Guns in the Gallery

‘Yes. Though the depression was just one manifestation of a great number of symptoms. When I treat a client, I treat the whole client.’

He nodded. ‘When we last met . . . well, that is to say not when we met at Butterwyke House after . . .’ He couldn’t shape the words. ‘When we met at the Private View, I told you that over the years we’d tried all kinds of treatments for Fennel. Most of them started promisingly, but then . . . If it was medication, she’d forget to take it – or perhaps deliberately not take it. What I’m saying is that we had tried everything.’

‘I’m sure you did all that anyone could have done. You shouldn’t be blaming yourself, Ned.’

He smiled grimly. ‘Easy enough to say, Jude, but when your oldest child, a girl you’ve adored for . . . when she . . . it’s inevitable that I blame myself. I keep trying to work out where I went wrong, what I did that precipitated . . . what happened.’

‘That’s a natural human reaction. But what you have to remind yourself, Ned, is that Fennel was suffering from a very serious illness – the fact that it was a mental illness doesn’t make it any less real than heart disease or cancer. As I say, you did everything any parent could have done – more than most would have done – to help her cope with that illness. But sadly all your efforts failed.’

Jude was not ready, at this stage, to express any doubts she harboured about the authenticity of Fennel’s suicide. Though the idea of murder might have energized Ned Whittaker, reduced his feeling of guilt, maybe even given him a quest to identify the perpetrator, it would have been irresponsible of Jude to set that particular hare running.

‘Where do you stand,’ he asked, ‘on the causes of depression? Do you think it’s kind of genetic?’

‘I think it can be. Some medical authorities divide depression into two categories: reactive and endogenous. Reactive depression is triggered by some life event; the break-up of a relationship, the death of a loved one. Endogenous depression doesn’t seem to have such a readily identifiable cause. The sufferer is just born with it.’

‘And that’s what Fennel had?’

‘Definitely.’ Jude posed her next sentence with some delicacy. ‘It is frequently thought that endogenous depression is hereditary.’

Ned Whittaker looked at her blankly for a moment, then caught on. ‘Ah, you’re asking if I’ve ever suffered from depression . . .?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’d say the answer is a definite no. I’ve felt terrible at times – God, I can’t imagine ever feeling worse than I do at the moment – but I don’t think it’s depression. Fennel used to tell me how she felt at times, and I’ve read descriptions of depression, both in medical works and novels . . . I mean, Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye is reckoned to be a good description of a depressive, but I’ve never had feelings like that. When things go wrong for me, I don’t get mad, I want to get even.’

‘Which is perhaps why you’re feeling so bad at the moment. Because there’s no one you can get even with?’

Ned Whittaker nodded thoughtfully. ‘You could be right, Jude.’

‘Anyway, that’s your side of the family. You don’t have a genetic disposition towards depression.’

Once again he seemed rather slow to pick up the implication of her words, but this time Jude suspected the slowness might be calculated. ‘Oh, you mean Sheena. You’re asking if there’s a predisposition towards depression in her family?’

‘Yes.’

He shook his head firmly. ‘No, definitely not. With Sheena what you see is what you get. She’s very upfront. No murky hidden depths there.’

His answer seemed a little too emphatic, but Jude didn’t pick up on it. There’d be time enough to find out more about Sheena Whittaker, and at the moment her main priority was to give Ned any support that she could offer to alleviate his current misery.

In the circumstances, Jude didn’t have any inhibitions about divulging what Fennel had confided to her in the course of their sessions. A lot of what she reported – the circling, ingrowing sense of inadequacy – was familiar to the girl’s father. But he hadn’t realized how much guilt Fennel had felt; guilt for taking up too much of her parents’ attention, guilt for ruining their lives.

At the end of Jude’s long narrative, Ned Whittaker still looked shrunken and feeble in his chair, but he did seem calmer. ‘So do you reckon – in spite of the fact that Fennel’s depression was endogenous – there was some big shock that prompted her into actually taking action? You know, as opposed to talking about it, as she had done for years?’

Jude repeated Detective Inspector Hodgkinson’s observation about depressives frequently committing suicide at the moment when their mood was improving and he seemed to take that on board.

‘What about the scene she threw at the Cornelian Gallery, though?’ asked Ned. ‘Do you reckon that was what triggered it?’