Tinsel had been draped over the reception desk and the waiting room cleared of chairs, which had been stacked in corners. Strike searched for Margot in both pictures and found her, baby Anna in her arms, talking to a tall black woman he assumed was Wilma Bayliss. In the corner of the picture was a slim, round-eyed woman with feathered brown hair, who Strike thought might be a young Janice.

In the second picture, all heads were turned away from the camera or partially obscured, except one. A gaunt, unsmiling older man in a suit, with his hair slicked back, was the only person who seemed to have been given notice that the picture was about to be taken. The flash had turned his eyes red. The picture was captioned “Margot and Dr. Joseph Brenner,” though only the back of Margot’s head was visible.

In the corner of this picture were three men who, judging from their coats and jackets, had just arrived at the party. The darkness of their clothing made a solid block of black on the right-hand side of the photo. All had their backs to the camera, but the largest, whose face was slightly turned to the left, displayed one long black sideburn, a large ear, the tip of a fleshy nose and a drooping eye. His left hand was raised in the act of scratching his face. He was wearing a large gold ring featuring a lion’s head.

Strike examined this picture until noises out on the street made him look up. SB had just emerged from the house. A plump blonde in carpet slippers was standing on her doormat. She raised a hand and patted SB gently on the top of the head, as you would pet a child or a dog. Smiling, SB bade her farewell, then turned and walked back toward his Mercedes.

Strike threw the copy of Whatever Happened to Margot Bamborough? into the passenger seat. Waiting for SB to pull out into the road, he set off in pursuit.

After five minutes or so, it became clear that his quarry was driving back to his home in West Brompton. One hand on the steering wheel, Strike groped for his mobile, then pressed the number of an old friend. The call went straight to voicemail.

“Shanker, it’s Bunsen. Need to talk to you about something. Let me know when I can buy you a pint.”

26

All were faire knights, and goodly well beseene,

But to faire Britomart they all but shadowes beene.

Edmund Spenser

The Faerie Queene

With five active cases on the agency’s books, and only four days to go until Christmas, two of the agency’s subcontractors succumbed to seasonal flu. Morris fell first: he blamed his daughter’s nursery, where the virus had swept like wildfire through toddlers and parents alike. He continued to work until a high temperature and joint pain forced him to telephone in his apologies, by which time he’d managed to pass the bug to a furious Barclay, who in turn had transmitted it to his own wife and young daughter.

“Stupid arsehole shoulda stayed at home instead o’ breathin’ all over me in the car,” Barclay ranted hoarsely over the phone to Strike early on the morning of the twentieth, while Strike was opening up the office. The last full team meeting before Christmas was to have taken place at ten o’clock, but as two of the team were now unable to attend, Strike had decided to cancel. The only person he hadn’t been able to reach was Robin, who he assumed was on the Tube. Strike had asked her to come in early so they could catch up with the Bamborough case before everyone else arrived.

“We’re supposedtae be flying to Glasgow the morra,” Barclay rasped, while Strike put on the kettle. “The wean’s in that much pain wi’ her ears—”

“Yeah,” said Strike, who was feeling sub-standard himself, doubtless due to tiredness, and too much smoking. “Well, feel better and get back whenever you can.”

“Arsehole,” growled Barclay, and then, “Morris, I mean. Not you. Merry fuckin’ Christmas.”

Trying to convince himself that he was imagining the tickle in his throat, the slight clamminess of his back and the pain behind his eyes, Strike made himself a mug of tea, then moved through to the inner office and pulled up the blinds. Wind and heavy rain were causing the Christmas lights strung across Denmark Street to sway on their cables. Just as they’d done on the five previous mornings, the decorations reminded Strike that he still hadn’t started his Christmas shopping. He took a seat on his accustomed side of the partners’ desk, knowing that he’d now left the job so late that he would be forced to execute it within a couple of hours, which at least obviated the tedious preliminary of carefully considering what anyone might like. Rain lashed the window behind him. He’d have liked to go back to bed.

He heard the glass door open and close.

“Morning,” Robin called from the outer office. “It’s vile out there.”

“Morning,” Strike called back. “Kettle’s just boiled and team meeting’s canceled. That’s Barclay down with flu as well.”

“Shit,” said Robin. “How’re you feeling?”

“Fine,” said Strike, now sorting out his various Bamborough notes.

But when Robin entered the inner office, carrying tea in one hand and her own notebook in the other, she didn’t think Strike looked fine at all. He was paler than usual, his forehead looked shiny and there were gray shadows around his eyes. She closed the office door and sat down opposite him without passing comment.

“Not much point to a team meeting anyway,” muttered Strike. “Fuck-all progress on any of the cases. Twinkletoes is clean. The worst you can say about him is he’s with her for the money, but her dad knew that from the start. Two-Times’ girlfriend isn’t cheating and Christ only knows what Shifty’s got on SB. You saw my email about the blonde in Stoke Newington?”

“Yes,” said Robin, whose face had been whipped into high color by the squally weather. She was trying to comb her hair back into some semblance of tidiness with her fingers. “Nothing come up on the address?”

“No. If I had to guess, I’d say she’s a relative. She patted him on the head as he left.”

“Dominatrix?” suggested Robin.

There wasn’t much she hadn’t learned about the kinks of powerful men since joining the agency.

“It occurred to me, but the way he said goodbye… they looked… cozy. But he hasn’t got a sister and she looked younger than him. Would cousins pat each other on the head?”

“Well, Sunday night’s all wrong for a normal counselor or a therapist, but patting’s quasi-parental… life coach? Psychic?”

“That’s a thought,” said Strike, stroking his chin. “Stockholders wouldn’t be impressed if he’s making business decisions based on what his fortune teller in Stoke Newington’s telling him. I was going to put Morris on to the woman over Christmas, but he’s out of action, Hutchins is on Two-Times’ girl and I’m supposed to be leaving for Cornwall day after tomorrow. You’re off to Masham when—Tuesday?”

“No,” said Robin, looking anxious. “Tomorrow—Saturday. We did discuss this back in September, remember? I swapped with Morris so I could—”

“Yeah, yeah, I remember,” lied Strike. His head was starting to throb, and the tea wasn’t making his throat feel much more comfortable. “No problem.”

But this, of course, meant that if he was going to give Robin a Christmas present, he’d have to buy it and get it to her by the end of the day.