*
A little later, as Frears left 10 Downing Street, two figures appeared at a window above Number 11. One was Charlotte Stirling, the PM’s wife. Her dark hair was cut in a severe bob and she wore one of her trademark peasant-style long-sleeved smocks, a look the fashion press loved to deride. The second figure was Aidan Stirling, Charlotte and Philip’s twenty-five-year-old son, his face framed in a mop of curly locks. Had anyone been able to see Aidan clearly, they’d have noticed a face devoid of expression, as if a shock had reduced him to an android state. They’d have then seen his mother wrapping a protective arm around her son’s shoulder.
Chapter 3
North London
It was 11am the following day, and Sam was between clients. He allowed himself about twenty minutes to make a coffee, write up notes and attempt to clear his mind of one person’s inner world before he entered another’s. He’d returned from the kitchen with his mug, settled behind the desk in his consulting room and was about to begin writing when there was a loud knock on the door, accompanied by the doorbell ringing.
Sam leaned back in his seat to look out of the front bay window. There was a short, bald man on the doorstep. Sam tensed. The figure outside, he was sure, was the driver of the car from yesterday – the person who’d so rattled Scott.
The man had been looking out at the street and turned towards Sam when the door opened, a poor attempt at a smile on his face. He wore an ill-fitting suit that seemed to accentuate his truncated legs and barrel chest.
‘Mr Keddie?’
‘Yes.’
‘I work for the Government,’ said the man. ‘I need to talk to you about one of your clients, Charles Scott.’
Sam took a moment to register what the man was saying, then instantly became defensive.
‘Firstly, I do not discuss my clients with anyone else and secondly –’
The man raised the palm of his left hand. ‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘We know Charles Scott is one of your clients. We’re not asking you to reveal whether he was bullied at school.’
‘You say you work for the Government,’ said Sam, who was now angry, ‘but you haven’t shown me any identification.’
The man looked Sam in the eye, as if assessing him. He softened a fraction. ‘I’m sorry.’ He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a leather wallet. He flicked it open for Sam to see. It appeared to be an identity badge – a royal coat of arms sat next to the man’s face above some printed words and numbers – but before Sam had a chance to study it, the badge was whipped away and replaced in the wallet.
‘May I come in?’ said the man. ‘I’d rather not discuss this matter outside.’
‘No,’ said Sam. ‘I’m expecting another client in a few minutes.’
The man ignored him and moved past the therapist, turning into the consulting room to sit in Sam’s chair. Sam stood behind the seat his clients normally took. He hoped his stance was clear, but the man was ignoring Sam, his eyes slowly scanning the room.
‘I’m afraid Charles Scott is dead,’ he said abruptly. ‘He committed suicide last night.’
Sam closed his eyes in disbelief, half-hoping that, when he reopened them, the bald man would have evaporated. But when he looked again, he was still there, staring at Sam.
‘Obviously this is devastating for Scott’s family,’ said the man, ‘but – and excuse me if I sound a little callous at this point – there are also political implications. We need to ensure that his work within Government is not exposed in an unmanageable way.’
‘You said he committed suicide,’ said Sam.
The man looked distracted, as if he were now the one in a hurry. ‘Yeah.’
Sam was reeling. He remembered Scott’s phrase: ‘There’s only one way I can move on’. Alarmed at the time, Sam’s response had been therapeutically off-kilter, a comment about Scott’s black-and-white reading of life, a distraction rather than an acknowledgment of the man’s obviously dark feelings. He cursed himself. Had he somehow precipitated this?
‘Mr Keddie?’
Sam re-focused on the bald man, gripping the top of the seat to steady himself.
‘We need to know what Scott said about his work.’
Sam’s brain was spinning. ‘I never divulge what my clients tell me in counselling.’
‘You’ve made that clear,’ said the man, struggling to appear patient. ‘Now let me be clear –’
‘This is really simple,’ said Sam, who now wanted the man to leave as quickly as possible. ‘Whatever Charles Scott told me stays in this room.’
The man leaned forward in his seat, a hand raised, the index finger pointing in Sam’s direction. The doorbell went.
‘You have to leave,’ said Sam. ‘My next client is here.’
The bald man stood and moved towards Sam, squaring up to him. He appeared about to say something, but thought better of it.
He then shoved past Sam, sending him backwards into the wall. Sam was stunned by the man’s aggression and straightened, ready to say something before the man left. But it was too late. By the time the therapist made it to the door, the man was exiting, storming out past Sam’s next client, an elderly man who was almost knocked to the ground.
Chapter 4
North London
During the sessions that followed the man’s visit, Sam struggled to concentrate on what his clients were saying. He spent every break scouring the internet for signs of the story in the news.
It broke at lunchtime on the BBC and was the lead story. The news reader announced that the body of the Secretary of State for International Development, Charles Scott, had been found at his London flat. The screen then switched to a street in Battersea. It was a sunny autumnal day – the cheery, optimistic light quite at odds with the unravelling tragedy. The reporter was positioned across the road from a mansion block, the area immediately around the entrance ringed off by police. Two officers were standing guard.
The reporter claimed that the body had been found at around 10am by a cleaner who had keys to the flat. Little was known of the exact circumstances of the Minister’s death but a police spokesman had stated that they were not treating it as suspicious. At this point the news reader interjected, asking if they thought it was natural causes. The reporter on the street replied that this had not been mentioned, but that it was probably too early to say.
The hint had been dropped. If it wasn’t suspicious and didn’t turn out to be natural causes, there was only one other possibility – suicide.
The news reader thanked the reporter and then began talking about Scott’s career. Sam watched footage of the Minister during a recent trip to Africa, standing in a field of maize talking to a farmer, before older images appeared – him walking the streets of his constituency, then a still of Scott as a much younger man with his arm around the shoulder of another – a beaming, tanned individual instantly recognisable as the man who was now Prime Minister. To the right of the PM was his wife and a young boy, the PM’s son – Scott’s godchild.
The news reader promised to return to the story when more details became available. He then turned to Marrakesh, where police had broken up a large street protest with tear gas.
Sam kept his eye on the news throughout the afternoon. At around 3pm, there was a press conference from Downing Street that was relayed live on the BBC news website.
A podium had been positioned outside Number 10. The famous door opened and Stirling, his wife, Charlotte, and son, Aidan, walked slowly out. They all looked shell-shocked.
Stirling stood at the podium, Charlotte and Aidan to one side, a couple of steps behind. The PM was in his late 50s, a man of average height whose most distinguishing feature was his wavy and slightly unruly grey hair. That and the fact that, unlike other, more immaculately turned out leaders, Stirling always looked as if he’d dressed in a hurry. The tie was often off-centre, the suit jacket slightly crumpled. These elements added up to an impression of someone who’d found himself in power by accident, w
hen it was never his intention.
Today, his face looked tired and sad. His eyes lacked their usual animation, his skin seemed paler and looser. He pulled a pair of glasses from a jacket pocket and, from another, a piece of paper. This was unusual. He was known for speaking without notes. When he glanced up at the assembled media, he looked fragile, the tough politician beaten down by tragedy.
‘Most of you will by now know that Charles Scott, the Secretary of State for International Development, was found dead this morning,’ said the PM, his voice, with its slight Yorkshire lilt, quiet and soft. It was a tone Sam had heard before, the one the man adopted for sensitive statements – the death of a soldier in action, a natural disaster overseas – but this time it came with an apparent choke, as if the PM were struggling with each word.
‘Charles was a very able minister who did so much to help countries who needed the expertise and resources of the UK. I know his energy and enthusiasm will be missed across the globe. Charles was also a close friend of mine. He and I had known each other since we were at university together. He had been an integral part of my family’s life ever since. Naturally, I cannot expect you to refrain from reporting this story – or making enquiries of your own – but I politely implore you all to show respect to his widow, Wendy, and daughter, Eleanor. Thank you.’
There’d been no mention of suicide, and Sam briefly wondered whether the Government employee had got it all wrong. But then he checked himself. The law required a coroner to sign off the death in unusual circumstances like this, which often meant an autopsy, and even an inquest. The PM was hardly likely to pre-empt a coroner’s findings, let alone talk about it at such a sensitive time.
No, Sam knew he was merely trying to comfort himself. The bald man and his grim tidings reappeared in his mind. His client had committed suicide.
Chapter 5
Clerkenwell, London
Sam cancelled the following day’s clients and made an arrangement to meet Kate for lunch. Despite their split some years back, they’d managed to salvage a friendship, one which he greatly valued.
That they achieved this was quite something. Spectacular rows had preceded their rift, arguments in which their very incompatible agendas had become fatally exposed. Kate, it was evident, wanted long-term commitment and, in time, a family. Sam, as he gradually discovered over the course of the relationship, was not ready for either.
Sam had been hoping for a long boozy lunch and, if he was honest, that his ex would take the afternoon off and come back to have sex with him at the home they once shared. He could sense from the moment they sat down in the bar in Clerkenwell that Kate was not up for it. She was in a hurry, keen to get back to her studio round the corner where she was due to take some shots of a young actress for the cover of Red.
She groaned when Sam said that he hadn’t heard of her.
‘What’s happened to the man who used to be so on the pulse?’ she mocked.
Sam shrugged. Being aware of the latest cultural phenomenon was, like so many of the interests he’d once shared with Kate, a thing of the past.
‘So what’s up?’ she asked. Her hair was cut short and croppy these days. In fact he might have struggled to recognise her compared to the long-haired woman he’d once gone out with. She’d changed a great deal – blossomed, if he was going to be truthful – since they’d split. Her career had thrived and, while she remained for the most part single, she seemed supremely content. He had no reason to resent this but it still occasionally hurt.
‘One of my clients committed suicide.’
Confidentiality, as he’d told the short, bald man, was one of psychotherapy’s cast-iron rules. But this wasn’t about divulging what Scott had said; it was about how Scott’s death made him feel.
Kate’s hand reached across the table and grabbed Sam’s.
‘Oh sweetheart, I’m so sorry.’
She squeezed his hand. A waiter arrived with the bottle of wine Sam had ordered and poured them both a glass.
Alcohol had been a regular feature of their relationship and often precipitated the fiercest of their quarrels. Sam had a sudden, discomforting memory of how he’d broken several bones in his right hand after punching a hole in the wall during an argument over some domestic – and now long-forgotten – trifle. Later, feeling very foolish in A&E, he’d marvelled at his over-reaction, one that was vastly out of proportion with the petty matter they’d been quarrelling over.
Kate sipped her glass tentatively. Sam took a deep gulp.
‘I know it’s a cliché,’ said Kate, ‘but you know it’s not your fault, don’t you?’
Sam smiled weakly. ‘I should think that. But right now I don’t.’
‘I’m no expert,’ said Kate, ‘but your job isn’t to save people. If someone’s got it into their head to kill themselves, it’s never going to be easy to persuade them otherwise.’
‘I should have been more careful.’
The hand slipped from his. The friendship had certain limits. And one of those was too much introspection, which Kate had grown tired of.
Self-examination had become Sam’s obsession in the latter years of their relationship. Outbursts like the one that led to A&E had made him increasingly aware that beneath the façade he presented there lay a number of unresolved issues, damaged pieces of his psyche that had far more influence than he’d realised, let alone acknowledged.
‘You going to eat?’
She shook her head. ‘I’m a bit pushed for time. I’ll probably grab a sandwich on the way back.’
He smiled. They needed to talk about something else.
‘Hey,’ she said, her voice suddenly brighter. ‘You’ll never guess where I’m off to next month.’
As Kate began talking about an assignment in the Grenadines, Sam felt himself drift, remembering a definitive row they’d had, when she’d implored him to confront his demons.
Sam had heeded her advice, finding himself a therapist, a Jungian in Highgate, whose consulting room was filled with leather-bound volumes on Jung and Freud and shelves groaning with African masks and sculptures of stunted tribal figures.
Sam’s early memories provided the substance that was raked over between them, the Jungian remaining aloof and mirror-like, so that Sam never really knew the man’s true reactions or feelings.
In time, while much useful insight was gained – including the understanding that Sam was not ready for marriage or fatherhood and his career in the often superficial world of advertising was probably not the ideal choice for an introspective man – he tired of the analyst’s studied indifference. After four years in therapy, he called time on the Jungian.
‘ – and if that works out, we could be talking American Vogue.’
Sam recognised the definitive pause, the moment when a response was necessary. He was a good listener – his job demanded it – but not today.
‘Sounds like you’re doing brilliantly.’
Kate gave him a suspicious look. ‘You’re not really here, are you? You’re in your bloody head again.’
‘Sorry. I’m a little preoccupied.’
He watched her face flush, sensed her anger, then saw it subside.
‘You can see why I found you so irritating at times,’ she said.
Sam nodded. ‘Totally. I’m a navel-gazing pain in the arse.’
Kate smiled, then glanced at her mobile on the table. ‘Shit, gotta go.’
She stood, gave him a peck on the cheek, then paused briefly to examine him like a concerned mother.
‘Look after yourself,’ she said. Then she rushed to the door.
Sam was still in the bar an hour after Kate had left. He’d polished off the bottle, keen to obliterate the day.
As he left, a chill breeze hit him hard in the face and he felt twice as drunk as he had in the bar’s warm interior. Unwilling to face his home – and consulting room – at that point, he decided to take the slow way back, and walk.
Sam drew the collar of his jacket up, walking
north with little thought for the route he’d take.
Seeing Kate was a mixed experience emotionally. It was good to have friends who knew him as well as she did – and to feel comfortably connected to the past, as he so often urged his clients – but equally, he preferred not to revisit certain thoughts too often.
As he crossed the road from the restaurant, pausing momentarily to let a black car pass at speed, Sam wondered again whether terminating his own therapy had been wise. The presence of an irritating phobia, as well as his recurring nightmare, provided confirmation that things were far from resolved. He was middle-aged, yet still haunted by the same figure from his childhood.
*
It was dark by the time he returned to Stoke Newington. As he rounded the corner of his street, he was sure he saw a light on in his house. But as he neared it, the light went out.
Sam tensed. Unlatching the gate quietly, he walked very slowly up the short garden path, then unlocked the door, as if in slow motion. As soon as the door edged open, Sam heard the sound of rapid footsteps at the rear of the property and the back door slamming. Sam rushed in, anger replacing the caution he’d felt as he became convinced that he’d disturbed a burglar. The small back garden was bordered by a brick wall about four feet high. As Sam reached the back door, he saw a figure – a tall man in a dark bomber jacket and jeans – disappear over the wall with an athletic movement.
Sam ran to the wall and looked over it. The figure was already at the other side of his neighbour’s garden, about to bound over it into the street beyond. Sam attempted to leap his wall, but his hand became snagged on a rose thorn, ripping the flesh.
‘Fuck,’ he cried out in pain.
When he looked up, the man had disappeared. Sam knew there was no point pursuing. By the time he’d made it over both walls, the burglar would be on the high street, blending in with the crowds.
Sam returned to the kitchen, turning on the tap to wash his hand, which was pouring blood. Wrapping paper towels around it to stem the flow, he then walked slowly through the house, looking for signs of disturbance. Upstairs, his bedroom was untouched, as were the guest rooms and bathroom. Downstairs, the sitting room was as he’d left it. He then went into his consulting room and flicked on the light.
Disorder (Sam Keddie thriller series Book 1) Page 2