Haberland nodded. ‘I had a long talk with her earlier on, while you were asleep. She made a feverish, nervous, edgy impression. The fact is, she’s only interested in looking for evidence that will justify her conspiracy theory.’
‘So you think she’s paranoid?’
‘Don’t you?’
They passed a bench that had seen better days. The back was rotten and the seat seemed unlikely to be able to bear much weight. Haberland propped one foot on it and removed a wad of damp leaves adhering to the sole of his shoe.
‘Let’s assume you’re entirely healthy, Marc – discounting your superficial injuries and your discoloured eyes, which worry me greatly, by the way. At least you aren’t suffering from any psychosomatic disorder. The house, the lake, the forest – they’re all real, and we’re really having this conversation. How could you explain these occurrences?’
Tarzan trotted over to them. Not that Marc had noticed it before, the old dog avoided putting weight on one of its hind legs.
‘Perhaps my memory was erased once before?’ he theorized. ‘Perhaps it didn’t work properly the first time and I’m suddenly remembering facts from my former life?’
‘Possibly.’ The corners of Haberland’s mouth turned up in a moue of scepticism. ‘Or perhaps the exact opposite is happening.’
He picked up a stick and threw it in the direction they’d come from. Tarzan just stared after it with a weary eye.
‘How do you mean?’
‘I don’t like talking about it, but for a short time I myself once suffered from almost total amnesia. Loss of memory occasioned by a trauma I wanted to suppress at all costs.’ The professor rubbed his wrists again. ‘Rediscovering my memory was a terrible process, but it did teach me one thing.’
‘Well?’
‘That the truth is often the opposite of what we believe.’
Haberland turned and followed his dog, which had set off for home. Marc hesitated for a moment, then hurried after him.
‘You’re afraid your memory has been tampered with. Erased. Possibly even for the second time,’ Haberland said without looking at Marc. ‘But what if it’s being erased at this very moment?’
Marc shivered. ‘How?’
‘Well, I’m not sure how the Bleibtreu Clinic induces artificial amnesia in its patients. Up to now, losses of memory have always been an unintended by-product. However, it’s conceivable that they subject their guinea pigs to shock therapy. And isn’t that just what’s happening to you now? One traumatic incident hard on the heels of another?’
‘But why should anyone do that?’
They were almost back at the house now. Voices could be heard coming from beyond the veranda, probably those of Emma and Benny, who must have brought themselves to have a chat.
‘To make you forget. The only question is, what.’
Marc shut his eyes, recalling a sequence from his recent dream.
‘I wish you hadn’t found out. Not so soon, at least.’
‘I don’t know,’ he said truthfully.
‘Then try to recall it.’ The professor came to a halt and looked at him intently. ‘Recall what you want to forget!’
‘But how? How am I supposed to…’
Marc’s wristwatch buzzed. He felt in his jacket pocket, then smacked his forehead with annoyance.
‘What is it?’ Haberland asked. His dog, too, seemed to stare at Marc enquiringly.
‘I have to take my pills, but they’re still in the glove compartment of my car.’
‘What sort of pills?’
Marc touched the plaster on his neck.
‘Oh yes.’ Haberland went round behind him. ‘I’m glad you raised the subject.’
‘Why?’
‘Earlier on, when I examined your head for superficial injuries, I took the liberty of changing the dressing. What’s it for?’
‘There’s a splinter in my neck.’
The professor raised his eyebrows. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course. Hey, what are you doing?’
Marc couldn’t react quickly enough to prevent the old man from ripping off the salmon-coloured plaster that held the gauze dressing in place.
‘I know you can’t see it, but go on, have a feel.’
Why should I? Constantin told me the wound must remain sterile.
‘Well, go on.’ Haberland guided his hand. Marc winced, but not in pain. He couldn’t feel a thing. Nothing but bare, unbroken skin.
Haberland confirmed it. ‘You don’t have a wound there at all.’
No splinter.
‘And it looks as if there never was one.’
55
The snow came without warning. Although it was still too fine and feathery to settle, Haberland advised them to leave as soon as possible. The rental car in which Benny had driven them there was fitted with summer tyres and would fail to negotiate the narrow forest tracks if the snow became heavier. And that, if the professor was to be believed, was a possibility to be reckoned with. By the time he said goodbye he was rubbing his wrists even more nervously than when they first started talking.
Marc couldn’t understand why Benny was driving so cautiously. He dipped the headlights after only a few hundred metres and set the windscreen wipers at maximum. Ten minutes later it was as if the car had taken off, leaving the leaf-strewn ground behind, and was flying above a dense layer of cloud.
‘What were you talking about with the professor all that time?’ Benny asked, his fingers drumming nervously on the steering wheel. He sounded uneasy and faintly suspicious.
‘Don’t worry, he didn’t tell me anything about you I didn’t know already.’
Marc went on to describe the revelation that had occurred in the course of their walk.
‘No splinter?’ said Benny.
‘No splinter.’ Marc turned so that he could see his neck. ‘He also said that no one would have prescribed an immuno-suppressive for an injury like that. At most an antibiotic to combat inflammation.’
Benny shook his head in surprise.
They were bouncing along a track full of potholes. Marc still couldn’t tell where they were, and visibility didn’t improve until they turned out on to a deserted but metalled road. He now thought he knew what part of the suburbs they were in. He had been out here with Benny once before, years ago, when the future ill-feeling between them wasn’t even a cloud on the horizon. Not far from here must be the abandoned quarry in which they’d dumped their father’s car.
‘Twelve forty-five on the thirteeth of November. We’re heading away from the Müggelsee and towards Köpenick old town,’ Marc heard Emma dictate into her mobile behind him. ‘All advice to the contrary, Marc Lucas is planning to go to the home of his father-in-law, Constantin Senner, in Sakrow.’
Constantin.
Marc managed to fade out her voice by shutting his eyes. He thought of the man he’d trusted more than himself. The man with whom he’d shared every possible emotion: joy, grief, anger, concern, euphoria, and dark, abysmal depression.
He had admired Constantin for being a man of integrity with clear aims, a man whose conservative political stance he had no use for, but whom he respected for his principles and the love he bestowed on anyone who meant something to his only daughter. Constantin had been his friend, confidant and mentor. And now he seemed to be the author of a plan designed to drive him insane.
‘Why does Haberland live all on his own like that?’ he heard Emma ask. He opened his eyes.
She had put her mobile away and was leaning forwards.
‘Ever heard of the “Soul-Breaker”?’ Benny countered. His tone was less hostile, and the fact that Emma had addressed him of her own accord denoted a slight rapprochement between them. Clearly, Haberland’s words had not been altogether wasted on them.
‘You mean you haven’t heard about the women who were abducted and later found buried alive in their own bodies, so to speak?’ Benny glanced in the rear-view mirror. ‘No? Just as well, probably.’
Marc turned to him, aware for the first time of being unhampered by any plaster on his neck – a pleasant but unnerving sensation.