The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris [123]
From the basement then a thin paper cut of a scream.
She didn't like the stairs, didn't like the stairs, Clarice Starling in the quick where you give it or you don't.
Catherine Martin screamed again, he's killing her and Starling went down them anyway, one hand on the bannister, gun arm out the gun just under her line of vision, floor below bounding over the gunsight, gun arm swinging with her head as she tried to cover the two facing doors open at the bottom of the staircase.
Lights blazing in the basement, she couldn't go through one door without turning her back on the other, do it quick then, to the left toward the scream. Into the sandfloored oubliette room, clearing the door?frame fast, eyes wider than they had ever been. Only place to hide was behind the well, she sliding sideways around the wall, both hands on the gun, arms out straight, a little pressure on the trigger, on around the well and nobody behind it.
A small scream rising from the well like thin smoke. Yipping now, a dog. She approached the Well, eyes on the door, got to the rim, looked over the edge. Saw the girl, looked up again, down again, said what she was trained to say, calm the hostage:
“FBI, you're safe.”
“Safe SHIT, he's got a gun. Getmeout. GETME?OUT.”
“Catherine, you'll be all right. Shut up. Do you know where he is?”
“GETMEOUT, I DON'T GIVE A SHIT WHERE HE IS, GETMEOUT.”
“I'll get you out. Be quiet. Help me. Be quiet so I can hear. Try and shut that dog up.”
Braced behind the well, covering the door, her heart pounded and her breath blew dust off the stone. She could not leave Catherine Martin to get help when she didn't know where Gumb was. She moved up to the door and took cover behind the frame. She could see across the foot of the stairs and into part of the work?room beyond.
Either she found Gumb, or she made sure he'd fled, or she took Catherine out with her, those were the only choices.
A quick look over her shoulder, around the oubliette room.
“Catherine. Catherine. Is there a ladder?”
“I don't know, I woke up down here. He let the bucket down on strings.”
Bolted to a wall beam was a small hand winch. There was no line on the drum of the winch.
“Catherine, I have to find something to get you out with. Can you walk?”
“Yes. Don't leave me.”
“I have to leave the room for just a minute.”
“You fucking bitch don't you leave me down here, my mother will tear your goddamn shit brains out---”
“Catherine shut up. I want you to be quiet so I can hear. To save yourself be quiet, do you understand?” Then, louder, “The other officers will be here any min?ute, now shut up. We won't leave you down there.”
He had to have a rope. Where was it? Go see.
Starling moved across the stairwell in one rush, to the door of the workroom, door's the worst place, in fast, back and forth along the near wall until she had seen all the room, familiar shapes swimming in the glass tanks, she too alert to be startled. Quickly through the room, past the tanks, the sinks, past the cage, a few big moths flying. She ignored them.
Approaching the corridor beyond, it blazing with light. The refrigerator turned on behind her. and she spun in a crouch, hammer lifting off the frame of the Magnum, eased the pressure off. On to the corridor. She wasn't taught to peek. Head and gun at once, but low. The corridor empty. The studio blazing with light at the end of it. Fast along it, gambling past the closed door, on to the studio door. The room all white and blond oak. Hell to clear from the doorway. Make sure every mannequin is a mannequin, every reflection is a mannequin. Only movement in the mirrors your move?ment.
The great armoire stood open and empty. The far door open onto darkness, the basement beyond. No rope, no ladder anywhere. No lights beyond the studio. She closed the door into the dark part of the basement, pushed a chair under the knob, and pushed a sewing machine against it. If she could be positive he wasn't in this part of the basement, she'd risk going upstairs for a moment to find a phone.
Back down the corridor, one door she'd passed.