Before We Met(64)

Nick Reilly had found his element.

In court this week Jonathan Hepperton QC, prosecuting, said: ‘In Nicholas Reilly we see a man who is arrogant almost beyond belief, entirely careless of others, ultimately amoral. He is the embodiment of a sense of entitlement, a man who views life as a series of opportunities for him to take what he wants, putting his own pleasure above all other considerations, no matter what the cost to those around him.’

Those people include his brother Mark who in January this year took a rare weekend away from work and accepted Nick’s invitation to join him in Val d’Isère. It was in the queue for a ski lift that Mark met Patty Hendrick, also there for a long weekend. The pair shared a lift and clearly enjoyed each other’s company enough for Mark to suggest they meet for a drink that evening. Back in London, they began meeting regularly.

The relationship was not serious but there was a clear attraction between the handsome, successful Reilly and the pretty, vivacious Patty. ‘They had fun together,’ said Jamie Hancock, a friend of Mark’s. ‘Mark had been working very hard for years at DataPro and before that at Cambridge, and Patty offered him a chance to blow off steam. She might not have been his intellectual equal or his soulmate, but neither of them was looking for that. It was about fun.’

The events of the night of 7 March and the following 48 hours reflect well on none of the key players. The revelation that Mark Reilly had sex with Patty in the lavatories of the club before she left with Nick has challenged the public perception of the senior Reilly as a decent man who fell victim to his brother’s remorseless sexual appetite and instead helped paint a portrait of a group of people for whom anything went.

It was an environment that suited Nicholas Reilly perfectly, a meeting point for gross consumption, his imagined entitlement to pleasure and his belief that he was immune from the consequences of his actions, literally above the law. This week the jury at the Old Bailey has surely ended that belief once and for all.

Reilly now awaits sentencing but the case continues to raise troubling questions about the world in which he lived. What kind of society have we created, people have asked this week, when young women like Patty Hendrick will willingly sleep with a pair of brothers and indulge in protracted binges of drug-taking and extreme sexual activity? When a man like Nick Reilly will let a woman die rather than stop the party? What does this case tell us about our over-privileged younger generation?

The death of Patty Hendrick is beyond doubt a tragedy for her friends and family, and a crime that is hard to fathom. For many, however, it speaks of a generation without a moral compass, one that worships at the altar of the false god of consumption – of fast cars and foreign holidays, drink and drugs, and, ultimately, of each other.





Chapter Fifteen

Hannah woke to an insistent buzzing, a sound like an angry bee trapped under a glass. After several seconds’ confusion she connected the noise to her BlackBerry on the bedside table, sat up and reached for it. The number on the screen was a central London one, but the phone didn’t recognise it and neither did she. Curiosity got the better of her, however, and she hit the green button and croaked hello.

‘Good morning. Am I speaking to Hannah Reilly?’ It was an older woman’s voice, with a clipped accent that evoked girls’ boarding schools and crisp tennis whites.

Hannah confirmed that she was.

‘Hello, my name’s Jessica Landon,’ the voice said more warmly. ‘I’m calling from Roger Penrose’s office.’

Roger Penrose – in her newly conscious state Hannah made a reduced-speed search of her mental archives. Penrose. The woman clearly expected her to know whom she was talking about. At last she found the index card: Roger Penrose, from Penrose Price.

Jessica Landon was talking again. ‘Roger very much enjoyed meeting you on the second and asked me to apologise for the length of time it’s taken us to get back to you. I’m afraid his wife hasn’t been very well.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘Thank you. She’s feeling much better now.’ A second’s respectful pause. ‘Anyway, as you know, we’re a family company and pride ourselves on being tight-knit. Roger likes to meet the final candidates for senior roles in a social context, along with their partners. He wonders whether you and your husband are available for dinner next week?’

‘Dinner?’

‘It would be you and your husband, and Roger and his wife, Diane. How about next Tuesday, a week today? Would that suit? At eight o’clock?’

‘Er, yes,’ Hannah said. ‘I think that’ll be fine.’