“I’ll come with you,” Hannah said. She looked at her watch, trying to figure out the likelihood that Neville would be back at Pelham by now. Did he live in college? It dawned on her she had no idea about the lives of the porters outside their jobs. “Hugh?”
“Well, I am pretty hungry. I might… I might join Ryan?” Hugh said, as if seeking their approval. He looked a little uncertain. Hannah had the impression that he and Ryan had never really been the best of friends—that they were linked by default, through Will, rather than via any real connection of their own. But maybe Hugh was trying to change that.
“Knock yourself out,” Emily said. “Laters, Coates!” she bellowed down the alleyway after Ryan, and then turned on her heel and left.
* * *
IT WAS ALMOST ELEVEN WHEN they got back to Pelham, and Hannah found her footsteps slowing as they approached the front gate, wondering if Neville would be there.
“Come on,” Emily said impatiently as they crossed Pelham Street.
“You go on,” Hannah said. “I just want to check if the Cloade gate is still open.”
“It won’t be,” Emily said. She stopped, looking harder at Hannah. “Is this about Neville? Do you want me to see if he’s in the lodge?”
“No, it’s fine,” Hannah said, rather wearily. “You’ll have to knock at this time of night, and then how will you explain going back for me? I’ll just brave it out. I mean, so what if he’s there. He can’t eat me.”
“Okay, well, first of all, let me reiterate once again how extremely fucked up it is that you’re rearranging your life to avoid this man without going to the college authorities, and second, you know you can climb the wall behind Cloade’s?”
“What?” Hannah wrapped her arms around herself, trying not to shiver in the draft coming down Pelham Street. It was June, but the night air was cool in spite of her cardigan. “No, I had no idea. Where? All the walls are eight foot and covered in spikes.”
“There’s a bit where you can get a foothold. Ryan showed me—he used it one time when he’d forgotten his Bod card and couldn’t be arsed to go round the front. Want me to show you?”
“Yes!” Hannah said, more eagerly than she had meant, and then felt ridiculous. “I mean, not that it’s that much of an issue. I don’t mind going past the lodge. It just might be—you know. Useful. One day.”
Emily shot her a look like she was in absolutely no doubt of how much Hannah did not want to face Neville, but said nothing, only turned up Pelham Street. They passed the Cloade gate without stopping, and then rounded the corner and ducked into a small lane that led between houses to the Meadow, a large field that backed onto Pelham and was used for cricket in the summer and lazing out on sunny days. Here, the high wall that bounded the college on four sides was covered in ivy and creepers, and Emily walked slowly through the scrubby trees, picking her way by the light of her mobile, before stopping at last at a place where the ivy grew particularly thick.
“There,” she said, pointing. “Can you see? The ivy makes a kind of mattress over the spikes, and you can get a foot onto that sticking-out stone halfway up, and pull yourself up.”
“That one?” Hannah said, disbelievingly pointing to a stone at least four feet off the ground. “Maybe Ryan can, but I definitely can’t. It’s much too high.”
“Yeah, that one. Ryan had to give me a leg up, but maybe we can find a log,” Emily said. She was searching around in the undergrowth, using her phone as a torch, but then seemed to realize that was a nonstarter. There was nothing solid enough around. “Okay, scratch that. New plan. I’ll boost you, and you pull me up if you can. If you can’t, I’ll go round by the main entrance.”
Hannah nodded. Emily made a platform of her hands and braced herself, and Hannah put her weight onto the living, yielding flesh of Emily’s linked fingers and felt Emily shove with all her might.
Hannah’s hands caught on the top of the wall, but for a second she wasn’t sure if she would make it. The stone was old and crumbling, and the creepers began to peel away under her fingers. But then her kicking left foot caught on something, the sticking-out stone Emily had pointed out, and it gave her just enough purchase to haul herself up, panting and scrabbling, and swing her right leg over the top of the wall.
“Ow!” The yelp of pain came out louder than she had meant.
“Are you okay?” Emily whisper-shouted from below.