“And was that worth driving Rowena to suicide for?”

“No. Of course not. I had no idea-”

“You knew about the first attempt. How can you claim to have had no idea?”

“Ah. Sarah’s mentioned that, has she?”

“Yes. And I wish she’d done so at the time. Then Keith and I might have been able to- Oh, never mind.” She rose and walked up and down, puffing at her cigarette. “It’s not all your fault. I’ll say that much. Sarah was a fool to keep us in the dark. And she should have realized what might happen if Rowena found out about the programme.”

“How did she find out?”

“A stroke of bad luck. With her exams finished and term all but over, she wasn’t going into the university last week, so Paul thought she probably wouldn’t meet anybody who’d seen the programme. But another maths student she knew quite well had seen it. She called round for coffee on Thursday morning and asked Rowena about it. But Rowena didn’t know it had even been made, let alone broadcast. She was shocked. Outraged, I suppose, that it had been kept from her. I knew that was a mistake all along. I should never have let Keith… Anyway, about half an hour after her visitor left, Rowena was spotted by another resident going into Sarah’s flat in Caledonia Place. She still had a key from when they shared it. She must have guessed her sister had recorded the programme while she was out with her and Paul the night before. But Sarah hadn’t needed to record it, had she? Because you’d given her a tape of it, neatly labelled, which Rowena found and watched on Sarah’s TV. It was still in the video recorder when Sarah got back. Can you imagine the effect it must have had? Sophie Marsden implying her mother was some sort of nymphomaniac.”

“She didn’t exactly-”

“And you backing her up. Reviving Rowena’s delusions about second sight and missed opportunities. Making her feel guilty for aiding Naylor’s conviction. Making her suspicious of her own family for keeping so much back. Making her afraid of what it all might mean. God knows how many times she watched that video over the next couple of hours. But it was too many times for her to bear. She drank about half a bottle of gin, you know. Then walked up to the bridge and threw herself off. They think she may have tried to phone somebody just before she did it. They found her diary in the call-box on the Clifton side.”

“It was me.”

Bella stared at me in astonishment. “You?”

“Yes. But I was at Lord’s all day. With Simon. She told my secretary she’d call back.”

“Oh, perfect! Our last chance of saving her blown. Because you go to bloody Lord’s and get pissed with Simon. That really is wonderful.”

“For God’s sake, I wasn’t to know.” If blame was to be distributed, I didn’t mean to take more than my share. “Sarah swore me to silence about Rowena’s overdose. And your husband pleaded with me to say nothing to her about Benefit of the Doubt. Maybe if you’d tried to understand her misgivings before the trial; maybe if you’d trusted her just a-”

“Keith didn’t plead with you to give Seymour an interview. Or to pour out some psycho-babble to the wretched man about Louise’s state of mind the day she died.”

“No, but-”

“And since you seem to be trying to shuffle off responsibility for what’s happened, I may as well mention something I was intending to spare you. But it makes more sense now you’ve admitted it was you she rang, so you may as well know. When Sarah got back to her flat, the TV was still on. With the Benefit of the Doubt video freeze-framed on the interview with you. So now you know why she wanted to speak to you, don’t you?”

“To ask which version was the truth,” I murmured in reply, as much to myself as to Bella. “The one I told at the trial. Or the one I hinted at in the interview. The one she forced herself to believe. Or the one she could never quite forget.”

“And what would you have told her?”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure of the answer any more. I suppose I never was.”

Bella sat down again, stabbed out her cigarette and glared across at me. “Why couldn’t you just leave it alone, Robin, eh? She was getting over it. They all were. Keith’s been so happy recently. Really enjoying his retirement. And now…”

“I’m sorry, Bella. Sorry for everything. But even if I’d done and said nothing, Bantock would still have written his book. Seymour would still have made his programme. The questions-and the doubts-would still have been raised.”

“And maybe Rowena could have borne them. But for your intervention. Have you considered that?”

“Yes. I’ve considered it. Kind of you to point it out, though.”

Bella plucked off her sunglasses and stared at me. I think she may have felt she’d gone too far. But a softening of her tone was the only concession she offered. “Keith, Sarah and Paul are going to need all my help to recover from this. It’s like a blow to an unhealed wound. I have to think of them before anyone else.”

“I understand that.”

“I’m not sure exactly when the funeral’s going to be, but I think it would be best if you left them alone until it’s out of the way, don’t you? Until it’s well out of the way.”

I’d expected it, of course. This exile from their company as well as their affections. I’d brought it on myself. Yet it still hurt. “You’ll let me know when and where? I’d like to… send some flowers.”

“I’ll let you know.”

“If there’s anything-”

“There is, as a matter of fact.”

“What?”

“Speak to Sophie Marsden. Find out what the hell she meant by saying those things to Seymour. It’s eating Keith up. The fear that there was some truth in it. I doubt there was, personally. Louise was no good-time girl. Not according to everybody I’ve spoken to about her. In which case, I’d like to know why Sophie Marsden chose to depict her as one. Keith looked on Sophie as a friend. Her behaviour’s shocked him even more than yours.”

“What makes you think she’ll open her heart to me?”

“You’re on her side, aren’t you?”

“Of course not. There are no-”

“Besides, I wouldn’t trust myself in her presence. I need an intermediary. If you want to repair some of the damage you’ve done…”

“All right. I’ll be your messenger boy.” My reluctance was mostly show. I wanted to prise Sophie’s motives out of her as much as Bella did, if not more so. Our one brief meeting at Rowena’s wedding had left me with the strange and disturbing impression that she knew something about me that I didn’t even know myself. It was high time I found out what it was.

Bella had given me Sophie’s phone number. I tried it as soon as I got home. But Sophie was out, according to her husband.

“You’re not another of these bloody journalists, are you?”

“No. More like another victim of them.”

“I’ll tell her you called, in that case.”

There was something faintly familiar in his mournful voice. I could almost have believed I’d spoken to him before. But when would I have crossed paths with somebody in the agricultural machinery business? Never seemed the likeliest answer.

No less than five hours later, rousing me from drink-deepened slumber, Sophie called back. She didn’t sound in the least drowsy, even though the hall clock had struck one as I stumbled to the phone. Nor, to my fuddled surprise, did she seem at all reluctant to meet.

“I think we probably should, don’t you? In the circumstances.”

“Well, obviously I do. But-”

“Would London suit you? We have a small flat in Bayswater. I’m thinking of going down there for a few days next week. The summer sales may cheer me up. I’ve felt quite awful since the news about Rowena.” The idea that a spendthrift spin round Harrods could reconcile her to the needless extinction of a young girl’s life disgusted me more keenly than for the moment my tired brain could grasp. “Why not come to tea on Tuesday?”