‘Is to get to the heart of things. I know, John, and you shouldn’t take it so personally. We can all see you’re in a tight spot.’

That was the coup de grâce – the final twist of the knife. Having floored him she now turned to Woolf. ‘I’m sure MI5 would be the first to agree that this one’s going to take a lot of digging to resolve. Woolf, don’t you agree?’

He looked startled to have the spotlight suddenly trained on him. ‘Er – absolutely, ma – Home Secretary.’

‘Can you bring us up to speed on their thinking?’

He fiddled with his tie as if to check it was still there holding his head in place, discovered it was loose, made an attempt to tighten it, failed and gave up. ‘All our intelligence seems to confirm that Suleiman was clean, which may have put him at odds with the drug lords.’ He stole a glance at Halford, who was staring at his cap. ‘But if there turns out to be no drug-crime-related motive, then we could be looking at extremist elements wanting to open divisions between Muslims and the, er – well, the rest.’

Garvey was ready to pounce. ‘Which elements? You’re supposed to be the people with their fingers on the extremist pulse.’

She watched Woolf scan the room. All eyes were on him. Evidently he hadn’t anticipated being put on the spot like this. She knew just what was going through his head; Mandler would have told him to sit tight and take notes, but say as little as possible. But now she had put him on the spot. He would have to try to sound as though he was answering the question, while not actually doing so at all. ‘We’re preparing a dossier for you, which we’ll be sharing with all of the security services by the end of play today.’

‘Oh, marvellous.’

They give nothing away, that lot. Garvey gave him an empty smile. She needed him to know that he wasn’t in the clear yet.

Clements was trying to get her attention. ‘Since we are without an FCO presence today . . .’ He cleared his throat.

Trust him to try to ride more than one horse, she thought.

He took off his annoying little half-glasses and twirled them. ‘There is the matter of Britons who’ve been fighting in Syria rotating back to the UK. We have to factor in that some of these folk have seen some pretty serious action and acquired, in some cases, some equally serious training. I just thought I should add that to the pot as our people are pretty stretched keeping tabs on them all, particularly in view of their increasing use of, and for once this phrase is appropriate, noms de guerre.’

Garvey looked at him. Pretentious twat.