فصل 13

CHAPTER 13

“Drop me at the lab, Jeff,” Crawford told the driver. “Then I want you to wait for Officer Starling at the Smithsonian. She’ll go on from there to Quantico.” “Yes sir.”

They were crossing the Potomac River against the after-dinner traffic, coming into downtown Washington from National Airport.

The young man at the wheel seemed in awe of Crawford and drove with excessive caution, Starling thought. She didn’t blame him; it was an article of faith at the Academy that the last agent who’d committed a Full Fuck-Up in Crawford’s command now investigated pilfering at DEW-line installations along the Arctic Circle.

Crawford was not in a good humor. Nine hours had passed since he transmitted the fingerprints and pictures of the victim, and she remained unidentified. Along with the West Virginia troopers, he and Starling had worked the bridge and the riverbank until dark without result.

Starling had heard him on the phone from the airplane, arranging for an evening nurse at home.

The FBI plain-jane sedan seemed wonderfully quiet after the Blue Canoe, and talking was easier.

“I’ll post the hotline and the Latent Descriptor Index when I take your prints up to ID,” Crawford said. “You draft me an insert for the file. An insert, not a 302—do you know how to do it?” “I know how.”

“Say I’m the Index, tell me what’s new.”

It took her a second to get it together—she was glad Crawford seemed interested in the scaffolding on the Jefferson Memorial as they passed by.

The Latent Descriptor Index in the Identification Section’s computer compares the characteristics of a crime under investigation to the known proclivities of criminals on file. When it finds pronounced similarities, it suggests suspects and produces their fingerprints. Then a human operator compares the file fingerprints with latent prints found at the scene. There were no prints yet on Buffalo Bill, but Crawford wanted to be ready.

The system requires brief, concise statements. Starling tried to come up with some.

“White female, late teens or early twenties, shot to death, lower torso and thighs flayed—” “Starling, the Index already knows he kills young white women and skins their torsos—use ‘skinned,’ by the way, ‘flayed’ is an uncommon term another officer might not use, and you can’t be sure the damned thing will read a synonym. It already knows he dumps them in rivers. It doesn’t know what’s new here. What’s new here, Starling?” “This is the sixth victim, the first one scalped, the first one with triangular patches taken from the back of the shoulders, the first one shot in the chest, the first one with a cocoon in her throat.” “You forgot broken fingernails.”

“No sir, she’s the second one with broken fingernails.”

“You’re right. Listen, in your insert for the file, note that the cocoon is confidential. We’ll use it to eliminate false confessions.” “I’m wondering if he’s done that before—placed a cocoon or an insect,” Starling said. “It would be easy to miss in an autopsy, especially with a floater. You know, the medical examiner sees an obvious cause of death, it’s hot in there, and they want to get through … can we check back on that?” “If we have to. You can count on the pathologists to say they didn’t miss anything, naturally. The Cincinnati Jane Doe’s still in the freezer out there. I’ll ask them to look at her, but the other four are in the ground. Exhumation orders stir people up. We had to do it with four patients who passed away under Dr. Lecter’s care, just to make sure what killed them. Let me tell you, it’s a lot of trouble and it upsets the relatives. I’ll do it if I have to, but we’ll see what you find out at the Smithsonian before I decide.” “Scalping … that’s rare, isn’t it?”

“Uncommon, yes,” Crawford said.

“But Dr. Lecter said Buffalo Bill would do it. How did he know that?” “He didn’t know it.”

“He said it, though.”

“It’s not a big surprise, Starling. I wasn’t surprised to see that. I should have said that it was rare until the Mengel case, remember that? Scalped the woman? There were two or three copycats after that. The papers, when they were playing around with the Buffalo Bill tag, they emphasized more than once that this killer doesn’t take scalps. It’s no surprise after that—he probably follows his press. Lecter was guessing. He didn’t say when it would happen, so he could never be wrong. If we caught Bill and there was no scalping, Lecter could say we got him just before he did it.” “Dr. Lecter also said Buffalo Bill lives in a two-story house. We never got into that. Why do you suppose he said it?” “That’s not a guess. He’s very likely right, and he could have told you why, but he wanted to tease you with it. It’s the only weakness I ever saw in him—he has to look smart, smarter than anybody. He’s been doing it for years.” “You said ask if I don’t know—well, I have to ask you to explain that.” “Okay, two of the victims were hanged, right? High ligature marks, cervical displacement, definite hanging. As Dr. Lecter knows from personal experience, Starling, it’s very hard for one person to hang another against his will. People hang themselves from doorknobs all the time. They hang themselves sitting down, it’s easy. But it’s hard to hang somebody else—even when they’re bound up, they manage to get their feet under them, if there’s any support to find with their feet. A ladder’s threatening. Victims won’t climb it blindfolded and they sure won’t climb it if they can see the noose. The way it’s done is in a stairwell. Stairs are familiar. Tell them you’re taking them up to use the bathroom, whatever, walk them up with a hood on, slip the noose on, and boot them off the top step with the rope fastened to the landing railing. It’s the only good way in a house. Fellow in California popularized it. If Bill didn’t have a stairwell, he’d kill them another way. Now give me those names, the senior deputy from Potter and the state police guy, the ranking officer.” Starling found them in her notepad, reading by a penlight held in her teeth.

“Good,” Crawford said. “When you’re posting a hotline, Starling, always credit the cops by name. They hear their own names, they get more friendly to the hotline. Fame helps them remember to call us if they get something. What does the burn on her leg say to you?” “Depends if it’s postmortem.”

“If it is?”

“Then he’s got a closed truck or a van or a station wagon, something long.” “Why?”

“Because the burn’s across the back of her calf.”

They were at Tenth and Pennsylvania, in front of the new FBI headquarters that nobody ever refers to as the J. Edgar Hoover Building.

“Jeff, you can let me out here,” Crawford said. “Right here, don’t go underneath. Stay in the car, Jeff, just pop the trunk. Come show me, Starling.” She got out with Crawford while he retrieved his datafax and briefcase from the luggage compartment.

“He hauled the body in something big enough for the body to be stretched out on its back,” Starling said. “That’s the only way the back of her calf would rest on the floor over the exhaust pipe. In a car trunk like this, she’d be curled up on her side and—” “Yeah, that’s how I see it,” Crawford said.

She realized then that he’d gotten her out of the car so he could speak with her privately.

“When I told that deputy he and I shouldn’t talk in front of a woman, that burned you, didn’t it?” “Sure.”

“It was just smoke. I wanted to get him by himself.”

“I know that.”

“Okay.” Crawford slammed the trunk and turned away.

Starling couldn’t let it go.

“It matters, Mr. Crawford.”

He was turning back to her, laden with his fax machine and briefcase, and she had his full attention.

“Those cops know who you are,” she said. “They look at you to see how to act.” She stood steady, shrugged her shoulders, opened her palms. There it was, it was true.

Crawford performed a measurement on his cold scales.

“Duly noted, Starling. Now get on with the bug.”

“Yes sir.”

She watched him walk away, a middle-aged man laden with cases and rumpled from flying, his cuffs muddy from the riverbank, going home to what he did at home.

She would have killed for him then. That was one of Crawford’s great talents.