Chapter Four
McCarran International Airport, Hertz Desk: October, 1998
"I specifically requested a full-sized car," Lawrence Perkins was saying to the Hertz representative behind the counter. "I reserved such a vehicle three weeks in advance."
Perkin's tone had a cold and lethal edge to it that was very much at odds with his mild appearance. The clerk felt a strange impulse to shiver, momentarily, then recovered her usual oblivious customer service facade. She'd been yelled at by worse than this wimpy looking jerk, in the course of her career.
"I AM sorry, sir," she repeated, for the fourth or fifth time. "But there's three conventions in town and it's Friday night. All we have left are the compacts. Hertz will gladly give you a partial refund, of course. Or a full refund, if you decide you don't want the car at all."
A veiled threat. No mistaking that. Accept this outrageous breach of professional ethics on our part - or walk. Or grab a taxi, if you can.
Dr. Lecter was at an impasse. He could not follow any of the courses of action that immediately came to mind. He could not accomplish anything by further argument. He could not accomplish anything by bribery or by manipulation. He did not intend to spend a full week in this benighted hell- hole of a city without a car of some kind. And he could not leap over the counter and savage the clerk without attracting attention.
He wondered how she'd look without a nose for a moment, and just how she'd go about saying "I AM sorry, sir" over and over again if her tongue were gone. And then he bit the bullet and signed the rental contract. He had not expected this trip to be anything less than all the tortures of Hell combined, from start to finish, and there was some bitter pleasure in having ALL of his expectations confirmed so early on in the ordeal.
Oh, Margot, darling, he thought as he accepted the keys to his rental for the week, what wonderful surprises I have in store for YOU . . .
He left the Hertz counter and began to make his way to the baggage claim, to meet Clarice. To meet "Norma", rather, he mentally corrected himself, and readjusted his posture to the defeated slump he'd chosen for the persona of "Larry". There were cameras everywhere. It would be best not to forget that.
Impressions came to him. Scents of industrial carpet cleaner, many bodies in varying degrees of cleanliness, stale cigarette smoke on dry air, a hot metallic whiff of money and greed and desperation.
The clanking, ringing, almost musical, yet maddeningly off-key trilling of slot machines. A thousand different conversations, and the muted droning of the aircraft outside these walls. Announcements of flights boarding and flights departing. An almost imperceptible low frequency hum, the ambient signature of all large interiors.
People. Arrivals wearing expectant, half sheepish smiles, bent on temporary tosses with homogenized sin and mass-marketed iniquity. Departures wearing the dazed, flat expressions of flounders in the fishmonger's case, pounded into dead affect by systematic excess. Many of the very aged, few of the very young. Stridently colorful clothing everywhere, much metallic gold and silver, tacky talismans . . . for luck, always for luck.
Lady Luck. The rhinestone encrusted, tormenting whore-goddess of the city. Cheap as dirt, elusive as air. A thousand different forms of worship in Her name, a thousand sacrifices large and small to Her glory, twenty-four hours a day, every day. Amen.
I'm in a foreign domain, he thought. My rites are not Her rites. Blood means nothing to Her, evil is immaterial. The rule of the random occurrence. Please place your bets . . .
Are we off to a poor start, Lady, you and I? I could have done without the car business. Clarice will NOT be pleased.
Lawrence Perkins/Hannibal Lecter walked on to the baggage check. He saw Clarice struggling with one of their bags at a crowded carousel, bent over at an awkward angle, artificially augmented rump in the air. There was another large bag already beside her. He noticed that she was muttering, when he caught a glimpse of her face.
Cursing, I expect, he thought, and smiled. Wait until she sees our car! Then we'll hear some creative language. I wonder if she'd like to drive?
He strode forward and reached for the heavy bag that was eluding Clarice. He caught the handle before it could roll past.
"Hi, Norma," Larry said, pulling the bag off the car. "Gosh, that's a heavy one. What'd you pack in here?"
He bent a little closer to "Norma" and spoke a private word in her ear "Heavy as a body, Clarice. Is there something you haven't told me? And why didn't you wait for me to help you with this luggage?"
"You were taking too long," she answered curtly. "Any problems? Get the car?"
"That depends. Define 'problems'," he said, and showed her the keys.
"Oh, wow. I don't like the sound of that."
He picked up the two bags and declined to comment. They walked through the glass doors that fronted the baggage area and out into the open Nevada air.
Dr. Lecter was pleasantly surprised. The air was fresh, a crisp fall current in it, dry, but marvelously clear. He could see a range of grey- blue mountains far to the west, the sun setting on them in vivid hues. The stark and compelling sunset of the high desert. Blue and gold and salmon and magenta and scarlet and more. Beautiful.
Always compensations. Even here. Thank you, Lady Luck. Perhaps we can be friends after all.
They went to the Hertz shuttle and surrendered their bags, then climbed aboard the small bus that would take them to their car.
The flight had been long and dull. They had chosen separate seats, reasoning that it might be better not to be observed, side by side, for hours at a stretch. No one on the plane had paid either of them the slightest attention, however, and the hours of separate boredom had taken a toll on them both.
But it was safe enough to be seen together now. It was a short trip, and they "matched", in a way. Both sank onto a bench seat in the back of the minibus with tired appreciation.
"Are you gonna make it? " Clarice whispered to Dr. Lecter as the small bus pulled away from the terminal curb. "Now that we're really here? Or are you just going to croak?"
"So far, I'm holding up surprisingly well, and thank you so much for your tender concern, my love. I'll demonstrate my gratitude at some later opportunity, do be assured. Very soon, perhaps."
He jingled the rental car keys cryptically as they pulled into the Hertz pick-up lot, and then pressed them into her palm.
Only two vehicles remained in this lot. One was a candy-apple red Ford Aspire. The other was a violet-blue Aspire hatchback.
"Ah," Dr. Lecter said. "Our auto. Limited choices, I'm afraid, but I thought you'd prefer the hatchback. If you don't care to drive it, I believe that between us we could probably CARRY it to the hotel."
"Moose-fucking-SHIT!" Clarice exclaimed, startling the driver of the shuttle and causing Dr. Lecter to laugh out loud.
If HE was going to suffer, he didn't see any good reason why his companion shouldn't suffer as well.
"Now, now. It gets excellent gas mileage, I'm told," he argued.
They disembarked from the shuttle and Lecter collected their bags, then they strolled over to the vividly colored little car.
"Three conventions in town on a Friday night," Dr. Lecter explained to Clarice, who was staring at the compact as though it were some particularly repellent insect. "So the Hertz clerk told me. Repeatedly. Other rental agencies were equally unhelpful. This is it. Would you open the hatch for me, please, Clarice?"
She shrugged and unlocked the narrow cargo space at the rear of the car. "All the performance of a motorized roller skate, all the pickup of a dead dog," she summarized. "Great. Love the color too. I suppose you're going to make ME drive?"
He was busy trying to angle two standard sized suitcases into the space allotted, an absorbing problem in applied geometry.
"Hmm? Oh, yes, I'd appreciate it if you would."
"Mm-hmm. I thought so."
She unlocked the driver's side and squeezed in behind the dinner plate sized wheel, and reached over to unlock the passenger door. After a moment, Dr. Lecter got into the cramped interior.
"You know, " he remarked, adjusting his seat position controls to make room for his legs. "Although, on the whole, I've always been reasonably satisfied with myself, I confess that I have occasionally wished I was a little taller. Until now."
"Small favors," Clarice quipped.
"How clever. How very amusing, Clarice, really. Can we get this over with now? Or do you need to consult a map?"
"Nope. Let's saddle up. First, the lockboxes, then the Four Seasons, south end of the strip. A mile or so from here. We should probably get there in a couple of hours, in this heap. What about your seat belt?"
"No, I think I'll keep my options open. I may ask you to throw on the brakes at high speed at some point during the trip."
She laughed and pulled out of the parking lot, and threaded her way out of the airport. East on Sunset, right on Las Vegas Boulevard, headed north. The fabled Las Vegas "strip" opened before them like a river, a garish, glittering channel of light and noise and Friday evening traffic. The famous "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign loomed up on their right like a malevolent explosion of neon in the darkening evening.
Dr. Lecter groaned.
"Kill me now, Clarice. Please."
"Not now, sweetie. We need to get our things from the lock boxes. "Mailboxes Etc.", 1200 Paradise Road. Shouldn't be far. After I'm armed, I promise I'll shoot you, okay?"
But he was gazing, both repelled and fascinated, at the most consummately hideous cityscape he had ever seen in his life, and did not immediately answer her.
He had to admit to himself, whatever was definitive had always interested him. The worst, the best, the finest, the ugliest, the least, the most. And this "strip" was all of that. The most use of excessive display. The least use of any recognizable aesthetic principle.
Profligate waste of energy, provided in cheap abundance, so he had read, by the nearby Hoover dam. Glaring light in every hue, bubble-gum pink and canary yellow and radioactive green and corpse-light blue. Neon twining to the horizon, like a disorderly parade of glowing, multicolored, gaseous snakes. Red taillights pulsing in the bumper-to-bumper traffic ahead, white headlights flashing from the equally heavy traffic going in the opposite direction. The very stars above dimmed in the clear desert night by the riot of man-made illumination below.
An enormous black pyramid across the way to their left, hulking in the dark, emitting a beam of light from its apex at intervals, so bright it must surely interfere with the navigation of small aircraft. Then an immense fairy tale castle, or rather, a somewhat unimaginative child's conception of such a castle, just past the pyramid. To the right, an antiseptic version of a Jamaican village amid a small, manicured jungle, a counterfeit Easter Island head lowering at the corner. Then a blue lit high- rise/pagoda hybrid, almost directly across the way from half scale reproduction of the Statue of Liberty and Manhattan skyline. In the distance, an abysmally ugly concrete tower reared up above all, fifties "atomic" architecture, topped by, of all things, a roller coaster. And a medium sized volcano, it seemed, was currently erupting down the street, perhaps spilling flows of super heated lava directly onto the flow of traffic that thronged this jumbled boulevard of American dreams.
It was madness made manifest. The architecture of insanity, bathed in artificial light, pitched like a Bedouin tent in a barren stretch of empty desert. Nothing in this bizarre vista bore even a passing connection to any known reality. Only the real night sky over all, stars dimmed by the artifice and insane arrogance and unending yearning of human beings.
Aside from the unmitigated tackiness and the aggressive vulgarity, there was something compelling in it. A kind of twisted gallantry, perhaps, or a brutal honesty. A glittering monument to sin, once the deranged dream of a dead gangster, now raised to the level of mass cultural demonstration, powered by twin engines of greed and need.
Dr. Lecter was no stranger to extremes. There was something here that, in a peculiar way, he could relate to. He was not entirely displeased.
And he would watch faces here, he thought, with an odd sort of revolted anticipation. That would prove instructive indeed.
Clarice broke into his reverie with a question.
"What do you think? Is it as bad as you thought?" she asked.
"Worse," he answered, after a moment. "Far worse than I imagined. So much so, in fact, that it almost achieves a kind of terrible appeal. There's more here than just tackiness, anyway. This level of ugliness is almost epic. And it's certainly not boring. I begin to see why Margot might have wanted to live here. All this would appeal to her sense of humor. Not that she won't have to pay, you understand."
"Oh, of course. So you don't still want me to shoot you like I promised?" she asked, and took his hand.
"Well, maybe not just yet. And I know you were only saying that, incidentally. A false promise. For shame, Clarice. Do I ever tell you stories?"
"No, you never do," she answered quietly, as she turned right onto Flamingo and drove east.
After a few more blocks, they found the Mailboxes Etc. Clarice had mentioned earlier. Here they retrieved three nondescript brown paper wrapped packages from rented mailboxes. These packages, though uninteresting to look at, had the welcome property of making them both feel a bit more relaxed once they had them safely stowed in the tiny car.
This important errand done, Clarice turned the car around and retraced their route, back to the far southern end of the strip, past Mandalay Bay and to the Four Seasons. It was the only resort in all of Las Vegas that did not contain a casino, and was the only one that had been awarded a four star rating. Only 487 guest rooms, a small fraction of the thousands-plus numbers boasted by all the other monstrously oversized accommodations.
Clarice had chosen this particular hotel herself, hoping to make him feel as comfortable as might be, given that she expected him to be very much a fish out of water throughout their stay. Also, since there was no casino, there would be far fewer hidden security cameras at this hotel. An excellent deduction. He admired her cleverness greatly. She had the makings of a first class criminal hidden somewhere in her righteous psyche.
The lobby bore out her selection, and he was satisfied. Tasteful earth tone color palette, soft lighting, decent antiques, well trained staff. The captain and valets at the entrance had been too professional to sneer at their fiercely blue economy car, the bellman that had taken charge of their bags had been polite, and the desk staff had been kind and courteous to Norma and Larry, rumpled and ordinary as they appeared to be. This was clearly not a place that worshipped the high roller and snubbed the paying guest.
In the trip up to their suite in the elevator, Larry put his lips to Norma's ear and whispered in Dr. Lecter's voice.
"Thank you, Clarice. A civilized choice. I may live out the week after all."
The suite was lovely. The decor was faultless, the size comfortable, the amenities acceptable. There was a sitting room, a bedroom, a spacious, well equipped bathroom, and a nice sized balcony that overlooked an inner courtyard, rather than the glowing chaos outside the hotel walls. A suitable refuge.
Larry surprised the bellman with a considerable tip, and at last they were alone. Dr. Lecter immediately went to the phone beside a pleasant overstuffed sofa and sat down to make a call.
Clarice started to unpack some of their things as she listened.
"Hello, is this Margot Verger?" he asked, in a voice that even Clarice did not recognize, judging by her startled reaction.
"Oh, yes? May I speak to her then? . . . no, it's a personal matter . . . yes, that's right . . . yes, thank you, I'll hold . . . Ms. Verger? Yes, so sorry to call after business hours, this is Herman Eggers? Clark County Child Welfare? . . . yes, that's right, Ms. Verger, Child Welfare Division . . . well, I'm afraid we've had a complaint . . . no, no, but both abuse AND neglect have been mentioned . . . well, we have to . . . please, Ms. Verger, there's no need for that kind of language . . . may I ask, how old is your son? And what was his name, again, I don't have the case file in front of me . . . Michael? Michael Verger? No middle name? . . . oh, Hannibal? . . . really? Unusual name, one doesn't often hear it . . . but a very NICE name, still . . . any particular significance . . . hello? . . . no, I told you, this is Herman EGGERS . . . Eggers, Margot, dear, Eggers, as in 'ham-and-egger'."
He held the phone out with a nasty vindicated chuckle as Margot Verger's voice raved tinnily from the receiver.
Once she'd calmed herself enough to stop screaming, he resumed the conversation.
"Yes, we just arrived. I wanted to let you know. And to thank you again, Margot, for your kind, if somewhat misleading, invitation . . .hmm? Oh, Four Seasons . . . You're in Summerlin? No, I don't, but we'll find it . . . Sunday? . . . yes, of course . . . ceremony at four, your home at six . . . yes, I'd very much like for you to send a car . . . no, Margot, we are certainly NOT even . . . oh, probably never . . . yes, all right, see you then, I'm looking forward to it . . . yes, certainly . . . good night, Margot."
"You are a fiend," Clarice commented.
"I am justified," he declared, smiling. He bent his head toward his open palm and removed the blue lenses from his eyes. Ah. It was good to get them out.
"These hurt, in this dry climate, " he commented absently. The fragile blue disks went into a case he'd retrieved from one of his many vest pockets. "I'm tired of being Larry, anyway. He's the dullest alter-ego I've ever devised. What possessed me?"
"I'm just plain tired," Clarice declared, and rolled her head in an effort to work some of the kinks out of her neck. "What a trip. I need to get out of all this padded underwear. Do you mind if I shower first?"
"Certainly I mind. You'd have invited that great bore Larry to join you. Don't imagine I don't know what's going on. Why are you doing that with your head? Is your neck stiff?"
She turned away from him and started toward the bathroom, adding an amusing exaggerated sway to her padded hips as she walked.
"I'm stiff all over," she breathed, and disappeared past the bathroom door.
The sound of water running followed. A few moments later she called out again, voice muffled by the patter of the running water. "Shower's huge. We could fit that goddamned Aspire in here, and still have room for a barn dance. Plenty of room to share. But if you send that Larry in here after me, I really will shoot you. I'm tired of him too."
Dr. Lecter really was very tempted to resurrect Larry just out of spite. He hated to let an ultimatum go by unanswered. On the other hand, he really was very tired of being Lawrence Perkins, and the thought of warm water and soap and delicate fragrances and Clarice's stiff neck and the fine down on the small of her back seemed far more tempting at that moment than any bloody-minded contrariness could be.
He could be contrary on Sunday. At Margot's . . .
He could be cooperative now. He knew of some interesting ways to relieve a stiff neck.
He had survived his first day in Las Vegas. Only six more days remained. Surely that warranted some small celebration?
Dr. Lecter thought it did. He left the couch and wandered into the steamy bathroom.
***************************************************************
McCarran International Airport, Hertz Desk: October, 1998
"I specifically requested a full-sized car," Lawrence Perkins was saying to the Hertz representative behind the counter. "I reserved such a vehicle three weeks in advance."
Perkin's tone had a cold and lethal edge to it that was very much at odds with his mild appearance. The clerk felt a strange impulse to shiver, momentarily, then recovered her usual oblivious customer service facade. She'd been yelled at by worse than this wimpy looking jerk, in the course of her career.
"I AM sorry, sir," she repeated, for the fourth or fifth time. "But there's three conventions in town and it's Friday night. All we have left are the compacts. Hertz will gladly give you a partial refund, of course. Or a full refund, if you decide you don't want the car at all."
A veiled threat. No mistaking that. Accept this outrageous breach of professional ethics on our part - or walk. Or grab a taxi, if you can.
Dr. Lecter was at an impasse. He could not follow any of the courses of action that immediately came to mind. He could not accomplish anything by further argument. He could not accomplish anything by bribery or by manipulation. He did not intend to spend a full week in this benighted hell- hole of a city without a car of some kind. And he could not leap over the counter and savage the clerk without attracting attention.
He wondered how she'd look without a nose for a moment, and just how she'd go about saying "I AM sorry, sir" over and over again if her tongue were gone. And then he bit the bullet and signed the rental contract. He had not expected this trip to be anything less than all the tortures of Hell combined, from start to finish, and there was some bitter pleasure in having ALL of his expectations confirmed so early on in the ordeal.
Oh, Margot, darling, he thought as he accepted the keys to his rental for the week, what wonderful surprises I have in store for YOU . . .
He left the Hertz counter and began to make his way to the baggage claim, to meet Clarice. To meet "Norma", rather, he mentally corrected himself, and readjusted his posture to the defeated slump he'd chosen for the persona of "Larry". There were cameras everywhere. It would be best not to forget that.
Impressions came to him. Scents of industrial carpet cleaner, many bodies in varying degrees of cleanliness, stale cigarette smoke on dry air, a hot metallic whiff of money and greed and desperation.
The clanking, ringing, almost musical, yet maddeningly off-key trilling of slot machines. A thousand different conversations, and the muted droning of the aircraft outside these walls. Announcements of flights boarding and flights departing. An almost imperceptible low frequency hum, the ambient signature of all large interiors.
People. Arrivals wearing expectant, half sheepish smiles, bent on temporary tosses with homogenized sin and mass-marketed iniquity. Departures wearing the dazed, flat expressions of flounders in the fishmonger's case, pounded into dead affect by systematic excess. Many of the very aged, few of the very young. Stridently colorful clothing everywhere, much metallic gold and silver, tacky talismans . . . for luck, always for luck.
Lady Luck. The rhinestone encrusted, tormenting whore-goddess of the city. Cheap as dirt, elusive as air. A thousand different forms of worship in Her name, a thousand sacrifices large and small to Her glory, twenty-four hours a day, every day. Amen.
I'm in a foreign domain, he thought. My rites are not Her rites. Blood means nothing to Her, evil is immaterial. The rule of the random occurrence. Please place your bets . . .
Are we off to a poor start, Lady, you and I? I could have done without the car business. Clarice will NOT be pleased.
Lawrence Perkins/Hannibal Lecter walked on to the baggage check. He saw Clarice struggling with one of their bags at a crowded carousel, bent over at an awkward angle, artificially augmented rump in the air. There was another large bag already beside her. He noticed that she was muttering, when he caught a glimpse of her face.
Cursing, I expect, he thought, and smiled. Wait until she sees our car! Then we'll hear some creative language. I wonder if she'd like to drive?
He strode forward and reached for the heavy bag that was eluding Clarice. He caught the handle before it could roll past.
"Hi, Norma," Larry said, pulling the bag off the car. "Gosh, that's a heavy one. What'd you pack in here?"
He bent a little closer to "Norma" and spoke a private word in her ear "Heavy as a body, Clarice. Is there something you haven't told me? And why didn't you wait for me to help you with this luggage?"
"You were taking too long," she answered curtly. "Any problems? Get the car?"
"That depends. Define 'problems'," he said, and showed her the keys.
"Oh, wow. I don't like the sound of that."
He picked up the two bags and declined to comment. They walked through the glass doors that fronted the baggage area and out into the open Nevada air.
Dr. Lecter was pleasantly surprised. The air was fresh, a crisp fall current in it, dry, but marvelously clear. He could see a range of grey- blue mountains far to the west, the sun setting on them in vivid hues. The stark and compelling sunset of the high desert. Blue and gold and salmon and magenta and scarlet and more. Beautiful.
Always compensations. Even here. Thank you, Lady Luck. Perhaps we can be friends after all.
They went to the Hertz shuttle and surrendered their bags, then climbed aboard the small bus that would take them to their car.
The flight had been long and dull. They had chosen separate seats, reasoning that it might be better not to be observed, side by side, for hours at a stretch. No one on the plane had paid either of them the slightest attention, however, and the hours of separate boredom had taken a toll on them both.
But it was safe enough to be seen together now. It was a short trip, and they "matched", in a way. Both sank onto a bench seat in the back of the minibus with tired appreciation.
"Are you gonna make it? " Clarice whispered to Dr. Lecter as the small bus pulled away from the terminal curb. "Now that we're really here? Or are you just going to croak?"
"So far, I'm holding up surprisingly well, and thank you so much for your tender concern, my love. I'll demonstrate my gratitude at some later opportunity, do be assured. Very soon, perhaps."
He jingled the rental car keys cryptically as they pulled into the Hertz pick-up lot, and then pressed them into her palm.
Only two vehicles remained in this lot. One was a candy-apple red Ford Aspire. The other was a violet-blue Aspire hatchback.
"Ah," Dr. Lecter said. "Our auto. Limited choices, I'm afraid, but I thought you'd prefer the hatchback. If you don't care to drive it, I believe that between us we could probably CARRY it to the hotel."
"Moose-fucking-SHIT!" Clarice exclaimed, startling the driver of the shuttle and causing Dr. Lecter to laugh out loud.
If HE was going to suffer, he didn't see any good reason why his companion shouldn't suffer as well.
"Now, now. It gets excellent gas mileage, I'm told," he argued.
They disembarked from the shuttle and Lecter collected their bags, then they strolled over to the vividly colored little car.
"Three conventions in town on a Friday night," Dr. Lecter explained to Clarice, who was staring at the compact as though it were some particularly repellent insect. "So the Hertz clerk told me. Repeatedly. Other rental agencies were equally unhelpful. This is it. Would you open the hatch for me, please, Clarice?"
She shrugged and unlocked the narrow cargo space at the rear of the car. "All the performance of a motorized roller skate, all the pickup of a dead dog," she summarized. "Great. Love the color too. I suppose you're going to make ME drive?"
He was busy trying to angle two standard sized suitcases into the space allotted, an absorbing problem in applied geometry.
"Hmm? Oh, yes, I'd appreciate it if you would."
"Mm-hmm. I thought so."
She unlocked the driver's side and squeezed in behind the dinner plate sized wheel, and reached over to unlock the passenger door. After a moment, Dr. Lecter got into the cramped interior.
"You know, " he remarked, adjusting his seat position controls to make room for his legs. "Although, on the whole, I've always been reasonably satisfied with myself, I confess that I have occasionally wished I was a little taller. Until now."
"Small favors," Clarice quipped.
"How clever. How very amusing, Clarice, really. Can we get this over with now? Or do you need to consult a map?"
"Nope. Let's saddle up. First, the lockboxes, then the Four Seasons, south end of the strip. A mile or so from here. We should probably get there in a couple of hours, in this heap. What about your seat belt?"
"No, I think I'll keep my options open. I may ask you to throw on the brakes at high speed at some point during the trip."
She laughed and pulled out of the parking lot, and threaded her way out of the airport. East on Sunset, right on Las Vegas Boulevard, headed north. The fabled Las Vegas "strip" opened before them like a river, a garish, glittering channel of light and noise and Friday evening traffic. The famous "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign loomed up on their right like a malevolent explosion of neon in the darkening evening.
Dr. Lecter groaned.
"Kill me now, Clarice. Please."
"Not now, sweetie. We need to get our things from the lock boxes. "Mailboxes Etc.", 1200 Paradise Road. Shouldn't be far. After I'm armed, I promise I'll shoot you, okay?"
But he was gazing, both repelled and fascinated, at the most consummately hideous cityscape he had ever seen in his life, and did not immediately answer her.
He had to admit to himself, whatever was definitive had always interested him. The worst, the best, the finest, the ugliest, the least, the most. And this "strip" was all of that. The most use of excessive display. The least use of any recognizable aesthetic principle.
Profligate waste of energy, provided in cheap abundance, so he had read, by the nearby Hoover dam. Glaring light in every hue, bubble-gum pink and canary yellow and radioactive green and corpse-light blue. Neon twining to the horizon, like a disorderly parade of glowing, multicolored, gaseous snakes. Red taillights pulsing in the bumper-to-bumper traffic ahead, white headlights flashing from the equally heavy traffic going in the opposite direction. The very stars above dimmed in the clear desert night by the riot of man-made illumination below.
An enormous black pyramid across the way to their left, hulking in the dark, emitting a beam of light from its apex at intervals, so bright it must surely interfere with the navigation of small aircraft. Then an immense fairy tale castle, or rather, a somewhat unimaginative child's conception of such a castle, just past the pyramid. To the right, an antiseptic version of a Jamaican village amid a small, manicured jungle, a counterfeit Easter Island head lowering at the corner. Then a blue lit high- rise/pagoda hybrid, almost directly across the way from half scale reproduction of the Statue of Liberty and Manhattan skyline. In the distance, an abysmally ugly concrete tower reared up above all, fifties "atomic" architecture, topped by, of all things, a roller coaster. And a medium sized volcano, it seemed, was currently erupting down the street, perhaps spilling flows of super heated lava directly onto the flow of traffic that thronged this jumbled boulevard of American dreams.
It was madness made manifest. The architecture of insanity, bathed in artificial light, pitched like a Bedouin tent in a barren stretch of empty desert. Nothing in this bizarre vista bore even a passing connection to any known reality. Only the real night sky over all, stars dimmed by the artifice and insane arrogance and unending yearning of human beings.
Aside from the unmitigated tackiness and the aggressive vulgarity, there was something compelling in it. A kind of twisted gallantry, perhaps, or a brutal honesty. A glittering monument to sin, once the deranged dream of a dead gangster, now raised to the level of mass cultural demonstration, powered by twin engines of greed and need.
Dr. Lecter was no stranger to extremes. There was something here that, in a peculiar way, he could relate to. He was not entirely displeased.
And he would watch faces here, he thought, with an odd sort of revolted anticipation. That would prove instructive indeed.
Clarice broke into his reverie with a question.
"What do you think? Is it as bad as you thought?" she asked.
"Worse," he answered, after a moment. "Far worse than I imagined. So much so, in fact, that it almost achieves a kind of terrible appeal. There's more here than just tackiness, anyway. This level of ugliness is almost epic. And it's certainly not boring. I begin to see why Margot might have wanted to live here. All this would appeal to her sense of humor. Not that she won't have to pay, you understand."
"Oh, of course. So you don't still want me to shoot you like I promised?" she asked, and took his hand.
"Well, maybe not just yet. And I know you were only saying that, incidentally. A false promise. For shame, Clarice. Do I ever tell you stories?"
"No, you never do," she answered quietly, as she turned right onto Flamingo and drove east.
After a few more blocks, they found the Mailboxes Etc. Clarice had mentioned earlier. Here they retrieved three nondescript brown paper wrapped packages from rented mailboxes. These packages, though uninteresting to look at, had the welcome property of making them both feel a bit more relaxed once they had them safely stowed in the tiny car.
This important errand done, Clarice turned the car around and retraced their route, back to the far southern end of the strip, past Mandalay Bay and to the Four Seasons. It was the only resort in all of Las Vegas that did not contain a casino, and was the only one that had been awarded a four star rating. Only 487 guest rooms, a small fraction of the thousands-plus numbers boasted by all the other monstrously oversized accommodations.
Clarice had chosen this particular hotel herself, hoping to make him feel as comfortable as might be, given that she expected him to be very much a fish out of water throughout their stay. Also, since there was no casino, there would be far fewer hidden security cameras at this hotel. An excellent deduction. He admired her cleverness greatly. She had the makings of a first class criminal hidden somewhere in her righteous psyche.
The lobby bore out her selection, and he was satisfied. Tasteful earth tone color palette, soft lighting, decent antiques, well trained staff. The captain and valets at the entrance had been too professional to sneer at their fiercely blue economy car, the bellman that had taken charge of their bags had been polite, and the desk staff had been kind and courteous to Norma and Larry, rumpled and ordinary as they appeared to be. This was clearly not a place that worshipped the high roller and snubbed the paying guest.
In the trip up to their suite in the elevator, Larry put his lips to Norma's ear and whispered in Dr. Lecter's voice.
"Thank you, Clarice. A civilized choice. I may live out the week after all."
The suite was lovely. The decor was faultless, the size comfortable, the amenities acceptable. There was a sitting room, a bedroom, a spacious, well equipped bathroom, and a nice sized balcony that overlooked an inner courtyard, rather than the glowing chaos outside the hotel walls. A suitable refuge.
Larry surprised the bellman with a considerable tip, and at last they were alone. Dr. Lecter immediately went to the phone beside a pleasant overstuffed sofa and sat down to make a call.
Clarice started to unpack some of their things as she listened.
"Hello, is this Margot Verger?" he asked, in a voice that even Clarice did not recognize, judging by her startled reaction.
"Oh, yes? May I speak to her then? . . . no, it's a personal matter . . . yes, that's right . . . yes, thank you, I'll hold . . . Ms. Verger? Yes, so sorry to call after business hours, this is Herman Eggers? Clark County Child Welfare? . . . yes, that's right, Ms. Verger, Child Welfare Division . . . well, I'm afraid we've had a complaint . . . no, no, but both abuse AND neglect have been mentioned . . . well, we have to . . . please, Ms. Verger, there's no need for that kind of language . . . may I ask, how old is your son? And what was his name, again, I don't have the case file in front of me . . . Michael? Michael Verger? No middle name? . . . oh, Hannibal? . . . really? Unusual name, one doesn't often hear it . . . but a very NICE name, still . . . any particular significance . . . hello? . . . no, I told you, this is Herman EGGERS . . . Eggers, Margot, dear, Eggers, as in 'ham-and-egger'."
He held the phone out with a nasty vindicated chuckle as Margot Verger's voice raved tinnily from the receiver.
Once she'd calmed herself enough to stop screaming, he resumed the conversation.
"Yes, we just arrived. I wanted to let you know. And to thank you again, Margot, for your kind, if somewhat misleading, invitation . . .hmm? Oh, Four Seasons . . . You're in Summerlin? No, I don't, but we'll find it . . . Sunday? . . . yes, of course . . . ceremony at four, your home at six . . . yes, I'd very much like for you to send a car . . . no, Margot, we are certainly NOT even . . . oh, probably never . . . yes, all right, see you then, I'm looking forward to it . . . yes, certainly . . . good night, Margot."
"You are a fiend," Clarice commented.
"I am justified," he declared, smiling. He bent his head toward his open palm and removed the blue lenses from his eyes. Ah. It was good to get them out.
"These hurt, in this dry climate, " he commented absently. The fragile blue disks went into a case he'd retrieved from one of his many vest pockets. "I'm tired of being Larry, anyway. He's the dullest alter-ego I've ever devised. What possessed me?"
"I'm just plain tired," Clarice declared, and rolled her head in an effort to work some of the kinks out of her neck. "What a trip. I need to get out of all this padded underwear. Do you mind if I shower first?"
"Certainly I mind. You'd have invited that great bore Larry to join you. Don't imagine I don't know what's going on. Why are you doing that with your head? Is your neck stiff?"
She turned away from him and started toward the bathroom, adding an amusing exaggerated sway to her padded hips as she walked.
"I'm stiff all over," she breathed, and disappeared past the bathroom door.
The sound of water running followed. A few moments later she called out again, voice muffled by the patter of the running water. "Shower's huge. We could fit that goddamned Aspire in here, and still have room for a barn dance. Plenty of room to share. But if you send that Larry in here after me, I really will shoot you. I'm tired of him too."
Dr. Lecter really was very tempted to resurrect Larry just out of spite. He hated to let an ultimatum go by unanswered. On the other hand, he really was very tired of being Lawrence Perkins, and the thought of warm water and soap and delicate fragrances and Clarice's stiff neck and the fine down on the small of her back seemed far more tempting at that moment than any bloody-minded contrariness could be.
He could be contrary on Sunday. At Margot's . . .
He could be cooperative now. He knew of some interesting ways to relieve a stiff neck.
He had survived his first day in Las Vegas. Only six more days remained. Surely that warranted some small celebration?
Dr. Lecter thought it did. He left the couch and wandered into the steamy bathroom.
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