Forty-Seventh Session

Richard was much quieter and looked happy. He said he had not brought his fleet. He went to have a drink from the tap and asked Mrs K. whether she minded this. Without waiting for an answer he had another drink. This time he inquired whether Mrs K. would mind if he exhausted the whole water-supply; he also asked whether she had seen John on that day.

Mrs K. interpreted that his asking permission to drink expressed his fear, not of exhausting the water-supply, but of exhausting Mrs K.'s strength and thereby robbing the other patients, particularly John. He experienced again the fear he had as a baby of having exhausted his mother and sucked her dry and thus deprived any babies who might yet be born; the tap also stood for Daddy's good penis, and that meant that he was afraid of robbing Mrs K. of the good penis she was supposed to contain. Mrs K. reminded him that (in the Forty-first Session) he had tried to find out whether Mr Evans had sold her cigarettes and said that his mother had got sweets from him and that on the previous day he had asked whether Mrs K. had sweets from him.1

Richard said he wanted to draw and added that he was very happy. He also explained his reasons for feeling happy: he felt much better, actually he was quite all right; the sun was shining; the war news was good; he had no socks on and his legs were bare; the unpleasant boy at the hotel was leaving tomorrow.2 He repeated