‘What happened at Midland didn’t just impact those kids and their families. The ripple effect was enormous: neighbours, friends, a whole generation of students most of whom didn’t even know their dead compatriots, staff at the university. It rocked the whole city.’

Honor’s not sure where this is going. Taking a deep breath, Alex goes on. ‘When I was a reporter, it was all about access and authority, who had access to people in power and the authority to ask them difficult questions. If you didn’t have those, you couldn’t write the piece.

‘You’re the parent of a student at the university. That gives you authority. The high-ups can’t just brush you off in the way they might a student. And Nevis has access. She knows the right people to talk to. If there’s something fishy going on…’

‘Did I say that?’

‘Not in so many words.’ He looks up and, reading the uncertainty in her face, flashes her a soft smile. ‘Look, maybe I’m just a cynical old hack. I’m just saying, there’s form for this kind of stuff, a cover-up if you like, and if you two did want to look at it, you’d be a great investigative team. Mother–daughter private eyes. Make a good TV show don’t you think?’ His tone is light and conciliatory now.

She leans back and takes a sip of tea, enjoying the conceit for a moment, letting it bed in, before adding, ‘That presumes we’re on the same side. Which, at the moment…’ She tails off, not wanting to delve into her sadder feelings.

‘And at least one of you would need to be a drunk with a penchant for over-complicated sex,’ he says, lips cracking into a broad grin.

It feels good to laugh. She lingers on its tail end and waits for Alex to break the atmosphere. Eventually, when the last laugh has been had, he says, ‘Granted, I can be a paranoid bugger, but something’s amiss.’

‘I think I can pretty confidently say that Satnam didn’t take a massive overdose of Ritalin and drink most of a bottle of vodka by accident.’

‘Hmm.’ Alex draws a piece of yellowed paper from his file and places it on the table. ‘I found the original press cutting about the Midland Uni thing. It appeared in the Midlands Observer, written by my ex, and the mother of my son actually, Anne Devlin, who also happened to be my colleague at the time. Like I said, it became a big scandal locally though it didn’t make much play in the national media. God knows why. How many dead kids does it take?’

She picks up the clip and scans it. ‘Says that Ritalin was “involved” in at least one of the cases.’

‘Wasn’t there a scandal about Ritalin back in the noughties? Kids being diagnosed with ADHD and massively overprescribed as I recall.’