‘Anyway,’ Hecate said, ‘what I wanted to discuss was Macbeth. I’m concerned about him. He’s changed.’
‘Really?’
‘I fear he’s hooked. Not so strange, maybe, after all it is the world’s most addictive dope.’
‘Power?’
‘Yes, but not the type that comes in powder form. Real power. I didn’t think that he would be hooked quite so quickly. He’s already managed to divest himself of any emotions that tie him to morality and humanity; now power is his new and only lover. You heard the radio interview the other day. The brat wants to be mayor.’
‘But in practice the chief commissioner has more power.’
‘As chief commissioner he will of course make sure that real power is returned to the town hall before he occupies the mayoral office. Truly, Macbeth is dreaming of taking over this town. He thinks he is invincible now. And that he can challenge me too.’
Bonus looked at Hecate in surprise. He had folded his hands over the golden top of his stick and was studying his reflection.
‘Yes, Bonus, it should be the other way round: it should be you telling me that Macbeth is after me. That’s what I pay you for. And now your little flounder brain is wondering how I can know this. Well, just ask me.’
‘I... er... How do you know?’
‘Because he said so on the radio programme you also listened to.’
‘I thought he said the opposite, that pursuing Hecate wouldn’t have the same priority as under Duncan.’
‘And when did you last hear anyone with political ambitions say on radio what they weren’t going to do for the electorate? He could have said he was going to arrest Hecate and create jobs. Sober politicians always promise everything under the sun. But what he said wasn’t meant for voters, it was meant for me, Bonus. He didn’t need to, yet he committed himself publicly and pandered to me. And when people pander you have to watch out.’
‘You think he wants to gain your confidence—’ Bonus looked at Hecate to see if he was on the right track ‘—because he hopes that way you will let him in close and he can then dispose of you?’
Hecate pulled a black hair from a wart on his cheek and studied it. ‘I could crush Macbeth under my heel this minute. But I’ve invested a lot in getting him where he is now, and if there’s one thing I hate it’s a bad investment, Bonus. Therefore I want you to keep your eyes and ears open to find out what he’s planning.’ Hecate threw up his arms. ‘Ah! Look, here’s Al with more jackets. Let’s find one to fit your long tentacle arms.’
Bonus gulped. ‘What if I don’t find out anything?’
‘Then I have no more use for you, dear Bonus.’
It was said in such a casual way and made even more innocuous with a little smile. Bonus’s eyes searched behind the smile. But he found nothing there except night and chill.
‘Look at the watch,’ Dr Alsaker ordered and let his pocket watch swing in front of the patient’s face. ‘You’re relaxing, your arms and legs are feeling heavy, you’re tired and you’re falling asleep. And you won’t wake until I say chestnut.’
She was easy to hypnotise. So easy that Alsaker had to check a couple of times that she wasn’t pretending. Whenever he came to the Inverness he was followed up to the suite by the receptionist, Jack. There she sat ready in her dressing gown — she refused to wear anything else. Her hands were red from compulsive daily scrubbing, and even if she insisted she wasn’t taking anything, he could see from her pupils that she was under the influence of some drug or other. It was one of several disadvantages of being refused permission to admit her to a psychiatric ward, where he could have kept an eye on her medication, sleep and meals and observed her behaviour.
‘Let’s begin where we left off last time,’ Alsaker said, looking at his notes. Not that he needed them to remember; the details were of such a brutal nature they had seared themselves into his memory. He needed his notes to believe what she had actually told him. The first lines were not unusual; on the contrary they were a common refrain in many similar cases. ‘Unemployed, alcoholic father and depressive and violent mother. You grew up by the river in what you call a hovel or a rats’ nest. Literally. You told me your first memories were watching rats swimming towards your house when the sun set, and you remember thinking it was the rats’ house. You slept in their bed, you had eaten their food, when they came up into your bed you understood why they bit you.’
Her voice was soft and low. ‘They just wanted what was theirs.’
‘And your father said the same when he got into your bed.’
‘He just wanted what was his.’
Alsaker skimmed his notes. It wasn’t the first abuse case he had treated, but this one had some details that were particularly disturbing.
‘You became pregnant when you were thirteen and gave birth to a child. Your mother called you a whore. She said you should chuck the misbegotten child into the river, but you refused.’
‘I just wanted to have what was mine.’
‘So you and the child were thrown out of the house, and you spent the next night with the first man you met.’
‘He said he’d kill the baby if it didn’t stop screaming, so I took it into the bed. But then he said it ruined his concentration because it was watching.’
‘And while he was sleeping you stole money from his pockets and food from the kitchen.’
‘I just took what was mine.’
‘And what is yours?’
‘What everyone else has.’
‘What happened then?’
‘The river ran dry.’
‘Come on, Lady. What happened then?’
‘More factories were built. More workers came to town. I earned a bit more money. Mum came to see me and told me Dad was dead. His lungs. It had been a painful death. I told her I’d have liked to have been there to see his pain.’
‘Don’t skirt around it, Lady. Get to the point. What happened to the baby?’
‘Have you seen how babies’ faces change, almost from one day to the next. Well, suddenly, one day it had his face.’
‘Your father’s.’
‘Yes.’
‘And what did you do then?’
‘I gave it extra milk so that it was smiling blissfully at me when it fell asleep. Then I smashed its head against the wall. A head smashes easily, you know? How fragile a human life is.’
Alsaker swallowed and cleared his throat. ‘Did you do it because the child’s face was like your father’s?’
‘No. But it finally made it possible.’
‘Does that mean you’d been thinking about it for a while?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Can you tell me why you say of course ?’
She was silent for a moment. Alsaker saw her pupils twitch, and this reminded him of something. Frogspawn. A tadpole trying to break free from a sticky egg.
‘If you want to achieve your aims you have to be able to renounce what you love. If the person you climb with to reach the peak weakens, you have to either encourage him or cut the rope.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? If he falls he’ll drag both of you down. If you want to survive, your hand has to do what your heart refuses to do.’
‘Kill the person you love?’
‘The way Abraham sacrificed his son. Let the blood flow. Amen.’
Alsaker shivered and took notes. ‘What is there at the peak that you want?’
‘The peak is the top. Then you’re up. Higher than everything and everyone.’
‘Do you have to go there?’
‘No. You can crawl around in the lowlands. On the rubbish heap. In the muddy riverbed. But once you’ve started climbing there’s no way back. It’s the peak or the abyss.’