VAL McDERMID

The Last Temptation

For Cameron Joseph McDermid Baillie:
not much of a gift by comparison,
but the best I can do.

Epigraph

The last temptation is the greatest treason:
To do the right deed for the wrong reason.

Murder in the Cathedral
T. S. Eliot

Only when it is responsible for providing psychological diagnoses for state purposes does psychology really become important.

Max Simoneit, scientific director of
Wehrmacht Psychology 1938

Table of Contents

Epigraph

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

About the Author

By the Same Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

Extract from Murder in the Cathedral by
T. S. Eliot (published by Faber and Faber Ltd)
reproduced by permission of Faber and Faber Ltd.

Case Notes

Name: Walter Neumann

Session Number: 1

Comments: The patient has clearly been troubled for some time with an overweening sense of his own infallibility. He presents with a disturbing level of overconfidence in his own abilities. He has a grandiose self-image and is reluctant to concede the possibility that he might be subject to valid criticism.

When challenged, he appears offended and clearly has difficulty masking his indignation. He sees no need to defend himself, regarding it as self-evident that he is right, in spite of all evidence to the contrary. His capacity for self-analysis is clearly limited. A typical response to a question is to deflect it with a question of his own. He shows a marked reluctance to examine his own behaviour or the consequences of his actions.

He lacks insight and the concept of a wider responsibility. He has mastered the appearance of affect, but it is unlikely that this is more than a convenient mask.

Therapeutic Action: Altered state therapy initiated.

Chapter 1

1

Blue is one colour the Danube never manages. Slate grey, muddy brown, dirty rust, sweat-stained khaki; all of these and most of the intermediate shades sabotage the dreams of any romantic who stands on her banks. Occasionally, where boats gather, she achieves a kind of oily radiance as the sun shimmers on a skin of spilled fuel, turning the river the iridescent hues of a pigeon’s throat. On a dark night when clouds obscure the stars, she’s as black as the Styx. But there, in central Europe at the turning of the new millennium, it cost rather more than a penny to pay the ferryman.