She sat silently for half an hour, hoping for the instant miracle that would open his eyes and animate his face into its familiar smile. Nothing was going to happen quickly.

Bridget hovered at the door. ‘We have a small room with a sofa for families,’ she said. ‘There’s no one else there tonight so you might find it comfortable. Room for a few others if you want too.’

‘Thank you,’ said Sara, ‘yes, I’ll need to make some calls.’

‘The senior registrar’s just called to say he’ll be down in five minutes to explain everything. Maybe best you see him in the family room. Then make your calls after that.’

‘Yes, good idea.’ For once in her life, Sara was pleased to be told what to do.

‘Your father has sustained a severe brain injury,’ said the senior neurological registrar, who had introduced himself as Azhar Mahmoud. He seemed young to Sara, as young as herself – though she quickly realised there was no reason why he shouldn’t be. He was tall, bespectacled, and closely and elegantly bearded; his blue surgeon’s smocks anointed him with a halo of authority.

‘I see,’ said Sara feebly.

‘The CT scan shows considerable bleeding inside the brain and what we call a subdural haematoma. Our first priority is to stabilise him and very carefully drain some of the excess blood from his brain. When that’s done, we’ll consider operating.’

‘How bad is it?’

He smiled and shrugged. ‘I don’t believe in holding out false hopes – or false dangers for that matter. The good thing is that we don’t consider from the CT scan that your father’s injury is what we call “un-survivable”. If that were so, we could do nothing but make him comfortable and allow him to slip away in peace.’

‘This all sounds so bad,’ said Sara, unable, for the first time, to restrain a tear.

‘I’m sorry, Miss Shah, I truly am.’

‘Please call me Sara.’

‘Of course. There’s a reasonable chance that he can pull through this.’

‘How reasonable?’

‘Please don’t ask me to give odds, I’m not a betting man.’

‘I think he was sometimes,’ said Sara, smiling through the tears.

‘Well, let’s hope he fancies his chances. In the meantime, for the next few hours, perhaps a day or two, just allow the time to pass. If he gets through that and we can operate, I think we can give him back to you.’

‘In what state?’

‘Again, I give no guarantees.’

She could see that, while he had finished delivering his verdict, there was something left hanging. ‘So is that it for the moment?’ she asked.