“That’s just the surface, though,” Will says, and she nods, knowing it’s not just Will defending his best friend, it’s also true. Because although Hugh may come across as slightly effete, the reality is very different. Underneath the self-mocking veneer, Hugh is tough, and driven, and very, very ambitious. It’s why he’s done as well as he has. Will’s family is old money—not that there’s much of it left now, apart from some land and a few paintings. April’s was new—her father came from nowhere, a brash Essex boy who made his fortune in the city and cashed out at the right time. But Hugh’s family were neither, in spite of his schooling. His father was a GP, his mother a housewife, “county” folk who scraped together the money for their only child’s education, going without themselves, even as they pinned all their hopes on him.
That sacrifice is something Hugh has been trying to justify ever since he left Pelham—and now, to a large extent, he has succeeded. He followed in his father’s footsteps as far as graduation, but then went swiftly and lucratively into private practice—he’s now the head of a very successful plastic surgery clinic in Edinburgh. One of his first clients was April’s mother. Hannah doesn’t know how much he earns, but she can tell from his flat that he must be extremely comfortable—you don’t get a place like that in central Edinburgh for small change.
“So, what was she saying?” Will continues, and Hannah has to drag her mind back to Emily’s conversation. The sinking feeling in her stomach returns.
“She was saying…”
She breaks off. The waiter has arrived with their starters and there’s a moment’s respite as they sort out whose is whose, but then Will prompts, “She was saying?”
“She was asking if I was okay and…”
“Yes?” Will says. He’s looking worried now, and puzzled, and maybe slightly irritated too, it’s hard to tell.
“There’s this journalist. He’s been trying to get in touch with her—and me. He’s a friend of Ryan’s and he thinks…”
Oh God, this is hard.
She puts her knife and fork down, takes a deep breath, forces the words out.
“He thinks there might have been a mistake. He thinks Neville’s conviction was a miscarriage of justice.”
“Bullshit.” Will doesn’t even stop to consider her words; his reaction is swift and decisive, and he slams his hand down on the table, making his plate and cutlery clatter and jump. The people at the neighboring table look around in surprise and Hannah winces, but Will doesn’t lower his voice. “Utter bollocks. I hope you told Emily not to speak to him?”
“She already has,” Hannah says, her voice practically a whisper as if to compensate for Will’s, and then, seeing Will’s expression, she backtracks. “Not about Neville. They seem to have talked mostly about Ryan. But don’t you think—”
She stops.
Don’t you think it’s at least a possibility? is what she wants to ask. But she can’t quite bring herself to say the words. It’s been hard enough turning them over and over inside her head without articulating them.
“Sweetheart.” Will puts down his cutlery and reaches across the table, holding her hand, forcing her attention. “Hannah, don’t do this. Don’t start second-guessing yourself. And for what? Just because Neville’s dead? His death changes nothing. It doesn’t change the evidence—it doesn’t change what you saw.”
And that’s the thing. She knows he’s right.
Of course he’s right.
The fact that Neville went to his grave protesting his innocence proves what exactly? Nothing. There have been plenty of murderers who denied their guilt until their dying day.
But the truth is that Neville could have been heading towards parole by now, if he had played the game—accepted his guilt—done his time. Instead he spent the years after April’s death protesting his innocence and launching futile appeal after appeal after appeal—all of which achieved nothing except to keep his name in the press and public anger high.
Would a guilty man really have shot himself in the foot like that?
“Hannah?” Will says. He squeezes her hand, forcing her to meet his eyes. “Hannah, sweetheart, you know that, right? This is not your fault.”
“I know,” she says. She withdraws her hand, shuts her eyes, rubs at the headache that is beginning to build beneath the plastic nose-rest of her glasses. But when she shuts her eyes, it’s not Will’s face that she sees, full of love and concern—it’s Neville’s. And not the Neville that has dogged her since university—glowering, full of belligerent defensiveness—it’s the one she saw the other day. The haunted, hunted old man, staring out of the screen with a kind of pleading fear.
And she knows, what Will said? It’s not true.
This is all her fault—all of it.
BEFORE
“Oh, Hannah,” Dr. Myers said, as Hannah closed her folder and stood up, ready to leave at the end of their session. “Could you stay back for a moment? Miles, you’re free to go.”
Hannah’s tutorial partner nodded and left, leaving Hannah standing slightly awkwardly, wondering what Dr. Myers was about to tell her. Had she slipped up? He had seemed pleased with her essay this time, but the same couldn’t be said for some of her earlier efforts. It was a moment before she realized Dr. Myers was talking—and she wasn’t paying attention.
“… little drinks party,” he was saying. “I always have one at the end of every term. I invite a few particularly promising students along—we make connections—it’s rather fun.”
Hannah stood, holding her breath, not wanting to make an assumption that might swiftly be shot down. Particularly promising students. Was he really talking about her? But surely he wouldn’t have mentioned the drinks party if he didn’t intend to invite her?
“It’s this Friday,” he said. “Very informal—just a glass of sherry in my rooms. At least you won’t have any trouble finding it!”
Hannah gave a laugh, and then, lacking anything else to say, said, “Thank you. So much. I mean—yes, I’d love to come.”
“Wonderful. Eight p.m.”
“Can I bring anything?”
“No, just yourself.”
Outside, in the corridor, she leaned against the wall, feeling a smile spreading across her face. Particularly promising. Could it really be true?
The big question, of course, was what to wear. Very informal, Dr. Myers had said, which was the worst kind of invitation. At least with the ones that said “white tie” or “academic gowns,” you knew where you stood. Very informal could mean anything from party dresses to jeans.
“Jeans,” April said decisively when Hannah asked her advice, “and a pleated poplin camisole, very high at the neck, no sleeves, single pearl button fastener behind. Business at the front, party in the back.”
“Yes,” Hannah said impatiently, “but I don’t have a—” What was it? A pleated something something? “A top like that. Friday is two days away. I haven’t got the time to go shopping.” Or the money, she thought but did not say. Such considerations didn’t weigh with April.
“You may not have one,” April said, “but I have. Come through here.”
Hannah had not been into April’s bedroom for several weeks—with a joint sitting area, they didn’t need to go into each other’s rooms to socialize, and since Will was a frequent visitor, Hannah was always half-afraid of what she might find if she knocked.
Now, she was amazed afresh not just at the difference between April’s room and her own—a difference which had seeped out into the living room, where the boring, regulation university furniture was slowly being replaced or supplemented by April’s own luxuriously expensive taste—but by the mess. There were clothes everywhere: Designer garments piled up in corners. Beaded tops slung over lamps. Jimmy Choos hanging casually by a strap from a desk chair. But not just clothes. Half-drunk cups of coffee languished on the windowsill, sporting an extravagant coating of mold. Books were scattered like splay-winged birds. An open bottle of pills spilled across the nightstand. A half-eaten doughnut leached grease into a pile of essays, and a makeup palette lay burst open on the rug, colored powder ground into the carpet pile.
In one corner a lamp burned, low and golden, and April clutched her head.
“Oh shit, every time I come in here I’m shocked at how awful it is. I wish I could pay Sue to sort it, but she’s such a bitch.”
“She’s not a bitch,” Hannah said reflexively, “she’s just busy,” but she was eyeing the chaos and silently agreeing that it was going to take more than April to sort this out. There were weeks of mess here, and university rules stated that they had to clear their rooms for the Christmas break. “How do you find anything?”