Jez didn’t see where any protest of his could be lodged. He said, ‘I don’t know, maybe five-six, five-seven.’

‘Magnifique. One of the ones on the lam from the mosque is five-six. There we go. And the rest were five-eight or five-nine. You said five-seven?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Seven, eight…’ She turned to her reporters: ‘What’s the difference?’

Jeremy interjected, ‘Well—’

‘None. There’s no practical difference. And who knows how accurate that original five-eight is anyway?’

The cherubic reporter, riding high on his success, spoke up again. ‘And a lot of Asian guys are quite short, aren’t they?’

‘That’s got nothing to do with anything.’ Inaccuracy irritated Geraldine, but the intimate fear she lived with – of getting the story wrong, of printing the wrong thing and having to explain it – made her ask, ‘There’s not some special reason you’ve got a brilliant eye for height, is there? You didn’t use to work in the menswear department at Peter Jones? You’re not some kind of enthusiastic hobby carpenter?’

‘No.’ Jeremy glumly shook his head.

‘Good.’ Geraldine was reassured. ‘And you told Colin that one of them had an adolescent voice, like this Atif Kayani, who’s what, nineteen?’

Jeremy nodded, capitulating.

‘So,’ she looked around her staff, ‘the descriptions are a match. The voices are a match. One was carrying a package. They were pointing at our offices. So far, at least, it stands up.’ She squeezed Jeremy’s shoulder and said, ‘Well done, old bean, we’ll make a reporter of you yet.’

The reporters popped their knuckles or shifted restlessly. A couple glanced at the doors and one asked, ‘So does that mean—’

Geraldine interrupted. ‘It means we go out and get a marvellous story. Do you really think the Daily Beast is going to be intimidated by a bunch of carbuncular teenagers from West Acton? Don’t start quaking in your boots quite yet, Davidson; you won’t be murdered at your desk.’

Jeremy’s lips parted, but his remonstrances all blocked one another and none came out.

Geraldine seemed to have done with him. She said, ‘Righty-ho-ho, chaps, off we go-go,’ and began to give her orders.

Jeremy’s dread seeped into his arms and legs like flu, dragging him towards the carpet. He wished he could go out for a cigarette and clear his head. It would soon be too late to stop them. And he sensed that, if he didn’t stop them, everything would in some unforeseeable way become immeasurably worse. He could hear Geraldine telling the reporters not to let anything slip to the police until after deadline.

Jeremy spoke. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘There was something else I should mention.’

Geraldine was obviously not often interrupted. She stared at Jeremy for a hard second, then said, ‘What is it? They handed you an embossed business card saying Bombs R Us and you’re not sure it’s relevant?’