Instead, it appeared, the world around her was indifferently getting on with itself. Ingrams in particular seemed concerned with nothing more pressing than the need to free his vehicle from the hedge. Something about his pragmatism was deeply offending her.

Several cars passed in either direction. They all slowed to have a look, a few getting as far as winding the window down ahead of presumably offering assistance, but Ingrams calmly waved them all on. He clearly didn’t want to have to explain anything to anyone, which prompted a further horrified deduction from Jasmine.

‘You’re not calling the police?’ she asked incredulously, as he held open the driver’s-side door and indicated that she should climb back in.

‘I’d rather not, no. I think it would be difficult to make a statement about what happened without mentioning that I had a gun, and that might lead to certain complications for me.’

‘Complications? What about men with shotguns? I’d anticipate that having my head blown off might complicate things quite a bit. It’s not my problem you’re mixed up in stuff that means you’ve got guns stashed under your car. No, actually, today it was my problem, and that’s all the more reason I want the authorities involved.’

Ingrams let her babble for a moment, then started the engine by way of overruling her objection. He pinned her with that stare as he spoke.

‘First of all, once again, gun, singular. Second, also once again, you’re the one who’s mixed up in something. And third, if it wasn’t for me having my gun, singular, we’d both be dying from shotgun wounds right now. I’d consider it an act of courtesy and gratitude, therefore, if you didn’t respond to my saving your life – twice, plural – by dropping me in it with the cops.’

Jasmine said nothing for a while, seething. She wasn’t feeling much gratitude, as she still wasn’t buying the theory that this was something that was happening to her rather than him. The guy could shoot a gun out of a man’s hands, she realised. That meant he had chosen not to kill or even wound the gunman, but merely scare him off instead. Why?

Complications. Mess to clear up. Difficult matters to explain to the police. What kind of man was so reluctant to involve the authorities under circumstances like this? And what would he say if she insisted? She needed to know where she stood, and whether where she should be standing was as far away from Ingrams as possible.

He interpreted her silence as the end of the discussion and began negotiating the Land Rover away from the hedgerow and off the grass verge.