When the glasses and plates are laid out, the barman retreats and leaves Hannah and Hugh in silence. Hannah waits. Is Hugh going to speak? Should she? She’s not sure what exactly she wants to ask.
“Will—Will isn’t completely on board,” she adds at last, more as a way of breaking the painfully stretching silence than because she thinks she really needs to tell Hugh this. “That’s why he isn’t here. He’s not—I don’t think he understands why I’m pursuing this. As far as he’s concerned Neville’s dead and that’s it. But for me… it was my evidence, Hugh. And if I got it wrong, and Neville died in prison because of me…”
“I see,” Hugh says again. He settles his glasses back on his nose and sighs. He looks very tired, as if Hannah’s story has put a huge weight on his shoulders that wasn’t there at the start of the evening.
“Hugh, listen,” Hannah says impulsively. “Look, if you’d rather forget all this, just say, I can go. We don’t need to talk about this. If you feel the same as Will, I wouldn’t blame you, but—”
“No, I understand,” Hugh says. He rubs his face with his hand, his palm rasping against his stubbled cheek. “I wish—I mean, I wish this Geraint chap hadn’t opened this can of worms, I’m not going to pretend otherwise. But I understand your feelings. What do you want to know?”
“Just what you remember from that night, something, anything that I might have missed or forgotten. I don’t care if it’s something to reassure me or something to make me doubt the verdict even more, I just feel like I have to know.”
“I don’t know if I can tell you very much more than what you already know,” Hugh says. He takes a long gulp of his wine as if gearing himself up for something painful. “But I’ll try. I mean, the first part of the evening you know—I was up in that room above the Lodge, acting as lookout, and she came in with those friends of hers from the play. They were all dressed up, do you remember? All in their wigs and makeup.”
“Yes, but the two girls changed halfway through the evening, didn’t they,” Hannah remembers. “Clem and whatever the other one was called. Sinead, or something like that? Only April and the boys stayed in costume.”
“We were all in the bar all evening,” Hugh continues. “None of us left, I’d swear to that.” Hannah nods. That chimes with her recollection too. “And then it was almost last orders and April decided to go up and change.”
“It was so late,” Hannah remembers. “It was utterly stupid, the bar was never going to let her back in. I suppose she thought we’d all carry on drinking in our room or something.”
“But she didn’t return,” Hugh says. “So you said you were going up to find her, and I said I’d come too. We walked across the quad, and just as we were about to get to your stairs, you saw Neville coming out.”
“You didn’t see him?”
“I saw someone who looked a lot like Neville, but I didn’t see him coming out of your staircase,” Hugh says. “But you did—and you saw it before you knew there was anything going on. And besides, he admitted being up there, didn’t he? Don’t start second-guessing yourself now.”
“I’m not,” Hannah says. “I mean—I am—but not like that. I don’t want you to think I’m looking for holes in my own memories, not exactly, I just want… I just want to be sure—do you know what I mean? I want to see it from another perspective, see something that I might have missed. Does that make sense?”
Hugh nods.
“Well, then, what happened next?” Hannah asks.
“Well…” Hugh says slowly. He takes another sip of his wine. She has the impression he is steadying himself, steeling himself to answer. “After that… you went up the stairs. And I waited. I was just about to walk away when I heard you cry out. I knew it couldn’t be Neville, we’d seen him leave, or at least you had, but you sounded… you sounded really scared. I knew something was wrong, I can’t explain it. I ran up the stairs, the door was open, and you were inside, on your knees, leaning over—” He swallows. His face in the candlelight looks suddenly much older. “Over April’s body.”
“You knew she was dead?” Hannah whispers. Her throat feels dry, but she doesn’t raise the Orangina to her lips. She doesn’t think she would be able to swallow it. Hugh shakes his head.
“Not at first. I mean—I wasn’t sure. She looked an odd color, but that could have just been the remains of the makeup. She was—” He chokes suddenly. “She was still wearing her wig.” He puts a hand to his face, over his eyes, as if he can’t bear to look all of a sudden. “I always wondered—” and again, he swallows, and then stops.
“What?” Hannah says. She is puzzled. She has heard Hugh’s story before, but not this detail. What has he wondered?
“I always wondered,” Hugh says softly, “if he thought she was you.”
Hannah feels suddenly cold.
“What do you mean?”
“April had short blond hair. Back then you had long dark hair. And the lights were very dim, it was just that one lamp in the corner burning.”
Hannah nods. She knows the lamp Hugh means, it was the one with the rose-colored shade, the one they always left on when they left the set, so that they didn’t have to come back to a dark room.
“I always wondered if Neville walked in, saw a girl with dark hair and thought… and thought…”
“You mean, he meant to kill me?” Hannah says. Her lips are dry and her hands feel suddenly cold, as if all the blood has drained out of them.
“You had just reported him to the college authorities,” Hugh says miserably. “Hadn’t you? I’ve always wondered…”
“Oh my God,” Hannah says. She picks up her glass and takes a sip of her drink, trying to cover her shaking hands. “You mean… you mean she might have died because of what I did?”
“No,” Hugh says forcefully. He leans across the table, takes Hannah’s free hand in his. His hands are large, capable, and bony, and very strong. They are surgeon’s hands. “That’s not what I’m saying. Whoever killed April, it was their fault, Hannah, not yours. Don’t let yourself get sucked into that narrative. But I’ve always wondered, if you had gone up first…”
“Oh my God,” Hannah says again. She feels sick.
“That’s what I meant. Don’t let yourself get caught up in what-ifs. That way madness lies.”
“I just want to know,” Hannah says. She swallows against the dryness in her throat. “I just want to know what happened. I don’t remember what happened after that. I remember you doing mouth-to-mouth—”
She puts her hand to her head, as if she can press the memories back into place, remembering the sound of Hugh’s feet on the stairs, Hugh dropping to his knees beside April.
Hugh lets his hand drop and he brushes his fringe away from his forehead. His face is profoundly unhappy.