The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris [122]
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 sleep?ing... Mrs. Lippman had a lawyer, I may have his card somewhere, I'll see if I can find it. Do you mind step?ping 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 pi?geonholes. 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 rec?ords?”
“No, nothing at all. Does the FBI have any ideas? The police here don't seem to know the first thing. Do they have a description, or fingerprints?”
Out of the folds in the back of Mr. Gumb's robe crawled a Death'shead Moth. It stopped in the center of his back, about where his heart would be, and ad?justed its wings.
Starling dropped her notebook into the bag.
Mister Gumb. Thank God my coat's open. Talk out of here, go to a phone. No. He knows I'm FBI, I let him out of my sight he'll kill her. Do her kidneys. They find him, they fall on him. His phone. Don 't see it. Not in here, ask for his phone. Get the connec?tion, then throw down on him. Make him lie facedown, wait for the cops. That's it, do it. He's turning around.
“Here's the number,” he said. He had a business card.
Take it? No.
“Good, thank you. Mr. Gordon, do you have a tele?phone I could use?”
As he put the card on the table, the moth flew. It came from behind him, past his head and lit between them, on a cabinet above the sink.
He looked at it. When she didn't look at it, when her eyes never left his face, he knew.
Their eyes met and they knew each other.
Mr. Gumb tilted his head a little to the side. He smiled. “I have a cordless phone in the pantry, I'll get it for you.”
No! Do it. She went for the gun, one smooth move she'd done four thousand times and it was right where it was supposed to be; good twohand hold, her world the front sight and the center of his chest. “Freeze.”
He pursed his lips.
“Now. Slowly. Put up your hands.”
Move him outside, keep the table between us. Walk him to the front. Facedown in the middle of the street and hold up the badge.
“Mr. Gub--- Mr. Gumb, you're under arrest. I want you to walk slowly outside for me.”
Instead, he walked out of the room. If he had reached for his pocket, reached behind him, if she'd seen a weapon, she could have fired. He just walked out of the room.
She heard him down the basement stairs fast, she around the table and to the door at the top of the stairwell. He was gone, the stairwell brightly lit and empty. Trap. Be a sitting duck on the stairs.