Everyone, basically.

The students at Bramshill, the brightest and the best, all these fast-tracked cops, the next generation of CID, young and tough and smart, had almost wet themselves with laughter. But unlike the rest of them, I did not find the talk useless. Just the opposite. Because I remembered the FBI man’s number one point of potential indicators.

The suspect significantly alters his appearance.

Although my colleagues had smirked and rolled their eyes, I thought that was a point well worth making. Never overlook the obvious. Don’t expect him to look like the photographs and the CCTV images. Be ready for him to look like someone else.

And here was another thing the FBI agent could have mentioned. The target who significantly alters his appearance will probably not bother to get a new bag.

‘The same backpack,’ I said, opening the car door. ‘In the CCTV. Red backpack. When he bought the gear. Red backpack. All the way through. That’s the red backpack. And that’s him.’

‘You can’t park here, mate,’ an Afro-Cockney voice said through my window, and I jumped to hear a voice that did not come from somewhere inside my head.

A traffic warden was writing me a parking ticket. I got out of the car. He was a tall man with West African tribal scars on his cheeks, and he reared back slightly, expecting trouble. I looked past him and could see the man with the red backpack.

The crowds had thinned now.

He was about to enter the station.

Fifteen seconds.

Then a voice inside my head: ‘This is DCS Swire. Get back in the bloody car, Wolfe.’

All pretence at calm now gone.

I hesitated for a moment.

Then I got back into the car.

The traffic warden was tucking a ticket under my windscreen wiper. I shook my head and looked in the rear-view mirror. The man with the red backpack was directly behind me now, standing right outside the main entrance to the station. The crowds were melting away. There was nothing stopping him entering. But he had paused directly outside the station.

He was talking to himself.

No.

He was praying.

Ten seconds.

The man with the red backpack moved forward.

Nine seconds.

I stuck the car into reverse.

Eight seconds.

I twisted in my seat and slammed my foot to the ground.

The car shot backwards and I stared at the man with the red backpack as I hurtled towards him. I had one arm braced across the passenger seat for the shock of impact and the hand on the wheel pressed down hard on the horn, keeping it there, scattering the stray commuters.

He did not move.

But he looked into my eyes as the old X5 shot towards him, his mouth no longer praying.

Five seconds.