Madden spoke for the next twenty minutes. He related the entire course of the investigation, omitting nothing. He described the ambush that he and Stack pole had survived in the woods above Highfield and the subsequent discovery of the dugout.
'At that point we believed we were dealing with an isolated incident. Recently, however, we have learned that he made a similar attack on a house some months ago. The only person home was a woman and he killed her in much the same way as he killed Mrs Fletcher.'
'In much the same way?'
'In virtually the identical manner. He cut her throat and left her body sprawled across the bed. She was in her bath and he dragged her from there to put her on the bed, just as he carried Mrs Fletcher from the stairs.
I was reminded of something someone said to me earlier, referring to Lucy Fletcher. That she had been laid out like a sacrifice.'
'You saw an element of ritual in both killings?' Dr Weiss leaned forward. His face was a study in concentration.
Madden nodded. 'That was how they appeared to me.'
'And neither woman was sexually abused in any way?'
'Correct.'
'You tested for seminal fluid?'
'Everywhere. At least in the case of Mrs Fletcher.'
'On her body, as well as in the orifices?'
'Yes, why?'
'On the bedclothes?'
Madden frowned. 'I don't know. Is it important?'
'It might be.' Dr Weiss seemed to notice the glass of whisky in front of him for the first time. He took a sip of the drink. 'So! These are the facts.' He looked Madden in the eye. 'Let us deal with your first question — are these murders sexually motivated? To which I would answer yes. Beyond any doubt.'
'Why?' Madden was struck by the certainty of his tone.
'Partly through reductive reasoning. Once you exclude other motives such as revenge or, indeed, robbery, it's difficult to imagine what else could lie behind them. But mainly because of the close similarities in the killing of Mrs Fletcher and Mrs Reynolds.
The element of repetition — of ritual, as you rightly surmise — is one of the classic signs of the sexual murder. As I'm sure you're aware, Inspector.'
'Yes, but we're puzzled by the lack of direct evidence.
To put it bluntly, why doesn't he rape them? Or abuse them in some other way?'
Dr Weiss cocked his head on one side. 'You've considered the possibility that the man is impotent?
That these killings are an expression of rage?'
Madden nodded. 'But in that case I would expect him to demonstrate it more clearly, on the bodies of his victims. Merely cutting their throats seems insufficient.'
'I agree.' Weiss nodded crisply. 'But there could be another explanation. He may feel he can't satisfy himself directly. I mean by normal, or even abnormal, penetration.'
'Why would that be?'
'Because he thinks it's forbidden. Taboo. That doesn't mean he's incapable of ejaculation. Only that he can't bring himself to conclude the act in an orthodox manner. Then again, that may be what he is aiming at. To achieve coitus somehow.' Dr Weiss's fingertips played a scale on the glassed table. As though in response the sawing notes of a cello came from the next room where an orchestra had struck up. They were playing an old tune: 'Just A Song At Twilight'.
'But can we be certain?' Madden felt impelled to play the devil's advocate. 'What about the wartime connection? The bayonet, the dugout, the gas mask?
Isn't it possible he's simply deranged? That he's reacting to something he experienced in the trenches?'
Weiss shook his head. 'We must take that into account, certainly. But the seed of these crimes was planted much earlier in life. In childhood. In infancy, perhaps.'
'Can you be sure of that?' Madden was sceptical.
'Sure?' The doctor lifted his shoulders in an eloquent gesture. 'In my profession one can seldom be sure of anything. There's a saying Freud is fond of quoting: "The soul of man is a far country, impossible to explore." But with regard to human sexuality, certain facts are now, surely, beyond dispute. For one, it is established very early in childhood. For another, any damage done then is carried into adult life and magnified. About this there can be no doubt.'
Madden was paying close attention. 'But if he was damaged in childhood, as you suggest, wouldn't he have shown signs of it before now? If we accept he went through the war, he must be in his late twenties, at the very least.'
'This is something that is bothering me,' Dr Weiss admitted wryly. 'Have you checked police records before the war as well as since?'
'Yes, there's nothing of this kind on file.'
'Then we must go deeper into speculation.' The doctor shifted in his chair. He slipped a gold watch out of his fob pocket and began to swing it to and fro like a pendulum in front of him. His brow was knitted in a frown. 'Let us suppose this man conforms to a type familiar to psychiatry. Early in his life he would have shown symptoms of sexual disorientation — the infliction of pain on animals, dogs and cats, is one of the most common. With such children the first full sexual experience, I mean orgasm, is often associated with a blood ritual already developed and establishes a pattern difficult to break. We may imagine he underwent some such experience at the start of adolescence.
But since he left no trace of himself as a young man, either his sexual desires were very small or he possessed an exceptional degree of willpower and was able to suppress them. Given the ferocity of his present actions, I would tend to discount the first.
'So what are we faced with?' Dr Weiss pondered his own question. 'A man of unusual self-control who has suddenly cast off his shackles and revealed his true sexual identity. For this to have occurred he is most likely to have undergone an experience — what we in our profession term a trauma — of a quite shattering kind. And now we see a very definite connection to his time in uniform. When it comes to injuries wrought to the human psyche, there is no need to look further than the experience of the common soldier in the trenches.'
Weiss paused. His sympathetic glance rested on the inspector. 'I speak only as an analyst,' he said gently.
'My knowledge of this is second-hand — it comes from the many patients I treat in Vienna. Yours, I suspect, is more immediate and more personal.'
Madden made no reply at first. Then he responded with a brief nod.
'So! Having established that, we can at least form a theory as to why the man you seek has begun — begun now — to commit these crimes. A theory, mind you!'
Dr Weiss raised a warning finger. 'But if we accept it, we can see a possible line of inquiry emerging. What you have told me about his behaviour suggests that the link with his wartime service is more than merely causal.'
'I'm sorry, I don't…'
'The killing of these two women derives from some experience in childhood — or so I believe.' The doctor's features were screwed into a deep frown. 'But the details overlying it — the dugout, the gas mask, the furious attack and bayoneting of the others — these seem like a refinement of the original action. An addition to it even.'
'An addition?' Madden was alert at the word. 'You're saying he might have committed a murder of this kind during the war?'
'And is now seeking to perfect the act. Yes, that is a possibility.' Dr Weiss nodded vigorously.
'While he was in the trenches?'
'Oh, no!' Weiss shook his head with equal urgency.
'The killing, if it took place, would have been quite separate from the general carnage. The woman is crucial to the act.'
'But while he was a soldier? Behind the lines, perhaps?' Madden felt a spark of excitement. 'We could ask the War Office. It would be in the provost marshal's records.'
'Only if the military authorities investigated it,' Dr Weiss cautioned. 'And only if it actually occurred.
Remember, Inspector, this is all supposition.'