The Lambs of the Silence

Clarice Starling was a fitting name, she was like a bird recently fallen from the nest who couldn’t quite fly, mindful of nearby cats who would consume her as a tidy snack.

She strolled past Miegs and the others, obviously terrified. Surely there were more seasoned FBI agents Jack Crawford could have sent, he thinks that dangling this fledgeling inches from my lips will coax this this old feline to tell him what other cats nipped the cream. Well played, Jack, well played.

“Dr. Lecter.” Came a shy voice, the bird most sonorific before it dies..

“My name is Clarice Starling. May I talk with you?”

She was slender and not especially tall for an FBI agent, in the outside world she wouldn’t be much of a challenge, not enough meat to feed a cat, not even worth the effort, barely a quart of blood in her. I arose from my seat to examine this avian explorer outside my cage, perhaps my claws could somehow snag her and draw her inside, but the plexiglass prevents that; it only had small holes.

Remind me to kill Chilton for this.

* * *

Raspail was my ninth victim, part of a final dinner I gave for the conductor of the Baltimore Philharmonic, it was more of a participatory meal, a gastric sing along where the guests and the food got to join along, Kumbayaa.

The police never got the humor about him being the ninth, the number most hated by conductors so tired of playing that dreaded piece of Beethoven yet again, like the wedding singer who would rather slit his own throat than play the Macarena. I saved my friend Raspail from indignities such as that when my corkscrew found a new home in the side of his brain. Yum.

To the car, Clarice. It will show you many things I find beautiful but you will not.

Starling was so young and reckless she would go the car without authorization, the car in the storage unit was a fresh bloody worm no hungry bird could ignore.

And so she did, and on worms she did feast.