The low-hanging lamps illuminating the desks at the back of the library blazed up for a moment, casting a dappled peachlight across the paper in front of me. I glanced up at the old-fashioned fittings as I continued to leaf through the book, and very nearly turned the page without noticing it. At the last moment I stopped, and went a page back. The section was about a Trinity College anniversary, and it included photographs from the celebrations.
It took me a moment to realise which one had caught my eye. It was at the very bottom, spread across half the page: five people against a brick wall, all looking directly into the lens. The photograph was in black and white, but I was certain they were all wearing black.Starling-black, I thought, and in the next breath I remembered Blake’s hair. Narrowing my eyes, I examined them more closely. Three men, two women, all in their early twenties, and at first glance not only strikingly attractive but also so obviously self-assured that they could only have led lives of privilege.
They looked no different from the students I crossed paths with every day, yet there was one detail that stopped me in my tracks. One of the women was wearing a brooch at the neckline of her dress. A brooch in the shape of a bird holding a twig in its beak.
Heat rose to my cheeks and blurred my vision. I blinked it away, then bent hastily over the book to read the caption.
The new generation of the Cambridge elite. From left to right: Quentin Middleton, Ellen Lucille Meester, Cedric Landon Wells, Arthur O’Brien, Amelia Victoria Wallingford.
I had to reread the last name several times before I realised why it sounded so familiar. Once it clicked, I reached for the stack of books in front of me and found the one I’d just been looking through. It took me a minute to find the page again. Next to an article about the most scenic views in Cambridge were several photographs. One of them was of a bench next to the Cam. I’d dwelt on the picture earlier because I always paused to look at benches–at least, I did if they had a commemorative plaque. My mother always used to stop and read the inscriptions.Sometimes there were just names, sometimes dates or quotations.Funny, isn’t it? When somebody dies, people often don’t know what to do with their love, she’d told me once.
Is that sad or beautiful?I’d asked.
That, my darling, she had answered, linking her arm through mine,is life’s most fundamental question.
Barely two months later, her old Volvo had been T-boned by a Porsche. Since then, I too had been at a loss, not knowing what to do with my love. If I had the money I’d have put up a dozen benches in her memory, but as it was, I just stopped for amoment at the ones I found, and read my mother’s name in each inscription.
I’d done the same with this one earlier, but the actual name on the plaque had stuck in my head.
In memory of Amelia Victoria Heaven Wallingford
ex hoc momento pendet aeternitas
I picked up my phone, opened the translator app and typed in the Latin phrase.
Eternity is poised upon this moment.
Frowning, I entered the woman’s name into the search engine. While the creaky library Wi-Fi slowly loaded the results, the student at the other end of the table got up and left, although I was so focused on scanning the search results I barely noticed. The third one caught my eye. I clicked it, and a photograph appeared: smiling out at me was the familiar face of a pretty blonde-haired girl. A gap between her front teeth, a dimple at the right-hand corner of her mouth, large eyes, thick lashes. A face that radiated youth and a zest for life. A face totally at odds with the headline of the article.
STUDENT, 22, DIES IN FIRE AT UNIVERSITY BUILDING
Amelia Victoria Wallingford (b.1960), daughter of the Home Secretary, lost her life in a blaze that broke out last Friday at Trinity College, Cambridge. The circumstances that led to this tragic incident are still unclear. According to a spokeswoman from the University Council, an investigation has been launched in cooperation with the police and fire services. At this time, the authorities have not yet ruled out arson. Wallingford was in her second year studying Social and Political Sciences, and volunteered?—
I broke off at the sound of a thud somewhere behind me.
Whirling round, I stared along the serried rows of shelves that yawned before me. The lamps above the stacks were flickering, too, and some had gone out altogether. The gloom thickened as the shelves receded, a colourless labyrinth of interweaving spines and wooden shelving. There was no one to be seen.
Glancing at my watch, I realised the library would be closing soon. Returning my attention to the search results, I scanned the first three pages. Article after article about Amelia’s swimming competitions, public appearances with her father and her volunteer work at a local animal shelter. The face in thepictures was always the same. So was the name itself. Except– it wasn’t the same as on the bench. Not quite. The second middle name, Heaven, appeared nowhere else, not even in her official obituary.
My heart began to thud, as if it sensed this tiny detail might mean something, even if my rational mind didn’t understand what. I hunched so far forward that the tip of my nose was almost touching the paper. The faces told me nothing, yet somehow they jogged a memory. I wasn’t sure what it was, butsomething about them was eerily familiar. The proud look in their eyes, the superior smiles, the upright bearing, and above all the way they seemed to make up a complete picture, even though they were barely touching one another, if at all. Their whole demeanour reminded me irresistibly of Ashton and his friends.
Again, I examined the photograph, pausing over the boy in the middle. Short hair, light eyes, broad shoulders in an elegant jacket.Cedric Landon Wells. Something about him annoyed me, but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. Before I could enter his name into the search engine, another thud behind me made me jump.
The bookstacks still seemed deserted, but this time I leapt impulsively to my feet. Grabbing my phone, I looked around carefully before peering down the row of books where the noise had come from. But… there was no one. All was still and colourless, the only sound the creaking of the shelves. Then, just as I was about to turn away, I saw it. A gap on the shelf nearest the wall. Looking more closely, I realised there were books scattered across the floor in front of it, as if somebody had knocked them off the shelf–which would explain the thump I’d heard.
Approaching slowly, I moved close enough to see what was off about the wall behind it. The white paint was marred with black letters. Letters my brain was loath to arrange into a sentence, even though every single one had been fastidiously drawn.
Memento mori
I didn’t have to translate this time. I knew enough Latin to know what it said.
Remember you must die.
Suddenly I was so nauseous that when I swallowed I thought I could taste bile. My rational mind was telling me it was just a bad joke, that it had nothing to do with me, but my heart was hammering so hard that it felt like I was being punched. My thoughts were a welter of bruises, all meaning crumbling away. For a few long seconds I stared at the words, before I reached out to touch the final letter. Even before I looked at my finger, I knew it was streaked with ink. Because it was fresh. Because whoever had written it was still here.
I whipped around, turning in a circle, peering over the edges of the rows of books in the neighbouring stacks and bending down to look underneath. No eyes, no feet, no… nothing. I was alone. With a deep breath, I straightened my shoulders and put the books back onto the shelf. As if nothing had happened,because nothing had.
When I returned to my seat the gong sounded, announcing that the library was closing in ten minutes. I slid my phone into my trouser pocket and began to put the books into a pile. When I got to the yearbook I’d clapped carelessly shut, I hesitated. I threw a quick look over my shoulder, but the coast was clear. Ignoring a twinge of guilt, I tore the page with the photograph out of the book and slipped it into my notebook.
