Hannibal (50 page)

“I say what I mean,” Starling said. “Would you like it better if I said ‘I’m glad you find me so.’ That would be a little fancier, and equally true.”

She raised her glass beneath her level prairie gaze, taking back nothing.

It occurred to Dr. Lecter in the moment that with all his knowledge and intrusion, he could never entirely predict her, or own her at all. He could feed the caterpillar, he could whisper through the chrysalis; what hatched out followed its own nature and was beyond him. He wondered if she had the .45 on her leg beneath the gown.

Clarice Starling smiled at him then, the cabochons caught the firelight and the monster was lost in self-congratulation at his own exquisite taste and cunning.

“Clarice, dinner appeals to taste and smell, the oldest senses and the closest to the center of the mind. Taste and smell are housed in parts of the mind that precede pity, and pity has no place at my table. At the same time, playing in the dome of the cortex like miracles illumined on the ceiling of a church are the ceremonies and sights and exchanges of dinner. It can be far more engaging than theater.” He brought his face close to hers, taking some reading in her eyes. “I want you to understand what riches you bring to it, Clarice, and what your
entitlements
are. Clarice, have you studied your reflection lately? I think not. I doubt that you ever do. Come into the hall, stand in front of the pier glass.”

Dr. Lecter brought a candelabrum from the mantel.

The tall mirror was one of the good eighteenth-century
antiques, but slightly smoky and crazed. It was out of Château Vaux-le-Vicomte and God knows what it has seen.

“Look, Clarice. That delicious vision is what you are. This evening you will see yourself from a distance for a while. You will see what is just, you will say what is true. You’ve never lacked the courage to say what you think, but you’ve been hampered by constraints. I will tell you again, pity has no place at this table.

“If remarks are passed that are unpleasant in the instant, you will see that context can make them something between droll and riotously funny. If things are said that are painfully true, then it is only passing truth and will change.” He took a sip of his drink. “If you feel pain bloom inside you, it will soon blossom into relief. Do you understand me?”

“No, Dr. Lecter, but I remember what you said. Damn a bunch of self-improvement. I want a pleasant dinner.”

“That I promise you.” He smiled, a sight that frightens some.

Neither looked at her reflection now in the clouded glass; they watched each other through the burning tapers of the candelabrum and the mirror watched them both.

“Look, Clarice.”

She watched the red sparks pinwheel deep in his eyes and felt the excitement of a child approaching a distant fair.

From his jacket pocket Dr. Lecter took a syringe, the needle fine as a hair and, never looking, only feeling, he slipped the needle into her arm. When he withdrew it, the tiny wound did not even bleed.

“What were you playing when I came in?” she asked.

If True Love Reigned. “It’s very old?”

“Henry the Eighth composed it about 1510.” “Would you play for me?” she said. “Would you finish it now?”

T
HE BREEZE
of their entry into the dining room stirred the flames of the candles and the warmers. Starling had only seen the dining room in passage and it was wonderful to see the room transformed. Bright, inviting. Tall crystal repeating the candle flames above the creamy napery at their places and the space reduced to intimate size with a screen of flowers shutting off the rest of the table.

Dr. Lecter had brought his flat silver from the warmer at the last minute and when Starling explored her place setting, she felt in the handle of her knife an almost feverish heat.

Dr. Lecter poured wine and gave her only a tiny
amuse-gueule
to eat for starters, a single Belon oyster and a morsel of sausage, as he had to sit over half a glass of wine and admire her in the context of his table.

The height of his candlesticks was exactly right. The flames lit the deeps of her décolleté and he did not have to be vigilant about her sleeves.

“What are we having?”

He raised his finger to his lips. “You never ask, it spoils the surprise.”

They talked about the trimming of crow quills and their effect on the voice of a harpsichord, and only for a moment did she recall a crow robbing her mother’s service cart on a motel balcony long ago. From a distance she judged the memory irrelevant to this pleasant time and she deliberately set it aside.

“Hungry?”

“Yes!”

“Then we’ll have our first course.”

Dr. Lecter moved a single tray from the sideboard to a space beside his place at the table and rolled a service cart to tableside. Here were his pans, his burners, and his condiments in little crystal bowls.

He fired up his burners and began with a goodly knob of Charante butter in his copper
fait-tout
, swirling the melting butter and browning the butterfat to make
beurrenoisette
. When it was the brown of a hazelnut, he set the butter aside on a trivet.

He smiled at Starling, his teeth very white.

“Clarice, do you recall what we said about pleasant and unpleasant remarks, and things being very funny in context?”

“That butter smells wonderful. Yes, I remember.”

“And do you remember who you saw in the mirror, how splendid she was?”

“Dr. Lecter, if you don’t mind my saying so this is getting a little
Dick and Jane
. I remember perfectly.”

“Good. Mr. Krendler is joining us for our first course.”

Dr. Lecter moved the large flower arrangement from the table to the sideboard.

Deputy Assistant Inspector General Paul Krendler, in the flesh, sat at the table in a stout oak armchair. Krendler opened his eyes wide and looked about. He wore his runner’s headband and a very nice funeral tuxedo, with integral shirt and tie. The garment being split up the back, Dr. Lecter had been able to sort of tuck it around him, covering the yards of duct tape that held him to the chair.

Starling’s eyelids might have lowered a fraction and her lips slightly pursed as they sometimes did on the firing range.

Now Dr. Lecter took a pair of silver tongs from the sideboard and peeled off the tape covering Krendler’s mouth.

“Good evening, again, Mr. Krendler.”

“Good evening.” Krendler did not seem to be quite himself. His place was set with a small tureen.

“Would you like to say good evening to Ms. Starling?”

“Hello, Starling.” He seemed to brighten. “I always wanted to watch you eat.”

Starling took him in from a distance, as though she were the wise old pier glass watching. “Hello, Mr. Krendler.” She raised her face to Dr. Lecter, busy with his pans. “How did you ever catch him?”

“Mr. Krendler is on his way to an important conference about his future in politics,” Dr. Lecter said. “Margot Verger invited him as a favor to me. Sort of a quid pro quo. Mr. Krendler jogged up to the pad in Rock Creek Park to meet the Verger helicopter. But he caught a ride with me instead. Would you like to say grace before our meal, Mr. Krendler. Mr.
Krendler
?
”

“Grace? Yes.” Krendler closed his eyes. “Father, we thank Thee for the blessings we are about to receive and
we dedicate them to Thy service. Starling is a big girl to be fucking her daddy even if she is southern. Please forgive her for that and bring her to my service. In Jesus’ name, amen.”

Starling noted that Dr. Lecter kept his eyes piously closed throughout the prayer.

She felt quick and calm.
“Paul
, I have to tell you, the Apostle
Paul
, couldn’t have done better. He hated women too. He should have been named
Appall.”

“You really blew it this time, Starling. You’ll never be reinstated.”

“Was that
a job
offer you worked into the blessing? I never saw such tact.”

“I’m going to Congress.” Krendler smiled unpleasantly. “Come around the campaign headquarters, I might find something for you to do. You could be an office girl. Can you type and file?”

“Certainly.”

“Can you take dictation?”

“I use voice-recognition software,” Starling said. She continued in a judicious tone. “If you’ll excuse me for talking shop at the table, you aren’t fast enough to steal in Congress. You can’t make up for a second-rate intelligence just by playing dirty. You’d last longer as a big crook’s gofer.”

“Don’t wait on us, Mr. Krendler,” Dr. Lecter urged. “Have some of your broth while it’s hot.” He raised the covered
potager
and straw to Krendler’s lips.

Krendler made a face. “That soup’s not very good.”

“Actually, it’s more of a parsley and thyme infusion,” the doctor said, “and more for our sake than yours. Have another few swallows, and let it circulate.”

Starling apparently was weighing an issue, using her
palms like the Scales of Justice. “You know, Mr. Krendler, every time you ever leered at me, I had the nagging feeling I had done something to deserve it.” She moved her palms up and down judiciously, a motion similar to passing a Slinky back and forth. “I
didn’t
deserve it. Every time you wrote something negative in my personnel folder, I resented it, but still I searched myself. I doubted myself for a moment, and tried to scratch this tiny itch that said Daddy knows best.

“You
don’t
know best, Mr. Krendler. In fact, you don’t know anything.” Starling had a sip of her splendid white Burgundy and said to Dr. Lecter, “I
love
this. But I think we should take it off the ice.” She turned again, attentive hostess, to her guest. “You are forever an … an
oaf
, and beneath notice,” she said in a pleasant tone. “And that’s enough about you at this lovely table. Since you are Dr. Lecter’s guest, I hope you enjoy the meal.”

“Who are you anyway?”
Krendler said. “You’re not Starling. You’ve got the spot on your face, but you’re not Starling.”

Dr. Lecter added shallots to his hot browned butter and at the instant their perfume rose, he put in minced caper berries. He set the saucepan off the fire, and set his sauté pan on the heat. From the sideboard he took a large crystal bowl of ice cold water and a silver salver and put them beside Paul Krendler.

“I had some plans for that smart mouth,” Krendler said, “but I’d
never
hire you now. Who gave you an appointment anyway?”

“I don’t expect you to change your attitude entirely as the other Paul did, Mr. Krendler,” Dr. Lecter said. “You are not on the road to Damascus, or even on the road to the Verger helicopter.”

Dr. Lecter took off Krendler’s runner’s headband as you would remove the rubber band from a tin of caviar.

“All we ask is that you keep an open mind.” Carefully, using both hands, Dr. Lecter lifted off the top of Krendler’s head, put it on the salver and removed it to the sideboard. Hardly a drop of blood fell from the clean incision, the major blood vessels having been tied and the others neatly sealed under a local anesthetic, and the skull sawn around in the kitchen a half-hour before the meal.

Dr. Lecter’s method in removing the top of Krendler’s skull was as old as Egyptian medicine, except that he had the advantage of an autopsy saw with a cranial blade, a skull key and better anesthetics. The brain itself feels no pain.

The pinky-gray dome of Krendler’s brain was visible above his truncated skull.

Standing over Krendler with an instrument resembling a tonsil spoon, Dr. Lecter removed a slice of Krendler’s prefrontal lobe, then another, until he had four. Krendler’s eyes looked up as though he were following what was going on. Dr. Lecter placed the slices in the bowl of ice water, the water acidulated with the juice of a lemon, in order to firm them.

“Would you like to swing on a star,”
Krendler sang abruptly.
“Carry moonbeams home in a jar.”

In classic cuisine, brains are soaked and then pressed and chilled overnight to firm them. In dealing with the item absolutely fresh, the challenge is to prevent the material from simply disintegrating into a handful of lumpy gelatin.

With splendid dexterity, the doctor brought the firmed slices to a plate, dredged them lightly in seasoned flour, and then in fresh brioche crumbs.

He grated a fresh black truffle into his sauce and finished it with a squeeze of lemon juice.

Quickly he sautéed the slices until they were just brown on each side.

“Smells great!” Krendler said.

Dr. Lecter placed the browned brains on broad croutons on the warmed plates, and dressed them with the sauce and truffle slices. A garnish of parsley and whole caper berries with their stems, and a single nasturtium blossom on watercress to achieve a little height, completed his presentation.

“How is it?” Krendler asked, once again behind the flowers and speaking immoderately loud, as persons with lobotomies are prone to do.

“Really excellent,” Starling said. “I’ve never had caper berries before.”

Dr. Lecter found the shine of butter sauce on her lip intensely moving.

Krendler sang behind the greens, mostly day-care songs, and he invited requests.

Oblivious to him, Dr. Lecter and Starling discussed Mischa. Starling knew of the doctor’s sister’s fate from their conversations about loss, but now the doctor spoke in a hopeful way about her possible return. It did not seem unreasonable to Starling on this evening that Mischa might return.

She expressed the hope that she might meet Mischa.

“You could never answer the phone in my office. You sound like a cornbread country cunt,” Krendler yelled through the flowers.

“See if I sound like Oliver Twist when I ask for
MORE
,” Starling replied, releasing in Dr. Lecter glee he could scarcely contain.

A second helping consumed most of the frontal lobe, back nearly to the premotor cortex. Krendler was reduced to irrelevant observations about things in his immediate vision and the tuneless recitation behind the flowers of a lengthy lewd verse called “Shine.”