‘What kind of monster would force his son to stand there with an apple on his head, in front of everybody, waiting for a cigarette to go through his body?’

‘Well, that’s a very important question which we can take up on Wednesday,’ said Martin, inured to the endlessly repeated phenomenon of the most important material emerging at the end of a session.

‘Can I stay here?’ asked Sebastian desperately.

‘I’m afraid, as we’ve discussed—’

‘Hang on, hang on,’ said Sebastian, switching his tone abruptly. ‘If my name was changed, who’s to say that yours wasn’t?’

‘My name has always been Martin Carr,’ said Martin firmly. ‘And we’ll resume—’

‘Put a sock in it, Wernher. For all I know, you’re my father. You’re the fucking Nazi!’ said Sebastian, walking out with the belligerence of a man determined to avoid rejection.

Martin sat motionless in his chair as Sebastian slammed the basement door behind him (if it was behind him). He listened carefully to detect any signs of his patient not having genuinely left. He heard nothing. Could it really be true? Adopted at two, covered in cigarette burns. And he had said it was his birthday last month. It was too much of a coincidence, but a coincidence was always too much, otherwise it would just be an incident. With their passion for synchronicity, this sort of thing must happen to Jungians all the time, but Martin was not at all thrilled to find himself wondering if his maddest patient was also his daughter’s twin. It might still very well be a fantasy, but he couldn’t help being reminded of some of the turbulent family discussions Olivia had provoked during her adolescence, when she was trying to process her own story and had found out that adopting parents often had detailed access to the socio-economic and health backgrounds of the children’s birth families. Describing candidates from the most troubled families, the author of one article had written, ‘One might ask, “Who would adopt such a child?”’ Olivia had confronted Lizzie about how much she had been told about her biological parents’ history and background.

‘We knew that it was an accidental pregnancy,’ said her mother, ‘and we knew about your father’s criminal record.’

‘Was that appealing to you?’ asked Olivia, half-joking.

‘I wouldn’t put it that strongly,’ said her mother, smiling at Olivia. ‘We just wanted to look after you.’

‘I suppose,’ said Olivia, who had emerged too recently from looking up ‘Adoption’ in the index of dozens of books from her parents’ shelves.

‘Was I an experiment?’ she asked.

‘Don’t be so silly,’ Lizzie said, kissing Olivia on the forehead, ‘you were a child who needed help.’