His eyes felt heavy, his throat ached and his nose had started running. Unsure where he was going, or what he was looking for, he walked blindly onwards. He, who usually had an excellent sense of direction, kept turning the wrong way, becoming disorientated. Several times he knocked into carefully stacked piles of Christmas merchandise, or buffeted smaller people, who scowled and muttered and scurried away.

The bulky bags he was carrying contained three identical Nerf blasters for his nephews; large plastic guns which shot foam bullets, which Strike had decided to buy on the dual grounds that he would have loved one when he was eleven, and the assistant had assured him they were one of the must-have gifts of the year. He’d bought his Uncle Ted a sweater because he couldn’t think of anything else, his brother-in-law a box of golf balls and a bottle of gin on the same principle, but he still had the trickiest gifts to buy—the ones for the women: Lucy, Joan and Robin.

His mobile rang.

“Fuck.”

He hobbled sideways out of the crowd and, standing beside a mannequin wearing a reindeer sweater, shook himself free from a few of his bags so that he could pull out his mobile.

“Strike.”

“Bunsen, I’m near Shakespeare’s ’Ead on Great Marlborough Street. See you there in twenty?”

“Great,” said Strike, who was becoming hoarse. “I’m just round the corner.”

Another wave of sweat passed over him, soaking scalp and chest. It was, some part of his brain acknowledged, just possible that he had caught Barclay’s flu, and if that was the case, he mustn’t give it to his severely immunosuppressed aunt. He picked up his shopping bags again and made his way back to the slippery pavement outside.

The black and white timbered frontage of Liberty rose up to his right as he headed along Great Marlborough Street. Buckets and boxes of flowers lay all around the main entrance, temptingly light and portable, and already wrapped; so easy to carry to the Shakespeare’s Head and take on to the office afterward. But, of course, flowers wouldn’t do this time. Sweating worse than ever, Strike turned into the store, dumped his bags once more on the floor beside an array of silk scarves, and called Ilsa.

“Hey, Oggy,” said Ilsa.

“What can I get Robin for Christmas?” he said. It was becoming difficult to talk: his throat felt raw.

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fantastic. Give me an idea. I’m in Liberty.”

“Um…” said Ilsa. “Let’s th… ooh, I know what you can get her. She wants some new perfume. She didn’t like the stuff she—”

“I don’t need backstory,” said Strike ungraciously. “That’s great. Perfume. What does she wear?”

“I’m trying to tell you, Oggy,” said Ilsa. “She wants a change. Choose her something new.”

“I can’t smell,” said Strike, impatiently, “I’ve got a cold.”

But this basic problem aside, he was afraid that a perfume he’d personally picked out was too intimate a gift, like that green dress of a few years back. He was looking for something like flowers, but not flowers, something that said “I like you,” but not “this is what I’d like you to smell like.”

“Just go to an assistant and say ‘I want to buy a perfume for someone who wears Philosykos but wants a—’”

“She what?” said Strike. “She wears what?”

“Philosykos. Or she did.”

“Spell it,” said Strike, his head thumping. Ilsa did so.

“So I just ask an assistant, and they’ll give me something like it?”

“That’s the idea,” said Ilsa patiently.

“Great,” said Strike. “Appreciate it. Speak soon.”

The assistant thought you’d like it.

Yeah, he’d say that. The assistant thought you’d like it would effectively de-personalize the gift, turn it into something almost as mundane as flowers, but it would still show he’d taken some care, given it some thought. Picking up his carrier bags again, he limped toward an area he could see in the distance that looked as though it was lined with bottles.

The perfume department turned out to be small, about the size of Strike’s office. He sidled into the crowded space, passing beneath a cupola painted with stars, to find himself surrounded by shelves laden with fragile cargos of glass bottles, some of which wore ruffs, or patterns like lace; others which looked like jewels, or the kind of phial suitable for a love potion. Apologizing as he forced people aside with his Nerf guns, his gin and his golf balls, he met a slim, black-clad man who asked, “Can I help you?” At this moment Strike’s eye fell on a range of bottled scents which were identically packed with black labels and tops. They looked functional and discreet, with no overt suggestion of romance.

“I’d like one of those,” he croaked, pointing.

“Right,” said the assistant. “Er—”

“It’s for someone who used to wear Philosykos. Something like that.”

“OK,” said the assistant, leading Strike over to the display. “Well, what about—”

“No,” said Strike, before the assistant could remove the top of the tester. The perfume was called Carnal Flower. “She said she didn’t like that one,” Strike added, with the conscious aim of appearing less strange. “Are any of the others like Philo—”

“She might like Dans Tes Bras?” suggested the assistant, spraying a second bottle onto a smelling strip.

“Doesn’t that mean—?”

“‘In your arms,’” said the assistant.

“No,” said Strike, without taking the smelling strip. “Are any of the others like Phi—?”

“Musc Ravageur?”

“You know what, I’ll leave it,” said Strike, sweat prickling anew beneath his shirt. “Which exit is nearest the Shakespeare’s Head?”

The unsmiling assistant pointed Strike toward the left. Muttering apologies, Strike edged back out past women who were studying bottles and spraying on testers, turned a corner and saw, with relief, the pub where he was meeting Shanker, which lay just beyond the glass doors of a room full of chocolates.

Chocolates, he thought, slowing down and incidentally impeding a group of harried women. Everyone likes chocolates. Sweat was now coming over him in waves, and he seemed to feel simultaneously hot and cold. He approached a table piled high with chocolate boxes, looking for the most expensive one, one that would show appre­ciation and friendship. Trying to choose a flavor, he thought he recalled a conversation about salted caramel, so he took the largest box he could find and headed for the till.

Five minutes later, another bag hanging from his hands, Strike emerged at the end of Carnaby Street, where music-themed Christmas decorations hung between the buildings. In Strike’s now fevered state, the invisible heads suggested by giant headphones and sunglasses seemed sinister rather than festive. Struggling with his bags, he backed into the Shakespeare’s Head, where fairy lights twinkled and chatter and laughter filled the air.

“Bunsen,” said a voice, just inside the door.

Shanker had secured a table. Shaven-headed, gaunt, pale and heavily tattooed, Shanker had an upper lip that was fixed in a permanent Elvis-style sneer, due to the scar that ran up toward his cheekbone. He was absentmindedly clicking the fingers of the hand not holding his pint, a tic he’d had since his teens. No matter where he was, Shanker managed to emanate an aura of danger, projecting the idea that he might, on the slightest provocation, resort to violence. Crowded as the pub was, nobody had chosen to share his table. Incongruously, or so it seemed to Strike, Shanker, too, had shopping bags at his feet.