillic at Solomon; there were specialists for that.
I read over the body of the document, stumbling through the text, trying to conjure up the ghost of my lousy Russian. Most of the copy was gibberish to me, but a few words stood out, confirming my first impressions. In the space that called for a description of goods, my Russian failed me completely, but I managed to decipher the next few lines. Country of origin, I translated, and, in the space provided, Trans-Dniester. And below, Port of origin, Odessa.
The next few lines were shipping technicalities, weights and measurements, but there was one other piece of information that caught my eye, a single line close to the bottom of the page. Port of entry, it read, Basra, Iraq.
Valsamis rolled onto his side and put the pillow over his ear. On the chair by the window, his coat pocket was ringing, and not for the first time that morning. It would be Morrow, Valsamis thought, counting out the four long rings, waiting for his voice mail to kick in. Valsamis had forgotten to turn off the ringer earlier, and now the idea of getting out of bed and walking across the room seemed like too much effort.
He was hoping that if he ignored the phone, Morrow would give up. But the ringing started again almost as quickly as it had stopped, just enough time in between for Morrow to hang up and redial.
Valsamis pushed aside the covers, swung his legs off the bed, and padded across the room. Fishing in his coat pocket for the little phone, he flipped open the receiver. “Yes?”
“Well?” Morrow’s tone seemed presumptive, accusatory, even. Too confident, Valsamis thought, that something was wrong.
“There won’t be any more problems with Ali.”
“And Nicole Blake?”
“I told you, I’ll take care of her.” Valsamis winced, wishing he had lied.
“There are people in Lisbon I can call if things get out of hand.” Morrow’s words were more warning than assurance.
“They won’t,” Valsamis told him.
Morrow hesitated. “One
No, it wasn’t so much the printer as the fact that Rahim had left it, especially since he’d so obviously cleaned the apartment of everything else. If it had been me, I thought, and I’d been running, I might not have taken it with me, but I wouldn’t have left it behind, either.
Crossing the room, I lifted the lid and checked the scanner plate again, then pulled out the tray and leafed through the blank sheets of paper. Nothing. I put the tray back and pressed the power button, watched the little green light blink on.
The machine was silent at first, but as I moved to stand, some internal mechanism clicked inside. There was a hum and then the sound of paper sliding from the tray. Whatever Rahim’s last command to the machine had been, he’d turned off the power prematurely. Now, back online, the printer spit out its long-hoarded task.
Taking the document from the tray, I switched on one of the swing-arm lamps and set the paper on the makeshift desk. It was a shipping bill of some sort. An invoice, though for what I couldn’t be sure. The bulk of the document was printed in Russian, but the letterhead stood out in English. BSW AIR CARGO INTERNATIONAL, it read. And the address: a post office box in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. The date at the top of the page read April 11, 2001.
Language is an integral part of forgery— I’ve worked in dozens of languages in my time— but fluency is never a requirement. Where opera singers learn their parts phonetically, I’ve often learned mine by shape, perfecting whole documents without ever deciphering their meaning.
Russian had been a minor exception; I’d attained what I called bar fluency, enough knowledge to order a drink. And, from my few forays into Soviet commerce, the basics of official language. But all that had been a long time ago. I didn’t work in Cyrillic at Solomon; there were specialists for that.
I read over the body of the document, stumbling through the text, trying to conjure up the ghost of my lousy Russian. Most of the copy was gibberish to me, but a few words stood out, confirming my first impressions. In the space that called for a description of goods, my Russian failed me completely, but I managed to decipher the next few lines. Country of origin, I translated, and, in the space provided, Trans-Dniester. And below, Port of origin, Odessa.
The next few lines were shipping technicalities, weights and measurements, but there was one other piece of information that caught my eye, a single line close to the bottom of the page. Port of entry, it read, Basra, Iraq.
Valsamis rolled onto his side and put the pillow over his ear. On the chair by the window, his coat pocket was ringing, and not for the first time that morning. It would be Morrow, Valsamis thought, counting out the four long rings, waiting for his voice mail to kick in. Valsamis had forgotten to turn off the ringer earlier, and now the idea of getting out of bed and walking across the room seemed like too much effort.
He was hoping that if he ignored the phone, Morrow would give up. But the ringing started again almost as quickly as it had stopped, just enough time in between for Morrow to hang up and redial.
Valsamis pushed aside the covers, swung his legs off the bed, and padded across the room. Fishing in his coat pocket for the little phone, he flipped open the receiver. “Yes?”
“Well?” Morrow’s tone seemed presumptive, accusatory, even. Too confident, Valsamis thought, that something was wrong.
“There won’t be any more problems with Ali.”
“And Nicole Blake?”
“I told you, I’ll take care of her.” Valsamis winced, wishing he had lied.
“There are people in Lisbon I can call if things get out of hand.” Morrow’s words were more warning than assurance.
“They won’t,” Valsamis told him.
Morrow hesitated. “One
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