“Are you changing the subject?”

Jack loosened his tie. “Not really.”

The Rose leaned back in his chair, and the psychiatrist told a tale of fear. A man had contracted multiple sclerosis. As soon as it was diagnosed, he had consulted every specialist in the street. Someone told him of a fellow sufferer who had cured herself—he should contact her. Yet, curiously, he resisted—until he began to lose his sight. He looked her up while he could still see.

“Why are you here?” she demanded.

“I have multiple sclerosis, and heard you could help.”

“We don’t call it that here,” she replied.

She massaged him, a brutal investigation of his spent body; painful, but at the same time exquisite. He was forbidden to scream or even cry out. If he wanted to vocalise his agony, he was told to put it into words. By the second visit, his wife’s name had surfaced more than once. The healer diagnosed the root cause of his condition. His wife evidently saw herself as a saintly figure and needed a mate she could direct her selfless attention to. He had become a cripple and was staying a cripple in order not to lose her.

“Did he recover?” asked the Rose.

“She explained that fear, although a natural emotion, when uncontrolled can close down life. Life being a whole keyboard of emotions, if you like, confined to the keys one hand can reach without effort. Instead of responding to life’s opportunities, the mind says, ‘We can’t do that—it’s too dangerous, too fearful.’ So the body, which is programmed to follow the mind’s directives. closes down. In the case of MS, the nerves simply atrophy.”

“Did he recover?” the Rose asked again.

“He did. Ran out of there, as it happened, after six sessions.”

“And the loss of sight?”

“It receded with regular visualisation.”

“So he recovered completely?”

“He works at it. A bit like yourself. Lost his missus, of course. but he continues to restructure his mental patterns—no easy task.”

“Does he pass his knowledge on—cure others?”

“Not many. One in ten, maybe.”

“So it’s not foolproof, the system?”

“My dear chap, most folks love their disability—they don’t want to be well. That’s the point. They hobble in here with their silver-topped walking sticks. They bejewel their bloody indolence.”

“In here?”

The psychoanalyst smiled.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” said the Rose.

“Not if you grapple with your fear, your denial that nothing is wrong. But it has to be every step of the way, I’m afraid. See many shrinks, do you?” he asked.

Caught with his guard down, the Rose replied, “I suppose.”

Jack stood and stretched himself.

“How much do I owe you, Doc?” asked the Rose, colouring a little.

“Let me see . . .” He pulled a pad from his drawer and wrote a receipt which he pushed across the table. “Was it worth it, do you think? You must only pay me what you think it’s worth.”

“That’s no way to do business.”