‘F. Scott Fitzgerald?’
‘The same.’
‘Tender is the Night – my mother’s favourite book.’
‘Are you going to miss her?’
‘I already do. She died, Mister Carter.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘It was a long time ago. I was a child.’
‘What happened?’
‘I grew up.’
I decided not to press the point – Hannah clearly didn’t want to talk about it. Looking at her it seemed to me that whatever had happened it hadn’t been so long ago. She might have been nineteen but she still looked like a child to me.
‘Losing a parent is never easy,’ I said gently. ‘No matter how old you are.’
‘Are your parents alive, Mister Carter?’
‘My father died a few years back. My mother is still with us, thank God.’
She looked at me unblinking for a moment, as if searching for something in my eyes.
‘You should thank God indeed. You must cherish her, Mister Carter,’ she said finally. ‘There is nothing in life more precious than your mother.’
‘I do,’ I said, feeling a little guilty. I hadn’t spoken to my mother in over a week.
Hannah nodded as if my answer satisfied her.
‘It was cancer,’ she said quietly. ‘There was nothing they could do.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said again.
She shook her head. ‘It wasn’t anybody’s fault, was it?’
I didn’t reply.
‘My father is a scientist, did you know? Extremely rich. Extremely clever. He couldn’t do anything, either.’
I nodded. She was right. Death just came at you sometimes. Sideways, from behind, head-on like a high speed train. And whichever way it came at you there was nothing you could do about it. I knew that better than most.
‘My father gave Mom a first-edition copy of Tender is the Night on their twentieth wedding anniversary. She treasured it like it was the most valuable thing in the world to her.’
‘Maybe it was …’ I paused for a moment. ‘After you, I should imagine.’
And got a smile this time. A sad one, though.
‘When she went it was like the light had gone out of the world, Mister Carter. All the warmth.’
‘Call me Dan, please.’
Hannah didn’t seem to be listening, lost in her own memories. ‘I feel sometimes that I’m still walking in the shadows, waiting for dawn,’ she said.
I thought of my mother and my dear departed dad and I knew how she felt. ‘The dawn does come,’ I said. ‘Eventually it always does come.’