Robin had taken over ten thousand pounds’ worth of goods into the changing room with her, of which the sequinned coat cost half. She would never have had the nerve to do this under normal circumstances, but something had got into her this morning: recklessness and bravado; she was proving something to herself, to Matthew, and even to Strike. The three assistants fussed around her, hanging up dresses and smoothing out the heavy folds of the coat, and Robin felt no shame that she could not have afforded even the cheapest of the belts now draped over the arm of the redhead with tattoos up both arms, and that none of the girls would ever receive the commission for which they were, undoubtedly, vying. She even allowed the assistant with pink hair to go and find a gold jacket she assured Robin would suit her admirably, and go wonderfully well with the green dress she had picked out.

Robin was taller than any of the shop girls, and when she had swapped her trench coat for the sequinned one, they cooed and gasped.

‘I must show my brother,’ she told them, after surveying her reflection with a critical eye. ‘It isn’t for me, you see, it’s for his wife.’

And she strode back out through the changing-room curtains with the three assistants hovering behind her. The rich girls over by the clothing rack all turned to stare at Robin through narrow eyes as she asked boldly:

‘What do you think?’

Strike had to admit that the coat he had thought so vile looked better on Robin than on the mannequin. She twirled on the spot for him, and the thing glittered like a lizard’s skin.

‘It’s all right,’ he said, masculinely cautious, and the assistants smiled indulgently. ‘Yeah, it’s quite nice. How much is it?’

‘Not that much, by your standards,’ said Robin, with an arch look at her handmaidens. ‘Sandra would love this, though,’ she said firmly to Strike, who, caught off guard, grinned. ‘And it is her fortieth.’

‘She could wear it with anything,’ the candy-flossed girl assured Strike eagerly. ‘So versatile.’

‘OK, I’ll try that Cavalli dress,’ said Robin blithely, turning back to the changing room.

‘Sandra told me to come with him,’ she told the three assistants, as they helped her out of the coat, and unzipped the dress to which she had pointed. ‘To make sure he doesn’t make another stupid mistake. He bought her the world’s ugliest earrings for her thirtieth; they cost an arm and a leg and she’s never had them out of the safe.’