Standing with Mischa in the barn beside the lodge, holding her close, Mischa coughing. Bowl-Man feels the flesh of their arms and speaks, but no sound comes out of his mouth, only his vile breath visible in the freezing air. Mischa buries her face against Hannibal 's chest to get away from Bowl-Man's breath. Blue-Eyes is saying something, and now they are singing, cozening. Seeing the axe and bowl. Flying at Blue-Eyes, taste of blood and beard stubble, they are taking Mischa away. They have the axe and the bowl. Breaking free and running after them, feet liftingtooosloooow to the door, Blue-Eyed One and Bowl-Man holding Mischa by her wrists above the ground, she twisting her head to look back desperately at him across the bloody snow and calling-

Hannibal came awake, choking, holding on to the end of the dream, clamping his eyes tight shut and tried to force himself past the point where he awoke. He bit the corner of the pillowcase and made himself go over the dream. What did the men call each other? What were their names?

When did he lose the sound? He couldn't remember when it went away. He wanted to know what they called each other. He had to finish the dream.

He went into his memory palace and tried to cross the grounds to the dark sheds, past Mr. Jakov's brains on the snow, but he could not. He could endure to see his mother's clothes on fire, his parents and Berndt and Mr. Jakov dead in the yard. He could see the looters moving below him and Mischa in the hunting lodge. But he could not go past Mischa suspended in the air, turning her head to look at him. He could remember nothing after that, he could only recall much later, he was riding on a tank, found by the soldiers with the chain locked around his neck. He wanted to remember. He had to remember. Teeth in a stool pit. The flash did not come often; it made him sit up. He looked at the gibbon in the moonlight. Teeth much smaller than that. Baby teeth. Not terrible. Like mine can be. I have to hear the voices carried on their stinking breath, I know what their words smell like. I have to remember their names. I have to find them. And I will. How can I interrogate myself?

36

PROFESSOR DUMAS WROTE a mild, round hand, unnatural in a physician. His note said: Hannibal, would you please see what you can do in the matter of LouisFerrat at LaSante?

The professor had attached a newspaper clipping about Ferrat's sentencing with a few details about him: Ferrat, from Lyon, had been a minor Vichy functionary, a petty collaborator during the German occupation, but then was arrested by the Germans for forging and selling ration coupons. After the war he was accused of complicity in war crimes, but released for insufficient evidence. A French court convicted him of killing two women in 1949-1950 for personal reasons. He was scheduled to die in three days.

LaSante Prison is in the 14th arrondissement, not far from the medical school. Hannibal reached it in a fifteen-minute walk.

Workmen with a load of pipe were repairing the drains in the courtyard, the site of guillotine executions since the public was barred from attending in 1939. The guards at the gate knew Hannibal by sight and passed him in. As he signed the visitors' log he saw the signature of Inspector Popil high on the page.

The sound of hammering came from a large bare room off the main corridor. As he passed by, Hannibal caught sight of a face herecognized. The state executioner, AnatoleTourneau himself, traditionally known as "Monsieur Paris," had brought the guillotine from its garage on the Rue de laTombe-Issoire to set it up inside the prison. He was twiddling the little wheels of the blade carrier, the mouton, which prevent the blade from jamming on its way down.

Monsieur Paris was a perfectionist. To his credit, he always used a cover at the top of the uprights so the subject did not have to see the blade.

LouisFerrat was in the condemned cell, separated by a corridor from the other cells on a second-floor tier in the first building of LaSante.

The din of the crowded prison reached his cell as a wash of murmurings and cries and clangs, but he could hear the blows of Monsieur Paris' mallet as the assembly proceeded on the floor below.

LouisFerrat was a slender man, with dark hair, newly cropped off his neck and the back of his head. The hair on top was left long, to provide Monsieur Paris' assistant a better grip than Louis' small ears would provide.

Ferratsat on his cot in combination underwear, rubbing between his thumb and fingers a cross on a chain about his neck. His shirt and pants were carefully arranged on a chair, as though a person had been seated there and evaporated out of the clothing. The shoes were side by side beneath the pants cuffs. The clothing reclined in the chair in the anatomical position. Ferrat heard Hannibal but he did not look up.

"Monsieur LouisFerrat, good afternoon," Hannibal said.

"Monsieur Ferrat has stepped away from his cell,"Ferrat said. "I represent him. What do you want?"

Hannibal took in the clothing without moving his eyes. "I want to ask him to make a gift of his body to the medical school, for science. It will be treated with great respect."

"You'll take his body anyway. Drag it away."

"I can't and I wouldn't take his body without his permission. Or ever drag it."

"Ah, here is my client now," Ferrat said. He turned away from Hannibal and conferred quietly with the clothing as though it had just walked into the cell and seated itself in the chair. Ferrat returned to the bars.

"He wants to know why should he give it to you?"

"Fifteen thousand francs for his relatives."

Ferratturned to the clothing and then back to Hannibal. "MonsieurFerrat says, Fuck my relatives. They hold out their hand and I'll shit in it."Ferrat dropped his voice. "Forgive the language-he is distraught, and the gravity of the matter requires me to quote him exactly."

"I understand perfectly," Hannibal said. "Do you think he'd like to contribute the fee to a cause his family despises, would that be a satisfaction to him, Monsieur…?"

"You may call me Louis-Monsieur Ferrat and I share the same first name.

No. I believe he is adamant. Monsieur Ferrat lives somewhat apart from himself. He says he has very little influence on himself."

"I see. He is not alone in that."

"I hardly see how you understand anything, you're not much more than a chi-not much more than a schoolboy yourself."

"You might help me then. Each student at the medical school writes a personal letter of appreciation to the donor with whom he is involved.

Knowing MonsieurFerrat as you do, could you help me compose a letter of appreciation? Just in case he should decide favorably?"

Ferrat rubbed his face. His fingers appeared to have an extra set of knuckles where they had been broken and badly set years ago.

"Who would ever read it, other than MonsieurFerrat himself?"

"It would be posted at the school, if he wishes. All the faculty would see it, prominent and influential people. He could submit it to Le CanardEnchaine for publication."

"What sort of thing would you want to say?"

"I'd describe him as selfless, cite his contribution to science, to the French people, to medical advances that will help the oncoming generation of children."

"Never mind children. Leave children out."

Hannibal quickly wrote a salutation on his notepad. "Do you think this is sufficiently honorific?" He held it up high enough for LouisFerrat to have to look up at it, the better to gauge the length of his neck.

Not a very long neck. Unless Monsieur Paris got a good grip on his hair, there wouldn't be much left below the hyoid bone, useless for a frontal cervical triangle display.

"We mustn't neglect his patriotism," Ferrat said. "When Le Grand Charles broadcast from London, who responded? It was Ferrat at the barricades!