“I’ve spoken with both Rebecka and Dr. Fischer. Rebecka is still very sick, and Fischer is concerned about her. He has increased her medication dosage, and he wants her to be admitted to the clinic again. I got the impression that he’s angry with Lefévre, that he thinks the guy is interfering too much.”
“I agree. When can Rebecka see us?”
“At eleven o’clock. Same place as last time. But I really had to insist. Neither Fischer nor Rebecka was particularly cooperative.”
“Why this opposition?” Irene asked.
“It seems Rebecka is much sicker than we realized. The doctor can’t say exactly what’s going on, because of confidentiality and so on. . ”
Glen didn’t continue his line of thought since he was trying to make his way through a heavily trafficked roundabout. Irene hadn’t noticed that they had taken a different route from the airport this time. Now they were entering Bayswater from the north.
“There’s Paddington Station. The train to Heathrow leaves from there. A train leaves every fifteen minutes in each direction, and it only takes fifteen minutes to get here from the airport.”
Irene saw people streaming in and out of a large stone building. No one would remember any particular individual. She saw, when she looked at the tourist map, that the station was located only a kilometer from Notting Hill.
“Do you think that Rebecka could have gone to Göteborg and carried out the murders?” Irene asked abruptly.
Glen pondered the possibility for a moment before he shook his head. “No. She has been sick for quite some time. There isn’t any. . strength in her. Is she at all familiar with firearms?”
“Not that we know of. Her brother and her father hunted. But we should ask her.”
“Is there no one else with a motive?”
“We don’t have a single suspect. But we have the theory concerning the Internet job for Save the Children. That’s the most important subject I have to cover with her.”
Glen glanced at her. “You believe that theory’s behind the murders?” he asked.
“Yes. Because it’s the only reason we have. The alternative is that a crazy person murdered them, that they were random victims. But that doesn’t hold up, because they weren’t killed in the same place. And then, the pentagrams were left at both sites. So we’d have to postulate a crazy Satanist!”
“I understand that the murderer also seemed to be familiar with the surroundings and acquainted with the family.”
“Yes. That’s the strongest argument against the murderer being a maniac. The murders were well planned. There’s nothing haphazard about them.”
They had arrived at the little hotel, and Glen parked. Irene took her dark-blue bag and walked up the steps to the entrance. Estelle was standing behind the reception desk, a pair of frameless reading glasses on her nose, as she typed information into the computer. She looked up from the screen and smiled when she recognized Irene.
“Welcome back! You have the room next to the one you had last time. I hope that’s okay. They’re identical.”
She handed Irene a key and quickly returned to the numbers on the computer screen.
The room next to the one she had had before. Then she had to trudge up the stairs again. Irene tried to reconcile herself by recalling that such exercise prevented blood clots from forming after airplane flights and that it was good for one’s all-around physical condition.
The room was the mirror image of the one she had occupied previously; otherwise they were exactly alike. Irene hung up the few items of clothing she had brought with her-the same things she had packed the last time-and went into the bathroom. It struck her that she had forgotten to turn on her cell phone after the flight.
She heard Hannu’s voice on her voicemail. His message was just for her to return his call.
She called him back, but he didn’t answer. Perhaps he was questioning some of the motorcycle hooligans. Irene shivered with joy when she thought about having gotten out of that chore.
She clattered down the narrow stairs in high spirits. Glen sat in the hotel lobby, smoking a cigarette. He put it out when Irene reached the last step.
“Estelle is serving coffee and tea in the breakfast room. We should put something in our stomachs before we drive to Fischer’s office,” he said.
Irene agreed. She was hungry, because the airplane breakfast hadn’t been much to cheer about. But the coffee had been tolerable and she had gotten as many refills as she wanted.
GLEN FILLED her in as to the information he had received about Dr. Fischer during the drive to Oxford Street.
“John Desmond Fischer, fifty-seven years old. His parents moved here from New York when he was four years old. They were very well-to-do. He has worked as a psychiatrist for almost thirty years and he has had his private practice for about twentyfive. He has a very good reputation and is the ‘in’ doctor for people with mental problems. And he’s expensive! Not for the riff-raff,” Glen said.
She understood that Christian Lefévre had probably arranged that Dr. Fischer take Rebecka on as a patient.
Glen continued, “He has been through three marriages and is now on his fourth. He has a newborn daughter. He has seven children altogether. The oldest daughter is thirty-two years old and has two children herself. His new wife is twenty-four.
“He was in hot water about eleven years ago. An eighteen-year-old girl who was one of his patients accused him of having sex with her. Fischer wormed his way out of it when several of his colleagues testified that the girl had delusions about sexual assault. The investigation was closed. The girl hanged herself shortly afterward.”
“Where did you get this information?” Irene asked, amazed.
“Press archives. The gossip columns. I haven’t found anything else of interest. But maybe it’s worth thinking about.”
Irene concluded, “He has a thing for young women. He’s a conqueror.”
Glen nodded. “What do they see in that fatso? You’re a woman, you tell me,” he said.
She started to shrug, but then she remembered Fischer’s charisma, his air of virility and strength. The thick hair, the piercing eyes and smile.
“Power. He has power. A. . ”
She searched in vain for the English word she wanted, and couldn’t come up with it. Eventually, she said “aura.”
“I understand. An aura women feel. Maybe men as well. But his women are young. Why are they drawn to him? He’s not particularly good-looking.”
“No. But, as we said, he has power. . and. . an aura. Maybe his profession makes young women feel safe with him. He understands them. He can listen and speak with them. But he also has social status. And economic status. You said yourself that he was rich.”
“True. I realize that I’ve chosen the wrong profession,” Glen said and smiled.
Irene looked at his attractive profile and noted the tiny dimple in his cheek. He had everything he needed to get women to fall for him without having a fortune. And they would never care whether or not he had a lofty position.
IT WAS harder to find a parking place this time. They had to leave the car in the vicinity of Grosvenor Square. The advantage was that they got to walk to Dr. Fischer’s office.
The rain had stopped, and the thin cloud cover started breaking up. The air felt warm and damp despite the fact that it was only a relatively comfortable twenty degrees Celsius. The car-exhaust fumes hung in the air like an oily haze between the houses. Irene took off her jacket and walked in her short-sleeved blouse. Her shirt was clinging to her back by the time they arrived at the doctor’s office.
The cool stairwell felt like liberation. John Fischer stood in the doorway waiting for them, just like the last time.