She looked like someone who’d taken a blow to the head, saying finally, ‘Jesus, talk about it never fucking rains.’ Side-tracked, she said, ‘Did you go to his funeral?’
‘No. I only found out afterwards.’ Though now that he thought of it, he hadn’t asked Luke about a funeral, and probably wouldn’t have gone anyway, Will’s death tainted somehow whereas Rob’s had been heroic. It was a false distinction, a superficiality that neither of them would have appreciated, made falser still by the possibility they’d both shared exactly the same kind of death.
‘How sad,’ said Natalie, sounding touched, as if imagining Will being buried in some desolate pauper’s plot without any mourners at all. He thought of mentioning the visit from Will’s father but thought better of it, not wanting to muddy the waters.
He simply said, ‘I know, I was thinking of paying for a tree to be planted on campus, you know, as a memorial.’
‘That’s a nice idea.’ She thought about it for a second, then snapped out of it and pointed at the door behind her. ‘This is it.’
‘Oh, right.’ He followed her in. It was a small busy place but they appeared to recognize Natalie and had no trouble finding them a table tucked away near the back.
The menus were oversized, demanding to be looked at right away, and so they ordered quickly and then once they were left alone again, Natalie smiled and said, ‘I’ve been itching to ask, but what on earth happened to your head?’
He automatically lifted his hand to the bump which had almost disappeared and had lost its tenderness. The bruising still looked angry, an abstract mess of yellow and blue-black. He was about to tell her what had happened but held back, wanting for some reason to maintain his reputation as someone who kept calm in a crisis, feeling it important, particularly now.
‘It’s a long story,’ he said, ‘nothing exciting. Suffice to say it involved alcohol.’
She laughed and said, ‘You see, that’s the danger of staying in academia; you never grow up.’
He laughed too, amused by the picture she had of him now as an eternal student, living it up as if adult life had passed him by. It was hard to imagine how she could have been further from the truth.
‘It’s not all fun and games you know.’
‘I know, I’ve followed your career, I mean, not like in a stalking way, but I know what you’ve been up to.’ He felt guilty, that he’d thought of her so rarely over the intervening years, no nagging curiosity, no idle speculation about where she might be or what she might be doing.
‘Rob told me you’ve done pretty well.’ She shrugged, downplaying her success. ‘What is it you do?’
‘I work in the city; it’s not particularly interesting. I mean, it’s a great job, but...’
The waiter brought the wine, distracting them for a short while, and once he’d gone Alex said, ‘Look, I may as well get this out of the way now. I don’t even know what to think of it myself so I’ll just put the facts before you and let you interpret it as you see fit.’
‘Well this all sounds very intriguing.’
‘Maybe. The police don’t think Will’s death was suspicious but his flatmate did. Will was phobic about needles, smoked his heroin, but the overdose that killed him was injected.’
She’d been listening with mock enthusiasm but her face became serious now, realizing the kind of story she was being told. She put her wine glass down and said, ‘Did you speak to the police?’ He nodded. ‘And what did they say?’
‘They said they’d looked at all the options but there was nothing to indicate a struggle, nothing to suggest it wasn’t self-administered.’
‘So the flatmate’s paranoid.’
The conclusion grated a little, Alex conscious that the same could probably be said of him, with plenty of justification too.
‘Maybe. I thought the same. But I was outside the church earlier and a few of Rob’s colleagues were talking about him. Apparently his death doesn’t add up either.’ She looked cynical. ‘Like I said, I’m just putting it before you. Apparently Rob was tipped off that there was something interesting at this farm. He went out there and just after he arrived the Americans decided to bomb it.’
‘He was killed by our own side?’
‘Friendly fire.’
‘Jesus.’ She looked upset by the thought of it. ‘Still, don’t you think it’s just journalists’ talk? They love a good conspiracy theory, and let’s be honest, it seems like a pretty random and over-the-top way of killing someone.’
‘I agree.’
‘And a motive. Why would someone kill Rob?’ The working of her thoughts became briefly visible, her eyes darting about as she put together everything he’d told her, coming to the only possible conclusion. ‘You’re not serious?’
‘Like I said, I’m just putting it before you like it is.’