‘I’m not a trained conservator,’ I warned him. ‘I can do the rudiments – stabilise the items, assess the damage. My specialty is illuminating the cultural significance of an article of clothing, tracking down its origins. With luck, I can unlock certain key aspects of the wearer’s identity, the time and place where they were born, the things that shook their world – religious wars, revolutions, scientific advancements. I’d love to help, but we’re going to need to get someone else on board with experience in other aspects of conservation, not just textiles.’

I paused, mentally sifting through the profiles of former colleagues. My contact list was a little rusty since I’d moved back to Australia to work on my book, but I could think of only one person who could fulfil all our requirements.

Liam Pinney was one of the best conservators around. We’d known each other since we were undergrads and had kept up our friendship all the way through our admittedly colourful careers. Six years ago, we’d been asked by the London Met, where we were both working, to assess a collection of 16th-century French tapestries and silk brocade nightgowns discovered by a wealthy octogenarian in the attic of her Cambridge castle. The woman had contacted the London Met to request an assessment and they’d sent Liam and me out to investigate the artefacts. We ended up publishing our findings at the same time, but the university chose to promote Liam’s research into the tapestries, while my paper championing the delicate gowns as some of the earliest and best examples of royal dress was relegated to second and third-tier publications. This had resulted in a depressing lack of citations.

I’d confronted the Dean of Social Sciences, who’d said nightgowns simply weren’t in the same league as priceless tapestries. His insinuation, that the study of women’s fashion was unworthy of any real academic distinction, was one of the reasons I left academia shortly afterwards, vowing never to return.

Liam had rung me to apologise straight after I’d stormed out of the Dean’s office.

‘I’m so sorry. If I’d known what the university was planning, I’d have insisted on combining our research and publishing it together. You’ve got to believe me, Jo.’

He’d sounded so earnest, it was impossible not to forgive him. Last I’d heard, he’d been teaching at the Glasgow School of Art while working on his own research about the ‘self-made man’ and the rise of dandyism in early 18th-century Europe.

‘I have someone in mind,’ I told Bram. ‘There may be some complications over ownership of the artefacts. You’ll probably be asked to explain what you were doing down there, retrieving items from a known wreck.’