Chill Factor (24 page)

“Mainly cat C, with a few cat B. The ones making good progress, who we felt would benefit.”

“Is there always a warder present?”

“Yes. Always.”

“But he might have the opportunity to talk with them.”

“I doubt it, Charlie, but what might happen is this: he discusses his case with a fellow remandee, one who is about to go for trial and knows he’ll be coming back. He leaves
D-wing
in the morning to go to court, but has a good idea that he’ll be back in A- or B-wing by the evening. He could offer to have a word with someone he knows in there.”

I said: “Not to put too fine a point on it, Gwen, the
system’s
leaky.”

“Leaky!” she snorted. “Of course it’s leaky. We can’t
prevent
them from talking amongst themselves. What sort of a place do you think this is?”

“It wasn’t meant to be a criticism,” I replied.

I’d underlined four names, and we printed hard copies of their notes. Gwen showed me another file which showed who Silkstone had shared a cell with, and I printed their names and files, too.

Two of them were still there. Gwen used her authority and they both found they had a surprise visitor that
afternoon
. It cost me the price of four teas and four KitKats from the WVS stall to learn that Silkstone was a twat who never stopped complaining. He’d “done over” a nonce, they said, and that made him all right, but half the time they hadn’t known what he was talking about. He had big ideas and never stopped bragging about what he’d do when he was freed. They were both looking at a long time inside, and soon tired of him. I thanked Gwen for her assistance and went home.

One of the other names was Vince Halliwell, who I’d put in the dock eight years ago. According to Gwen’s computer he’d attended the same rehabilitation classes as Silkstone and had recently been transferred to Eboracum open prison, near York. He was nearing the end of his sentence, and
considered
a low risk, even though he was doing time for
aggravated
burglary. Halliwell was a hard case, but I remembered that there was something about him that I’d almost admired. He was tall, with wide bony shoulders and high cheeks, and blond hair swept back into a ponytail. I think it was the ponytail I envied. He had problems. All his life he’d lived in some sort of institution, and he had a record of binge
drinking
, paid for by thieving. The aggravated burglary – armed with a weapon – that we did him for was an escalation in his MO.

At first I hadn’t considered talking to him, but that evening I started to change my mind. He’d refused to
cooperate
when he was arrested, but became garrulous when interviewed for psychiatric, social enquiry and pre-
sentencing
reports. They made sad reading, and he had a chip the size and shape of a policeman on his shoulder. It was hard to blame him. I rang Gwen at home and asked her to oil the wheels for me at HMP Eboracum. Next morning she rang me and said the Governor there was willing to play ball.

It was the probation officer I spoke to. She wasn’t too keen on the idea, but the Governor was the boss…I assured her that Halliwell was a model prisoner, unlikely to blot his record at this late stage in his sentence, and I’d take
responsibility
if it all went pear-shaped. We settled for Friday morning.

When long-stay inmates are nearing the end of their
sentences
the prison authorities like to gradually re-introduce them to life on the outside; to give them a taste of freedom, in small doses. One way is by home visits, another is by what are called town visits. Vince Halliwell had no home to go to, so it would have to be a town visit. I knew he wouldn’t talk to me in jail – somebody always knows it’s a cop who’s called to see you – but he might if I met him on neutral
territory
, away from screws and inmates and the gossip of a closed community.

The probation officer gave him strict instructions and a ten-pound note. It was a tough test. He had to catch the ten o’clock bus from the prison gates into York, walk to the Tesco supermarket, buy himself a pair of socks there, have a cup of coffee in the restaurant and catch the next bus back to the jail. He’d have to walk past all those pubs, all those shelves stocked with whisky and rum and beer from places he’d never heard of, with money jangling in his pockets. Anything less than superhuman effort and he’d be back at Bentley, category A again. At eight thirty, nice and early, I started the car engine and headed towards the Minster City.

I arrived with enough time to do my shopping, which was intentional, and to have a quick breakfast in the restaurant before he arrived, which was an afterthought. Their curries were a pound cheaper than Heckley Sainsbury’s. At ten
thirty
I walked across the car-park towards the road he would come down.

It was a warm morning, with people strolling about in their shirt sleeves and summer dresses. Four-wheel drive vehicles with tyre treads like Centurion tanks slowly
circulated
, following sleek Toyota sports cars and chunky Saabs, all looking for a space near the entrance. In the afternoon they’d do the same outside the health club. The indicators flashed on a BMW like the one that met Chilcott at the
station
, and an elderly couple in front of me steered their
trolley
towards its boot. A few minutes later, out on the main road, they drove past me. The driver’s window was down and I could hear the sound of Pavarotti coming from inside it. BMW spend countless millions of pounds and thousands of hours on wind tunnel tests. They install the finest music system money can buy, with more speakers than an Academy Awards ceremony. They design a climate control – that’s air conditioning to the rest of us – better than in the finest operating theatre in the world, and what happens? People drive around with the window down; that’s what.

I hardly recognised him. Some thrive in prison, put weight on; others are consumed by it. Halliwell’s time inside had reduced him to a shambling shell. Always a gaunt figure, he was now stooped and hollow and looked well into his fifties, although he was only about thirty-six. He crossed the road at the lights, waiting until they were red and then checking that the traffic had stopped, glancing first this way, then the other, but still not moving until everybody else did. He was wearing grey trousers that had been
machine-washed
until they were shapeless, a blue regulation shirt that was almost fashionable, and cheap trainers. His jacket was gripped in one hand. I stood in the queue for the park-
and-ride
bus until he’d passed, then fell in behind him.

There were supermarkets before he went inside, but a man forgets, and the rest of us take progress, if that’s what it is, for granted. He stopped to examine the rows of parked trolleys as if they were an outlandish life-form engaged in group sex, and stared at the big revolving doors as they
gobbled
up and regurgitated a steady stream of shoppers. Slowly, nervously, he made his way into the store.

The security cameras were probably focused on this
suspicious
, shabbily dressed character who wandered about aimlessly, occasionally changing direction for no reason at all, picking up packets and jars at random only to replace them after reading the labels, but nobody challenged me. How Barry Moynihan had followed Chilcott for eight or nine hours dressed like he was, without being spotted, I couldn’t imagine. After a good look up and down the rows Halliwell selected a pair of socks and took them to the checkout. I replaced the jar of Chicken Tonight I was
studying
– 0.4g of protein, 7.7g of fat – and headed for the
restaurant
.

It was a serve-yourself coffee machine with scant
instructions
. Halliwell watched a couple of people use it before
having
a hesitant attempt himself. His first try dumped a shot of coffee essence and hot water through the grill, then a woman took over and showed him how to do it. He smiled and made an “I’m only a useless man” gesture and allowed her to pass him in the queue at the till. For a few seconds I was afraid they would sit down together, but she had two cups on her tray and joined a waiting friend at one of the tables. Halliwell headed for an empty table in a corner. I collected a tea and joined him.

“It’s Vince, isn’t it?” I said, sitting down.

He looked at me, speechless, for a long time. His eyes were frosty blue, and the ponytail had given way to a
regulation
crop that still, annoyingly, looked good on him. He could have been a jazz musician on his way home from a gig,
or a dissolute character actor researching a part. He had, I decided, that elusive quality known as sex appeal. His jacket was draped across his knees. He fumbled in the pockets until he found a tobacco pouch, and in a few seconds he was
puffing
on a roll-up.

“What you want?” he asked, eventually, as a cloud of smoke bridged the gap between us. A woman who was about to sit at the next table saw it and moved away.

“I was just passing,” I lied.

“Like ’ell you were. It’s Priest, innit? Mr Priest?”

“Charlie when I’m off duty.”

“You still with the job, then?”

“’Fraid so.”

“So this is all part of it, is it?”

“Part of what?”

“The test. This is all part of the test?”

“Oh yes,” I agreed. “This is all part of it. All over York there are people from your past who are going to pop out in front of you, confront you with situations to see how you react. Then there are the markers. Women with clip boards and coloured pens, following you, giving you marks for style, difficulty and performance. So far you’re doing well.”

He grinned, saying: “They always said you were a bit of a card. Did you set all this up? If you did, you’re wasting your time.”

He stood up to leave, but I said: “Sit down, Vince, and hear what I have to say.” He sat down again. That’s what eight years inside does to a man.

The roll-up was down to his fingertips. He nipped it and looked for an ashtray but there wasn’t one, so he put the debris back in the pouch and made another.

“Could you eat a breakfast?” I asked.

“Not at your prices,” he replied.

“No charge. My treat.”

“No, thanks all the same.”

“It comes on a real plate, made of porcelain, with a knife
that cuts.”

“I’ll do without.”

I said: “Listen, Vince. It’s not going to be easy for you. You’ll need all the help you can get, so if someone offers you a free breakfast, take it. That’s my advice.” “You weren’t so generous with your ’elp and advice eight years ago,” he reminded me. “You knew…well, what’s the point.” He left the statement hanging there, dangling like the rope from a swinging tree.

“I knew it wasn’t your gun. Is that what you were going to say?”

“And the rest.” He twisted around in his chair until he was half-facing away from me.

“It wasn’t my job to tell the court it wasn’t your gun,” I said. “It was your brief ’s. It was yours. You could have said whose it was.”

“And a fat lot of good it would ’ave done me.”

“It’d have got you five years instead of ten. Aggravated burglary’s a serious offence.”

“You knew it wasn’t mine. I’ve never carried a shooter, and you knew it.”

“There’s always a first time, Vince. I wanted you to get fifteen years; keep you out of my hair for as long as possible. Now you’re doing full term because you’ve refused to admit it was your gun. It’s your choice all along, Vince. Take responsibility for your actions. Now, tell me this: How do you like your sausages?”

A youth in a white shirt was hovering near us. I looked up at him and he said: “I’m sorry, Sir, but this is the
no-smoking
area.” Halliwell looked annoyed but nipped the tip of his cigarette.

I said to him: “Go sit over there. I’ll fetch you a
breakfast
,” and he carried his coffee to a table with an ashtray on it.

I kept a weather eye on him as I stood in the queue, but he sat patiently waiting, occasionally sipping the coffee, his
glance following the succession of people who moved away from the pay point carrying trays and leading toddlers. I placed the plate of food in front of him and walked off towards the cigarette kiosk without waiting for a thank you. When I flipped the packet of Benson and Hedges on to the table, saying: “If you must poison me, do it with something reasonable,” he grinned and said: “Right. Cheers.”

I sipped the fresh tea I’d brought myself as he ate the first food he’d had in eight years that he could be sure nobody had dipped their dick in. When he’d half-cleared the plate he said: “You not eating, then?”

“I had mine before you came,” I replied.

He manoeuvred a piece of egg white on to a corner of toast and bit it off. “So this is all a fit-up, eh? You arranged the whole thing,” he mumbled.

“I thought you’d appreciate a day out,” I replied.

“You’re wasting your time.”

I shrugged. “It’s a day out for me, too.”

“I’m sticking to my story.”

“That you didn’t know the name of the bloke with you. You planned a burglary with him, did the job together, and never asked each other’s names.”

He took a cigarette from the packet and lit it. “Yeah, well,” he said, exhaling. “That’s how it was.”

“And you don’t grass each other.”

“That’s right.”

“He’d have grassed you. They always do.”

“Not always.”

“You were a fool, Vince. A twenty-four carat mug, believe me.”

“Yeah, well, I can sleep at nights.”

I changed the subject. “How does Eboracum compare with Bentley?” I asked.

“It’s OK,” he replied.

“Only OK? I’d have thought it would be a big
improvement
.”

“Oh, it is. It’s just that, at Bentley, you knew where you stood, what the rules were, if you follow me. At this place, you’re never sure. Some of the screws say one thing, then another will say summat different. ’Ere, what time is it? I’d better be getting back.”