“Unless… unless they were already in there.”
Emily stops. She puts a bowl down in front of November and looks hard at Hannah.
“Hannah, what are you saying? You’re saying that someone else on the staircase—”
“I’m saying it’s possible. The two guys below—Henry and Philip—they had alibis. They were both together all night in Henry’s room, and they gave evidence at the trial about hearing April walking around on the floor above from about ten forty-five and answering the door to someone. And the rooms below them, rooms one and two, room one was empty, it was used for some kind of scouts storage. And the girl in room two had her boyfriend over. I know because I knocked on the door on my way down and they came out together. But Dr. Myers… he was never questioned at the trial. He didn’t come out and see what was going on. Why wouldn’t he come out when he heard me screaming like that?”
“Yes. Why wouldn’t he…” Emily says, very slowly. “Unless he had something to hide… Fuck. I can’t believe the police didn’t rule him out, though?”
“I mean, maybe they did and we just didn’t hear about it—but on the other hand, maybe they just never suspected him. What would his motive be?”
“Well, that’s a good point,” Emily says. “What would his motive be?”
Hannah looks down at her plate. She has to tell Emily. It isn’t fair not to. She takes a deep breath.
“Well… we think April may have been pregnant.”
She’s not sure what she’s expecting from Emily. Shock maybe, or a flicker of something indicating that she already knew. Neither comes. Instead a deep, weary sadness spreads over Emily’s face.
“Fuck,” she says very quietly. “Oh my God, that’s awful. Why didn’t they bring it up at the trial?”
“According to Geraint, Neville’s defense thought it would look bad,” November says. “You know—victim-blaming. But if Myers was the father, it wouldn’t have gone down well with the college, would it?”
“Or his wife,” Emily says. “You know he’s married?”
“What?” Hannah is more puzzled than shocked. “When? Recently?”
“No, forever. He was married when we were at Pelham.”
“What?” Now Hannah really is shocked. “But—but where was his wife then? Had they separated?”
“I don’t think so. Fellowship abroad or something? But she came back the following year, after you’d left, and he moved out of Pelham and into a rather nice house in Jericho with her. I think they’re still there. She’s a professor at Wadham.”
“Shit,” November says. She looks very sober, in spite of the glass of white wine she’s holding. Hannah has a sudden, visceral longing for a glass herself, even though she hasn’t drunk since she held her own positive pregnancy test in her hand.
“And this is why you’re going to see him tomorrow?” Emily says. She looks rattled now, her cool composure shattered. “To try to—what? Trap him into something? Confront him?”
“Not confront him, no,” Hannah says impatiently. She digs her spoon into the tagine, as if the gesture can somehow restore the normality of the situation. “I’m not stupid. We’re just—we’re going to talk to him. That’s all.”
“I mean—” Emily stops. She folds her hands in her lap as if she’s trying to think how to compose something, and then starts again. “Look, if you think your evidence at the trial could have been based on a mistaken premise, then I can understand you wanting to get to the bottom of that, but—this could be dangerous.”
“It won’t be dangerous,” Hannah says, rather cross now. This is not what she wants. She doesn’t want Emily echoing Will’s concerns. “As far as Myers is concerned, November and I are just two grieving people remembering April in her last year. He doesn’t need to know anything else.”
“I really think—”
“I really think this is Hannah’s decision,” November puts in, and Hannah shoots her a grateful look. Yes. Thank you. “If Myers is guilty—which is a pretty big if—he’d be absolutely insane to try anything. We’ll be together in broad daylight. He’s hardly going to gun a pregnant former student down just for coming on a tour of Pelham.”
“Ugh,” Emily says now, as if frustrated. She runs her hand through her hair, leaving the stiff waves mussed and tousled, and then rubs under the nose-clips of her glasses before resettling them. “I wish I could come with you, but I’ve got tutorials. Will you promise me you’ll be careful? And will you report back tomorrow night?”
“Of course we’ll be careful,” Hannah says firmly. She picks up her spoon again and takes another bite of tagine. “And yes I’ll report back tomorrow night. Shall we have dinner somewhere in town?”
“Okay,” Emily says reluctantly. “I’ll make a reservation and text you.”
“Okay,” Hannah says. “Good. Now. Let’s eat dinner, I’m starving.”
AFTER
The next day, as she walks down the High Street towards Pelham College, Hannah thinks she knows what Emily meant the night before, about seeing her and November on the couch together. The sense that she’s stepping back in time is overwhelming, almost sickeningly so. Oxford doesn’t change—that’s part of it. Sure, some of the shops and cafes have different names, but the buildings, the road, the river, the skyline—it’s so close to how she remembers it that it gives her a surreal, dreamlike feeling, and a sense of something so strong it’s almost nausea washes over her as she crosses Pelham Street and nears the Porters’ Lodge. It’s not nostalgia—because she has no real wish to be back here. It’s something else. A sense… a sense almost of the past pressing down on her, suffocating her. And November’s presence beside her is part of that. Like a living ghost of April.
“I’m sorry,” she says to November as they draw level with the huge wooden gate, the miniature door-within-a-door. “I’m sorry, can we just—I need a second.”
“Sure!” November says. She looks concerned, and they stand for a minute, Hannah resting one hand against the golden stone of the outer wall, trying to steady herself. You can do this, he won’t be in there.
“Okay,” she says at last. And she is. Because the picture in her head is not of Neville as he was then—tall and broad and terrifying—but of the man in the article, the frail elderly man in his prison uniform. She feels her breathing steady. “Okay, I’m ready.”
“Are you sure?” November asks, a little anxiously now. “Because we really don’t have to. We can bow out—send our apologies. I can say I couldn’t face it. People will understand.”
“No, I’m fine. I want to do this.”
“Okay,” November says. She puts out a hand towards the big metal handle of the inner door. “Sure?”
“Sure.”
As she nods, November pushes on the centuries-old door—and it opens. And together they duck through, and then, for the first time in more than ten years, Hannah is inside Pelham College.
It hasn’t changed either. That’s the first thing she thinks. It hasn’t changed at all. There’s the Porters’ Lodge to the right, under the arch. There’s a kind of sick reflexive lurch in her stomach as she remembers all the times she scurried past, head down, panic choking her in case he was there. But now she forces herself to stop and look, really look. Two elderly men are standing behind the counter, white shirts straining over ample stomachs, but Neville is just a ghost in her imagination, and she doesn’t know either of them.
November leads the way into the Porters’ Lodge and steps up to the counter.
“Hi, we’re here for a tour? My name is November Rain, this is Hannah de Chastaigne. We’re here to look around the college and then we’re meeting with Dr. Myers.”