The Silence of the Lambs (Hannibal Lecter 2)

“Urgent is right. We got an ID on the girl in West Virginia, Starling. A missing-person fingerprint card from Detroit rang the cherries in ID section about a half hour ago. Kimberly Jane Emberg, twenty-two, missing from Detroit since February seventh. We’re canvassing her neighborhood for witnesses. The Charlottesville medical examiner says she died not later than February eleventh, and possibly the day before, the tenth.”

“He only kept her alive three days,” Starling said.

“His period’s getting shorter. I don’t think anybody’s surprised.” Crawford’s voice was even. “He’s had Catherine Martin about twenty-six hours. I think if Lecter can deliver, he’d better do it in your next conversation. I’m set up in the Baltimore field office, the van patched you through. I have a room for you in the HoJo two blocks from the hospital if you need a catnap later on.”

“He’s leery, Mr. Crawford, he’s not sure you’d let him have anything good. What he said about Buffalo Bill, he traded for personal information about me. I don’t think there’s any textual correlation between his questions and the case.… Do you want to know the questions?”

“No.”

“That’s why you didn’t make me wear a wire, isn’t it? You thought it’d be easier for me, I’d be more likely to tell him stuff and please him if nobody else could hear.”

“Here’s another possibility for you: What if I trusted your judgment, Starling? What if I thought you were my best shot, and I wanted to keep a lot of second-guessers off your back? Would I have you wear a wire then?”

“No sir.” You’re famous for handling agents, aren’t you, Mr. Crawfish? “What can we offer Dr. Lecter?”

“A couple of things I’m sending over. It’ll be there in five minutes, unless you want to rest a little first.”

“I’d rather do it now,” Starling said. “Tell them to ask for Alonzo. Tell Alonzo I’ll meet him in the corridor outside Section 8.”

“Five minutes,” Crawford said.

Starling walked up and down the linoleum of the shabby lounge far underground. She was the only brightness in the room.

We rarely get to prepare ourselves in meadows or on graveled walks; we do it on short notice in places without windows, hospital corridors, rooms like this lounge with its cracked plastic sofa and Cinzano ashtrays, where the café curtains cover blank concrete. In rooms like this, with so little time, we prepare our gestures, get them by heart so we can do them when we’re frightened in the face of Doom. Starling was old enough to know that; she didn’t let the room affect her.

Starling walked up and down. She gestured to the air. “Hold on, girl,” she said aloud. She said it to Catherine Martin and she said it to herself. “We’re better than this room. We’re better than this fucking place,” she said aloud. “We’re better than wherever he’s got you. Help me. Help me. Help me.” She thought for an instant of her late parents. She wondered if they would be ashamed of her now—just that question, not its pertinence, no qualifications—the way we always ask it. The answer was no, they would not be ashamed of her.

She washed her face and went out into the hall.

The orderly Alonzo was in the corridor with a sealed package from Crawford. It contained a map and instructions. She read them quickly by the corridor light and pushed the button for Barney to let her in.

CHAPTER 25

Dr. Lecter was at his table, examining his correspondence. Starling found it easier to approach the cage when he wasn’t looking at her.

“Doctor.”

He held up a finger for silence. Wh

en he had finished reading his letter, he sat musing, the thumb of his six-fingered hand beneath his chin, his index finger beside his nose. “What do you make of this?” he said, putting the document in to the food carrier.

It was a letter from the U.S. Patent Office.

“This is about my crucifixion watch,” Dr. Lecter said. “They won’t give me a patent, but they advise me to copyright the face. Look here.” He put a drawing the size of a dinner napkin in the carrier and Starling pulled it through. “You may have noticed that in most crucifixions the hands point to, say, a quarter to three, or ten till two at the earliest, while the feet are at six. On this watch face, Jesus is on the cross, as you see there, and the arms revolve to indicate the time, just like the arms on the popular Disney watches. The feet remain at six and at the top a small second hand revolves in the halo. What do you think?”

The quality of the anatomical sketching was very good. The head was hers.

“You’ll lose a lot of detail when it’s reduced to watch size,” Starling said.

“True, unfortunately, but think of the clocks. Do you think this is safe without a patent?”

“You’d be buying quartz watch movements—wouldn’t you?—and they’re already under patent. I’m not sure, but I think patents only apply to unique mechanical devices and copyright applies to design.”

“But you’re not a lawyer, are you? They don’t require that in the FBI anymore.”

“I have a proposal for you,” Starling said, opening her briefcase.

Barney was coming. She closed the briefcase again. She envied Barney’s enormous calm. His eyes read negative for dope and there was considerable intelligence behind them.