Purgatory: A Prison Diary Volume 2 (18 page)

‘But they could take the gems abroad and make a fortune?’
‘Most peasants,’ says Sergio, ‘have never travelled further than the next
village, and none of them speaks anything but mountain Spanish, which even I
can’t understand. Even the owner of the mountain can still only converse in his
native tongue and would never consider leaving Colombia. It is only because of
my four years in an English jail,’ continues Sergio, ‘that it’s now possible
for me to act as a go-between and consider the export business. And you now
also have an advantage, Jeffrey, because your rivals cannot easily buy or sell
paintings from Colombia.’ I raise an eyebrow. ‘I am being deported in four
weeks’ time, and can never return to Britain unless I am willing to risk
completing the remaining four years of my sentence.’ ‘An enterprising dealer
could always fly to Bogota.’ ‘Not wise,’ says Sergio. ‘Fair-haired, blue-eyed
people are not welcome in Bogota, and especially not on the mountain.’ He goes
on to explain: ‘It would be assumed that you are an American, and your chances
of making it back to the airport would be about as good as a peasant caught
stealing.’ No wonder it’s a closed market.

My tutorial comes to an end when an officer bellows, ‘Lock
up.’ I run out of Sergio’s cell to return to the real world, because I need the
five minutes to join the queue and change my sheets, pillowcase, towels and gym
kit. Don’t forget it’s Wednesday, and if you don’t get to the laundry room
before they close, you have to wait another week.

When I get back to my cell I find a biography of Oscar Wilde
by Sheridan Morley awaiting me on my bed. I had asked Steve (conspiracy to
murder, chief librarian) to reserve this book for me.
Nothing
like a personal delivery service.

I become so engrossed in Wilde’s life that I miss the Ten
O’clock News. I have reached Oscar’s first trial by the time I put the book
down. I must save the second trial for tomorrow night.

Not a bad day, but please don’t think, even for one moment,
that it’s therefore been a good one.

I arrive for my pottery class to find it’s been cancelled
because the teacher hasn’t turned up. Shaun tells me this is a regular
occurrence, and he seems to be the only person who is disappointed because he
was hoping to finish a painting. It gives me another couple of hours to write, while
the other prisoners are happy to go off to the gym or their cells while still
being paid £1.40.

I hear a cry of ‘library’ bellowed down the corridor and, as
I’ve just come to the end of another chapter of Oscar Wilde, decide to take a break
and return Arts and Artists. I now know my way around the library and go
straight to the art shelves. I select a book entitled Legendary Gemsby Eric
Bruton and add a novel by Robert Goddard.

When I return to my cell I find my laundry is waiting in a neat
pile, washed and dried. I look up to see Darren standing on my chair, clipping
up a new curtain rail.

‘Let me warn you’ he says as he climbs back down off the
chair, ‘you can’t hang yourself from a prison curtain rail.’

‘I hadn’t given the idea much thought, but why not?’ I ask,
opening my notebook.

‘Because it just clips on, so if you attached a noose to the
rail and then jumped off the chair, you’d land on the floor wrapped up in your
curtain.’

‘So how can I hang myself?’ I demand.

‘You should have done it at your remand prison’ Darren
replies.

‘I’m not sure I understand.’

‘Most remand prisons are of a Victorian vintage, and have
high-level barred windows making the job that much easier.’

‘But I was only there for a few days.’

There are more hangings in the first few days in jail than
at any other time.’

‘Why?’

‘Often the psychological impact of
entering prison for the first time causes deep depression, and that’s when a
prisoner sees suicide as the only way out.’

‘So it’s less common once you’ve been transferred?’

‘Yes, but I knew a prisoner who still found an original way
to kill himself.’ I continue to scribble away. He was in a cell with a one-up
and one-down, and when his room-mate went to work and he was left alone for the
rest of the morning he stood the bed up on its end, so that the rail was about
seven feet from the ground. He used his belt as a noose, and attached it to the
top railing. He then climbed on top, placed his hands in the back of his jeans,
rolled off the bed and hanged himself. On the table they found a letter from
his girlfriend saying she couldn’t wait for three years. If you want to kill
yourself, you can always find a way,’ Darren adds matter of factly. ‘Each year
the Prison Service publishes statistics on how many inmates commit suicide.
There were ninety-two in 2001’ says Darren, just before he leaves to continue
his rounds. ‘However, what they don’t tell you is how many people die, or
commit suicide within six months of being released.’ I slowly unpack my washing
and stack it on the narrow shelves while I consider what Darren has just told
me.

After lunch I pick up Legendary Gems and turn to the chapter
on emeralds. Everything Sergio has told me during the past ten days is verified
by the author, which gives me more confidence in Sergio. However, two crucial
questions remain: does Sergio have the right contacts and can he replace the
middlemen? I am pleased to see that Laurence Graff warrants three mentions in
the diamond chapter.

To date I haven’t mentioned Laurence Graff (of Graff’s of
Bond Street, Madison Avenue and Monte Carlo), but I’m rather hoping he will
agree to value the gem for me. Laurence and I first met at a charity function
many years ago when I was the auctioneer. Since then he and his wife,
Anne-Marie, have told me many stories about the diamond trade which have found
their way into my books. It was Laurence who gave me the idea for the short
story ‘Cheap at Half the Price’.

Jimmy rushes into my cell with a large grin on his face. He
scowls at Darren’s new curtain rail, immediately aware of who must have
supplied it.

‘I am the bearer of glad tidings,’ he says. ‘A prisoner on
our spur will be leaving tomorrow morning, a week earlier than originally
planned. He keeps the cleanest cell on the block. He’s even decorated it, and
best news of all, it’s on the quiet side of the spur, so you’d better have a
word with Meanwell before someone else grabs it.’

I’m just about to go off in search of Mr Meanwell, when
Jimmy adds, ‘He’s off today, but he’s back on tomorrow morning at 7.30, and
don’t forget you’ve got the special needs group at 8.45, so you’d better see
him straight after breakfast.’ Darren walks in, livid to find Jimmy sitting on
the end of my bed. He’s obviously picked up the same piece of information and
had hoped to be the first to impart it.

‘I think you’ll find my information was as welcome as your
curtain rail,’ suggests Jimmy smugly.

‘Only if his lordship ends up getting David’s cell,’ says
Darren, well aware that I am playing them against each other. Still, like two
children, they find the challenge irresistible.

After supper, Sergio reveals good news. Having visited the
mountain, his brother has selected a 4-carat emerald at a cost of $10,000.

‘If my contact confirms that its shop value is twenty
thousand, then I’ll buy it,’ I tell him. ‘If not…’ Sergio looks up and frowns.
‘Purchase the emerald,’ I continue, ‘and have it sent to London. I’ll need
proper certification, but if my valuer says he can sell me a stone of the same
quality at the same price or cheaper, it will all have been a waste of your
time, and I’ll return the stone to Colombia at my expense.’

‘My whole reputation rests on this one stone?’ Sergio asks.

‘You’ve got it,’ I tell him.

Breakfast.
I eat my cereal out of a
china bowl, my toast on a plate and drink my milk from a mug. Mary has selected
the plate and bowl from the Bridgewater collection and the beaker – a garish
object covered in the American stars and stripes – was a gift
Will
brought back from the States.

When I’ve finished my breakfast I fill my washbasin with hot
water and Fairy Liquid, allowing my newly acquired treasures to soak while I go
off in search of Mr Meanwell. The block’s senior officer has been off for two
days, so was unaware that David had been released six days early, and that his
cell on the enhanced wing has suddenly become available. He’ll let me know what
he’s decided later today.

I return to my cell and find a gathering of West Indians in
the corridor. They’ve come to say farewell to a prisoner who is leaving this
morning, having served six years of a nine-year sentence for armed robbery –
his first offence.

Most of you reading this will have already formed a picture
of him in your mind, as I would have done only a couple of months ago. A young
black thug who’s better off locked up, and who will probably beat up some other
innocent person the moment he’s released and be back in prison within a year.

In fact, he is thirty-two years old, five foot eight, slim
and good-looking. He was the one who politely asked if he could read my
newspapers every evening. And he has used his six years productively. First to
pass his GCSEs (five) and two years later
A
levels in
English and History.

No sooner has he departed than Jules appears in the corridor
carrying a plastic bag full of his worldly goods. He is taking over Steve’s
cell. He tells me that the past week has not been a happy one because he’s had
to share our old cell with a heroin addict who was injecting himself two,
sometimes three times a day.

On Friday mornings the gym is taken over by the special
needs group. They’re
an enthusiastic bunch who, despite their
problems, bring
a range of skills and boundless energy to everything
they do. Les performs well on the rowing machine (1,000m in ten minutes), while
Robbie enjoys lifting weights and Paul prefers to run. But when it comes to the
game of catchball that we always play at the end of any session, Robbie can
catch anything that comes his way. He could, and would, happily field in the
slips for England.

All of them are chatterboxes, and demand answers to their
endless questions. Do you have a father? Do you have a mother? Do you have any
brothers or sisters? Are you married? Do you have any children? By the end of
the hour’s session, I am physically and mentally exhausted, and full of
admiration for their carer, Ann, who spends every waking moment with them.

At the end of the session, I watch them leave, chatting,
laughing and – I hope – happier. There, but for the grace of God…

Mr Nutbourne opens the cell door. ‘You’re moving again,
Jeffrey,’ he says. ‘You’ve been allocated David’s old cell on the enhanced
spur.’ He winks.

Thank you,’ I reply, and prepare for my ninth move in six
weeks. The whole process takes less than an hour, because on this occasion I’m
assisted by a local removal company: Darren, Sergio and Jimmy Ltd.

My new cell is on the ground floor with the enhanced
prisoners. Number seventeen is opposite Darren’s cell,
who
has Steve (conspiracy to murder and librarian) on one side, and Jimmy (Ecstasy
courier, captain of everything) on the other. The officers describe it as the
grown-up spur, and personally select who will be allowed to reside there. To
have made it in three weeks is considered quite an achievement, although Darren
managed it in four days.

The cells are exactly the same size as in any other part of
the prison, but the table on which I’m now working is far larger (four feet by
two). I also have an extra cupboard for my possessions, which seem to grow as
each day passes, not unlike when you’re on holiday.

Once I’ve completed my move, I join Darren and Sergio for a
walk in the exercise yard. I stop halfway round to watch Shaun sketching Dale.
He is still proving to be a restless model, but despite this Shaun is producing
a good likeness of him.

After supper I call Mary (my new spur has a phone of its
own, which any self-respecting estate agent would describe as ‘an added
amenity’). She’s full of news, some good, some not so good. The police confirm
that they will not be presenting their report on the Simple Truth until they’ve
read the findings of the KPMG report. This won’t be handed in to the Red Cross
for at least another two, perhaps three weeks. Mary tells me that the police
reply to Tony Morton-Hooper’s letter was not unhelpful, and she hopes that once
the KPMG report is finished, it will only be a matter of days before they move
me to an open prison.

I use the remainder of my twenty units catching up with all things
domestic, particularly what is happening at the Old Vicarage. When the
phonecard flicks out, indicating I have only thirty seconds left, I promise to
call again on Sunday. Don’t forget, I no longer have an endless source of
cards.

As soon as I replace the receiver, Sergio takes over the
phone. He has the advantage of being able to hold a conversation in a language
no one else on the spur can eavesdrop on, but the disadvantage of needing at
least five phonecards every time he dials home.

When Sergio has finished his call, he joins me in my cell.
Now that we’re on the same spur, it’s no longer necessary for me to try and
pretend I’m learning Spanish – he’s just another prisoner from across the
corridor.

Sergio’s brother has selected four emeralds for
consideration. He confirms they range in price from ten to fifteen thousand
dollars. Once he has made the final choice, I will await a valuation from my
expert. His brother claims that any one of the gems would retail on the London
market at around $20,000. If this proves to be accurate, then I’ll be happy to
purchase the selected gem and give it to Mary as her Christmas present. Ah,
you’ve finally discovered why I’m going to all this trouble.