The knife had been pressed into the sinews of the old man’s neck, his eyes wide: he’d looked like a little child, afraid and helpless. His son had moved towards him, instinctively, but one look from Nowak stopped him dead in his tracks. He stepped back, impotent, angry and afraid in equal measure. They had refused to pay the protection money. Their allegiance had always been with the Khan, but he was dead, and now Nowak and his men were demanding blood.

‘Malala Food Store,’ said Nowak, reading the sign above the cigarette display stand. ‘After the Nobel laureate girl?’ Silence. The shopkeeper’s son only had eyes for his father, and the urine that had pooled by his leg. He felt sick to his stomach. This was his fault. He should have asked Idris for help. He should have called earlier.

‘If you’d paid my men your father would not be embarrassed in this way. But now we have to make an example of you.’ Nowak grinned, brandishing the knife the way a conductor leads an orchestra and then placing it back on the old man’s throat. His men hulked closed by. One of them kicked a box of laundry powder off the shelf. It fell with a thud, breaking open and spilling its contents across the floor. Another took a bottle of detergent and poured it over the powder, mixing it in with his boot, like children in a sandpit.

‘What are you doing?’ said Nowak. ‘We’re here to send a message.’ The men smirked at each other. ‘Fetch the cans,’ he said. He wasn’t used to getting his hands dirty but today was about more than this shop. It was about getting a reaction out of Jia Khan and the Jirga. He felt ignored, as if they didn’t consider him worthy of their time. Like a petulant child, Nowak thrived on chaos and the attention it brought him.

His men returned with red canisters full to the brim with fuel. They unscrewed the caps and began pouring petrol all over the shelves, holding the cans high and slopping the oil around. The thick smell permeated the air. The shopkeeper’s son could feel the stench in his throat. He tried to formulate a plan. There was a baseball bat by the till if he could only get to it, but he was by the door. He had been about to lock up when the men had forced their way in.

‘Here, give me one of those,’ said Nowak, taking one of the canisters and tracing a circle of petrol around the old man. ‘Who can help you now?’ he sneered.

The old man opened his eyes wide and looked at Nowak, the fear now gone. He was short, a few inches over five foot. He tilted his head up. ‘Allah,’ he said. ‘Allah can save me,’ and he spat at Nowak’s feet.