Bertie swallowed. “Ink,” he said quietly. It was best not to say anything that would cause Dr Fairbairn to become more excited. Short words, uttered very softly, were probably safest.
“Yes,” said Dr Fairbairn. “Good boy. Black ink.”
Bertie nodded. “Ink,” he said again. And then added: “Ink.”
Dr Fairbairn smiled. “You may be wondering, Bertie, why I’m holding a bottle of ink.”
Bertie shook his head. “No,” he said, even more quietly.
“Well,” said Dr Fairbairn. “There’s a very interesting little game we therapists have invented. It’s called the Rorschach Inkblot Test. Would you like to play it, Bertie?”
Bertie felt he had no alternative but to agree, and he did. This must have been the right answer, as Dr Fairbairn appeared pleased with it.
“Very well,” said the psychotherapist. “I shall open this little bottle of ink…so. There we are. And now I shall pour just a little bit of it onto the middle of this piece of paper. So! Look. Now I shall fold the paper over, in half, like that. There!”
Bertie stared at the piece of folded paper. “Is it my turn?” he asked.
Dr Fairbairn smiled. “Hah! No, there are no turns in this game. You, Bertie, have to look at the ink blot that comes out and tell me what you see! That’s what you do.”
Bertie took the piece of paper and unfolded it with trembling hands. Then he examined the still wet ink blot.
“I see Scotland,” he said quietly. “Look, there it is.”
Dr Fairbairn took the piece of paper and stared at it. Then he turned it round.
“Funny,” he said. “I’ll do it again.”
Once more he poured a small amount of ink onto the paper and folded it over. Again, he handed it to Bertie. “Now, we shall see,” he said. “You tell me what you see. And don’t hesitate to tell me, even if it’s something very strange. Don’t hesitate to speak your mind.”
“I won’t,” said Bertie obligingly.
He took the piece of paper and unfolded it.
“I see the Queen,” said Bertie. “Look, there she is, Dr Fairbairn. I see the Queen’s head.”
Dr Fairbairn took the paper from him and peered at it. He seemed put-out.
“I shall do it again,” he said.
More ink was spilled, and the paper was folded. Bertie, now quite confident, although he found this game somewhat tedious, exposed the blot to view.
This time he stared at the blot for some time before he spoke. Then, handing the paper back to Dr Fairbairn, he said: “That’s Dr Freud, isn’t it? Look, Dr Fairbairn, you’ve made two Dr Freuds!”
Rather to Bertie’s surprise, Dr Fairbairn now put away his bottle of ink and threw the pieces of paper in the wastepaper bin. “Perhaps we shall do that again, Bertie,” he said, “when you are feeling a bit more imaginative. For the moment I think we can leave it at that. I need to have a quick chat with your Mummy before you go. You go off and read Scottish Field in the waiting room. Good boy.”
Bertie sat in the waiting room while his mother went in to speak to Dr Fairbairn. Although he knew that he was meant to have an hour of therapy, he never really had more than ten minutes, as his mother would go in and talk to Dr Fairbairn for at least fifty minutes before she came out. What could they be talking about? he wondered. Surely one could not go on about Melanie Klein for fifty minutes twice a week? But that’s what they seemed to be doing.
Inside the consulting room, Irene sat in the chair recently vacated by Bertie and listened to Dr Fairbairn.
“I did a bit of Rorschach work with him this morning,” Dr Fairbairn said. “We didn’t get very good results. He came up with very literal interpretations. I saw nothing of the subconscious processes. No light on the object relations issue.”
“Oh well,” said Irene. “We must persist. There’s still a lot of aggression there, I’m afraid. He wanted to go bowling the other day. That’s very aggressive.”
“Maybe,” said Dr Fairbairn, noting something down on a pad. “Maybe not.”
“And then there’s some sign of knife fantasies,” went on Irene. “He keeps asking for a penknife.”
“Worrying, that,” said Dr Fairbairn. “Of course, boys do like that sort of thing, you know.”
Irene looked at him. “Some boys may,” she said. “Some males need knives. Some don’t.”
Dr Fairbairn thought for a while. “You know,” he said, “I’ve been thinking a bit about Bertie, and I’m beginning to have a sense of what’s going on. The dynamics. The splitting process. The good mother/bad mother schizoid bifurcation.”
Irene leant forward eagerly. “Oh yes?” she said. “And what do you think is the problem?”
Dr Fairbairn rose to his feet. He looked down at the crumpled pieces of paper in his wastepaper basket and, on a sudden impulse, picked one out, uncrumpled it and showed it to Irene.
“What do you see there?” he asked.
Irene took the inkblot of Scotland and frowned. “A cloud of guilt?” she suggested. “Yes, a cloud of guilt.”
“Hah!” exclaimed Dr Fairbairn. “That is Scotland!”
“Nonsense!” cried Irene. “That’s a cloud of guilt.”
Dr Fairbairn bent down and retrieved the inkblot of the Queen. “And this?” he asked, thrusting it into Irene’s hands. “What’s this?”
“Mother,” said Irene, without hesitation.
Dr Fairbairn snatched the paper back from her. Then he turned to face her and spoke very quietly but firmly.
“You know something?” he said. “You know something? I’ve decided what the problem is. It’s you!”
73. Wee Fraser Again
Bertie knew that something was wrong the moment that he heard shouting issuing from Dr Fairbairn’s consulting room. He had been engrossed in a copy of Scottish Field and the time had passed rather quickly. But now the normal sedate silence of the waiting room was disturbed by voices raised in discord. Dr Fairbairn and his mother were having a row! Indeed, it might be even worse. Perhaps Dr Fairbairn had finally got out of control and might even now be assaulting his mother, possibly even throwing ink at her! Bertie dropped the magazine and sprang to his feet. He was not sure what to do; if he burst into the consulting room, then that might just make matters worse; if he stayed where he was then his mother could meet some terrible fate at the hands of the psychotherapist, all the while unaided by her son.
Bertie moved over and put an ear to the door of the consulting room. The sound of shouting had dropped, and now there seemed to be silence within the room. That was a very bad sign, he thought. Perhaps Dr Fairbairn was even now lowering his mother’s body from the window, on a rope, with a view to hiding it in the Queen Street Gardens. But then, there was a voice, and another–voices which were no longer raised and seemed to be making casual conversation. Bertie heaved a sigh of relief. The row was over. They had got back to talking about Melanie Klein.
Inside the consulting room, Dr Fairbairn sat at his desk, his head in his hands.
“I don’t know what came over me,” he said remorsefully. “It was all so sudden. I don’t know why I said it.”
Irene looked at him. She understood how stress could affect people. Dr Fairbairn’s job was undoubtedly stressful, dealing with all sorts of harrowing personal problems. It would be easy in such circumstances to say something rash and, as in this case, completely unjustified.
“I understand,” she said gently. “I really do. You mustn’t reproach yourself unduly.”
She looked at him as he continued to stare down at the surface of his desk. Of course this might be an opportunity to probe a bit; there was a great deal she would like to know about Dr Fairbairn and now might be the time to do that probing.
“Of course, it might be better if you talked to me about it,” she said.
Dr Fairbairn looked up. “About what?” he asked.
“About all the things that you’re so obviously repressing,” Irene said quietly. “About the guilt.”
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br /> Dr Fairbairn was silent for a few moments. “Is my guilt that obvious?” he asked.
“I’m afraid so,” said Irene, trying to sound as sympathetic as she could. “It’s written very clearly. I’ve always sensed it.”
“Oh,” said Dr Fairbairn. It was like being told that one’s deodorant was less than effective. It was very deflating.
“Guilt has such a characteristic signature,” went on Irene. “I find that I can always tell.”
She watched Dr Fairbairn from the corner of her eye. She was not sure what his guilt was based on, but it was bound to be something interesting.
“You can tell me, you know,” she urged. “You’d feel much relieved.”
“Do you think so?” asked Dr Fairbairn.
Irene nodded. It was a time for non-verbal signs.
“I feel so awful,” said Dr Fairbairn. “I’ve been carrying this burden of guilt for so long. And I’ve tried to convince myself that it’s not there, but my denial has only made things worse.”
“Denial always does,” said Irene. “Denial is a sticking tape with very little sticking power.” She paused and reflected on the adage that she had just coined. It was really rather apt, she thought.
“And yet it’s so difficult to confront one’s sense of shame,” said Dr Fairbairn. “That’s not easy.”
Irene was beginning to feel impatient. She glanced at her watch. What if the next patient arrived now? She might be prevented from hearing Dr Fairbairn’s revelations, and by the time that they next met he might be more composed and less inclined to confess his guilt. “So?” she said. “What lies at the heart of your guilt?” She paused. “What did you actually do?”
Dr Fairbairn looked away from her, as if embarrassed by what he was about to say.
“I suppose at the heart of my guilt lies my professional failure,” he said. “I’ve tried to tell myself that it was no failure, but it was. It really was.”
Irene leaned forward. “How did you fail?” she asked. “Tell me. Let me be your catharsis.”
“You’ve heard of my famous case?” asked Dr Fairbairn. “The study of Wee Fraser?”
“Of course I have,” said Irene. “It’s almost as famous as Freud’s case of Little Hans or Melanie Klein’s Richard.”
Dr Fairbairn smiled, a smile that surrendered shortly to pain. “I’m flattered, of course,” he said, “but in a curious way that makes what I did even worse.”
Irene looked at him in astonishment. Had he falsified the case? Did Wee Fraser actually exist, or was he a fraudulent creation upon which Dr Fairbairn’s entire scientific reputation had been built? If the latter were the case, then it would amount to a major scandal. It was easy to understand why the author of such an act of deception would feel a crushing burden of guilt.
“What exactly did you do?” Irene asked. “Did you invent Wee Fraser?”
Dr Fairbairn looked at her blankly. “Invent him? Why on earth would I have invented him?” He paused. “No. I didn’t invent him. I hit him.”
Irene gasped. “You hit Wee Fraser? Actually hit him?”
Dr Fairbairn closed his eyes. “I hit him,” he said. “He bit me and I hit him. And do you know what? You know what? After I hit him, I actually felt a lot better.” He looked out of the window, shaking his head. “And then the guilt came,” he said. Then the guilt came, like a thief in the night.
And took from me my peace of mind.
74. The Wolf Man, Neds, Motherwell
Irene was rarely at a loss for words, but on this occasion, faced with the extraordinary confession by Dr Fairbairn that he had actually raised a hand to Wee Fraser, the famous three-year-old tyrant, she was unable to speak for at least two minutes. During this time, Dr Fairbairn sat quite still, privately appalled at what he had done. He had spoken about that thing which he had for almost eleven years completely repressed. He had articulated the moment of aggression when, his hand stinging from the painful bite which Wee Fraser had inflicted upon him, he had briefly, and gently, smacked the boy on the hand and told him that he was not to bite his therapist. Wee Fraser had looked at him in astonishment and had behaved extremely and uncharacteristically well for the rest of the session. Indeed, had Dr Fairbairn not been as well versed in the dynamics of child behaviour, he might have concluded that this was what Wee Fraser had needed all along, but such a conclusion, of course, would have been quite false.
Eventually, Irene spoke. “I can understand how you feel,” she said. “That’s a serious burden of guilt to carry around. But at least you’ve spoken to me about it.” She looked at him quizzically. “And, tell me, how do you feel now?”
Dr Fairbairn took a deep breath. “Actually, I feel quite a bit better. It’s the cathartic effect of telling the truth. Like a purging.”
Irene agreed. Dr Fairbairn actually looked lighter now; it was almost as if the metaphysical weight of guilt had been pressing down upon his shoulders; now these seemed to have been raised, lifted, filling his blue linen jacket with movement and strength.
“Of course you won’t be able to leave it at that,” she said, gently lifting a finger, not so much in admonition as in caution.
Dr Fairbairn looked momentarily crestfallen. “No?” he said.
“No,” answered Irene. “The striking of Wee Fraser is unfinished business, isn’t it? You need to make a reparative move.”
Dr Fairbairn looked thoughtful. “Maybe…”
Irene interrupted him. “Tell me,” she said, “what happened to Wee Fraser. Did you do any follow-up?”
Dr Fairbairn shook his head. “Wee Fraser had been referred to me by a general practitioner. She managed to get the Health Board to pay for his therapy after he had been involved in an unfortunate piece of exhibitionist behaviour in a ladies’ hairdressing salon out at Burdiehouse. He had been taken there by his mother when she went to have her hair done. Some of the other ladies were a bit put-out and so she took Wee Fraser to the doctor to discuss his behaviour. Fortunately, the GP in question had the foresight to believe that psychotherapeutic intervention might be of some help, and that’s how our paths came together.”
“And the parents?” asked Irene. “Functional?”
“Oh, I think that they functioned quite well,” said Dr Fairbairn. “Or they seemed to. They were a respectable couple. The father was a fireman and the mother was a receptionist at the Roxburghe Hotel. They were at their wits’ end with Wee Fraser, I fear.”
“And what happened to him?” asked Irene. “Did you not hear anything?”
“Nothing,” said Dr Fairbairn. “But I should imagine that they’re still there. Fraser will be fourteen now, I should imagine.” He stopped. “You know, I saw him the other day?”
Irene’s eyes widened. “Wee Fraser? You saw him?” She had read about how Freud’s famous patient, the Wolf Man, had been found not all that long ago, living in Vienna, as a retired Wolf Man. The discovery had been written up by an American journalist who had gone in search of him. Perhaps it was time for Wee Fraser to be discovered in much the same way.
“I saw him at the East End of Princes Street,” said Dr Fairbairn. “You see a lot of neds…I mean young men hanging about, I mean congregating, down there. I think they go shopping in that ghastly shopping centre at the top of Leith Street. You know the one that Nicky Fairbairn was so scathing about.”
Irene sat up at the mention of the name. Nicholas Fairbairn. Why did Dr Fairbairn mention Nicholas Fairbairn? Was it because he was his brother, perhaps? Which meant that he must be the son of Ronald Fairbairn, no less–Ronald Fairbairn who had written Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality, in which volume there appeared the seminal paper, “Endoscopic Structure Considered in Terms of Object-Relationships.”
“Are you, by any chance…?” she began.
Dr Fairbairn hesitated. More guilt was coming to the surface, inexorably, bubbling up like the magma of a volcano. “No,” he said. “I’m not. I am nothing to do with Ronald Fairbairn, or his colourful son. I am an ordi
nary Fairbairn.” He hesitated again. “We actually come from Motherwell originally.”
“Motherwell!” exclaimed Irene, and then checked herself. There was nothing wrong with Motherwell, nor with Airdrie for that matter. We all had to come from somewhere, even Motherwell. She herself came from Moray…Well, there was no need for anybody to go into that. (Moray Place, actually.)
“Yes,” said Dr Fairbairn. The confessions had given him confidence and now he looked directly at Irene. “Where do you come from, Mrs Pollock?”
“Moray,” said Irene, prepared to continue to add Place (one should not lie, directly), but taking her time, and not having the opportunity to complete her sentence (no fault of her own).
“Moray!” said Dr Fairbairn. “What a pleasant part of the country. I love Moray, and Nairn too.”
Irene said nothing. It was not her guilt that they were meant to be talking about; it was his.
“You have to seek out Wee Fraser,” she said. “You know that, don’t you? You have to find him and apologise for what you did to him.”
Dr Fairbairn sat quite still. He had no doubt but that what Irene said was true. Reparation was of the essence; Melanie Klein herself had said that. He would have to go out to Burdiehouse, find Wee Fraser, and ask his forgiveness. It was a simple thing to do, but a very important one, not only for himself, but perhaps for Wee Fraser too.
75. Cyril’s Moment of Glory
Irene had much to think about as she walked home with Bertie. The session with Dr Fairbairn had been a traumatic one and she needed to order her thoughts. She had been astonished when the psychotherapist had turned on her in that unexpected and vindictive way, suggesting that she, of all people, might be responsible for Bertie’s troubles. Of course it was easy to blame mother; anybody with a smattering of knowledge of psychoanalysis thought that they could point the finger at mother; but to hear that coming from somebody like Dr Fairbairn, who had even held psychoanalytical office, was most surprising. And it was so dangerous too; she could cope with an allegation of that sort because she could stand up to him intellectually, and she was versed in Kleinian theory; but what if he had said something to an ordinary person? Such a mother could be extremely upset.