House of Correction

by French, Nicci

  The judge came in and he wasn’t as old as she’d expected. He had a grey wig and a blue-and-black gown with a red slash across it. He called her Ms Hardy and she wanted to thank him for using the correct title. He had a thin, clever face and a courteous tone. Perhaps he would be the judge at the real trial. He was saying something else but she couldn’t hear properly.

  ‘I was asking, Ms Hardy,’ he said, ‘if your legal representative is present.’

  ‘No,’ said Tabitha. ‘Your honour,’ she added. Was that what you called a judge?

  He frowned. ‘Is he on his way?’

  ‘I haven’t got legal representation.’

  ‘Why not?’ His benevolent expression changed to one of alarm.

  ‘I fired her.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A few minutes ago,’ added Tabitha.

  He leaned forward. ‘I hope this isn’t some attempt to delay proceedings.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You are charged with murder.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘This is serious.’ His voice slowed. He spoke to her like she was a small child. ‘You don’t have to pay, you know. This is a charge of murder. But you must have legal representation.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s correct.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘I don’t think that’s correct.’

  The judge pushed his wig back slightly to scratch his head and scowled at her. He looked appalled.

  ‘For goodness’ sake. This is a serious, complex matter. You need legal representation.’

  ‘They’ll tell me to plead guilty.’

  ‘They will act according to your instructions.’

  ‘But they won’t believe it.’

  ‘They will put your case to the best of their professional ability.’

  ‘I’ll do it myself,’ said Tabitha. Her voice was scratchy.

  ‘That’s ridiculous.’ He leaned further forward. ‘It’s worse than ridiculous, it would be a gross act of self-harm.’

  ‘It’s my right.’

  The judge stared hard at her until she felt herself flush. Her legs trembled and she wished someone would offer her a chair. Finally he sat back. His face wasn’t so benevolent now. He took several deep breaths.

  ‘If you think you’ll get some benefit by doing this, you’re very much mistaken,’ he said.

  ‘She just wanted me to plead guilty,’ said Tabitha.

  ‘Stop,’ said the judge. ‘Don’t say anything about any conversation you had with any lawyer. Do you understand?’

  ‘I don’t see why it matters.’

  ‘In court, you follow the instructions of the judge. Do you understand?’

  ‘All right, fine,’ said Tabitha angrily and then tried to calm herself. ‘I mean, yes.’

  He looked across at the prosecuting team.

  ‘This young woman says she is going to conduct her own defence,’ he said. ‘She has been advised against it, but there it is. It’s is your duty to get all the documents in your case to her. Everything. Do you hear?’

  They nodded. The younger man with the clipboard grinned at Tabitha as though she’d just told them all a good joke. She knitted her brows at him and he looked away.

  ‘I don’t want things going astray. At the end of this hearing, I want you to give her contact numbers. She needs to have a CPS liaison officer immediately, is that clear?’

  They nodded.

  ‘How will they contact me?’ asked Tabitha.

  ‘Usually we get in touch by email,’ said the young man.

  ‘I’m in prison.’

  ‘I know.’ He was still smiling.

  ‘You’ll need to use the phone,’ said the judge irritably. ‘See to it. I am setting the trial for Monday the third of June. In up to fifty days from now, Ms Hardy, you will be served with all the evidence. You then need to serve your defence to the prosecution and the court no later than forty days after that.’

  Tabitha gazed at him. She didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.

  ‘Your defence statement, a list of witnesses you want to call, written responses from any professionals. Do you understand?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Of course you don’t: you’re not a lawyer. This is a farce – and a reprehensible waste of time and public money, I might add.’

  He went on speaking. He was saying things about written applications, previous convictions, applications for hearsay, primary and secondary disclosures. Tabitha wasn’t listening or, at least, she wasn’t properly hearing. The words sounded like gibberish to her, and now the crown prosecution solicitors were replying with the same orotund vocabulary. She felt suddenly hollowed out by tiredness.

  ‘Let’s get this over with,’ the judge was saying.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You haven’t entered your plea, Ms Hardy.’

  A woman who had been sitting impassively below the judge stood up. She asked Tabitha to confirm her name, her nationality and her date of birth.

  And then here it came:

  ‘Tabitha Hardy. On count one you are charged with murder. The particulars of the offence are that on Friday the twenty-first of December 2018, you did murder Stuart Rees. Do you plead guilty or not guilty?’

  Tabitha gripped the side of the dock.

  ‘Not guilty,’ she said.

  NINETEEN

  On the way back, enclosed in the van, she wanted to bang her head against the metal walls. She wanted to kick against them. She wanted to punch them. When they arrived back at Crow Grange she was led out of the van. She said to herself that if they strip-searched her again, she would go for one of the warders, leave them something to remember her by, but she was given nothing more than a cursory pat down.

  She was led into the body of the prison and then she walked along the corridor and into the main hall. She kept her head down all the time, staring at the floor in front of her. She had a feeling that if someone looked at her wrong or if she saw someone picked on, she would get involved. She felt a terrible impulse not just to do damage to someone but to be damaged herself, to be beaten up, to be really hurt, just to stop the burning, fizzing feeling inside. She arrived back at her cell, which was empty, and paused only to grab her towel.

  What she normally would have done at a time like this was to walk out of her house, down to the beach and plunge into the sea, the colder and stormier the better. A shower would have to do instead. She pulled her clothes off and stood under the shower and switched it on. Only a few drops fell on to her upturned face. She remembered the advice on her first morning to bang the pipe. She hit it a couple of times and nothing much changed. She hit it harder and harder and then she felt as if something inside her gave way. She grabbed the showerhead above her with both hands and swung from it with her whole weight until it came away. Then she seized the pipe that ran up the wall and pulled. It wouldn’t move, so she put her right foot up on the wall to give her some real purchase and leaned backwards. At first there was nothing, then a creaking sound and then a shattering and she fell back on the floor, pulling the pipe with her. There was a jet of water from where the pipe had snapped. The pipe had bent so the water gushed outwards on to her as she lay on the floor. She heard shouts from either side, the women gathered round her, aghast, though a little impressed. Just for a moment, Tabitha laughed and felt a sense of release that was like nothing she had experienced for weeks and months.

  She wrapped herself in her scratchy towel, gathered her clothes and ran, half naked, back to her cell, her wet feet slapping on the floor. She could hear people shouting, but she didn’t know who they were or what they were saying.

  She pushed open the door and half fell inside. She dropped her clothes – Ingrid’s clothes – to the floor and pulled on some old trousers and a thick shirt. She needed to have a swim, go for a run, walk for miles and miles with a gale in her face. What should she do to get rid of this terrible energy? She jumped up and down, feeling her heart begin to race.

 
; And then the warders came: Mary Guy, of course, and the thin one with a face like vinegar, and someone she’d never seen before who wore an incongruous red bow in her hair.

  ‘Stand back,’ said Mary Guy.

  ‘Get out of here. This is my room,’ said Tabitha. ‘Fuck off and leave me in peace.’

  Mary Guy swept the flat of her hand across Tabitha’s table, scattering all her meagre possessions to the floor.

  ‘You’ve no right!’ yelled Tabitha.

  ‘Really?’ She nodded to the other warders. ‘Carry on with the search,’ she said. ‘You’re coming with me.’

  Tabitha stepped backwards into the room. ‘I’m not.’

  Now the warders were pulling her clothes out of drawers and tossing them on the ground, throwing her books carelessly. Mary Guy gripped the top of her arm so hard that Tabitha gave a grunt of pain.

  ‘Walk,’ she said.

  * * *

  The governor looked impassively at Tabitha. She didn’t ask a question. She didn’t say anything at all. Tabitha just stared back at her. She wasn’t going to apologise. The governor looked at Mary Guy standing beside her.

  ‘She wrecked a shower fitting. Totally destroyed it. Pulled it away from the wall. There’s water everywhere.’

  Deborah Cole took a deep breath. ‘I heard about your court appearance,’ she said.

  There was a pause. Tabitha didn’t reply.

  ‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’ Cole continued.

  ‘I don’t know what to say,’ said Tabitha. ‘It didn’t go the way I expected.’

  ‘You’re planning to defend yourself?’

  ‘I don’t know what else to do.’

  ‘If you want to destroy yourself, that’s none of my business. What is my business is what goes on in this prison.’ Cole pushed her chair back and looked up at the ceiling. She took another deep breath, as if she was forcing herself to stay calm. ‘I don’t think you understand your position.’

  Tabitha was also trying to stay calm. ‘In what way?’

  ‘You think because you’re on remand that you’re somehow not a normal prisoner, that the rules don’t apply to you. Well they do. You’ve committed an act of vandalism.’

  ‘It was not an act of vandalism,’ said Tabitha. ‘That shower has never worked. You have to bang it to get it to work. I banged it and it still didn’t work. I hit it and pulled at it and then it came off the wall.’

  Cole looked past Tabitha at the warder. Tabitha couldn’t see how the warder responded.

  ‘I’m tempted to give you a week or two in solitary confinement,’ said Cole. ‘It might give you a chance to reflect on things.’

  ‘You can’t put me in solitary confinement.’

  Cole’s lips tightened. ‘Really?’ she said. ‘And why not?’

  ‘If I’m doing my own defence, I’m going to need help. I’m going to need a place to work.’

  There was a silence only broken when Cole started drumming her fingers lightly on her desk. When she spoke, it was slowly and distinctly.

  ‘Don’t you ever try to tell me what I can and what I can’t do.’

  Tabitha felt her heart beating fast, so fast that it almost hurt. She could feel the blood racing through her veins, bulging. She was breathing faster, her eyes flickering from side to side. She saw a very slight shift in the governor’s expression, a wince of concern. She understood that she was just very slightly wary of what Tabitha might do next. Was she going to fly at her? Was she going to say something reckless? It felt like a battle of wills and then Tabitha realised, almost with an ache, that it was a battle she could only lose.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, untruthfully. ‘Things have been difficult. It’s been a strange day. I didn’t mean to damage the shower.’ Again, untruthful. ‘But I’m sorry that it happened.’ She swallowed hard. She hated saying this. ‘I want to be cooperative.’

  Cole’s expression was unchanged. ‘It’s not about cooperating. It’s about obeying the rules.’ She paused again. ‘Consider this a warning. I’m making allowances. I won’t do it again.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Tabitha.

  ‘Thank you, ma’am,’ said a voice behind her.

  Tabitha looked round.

  ‘You address the governor as “ma’am”,’ said Mary Guy.

  ‘Ma’am?’ she said. She turned to Deborah Cole and she had a terrible impulse to laugh at the ridiculous theatre of it all and then it made her so angry that she could hardly think. This woman was sitting in her nice office wanting to be called ‘ma’am’ while a few corridors away there were women finding places to cut themselves where it wouldn’t show and someone, somewhere, was looking for a way to end it all.

  ‘Thank you, ma’am,’ she said.

  * * *

  She pushed open the door expecting to walk into a scene of wreckage but instead it was as if the past hour had been a violent dream. All her things were back on the table, in the same positions as they had been before. She pulled open the drawers of her chest. Her clothes had been folded and replaced and as far as Tabitha could remember they were exactly as they had been. Ingrid’s clothes were folded and laid on top of her bed, which had been made.

  She sat down with a little grunt and rubbed her eyes. The door opened and Michaela came in.

  ‘Did you do all this?’ asked Tabitha.

  Michaela shrugged. ‘Things need to be kept neat in such a small space,’ she said.

  ‘You’ve made it identical to how it was.’

  ‘I thought that was best.’

  She’d noticed everything, thought Tabitha: how she rolled her tee shirts; where she put her deodorant, her toothbrush; what order her books were stacked; how she attached her pens to her notebook by the clip on their lids.

  ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  ‘You don’t need to say anything.’

  TWENTY

  Tabitha sat at the table in the library and opened the brown notebook that Shona had bought for her. She smoothed the page flat with the palm of her hand. She took the cap off the top of the blue ballpoint pen and stared at the blank paper. She had absolutely no idea where to begin.

  Yesterday, the judge had instructed the prosecution to hand over all the evidence, and she vaguely remembered something about timetables and stages. After she had stepped down from the dock, legs weak as water, she had given a young man her prison details so that they could keep in touch with her. But until that happened, was she supposed to sit and wait?

  She wrote ‘Friday 21 December’ at the top of her page and underlined it. She drew a snowflake beside it. Perhaps she should begin with everything she could remember about her movements that day. ‘Cold, sleety, wet, never properly light,’ she wrote. She tried to recall what she had told Mora about the day – that she had woken early, but not got out of bed at once; that she had started to make herself porridge, but had run out of milk; that she had gone to the village shop; that she had made herself swim in the inhospitable sea, but she didn’t know at what time; that she thought she might have met people but couldn’t be sure; that Andy had come round when it was already dark, and that was when Stuart’s body had been found.

  She wrote each item down beside a bullet point. The trouble was, it was simply a memory of what she had told Mora, which presumably was itself a memory of what she had told the police, and that had been a memory of what she couldn’t adequately remember.

  Squeezing her eyes shut and pressing her fingers against her temples, she tried to put herself into her house. She imagined walking along the gravel track and through the rickety iron gate that hung askew (she could ask Andy to fix that), up the little path that was muddy in winter, to the grey-stone building with its dilapidated outhouses and the old beech tree to the left that as a child she had imagined climbing. Through the front door, the tiled hall filled with building material, and into the low-ceilinged kitchen with its thick walls, wide windowsills and its view of the sea. The floorboards near the door had been pulled up, ready for her
and Andy to lay new ones. The walls were plastered and unpainted; one day they would be white. There was an open fire that she hadn’t lit that day because she hadn’t found the energy, and beside it a large battered sofa, bought on eBay, where she had been lying, covered in a rug, when Andy had knocked at the door. The back door led out to the main garden, though more a muddy building site than garden at the moment, and to more falling-down sheds. Tabitha forced herself to think of that door swinging open on to the wet December darkness: the pile of boards, Andy crouched on the ground, reaching out for him and feeling the plastic cover under her hands, then the bulk of the body; the blood.

  In her mind she stepped back inside, into the kitchen, then the living room that was uninhabitable at the moment. Up the narrow, winding stairs, past the small bathroom, the guest bedroom stacked high with boxes, up a few more steps and into her room under the eaves. She had chosen it for the view of the sea from its small windows; when the waves were large, you could hear the sea as well.

  In her mind, she stood in front of that window now, and she was looking at the grey water and listening to its distant sigh.

  ‘Tabitha Hardy?’

  The voice made her start. It was a warder, the thin woman with a pinched face who had helped strip-search her.

  ‘Your lawyer is waiting for you in the visitors’ room.’

  ‘She’s not. I don’t have a lawyer.’

  The warder shrugged her sharp shoulders. ‘Whatever. She’s there anyway.’

  * * *

  ‘Why are you here?’ asked Tabitha.

  ‘Hello to you as well,’ said Mora Piozzi. ‘How are you, Tabitha?’

  ‘Confused.’

  ‘I wasn’t happy with how we left things.’

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ said Tabitha. ‘I know you were trying to help.’

  ‘And I’d like to continue trying.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You can’t do this alone, Tabitha.’

  ‘Except I am.’

  ‘You mustn’t. It’s madness.’

  ‘Perhaps I am mad – that’s what you think, isn’t it?’