watched her draw back the curtains to reveal a fine sunny day, and wished that she could have revealed her naked body as easily.
âAnd how are you this beautiful day?â I said.
âAwful,â she grimaced.
âMarianne, you know itâs supposed to be the other way around, donât you? Iâm the one who is supposed to feel awful, and youâre the one who should ask after my health.â
âIâm sorry, Herr Strauss, but I am bored as hell with this place.â
âWell, why donât you jump in here beside me and tell me all about it. Iâm very good at listening to other peopleâs problems.â
âIâll bet youâre very good at other things as well,â she said, laughing. âI shall have to put bromide in your fruit-juice.â
âWhat would be the point of that? Iâve already got a whole pharmacy swilling around inside of me. I canât see that another chemical would make much difference.â
âYouâd be surprised.â
She was a tall, athletic-looking blonde from Frankfurt with a nervous sense of humour and a rather self-conscious smile that indicated a lack of personal confidence. Which was strange, given her obvious attractiveness.
âA whole pharmacy,â she scoffed. âA few vitamins and something to help you sleep at night. Thatâs nothing compared with some of the others.â
âTell me about it.â
She shrugged. âSomething to help them wake up, and stimulants to help combat depression.â
âWhat do they use on the pansies?â
âOh, them. They used to give them hormones, but it didnât work. So now they try aversion therapy. But despite what they say at the Goering Institute about it being a treatable disorder, in private all the doctors say that the basic condition is hard to influence. Kindermann should know. I think he might be a bit warm himself. Iâve heard him tell a patient that psychotherapy is only helpful in dealing with the neurotic reactions that may arise from homosexuality. That it helps the patient to stop deluding himself.â
âSo then all he has to worry about is Section 175.â
âWhatâs that?â
âThe section of the German penal code which makes it a criminal offence. Is that what happened to Reinhard Lange? He was just treated for associated neurotic reactions?â She nodded, and sat herself on the edge of my bed. âTell me about this Goering Institute. Any relation to Fat Hermann?â
âMatthias Goering is his cousin. The place exists to provide psychotherapy with the protection of the Goering name. If it werenât for him there would be very little mental health in Germany worthy of the name. The Nazis would have destroyed psychiatric medicine merely because its leading light is a Jew. The whole thing is the most enormous piece of hypocrisy. A lot of them continue privately to subscribe to Freud, while denouncing him in public. Even the so-called Orthopaedic Hospital for the SS near Ravensbrück is nothing but a mental hospital for the SS. Kindermann is a consultant there, as well as being one of the Goering Instituteâs founding members.â
âSo who funds the Institute?â
âThe Labour Front, and the Luftwaffe.â
âOf course. The prime ministerâs petty-cash box.â
Marianneâs eyes narrowed. âYou know, you ask a lot of questions. What are you, a bull or something like that?â
I got out of bed and slipped into my dressing-gown. I said: âSomething like that.â
âAre you working on a case here?â Her eyes widened with excitement. âSomething Kindermann could be involved in?â
I opened the window and leant out for a moment. The morning air was good to breathe, even the stuff coming up from the kitchens. But a cigarette was better. I brought my last packet in from the window ledge and lit one. Marianneâs eyes lingered