As Strike had been expecting ever since the news of the severed leg hit the media, his old acquaintance Dominic Culpepper of the News of the World had contacted him early on Tuesday morning in a state of advanced ire. The journalist refused to accept that Strike might have had legitimate reasons for choosing not to contact Culpepper the very second he had realized that he was in receipt of a severed limb, and Strike further compounded this offense by declining the invitation to keep Culpepper informed of every fresh development in the case, in return for a hefty retainer. Culpepper had previously put paid work Strike’s way and the detective suspected, by the time the call terminated, that this source of income would henceforth be closed to him. Culpepper was not a happy man.
Strike and Robin did not speak until midafternoon. Strike, who was carrying a backpack, called from a crowded Heathrow Express train.
“Where are you?” he asked.
“Pub opposite Spearmint Rhino,” she said. “It’s called the Court. Where are you?”
“Coming back from the airport. Mad Dad got on the plane, thank Christ.”
Mad Dad was a wealthy international banker whom Strike was tailing on behalf of his wife. The couple were having an extremely contentious custody battle. The husband’s departure for Chicago would mean that Strike would have a few nights’ respite from observing him as he sat in his car outside his wife’s house at four in the morning, night-vision goggles trained on his young sons’ window.
“I’ll come and meet you,” said Strike. “Sit tight—unless Platinum cops off with someone, obviously.”
Platinum was the Russian economics student and lap-dancer. Their client was her boyfriend, a man whom Strike and Robin had nicknamed “Two-Times,” partly because this was the second time they had investigated a blonde girlfriend for him, and also because he seemed addicted to finding out where and how his lovers were betraying him. Robin found Two-Times both sinister and pitiable. He had met Platinum at the club Robin was now watching, and Robin and Strike had been given the job of finding out whether any other men were being granted the additional favors she was now giving Two-Times.
The odd thing was that, little though he might believe or like it, Two-Times seemed to have picked an atypically monogamous girlfriend this time. After watching her movements for several weeks, Robin had learned that she was a largely solitary creature, lunching alone with books and rarely interacting with her colleagues.
“She’s obviously working at the club to help pay for her course,” Robin had told Strike indignantly, after a week’s tailing. “If Two-Times doesn’t want other men ogling her, why doesn’t he help her out financially?”
“The main attraction is that she gives other men lap dances,” Strike had replied patiently. “I’m surprised it’s taken him this long to go for someone like her. Ticks all his boxes.”
Strike had been inside the club shortly after they took the job and he had secured the services of a sad-eyed brunette by the unlikely name of Raven to keep an eye on his client’s girlfriend. Raven was to check in once a day, to tell them what Platinum was up to and inform them immediately if the Russian girl appeared to be giving out her phone number or being overattentive to any client. The rules of the club forbade touching or soliciting but Two-Times remained convinced (“Poor, sad bastard,” said Strike) that he was only one among many men taking her out to dinner and sharing her bed.
“I still don’t understand why we have to watch the place,” Robin sighed into the phone, not for the first time. “We could take Raven’s calls anywhere.”
“You know why,” said Strike, who was preparing to disembark. “He likes the photographs.”
“But they’re only of her walking to and from work.”
“Doesn’t matter. Turns him on. Plus, he’s convinced that one of these days she’s going to leave the club with some Russian oligarch.”
“Doesn’t this stuff ever make you feel grubby?”
“Occupational hazard,” said Strike, unconcerned. “See you shortly.”
Robin waited amidst the floral and gilt wallpaper. Brocade chairs and mismatched lampshades contrasted strongly with enormous plasma TVs showing football and Coke ads. The paintwork was the fashionable shade of greige in which Matthew’s sister had recently painted her sitting room. Robin found it depressing. Her view of the club’s entrance was slightly impeded by the wooden banisters of a staircase leading to an upper floor. Outside, a constant stream of traffic flooded left and right, plenty of red double-deckers temporarily obscuring her view of the front of the club.
Strike arrived looking irritable.
“We’ve lost Radford,” he said, dumping his backpack beside the high window table at which she was sitting. “He’s just phoned me.”
“No!”