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In the ops room, Gabriel listened to the radio chatter with a burgeoning sense of dismay. The officer in the rear garden had a good view of the kitchen and had raised the alarm the moment that the woman switched on the light and Fletcher advanced on her with a knife.

The voices around her were raised, buzzing with excitement tinged with relief that this two-day manhunt was over, relief that the woman had been saved before Fletcher had a chance to attack her again. But Gabriel felt none of that. She slumped into a chair with a sense of despair at the hollow victory. She had needed Fletcher alive. He was a weak man and she believed his vulnerability had been ripe for exploiting in the interview room. They could have got so much from him – not just the person who had recruited and groomed him for Chilton Park, but insights into the NRF, and crucially, clues into what this shadowy organisation was planning next. But in the confusion and mess of this suburban house, Fletcher’s secrets had died with him, and Gabriel was no closer to knowing what was coming next.

DAY 3

Friday

Burgess Hill, West Sussex

The A23 was quiet, and it had been tempting for Abu Mujahid to let the speed build up as he passed Crawley and headed towards the predawn glow of Brighton that lay beyond the wall of the South Downs. But he resisted. The speedometer stayed under sixty-nine and the speed cameras let his van pass unmolested through the winter morning.

He pulled off the dual carriageway at Burgess Hill on to a lane that twisted sharply through dimly glimpsed farmland. Then, ahead in the road, low down and small, an object was caught in his swaying headlights. It was hard to see and for a split second, Abu Mujahid imagined it was an IED, an improvised explosive device, the sort he had set many times in Syria. It moved. Abu Mujahid squinted, and the object took the shape of a pheasant. Twenty metres away, Abu Mujahid slowed and honked the horn. Ten metres, now five. Finally, the pheasant took flight, but moved towards his van, thumping into the windscreen, leaving a greasy smear, before bouncing over the roof. Abu Mujahid glanced in the side mirror to see the bird in the fiery glow of his brake lights, stunned and confused among a cloudburst of feathers.

His destination, the industrial park, was on the edge of the town, and the warehouse was at the rear of the park. A red container lorry was parked by the rolled-down shutters, next to a white Honda Civic. Abu Mujahid pulled into the visitor parking space and walked to the office.

A bearded man, all belly and hair, was slumped in his chair reading the Herald.

‘You’re late,’ he said, barely looking up.

‘I’m sorry?’ said Abu Mujahid in a quiet voice.

‘I said you’re late. I’ve been waiting twenty minutes,’ said the fat man.