by Caro Savage
‘It’s Amber, isn’t it?’ said Bailey.
‘That’s right,’ smiled Amber.
‘What happened?’
Amber hesitated a few moments, her face becoming serious. ‘Dead inmate. One of the building contractors found her in the Old Tread-Wheel House.’
‘Who was she?’
‘Her name was Sarah Prebble. She had a little blonde topknot. You might have seen her around.’
‘You mean Poodle?’ said Sharon from her bunk.
Bailey remembered her distinctive hairstyle. She realised Poodle must be the nickname for the girl with the track marks that she’d noticed in the shower, the one who’d told her to fuck off in the canteen. The junkie.
‘She was murdered, wasn’t she?’ said Bailey. ‘That’s why all the police were here.’
Amber looked around uneasily. ‘We haven’t really been told anything yet, but yes, it looks that way.’
‘Poodle got murdered?!’ said Sharon. ‘No way!’
‘What happened?’ asked Bailey.
‘We’re not supposed to talk about it.’
‘Oh come on. You must know something.’
‘Yeah give us the juicy details,’ said Sharon.
Amber sighed. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘From what I’ve heard, it was pretty unpleasant. And that’s all I can tell you at this stage.’
Bailey watched her walk off along the landing unlocking the cells.
Unpleasant. What did that mean exactly?
20
‘What it means,’ said the Governor, surveying the roomful of prison officers, ‘is that you all need to keep an extra-special eye out for anything which appears in the least bit suspicious.’
‘But you still haven’t answered my question,’ said Maggie. ‘Is this murder linked in any way to the one in the laundry? By all accounts—’
‘We won’t know anything for certain until the autopsy’s been done,’ said the Governor firmly. ‘So there’s no point speculating about it. Anyhow, it’s not your job or my job to be thinking about such things. That’s the job of the police. That’s why they’re here.’
At the mention of the police, a low series of resentful groans rumbled across the room.
‘Your job,’ the Governor continued, ‘is to maintain security and order within the prison.’
‘But how can we do that if the tools that we have at our disposal are inadequate?’ Terry griped. ‘We can barely protect ourselves, let alone the inmates. Not to mention the fact that we’re seriously understaffed and seriously overstretched. Is it any wonder that this kind of thing is happening?’
He crossed his arms and stared defiantly at the Governor. The Governor glared back at him. The room fell into a tense silence at their stand-off.
Amber glanced around. Dylan was sitting a few seats away. As usual, he was looking bored and faintly amused by it all. He raised his sandy-coloured eyebrows at her in mock alarm. She couldn’t help but smile. The daily morning briefings never seemed to go by without some kind of confrontation between Terry and the Governor.
The Governor pulled his attention away from Terry to address them all. ‘I had a meeting with the lead detective on the case. And if there’s one thing we both agree on, it’s that we want to do our best to keep all of this out of the media. From the police’s perspective, they don’t need loads of journalists clogging up their investigation. And from our perspective, a media frenzy could create unnecessary panic and disorder inside the prison, and that’s one thing we definitely don’t need.’
Amber observed him cynically. She and the rest of them knew very well that what the Governor was really concerned about was looking bad in front of his superiors in the Home Office.
He scoured the room. ‘So I don’t want any of you talking to any journalists,’ he said. ‘And I don’t want you discussing any of the details of these murders with the inmates; the less they know the better. Understood?’
21
It was visiting time and the cries and laughter of children rang through the air. Bailey stood in the doorway of the visit hall and scanned the crowded room. Apparently a good third of the inmates in here had children. There was a mother and baby unit in D-Wing for inmates who were admitted when pregnant, but for most of them this was the only opportunity they got to see their kids.
Bailey herself had never felt the maternal urge. At least not yet, and she figured that if it was going to happen, she probably would have done something about it by now, going by what her friends and contemporaries from school and college were up to. Most of them were now married and in the process of starting families, and she’d grown sick of going round their houses to coo over yet another new baby. That was probably why she had got on so well with Alice. They had shared much the same attitude towards relationships and kids. Birds of a feather…
She spotted Frank sitting over in the far corner of the visit hall, as far removed from the other visitors as he could manage in the busy room. She navigated her way through the tables and sat down opposite him. He smiled at her, his watery eyes cool and emotionless as usual. He was wearing casual clothes – a black leather jacket and faded jeans – and she was relieved that he didn’t look too much like a policeman. She wasn’t too worried about anyone in here recognising him from his undercover days as those were long behind him and he was now mainly office-based.
She glanced at the table next to them, concerned that they might be in earshot. It was occupied by a young couple who were barely in their twenties. On his knee the man was balancing a vacant-looking toddler that had strings of drool coming out of its mouth. Both parents were talking intently to each other, stroking hands, gazes locked, clearly still in love and very much oblivious to anything going on around them.
‘So how’s Dad?’ said Bailey in a slightly louder voice than she needed to. ‘Is his back still playing up?’
‘Yes, now and then,’ said Frank, a completely fake smile frozen onto the lower half of his face. ‘He misses you, you know.’
She nodded to herself, satisfied that the young couple weren’t paying them the slightest bit of interest. She fixed her attention on Frank and lowered her voice.
‘I’ve only been in here a week and someone’s been murdered already. A junkie by the name of Poodle.’
Frank’s fake smile dissolved away, his face reverting to its usual cold and impassive expression. ‘Poodle?’
‘I mean Sarah Prebble. Her nickname was Poodle. Because of her little blonde topknot.’
‘Oh right. Well, she doesn’t have that any more.’ He glanced around to check no one was listening. ‘Preliminary autopsy results strongly indicate that she was scalped.’
Bailey nodded slowly, a strange tingling feeling coming over her.
‘Exactly the same signature as with Alice’s murder.’ She paused. ‘Are you going to tell me Poodle was an undercover cop as well?’
‘No, she most certainly wasn’t. But I’m guessing that there must be some kind of connection between the two murders. Same perpetrator or perpetrators.’
‘How much do the press know? It’s the kind of thing they’d jump on in an instant.’
‘For the time being, we’re withholding specific details of the mutilations. Standard procedure with this kind of thing.’
‘I’m sure it’ll get out eventually. For one thing, the inmates can’t stop talking about it. It’s the kind of thing that spreads like wildfire in here. One was bad enough. But two? I think they’re getting kind of scared now.’
He shrugged and fixed her with his cold watery gaze. ‘Any leads on the drugs ring? Remember your priorities.’
At that very moment, a prison officer walked slowly past them, eyeing them vigilantly as part of his duty to make sure that no visitors were attempting to transfer illegal contraband to the inmates.
‘I hear Uncle John’s just bought a new lawnmower,’ said Bailey.
‘That’s right. It’s got a cylinder blade instead of a rotary blade, which means he can cut his lawn in these
neat little light- and dark-coloured strips.’
They both tracked the movement of the prison officer who had now wandered out of hearing range, then leant in to face each other once more.
‘I found the cellmate. Melanie Clarke. But like you said, she didn’t seem all that coherent. I don’t think I’m going to get much out of her.’
Frank sighed. She could tell he was disappointed with her progress.
‘But…’ she said, ‘her mates did tell me where I could buy some drugs, so I’m going to try and get hold of some tomorrow. Hopefully it’ll lead to something specific.’
‘Time is money, and money only lasts so long. If you don’t find out something soon, the drugs squad will pull the plug on the operation.’
She paused and looked around the visit hall at all the inmates chatting to their friends and relatives.
‘You know… just because Poodle was a junkie and an inmate, she was still a human being. Try not to lose sight of that fact with your government drugs targets. I mean, surely her family must be pretty upset about it.’
‘Sadly it’s proving hard to find someone who actually gave a shit about her. She spent most of her life in care and what family she does have look to be even bigger junkies and wasters than she was. Listen, the murder investigation team are doing all they can. The prison authorities have searched this place from top to bottom twice now and come up empty.’
‘I’m not surprised. It’s like a maze in here. Too many dark corners. And security’s a shambles. Too many inmates, not enough staff.’
‘I hope you’re not trying to make excuses. You know how much I hate excuses.’
22
Bailey lay on her bunk in the darkness, eyes open, looking up at the ceiling. The lights were now off and they had been locked in for the night. The springs creaked as Sharon shifted position on the bunk below.
Wide awake, Bailey was contemplating her next move, trying to work out how Poodle’s murder fitted into the wider picture. Did it simplify things or did it complicate them?
Sharon’s voice drifted up from below.
‘Who was that visiting you today?’ she asked.
Bailey felt a small pinch of anxiety. She hadn’t noticed Sharon in the visit hall. It just went to show that you never knew who might be watching you when you weren’t aware. You couldn’t afford to let your cover slip for one moment.
She resisted the urge to tell Sharon that it was none of her business.
‘He’s my brother,’ she answered.
There was a brief pause.
‘You don’t look alike. His nose is way bigger than yours for one thing.’
Bailey sighed inwardly. This inmate was too inquisitive by half.
‘He got his mum’s nose. He’s my half-brother. Same father, different mothers.’
‘Oh.’
Sharon went quiet. Bailey hoped that the explanation was sufficient. Not being able to see Sharon’s face, it was hard to know what she was thinking.
There was no noise from the bunk below for a few minutes. Hopefully she had gone to sleep.
‘How did you get those scars?’ said Sharon.
No such luck.
‘I’d rather not talk about it.’
‘Sorry I asked.’
‘No problem.’
Another pause. Just long enough for Bailey to think that she actually had gone to sleep this time, when she spoke up again.
‘What did you do with the money?’
‘What money?’ Bailey was confused.
‘The money you stole when you were an accountant. You told me you stole a load of money, right?’
Bailey cursed herself for her slow uptake. ‘Oh, that money.’
‘Yeah. That money. Did you give it back?’
‘Yes. I had to.’
‘You must have spent some of it surely? Why steal it otherwise?’
Bailey paused. She wasn’t enjoying this interrogation. Why couldn’t Sharon just go to sleep?
‘Yeah, of course I spent some.’
‘So what did you buy then?’
‘Oh… handbags, shoes, that kind of thing. Stuff I couldn’t normally afford. Louis Vuitton, Kurt Geiger, y’know.’
‘Nice. How much did you nick?’
Bailey couldn’t work out if Sharon’s questions were innocent curiosity or if she was angling for something somehow. Either way, she knew she had to be careful.
‘It was in the thousands.’
‘Tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands?’
‘Enough to put me away for four years.’
‘Keeping it close to your chest, huh?’ Sharon laughed. ‘I bet you squirrelled some of it away somewhere. Some cash buried in the woods wrapped in plastic?’
‘No. I told you, I had to give it all back.’
‘If I’d been in your situation, I would have invested in property.’
‘They would have confiscated it.’
‘Not if you’d bought it in Northern Cyprus. That’s the place to buy property with illegal cash. And there’s no extradition treaty either.’
‘Thanks for the tip.’
‘Remember it for next time, eh?’
23
Amber gazed idly at the three multiplexer monitors which filled the entire span of one wall of the CCTV control room. Each monitor was subdivided into twelve mini-screens, each of those in turn connected to a camera somewhere in the prison complex. There were no windows in the control room, and this gave it a vaguely claustrophobic feel, but with so many things to pay attention to on the screens, they would have presented an unnecessary distraction anyhow.
All of the prison officers were required to work shifts in the control room. Some of them enjoyed it, seeing it as a cushy job, the opportunity to watch television for several hours. Amber had initially found it quite intriguing from a voyeuristic perspective, however the novelty had soon dulled. When you watched normal television, there was usually a story of some sort to maintain your interest. In here, however, much of the activity displayed on the screens was incredibly mundane and repetitive. And it got boring pretty quickly.
From her vantage point in her swivel chair, she could see what was happening all over the prison at that exact moment in time. A group of inmates loitering around on one of the landings, laughing and joking amongst themselves. Two of her colleagues leading a nervous new inmate from the back of a prison van. A brood of crying children being scolded by their incarcerated mother in the crowded visit hall. A chaotic and argumentative game of football in the prison yard. And so on. And so forth.
Directly in front of her was a spot monitor where she could view the feed from a specific camera in larger detail. Using the keyboard on the desk, she could switch between cameras and different locations within the prison, and she could also operate the cameras, tilting, panning and zooming them as necessary. That was perhaps the only fun bit – being able to zoom in on people without them knowing that you were doing so.
During her induction a few weeks previously, Maggie had brought her in here and explained how it all worked.
‘The cameras give real-time coverage of what’s going on in the prison, and all of it is recorded onto this hard drive.’ She’d gestured at the computer terminal on the desk. ‘We archive the footage for twenty-eight days, then it’s overwritten automatically. It’s time-stamped and it’s admissible as evidence in court, so it’s good if you want to check back on a particular incident, and it’s also handy if an inmate accuses you of something you didn’t do.
‘Obviously, we can’t hope to monitor every square inch of the place. That would be impossible in a huge old Victorian building like this with all its millions of nooks and crannies. Anyhow, it would be counterproductive to try and see everywhere as there are a limited number of screens in here and there’s only ever one person manning them at any particular time. So we stick the cameras in places where we think incidents are most likely to occur, and also in places where overall security is particularly important.’
‘The gatehouse and the reception area – so we can see who’s coming in and out of the prison; the landings and the common areas, such as the atrium, the canteen and the yard – to cut down on general misbehaviour and to increase safety for the inmates and for us as well; the main corridors, walkways and stairwells, as well as all the major entrances and exits – to monitor inmates’ movements; the visit hall – to deter visitors from passing over contraband; the segregation block – to monitor dangerous or vulnerable inmates; the perimeter wall – to prevent people from escaping; and the medical unit – as those who are at risk of self-harm or suicide are often kept there.
‘Of course, there are plenty of blind spots. There always will be. I’m sure the more wily inmates are aware of those. But, generally speaking, we’ve got most of the important locations pretty well covered.
‘The bits of the prison which don’t have any surveillance, or which have very limited surveillance, are those areas where we think incidents are less likely to occur, either because they’re normally quite well-staffed or because the inmates are engaged in structured activities which keep them occupied and out of trouble.’
Since the murder of Sarah Prebble, a.k.a. Poodle, the Governor had specified that all of the prison officers, especially those working in the control room, maintain an increased vigilance for anything appearing remotely suspicious.
Amber dutifully scanned the multiple mini-screens – up, down, left, right – skimming back and forth across the entire prison complex. How would she know ‘suspicious’ when she saw it? Everything looked normal. Monotonously so.
Her attention paused on one of the mini-screens at the bottom left of the central multiplexer monitor. It was displaying several inmates standing around on one of the upper landings at the central point where the four wings of the prison converged. She squinted at it more closely. She recognised one of them as Bailey Pike, the inmate who’d been victimised in the canteen, the one who she’d intervened to help.