‘Al Qaeda and ISIS recruiting in the UK was uncoordinated. Young men initially, then women too, come under the spell of a shouty imam, sometimes get money, sometimes self-fund, then head abroad solo or in small groups. Maybe a bit of training in Pakistan or Afghanistan. Those who come back only attempt to operate in small independent cells. Or as loners. Since 7/7 that’s always been the pattern.’

‘I know. That’s why Sami’s story is significant. This so-called “Adviser” may be leading some kind of centralised operation in the UK.’

‘But his account’s a one-off.’

‘We have more names than one.’

‘Only a handful. And none of those have corroborated Sami’s version.’

‘Morahan told me the Blackburn files were the tip of an iceberg. The trigger. The inception. Everything, whatever it is, follows on.’

He shot her a caustic look. ‘You didn’t tell me that. How did he know?’

She searched for an answer. ‘He didn’t say.’ She paused. ‘I assume it came from his informant.’

A strained silence fell. ‘I’ve said before you can trust me.’ As he concentrated on the road ahead, she saw a smile forming. ‘Know something, Sara? When you’re caught on the hop, you’re a rubbish liar.’ He paused. ‘That’s a compliment, by the way.’

They were approaching the junction with the M40. ‘Two and a half hours or so, Blackburn to here,’ said Patrick. He was offering an olive branch. ‘Say they’d headed south, another half an hour and they could be turning off the motorway towards some hills. Sami remembered a road winding up, didn’t he?’

‘Yes.’

‘I can’t imagine they’d have found the landed aristocracy of the Cotswolds too congenial so it’s got to be south Wales.’

‘Unless they were heading north to the Trossachs,’ chipped in Sara.

‘A fellow route bore!’

‘Patrick, even I can circle a four-hour driving range around Blackburn. You hardly need to be in a car.’

‘Then we wouldn’t be having the fun of each other’s company.’ They passed a motorway services sign. ‘Coffee?’

‘Prayers first.’

Sara reappeared a quarter of an hour later. Patrick wondered how she found a place of calm – or whether that was even necessary. Maybe she had the skill of compartmentalising the mind and excluding the extraneous. Perhaps that was what regular daily prayer could do though. He thought of the regular Sunday services he’d been taken to as a child and the daily rituals in boarding school chapels. Even if his days of God, Paradise, Heaven and Hell were long gone, he felt a pang of envy.

She sat down opposite him and he slid a coffee and a couple of sachets of long-life milk across the tabletop.

‘You’re not vegan, are you?’ he asked.

‘Why on earth would I be vegan?’

‘Your blooming complexion, I guess.’

‘You can’t wind me up, you know.’