The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris [129]
The tapes include the final session, when Lecter killed Raspail. More important, they reveal how much Raspail told Lecter about Jame Gumb:
Raspail told Dr. Lecter that Gumb was obsessed with moths, that he had flayed people in the past, that he had killed Klaus, that he had a job with the Mr. Hide leathergoods company in Calumet City, but was tak?ing money from an old lady in Belvedere, Ohio, who had made linings for Mr. Hide, Inc. One day Gumb would take everything the old lady had, Raspail pre?dicted.
“When Lecter read that the first victim was from Belvedere and she was flayed, he knew who was doing it,” Crawford told Starling as they listened together to the tape. “He'd have given you Gumb and looked like a genius if Chilton had stayed out of it.”
“He hinted to me by writing in the file that the sites were too random,” Starling said. “And in Memphis he asked me if I sew. What did he want to happen?”
“He wanted to amuse himself,” Crawford said. “He's been amusing himself for a long, long time.”
No tape of Jame Gumb was ever found, and his activ?ities in the years after Raspail's death were established piecemeal through business correspondence, gas re?ceipts, interviews with boutique owners.
When Mrs. Lippman died on a trip to Florida with Gumb, he inherited everything--- the old building with its living quarters and empty storefront and vast base?ment, and a comfortable amount of money. He stopped working for Mr. Hide, but maintained an apartment in Calumet City for a while, and used the business ad?dress to receive packages in the John Grant name. He kept favored customers, and continued to travel to boutiques around the country, as he had for Mr. Hide, measuring for custom garments he made in Belvedere. He used his trips to scout for victims and to dump them when they were used up--- the brown van droning for hours on the Interstate with finished leather garments swaying on racks in the back above the rubberized body bag on the floor.
He had the wonderful freedom of the basement. Room to work and play. At first it was only games--- hunting young women through the black warren, creating amusing tableaux in remote rooms and sealing them up, opening the doors again only to throw in a little lime.
Fredrica Bimmel began to help Mrs. Lippman in the last year of the old lady's life. Fredrica was picking up sewing at Mrs. Lippman's when she met Jame Gumb. Fredrica Bimmel was not the first young woman he killed, but she was the first one he killed for her skin.
Fredrica Bimmel's letters to Gumb were found among his things.
Starling could hardly read the letters, because of the hope in them, because of the dreadful need in them, because of the endearments from Gumb that were im?plied in her responses: “Dearest Secret Friend in my Breast, I love you!--- I didn't ever think I'd get to say that, and it is best of all to get to say it back.”
When did he reveal himself? Had she discovered the basement? How did her face look when he changed, how long did he keep her alive?
Worst, Fredrica and Gumb truly were friends to the last; she wrote him a note from the pit.
The tabloids changed Gumb's nickname to Mr. Hide and, sick because they hadn't thought of the name themselves, virtually started over with the story.
Safe in the heart of Quantico, Starling did not have to deal with the press, but the tabloid press dealt with her.
From Dr. Frederick Chilton, the National Tattler bought the tapes of Starling's interview with Dr. Han?nibal Lecter. The Tattler expanded on their conversa?tions for their “Bride of Dracula” series and implied that Starling had made frank sexual revelations to Lecter in exchange for information, spurring an offer to Starling from Velvet Talks: The Journal of Telephone Sex.
People magazine did a short, pleasant item on Starling, using yearbook pictures from the University of Virginia and from the Lutheran Home at Bozeman. The best picture was of the horse, Hannah, in her later years, drawing a cart full of children.