Purgatory

DAY 45 – SATURDAY 1 SEPTEMBER 2001

8.15 am

The first day of a new month. After breakfast, I arrange with Locke (GBH), the spur painter, to have my new cell redecorated in his spare time. As the tariff has to be agreed in tobacco, and as I have no idea of the going rate, Darren (marijuana only) has agreed to act as my works manager for the transaction.

Once Locke has inspected my cell, he announces it will first need an undercoat of white, which will take him two, two-hour sessions. Darren agrees the price on a daily basis. Tomorrow he will add a coat of cream, and on Monday the cell door, the window ledge and frame plus the square around the wash basin will be painted beige. As far as I can work out, the painter will receive one pound’s worth of Golden Virginia (his choice) a day.

So the whole job will cost me PS3 – which, Darren assures me, is the going rate. The paint, however, will be supplied by Her Majesty’s tax payers. Please note that it was Margaret Thatcher who taught me never to say government; ‘Governments don’t pay taxes, Jeffrey, only tax payers do.’

Locke asks me to vacate my cell while the undercoat is being rolled on because once my bed, table and small cupboard have been pulled away from the walls and left in the centre of the room, there will only be enough space for one person.

I cross the corridor to join Sergio in his cell, where we hold a board meeting. Overnight, Sergio has typed out sixteen questions which he needs answered before he speaks to his brother again. For example: do I want to pay the full insurance cost? – Yes. Do I want the gold necklace to be 9, 14 or 18 carat? – 18 carat. Will I have to pay import tax when the chain and emerald land in London? – Don’t know, but I’ll find out

Once Sergio has asked all his questions and written out the answers neatly in Spanish, we move onto item number two on the agenda.

I’ve received a letter from Chris Beetles, who has carried out considerable research into which South American artists have a worldwide market. He reports that Christie’s and Sotheby’s have two Latin American sales a year, both held in New York. With the exception of Botero, who has recently passed $2 million for an oil, only Lamand Tamayo regularly fetches $100,000 or more under the hammer. Sergio reads the letter slowly and places it in his file.

11.00 am

Exercise. It’s Darren’s turn to be sketched by Shaun, and he’s proving a bit of a prima donna. He’s a very private man who doesn’t keep any photographs of himself. He’s still grumbling about his participation as we walk out into the yard. We are greeted by Shaun, who is holding a large art pad in his right hand, and a couple of pencils in his left.

Darren reluctantly agrees to pose, but only on two conditions. That the drawing is carried out on the far side of the yard, where few inmates will see him during their perambulations. He also insists that if he doesn’t like the result, he will be left out of the final montage. I don’t have a lot of choice, so I agree. I can only hope that Shaun will make such a good job of the preliminary sketch that Darren will be converted to the whole idea.

Jimmy and I go off for a circuit while Shaun begins his task. While we stroll round the perimeter, the talk among the inmates is only of football. England are playing Germany tonight, and Wayland are playing Methwold tomorrow. Some of the prisoners tying on the grass against the fence wish Jimmy, our captain, good luck, while another suggests that he couldn’t score in a brothel.

By the end of the third circuit, a likeness is appearing on Shaun’s sketch pad, but I have no way of knowing how Darren will react. He can be so perverse at times.

By the time we’ve completed two more circuits, the officers in the yard are beginning to herd us back to our blocks. We stop to look at Shaun’s effort. Darren joins us to see the outline image for the first time. It’s good, and he knows it. He nods his grudging approval, but finally gives the game away when, as we stroll back into A block, he asks, If that’s only a sketch before Shaun does the final portrait, can I have it for my mother?’ (See (date section.)

12 noon

Standing in the lunch queue I discover from Dumsday (who, Jimmy told me a few days earlier, had adopted an injured crow) that his crow died early this morning, despite his sitting up all night trying to feed it a boiled egg. I return to my cell and eat lunch standing in the middle of the room with the smell of fresh paint all around me. I survey my PS3 investment. Locke has made a good start.

2.00 pm

The spur is getting worked up about the match this evening between England and Germany, which is a World Cup qualifying game. I am invited to pull the name of an England player out of a plastic cup, and should my selection score the first goal, I’ll win nine Mars bars. I draw Gerard who, Jimmy assures me, has a good chance of scoring. I read in this morning’s Times that England haven’t won a match on German soil since 1965. But I don’t pass on this information to a football-mad spur. I glance out of my window to see five rabbits eating the left-over food the prisoners have thrown out of their cell. As we are hemmed in behind a twenty-foot fine-meshed wire fence, I wonder how the rabbits get into the prison. I’ll make enquiries.

6.00 pm

On a Saturday, we’re banged up after supper but, as I’ve mentioned, the enhanced spur goes last so we can roam the corridors until six thirty – an extra thirty minutes. I check my TV listings in The Times to find that the football is on BBC 1, but clashes with Jane Austen’s Persuasion on BBC 2. I elect to watch Persuasion while the rest of the spur settles down to follow the match. I’m confident that, if England score, the whole prison will let me know.

Just as Miss Elliot meets Captain Wentworth for the first time, the spur erupts with cheering and shouting. I quickly switch channels and watch a replay of Michael Owen scoring for England, which means I’ve lost a Mars bar. I switch back and continue my vigil with Miss Elliot who, because of her father’s financial problems, has had to move from the family’s magnificent country home to a smaller residence in Bath. I become deeply engrossed in the drama of lost love when there is another eruption of cheering. I switch over to find England have scored a second goal on the stroke of half-time. I discover that the score is 2-1 in England’s favour, so I must have missed the German goal. It was obviously greeted by my fellow inmates in total silence.

I turn back to Persuasion to find that Captain Wentworth is flirting (the occasional glance) with our heroine, the one we want him to marry. There is another roar. I can’t believe it, and switch across to find our other hero, Michael Owen, has scored again, and England are now leading three goals to one. No sooner have I switched back than there is a further roar, so I return to watch a replay of Owen completing his hat-trick, giving England an unbelievable 4-1 lead.

I flick over to Jane Austen and discover that the handsome Captain Wentworth could be about to marry the wrong girl, but then – an explosion – can it be true? I return to BBC 1 to find Heskey has scored for England and we now lead five goals to one with ten minutes to go. Quickly back to Persuasion where our hero and long-suffering heroine have become engaged. No suggestion of sex, not even a kiss. Long live Jane Austen.

10.00 pm

I finish the Robert Goddard book and then climb into my bed which is still in the middle of the room. I fall asleep to the smell of fresh paint and the sound of my fellow inmates reliving every one of those five England goals.