Red Dragon - Thomas Harris [25]
“He's very familiar with you. He's given you a lot of thought.”
“You had some sessions with him?”
“Yes. Twelve. He's impenetrable. Too sophisticated about the tests for them to register anything. Edwards, Fabré, even Dr. Bloom himself had a crack at him. I have their notes. He was an enigma to them too. It's impossible, of course, to tell what he's holding back or whether he understands more than he'll say. Oh, since his commit?ment he's done some brilliant pieces for The American Journal of Psychiatry and The General Archives. But they're always about problems he doesn't have. I think he's afraid that if we 'solve' him, nobody will be interested in him anymore and he'll be stuck in a back ward somewhere for the rest of his life.”
Chilton paused. He had practiced using his peripheral vision to watch his subject in interviews. He believed that he could watch Graham this way undetected.
“The consensus around here is that the only person who has dem?onstrated any practical understanding of Hannibal Lecter is you, Mr. Graham. Can you tell me anything about him?”
“No.”
“Some of the staff are curious about this: when you saw Dr. Lecter's murders, their 'style,' so to speak, were you able perhaps to reconstruct his fantasies? And did that help you identify him?”
Graham did not answer.
“We're woefully short of material on that sort of thing. There's one single piece in The Journal of Abnormal Psychology. Would you mind talking with some of the staff - no, no, not this trip - Dr. Bloom was very severe with me on that point. We're to leave you alone. Next trip, perhaps.”
Dr. Chilton had seen a lot of hostility. He was seeing some at the moment.
Graham stood up. “Thank you, doctor. I want to see Lecter now.”
# # #
The steel door of the maximumsecurity section closed behind Graham. He heard the bolt slide home.
Graham knew that Lecter slept most of the morning. He looked down the corridor. At that angle he could not see into Lecter's cell, but he could tell that the lights inside were dimmed.
Graham wanted to see Dr. Lecter asleep. He wanted time to brace himself. If he felt Lecter's madness in his head, he had to contain it quickly, like a spill.
To cover the sound of his footsteps, he followed an orderly push?ing a linen cart. Dr. Lecter is very difficult to slip up on.
Graham paused partway down the hall. Steel bars covered the entire front of the cell. Behind the bars, farther than arm's reach, was a stout nylon net stretched ceiling to floor and wall to wall. Through the barrier, Graham could see a table and chair bolted to the floor. The table was stacked with softcover books and correspondence. He walked up to the bars, put his hands on them, took his hands away.
Dr. Hannibal Lecter lay on his cot asleep, his head propped on a pillow against the wall. Alexandre Dumas' Le Grand Dictionnaire de Cuisine was open on his chest.
Graham had stared through the bars for about five seconds when Lecter opened his eyes and said, “That's the same atrocious af?tershave you wore in court.”
“I keep getting it for Christmas.”
Dr. Lecter's eyes are maroon and they reflect the light redly in tiny points. Graham felt each hair bristle on his nape. He put his hand on the back of his neck.
“Christmas, yes,” Lecter said. “Did you get my card?”
“I got it. Thank you.”
Dr. Lecter's Christmas card had been forwarded to Graham from the FBI crime laboratory in Washington. He took it into the backyard, burned it, and washed his hands before touching Molly.
Lecter rose and walked over to his table. He is a small, lithe man. Very neat. “Why don't you have a seat, Will? I think there are some folding chairs in a closet just down that way. At least, that's where it sounds like they come from.”
“The orderly's bringing one.”
Lecter stood until Graham was seated in the hall. “And how is Officer Stewart?” he asked.
“Stewart's fine.” Officer Stewart left law enforcement after he saw Dr. Lecter's basement He managed a motel