Chapter 4
8.15 a.m.
The latest project sprawled across the desk: a disembowelled Yorkshire terrier. The stench of embalming fluid clung to the air and climbed the walls with no means of escape. The windows were all tightly fastened. He preferred it that way.
He leant over the new kind of skeletal wooden frame which sat there, waiting to be the body and soul of the dog’s new existence. Much better than stuffing with straw. The doe’s head, which sat surveying the room from the mahogany plinth on the left of his desk watched with impassive glass eyes as he placed a sheet of cream writing paper in front of him and laid his fountain pen at the side. His glance caught the scarring on the back of his hand and his wrist, competing with the age spots creeping over the skin which pulled tightly a
