Kissed a sad goodbye - Deborah Crombie [43]
“Our legendary Lewis, the saint of the East End, according to some. He’s responsible for redeveloping and restoring many of the old warehouses and factories on the Island.”
Gemma heard skepticism in Janice’s voice. “Is that not a good thing?”
Shrugging, Janice said, “I can see the dissenters’ point. Once most of these places are tarted up, none of us who grew up here on the Island can afford to live in them.” She nodded towards the interview room. “You can see where the son gets his looks, if not his views. According to rumor, Lewis Finch is quite the ladies’ man.”
Was it possible that Annabelle Hammond had been one of his conquests? wondered Gemma as they entered the interview room.
Then, as Kincaid said, “Why don’t you begin the questioning, Janice,” Gemma stopped dead on the threshold.
The man stood in the center of the room, facing them, hands jammed in the pockets of his army-issue trousers. The sleeves had been cut out of his camouflage jacket, revealing the muscular definition of his suntanned arms. Since she had last seen him, his fair hair had grown out a bit and he’d added a gold earring in his left ear.
“You’ve no right to keep me here like this,” he said, and she remembered how unexpected she had found his educated voice. “Either let me leave or I’m calling my solic—” He saw her, and faltered.
His surprise, thought Gemma, must have been greater than hers, because she realized now that at some level she’d made the connection between Reg Mortimer’s description and this man.
For a few months, he had played his clarinet in front of the Sainsbury’s on the Liverpool Road, until he had become a regular if enigmatic part of her life. Although he had seldom spoken or smiled, she’d been drawn to him in a way she could not explain. But when she’d at last ventured to speak to him, he’d answered so brusquely that she’d felt a fool, and shortly after that he’d vanished from the area. She had not seen him since.
Sitting down, Janice Coppin switched on the tape recorder and gave the date, then addressed the busker. “Your name, please, for the record.”
Without taking his eyes from Gemma, he said, “It’s Finch. Gordon Finch.”
CHAPTER 6
Bounded on three sides by the river Thames, and communications hindered (in those days) by the swing bridges at the entrances to the working docks, [the Island] had (and still has) a special feeling of isolation, which separates it from the rest of East London.
Eve Hostettler, from Memories of
Childhood on the Isle of Dogs, 1870–1970
“Sit down, Mr. Finch.” Janice Coppin positioned her chair squarely in the center of the interview table; after a moment, Gordon Finch sank reluctantly into the chair on the other side. Kincaid and Gemma sat on either side of Janice and a bit back, so that Janice became the natural focus of attention.
Gemma was glad Kincaid had given Janice the lead, for it gave her a chance to study the busker, who hadn’t met her eyes again. It had been some time since she’d seen him, and she thought perhaps he’d lost weight. Surely the planes and angles of his face seemed more pronounced. His short cap of fair hair stood up in tufts where he had run his fingers through it, and darker stubble shadowed his chin.
“I want my solicitor,” he said. “You’ve no right to hold me here without my solicitor present.” How many street musicians, wondered Gemma, had a solicitor at their beck and call?
“You are free to ring your solicitor, Mr. Finch,” Janice countered. “But you understand that we are not charging you with anything—we merely want your help in answering a few questions.”
“What sort of questions?” Finch said warily, not sounding reassured.
Janice lined up her notebook at a right angle to the table’s edge. “You’re aware, of course, that busking is in direct violation of—”
“Oh, come off it, Inspector. It’s Sunday afternoon, the best day of the week, and most likely you’ve made me lose my pitch. If you mean to slap me with a fine for busking, do it. Otherwise let me go back to work before all the punters