I faced Andy again. ‘Can we take a copy of a few of these photographs as an interim?’

‘Sure.’

It took Dan a couple of moments to copy a few of the images into secure cloud storage and we made our way off the crime scene.

Just as we reached the car, a tall, mousey-haired man strode towards us. ‘Hey. Police. Wait a moment.’ It was a clipped, East London accent. His black, military-style trench-coat flapped with each stride and his eyes were darting around the scene.

The voice was familiar.

Maya, 6 p.m.

Maya, 6 p.m.

‘Someone said my mother’s been taken to hospital.’ The man was peering through the window of the newsagent’s and looking over at the wreckage of the soup shop.

Of course. That’s why he was familiar. It was Tomasz Feldman. The man in front of me was tall, a couple of years older than I was – but last time I’d seen him, he’d been a teenager.

‘Is Mum OK? Where is she?’ He took in the scene of devastation. ‘Why’s the street being evacuated?’

‘Your mother has been taken to the Royal London Hospital.’ Perhaps he didn’t recognise me?

‘Christ. She’s asthmatic.’

‘She’s inhaled smoke and was in a bad way. I gather her condition is stable now. She was in the street when the fire broke out and must’ve struggled back into the newsagent’s. I found her on the floor behind the counter.’

‘Thank you so much. Sounds like you saved her life.’ He had the same kind manner as when we were kids. ‘I’ll get down to the hospital and see if she needs anything.’

‘I don’t know if you remember me. I’m Maya Rahman. My sister and I used to—?’

His face softened. ‘Oh, I remember you two. The pick-n-mix,’ he said with a note of amused affection. ‘I was sorry to read about your brother. Dreadful thing to happen.’

‘Thank you.’ I paused to recalibrate and tell him about the gas in the soup shop. ‘The reason we’ve evac—’

‘It’s very damp in your mother’s shop.’ Dan’s interruption broke my train of thought. ‘Couldn’t you help her to get the heating updated?’

I shot Dan an unimpressed look. ‘Er – this is my sergeant, DS Maguire.’