Mr. Gumb leaned over the hole, the stalk-eyes of his goggles peering down. The Python has a good, muzzle-heavy feel, wonderfully pointable it is. Have to hold it in the beam of infrared. He lined up the sights on the side of its head, just where the hair was damp against the temple.
Noise or smell, he never knew—but Precious up and yipping, jumping straight up in the dark, Catherine Baker Martin doubling around the little dog and pulling the futon over them. Just lumps moving under the futon, he couldn’t tell what was dog and what was Catherine. Looking down in infrared, his depth perception was impaired. He couldn’t tell which lumps were Catherine.
But he had seen Precious jump. He knew her leg was all right, and at once he knew something more: Catherine Baker Martin wouldn’t hurt the dog, any more than he would. Oh, sweet relief. Because of their shared feeling, he could shoot her in the God damned legs and when she clutched her legs, blow her fucking head off. No caution necessary.
He turned on the lights, all the damned lights in the basement, and got the floodlight from the storeroom. He had control of himself, he was reasoning well—on his way through the workroom he remembered to run a little water in the sinks so nothing would clot in the traps.
As he hurried past the stairs, ready to go, carrying the floodlight, the doorbell rang.
The doorbell grating, rasping, he had to stop and think about what it was. He hadn’t heard it in years, hadn’t even known whether it worked. Mounted in the stairway so it could be heard upstairs and down, clanging now, a black metal tit covered with dust. As he looked at it, it rang again, kept ringing, dust flying off it. Someone was at the front, pushing the old button marked SUPERINTENDENT.
They would go away.
He rigged the floodlight.
They didn’t go away.
Down in the well, it said something he paid no attention to. The bell was clanging, grating, they were just leaning on the button.
Better go upstairs and peek out the front. The long-barreled Python wouldn’t go in the pocket of his robe. He put it on the workroom counter.
He was halfway up the stairs when the bell stopped ringing. He waited a few moments halfway up. Silence. He decided to look anyway. As he went through the kitchen a heavy knock on the back door made him jump. In the pantry near the back door was a pump shotgun. He knew it was loaded.
With the door closed to the basement stairs, nobody could hear it yelling down there, even at the top of its voice, he was sure of that.
Banging again. He opened the door a crack on the chain.
“I tried the front but nobody came,” Clarice Starling said. “I’m looking for Mrs. Lippman’s family, could you help me?”
“They don’t live here,” Mr. Gumb said, and closed the door. He had started for the stairs again when the banging resumed, louder this time.
He opened the door on the chain.
The young woman held an ID close to the crack. It said Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Excuse me, but I need to talk to you. I want to find the family of Mrs. Lippman. I know she lived here. I want you to help me, please.”
“Mrs. Lippman’s been dead for ages. She didn’t have any relatives that I know of.”
“What about a lawyer, or an accountant? Somebody who’d have her business records? Did you know Mrs. Lippman?”
“Just briefly. What’s the problem?”
“I’m investigating the death of Fredrica Bimmel. Who are you, please?”
“Jack Gordon.”
“Did you know Fredrica Bimmel when she worked for Mrs. Lippman?”
“No. Was she a great, fat person? I may have seen her, I’m not sure. I didn’t mean to be rude—I was sleeping.… Mrs. Lippman had a lawyer, I may have his card somewhere, I’ll see if I can find it. Do you mind stepping in? I’m freezing and my cat will streak through here in a second. She’ll be outside like a shot before I can catch her.”
He went to a rolltop desk in the far corner of the kitchen, raised the top and looked in a couple of pigeonholes. Starling stepped inside the door and took her notebook out of her purse.
“That horrible business,” he said, rummaging the desk. “I shiver every time I think about it. Are they close to catching somebody, do you think?”
“Not yet, but we’re working. Mr. Gordon, did you take over this place after Mrs. Lippman died?”
“Yes.” Gumb bent over the desk, his back to Starling. He opened a drawer and poked around in it.
“Were there any records left here? Business records?”