A nurse came in to check Fionn’s blood pressure and Bish thought it was a good time to leave.

‘Mr Ortley,’ Fionn called out when he was at the door.

Bish waited, but Fionn didn’t speak again until the nurse had left.

‘It would be easy for people to hate Violette because she belongs to that family, but regardless, she didn’t hand out sexual favours on the bus. I think it’s wrong that they’re saying things about her that aren’t true. It’s just wrong.’

Elliot rang him when he was on the M20 heading home. ‘Every time I turn on my TV or open a paper, there you are.’

‘What is it you want, Elliot?’

‘Layla Bayat. She’s a connection to the Sarrafs and could have information about Violette and Eddie. Grazier wants us to speak to her.

‘Good luck with that, Elliot, but you and me aren’t an us.’

‘We are if the Home Secretary says we are.’

‘Ms Bayat?’

Layla looks up to see two men standing in the doorway of her office.

‘Can I help you?’ she asks, feeling far from helpful, because whoever these men are, they should have been announced. Her office may be a shoebox next to the toilets, reflecting her status in the firm, but all she wants is for people to do their job and respect the importance of the four suffocating walls around her, thank you very much.

One of the assistants appears behind the men, looking almost apologetic. Almost. ‘George Elliot and Bish Ortley.’ Jemima gives a couldn’t-give-a-shit-who’s-who wave between the two.

Layla’s last encounter with a George Eliot was in high school, where she failed an English literature exam after expressing the view that Middlemarch could have been written in five hundred pages rather than eight hundred-plus. So the hostility she feels towards these two, turning up at ten am without an appointment, is limitless. But one look at them tells her they aren’t here for Silvey and Grayson business.

‘Can you bring me the file on the Carrington-King case?’ Layla asks Jemima all the same. Because unknown men in suits means trouble and Layla needs the office spy to reassure the partners that these men are part of everyday business.

Chances are Jemima will tell Layla to get it herself. On the younger girl’s first day two years ago, Layla told her she wouldn’t be there long. Jemima, misunderstanding, complained, and Layla was called in to explain herself to one of the partners, and to Vera, the head of the admin girls. Layla couldn’t admit that she had meant Jemima would outgrow her typing and filing duties, because Vera was a world-class bitch and would make sure that Layla never got a document typed again. The pity is that Layla liked Jemima instantly. A working-class Hounslow girl, smart and thorough. It was hard shaking a council-estate address when you were working in the city, regardless of your job or your race. But Jemima decided that Layla wasn’t the ally she wanted. The antagonism festered, even though Jemima was the only girl Layla gave work to. Everyone else was lazy and thought they were above it. Rumour had it that Jemima would be in charge of the admin girls one day. Nothing wrong with that. But if Jemima had taken the time to listen, Layla would have told her to get herself a law degree.