Shrewd eyes, behind heavy frames, peered at me.
‘None of the cuttings knew,’ said Adam.
‘Do you climb too?’ asked Joanna.
I laughed. ‘Not at all, not even stairs when there’s a lift available.’
‘It must be strange for you, waiting behind,’ she went on. ‘Worrying about him.’
‘I haven’t done the waiting yet,’ I said vaguely, moving off to put the kettle on. ‘And I have my own life,’ I added, wondering if that was a lie now.
I thought again about our honeymoon weekend in the Lake District. What had happened between us in that cabin – the violence he had done to me, with my permission – bothered me still. I tried not to think of it too much; it had become a dark zone in my mind. I had put myself into his hands and for a few moments, as I lay beneath him, I had thought he would kill me and I had still not struggled against him. Part of me was aghast at that, and part of me stirred.
As I stood by the kettle, half listening to the interview, I noticed a scrumpled-up sheet of paper with heavy black writing on it. I opened it up, knowing in advance what to expect. ‘I WON’T LET YOU REST,’ it said. They made my skin crawl, these letters. I didn’t know why we hadn’t gone to the police long ago. It was as if we had let ourselves become accustomed to them, so that their threats were like storm clouds in our life, which we simply took for granted. I looked up and saw that Adam was watching me, so I gave him a grin, tore the paper up into small shreds and dropped them disdainfully into the bin. He gave me a small nod of approval and turned his attention back to Joanna.
‘You were telling me about the last few hours.’ Joanna turned back to Adam. ‘Did you have any intimations of disaster?’
‘If you mean, did I think all those people would die up there, no, of course not.’
‘So when did you realize it was all going wrong?’
‘When it all went wrong. Can I have that whisky, Alice?’
Joanna looked down at her notebook and tried another tack. ‘What about the fixed ropes?’ she asked. ‘From what I understand, Greg McLaughlin and other expedition leaders fixed the different-coloured ropes that led up the ridge to the summit. But at some point the last bit of rope became untied, which might have made all the difference to the climbers.’
Adam stared at her. I brought him over a large shot of whisky. ‘Do you want some, Joanna?’ I said. She shook her head and went on waiting for Adam’s response. I poured myself a slug and downed it.
‘How do you think it happened?’
‘How the fuck do I know?’ he said eventually. ‘It was freezing cold. There was a storm. Everyone was out of it. Nothing functioned any more, nobody. I don’t know what happened to the rope, nor does anyone else. Now, you want blame, don’t you?’ He slurped some whisky back. ‘You want to write a nice, neat story saying so-and-so led a group of people to their death. Well, lady, it ain’t like that up in the death zone. No one’s a hero and no one’s a villain. We’re all just people stuck up a mountain with our brain cells cascading away.’
‘The book implies that you were a hero,’ said Joanna, quite unperturbed by his outburst. Adam said nothing. ‘And,’ she went on, carefully, ‘it also half implies that the leader of the expedition must bear some responsibility. Greg.’
‘Can you get me another, Alice?’ Adam held out his glass. When I took it from him I bent down and kissed him. I wondered at what point I should tell Joanna to go.
‘I gather that Greg is now in a bad condition. Is that guilt, do you think?’
Once again, Adam said nothing. He closed his eyes briefly, and tipped his head back. He looked very weary.
She tried again. ‘Do you think the trip was an unnecessary risk?’
‘Obviously. People died.’
‘Do you regret the way that the mountains have been commercialized?’
‘Yes.’
‘Yet you are part of that.’
‘Yes.’
‘One of the people who died,’ Joanna said, ‘was very close to you. An ex-girlfriend, I think.’
He nodded.
‘Were you badly affected by not being able to save her?’
I took the second whisky over and Adam put his arm around my waist as I leaned towards him.
‘Don’t go,’ he said, as if he was talking about our whole relationship. I sat on the arm of his chair, and rested my hand on his tangled hair. He stared assessingly at Joanna for a moment. ‘What the fuck do you think?’ he answered at last. He stood up. ‘I think that’s enough, don’t you?’
Joanna didn’t move, except to check that the spools of the taperecorder were still turning.
‘Have you got over it?’ she asked. I leaned over and turned off her taperecorder and she looked up at me. Our eyes met and she nodded at me, approvingly, I thought.
‘Got over.’ His tone was withering. Then he said, in an altogether different tone, ‘Shall I tell you my secret, Joanna?’
‘I’d be delighted.’
I’d bet she would.
‘I’ve got Alice,’ he said. ‘Alice will save me.’ And he gave a rather cracked laugh.
Now Joanna did stand up.
‘One last question,’ she said, as she put on her coat. ‘Will you go on climbing?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’m a climber. That’s who I am.’ His voice was slightly blurred with the whisky. ‘I love Alice and I climb mountains.’ He leaned against me. ‘That is where I find grace.’
‘I’m pregnant,’ said Pauline. We were walking in St James’s Park, arm in arm but awkward together still. It had been her idea to meet, and I had been half unwilling. All my old life seemed far off, almost unreal, as if it had happened to someone different. In that life, I had loved Pauline and depended on her; in this life, I had no room for such an intense friendship. I realized, walking to meet Pauline on that frosty Saturday afternoon in March, that I had put our friendship by for a rainy day. I assumed that I would be able to return to it, but not just yet. We had walked through the park together until it started to get dark, gingerly feeling our way round subjects where once we had been able to say more or less anything to each other. ‘How’s Jake?’ I had asked, and she, wincing slightly, had said he was all right.
‘How’s your new life?’ she’d said, not really wanting to know, and I hadn’t really told her.
Now I stopped and took her thin shoulders. ‘That is wonderful news,’ I said. ‘How pregnant?’
‘Eight or nine weeks. Enough to feel sick most of the time.’
‘I’m very happy for you, Pauline,’ I said. ‘Thanks for telling me.’
‘Of course I told you,’ she replied formally. ‘You’re my friend.’
We came to the road. ‘I go this way,’ I said. ‘I’m meeting Adam just up there.’
We kissed each other on both cheeks, relieved, and I turned away, into the unlit street. As I did so a tall young man stepped in front of me and, before I had time to register much except his dead white face and his garish mop of ginger hair, yanked my bag off my shoulder.
‘Oil’ I yelled, and lunged at him as he ducked away from me. I got hold of the bag, although there was almost nothing in it of any value, and pulled it from him. He whipped round to face me. There was a spider-web tattoo on his left cheek, and a line round his throat read ‘CUT HERE’. I kicked at his shin but missed, so I kicked again. There, that must have hurt.
‘Leggo, you cunt,’ he snarled at me. The straps of my bag cut into my fingers then slipped from me. ‘You stupid fucking cunt.’ He lifted his hand and struck me across the face, and I staggered and put a hand up to my cheek. Blood was running down my neck. His mouth was open and I saw that his tongue was fat and purple. He lifted his hand again. Oh, God, he was a madman. I remember thinking that he must be the man who was sending us those notes; our stalker. Then I closed my eyes: better get it over with. No blow came.