Martin’s growing conviction that Sebastian was Olivia’s twin brother came from the strange harmonies between some of the material that he brought with him to the sessions and the stories Karen had told Olivia about her brother’s early life. Towards the end of a session that appeared to be a long and rather generic allegory of explosive rage and potential attack – ‘where they keep the bombs hidden … the guns and the bodies riddled with bullet holes …’ – Sebastian revealed that when he was eighteen the Tanners had told him that he was an adopted child, but had refused to tell him anything about his mother, except to say that she was a bad woman who hadn’t wanted him, and that she lived in ‘the Arsenal area’. They said that if he was mad enough to want to meet her, he must do it on his own. The mysterious weapons depot and the ‘Gunners’ in Sebastian’s free association turned out not to be entirely metaphorical references, but historical and geographical ones as well. Martin knew that Karen lived in Arsenal; he also knew that Sebastian was the same age as Olivia; although his exact birthday still hadn’t yet come up, he knew it was in the same month as Olivia’s; he knew about the cigarette burns, now transformed into bullet wounds, and he knew that Olivia’s twin had been handed over for adoption at the same age as Sebastian. The evidence was hammering at the door, but Martin had still resisted making any official enquiries about Sebastian’s identity, preferring to work with the material that Sebastian brought to the sessions, keeping it sealed in the alembic of the psychoanalytic process. Now he wondered if he should just find out the facts of the case. Was Sebastian Olivia’s twin or not? And yet, knowing that he would never have tried to find out for Sebastian’s benefit, because the official facts would have introduced a foreign vocabulary into the lexicon of symbolic language that they were working to compile together, how could he justify doing that research simply to appease his own curiosity and concern? Part of him also wished he could discuss the matter with Lizzie, but he resisted doing so. She was a psychotherapist, and in theory he was allowed to discuss difficult cases with his colleagues, but she was also his wife and Olivia’s mother. Only absolute confidentiality could ensure that Sebastian’s insights were not tainted with the distrust and confusion that had afflicted him all his life. Ultimately, Martin could turn to the Ethics Committee; although, as a senior analyst, the Ethics Committee usually turned to him.