Three weeks later and she was one of the last in the office, finishing off the report she’d been compiling for Lauren, when she spotted Emsworth in his office with his back to the door. She was on a high, having noticed what she believed to be a series of potentially significant codewords being used on a forum linked to a magazine which sold itself as an aspirational lifestyle publication but was in fact funded by an Islamist terror cell that was part of a growing concern in the wake of the invasion of Iraq. She had been preparing to leave a print-out of her findings on Lauren’s desk for her to pass on to her boss the following day, but at the last minute she’d paused, deciding instead to hand the document to him herself in the morning. After all, it was her work: why risk someone else getting the credit?

As she walked past his office on her way back to her desk, she glanced through the semi-open door, hardly expecting him to still be there. Even with his back to her, she could sense there was something important about the conversation he was having on the phone, something in his stature giving it away.

He cut off the call a couple of seconds later and stepped out of the office, signalling across to her as she gathered her coat.

‘I didn’t know anyone was still here,’ he said and she was pleased he’d noticed her putting in the hours. ‘Listen, Gabriela. What are you doing now? A few of us were going to have a quick drink, if you fancied joining? They’ve gone ahead.’

She stood for a moment in the empty room, momentarily wondering why the head of the department would invite the intern along for after-work drinks, before smiling back at him, blotting out the warning voice in her head.

‘Oh bugger, it looks like the others have already left,’ he sighed, slipping his phone back into his pocket as they crossed Parliament Street towards the Red Lion, its colourful hanging baskets a counterpoint to the endless grey, and she felt another scratch of disbelief. But she could hardly turn back now.

Inside, the bar was heaving.

‘Grab us that seat, and I’ll come and join you.’

He didn’t ask what she wanted to drink, returning a few minutes later with two glasses of gin and tonic, the sweat from his palm leaving a handprint like a slap mark in the condensation. Settling beside her, too close, he said, ‘So, tell me, where did you go to university, Gabriela?’

She took a sip of her drink before answering, ‘UCL. I graduated last summer.’

‘Excellent,’ he replied, his eyes moving briefly to her chest. ‘And you live in London?’

She nodded. ‘At my father’s house.’