‘And these people, they asked you to torch the boat?’

Conor nods.

‘And threatened to kill you if you didn’t?’

Conor nods again. ‘I hung around till I saw the bloke living on the boat had got off.’

That was good of him. ‘It’s coercion – not your fault,’ Silas says. ‘I see it all the time. And the courts understand.’

‘The courts?’ Conor looks up. ‘You arresting me?’

‘Of course I’m not. I’m just saying you’re not automatically to blame.’

Silas gets to his feet and looks out through the door to the grassy area outside, his back to Conor.

‘I’m guessing you’re recruiting for them too?’ he asks, trying to bury his revulsion, the shame of it all. ‘Drug mules. Schoolkids.’

‘Jake tell you that?’

‘He put two and two together.’

‘They didn’t like him asking questions at the pub.’

‘That’s what I want to talk to you about. The Bluebell. I need your help.’

It’s a long shot, but Silas can see a way of playing Conor back into the organised crime gang. If he can discover more about the night Kate’s drink was spiked – who ordered it to be done – he might be able to help bring down the entire county lines network and expose any links it has with the modern slavery gang in Swindon that was recently sentenced. His boss won’t like it, but this is personal now. He also wants to know who sent Jake the CCTV footage.

‘Help you?’ Conor says. ‘Why should I?’

‘Because then I can help you,’ Silas says, turning to face him.

Once the drugs network has been disbanded, Silas can make an argument for Conor, cite the assistance he’s given the police, the mitigating circumstances. Would that really work? Or is he deluding himself?

‘I’m off,’ Conor says, gathering up a small rucksack and brushing past him out of the hut door into the evening light.

‘I just need to know who gave the order to target Kate, the super recogniser who worked for me,’ Silas says, calling after Conor as he heads off into the sunshine. ‘And find out who sent the CCTV footage of her drink being spiked at the Bluebell.’

He follows Conor out of the hut, but Conor is already ten yards away, striding across the open grass. A startled pheasant crows in the distance.

‘The CCTV footage was sent to Jake, the guy whose boat you torched,’ Silas calls after him. ‘Someone might know that the pub cameras were hacked.’

Conor is not interested. Silas scans the forest, as if searching for something else to say, but he knows there’s only one thing that will get his son’s attention.

‘I’ll make an effort with Mum,’ he shouts, his voice echoing through the trees. Are they mocking the hollowness of his words?

Conor is thirty yards away now. He stops and turns.