Saturday Requiem (5 page)

She thought of Hannah, beaten by other inmates, cuffed and drugged by the nurses, unvisited for years on end, abandoned and alone. She had no one. She had Frieda. For a while.

She sent an email to Levin saying that she had changed her mind. She needed to visit Hannah Docherty again. She asked him to arrange it.

Frieda had a new client, a middle-aged woman who had been referred to her because she was suffering from acute, disabling panic attacks. She came into the room as if blown by the wind, surging forward, then stopping near the chair. Her dark hair was wet from the weather and plastered to her skull.

‘Hello, Maria. I’m Frieda. Please, have a seat.’

The woman sat very upright, placing her hands on the arms of the chair as if it was about to speed off with her in it. ‘This is like going to the dentist’s,’ she said. Her voice rasped and she gave a single cough to clear it. ‘Just don’t tell me to relax.’

‘I won’t.’

‘Right, then.’ Her eyes were deep in their sockets, and there were purple shadows under them. She had the look of someone who had lost a lot of weight in a short time. Her black jeans were loose on her and her grey turtleneck jumper was baggy. She turned her gaze on Frieda as though she was forcing herself. Frieda saw her hands clench the armrests. ‘What now?’

‘I know that you’ve been having panic attacks and you’re probably feeling nervous about coming here, but today I’ll just do an assessment, asking some general questions, getting a kind of picture of your situation before we start on our actual therapy sessions together. All right?’

Maria Dreyfus nodded. She wiped the back of one hand across her forehead, which Frieda saw was beaded with sweat.

‘We’ll start with basic things, like where you live, what you do, if you have a partner, children …’

So they began. Slowly, patiently, Frieda extracted information. Maria Dreyfus was fifty-four. She was a fund-raiser and events manager for a mental-health charity. She had been married for twenty-five years, and while there had been ups and downs, of course, she described the marriage as strong. She had two children – a daughter who was a lawyer and a son who was still at university. Her father was alive, but her mother had died of cancer eleven years ago. She herself had had breast cancer in her early forties. She had a sister to whom she was close and a wide circle of friends, although recently she had stopped seeing them, and some of them were offended by that.

‘So I’m lucky,’ she said. Her voice was low and attractive. ‘I know I’m lucky. Nothing bad’s ever really happened in my life, not compared to most people I know. My husband had an affair just after our son was born. That was painful, but it was ages ago and we got over it, though sometimes I can’t believe I didn’t just walk out of the door. My mother died. That was awful. But everyone’s mother dies. I had breast cancer, but they got it early. I was scared, of course, but I didn’t go to pieces or anything. I just dealt with it. I’ve always thought of myself as someone who deals with things. That’s what my friends would say as well. I’m strong. I thought I was. Now I tell myself –’ She stopped and frowned. ‘I don’t know what I was going to say. I don’t know what I tell myself.’

‘Tell
me
,’ said Frieda.

‘What should I say?’

‘Tell me when it started. What happened? Describe it for me.’

She passed the back of her hand across her forehead once more, then put it against her throat briefly before replacing it
on the chair arm. ‘It’s hard to say. For a long time now – a couple of months, anyway –’ She stopped again. ‘Does my voice sound weird to you?’

‘Weird in what way?’

‘Thin and dry and coming from far away.’

‘No. But then I don’t know what your voice normally sounds like. You’re probably feeling self-conscious and removed from yourself and that’s why it sounds strange to you – like hearing a recording of yourself.’

‘What was I saying?’

‘You were saying that for some time now – and then you stopped.’

‘For some time I’d been having a peculiar and unpleasant feeling. Like a heaviness in my chest. I found it hard to swallow. And I had a nasty taste in my mouth and sometimes felt nauseous and short of breath. I lost my appetite. I thought maybe it was something physical. A bug I couldn’t shake off. Then one night, I woke.’ She took one hand off the armrest and put it on her stomach. Now she was looking away from Frieda, talking towards the window where the rain still streamed down the glass, obscuring the world. She’d had enough of making herself meet another person’s gaze. Silence was thick in the room.

‘You woke?’

‘I woke and I couldn’t breathe properly. I couldn’t breathe, and there was such a pain in my chest, I couldn’t move. I couldn’t make myself move. It was quite dark. I could hear my husband breathing beside me, and I could hear myself trying to take a breath, but I sounded like an animal in a trap. I thought I was dying. I knew I was dying. This was it.’

Frieda waited.

Maria lifted her eyes. ‘I didn’t die. Obviously. I woke my husband and he called the emergency services and I was
rushed to hospital with a suspected heart attack. But there was nothing wrong with me. Nothing physical. It was embarrassing, ridiculous.’

‘You were having a panic attack.’

‘Yes.’

‘And they’ve continued.’

‘Yes. Attack is the right word for it. I wake at night and I know it’s coming. It’s crouching and it’s going to get me. I lie there, with a thundering heart and the blood pounding in my head, and I’m pinned to the bed and this thing is going to happen. It’s like that man who has his liver pecked at by an eagle.’

‘Prometheus.’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it just at night?’

‘No. Nights are the worst. I used to love climbing into bed but now it’s like climbing onto a torture rack. I lie awake, and I dread the small hours. I feel like an object, a
thing
, lying there staked out. I’m so tired.’

‘You must be.’

‘Have you ever had proper insomnia?’ Frieda didn’t answer. ‘It’s horrible. But it’s not just at night. It happened at work a few times. It was ghastly. I knew I was making a spectacle of myself, but I couldn’t help it. I’m on sick leave now, though I keep trying to go back. I’m not used to not working. I’ve worked all my life – I’ve always been the main breadwinner. When my children were born I went back after a few weeks. This is the first time in over thirty years I’ve had time off. I used to long to have a painless illness for a few weeks so I could read and rest, you know, but I don’t do any of that. I lie in bed in the dark and listen to my heart banging. Or I just sit on the sofa, doing nothing. Me! I’ve never done nothing – it’s a family joke. I can’t see friends. I dread
seeing anyone. I even dread seeing my children, the effort of talking to them. I don’t want anyone looking at me. Into me.’

‘What would they see?’

‘I don’t know. I just know this is not bearable.’ She shifted abruptly in the chair. ‘That’s stupid. Of course it’s bearable. I’m not dying of it. It’s just …’ She raised her palms in the air in a gesture of bewilderment. Her gaunt, intelligent face sagged. ‘I don’t understand it.’

‘And you’re used to understanding things.’

‘Yes.’

‘And to feeling in control.’

‘Yes. This – it’s meaningless. It’s just dread. As if my time of reckoning has come.’

Leaving her office, half an hour after Maria Dreyfus had gone, Frieda found Jude, as arranged. She got into the car beside her.

‘We need to pick up someone on the way,’ Frieda said.

‘What do you mean?’ said Jude. ‘Who?’

‘Someone who can help.’

‘Have you cleared this with Levin?’

‘I only thought of it last night. He’s round the corner.’

‘That’s not really the point.’

Frieda directed Jude across Tottenham Court Road. He was standing outside the back entrance of the hospital on the pavement reading a book. When he saw the car, he slipped it into a side pocket. Frieda got out and moved to the back seat. Even so, he had trouble fitting himself inside, his knees drawn up.

Jude pulled away. ‘So who is this?’ she asked.

‘Ask him,’ said Frieda.

‘Is there a problem?’ he asked.

‘We didn’t know anyone was coming along.’

‘ “We”? Frieda asked me.’

‘I mean me. The people I work for.’

He looked round at Frieda with an amused expression. ‘If this is something awkward, I can get out here.’

‘This is Professor Andrew Berryman. He’s … Well, what are you?’

‘Neurology,’ said Berryman. ‘Brains.’

‘Yes, I know what neurology means,’ said Jude. ‘But I thought that was what Levin was using
you
for.’

‘I’m not really interested in the chemistry of the brain – in neurons and synapses,’ said Frieda. ‘I mean, I’ve studied it and read about it. I’m interested in how behaviour originates in experience, memory, trauma.’

Berryman laughed. ‘And I’m the opposite. I chose a branch of medicine where you don’t really have to deal with patients. Looking at people’s brains when they go wrong turns out to be a neat way of understanding how they work. I’m quoting from my first year-one lecture.’

‘So you think there’s something wrong with Hannah Docherty’s brain?’

‘We all know there’s something wrong with her brain – or her mind,’ said Frieda. ‘She’s been in a psychiatric hospital for thirteen years.’

‘You ought to have cleared this with Levin,’ said Jude.

‘If Levin doesn’t trust me, then he can look him up. He was crucial in solving the Robert Poole case a few years ago.’

‘ “Crucial” is putting it a bit strongly,’ said Berryman. ‘But, then, I should warn you that the last time I saw Frieda, she’d been brought into A & E.’ He looked round. Squeezed into the little car as he was, this took a considerable effort. ‘You were a terrible sight. Are you all right?’

‘As I said at the time, it wasn’t my blood.’

‘Not your blood?’ said Jude. ‘What the hell happened?’

‘It’s complicated,’ said Frieda. ‘You can ask Levin. He probably knows most of it. Actually, he probably knows more than I do. Anyway, the answer is, I’m fine. Other people came off worse.’

As they drove through London, Frieda gave an account of Hannah Docherty’s case. At one point, Jude interrupted: ‘You are going to be discreet about this?’

‘Which one of us are you talking to?’ asked Frieda.

‘Both of you.’

‘I could be pompous about it. And say I was a doctor.’ Berryman looked out of the window. ‘Of course, if it’s particularly interesting I might have to write a paper about it.’

Jude turned and stared at him.

‘Names disguised. And places.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Frieda. ‘He doesn’t have normal human reactions.’

‘It may seem funny to you,’ said Jude, ‘but if it gets into the papers, I’ll be the one in trouble.’

‘I’ll be discreet,’ said Berryman. ‘I promise. So we’re going to talk to Hannah Docherty?’

‘Not immediately,’ said Frieda.

Dr Christian Mendoza was the clinical director of Chelsworth Hospital. His office was in the original, old part of the house, the faded Gothic construction that looked like the remnant of a stately home or a castle or a public school. Frieda and Berryman were led along murky corridors and up a winding staircase, but the office itself was spacious, with large windows looking out on lawns and woodland. Mendoza was about sixty years old, with thinning grey hair, so that his pink scalp was clearly visible across the top of his head. He was dressed in a grey suit with a dark blue bow-tie.
He wore very small round tortoiseshell spectacles. He waved them towards two chairs that had been placed in front of his wooden desk. Its surface was almost empty, except for a telephone, a mug full of pencils and pens, an open blank notebook and a small pile of files.

‘Dr Frieda Klein and Dr Andrew Berryman,’ said Mendoza. ‘A psychotherapist and a neurologist.’

‘That’s us,’ said Frieda.

‘That’s the benefit of modern technology. I was able to look you up and I was impressed with what I found. I only wish you’d given us more notice and I could have arranged a proper reception for you.’

‘That’s all right,’ said Frieda. ‘I only decided this yesterday evening.’

Mendoza took a handkerchief from his pocket, removed his spectacles and breathed on them, then carefully cleaned the lenses. ‘So, my first question is why, after all these years, a psychotherapist and a neurologist should be interested in poor Hannah Docherty.’

‘Isn’t she interesting?’ said Frieda.

‘Everybody here is interesting. I’m curious about why she is of special interest to you.’

‘I’m looking at the crime she was involved in.’

‘The crime she
committed
.’ Mendoza looked at Berryman. ‘You’re being very quiet.’

‘Don’t mind me,’ said Berryman. ‘I’m just the Dr Watson. Or the Sancho Panza, or whatever.’

‘I’m sure that’s not true.’ Mendoza looked back at Frieda. ‘I understand you’ve already met Hannah.’

‘I talked to her, but she didn’t talk back. So, before seeing her again, I thought it would be useful to get some kind of account of her time here.’

‘What would you like to know?’

Frieda thought for a moment. There was so much. ‘What was her condition when she arrived?’

‘Of course, I wasn’t here then. I came in 2007. But I’ve looked at her file. She was committed here in a floridly psychotic state.’

‘Which was treated how?’

Mendoza shrugged. ‘As you’d expect, with a regime of anti-psychotic drugs and therapy.’

‘Anything else?’

‘She received ECT from time to time.’

‘I’d generally thought of ECT as a treatment for morbid depression,’ said Frieda.

‘Are you here to question our treatment?’

‘I’m just trying to build up a picture of her state of health.’

‘I can give you that in two words,’ said Mendoza. ‘Not good.’

‘Over thirteen years.’

‘Over thirteen years.’

‘When she arrived,’ said Frieda, ‘she was a convicted killer of her parents and of her teenage brother. Did that make her a target?’

‘You mean of other patients?’

‘That’s right.’

‘As I said, I wasn’t here then. But as I understand it, it was the other way round. You’ve met Hannah. She’s a pretty formidable figure. She quickly acquired a reputation.’

‘For violence.’

‘That’s right.’

‘And how do you respond here to someone with a reputation for violence?’

‘We’re a hospital,’ said Mendoza. ‘Our first responsibility is to our patients, to maintain their well-being and their safety.’