They had been such a team back then. ‘It’s us against the world, Romy,’ Michael would say, with a confident grin. She worked for a firm of architects in Islington – they called her a ‘secretary’ in those days – while Michael completed his pupillage in Gray’s Inn. Most weekends they would throw spaghetti suppers in their tiny flat, with raucous, drink-fuelled rows about anything and nothing. Michael’s increased pressure of work as he rose quickly through the system, and the birth of the boys, had begun to alter all that.

Romy’s birthday this year, however, would be more momentous by far than the Paris trip had been – but with none of the innocent enjoyment that had accompanied it. Because it was the day when she first began to think seriously that she might leave Michael, despite the trigger being almost ludicrously insignificant.

Her husband had appeared agitated that morning. ‘I’m really upset, Romy. I ordered your present weeks ago and the bloody thing hasn’t arrived,’ he said. ‘I’m so sorry.’

When she’d assured him it didn’t matter – which it didn’t – he went through a whole charade. ‘Were you in yesterday?’ he asked, and when Romy said she wasn’t, he went on, ‘Maybe Mrs Ratti took it in. I’d better run down and check.’ And he’d gone off to ask the Italian caretaker, who lived in the basement flat, if she’d seen the package. But when the present did arrive – an expensive Mulberry handbag in soft cerise leather – Romy noticed the order date was the actual day of her birthday.

It was such a small thing – in the past it might have been something they could laugh about. But his lie felt much more sinister to Romy than just a silly fib about forgetting her present. When she confronted him at breakfast that weekend, he initially denied it.

‘Are you accusing me of lying?’ he’d said, slamming his coffee mug onto the table, surprisingly full of aggression.

She’d laughed, tried to make light of it. ‘Well, you did, Michael. I don’t give a toss that you forgot – you know me better than that. But there’s no need to lie.’

For a moment he had continued to eye her indignantly. Then his face had collapsed into a sheepish grin and he’d held up his hands. ‘It’s a fair cop, guv,’ he said. ‘I’m so sorry, Romy. I felt terrible when I realized I’d forgotten.’

But Romy had not been mollified. She’d totally believed the charade with the lost parcel. If he can lie so convincingly about something as trivial as my birthday present … she thought. Because the letter coloured almost every exchange she had with Michael these days, as if she were filtering all his utterances through the prism of the woman’s words.