“Precisely,” Crawford said. “Tell you what: I’ll advise the Baltimore field office you’ll be up there. Saturday, Starling, on your own time. Go feel the fruit, if there is any.”
Crawford made a small, successful effort not to look after her as she left. From his wastebasket he lifted in the fork of his fingers a wad of heavy mauve notepaper. He spread it on his desk. It was about his wife and it said, in an engaging hand:
O wrangling schools, that search what fire
Shall burn this world, had none the wit
Unto this knowledge to aspire
That this her fever might be it?
I’m so sorry about Bella, Jack.
Hannibal Lecter
CHAPTER 8
Everett Yow drove a black Buick with a De Paul University sticker on the back window. His weight gave the Buick a slight list to the left as Clarice Starling followed him out of Baltimore in the rain. It was almost dark; Starling’s day as an investigator was nearly gone and she didn’t have another day to replace it. She dealt with her impatience, tapping the wheel in time with the wipers as the traffic crawled down Route 301.
Yow was intelligent, fat, and had a breathing problem. Starling guessed his age at sixty. So far he was accommodating. The lost day was not his fault; returning in the late afternoon from a week-long business trip to Chicago, the Baltimore lawyer had come directly from the airport to his office to meet Starling.
Raspail’s classic Packard had been stored since long before his death, Yow explained. It was unlicensed and never driven. Yow had seen it once, covered and in storage, to confirm its existence for the estate inventory he made shortly after his client’s murder. If Investigator Starling would agree to “frankly disclose at once” anything she found that might be damaging to his late client’s interests, he would show her the automobile, he said. A warrant and the attendant stir would not be necessary.
Starling was enjoying the use for one day of an FBI motor pool Plymouth with a cellular telephone, and she had a new ID card provided by Crawford. It simply said FEDERAL INVESTIGATOR—and expired in a week, she noticed.
Their destination was Split City Mini-Storage, about four miles past the city limits. Creeping along with the traffic, Starling used her telephone to find out what she could about the storage facility. By the time she spotted the high orange sign, SPLIT CITY MINI-STORAGE—YOU KEEP THE KEY, she had learned a few facts.
Split City had an Interstate Commerce Commission freight-forwarder’s license, in the name of Bernard Gary. A federal grand jury had barely missed Gary for interstate transportation of stolen goods three years ago, and his license was up for review.
Yow turned in beneath the sign and showed his keys to a spotty young man in uniform at the gate. The gatekeeper logged their license numbers, opened up and beckoned impatiently, as though he had more important things to do.
Split City is a bleak place the wind blows through. Like the Sunday divorce flight from La Guardia to Juárez, it is a service industry to the mindless Brownian movement in our population; most of its business is storing the sundered chattels of divorce. Its units are stacked with living room suites, breakfast ensembles, spotted mattresses, toys, and the photographs of things that didn’t work out. It is widely believed among Baltimore County sheriff’s officers that Split City also hides good and valuable consideration from the bankruptcy courts.
It resembles a military installation: thirty acres of long buildings divided by fire walls into units the size of a generous single garage, each with its roll-up overhead door. The rates are reasonable and some of the property has been there for years. Security is good. The place is surrounded by a double row of high hurricane fence, and dogs patrol between the fences twenty-four hours a day.
Six inches of sodden leaves, mixed with paper cups and small trash, had banked against the bottom of the door of Raspail’s storage unit, number 31. A hefty padlock secured each side of the door. The left-side hasp also had a seal on it. Everett Yow bent stiffly over the seal. Starling held the umbrella and a flashlight in the early dark.
“It doesn’t appear to have been opened since I was here five years ago,” he said. “You see the impression of my notary seal here in the plastic. I had no idea at the time that the relatives would be so contentious and would drag out the probate for so many years.”
Yow held the flashlight and umbrella while Starling took a picture of the lock and seal.
“Mr. Raspail had an office-studio in the city, which I closed down to save the estate from paying rent,” he said. “I had the furnishings brought here and stored them with Raspail’s car and other things that were already here. We brought an upright piano, books and music, a bed, I think.”
Yow tried a key. “The locks may be frozen. At least this one’s very stiff.” It was hard for him to bend over and breathe at the same time. When he tried to squat, his knees creaked.
Starling was glad to see that the padlocks were big chrome American Standards. They looked formidable, but she knew she could pop the brass cylinders out easily with a sheet metal screw and a claw hammer—her father had showed her how burglars do it when she was a child. The problem would be finding the hammer and screw; she did not even have the benefit of the resident junk in her Pinto.
She poked through her purse and found the de-icer spray she used on her Pinto’s door locks.
“Want to rest a second in your car, Mr. Yow? Why don’t you warm up for a few minutes and I’ll give this a try. Take the umbrella, it’s only a drizzle now.”
Starling moved the FBI Plymouth up close to the door to use its headlights. She pulled the dipstick out of the car and dripped oil into the keyholes of the padlocks, then sprayed in de-icer to thin the oil. Mr. Yow smiled and nodded from his car. Starling was glad Yow was an intelligent man; she could perform her task without alienating him.
It was dark now. She felt exposed in the glare of the Plymouth’s headlights and the fan belt squealed in her ear as the car idled. She’d locked the car while it was running. Mr. Yow appeared to be harmless, but she saw no reason to take a chance on being mashed against the door.
The padlock jumped like a frog in her hand and lay there open, heavy and greasy. The other lock, having soaked, was easier.
The door would not come up. Starling lifted on the handle until bright spots danced before her eyes. Yow came to help, but between the small, inadequate door handle and his hernia, they exerted little additional force.