40

      Jurek Walter is visible on one of the nine squares of the huge monitor. Like a caged beast he is pacing the dayroom, walking round the sofa, then turning left and going past the television. He goes round the running machine, turns left again and goes back into his room.

      Anders Rönn watches him from above on another of the screens, as well as on the other monitor.

      Jurek washes his face, then sits down on the plastic chair without drying himself. He stares at the door to the corridor as the water drips onto his shirt and dries.

      My is sitting in the operator’s chair. She checks the time, waits another thirty seconds, looks at Jurek, makes a note of the zone on the computer, and locks the door to the dayroom.

      ‘He’s getting faggots this evening … he likes that,’ she says.

      ‘He does?’

      Anders Rönn already thinks that the routines surrounding this one patient are so repetitive and static that it would be hard to tell the days apart if it weren’t for the daily meeting up on Ward 30. The other doctors talk about their patients and care plans. No one even expects him to repeat that the situation in the secure unit is unchanged.

      ‘Have you ever tried talking to the patient?’ Anders asks.

      ‘With Jurek? We’re not allowed to,’ she replies, and scratches her tattooed arm. ‘It’s because … well, he says things you can’t forget.’

      Anders hasn’t spoken to Jurek Walter since that first day. He just makes sure that the patient gets his regular injection of neuroleptic drugs.