In a way, it makes it better. ‘Dinah, think about it. He copied them for you, piece by piece. Think of the time he took, the attention to detail.’

‘Bof! He cheated me,’ she says, her voice hard. ‘Don’t tell me it’s the same – it’s not the same. Me in my home-made clothes, thinking I was someone! All these years he let me think I was worth something and I trusted him, I believed it,’ she says with growing comprehension. She settles her intense tawny gaze on me and she starts to laugh, self-mocking and shrill. ‘Look at me! I’ve been so proud of myself,’ she says, ‘and all this time I’ve been wearing fakes, and you know what? I am a fake! And Moss is a fake, too.’

‘Dinah, let’s just get out of here,’ I beg.

A couple of old ladies carrying clothes in Selfridges bags edge past us disapprovingly to get to their table and she turns to confront them.

‘Take a look at a fake!’ she shouts at them, jutting out her chin, and they avert their eyes and pretend not to hear.

‘Come on, please? Let’s go.’

‘He made a fool of you as well,’ she says, turning on me, her voice high-pitched with denigration, her eyes feverish with tears. ‘Curator of fashion!’ she mocks.

In the force of her anger I feel my core self disconnecting, shutting down. I should never have taken her there. I’ve ruined everything.

As she gestures wildly, Dinah’s hand catches in her necklace, snapping the thread, and the beads scatter to the floor. ‘Oh!’ she says in dismay and she grabs her red quilted bag, pushing past the people coming through the door.

I’m numbed by these developments and I feel frustrated and impotent in the face of Dinah’s rage. I give orders to myself in a voice as stern as my mother’s, feeling six years old again. Put your coat on. Put the suits back in the garment bags. Zip up the bags. Put the garment bags in the suit carrier.

This way, I leave the auction house. The air is fresh and I gulp it in gratefully. At the other end of the street, I catch the brightness of Dinah’s red jacket, the gleam of her dark hair. She’s not that far away and yet she’s so distant that I convince myself I can never catch her up.

I don’t even try.

LOT 20

Pale blue dolly-bird dress with elbow-length choirboy sleeves, viscose, round neck, medium. Unlabelled.

I repeatedly try calling Dinah but she doesn’t reply. Back at the market on Wednesday morning I fill David in on what’s happened.

‘Fakes?’ he says. ‘Bloody hell! Don’t look so worried, Fern. They’ll probably turn up today as if nothing’s happened.’

‘You think?’ I ask hopefully.

He’s completely wrong about this.