The Fear Index

the descending jets. Still, there are parts of the centre that retain the character of a traditional Swiss village, with overhanging roofs and green wooden shutters, and it was this aspect of the place that had stayed in Hoffmann’s mind for the past nine years. In his memory he associated it with melancholy autumn afternoons, the street lights just starting to switch on, children coming out of school. He turned a corner and found the circular wooden bench where he used to sit when he was early for his appointments. It girdled a sinister old tree in vigorous leaf. Seeing it again, he couldn’t bear to approach it but kept to the opposite side of the square. Nothing much else had changed: the laundry, the cycle shop, the dingy little café in which the old men gathered, the chapel-like maison d’artisant communal . Next to it was the detached building where he was supposed to have been cured. It had been a shop once, a greengrocer’s maybe, or a florist’s – something useful; the owners would have lived above the premises. Now its large downstairs window was frosted and it looked like a dentist’s surgery. The only difference from eight years ago was the video camera that covered the front door: that was new, he thought.
    Hoffmann’s hand shook as he pressed the buzzer. Did he have the strength to go through it all again? The first time he hadn’t known what to expect; now he would be deprived of the vital armour of ignorance.
    A young man’s voice said, ‘Good afternoon.’
    Hoffmann gave his name. ‘I used to be a patient of Dr Polidori. My secretary was supposed to make an appointment for tomorrow.’
    ‘I’m afraid Dr Polidori spends every Friday seeing her patients at the hospital.’
    ‘Tomorrow is too late. I need to see her now.’
    ‘You can’t see her without an appointment.’
    ‘Tell her it’s me. Say it’s urgent.’
    ‘What name was it again?’
    ‘Hoffmann.’
    ‘Wait, please.’
    The entryphone went dead. Hoffmann glanced up at the camera and instinctively raised his hand to cover his head from view. His wound was no longer tacky with blood but powdery: when he inspected his fingertips, they were covered with what looked like fine particles of rust.
    ‘Come in, please.’ There was a brief buzz as the door was unlocked – so brief that Hoffmann missed it and had to try a second time. Inside it was more comfortable than it used to be – a sofa and two easy chairs, a rug in soothing pastel, rubber plants, and behind the head of the receptionist a large photograph of a woodland glade with shafts of light falling from between the trees. Next to it was her certificate to practise: Dr Jeanne Polidori, with a master’s degree in psychiatry and psychotherapy from the University of Geneva. Another camera scanned the room. The young man at the desk scrutinised him carefully. ‘Go on up. It’s the door straight ahead.’
    ‘Yes,’ said Hoffmann. ‘I remember.’
    The familiar creak of the stairs was enough to unleash a flood of old sensations. Sometimes he had found it almost impossible to drag himself to the top; on the worst days he had felt like a man without oxygen trying to climb Everest. Depression wasn’t the word for it; burial was more accurate – entombment in a thick, cold concrete chamber, beyond the reach of light or sound. Now he was sure he could not endure it again. He would rather kill himself.
    She was in her consulting room, sitting at her computer, and stood as he came in. She was the same age as Hoffmann and must have been good-looking when she was younger, but she had a narrow gully that ran from just below her left ear down her cheek all the way to her throat. The loss of muscle and tissue had given her a lopsided look, as if she had suffered a stroke. Usually she wore a scarf; today not. In his artless way he had asked her about it once: ‘What the hell happened to your face?’ She told him she had been attacked by a patient who had been instructed by God to kill her. The man had now fully recovered. But she had kept a pepper spray in her desk ever since: she had opened the drawer and showed it to Hoffmann – a black can with a nozzle.
    She wasted no time on a greeting. ‘Dr Hoffmann, I’m sorry, but I told your assistant on the phone I can’t treat you without a referral from the hospital.’
    ‘I don’t want you to treat me.’ He opened the laptop. ‘I just want you to look at something. Can you do that at least?’
    ‘It depends what it