Keep praying for me, says Sharif, as his aides prepare for The Departure

In four days, Sharif will be heading back to Pakistan after a long exile.

“Bas taiyari hai, aap dua karte rahein,” he tells an elderly couple, who have traveled all the way from Lahore to see him, and encourage him to return, despite the warnings that he will be arrested.

Behind Sharif’s chair is a big Pakistan flag and opposite to it is a giant TV screen that shows a Pakistani news channel.

There’s a long queue of people waiting to see him, and each one of them is popped a question: “Are you a friend or a supporter?”

Historian Patrick French is amused to find that Sharif’s supporters and party officials have cramped up the office, outnumbering the sofa seats, and the temporary plastic chairs that were being pressed into service. French is working on a book, a “sort of political history” of Pakistan, and wants an appointment. “There might be some sort of mangled form of democracy returning there,” he says.

But will Sharif actually return? Ghous Ali Shah, senior party member of his Pakistan Muslim League, says, “Sharif is a man of firm resolve. Once he’s decided, he will do it, come what may. I am in London to assist him in that. He should be in Lahore on September 10 and I will be here in London, long after he leaves. I have to finish other important work here.”

Late afternoon, Sharif is still meeting people, accepting wishes, and discussing the political situation in Pakistan. The phone keeps ringing, requests for media interviews are pouring in. “I have got so much work to do, wapsi ki tayyari karni hai and this phone keeps ringing,” he says.

In five day from now, maybe Pontis’s will be the only big address left on Duke Street.