After a long silence, I whispered: “I don’t need to tell you. You know who it is”

Dr Langley placed her hands together, choosing her words carefully. “This session is about getting behind the truth, Maggie. We both know you’ve been bottling something up, something you either can’t admit to yourself, or won’t admit to me.”

I shifted in my seat. I’d gone this far so there was no point not going the rest of the way. “Marcellus didn’t kill Harry,” I said emphatically.

I’d expected a look of surprise, but what I saw was understanding. For the first time, I dared hope that salvation might be possible.

“And you want to find out who did,” she said.

I took a deep breath. “I owe it to Harry.”

“Let me get this straight. It’s because you want to see justice done for Harry?”

“For the others too.”

“You think you have a responsibility towards all the dead?” I said nothing.

“Okay, Maggie, tell me why you’re sure Marcellus wasn’t the killer. It seems a cut-and-dried case.”

I looked at her helplessly. “I just don’t see him as a killer. Yes, I know he was planning to kidnap his father, but I saw how the two of them behaved together.”

“Very well then, what about Marcellus killing Harry?”

Conclusion

“If Marcellus didn’t kill Wilson, then it follows he didn’t kill Harry.” I frowned. “And I keep thinking of the way Harry was murdered. Marcellus was built like a Sherman tank. He would have slipped up behind him and snapped his neck like a twig.”

Dr Langley fingered her letter opener. “Can you remember when you came to this conclusion?”

“It was when I was watching television. I saw a film about a group of commandos. One of them had the height and build of Marcellus, he looked just like him from the back. He crept up behind an enemy soldier and broke his neck. He was fast and he was silent.

“He slipped back into the shadows before the soldier even hit the ground. The others had their backs turned and didn’t know anything had happened until they heard the man fall.” I stared at the ceiling. “It was the strangest thing. The minute I saw it, I realised I’d known all along it couldn’t have been Marcellus. It was as if I’d woken from a deep sleep.”

“And you began to have the dream at about that time.” It was a statement.

I looked at her in surprise.

“Remember what I said earlier, Maggie? The thing that’s lurking under the water, yet never revealing itself, is something you want to discover.” She spoke slowly, emphasising the words.

“I now know what your dream signifies. What you want to discover is the identity of the killer.” “Then why don’t I see a body in the bath?”

She smiled gently. “You don’t yet know who the killer is.”

“And the smell of river water?” I said, looking at the floor.

“You fell into the river and nearly drowned. Your sleeping mind is associating a personally traumatic experience with the deaths at the Icehotel.”

I lifted my head. “So where do we go from here?” She rose and opened the window, letting in the faint early-evening sounds: the traffic, someone shouting selling the paper. She settled herself behind the desk. “I’d like you to tell me what you really think happened, Maggie. It doesn’t matter how far-fetched or illogical it sounds.”

“I don’t know if I can,” I said, in a small voice.

Interested

“You’ve been thinking about it these past few months. All I’m asking you to do is to think out loud. Remember that I’m less interested in catching a killer and more interested in helping you. What you say will stay within these four walls.” She paused. “Tell me who you think killed Wilson and Harry.”

After a long silence, I whispered: “I don’t need to tell you. You know who it is.”

“The white tiles and the sunken bath. You saw those in his bathroom. They’re always in the dream. It’s Mike you’re expecting to see in the bath, Maggie,” she added quietly.

I put my hands under my knees, not wanting her to see them shaking.

“Your subconscious is telling you it’s Mike. But does the conscious you really think he’s the killer?” When I said nothing, she continued: “From what you say, Mike hadn’t disguised his hatred of Wilson Bibby. But could he have done it? Did he have the opportunity?”

I gazed at her without blinking. “He could have spiked Wilson’s food or drink that evening. Then pushed him out of bed later.”

“Would he have known about the room swap?” “Harry could have told him, or he could have overheard Harry’s conversation with the receptionist.”

“And the snowmobiles? You said you didn’t think that was an accident.”

“Mike had been standing next to them when they fell. He had the opportunity to loosen the brakes.” I ticked off the facts on my fingers. “He’d been back from the husky trip well in time to murder Harry. The suit in the chapel was extra-large, Mike’s size. It was Mike who suspected that Harry had whispered his killer’s name to me. And it was Mike, not Jonas, who sat watching me at the rehearsal.” I glared at her triumphantly.

“Could he have followed you to the Icehotel that night?”

“From the lounge, he could have seen me go into Activities Room. He could have grabbed a suit and followed me.”

“And when you and Liz went into that town?” She paused. “Kiruna?”

“Mike hadn’t come with us but he could have taken the next bus in. He might have been the figure I’d seen tailing us, waiting for an opportunity to kill me, or Liz, or both of us.”

Understand

“Wasn’t that the policeman?”

“A trained detective would know how to follow someone without being seen.”

“Wouldn’t he have seen Mike following you and apprehended him?”

I felt as though I’d been slapped in the face. “You don’t believe me,” I said, my voice quivering.

“Maggie, please understand that I’m just working this through. It’s not what I believe, but what you believe. I’m trying to understand your thought processes.”

I nodded. “All right, Engqvist may have seen Mike, but perhaps he was under orders not to detain him, just see what he was up to.”

She seemed satisfied. “Go on.”

“Mike had been absent for much of the week. He said he’d been in the gym and perhaps he was telling the truth, perhaps he’d been plotting his moves there.” My head was spinning. It was obvious now. “To establish his alibi, he could have sent Marcellus to the church by persuading him I was his father’s killer.”

“Marcellus’s climb up the tower seemed to be the most difficult thing for the Inspector to explain.”

“And I’m convinced Mike had a hand in it somehow.”

More on Wednesday.

Icehotel, available on Amazon Kindle, is Hania Allen’s debut novel. Her second book, The Polish Detective (Constable, £8.99), is the first in her new series featuring DS Dania Gorska and is set in Dundee.