Chapter Text
Friday, May 13, 2011 - New Orleans, Louisiana, Gentilly
"You're wasting your time, you know," Agent Wilson says. Hannibal notes the way that Beverly's posture goes tight before he looks up to regard the man looming in the doorway of the cramped office they've commandeered for the duration of their stay in the New Orleans field office.
The Agent In Charge is older than Hannibal and trying to hide it by dying his hair dark. He's also been phenomenally unhelpful; his section is poorly managed, with terrible work ethic and a tribal insularity he's heard Jim Price call "the Good Old Boys Club."
Wilson's personal distaste for their team has been clear since they arrived here almost a week ago. He has made much show out of failing to understand Hannibal through his accent, and he has been entirely dismissive of Beverly's contributions to the investigation. He is clearly resentful on a professional level of the out-of-town experts who have swooped in to tackle a problem he claims does not exist.
"Knowledge gained is never wasted," Hannibal tells the man, keeping his voice level. Beside him, Beverly smiles slightly to herself as she highlights a line of text. She has observed his behavior enough to recognize certain signs of his displeasure - he has not risen for the man's presence, or greeted him by name. She reads the chilliness of his reception and assumes it is a show of solidarity.
"Washington sent you down here on a goose chase," Wilson says dismissively. He shifts, settling his weight comfortably against the door jamb. He intends to linger and disrupt them, then. This is not merely a passing visit. "A couple small-towners made a fuss and Obama or some of his people thought making up some racial thing to 'fix' would be good for the next election."
"We're here because of three girls missing and one found dead." Beverly says without looking up.
"Girls like that go missing all the time," Wilson says, like this is an normal and expected part of life. "They just wander off, or they move to the big city so it's easier to trade their asses for crack. They do dumb shit and get themselves killed."
"The statistics are indeed appalling," Hannibal says. Wilson will hear agreement. Beverly will hear a scathing criticism. "The time we've spent examining missing persons reports and cold homicides has certainly been eye opening. But not, I think, wasted."
"Four girls is just a clump in the numbers. It's not a serial killer," Wilson insists, for perhaps the hundredth time since their arrival.
Hannibal is quite certain the man is wrong. The team from the BAU had found three other likely pattern victims by Wednesday, and now they're combing through a truly enormous data pool, hunting for signal among the noise. The girls missing in Maringouin and Rosedale stood out to the locals because in towns with a population hovering around a thousand, one or two missing women are instantly noticeable. That's how they'd managed to tie in the young woman missing from Lottie, and the ones from Ramah and Grosse Tête - and then, once they'd known the victims might not all be black women, the one from all the way in Port Barre.
Not just Iberville Parish and neighboring Pointe Coupe, then - and if their killer had taken a victim in St. Landry Parish, if he is that mobile, why would he have stopped there? Why not hunt in richer grounds, where staggering rates of missing and trafficked young women would hide all evidence of a pattern?
"I think I have one," Beverly says once the tiresome man has gotten bored of glaring at them while they work. "Scotlandville, just north of Baton Rouge. Glenda Hoffman, 19. Single mom. Went out for groceries after her son was in bed and never came home. They found her car in the Walmart parking lot. Two old pickups for solicitation, one for possession, but no domestic reports and her mother swore up and down that she wasn't seeing anyone."
Hannibal takes the papers she passes him and peruses them, glancing through the details - the time, the place, the various police reports, known associates, employment history. "Could be," he agrees, and adds her information to their growing list of possibles.
Hannibal has felt the suspicion of a pattern for several days. He'd like the chance to enjoy himself in New Orleans over the weekend, though, so he'll wait to bring it up on Monday. There are still a few things that don't quite fit, anyway.
"It's almost six," Beverly says. She leans back in her chair, cracking her back as she raises her arms above her head. "Damn, these chairs are terrible."
"We're unlikely to find more tonight if we burn ourselves out," Hannibal tells her. "I'm surprised our esteemed colleagues haven't dragged us off before now, actually."
"I told Jimmy if he didn't bug me all afternoon I'd let him drag me to Bourbon Street tonight." She grins. "Brian doesn't know it yet, but he's coming, too. You should join us. I've never seen you shitfaced."
Hannibal allows a small smile as he sweeps his notes and pencils into his leather case. "Nor shall you."
"Come oooon," Beverly wheedles. She tugs gently at his arm. "You can't just hole up at the motel all weekend."
"As much as I'm sure I'd enjoy an evening out with you and Jim, I'm afraid I already have dinner plans," he tells her, allowing just enough relief to show through his regret to make her laugh. He is, as he always is with this particular set of people, charming and good-natured, but a little stuffy. "Perhaps another night."
Friday, May 13, 2011 - New Orleans, Louisiana, French Quarter
After a ride back to his accommodations, such as they are, to freshen up and dress for dinner, Hannibal calls a cab and heads for Galatoire's in the French Quarter. He takes some satisfaction in skipping the long line snaking down the sidewalk. Jack hasn't arrived yet, but he spots Sergeant Germaine Grant at a table near the mirrored wall, out of uniform and staring fixedly down at his drink.
The man is strongly built but soft now around the middle, a once active man brought to slight disrepair by age and the shift from city beat to desk job. His dark skin is darker at his throat and, when Hannibal had met him in his short-sleeved uniform, his elbows, the skin there discolored and showing xeroderma from velvet rash, suggesting incipient type two diabetes. He has been unfailingly warm and polite since Jack introduced him as an old army friend on Tuesday, and Hannibal is hoping for an opportunity to gently bring up the man's medical history and steer him toward a reputable endocrinologist.
"Dr. Lecter," Sergeant Grant says, brightly, as he stands to offer Hannibal a hand. "Good to see the fibbies didn't try to keep you all night."
"They might have tried," Hannibal says as he unbuttons his jacket and slips into his seat. "But I was promised 'the best pecan pie anyone but your grandmama ever made.'"
The quotation has the desired effect, and Sergeant Grant sits back with a deep laugh. He waves to a waiter and greets him by name when he reaches the table. "My friend here needs a drink." At Hannibal's amused look, he grins. "You've had Wilson up your ass all week. Save the wine list for dinner and get you a sazerac."
"I will defer to local expertise," Hannibal says and inclines his head to the waiter. When the man bustles off, he takes a moment to look around the room. The low lights are reflected off the many mirrors and the french windows at front of house. The slowly spinning fans on the high ceilings draw his eyes up, and then out over the crowded room.
Three tables away, a young black man in a cheap jacket stands and yields his table to a party of three white couples in suits and cocktail dresses. Money changes hands, and Hannibal watches the man disappear through the french doors out into the night.
"They don't take reservations," Sergeant Grant tells him. "People just pay somebody to wait in line for them. There are folks who do it for most of their living."
How absurd. "Is that how you claimed this table?" Hannibal asks.
"Nah, I sent an officer in to warm my seat." When Hannibal returns his eyes back to his companion, he shrugs. "He was happy to get out of the heat for a while."
And the city paid to hold this table. Hannibal accepts his drink from their returning server and contemplates it in the light before breathing deep, savoring the herbal notes and the hints of aniseed and lemon among the rye whiskey before taking a long, slow sip.
Jack arrives moments later, blaming the assistant director for his delay as he tucks himself up to the table and spreads his napkin in his lap. "They're talking about pulling us back," Jack tells Hannibal. "Wilson's still raising a stink and he's got some kind of backing from State Police. If we don't find something more conclusive linking the murders we'll be back home before the middle of the week.
"I'm confident we'll find something," Hannibal tells him. "Despite local obstruction. Present company excepted, of course."
"Of course," Grant agrees. He rolls his eyes and leans forward over the table, inviting conspiracy. "Y'all dig up anything interesting?"
Hannibal looks over his menu and waits for Jack to set the level of disclosure for this discussion. It seems Jack met with the rest of the team while Hannibal was cleaning up, because he's been filled in on Beverly's find, and another possible linked case Jim and Brian dug up this afternoon, six years ago in a town called Fordoche, in Pointe Coupe Parish, which would mark their earliest case so far. Hannibal will have to take a look through the records to be sure. Asking for what he needs would start Jack's mind down avenues that would ruin Hannibal's weekend plans.
"It's a damn shame," Sergeant Grant says, after the waiter has delivered his speech about the specials and taken their orders. "State Police is really still fighting y'all on this? You think they'd learned their lesson with the last… what, four, five serial killers they missed?"
Jack makes a sound of agreement. "There was a case in Baton Rouge a few years ago where the task force was so confident in a bad profile that they were out doing cheek swabs before they caught the guy another way and realized they had almost everything backward." He tips his glass to Hannibal. "That's why I brought my own profiler with me."
Hannibal bows his head graciously and tips his glass back before finishing off his cocktail just in time for their starters to arrive.
"There turned out to be two of them in Baton Rouge, though," Grant says. "There was someone else running around out there at the same time, similar MO but completely unconnected, muddying the water. They didn't even know to start looking for him until they caught the first guy."
"I hate when that happens," Jack says with great feeling. "Just when you think you're ready to wrap up… Bam, back into the trenches. The only thing worse is copycats. Always makes you doubt if you got the right guy the first time."
"At least none of ours are eating people." Grant points his fork at Hannibal, who pauses with a bite of shrimp halfway to his lips. "Jack was telling me about that Hobbs case, Hell of a way to start a career shift. Sounds like you worked a miracle, finding that psycho. Though I guess that's not really dinner table conversation."
"Jack and I have worked through many a dinner," Hannibal admits. "I'm afraid we're rather used to pairing our meat with morbidity."
Jack launches into a retelling of the Eldon Stammets case, talking up Hannibal's deductions regarding the victims' medical condition as if he's bragging on a favorite hunting dog. It might have been irritating if Hannibal weren't so amused by the dissonance between Jack's proud story and reality.
Hannibal had smelled the acetone odor of ketoacidosis on the breath of their sole temporary survivor from the first mushroom garden and worked out how to track the man from there. He'd waited a few weeks before his 'breakthrough' on the case - time enough to gather quite a crop of oyster mushrooms and morels.
"When we found him," Jack is saying, "he'd mostly buried himself like a kid at the beach, gave himself a sedative in the sugar water IV and just...went to sleep. Let the mushrooms eat him alive."
"Christ, that's terrifying," Grant says. Hannibal is already looking forward to watching him eat his redfish bonne femme.
"These are good, but your sweetbreads are better," Jack murmurs to Hannibal, under the cover of the noisy dining room. Someone seems to be having a birthday or an anniversary every five minutes or so, but Hannibal's shrimp remoulade is delightful enough to make up for the noise, especially seasoned with the schadenfreude of the long line outside. "But I guess even the best restaurants can't replicate the personal touch."