14

The next two weeks went fast. I sat in with some of the other teachers and instructors to get a feel for teaching and to try and pick up hints, tips and approaches. Some seemed to me to be really good and others were, quite frankly, rubbish. I went to the library and found some books on teaching and they, at least, gave me some structure. Slowly I integrated into prison life, massively helped by Harry, but my overriding thought was my first visit and I was counting down the days until I would see Sam again.

When the day finally arrived I was walking from the classroom allocated to me, towards the hub of the building, when two prisoners confronted me. This was a ‘blind’ area of the building. I didn’t know them. It surprised me that it had taken so long before I was challenged.

‘Got a visitor today then, copper?’

‘It seems so.’

‘Pity you won’t be well enough to see her.’ The speaker stepped forward, poking my shoulder with his finger.’

‘I would prefer it if you didn’t poke me.’

He grinned and went to poke me again, but the grin quickly transformed into a scream when I broke his finger. He dropped to his knees and I still held his finger while he screamed, pain I supposed, and then I kicked his face. I felt his teeth break on the toe of my shoe. His mate turned and ran. I kicked him twice more; his face was badly damaged. I then stamped onto his right hand and heard the bones crunch. I wiped the blood off the toe of my shoe on the downed man’s trousers and kicked him three or four more times. Undoubtedly, some ribs would break.

He was still conscious, so I said, ‘Okay, sonny Jim, tell your friends the next one I’ll kill.’ Lesson learned. Message sent. I picked up the books and papers and walked back and into the library. Arthur and Dad, who were in my class, were in there and Jacko the librarian was reading a letter to one of them. All three looked at me.

‘I’ve been in here nearly as long as you.’

They all nodded. They understood; no questions and Jacko restarted reading the letter. The door opened and two prison offices came in, Mary Williamson and Peter Osgood. They stood and looked at us.

‘Last one in?’ said Williamson, scanning the four of us.

‘That would be me I think,’ I said. ‘Yes, I shut the door. Yes, me, Officer Williamson.’

‘How long ago?’ Both the officers were staring at me.

‘Ten minutes, um, quarter of an hour.’

‘Did you see Bert Connolly?’

‘I don’t know Bert Connolly.’

‘Where did you come from?’

‘My classroom. Number seven.’

She nodded. ‘Okay.’ They stared for a few seconds then they left.

I asked Jacko to look after my papers and then followed the two officers down the passageway. The central area was like a tableau; it was quiet, prisoners stationary, looking at the entrance to the passageway, their eyes following me as I meandered towards the reception area. Nobody moved towards me. The repercussions of this little confrontation would be interesting.

Finally, I went into the visitors’ room; I was the last one in. It was the first time I’d been in there. The officer on the door checked my name and asked me whether I had read the rules for visitors. No touching was the one that had registered most strongly with me.

Each Formica-topped table was square, facing in the same direction, with two chairs on one side and one on the other, all fixed to the floor in perfect lines so the prisoners were facing the entry door. Video cameras were very noticeable around the room. When seated, prisoners were a long arm-stretch from their visitors and prison staff could patrol in any direction. I was pointed to a table at the back of the room; well, I assumed the visitors’ entrance was the front where an officer stood. I could understand the thinking of the designers, low chance of contact, easy viewing of all interactions. There were also vertical boards under the tables, between prisoners and their visitors that went down to just below knee height. Smart these designers: not possible to pass anything even on a shoe, and no hand jobs.

Many of the tables were occupied, some with visitors and prisoners and the rest with waiting prisoners like me, watching the door. You could feel the expectation, or was that just my excitement? I watched as visitors came in and the prison officer on the door took their names and pointed to where their prisoner was. The room was nearly full when finally Sam came in. She was, as she always was, calm, controlled, beautiful and observant. She saw me almost right away, long before the prison officer pointed me out. Her arrival, however, signalled a hush amongst the other prisoners; it seemed that everyone was looking at her and all talking had stopped. Then a breathless voice, filled with awe, said, ‘Fucking hell!’

Some laughed at the exclamation that they’d probably controlled and an appreciative growl came from some others. I doubted that many women who looked and dressed like Sam visited people in prison.

Sam smiled her dazzling smile in the direction of the young man who had spoken and he went bright red. Then she looked back to me and walked through the tables to me, all eyes and sighs were following her gently swaying hips as she weaved through the tables and chairs. The air was tingling, awed by her beauty. Perhaps it was the way she carried herself: slender, gracefully and elegantly moving through the tables towards me. She’d the bumps and curves in exactly the right places, exactly the right shape and exactly the size that made any red-blooded male hold his breath as she moved on those exotic, perfect, long legs. I suppose she’d an air of mystery about her. I’m sure that was what dominated the men who came into Sir Nicolas’s chambers and these men were no different – dominated, dum-founded by feminine beauty as I’d been from the first time I saw her and I still was. I suppose I’d always just accepted that she was beautiful, never thinking about her beauty, just knowing, but more than that, her inner beauty. But, as she walked amongst the tables toward me, I realised that she was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. I’m sure I knew that already, but it was just in this environment it hit me like a punch to the solar plexus and clearly it had this stunning effect on the other men in the room and put to shame the lesser beauty of their women.

She put her bag on the table, sat, leaned across to take my hand and was promptly stopped.

‘No touching,’ the female prison officer said.

‘I bet you want to touch him,’ said Sam with a smile and a knowing look at the officer.

The officer smiled. ‘We can’t always have what we might want, madam.’ She then continued her patrol down the aisles between the tables.

Sam looked at me and said, ‘Can we talk here?’

‘I think so.’

‘Your release is going well. Everything is in place to pull the plug when you trigger it. Your solicitor friend has found a real, live, lefty, human-rights nutter who has linked up with some prisoners’ rights nutters and they’re starting to create little waves in another prison to test the authorities reactions before tackling this place. Now let’s talk about you and me. Tell me what has happened to you.’

‘I am now a teacher.’

‘A teacher, teaching what?’

‘I have this class of non readers and I have to get them to learn to read.’

‘Don’t they have proper teachers in here, then? Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like it came out, it’s just I never would have thought of you as teaching people to read.’

‘I know, it’s weird really, but I’ve learned a lot already.’

We chatted on about my class and then Sam said, ‘Barrow came to see me.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘He said that Sir Nicolas had an anonymous tip that it was probably an individual called Ratty that killed Jase. Not a very nice name. Anyway he sends his regards. I bought a new picture by Henderson Cisz, Morning in Westminster.’

‘I bet that cost a few bob.’

‘Well, I know you like his pictures.’ I noted that she didn’t tell me the price so it was probably over five grand.

‘Where will you put it?’

‘You know where St Paul’s, The City is?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, I’ll move that towards the door and it will fit in there.’ I could just visualise it. They would look great next to each other. We chatted on about what she had been doing and what was happening at the chambers. June, in the restaurant, had got engaged at last. She had been going out with a civil servant for five years so that was a move forward towards her ambition. We chattered on and the time just flew by.

The only problem was that half the room was watching us, well, watching Sam. I suppose one of the attractions for our observers was the way Sam used her hands when she was describing things, flowing and expressive, a delight to watch.

Eventually, visiting time ended. The visitors left, Sam with them, and I had a hollow empty feel, a void. I was missing her before she reached the door, where she turned and blew me a kiss. The prisoners were told to leave row by row, except I was told to stay where I was. The room was empty and two prison officers came and sat opposite me. One was Peter Osgood and the other was a senior prison officer that I didn’t know.

‘Where were you at ten fourteen this morning?’ asked the senior prison officer.

‘I was in classroom seven or the library.’

‘Could you have been in the passageway past the library?’

‘Might have been, yes. Probably, I passed the library and then went back.’

‘Did you see anybody else?’

‘There were three people in the library. They were –’

‘No, in the bloody corridor.’

‘No, I don’t think so.’

‘You were there at the same time as Bert Connolly and Charlie Adams.’

‘If you say so.’

‘You just said that you didn’t see them.’

‘Well, I didn’t.’

‘How could you not see them if you were there at the same time?’

‘Perhaps I was facing away from them.’

‘Did you hear them in the passageway?’

‘Um, no.’

Just then, Senior Officer James, my personal officer came in.

‘Problems, Jake?’

‘No, ma’am, these officers seem to think I saw somebody that I didn’t.’

The senior officer and Senior Officer James went to the other side of the room. They called over Osgood then Senior Officer James came back to me and the other two left.

‘They don’t believe you, Jake.’

‘I don’t give a shit.’

‘Bert Connolly was seriously injured at about ten fourteen in that corridor this morning and you were there.’

‘How do they know?’

‘Two reasons: tracking switched onto you because you had an appointment and all those who have appointments are scanned to see if they’re in the right sort of area. The other reason was that you were also seen in the library just after that time.’

‘Well that’s right, I told them that, and Officer Osgood saw me in the library. Were they tracking this guy, Bert Connolly, as well?’

‘No.’

‘So he might have been there earlier or later.’

‘Possible, but unlikely. He was on video entering the passageway at ten thirteen.’

‘They said somebody else was also there.’

‘Yes, and he said he didn’t injure Connolly.’

‘Did he say who did?’

‘You know he didn’t. He’s not going to grass.’

‘So what will he get?’

‘Some loss of remission.’

‘Good lesson not to pick fights with people.’

‘But you didn’t kill Connolly, Jake.’

‘Then it couldn’t have been me.’

Senior Officer James smiled and shook her head. ‘He’ll take some months to fully recover, Jake.’

‘Oh dear. What a shame.’

‘Yes, you’re very dangerous, Captain Jake Robinson, but I don’t think you’ll be attacked again in a hurry.’

When I got back to our cell, Sergeant was there.

‘You look like shit, Captain,’ he said and I told him what happened. ‘It’s these bloody things,’ he said. ‘Always carry some silver paper then if you want to disappear, cover the transmitter.’ It was so obvious. ‘I know what you’re thinking, Jake. The screws know, but remember they can’t prove a thing.’