We spend the first half of our shift patrolling the entertainment precinct on the South Bank, which is quite fun because most of the patrons are in a good mood and appreciate seeing coppers on the beat. A few drunken ratbags spoil the party, but that’s why we’re here.
On balance, I’ve learned that most people who come in contact with the police are either poor, uneducated, low-skilled, mentally ill, unemployed, drug-addicted or simply unlucky. But since the murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests, I’ve noticed a subtle difference in the way ordinary people look at me, with less trust and more doubt.
I haven’t changed. I am the same compassionate, caring person that fought so hard to get this job. I have given a homeless person my gloves because he was freezing. I have stopped a woman being arrested for stealing a loaf of bread to feed her children. I have lent money to people to buy train tickets; and resuscitated a drunk who was choking on his own vomit. But I know colleagues who have grown jaded and lost faith in the fundamental goodness of human beings. Either that or they get tired of dealing with the red tape and regulations and the thankless routines.
For the past few hours, radio chatter has been dominated by an operation on the river. The Marine Policing Unit has put boats in the area looking for a body and discovered a ‘deceased male’ wedged against a pylon on Bankside Pier. ‘Floaters’ aren’t uncommon. We pull at least one a week from the Thames, mostly suicides or accidents, whose bodies get snagged in barge lines, or fishing nets, or washed down the river to the Isle of Dogs. This one must be different because the serious crime squad has been called.
‘I fancy a piece of that,’ says Dawson, as we get back to the patrol car. ‘I’m sick of getting puke on my shoes.’
‘You’d rather have blood on your shoes?’
‘You know what I mean.’
He pulls into traffic and we make our way to Bankside Pier, pulling up behind three other patrol cars on the eastern side of the Globe Theatre. Crime scene tape is threaded between bollards and theatre patrons are being kept to one side of the street by security guards in high-vis vests.
Dawson ducks under the tape and disappears between vehicles, heading towards the pier.
‘Are you here to relieve us?’ asks a PC on crowd control.
‘No. Sorry. What happened?’
‘Floater.’
‘Must be more than that.’
‘Weighted down with chains and concrete.’
I follow the bright lights across the cobblestones to the edge of the river where a police launch is tethered to the pier while another is using engines to hold itself against the current. Water churns beneath the propellers, creating foam that slides away on the tide. Police divers, encased in black, are standing on the deck, or treading water, as a crane hauls a weight from beneath the surface. The water stirs and a body emerges, cradled in a net. The arm of the crane swings over the pier where screens have been erected to shield the operation from onlookers. A TV crew has snuck past the cordon and the dock is suddenly bathed in a spotlight that illuminates the netted body, showing a pale face and dripping hair, hanging like weed across his eyes. I push forward, shouldering people aside. Ignoring protests.
A uniformed officer tries to stop me but I duck under his outstretched arm.
‘You got to sign in,’ he says.
‘I think I recognise him.’
My voice is amplified by a sudden moment of quiet. People are staring at me. A detective emerges from the huddle of watchers. He’s in his late thirties, tall and loose-limbed, with ginger hair and mayonnaise-coloured skin. Summers must have been horrible for him as a child, having to be slathered with sunscreen and forced to wear long sleeves and hats. He introduces himself as DI Martyn Fairbairn.
‘What’s your name?’
‘PC McCarthy. I’m stationed at Southwark.’
‘Wait here.’
The detective goes away. I watch as technicians begin setting up lights and carrying silver boxes behind the screens. I can see the figures merging and separating like shadow puppets projected against the white canvas.
Dawson pops up beside me. ‘We’re wanted back at the station.’
‘You go. I’m staying.’
The detective signals to me. Dawson looks on gormlessly as I’m escorted down a set of worn wooden steps to a floating dock that can rise and fall on the tide. I’m given a pair of latex gloves and a plastic net for my hair.
Fairbairn pulls back the canvas curtain and I edge forwards into a circle of light. I see the lower half of the body first. A chain is wrapped around his waist and criss-crosses the torso. Each end loops back around the centre holes of two concrete breeze blocks.
The technician steps back and I get a proper look at the face. Unshaven. Shaggy brown hair. Crooked nose.
‘Are you going to be sick?’ asks Fairbairn.
‘No, sir.’
‘Who is it?’
‘His name is Dylan Holstein. He works for the Guardian.’
‘A journalist?’
I nod.
‘Come with me.’
This time I’m taken to an unmarked police car and told to sit in the back seat. Fairbairn fetches a bottle of water and cracks open the lid for me.
‘How do you know this guy?’
‘I don’t … not really. I met him once. He approached me on my way to work.’
‘Why?’
I hesitate, unsure of how much to say.
‘He asked me about an arrest that I made a few weeks ago. It was a domestic dispute. A woman was beaten.’
‘Why was he interested?’
I sip the water. Fairbairn senses that I’m holding out. He waits.
‘I arrested a police officer, Darren Goodall.’
The name doesn’t seem to mean anything to Fairbairn.
‘He’s the hero cop. He stopped the knifeman at Camden Market.’
‘I remember. Why did you arrest him?’
‘He took a swing at me.’
I can almost see Fairbairn’s mind working. He’s picturing the minefield I’ve asked him to walk across.
‘Why would a journalist from the Guardian be interested in a garden-variety domestic? It sounds more like tabloid fodder.’
‘I didn’t talk to him.’
‘He must have said something.’
‘Apparently, Goodall had a fiancée who died in East Sussex eight years ago. Imogen Croker’s family believe she was murdered.’
I can’t believe I remember her name.
‘Why did Holstein approach you?’
‘I have no idea. Maybe he thought I might help him.’
‘But you didn’t?’
‘No.’
My shoulder radio is humming. The control room is asking for my location. They’ll be worried about overtime. Across the waterfront, forensic teams are still moving behind the white canvas and a drone hovers above the pier, taking aerial footage for the investigators.
Fairbairn has left me alone in the car while he makes a call. He returns.
‘Dylan Holstein didn’t show up at his office today, but we won’t be releasing the name until a formal identification.’
‘Is he married?’
‘Is that important?’
‘It makes it sadder.’
He tilts his head to the side, as though baffled by my reaction.