He lets all the pent-up terror erupt in those words, and they sound believable and genuine.

The man has stopped now. He has his hands up, and he’s backing away slowly. The people on the street are taking their children by the hand, lifting them up, and running away from the threat of terror as fast as they can go.

The soldiers have their rifles on their shoulders, screaming at his pursuer. The last thing he sees over his shoulder as he joins the rest of the terrified crowd that’s moving away, down towards the Gefinor Centre, is the man kneeling with his hands on his head, one of the soldiers putting a foot on his back, and pushing his head down against the cracked concrete.

Jacob continues running until he’s at the cool concrete of the Gefinor complex. The polished stone floor is slippery under his rubber soles as he finally slows down. His whole body aches. He looks around. He’s ended up very close to the Armenian’s bookstore. He must have headed in this direction unconsciously when the panic took hold of him.

He looks around at the enormous complex. The Gefinor Centre feels so clean and clear and modernist, not at all like the rest of Beirut, and it fills him with immediate relief. Straight lines, glass. No hidden agendas or lies.

He turns around and scans the direction he just came from. Everything is calm again, as if nothing happened. Drama is close at hand all the time in Beirut. Bombs and weapons are a part of everyday life, part of the city’s DNA. Tragedy flares up, like now, then dies out again. No one has time to ponder on it, everyone just wants to get home after work.

He wonders what happened to his pursuer, if the soldiers released him immediately when they discovered there was no bomb. Did he contact his colleagues?

Jacob hurries towards the international bookstore. With determined steps he walks over to the store and opens the door. An electronic chime rings when he steps inside.

The little Armenian who owns the place is standing at the counter, smoking a cigar, just as Jacob remembers, just as Yassim promised, and Jacob nods to him and walks by the paperbacks and the shelves with Middle Eastern history and politics, into the dim interior of the boutique where the art books are hidden, while he gathers his courage to approach the owner.

He randomly flips through a heavy volume, waiting for his breathing to return to something resembling normal. The door chime rings as the only other customer in the shop disappears out into the sunshine. Jacob sees that he’s alone in the shop with its owner, who’s now headed up the aisle towards him.

‘Can I help you with something?’ he asks in English.