When she stopped, Maya said, ‘I have a feeling it’s not just your son’s death that’s upsetting you. Can you tell us what it is?’

She took a loud breath in through her nostrils, her head moving back as she drew it in. ‘I’m his ma. I should have known what was going on in his life. I don’t blame him for wanting to better himself. We weren’t always like this. We came to the UK forty years ago. Things weren’t easy back home in Ireland and there was a labour shortage here. It was before the asbestos got to Gabriel. He was well then. Worked on the tools as a sparky. Now look at us. Stuck here in this dump.’ She waved her hand at the walls and the furniture. ‘If you’d had the opportunity to earn that sort of money, would you have taken it?’ She locked eyes with Maya.

‘I honestly don’t know,’ she replied. ‘But I think a lot of people would have. And I certainly know about having to graft to make a successful career.’

‘Why did he have to end up dead?’ Sinead’s face was streaked with blotches and her eyes were tiny. ‘I never told him I loved him, and now it’s too late.’ Her regret lay in the room between them all.

‘I’m so sorry. We will find the person who did this.’

Maya’s words were interrupted by an email alert from first Dan’s phone, then Maya’s.

‘Excuse me,’ Dan said. He left Maya with the Ryans and crept over to the door. Clicked his browser open and read the message.

It was from Alexej.

Frazer was back.

And he’d posted on the forum.

Maya, 5 p.m.

Maya, 5 p.m.

Telling the Ryans about their son’s death had been awful. It was always one of the worst parts of the job, and it had been made all the more poignant by the family’s estrangement, and the regrets I knew Mrs Ryan would have to deal with alone. Once I got back to Tower Hamlets, I decided to duck in at the flat and grab a quick shower. It was a relief to turn my door-key and feel the deadlock: Dougie was at his place, and I could soak up fifteen minutes of silence and be alone with the events of the last few days. I switched the shower on full-blast and hoped the stream of hot water might rinse away some of the day’s human devastation.

*

A while later, I was back in Brick Lane, in the front room above the newsagent’s, with Rosa and her daughter sitting opposite me on the worn sofa. The flat was quiet except for voices on the TV. The front room seemed cosier and warmer than last time I’d been there, thanks to a halogen heater which I suspected Agnieszka had introduced.