Osama

TWELVE

Douglas McGuire looked more like a con than a screw. Cropped hair, tattooed forearms. A stench of Golden Virginia roll-ups followed the prison officer everywhere. But there the similarity ended. McGuire had never met an inmate he trusted. These two – Hunter and Mansfield, the nonce and the soldier who’d done his missus – were no exception.

‘Strip.’

McGuire stood by the door while Sowden gave the instruction. It was 6 p.m. Dinner time. Out in the corridor there was the bustle of inmates making their way to the dining hall. Sowden was showing McGuire the ropes. Or as he had put it, ‘clue you up to how we do things around here’. It was only his first day in Barfield.

‘You gone deaf, Action Man? I said, strip.’

The soldier looked unwilling. But he did as he was told and started slowly unbuttoning his top.

‘No need to grin, Hunter,’ said Sowden. ‘You’re next.’ He looked back at McGuire. ‘So, what made you transfer from Whitemoor?’ he asked.

Like McGuire was going to tell anybody that. Like he was going to talk in front of a couple of inmates about the piece of scum he’d found smearing a shiv – made from a shard of mirror, the thick end wrapped in black electrical tape to form a handle – with his own shit, in the hope that his victim would get infected with AIDS. Like he was going to mention that one of his bitches who served up in the canteen had melted down a Mars Bar and spattered the burning caramel over his face.

‘Change of scene,’ he said. ‘Missus wanted to move to the smoke.’

‘Don’t know why you’d want to come and work in this dump.’

Sowden stopped. The soldier had removed his trousers without saying a word. He was now naked in front of them.

‘What do you think we are?’ Sowden whispered in near disbelief. ‘Fucking idiots?’

McGuire wasn’t surprised to see what this surly con had been hiding beneath his trousers. A length of electrical flex was wound several times around his shin. The screw could see at once that it had been ripped from the small television on the table. A good weapon, in the right hands.

‘Take it off, Mansfield, and give it to me,’ Sowden instructed. The soldier gave him a baleful stare, but still he didn’t open his mouth as he bent down, unwound the flex and plonked it into the screw’s waiting hands.

Sowden looked over his shoulder at McGuire again. ‘They’ll try anything,’ he said. His nose wrinkled as he turned back to the soldier. ‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘You stink. You need to get your arse down to the shower block, Mansfield. And speaking of arses – crouch and cough.’

McGuire didn’t like the look the prisoner gave them as he crouched down, fully naked, opened his lips just a fraction and cleared his throat.

‘Stand up and pass me your clothes.’

Mansfield did as he was told and Sowden started going through them minutely, checking all the pockets and seams for anything he might have hidden there. ‘I’ll give you the pleasure of doing Hunter,’ he muttered as he worked. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘You’re clean. Get dressed and get the fuck out of here.’

McGuire opened the door and watched Mansfield leave. There was something about him that he really didn’t like. Really didn’t trust. He prided himself on being able to spot the rotten apples. That soldier was a bad ’un through and through.

Left alone with Hunter, McGuire felt ill. The dumpy little nonce stripped off in front of him, rolls of pasty fat wobbling as he crouched and coughed. He sent him to the dining hall as quickly as possible. McGuire didn’t suppose he was long for this world. Most sex cases like him were segregated from the rest of the prison population, for obvious reasons. Someone had decided that this guy should have a bit of freedom. And that could only end one way.

Besides, he wanted a few minutes alone in this room.

The bedclothes on the bottom bunk were neatly squared away, unlike Hunter’s bunk at the top, which was a mess of blankets. McGuire stripped them both back and stared at the mattresses below. He didn’t know quite what he was expecting, but whatever it was, he didn’t see it. He cursed, turned and walked towards the door.

But then he stopped. Something had caught his eye. A small thing, but it screamed at him.

There were two posters on the wall. They showed pictures of two young pop stars, a boy and a girl, whom McGuire couldn’t have identified himself, but he wasn’t really looking at the images. He was looking at the bottom right-hand corner of the nearest poster. The Blu-tack had come away from the wall.

He stepped towards it and lifted up the loose corner.

His tiny eyes narrowed.

Stuck to the back of the poster were two pieces of masking tape. One of them was sticking a razor blade to the paper. The second had been peeled back. Whatever had once been there was there no longer.

‘Bastard,’ McGuire said under his breath. That flex round his ankle had been a decoy. The cunt had a blade on him.

The new prison officer left the cell and stormed down the corridor towards the dining hall.

The razor blade Joe had secreted under his tongue nicked the soft flesh inside his mouth. He could taste his own blood, but kept his lips tightly closed as he entered the dining hall.

He sensed the mood immediately. Atmospherics. Like going into an enemy village when the enemy know you’re coming. The buzz of conversation was quieter, the dull tapping of plastic cutlery against steel trays louder. More than usual, Joe saw inmates cast furtive glances in his direction as he walked slowly up the gangway towards the serving area. Even a couple of the screws standing along the side walls looked anxious.

Joe had covered a third of the gangway when he spotted Finch. He was sitting ten metres ahead and to his right, at the table closest to the serving area and with his back to it. His eyes were fixed on Joe, and he was chewing very slowly.

Joe walked on, the blade still needling at the underside of his tongue.

He recognized two members of Finch’s crew sitting to the left of the gangway, also with their backs to the serving area.

Also watching him.

His every sense was heightened as he walked. He felt he could hear every chink of cutlery.

Now he was next to Finch. The guy was two metres to his right and had laid his fork across his half-eaten tray of food. He followed Joe with his gaze as he passed, but he didn’t stand up.

Two metres from the serving area, Joe stopped. He could feel something dripping from the left corner of his mouth.

Three cons were waiting behind the hotplate, dressed in grease-spotted aprons and white paper hats. They were staring at the crimson trickle on his chin.

Joe saw himself distorted in the tea urn – like in a funfair.

And there were four men behind him.

They were not Finch’s. He recognized the Middle Eastern men who had been sitting cross-legged in the exercise yard that morning. He couldn’t tell how close they were because the distance was warped by the urn. Five metres? Less?

But they were definitely gaining on him quickly.

Joe spun round. So many things happened at once.

McGuire had appeared at the far end of the gangway. He was shouting something, but Joe didn’t register what it was. He was too busy with the Middle Eastern guys. The closest of them was three metres away, the other three a metre behind that. They were all carrying something. Two of them had bootlaces. One had the plastic tube of a ballpoint pen, its end sanded sharp. The leader had a broken bathroom tile, fashioned into a jagged blade. He was holding it like a dagger.

The whole room had fallen silent. There wasn’t a single inmate in the dining hall who didn’t have his eyes on the violence they knew was about to happen. But Joe’s focus wasn’t on the audience. It was on the enemy, two metres away.

He opened his mouth, pulled out the razor blade and spat a gobful of blood into the face of the fucker with the bathroom tile. He knocked the tile away with his left hand, and slashed with the razor in his right. It was exquisitely sharp, and cut a gash into the left side of his assailant’s throat as if the flesh wasn’t there. Blood spurted from the wound. There was pressure behind it – so much that the dark liquid sprayed over one of Finch’s men’s food – until the guy fell to his knees, a horrific gurgling coming from the back of his mouth. It was the only noise in the suddenly silenced room. Joe felt several hundred eyes on him – not least those of Finch and his crew. Even the screws had momentarily frozen, clearly shocked by the sudden violence. But Joe’s own attention was already on his other attackers. They had stopped in their tracks as their leader went down, but their eyes still shone and Joe could tell they didn’t intend to back off. He stepped over the puddle that was leaching from the dying man and grabbed the one carrying the sharpened plastic tube. He sliced his hand, causing him automatically to drop the makeshift weapon.

Suddenly the silence erupted into a storm of chaos. Finch and one other man Joe hadn’t seen before jumped from their seats and started laying into the two remaining attackers. Within seconds they had brought them to the floor and were kicking and pummelling them. The gangway filled with inmates, some pressing towards them to see what was happening, others struggling to get away as if they were afraid to be linked with, or affected by, the violence. The hall was filled with roars of encouragement, or shrieks at other inmates to get out of the way. Joe was deaf to it all. He muscled his man to the floor half a metre from the twitching body of his comrade, grabbed his hair with his left hand and positioned the bloody razor blade millimetres from his pumping jugular.

‘OK, you piece of shit,’ he hissed. ‘Time for some fucking answers.’

The back of the guy’s head was soaked with the blood oozing from his friend, but he looked neither disgusted nor frightened. He simply grinned.

‘Who put you up to it?’ Joe slammed the guy’s head against the floor. ‘Who fucking put you up to it?’

The man spat in his face. ‘I’ll die before I tell you.’

Joe thumped the fucker’s head down again, and this time there was a cracking sound. ‘How much pain can you manage, you piece of shit?’

‘Pain is nothing to me,’ the man whispered. ‘I will be welcomed into Paradise…’

The shouting all around was getting louder. A bell started ringing and Joe heard the sound of whistles being blown. Rage surged through him. Suddenly he didn’t even care about questioning this man: he just wanted to hurt the cunt. He slashed the blade across the right side of his face, ripping a deep seam in his cheek. The pain made the guy take a sharp breath in, and as a curtain of blood drew itself across the lower part of his face, Joe heard himself spitting words at him. ‘Be my fucking guest. And say hi to your bum-chum Osama while you’re at it. He’s had a few days there – he can show you the ropes…’

The man’s eyes grew brighter. ‘Sheikh al-Mujahid?’ He made a dismissive, hissing sound. ‘He’s not dead…’

Joe blinked. Again the noise all around seemed to dissolve, even though he knew the chaos was increasing. ‘What do you mean?’ he whispered. And then, when the man didn’t reply, he roared: ‘What the fuck do you mean!’

Joe felt hands grab him from behind as the noise of the dining hall burst into his head again. The screws had him, they were shouting, and now they were pounding him with their truncheons… a blow to his stomach winded him… a second one, and then a third to the hand gripping the razor. He dropped his only weapon and covered his head as the screws started beating his already bruised and damaged body in an orgy of unrestrained brute force.

The next few minutes were a blur. His mouth still bled profusely, sharp pain splintered through him. He felt himself being pulled up to his feet and realized his clothes were sopping with the blood of the man whose throat he’d just cut. McGuire and Sowden were on the ground next to the Middle Eastern guy, covered in his blood and attempting to give him CPR, but Joe knew they were trying to resuscitate a stiff. The crowd parted as he was pulled along the gangway, surrounded by six screws screaming at everybody to get back.

He’d just killed a man, in front of hundreds of witnesses. It wouldn’t matter that it was done in self-defence. In everyone else’s eyes he was not only a murderer, but a double murderer. He might be incarcerated in the most secure prison in the country, but it hadn’t stopped his enemy getting to him.

And there were only so many attacks he could survive.

The cell Joe had shared with Hunter had been a dump, but the Segregation Wing made it look luxurious. Joe didn’t care. One cell was the same as another, and it was better to be alone than with scum like Hunter. The moment they threw him into this tiny, stinking space, where the toilet was ten times more rancid and the single mattress covered in disgusting stains, he collapsed to the floor, his back to the wall. He felt like he was saturated in blood. His own. His enemies’. Caitlin’s. He could taste it. See it. It was everywhere.

Time passed. Joe didn’t know how long. Hours. The door opened and a screw he didn’t even look at placed a tray of food inside. Breakfast. It went untouched.

All he could think about was what the Middle Eastern guy in the dining hall had said: ‘Sheikh al-Mujahid? He’s not dead…’

Would some banged-up minor terror suspect really know something like that? Or was this just another mad theory? ‘Mark my words… a double agent working for the Americans…’

Joe shook his head. He’d seen the SEALs go in. He’d seen them remove the body bag containing their target.

While it was true that the Yanks had been in bed with the Mujahideen back in the seventies – hell, even the SAS had trained up the AQ-in-making – the idea that they were working hand in hand with the leader of their sworn enemies was ridiculous.

Wasn’t it?

And it had been Arabs who had just tried to kill him. What was it – revenge? Or had it just leaked out that he was army and they wanted to have a crack at him, like Finch and the rest of the fucking Micks?

The thoughts were so all-consuming that he barely noticed the door of his cell open for the second time. He looked up. His food tray was still there on the floor. The door was only slightly ajar. Nobody else was in the cell.

Joe scrambled to his feet, eyes screwed up, fists clenched, ready to defend himself.

The door opened a little wider.

Joe saw the narrow end of an old-fashioned wooden crutch appear in the gap, followed by a limping foot.

Hennessey stared at him. There was a silence. Long. Threatening.

‘How did you get in here?’ Joe demanded.

Hennessey didn’t immediately reply. He limped into the centre of the cell and started rolling a cigarette with a heavily tattooed hand as he leaned on his crutch.

‘I’ll be straight with you, son,’ Hennessey said. His voice was a cold, wheezy whisper, south London through and through. ‘I don’t have much time for wife-beaters. If you hadn’t done me a service in the yard, we’d be having a different chat right now.’

He lit the cigarette and inhaled.

Joe remembered Hunter’s words: ‘You think the screws are in charge here? That’s bullshit. Hennessey’s in charge…’

And as he had just acknowledged, Hennessey owed him one.

‘I have to get out,’ he said.

Hennessey finished his cigarette with a second long drag and dropped the butt to the floor. ‘Missing Hunter, are you?’

‘Not the Seg Wing. The prison.’

‘You and every other fucker in this place,’ Hennessey said dryly.

‘I mean it.’

A humourless smile played across Hennessey’s lips. ‘Well, let’s see now,’ he said. ‘How to break our new boy out of here? Double murder, is it? Usual procedure is to make a shiv and cut your wrists. That way they take you out in a box. Leaves a little mess for the screws to clean up, but you won’t have to worry about that.’ He waved one arm about the room. ‘My advice, lad, is get used to your new home, and make sure you stay in with the right people.’

‘Not good enough, Hennessey.’

‘Is that right, son? Ah well, we all have to live with these little disappointments.’

Hennessey wasn’t giving much away. What had Hunter said about him? A clever bastard. Joe sensed he was right. But what did he, Joe, have on Hennessey? What weapons were left in his arsenal?

‘Word is you’ve got half the screws in your pocket,’ he said. ‘How d’you do it? Blackmail? Threaten their families?’

‘Ways and means, son. Ways and means.’ He sounded – and looked – wary. ‘Let’s just say I call in a favour now and then, and leave it at that.’

‘Like the tart they smuggle in to service you every month? That’s quite a favour. Someone must really like you.’

‘What is it, son?’ Hennessey’s voice was very quiet now, but with an edge that hadn’t been there before. ‘On heat, are you? She’s coming in at five tonight, you know, but I’m afraid she’ll have her hands full. If you want someone to help you lose your load, I could always have a word with Hunter—’

‘Be a shame, wouldn’t it,’ Joe cut in, keeping his voice casual, ‘if word got round that the screws cut you slack in return for you grassing up the other inmates?’

A pause. Hennessey blinked at him, then suddenly gave a short, humourless bark of a laugh. ‘That a threat, son?’

‘More than that, Hennessey. I’m army, remember. I’ve got contacts. Trust me, there’s plenty of bent coppers in my little black book who’d deposit a few quid in one of your family’s bank accounts if I asked them. I guess some of the animals in this place might get funny ideas if they thought you were on a police payroll…’

Hennessey stared impassively at him, trying to judge if Joe was serious or not. ‘You’ll have to do better than that,’ he said finally, before giving Joe a contemptuous look, turning his back on him and hobbling towards the door.

The window of opportunity was closing. ‘You think you’re the big man, Hennessey?’ he called after him. ‘You think you scare me like you scare the other shitheads in this place? Trust me, son, I can fucking break you. The best way for you to stay king of the hill is to get me the hell out of here.’

Hennessey halted. For ten seconds he stood still, his back to Joe. When he finally turned, his expression was cold. He stumped back towards Joe, stopping when they were just a metre apart. ‘And how do you work that out?’ he barely whispered, derision dripping from his voice.

Joe moved quickly. He grabbed the food tray by the door – its contents went flying – then smashed the plastic over his knee so that it broke, with lethally jagged corners on each half. He swiped the crutch from under Hennessey’s arm. It didn’t appear to make the prisoner any less steady until Joe used it to push him violently up against the wall, before pressing a sharp corner of the shattered tray against his jugular. ‘Listen to me, you piece of shit. You think I don’t have friends who wouldn’t think twice about taking a smack at your whore if I asked them to? You think they wouldn’t break her legs just for fun?’ It wasn’t true, but Hennessey didn’t know that.

‘You think I care?’ Hennessey whispered. ‘She’s just a pair of lips to me…’

‘Of course you don’t care. But just think about it. Big bad Hennessey, stuck in the Seg Wing and not even able to stop his bit of skirt getting done over on the outside, even when he’s in the police’s pockets. Not to mention that, as long as I’m here, I’ll break a different bone in your fucking body every time I see you. You’ll need more than a wooden crutch.’

To emphasize his point he pressed the plastic harder into Hennessey’s throat – the guy broke into a sweat – before throwing it, along with the crutch, to the floor. He knew better than to turn his back on a man like this, so he stepped away while Hennessey caught his breath and bent down to pick up the crutch.

‘You’re a brave man, army boy,’ Hennessey said hoarsely, rubbing at his throat with one hand, ‘talking to me like that.’

Joe ignored him. ‘Course,’ he added, ‘pull some strings for me and it wouldn’t do your reputation much harm.’

‘What wouldn’t?’

‘You really are as stupid as you look. Think about it. The inmate who does Hennessey a favour gets out. They’ll know your name on every landing in the country after that. They’ll be falling over themselves to help you out.’

Hennessey fixed him with a dead-eyed stare. He made no attempt to hide his loathing of Joe, but he was clearly deciding what call to make.

Joe feigned indifference.

‘You’re in the Seg Wing of a Cat A prison,’ Hennessey said finally. ‘People don’t just walk out of this place.’

‘Except your bird.’

Hennessey’s eyes tightened. ‘What do you mean?’

‘How does she get in? I’m guessing she doesn’t just bang on the front gates.’

The inmate inclined his head, but didn’t answer.

Joe took a step towards him, and was pleased to notice Hennessey flinch. ‘You think I’m playing twenty fucking questions, Hennessey?’ he hissed. ‘You think I’m playing around? I’ll ask you one more time. How does she get in?’

He was watching Hennessey carefully. Examining his expression. He saw the way the eyes narrowed, just a millimetre. Hennessey had made a decision.

‘There’s a delivery of medical supplies. Once a month. The screws make a point of not checking too closely what’s in the back of the van when it arrives.’

‘And when it leaves?’

‘That too.’

Joe started pacing. ‘Where do you meet her?’ he demanded. ‘Does she come to you?’

‘No,’ Hennessey replied. The wariness had returned to his voice. It was as if they were tiptoeing around each other. ‘I go to her when they’ve finished unloading…’

‘How long for?’

Hennessey’s eyes narrowed.

‘How long for?’

‘Half an hour.’

‘Where does the van park?’

‘Delivery bay, behind the kitchens.’

‘Who takes you there?’

‘One of the screws,’ Hennessey said evasively. And then he added quickly – a bit too quickly? – ‘Hobson, ginger moustache…’

Joe remembered the screw he’d attacked the night he arrived. He’d hardly be queuing up to do Joe a favour. But that didn’t matter. Not if Joe worked it properly.

‘There’s a route from the back of the Seg Wing,’ Hennessey said. Joe noted that he was volunteering information without being pressed. ‘Winds round past the bins to the delivery bay. No cameras. That’s the way Hobson takes me.’

‘What time does the delivery arrive?’

‘Five p.m. Sometimes a bit later. Never earlier.’

Joe absorbed that information for a few seconds. ‘OK. Here’s what’s going to happen. Hobson’s going to take me instead of you. You can tell him that if he doesn’t play ball, I’ll grass him up. If I’m still in this cell at five-thirty, you’ll both wish you never even heard my name.’

There was a hostile silence. Hennessey stuck his chin out at Joe. ‘I’m beginning to wish that already,’ he said. ‘Five o’clock. Be ready.’ He started limping out of the room.

Joe wasn’t fooled. He knew Hennessey had given in too easily, that he couldn’t be trusted. Joe wanted him to think that he, Hennessey, had the upper hand, that Joe was so desperate to escape that he’d do anything, believe anything. He strode after him, grabbed him by the back of the shirt and spun him round. ‘Listen to me,’ he hissed. ‘Hunter told me you’ve got a habit of knocking off your cellmates because you know you’re never seeing the outside again. If I’m still in here at five-thirty, I’ll know I’m never seeing the outside either. I guess then it’ll come down to which one of us can fuck the other up best. Is that a game you really want to play? Is it?’

He let go of Hennessey, who said nothing. He just smoothed down his shirt, gave Joe a look of utter contempt, then limped out of the cell.

Joe heard the key turn in the lock. His mouth, he realized, was unbearably dry, the nape of his neck soaked with sweat.

He’d played his only card. All he could do now was wait.