As she spoke, Casey was scrolling through her phone to the photograph snapped from the tuk-tuk in Sagorika.

‘Ar-ack-ny,’ Hessa tried out the Bengali syllables in her mouth again. ‘Yes,’ she said carefully. ‘Arachne could be right.’

‘Arachne was a weaver,’ said Casey. ‘In Greek myth.’

‘Arachnid,’ said Miranda. ‘Spiders.’

‘Exactly,’ said Casey, tapping at her computer. ‘So Arachne Incorporated could be the vehicle for the weaving interests. Garments, in this case. And then Portunus was the ancient Greeks’ god of ports, so that could be the company he uses for buying and selling ships. And Aceso is the goddess of the healing process. So that makes sense for the Harley Street building.’

‘One second.’ Miranda stood up. ‘Peregrine,’ she shouted across the office.

Peregrine Courtenay wrote the Post’s crossword every morning, before lunching with the paper’s astrologer. They often spent lunch hastily cobbling together a horoscope for Aries, because the astrologer had forgotten it on the Tube. Today, Peregrine wore a maroon smoking jacket, mustard trousers and alarmingly bright red socks. His eyebrows bristled severely. Cressida occasionally begged to be allowed to make him over for the fashion pages.

‘He’s a perfect Before shot,’ she would wail.

‘My dear girl,’ Peregrine would respond, outraged.

‘Peregrine,’ Miranda coaxed him now. ‘Could you possibly read through this list of companies, and see if any of them have ancient Greek links?’

The eyebrows looked approving. ‘Of course.’

Miranda handed him a list of companies put together by Hessa. They sat in an impatient silence as Peregrine read through them, humming gently to himself.

‘I’m afraid not that I can see.’ He handed back the list. ‘I am sorry that I am unable to help, Miranda.’

‘That’s all right,’ said Miranda.

‘I’ll be off then.’

Peregrine pushed himself out of his chair.

‘Rhapso,’ he said, almost to himself.

‘I’m sorry, Peregrine?’ said Miranda.

He pointed to the black bag leaning against the wall, the smart carrier bag Cressida had shoved at Casey all those days ago, with the long silky ribbons. ‘Rhapso,’ Peregrine said again. ‘She was a nymph worshipped in Athens. Her name comes from the Greek word “to sew” or “to stitch”.’

‘Really?’

‘And that gives us the word rhapsody.’ Peregrine didn’t appear to have heard Miranda. ‘From rhaptein and ōidē, meaning song or ode. Sewing songs together; rather lovely really.’

‘Are you sure?’ said Casey.

‘Of course.’ Peregrine looked stern. ‘It’s just odd that they’ve used a thunderbolt as a logo. The thunderbolt represents Zeus, of course.’

Casey pushed her hair back from her face, thinking carefully. ‘There was an oak-leaf image on the garment factory in Bangladesh,’ she said slowly. ‘What would that represent?’

‘Zeus,’ said Peregrine promptly. ‘He and Hera were the oak god and oak goddess, of course.’

‘There’s an eagle on the Aceso paperwork.’ Hessa was looking through her notes.

‘The eagle is one of his symbols too,’ Peregrine agreed.