Part 5 (1/2)

I can hear the right-wingers a.s.suring us that it will be character-building and teach the lad a lesson. What stupidity. It's far more likely that he will become antagonistic towards authority and once he's released, turn to a life of crime. This same young man will now be spending at least a fortnight with murderers, rapists, burglars and drug addicts. Are these the best tutors he can learn from?

12 noon I am visited by a charming lady who spotted me sitting in church on Sunday. I end up asking her more questions than she asks me.

It turns out that she visits every prisoner who signs the pledge I fear I didn't and any inmate who attends chapel for the first time. She gives each prisoner a Bible and will sit and listen to their problems for hours.

She kindly answers all my questions. When she leaves, I pick up my plastic tray, plastic bowl, plastic plate, plastic knife, fork and spoon, leave my cell to walk down to the hotplate for lunch.*

One look at what's on offer and once again I return to my cell empty-handed. An old lag on his way back to the top floor tells me that Belmarsh has the worst grub of any jail in Britain. As he's been a resident of seven prisons during the past twenty years, I take his word for it. An officer slams my cell door closed. It will not open again until four o'clock. I've had precisely twelve minutes of freedom during the last twenty-two and a half hours.

4.00 pm After another four hours, I'm let out for a.s.sociation. During this blessed release, I stop to glance at the TV in the centre of the room that's surrounded by a dozen prisoners.

They're watching a cowboy film starring Ray Milland, who plays the sheriff. Normally I would flick to another channel but today it's the selection of the majority so I hang in there for ten minutes before finally giving up and moving on to the dominoes table.

An Irishman joins me and asks if I can spare him a minute. He's about five feet eight, with two scars etched across his face one above his left eyebrow, short, the st.i.tches still showing, and another down his right cheek, long and red. The latter I suspect is the more recent. Despite this disfigurement, he has that soft lilt of his countrymen that I can never resist.

'I'm up in court next week,' he says.

'What for?' I ask.

'You'd rather not know,' he replies, 'but all I want to find out is, once I'm in court, am I allowed to defend myself?'

'Yes,' I tell him.

'But would it be better to give my side of the story to a barrister and then let him brief the jury?'

I consider this for a moment because during my seven-week trial I gained some experience of the legal profession. 'On balance,' I tell him, 'I would take advantage of any legal expertise on offer, rather than rely on your own cunning.' He nods and slips away. I dread meeting up with this sharp, intelligent Irishman at some later date to be told that his barrister was a fool.

I stroll back across the room to see how the film is progressing. Being a western, a gunfight to end all gunfights is just about to take place when the officer on duty shouts, 'Back to your cells.' A groan goes up, but to be fair to the duty officer, he's seated at the far end of the room and has no idea that the film only has another five minutes to run.

'The good guys win, Ray Milland gets the girl, and the baddies are all blown away,' I tell the audience a.s.sembled round the TV.

'You've seen it before?' asks one of the inmates.

'No, you stupid f.u.c.ker,' says another. 'We always lose. Have you ever known it end any other way?'

Once locked back in my cell after the fortyfive-minute break, I pour myself a gla.s.s of Buxton water, eat a packet of Smith's crisps and nibble away at an apple. Having finished my five-minute non-prison meal, I clean my teeth and settle down to another two hours of writing.

I've written about a thousand words when I hear a key turning in the lock, always a welcome distraction because, as I've mentioned before, an open door gives you a feeling of freedom and the possibility that you might even be allowed to escape for a few minutes.

I'm greeted by a lady in civilian clothes who wears the inevitable badge in her case, Librarian. 'Good afternoon,' I say as I rise from my place and smile. She looks surprised.

'If a prisoner asks you to sign a book, could you in future say no,' she says without bothering to introduce herself. I look puzzled; after all, I've been asked to sign books for the past twenty-five years. 'It's just that they are all library books,' she continues, 'and they're being stolen. They've now become like tobacco and phonecards, a trading item for drugs, and are worth double with your signature.'

I a.s.sure her I will not sign another library book. She nods and slams the door closed.

I continue writing, aware that the next opportunity for a break will come when we have the allocated forty-five minutes for afternoon exercise. I'm already becoming used to the routine of the door opening, lining up to be searched, and then being released into the yard. I've written about another two thousand words before the door opens again.

Having gone through the ritual, I stroll around the large square accompanied by Vincent (burglary) and another man called Mark (driving offence), who supports a.r.s.enal. One circuit, and I discover that the only way to stop Mark boring me to death about his favourite football team is to agree with him that a.r.s.enal, despite Manchester United's recent record, is the best team in England.

Desperate for a change of subject, I point to a sad figure walking in front of us, the only prisoner in the yard who looks older than me.

'Poor old thing,' says Vincent. 'He shouldn't be here, but he's what's known as a bag man nowhere to go, so he ends up in prison.'

'But what was his crime?' I ask.

'Nothing, if the truth be known. Every few weeks he throws a brick through a shop window and then hangs around until the police turn up to arrest him.'

'Why would he do that?' I ask.

'Because he's got nowhere to go and at least while he's inside the poor old sod is guaranteed a bed and three meals a day.'

'But surely the police have worked that out by now?' I suggest.

'Yes, of course they have, so they advise the magistrate to bind him over. But he's even found a way round that, because the moment the magistrate fails to sentence him, he shouts out at the top of his voice, ”You're a stupid old f.u.c.ker, and I'm going to throw a brick through your window tonight, so see you again tomorrow.” That a.s.sures him at least another six weeks inside, which is exactly what he was hoping for in the first place. He's been sentenced seventy-three times in the past thirty years, but never for more than three months. The problem is that the system doesn't know what to do with him.'

A young black man runs past me, to the jeers of those lolling up against the perimeter fence. He is not put off, and if anything runs a little faster. He's lean and fit, and looks like a quartermiler. I watch him, only to be reminded that my planned summer holiday at the World Athletics Champions.h.i.+ps in Edmonton with Michael Beloff has been exchanged for three weeks in Belmarsh.

'Let's get moving,' whispers Vincent. 'We want to avoid that one at any cost,' he adds, pointing to a lone prisoner walking a few paces ahead of us. Vincent doesn't speak again until we've overtaken him, and are out of earshot. He then answers my unasked question. 'He's a double murderer his wife and her boyfriend.' Vincent goes on to describe how he killed them both. I found the details so horrific that I must confess I didn't feel able to include Vincent's words in this diary until six months after I'd left Belmarsh.

If you're at all squeamish, avoid reading the next three paragraphs.

This is Vincent's verbatim description.

That b.a.s.t.a.r.d returned home unexpectedly in the middle of the day, to find his wife making love to another man. The man tried to escape out of the bedroom window, but was knocked out with one punch. He then tied the two of them next to each other on the bed, before going down to the kitchen. He returned a few minutes later holding a serrated carving knife with a seven-inch blade.

During the next hour, he stabbed the lover eleven times making sure he was still alive before finally cutting off his b.a.l.l.s.

Once the man had died, he climbed on the bed and raped his wife, who was still tied up next to her dead lover. At the last moment he came all over the dead man's face. He then climbed off the bed, and stared at his hysterical wife. He waited for some time before inserting the carving knife deep into her v.a.g.i.n.a. He then pulled the blade slowly up through her body.

During the trial, he told the jury that he'd killed her to prove how much he loved her. He was sentenced to life with no prospect of parole.

'Just remember to avoid him at any cost,' says Vincent. 'He'd slit your throat for a halfounce of tobacco, and as he's going to spend the rest of his life in here, nothing can be added to his sentence whatever he gets up to.'

I feel sure he's just the sort of fellow Mr Justice Potts was hoping I'd b.u.mp into.

The hooter blasts out, the unsubtle indication that our forty-five minutes is up. We are called in, block by block, so that we can return to our individual cells in smaller groups.

As I'm on Block Three, I have to hang around and wait to be called. When they call Two, I notice that the double murderer is striding purposefully towards me. I bow my head hoping he won't notice, but when I look up again, I see he's staring directly at me and still heading in my direction. I look towards the four officers standing by the gate who stiffen, while the group of black men up against the fence stare impa.s.sively on. The double murderer comes to a halt a few paces in front of me.

'Can I speak to you?' he asks.

'Yes, of course,' I reply, trying to sound as if we were casual acquaintances at a garden party.