recounted the strange episode of Mr Banwell and the horse. Hugel listened intently and then exclaimed, 'Banwell! He must have seen the Acton girl outside the hotel. That's what scared him!'
'Miss Acton's not exactly what I'd call scary, Mr Hugel,' said Littlemore.
'You fool' was the coroner's response. 'Of course — he thought she was dead!'
'Why would he think she was dead?'
'Use your head, Detective.'
'If Banwell's the guy, Mr Hugel, he knows she's alive.'
'What?'
'You're saying Banwell's the guy, right? But whoever attacked Miss Acton knows she's alive. So if Banwell's the guy, he doesn't think she's dead.'
'What? Nonsense. He might have thought he had finished her. Or — or he may have been afraid she would recognize him. Either way, he would have panicked when he saw her.'
'Why do you think he's the guy?'
'Littlemore, he is over six foot tall. He is middle-aged. He is rich. His hair was dark but now is graying. He is right-handed. He lived in the same building as the first victim, and he panicked at the sight of the second.'
'How do you know that?'
'From you. You said his driver told you he took fright. What other explanation is there?'
'No, I meant how do you know he's right-handed?'
'Because I met him yesterday, Detective, and I make use of my eyes.'
'Gee, you're something, Mr Hugel. What am I, right- handed or left-handed?' The detective put his hands behind his back.
'Will you stop it, Littlemore!'
'I don't know, Mr Hugel. You should have seen him after it was all over. He was cool as a cucumber, giving orders, cleaning everything up.'
'Nonsense. A good actor, in addition to a murderer. We have our man, Detective.'
'We don't exactly have him.'
'You're right,' mused the coroner. 'I still have no hard evidence. We need something more.'
Chapter Ten
Leaving the Metropolitan, we took a carriage across the park to Columbia University's new campus, with its stupendous library. I had not been there since 1897, when I was fifteen and my mother dragged us to the dedication of the Schermerhorn building. Brill, fortunately, did not know of my marginal connection to that clan, or he doubtless would have mentioned it to Freud.
We visited the psychiatric clinic, where Brill had an office. Afterward, Freud announced that he wished to hear about my session with Miss Acton. So, while Brill and Ferenczi remained behind, discussing therapeutic technique, Freud and I took a stroll on Riverside Drive, whose broad promenade afforded a fine lookout on the Palisades, the wild and broken New Jersey cliffs across the Hudson River.
I left out nothing, describing to Freud both my first session with Miss Acton, ending in failure, and the second, ending in her revelations concerning her father's friend, Mr Banwell. He questioned me closely, wanting every detail, no matter how seemingly irrelevant, and insisting that I mustn't paraphrase but relay her exact words. At the close, Freud stubbed out his cigar on the sidewalk and asked whether I thought the episode on the rooftop three years ago was the cause of Miss Acton's loss of voice at the time.
'It would seem so,' I answered. 'There was involvement of the mouth and an injunction not to tell. Something unspeakable had been done to her; therefore she made herself unable to speak.'
'Good. So the fourteen-year-old's shameful kiss on the roof made her hysterical?' said Freud, measuring my reaction.
I understood: he meant the opposite of what he was saying. The episode on the roof, as Freud saw things, could not be the cause of Miss Acton's hysteria. That episode was not from her childhood, nor was it Oedipal. Only childhood traumas lead to neurosis, although a later event is typically the trigger that awakens the memory of the long- repressed conflict, producing hysterical symptoms. 'Dr Freud,' I asked, 'isn't it possible in this one case that an adolescent trauma caused hysteria?'
'It's possible, my boy, except for one thing: the girl's behavior on the roof was already entirely and completely hysterical.' Freud drew another cigar from his pocket, thought better of it, and put it back. 'Let me offer you a definition of the hysteric: one in whom an occasion for sexual pleasure elicits feelings largely or wholly unpleasurable.'
'She was only fourteen.'
'And how old was Juliet on her nuptial night?'
'Thirteen,' I acknowledged.
'A robust, fully mature man — of whom we know nothing other than that he is strong, tall, successful, well- made — kisses a girl on the lips,' said Freud. 'He is obviously in a state of sexual arousal. Indeed, I think we may be confident that Nora had a direct sensation of this arousal. When she says she can still feel this Banwell pulling her body against his, I have little doubt what part of the man's body she felt. All this, in a healthy girl of fourteen, would certainly have produced a pleasurable genital stimulation. Instead, Nora was overcome by the unpleasurable feeling proper to the back of the throat or gorge — that is, by disgust. In other words, she was already hysterical long before that kiss.'
'But mightn't Banwell's advances have been — unwelcome?'
'I very much doubt they were. You disagree with me, Younger.'
I did disagree — strenuously — although I had been trying not to show it.
Freud went on. 'You imagine Mr Banwell thrusting himself on an unwilling and innocent victim. But perhaps it was she who seduced him: a handsome man, her father's best friend. The conquest would have appealed to a girl her age; it would likely have inspired jealousy in her father.'
'She rejected him,' I said.
'Did she?' asked Freud. 'After the kiss, she kept his secret, even after regaining her voice. Correct?'
'Yes.'
'Is that more consistent with fearing repetition of the event — or desiring it?'
I saw Freud's logic, but the innocent explanation of the girl's behavior did not yet seem refuted. 'She refused to be alone with him afterward,' I countered.
'On the contrary,' rejoined Freud. 'She walked with him alone, two years later, by the shore of a lake, a romantic location if ever there was one.'
'But she rejected him there again.'
'She slapped him,' said Freud. 'That is not necessarily a rejection. A girl, like an analytic patient, is required to say no before she says yes.'
'She complained to her father.'
'When?'
'Immediately,' I stated, a little too immediately. Then I reflected. 'Actually, I don't know that. I didn't ask.'
'Perhaps she was waiting for Mr Banwell to make another attempt on her, and, when he did not, she told her father out of pique.' I did not say anything, but Freud could see I was not entirely persuaded. He added, 'In this, my boy, you must bear in mind that you are not disinterested.'
'I don't follow you, sir,' I said.
'Yes, you do.'
I considered. 'You mean I wish Miss Acton to have found Banwell's advances unwelcome?'
'You have been defending Nora's honor.'
I was conscious that I continued to call Miss Acton 'Miss Acton,' whereas Freud called her by her first name. I was also conscious of a rush of blood to my face. 'That is only because I'm in love with her,' I said.
Freud said nothing.
