‘I had a lucky night,’ Ruby says, reaching into her handbag. ‘I don’t want it to go to Annie Richmond, Daisy. If I take it to Annie, you’ll only get a cut of it.’

‘I thought you were steering clear of Annie anyway,’ Daisy sniffs and wipes a hand across her nose.

‘I’m back in the Forties. You won’t have heard, but Annie called me back. I’d served my time and she wanted me for a jewellery job. But she doesn’t know anything about this, and I won’t be telling her, so it’s all yours.’

She hands Daisy a pile of notes. Daisy drops the paper bag to the floor and shuffles the notes in her hand.

‘I can’t take this, Ruby. This is too much.’

‘Will it pay off your debt? Harry’s debt?’ Ruby pushes the notes back towards her.

‘Very nearly, yes.’

‘Well hold on to it. Keep it safe and add it to whatever Annie gives you on Saturday night. And whatever else you make here before then. I’ll bring more when I can.’

Daisy clutches the notes to her chest. ‘Why are you doing this, Ruby? Why are you helping me like this?’

‘Because I landed in a lucky spot. And we outcasts have to stick together. You’d do the same for me.’

‘I would.’ Daisy nods vigorously. ‘I would.’ She stares at the cash. ‘Where did you get it? It’s so much. Did you rob a bank?’

Ruby cackles with laughter. ‘Pour me some of that filthy gin of yours, and I’ll tell you all about him.’

‘This is all extremely odd.’ Gerald Littlemore stretches out his legs from the chair where he sits and gazes from his daughter to his wife, and to Inspector MacKenzie.

‘Mr Carrington was most perplexed about it.’ Arthur MacKenzie is sitting on the sofa opposite, bent over his cup and saucer, stirring in sugar. ‘Do you know anything that might help us, Harriet?’

‘No, not at all.’ She is only half-listening. She had spent only an hour at the office, fiddling with some words on the typewriter, before returning home. Her parents had eaten lunch already, so she found a slice of bread and butter in the kitchen and sat flicking through a novel until Mr MacKenzie arrived, and she was compelled to join him and her parents for tea.

Gerald starts up again. ‘Why would Anthony Carrington have thought you would go to his jewellery shop alone, I wonder? If we were buying you a birthday gift, we would simply have taken you.’