I wrote out a cheque for £320 to cover various outgoings — ‘kiss-off money’ Mandy called it — and marshalled Selina’s worldly possessions in the back of the van. She owned pitifully little, really. It would have all gone in the Fiasco, easy, if the Fiasco had been running. But the Fiasco has not been running. Three bin-liners full of clothes, a teapot, two photograph frames, a soap-rack, a chair, an iron, a mirror and a lamp.
There you go, girl,’ I said at the other end, when I brought in the final batch.
‘Thank you, darling,’ said Selina. She stood in the middle of my hired front room. ‘Now this is my home. Right then.’
Selina had three paperbacks to add to the shelves, A to Z, Common Legal Problems and The Guide to Married Loving. What with Martina’s present, my book collection is definitely expanding.
——————
‘Don’t tell anyone,’ whispered Alec Llewellyn, ‘but it’s really quite cool in here. Don’t laugh! They’ll see us and think I’m not taking it seriously.’
‘Have you got your own cell?’
He sat back. ‘No. It’s a cell meant for one but there are two other guys in it. We’re very overcrowded. They’re all burglars and swindlers and things in here. We’ve got our own little kettle. It’s so laid back I can’t believe it. On the first morning I woke up feeling great, like a kid, stretched my arms and thought, Now I’ll have a cup of tea and stroll out for a —! Then it hit me.’
‘Wow.’
‘Yeah. But I’m incredibly relieved. With my accent I thought I’d be smashed to pieces or fucked in half after five minutes in here. But it’s not like that. It must be the only place in England where the class system still works.’
I lit a cigarette, and waited.
‘I think it’s to do with the clarity of the voice. Everyone else, including the screws and the pigs, they all talk as if they’ve just learned how. They can’t understand why I’m in here. They’re all paranoid of me. The screws are paranoid of me. The assistant governor is paranoid of me. Even the governor comes down to hobnob with me in the cells.’
‘What’s the food like?’
‘Awful. It’s all that soya stuff. It fills you up okay but runs you down at the same time. You know, I always thought they put anti-bonk pills in the coffee. But they don’t need to. They don’t put anything in the coffee. They don’t put coffee in the coffee. Butch Beausoleil could live here in the nude and no one would give her a second glance. I suppose they might try and sellotape her to the walls of their cells. All day you feel as if you’ve just had about ten hand-jobs. It’s the food and the air, and the confinement.’
We sat in a gothic cafeteria. If you lifted your head, it felt like school. Up there among the coach-house windows it was all swimming light, free-style, and tolerance of the noise and warmth of the human commerce below. Below, the prisoners sat at the far side of a rank of yellow-decked tables, with their little visitors — women, kids, the old — ranged opposite on kitchen chairs. No booths or metal grilles. You could hold hands if you wanted to. You could kiss. The older jailbirds were a snouty, ferrety contingent. Some of them looked only half-made. They sat back easily on their benches, their gestures resigned, explanatory. Their women were tensed forward on their seats, almost in a crouch of inquiry or solicitude. The children simply stared and fidgeted, in a high state of nerves — they were on their best behaviour, no question.
‘I got you a sleeve of fags,’ I said, ‘plus twelve half-bottles of wine.’
‘Thanks. Did —’
‘I was amazed when they told me what I could bring. Half a bottle of wine a day—it’s not enough but it’s something. I left it all with the guy.’
‘Did you bring any books?’
‘Uh?’
‘Ah you fucking lout! Bring me some tomorrow, okay? Promise. What do you think I do all day, for Christ’s sake? All they’ve got in here is a little heap of Westerns and thrillers with half the pages torn out or covered in tea and snot. I’ve been reading the fucking Bible for the last few days. Even that would be okay but everyone’s beginning to think I’m bananas. Bring me some books.’