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Old School
There were prison tattoos on the dead man’s hands.
Five dots, arranged like the face of a dice on the skin between his thumbs and index fingers. I have heard a dozen different interpretations of what the quincunx means but the one I always believed was that it represents one lonely human soul, surrounded by four walls. The tattoos meant that the dead man had done hard time.
‘Daddy?’
‘Stay back, Scout.’
The dead man was lying on his back in a ditch on Hampstead Heath. My daughter Scout and I had been walking the dog on his long Sunday morning yomp across the Heath, and it had been the dog that had smelled him first.
We had come out of the trees heading towards the meadow that slopes down to the open-air bathing ponds when Stan – our ruby-coloured Cavalier King Charles Spaniel – had suddenly frozen, his nose twitching with disbelief. We thought he had picked up the scent of a fox or rabbit. But what Stan smelled was dead jailbird.
I turned to look at Scout. Stan was off lead but she was holding him by the collar as his eyes bulged with anticipation.
‘It’s going to be all right, Scout,’ I said. ‘But you two stay right there.’
The dead man’s face was a mask of blood. At the corner of his mouth were gaping wounds that looked black in the spring morning sunlight. I took a deep breath to slow my heart. Someone had slashed his mouth wide open and it was now twice the size it should have been.
Then I saw his dog. A white English Bull Terrier coming out of the bushes, whimpering for his master. A remarkable-looking animal, I thought, with its small black eyes and a forehead that seemed to slope all the way down to his mouth. He sniffed at the dead man’s mouth and began to whine. The dog knew he was gone forever.
I pulled out a pack of Natures Menu treats and whistled. The white dog took a look at me, then back at his dead master, and began padding towards me, licking his lips. I palmed him a treat and tossed the pack to Scout. The dog kept going, eager for more. Scout fumbled with the pack of treats as Stan and the English Bull Terrier went into their butt-sniffing circle dance.
She slipped a treat into the new dog’s mouth, then one for Stan, and then took both of them by their collars and looked anxiously in my direction. I held up my hand and she crouched down, waiting, the dogs still sniffing each other.
‘Just stay there,’ I said. ‘Everything is okay.’
I approached the dead man with my hands in my pockets so I would do as little to the crime scene as possible. The state of his face still shocked me. It was one of those injuries that you hear about and hope to never see. I stood there fighting for control of my heart rate as I looked around. There were some dog walkers and a couple of joggers in the far distance but it was still very early on a Sunday morning and there were few people on the Heath. I took my hands out of my pockets and called it in to Metcall. The First Contact Operator gave me an ETA of five minutes but by the time I hung up I could already hear our sirens.
I tried to see the man as he had once been. His thinning, silvery hair was shaved very short in what they call a number one crop and he wore a green MA1 flying jacket with a vivid orange lining, Doctor Marten boots, muddy from the Heath, and faded 501s. The skin on the hands with the dice tattoos was so dry it resembled paper. Lean and fit but not young, nowhere near it. He looked like a very elderly skinhead.
Scout was looking at the English Bull Terrier’s nametag.
‘“My name is Bullseye”,’ she read. Then she called out to me. ‘Can we keep him, Daddy?’
Thirty minutes later they had taped off the Heath from the bathing ponds all the way to the Hampstead Gate.
Scout was chatting to a female handler from the Dog Support Unit as her German Shepherd joined Stan and Bullseye in the nose-to-tail, getting-to-know-all-about-you routine. The Specialist Search Team were doing a fingertip
Old School
There were prison tattoos on the dead man’s hands.
Five dots, arranged like the face of a dice on the skin between his thumbs and index fingers. I have heard a dozen different interpretations of what the quincunx means but the one I always believed was that it represents one lonely human soul, surrounded by four walls. The tattoos meant that the dead man had done hard time.
‘Daddy?’
‘Stay back, Scout.’
The dead man was lying on his back in a ditch on Hampstead Heath. My daughter Scout and I had been walking the dog on his long Sunday morning yomp across the Heath, and it had been the dog that had smelled him first.
We had come out of the trees heading towards the meadow that slopes down to the open-air bathing ponds when Stan – our ruby-coloured Cavalier King Charles Spaniel – had suddenly frozen, his nose twitching with disbelief. We thought he had picked up the scent of a fox or rabbit. But what Stan smelled was dead jailbird.
I turned to look at Scout. Stan was off lead but she was holding him by the collar as his eyes bulged with anticipation.
‘It’s going to be all right, Scout,’ I said. ‘But you two stay right there.’
The dead man’s face was a mask of blood. At the corner of his mouth were gaping wounds that looked black in the spring morning sunlight. I took a deep breath to slow my heart. Someone had slashed his mouth wide open and it was now twice the size it should have been.
Then I saw his dog. A white English Bull Terrier coming out of the bushes, whimpering for his master. A remarkable-looking animal, I thought, with its small black eyes and a forehead that seemed to slope all the way down to his mouth. He sniffed at the dead man’s mouth and began to whine. The dog knew he was gone forever.
I pulled out a pack of Natures Menu treats and whistled. The white dog took a look at me, then back at his dead master, and began padding towards me, licking his lips. I palmed him a treat and tossed the pack to Scout. The dog kept going, eager for more. Scout fumbled with the pack of treats as Stan and the English Bull Terrier went into their butt-sniffing circle dance.
She slipped a treat into the new dog’s mouth, then one for Stan, and then took both of them by their collars and looked anxiously in my direction. I held up my hand and she crouched down, waiting, the dogs still sniffing each other.
‘Just stay there,’ I said. ‘Everything is okay.’
I approached the dead man with my hands in my pockets so I would do as little to the crime scene as possible. The state of his face still shocked me. It was one of those injuries that you hear about and hope to never see. I stood there fighting for control of my heart rate as I looked around. There were some dog walkers and a couple of joggers in the far distance but it was still very early on a Sunday morning and there were few people on the Heath. I took my hands out of my pockets and called it in to Metcall. The First Contact Operator gave me an ETA of five minutes but by the time I hung up I could already hear our sirens.
I tried to see the man as he had once been. His thinning, silvery hair was shaved very short in what they call a number one crop and he wore a green MA1 flying jacket with a vivid orange lining, Doctor Marten boots, muddy from the Heath, and faded 501s. The skin on the hands with the dice tattoos was so dry it resembled paper. Lean and fit but not young, nowhere near it. He looked like a very elderly skinhead.
Scout was looking at the English Bull Terrier’s nametag.
‘“My name is Bullseye”,’ she read. Then she called out to me. ‘Can we keep him, Daddy?’
Thirty minutes later they had taped off the Heath from the bathing ponds all the way to the Hampstead Gate.
Scout was chatting to a female handler from the Dog Support Unit as her German Shepherd joined Stan and Bullseye in the nose-to-tail, getting-to-know-all-about-you routine. The Specialist Search Team were doing a fingertip
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