PART 5



"Forgive me, Mr. Graham, but it was my understanding that the Bureau has chosen not to pursue an investigation into Starling's disappearance."

"Jack Crawford didn't agree with their decision, Agent Mapp. He asked me if I would be willing to look into the situation more closely."

"He thought Lecter had her." Her voice had gone flat.

He drew a breath to speak, but she cut him off.

"Don't bother to try and bullshit me, Mr. Graham. We both know the only reason for Crawford to have come to you is Lecter."

He said nothing. There was no need. She studied him in the silence that stretched out between them.

"If you'll forgive me saying, I'm surprised you agreed to do it."

He emitted a humorless snort.

"I didn't, to tell you the truth." A deep sigh. "But after Jack died..." his voice trailed off. Mapp finished the thought for him.

"You felt obligated."

"Yeah, I guess so."

She nodded and then drew in a deep breath.

"It's been months."

"Yes, it has."

"Starling would have found a way to let me know if she were alive."

"How can you be so sure?"

"She was my best friend." A pause. "And I was the closest thing she had to family. She would have found a way to let me know." A defiant glint shone in her earnest brown eyes.

"Agent Mapp, are you certain you knew Ms. Starling as well as you think?"

"I knew her as well as anybody. Starling didn't really let anybody get too close, but she let me in farther than most."

"She'd been suspended, was facing charges..."

"Where is this going, Mr. Graham?"

"Is it possible she saw this as a chance to simply disappear?"

"No. Not Starling." She said it almost too quickly. "Look, even if she were the type, she wouldn't have just gone off without letting me know she was alright."

"You can't think of any circumstances where she might have left without telling you?"

"You obviously can. Why not just come out and ask me what you want to know?"

"There were more than a few rumblings regarding Agent Starling and..."

Mapp's eyes hardened.

"Stop right there! I know that girl, Mr. Graham, and if she left Verger's farm with Lecter it was because he didn't give her a choice."

"You seem awfully sure of that."

"I'd stake my life on it."

She held his stare, daring him to push on this particular point.

"Is that what you think happened, Agent Mapp?"

She looked away from him then, with a deep sigh. She started to speak but paused to be sure she could maintain her composure.

"That sonofabitch was obsessed with Starling. I think he abducted her..." she stopped, visibly struggling for a moment, "... and I think he killed her."

Graham debated.

"Jack seemed to think Lecter might keep her alive," he suggested.

Ardelia Mapp looked up to the ceiling. A single tear made its way down along her cheek, but when she looked at Graham again her face had hardened to stone.

"I was afraid of that. I hope for her sake we're both wrong."

"Did she ever talk about Lecter?"

"No, not much." She looked off over Graham's shoulder, calling up a memory. "I asked her once if she was afraid of him."

He waited, and when she didn't go on, prompted her.

"And was she?"

"No. No, I don't think she was. She told me just before... she told me she'd like to be the one to go in after him if he was cornered. Said he'd have a better chance of coming out alive because she wouldn't shoot him just because she was afraid of him. I asked her straight out if she was, and she said what was scary was when somebody tells you the truth. 'Can't waste a man that's crazy enough to tell the truth,' she said."

Graham raised an eyebrow at that, but said nothing. Mapp continued to stare ahead of her at nothing in particular while he waited patiently for her to return to their conversation. Finally, her eyes focused on him once again.

"Look, Mr. Graham, I'd love to be able to help you. Believe me, there's nothing that would please me more. Don't you think I chased down every lead I could think of after it happened? Hell, I even went to Barney Jackson's apartment and held a gun on him. I just don't know what else there is to do."

"Barney Jackson?"

"Yeah, he was an orderly at the hospital in Baltimore. Starling talked to him when this whole mess started. I found out he worked for Mason Verger for about a month, thought he might know something."

The question was in his eyes.

"He said he didn't. Said Verger asked him about Lecter. He didn't like it up there, so he quit. I believed him."

"Do you still have that address?"