What the SFO will fear is that rather than increase its budget, she will conclude that the case against the SFO is now irrefutable and it may be time to put it out of its misery.
And so once again we are faced with a sympathetic, beaten Thomas Barrow, a man who has squandered all his good will, all his money, and now must leave Downton with no reference at all a perfect storm of misery and ruin into which the always compassionate John Bates inserts himself.