“No.”
“You gotta have full kit. This is the rig you’ve been wearing on the range. The gun is my own. It’s the same K-frame Smith you’re trained with, but the action’s cleaned up. Dry-fire it in your room tonight when you get the chance. I’ll be in a car behind C Wing in ten minutes flat with the camera. Listen, there’s no head in the Blue Canoe. Go to the bathroom while you’ve got the chance is my advice. Chop-chop, Starling.”
She tried to ask him a question, but he was leaving her.
Has to be Buffalo Bill, if Crawford’s going himself. What the hell is the Blue Canoe? But you have to think about packing when you pack. Starling packed fast and well.
“Is it—”
“That’s okay,” Brigham interrupted as she got in the car. “The butt prints against your jacket a little if somebody’s looking for it, but it’s okay for now.” She was wearing the snub-nosed revolver under her blazer in a pancake holster snug against her ribs, with a speedloader straddling her belt on the other side.
Brigham drove at precisely the base speed limit toward the Quantico airstrip.
He cleared his throat. “One good thing about the range, Starling, is there’s no politics out there.”
“No?”
“You were right to secure that garage up at Baltimore there. You worried about the TV?”
“Should I be?”
“We’re talking just us, right?”
“Right.”
Brigham returned the greeting of a Marine directing traffic.
“Taking you along today, Jack’s showing confidence in you where nobody can miss it,” he said. “In case, say, somebody in the Office of Professional Responsibility has your jacket in front of him and his bowels in an uproar, understand what I’m telling you?”
“Ummm.”
“Crawford’s a stand-up guy. He made it clear where it matters that you had to secure the scene. He let you go in there bare—that is, bare of all your visible symbols of authority, and he said that too. And the response time of the Baltimore cops was pretty slow. Also, Crawford needs the help today, and he’d have to wait an hour for Jimmy Price to get somebody here from the lab. So you got it cut out for you, Starling. A floater’s no day at the beach, either. It’s not punishment for you, but if somebody outside needed to see it that way, they could. See, Crawford is a very subtle guy, but he’s not inclined to explain things, that’s why I’m telling you.… If you’re working with Crawford, you should know what the deal is with him—do you know?”
“I really don’t.”
“He’s got a lot on his mind besides Buffalo Bill. His wife Bella’s real sick. She’s … in a terminal situation. He’s keeping her at home. If it wasn’t for Buffalo Bill, he’d have taken compassionate leave.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“It’s not discussed. Don’t tell him you’re sorry or anything, it doesn’t help him … they had a good time.”
“I’m glad you told me.”
Brigham brightened as they reached the airstrip. “I’ve got a couple of important speeches I give at the end of the firearms course, Starling, try not to miss them.” He took a shortcut between some hangars.
“I will.”
“Listen, what I teach is something you probably won’t ever have to do. I hope you won’t. But you’ve got some aptitude, Starling. If you have to shoot, you can shoot. Do your exercises.”
“Right.”
“Don’t ever put it in your purse.”
“Right.”
“Pull it a few times in your room at night. Stay so you can find it.”
“I will.”