“I’ve got fuck all else to do. My place of work’s underwater.”
Strike called a few car hire companies, finally finding one that had a jeep available. He was giving his credit card details when a text arrived from Robin.
Really sorry, I lost my purse, just found it, on my way now.
Strike had entirely forgotten that they were supposed to be catching up on the Bamborough case before the team meeting. Having finished hiring the jeep, he began to assemble the items he’d intended to discuss with Robin: the blood-smeared page he’d cut out of The Magus, which he’d now put into a plastic pouch, and the discovery he’d made the previous evening on his computer, which he brought up on his monitor, ready to show her.
He then opened up the rota, to check what shifts he’d have to reallocate now that he was heading back to Cornwall, and saw “Dinner with Max” written in for that evening.
“Bollocks,” he said. He didn’t suppose he could get out of it now, having agreed to it the previous day, but this was the last thing he needed.
At that very moment, Robin, who was climbing the escalator at Tottenham Court Road two steps at a time, heard her mobile ringing in her bag.
“Yes?” she gasped into the phone, as she emerged into the station, one among many bustling commuters.
“Hey, Robs,” said her younger brother.
“Hi,” she said, using her Oyster card at the barrier. “Everything OK?”
“Yeah, fine,” said Jonathan, though he didn’t sound quite as cheerful as the last time they’d spoken. “Listen, is it all right if I bring another guy with me to crash at yours?”
“What?” said Robin, as she emerged into the blustery rain and controlled chaos of the intersection of Tottenham Court Road and Charing Cross Road, at which there had now been building works for three and a half years. She hoped she’d misheard what Jonathan had said.
“Another guy,” he repeated. “Is that OK? He’ll sleep anywhere.”
“Oh Jon,” Robin moaned, half-jogging along Charing Cross Road now, “we’ve only got one sofa bed.”
“Kyle’ll sleep on the floor, he doesn’t care,” said Jonathan. “It’s not that big a deal is it? One more person?”
“OK, fine,” sighed Robin. “You’re still planning on getting here at ten, though?”
“I’m not sure. We might get an earlier train, we’re thinking of skipping lectures.”
“Yeah, but the thing is,” said Robin, “Cormoran’s coming over to dinner to talk to Max—”
“Oh great!” said Jonathan, sounding slightly more enthusiastic. “Courtney’d love to meet him, she’s obsessed with crime!”
“No—Jon, I’m trying to tell you, Max needs to interview Cormoran about a part he’s playing. I don’t think there’ll be enough food for another three—”
“Don’t worry about that, if we get there earlier, we’ll just order ourselves a takeaway.”
How was she supposed to say, “Please don’t come during dinner”? After he’d hung up, Robin broke into a jog, hoping that Jonathan’s time management, which she knew from experience could use improvement, might see him miss enough trains south to delay his arrival.
Taking the corner into Denmark Street at a run, she saw, with a sinking feeling, Saul Morris ahead of her, walking toward the office and carrying a small, wrapped bunch of pink gerberas.
They’d better not be for me.
“Hey, Robs,” he said, turning as she ran up behind him. “Oh dear,” he added, grinning, “someone overslept. Pillow face,” he said, pointing at the spot on his cheek where, Robin surmised, her own still bore a faint crease from the way she’d slept, face down and unmoving, because she was so tired. “For Pat,” he added, displaying his straight white teeth along with the gerberas. “Says her husband never gets her anything on Valentine’s.”
God, you’re smarmy, Robin thought, as she unlocked the door. She noticed that he was calling her “Robs” again, yet another sign that his discomfort in her presence post-Christmas had evaporated over the succeeding seven weeks. She wished she could as easily shrug off the lingering, unreasonable but no less potent sense of shame she felt, forever having seen his erection on her phone.
Upstairs, the harassed Strike was checking his watch when his mobile rang. It was unusually early for his old friend Nick Herbert to be calling him, and Strike, now sensitized to expect bad news, picked up with a sense of foreboding.
“All right, Oggy?”
Nick sounded hoarse, as though he’d been shouting.
“I’m fine,” said Strike, who thought he could hear footsteps and voices on the metal stairs outside. “What’s up?”
“Nothing much,” said Nick. “Wondered whether you fancied a pint tonight. Just you and me.”
“Can’t,” said Strike, very much regretting that this was so. “Sorry, I’ve got something on.”
“Ah,” said Nick. “OK. What about lunchtime, you free then?”
“Yeah, why not?” said Strike, after a slight hesitation. God knew he could use a pint away from work, from family, from his hundred other problems.
Through the open door he saw Robin enter the outer office, followed by Saul Morris, who was holding a bunch of flowers. He closed the dividing door on them, then his tired brain processed the flowers and the date.
“Hang on. Aren’t you busy with Valentine’s shit?” he asked Nick.
“Not this year,” said Nick.
There was a short silence. Strike had always considered Nick and Ilsa, a gastroenterologist and a lawyer respectively, the happiest couple he knew. Their house on Octavia Street had often been a place of refuge to him.
“I’ll explain over a pint,” said Nick. “I need one. I’ll come to you.”
They agreed a pub and a time and rang off. Strike checked his watch again: he and Robin had fifteen minutes left of what he’d hoped would be an hour on Bamborough. Opening the door, he said,
“Ready? We haven’t got long.”
“Sorry,” said Robin, hurrying inside. “You got my text, didn’t you? About the purse?”
“Yeah,” said Strike, closing the door on Morris and pointing at the page from The Magus, which he’d laid in front of Robin’s seat. “That’s the page from the book in the Athorns’ house.”
He’d called Robin about finding the Athorns straight after leaving
