A prison transport van – a large white truck with eight blacked-out windows on each side – lumbered into view. A murmur ran through the crowd and they pressed closer to the road, held back by a line of uniformed police officers.

A single bottle exploded on the side of the van. A cry went up, filled with something like relief, and another bottle was thrown but the prison transport van was already disappearing inside the gates of the Old Bailey. Nothing in the city works quite as well as the Central Criminal Court. Gangsters, terrorists, and murderers – the Old Bailey sees them come and sees them go with little drama every day of the week.

‘Go inside,’ I told Dejan. ‘I’ll see you in there.’

I pushed my way through the crowd to Nesha.

‘Go home,’ I told him. ‘Nothing’s going to happen today. It’s his first appearance. All they’re going to do is hear his plea and remand him in custody for a later date. The trial will be six or eight weeks from now.’

Nesha shook his head, as if I had it all wrong.

‘I want to see this man,’ he said. ‘And I want to see him punished.’

‘I understand that, Nesha. You’re here for Hana. You’re here for your sister. But today is just the start. You’re not going to see Warboys punished. And you’re not even going to see him. They’ll take him out the back way.’ I gestured towards the far side of the Central Criminal Court. ‘Warwick Square,’ I said. ‘They’re not going to risk this crowd. Go back to the gym, Nesha.’

‘I want to go inside.’

‘The public gallery was full hours ago. There’s nothing to see and there’s nothing to do. Go back to Fred’s and I’ll meet you there, OK?’

But he was not listening to me.

He stared up at the bronze statue of a woman that adorns the roof of the Old Bailey, blindfolded Lady Justice with the scales of justice in one hand and her sword in the other, and he kept staring up at her long after I had turned away, as if expecting her to rise up and strike down the wicked.

The holding cells below the Old Bailey lead directly into the courtrooms and so there was something almost theatrical about the way Barry Warboys suddenly appeared out of the ground and into the glass-walled dock of Court One. He blinked and stared around, haggard and dazed, his thinning fair hair dishevelled, like some subterranean creature dragged up to the light.

A murmur ran through the public gallery. I looked up and saw Billy Greene’s mother and his fiancée Siobhan sitting towards the back. And then it began.

‘All rise,’ the bailiff said.

The judge read out the charges against the defendant.