Daisy in Chains (15 page)

DR RIDELL: What is that you’re making? (By this time, the origami figure was taking shape, but it was difficult to see what it was supposed to depict.)

HAMISH WOLFE: A weasel.

DR RIDELL: Have you ever hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it?

HAMISH WOLFE: Yes.

(I think it worth pointing out that Wolfe’s demeanour changed at this point. I saw what appeared to be genuine regret on his face.)

DR RIDELL: Can you tell me about it?

HAMISH WOLFE: No.

DR RIDELL: How do you feel when people ask you about the four victims? Do you think they deserve what happened to them?

HAMISH WOLFE: Apart from the fact that they led to my being here, I don’t think about them at all. They don’t come on to my radar screen.

DR RIDELL: You’re saying you don’t think of them as people?

HAMISH WOLFE: I’m saying I only think of them in terms of
how they affect me. And, yes, I do appreciate that I’ve just described a classic symptom of psychopathy.

DR RIDELL: Would you describe yourself as a psychopath?

HAMISH WOLFE: Dick, I’m going to save you some time. I am not, at this moment in time, nor have I ever in the past, suffered from any form of mental illness. I’m sure you’ve checked my medical records already. If you haven’t, fucking shame on you, you don’t deserve the grossly overinflated fee that you guys charge for the pieces of piss you call psychiatric assessments. Nor am I psychotic. I don’t hear voices. There is no chip in my head. I have never been abducted by aliens. I was not sexually abused as a child, nor did I torture small animals. I fully understand the concepts of right and wrong and know only too well that if I fuck around with the law of the land, the law of the land is likely to jump up and bite me on the arse. Now, take your weasel, and fuck off out of here.

End of transcript.

It would be dishonest of me to say that I was satisfied with the outcome of my interview with Hamish Wolfe. I found him uncooperative, angry and aggressive. What I can say with some confidence is that he understands well the concept of being fit to stand trial and has, in his own words, declared himself to be so. I have nothing to add.

PROPERTY OF AVON AND SOMERSET POLICE. Ref: 544/45.2 Hamish Wolfe.

IT IS STILL
only the second week in December and yet cell 43, corridor 2, H wing of Parkhurst Prison is as festive as the Christmas aisle in Poundland, and every bit as tacky. Paper chains run from the central light fitting to the four corners of the room and drape the window bars like a climbing vine. More chains festoon the length of the two bunks and paper baubles dangle from the ceiling. A man called Phil James is perched in the corner, folding and sticking narrow strips of red and green paper.

‘OK, Mr Sahid.’ Wolfe is on his feet, looking down at the Pakistani man on his bed. ‘I need to have a look at your backside.’

The whites of Sahid’s eyes have turned yellow, his skin has the look of ageing leather. He is in his mid fifties, could be a decade older. He has been in this place for five years. He is unlikely, ever, to leave.

‘You better not try anything.’ Sahid doesn’t move. His two henchmen, their bodies as solid as the door they’re guarding, don’t take their eyes off him for a second.

‘I’ll try to restrain myself.’ Wolfe takes the single step that will bring him to the washbasin and soaps his hands. When he turns back, Sahid hasn’t moved.

‘It’s entirely up to you, Mr Sahid. I’m sure you’ll get an appointment with Dr Evans next week.’

‘What do you think it is?’

‘I don’t speculate, Mr S., I diagnose. I’ve got others waiting if you’ve changed your mind. How many out there, Phil?’

Wolfe’s cellmate looks up from his chain-making. ‘Seven, last time I checked, Doc. Kids on C wing have been spliff-banging again.’

Wolfe shakes his head. ‘Give me strength.’ Spliff-banging is the latest craze to hit the prison. Youngsters film themselves punching each other, in a sick, ritualistic fashion, with the violence tolerated because it will be rewarded later by cannabis. They bring the broken noses, the split lips, to Wolfe to fix up.

‘If you’re not going to show me your bottom, Mr S., I’ll wish you good morning. When you see Dr Evans, tell him I’m not happy about the yellowing in your scleras. If you were a drinker, I’d worry about liver damage. As it is, gallstones would be my best guess.’

These daily surgeries annoy the hell out of the prison doctor.

The small, slim man, who is probably the most powerful and feared in Parkhurst Prison, glares. ‘No one comes in.’ He barks the order at his bodyguards, who turn their backs and swell to fill the entire doorway.

Phil turns round too – he has a healthy respect for Sahid and his gang of ‘Muslim Boys’ – to look out of the small window at the leaden greyness beyond. Wolfe, caught off guard, does the same and feels the sharp stab of panic that hits him every time he sees the sky.

‘Trousers down, lean over.’ He concentrates on the patient, because even here, this is normal, this is who he is.

‘Try anything and you’re a dead man.’

‘You’re really not my type, Mr Sahid.’ Wolfe adjusts the angle-lamp and crouches, trying not to breathe too deeply. An arsehole is just an arsehole. Though the smell intensifies somewhat when showers are rationed.

‘Any noticeable change in bowel habits, other than the blood you mentioned?’ There is hardly any flesh left on Sahid’s backside. The brown skin is fading to a dull beige, dry and flaking. This is more than poor diet and five years without sunshine. ‘Going to the toilet more often? Passing looser stools? Pain when you go to the toilet?’

‘Not particu— What in the name of God are you doing?’

‘Keep still, please, try to relax. I’m checking for swelling just inside the anus. OK, we’re done. You can get dressed.’

Phil has filled the sink again, adding hot water that he’s had to bring from the kitchen. Water from the taps is never hot after eight o’clock in the morning.

‘Thank you, nurse,’ Wolfe says, as he sometimes does.

‘Suck my dick,’ Phil replies, and passes him a towel. Wolfe joins Sahid, who is dressed again, on the bunk.

‘You look like you’ve lost weight, to me.’

Sahid gives a flat smile. ‘My bathroom scales are broke. It’s hard to tell.’

‘Trousers feel looser?’

A grudging nod. ‘A bit.’

‘Any itching?’

A shrug. It means little, anyway. With hygiene so poor, itching of the genitalia is more or less the norm. Some cons seem never to take their hands out of their trousers. The constant movement down there could be scratching; few like to enquire.

‘How’s your appetite?’

‘How’s anyone’s in this place, the shit they serve us.’

Wolfe thinks of the porridge he was given in his first week, with actual shit in it. He’d taken a mouthful before realizing where the smell was coming from. ‘If you’re lucky, Mr Sahid, you’ve got haemorrhoids. I can’t see anything, and I don’t have the equipment for an internal examination, but it’s quite possible you’ve got enlarged blood vessels inside your rectum. They’ll be causing the bleeding you talked about, any itching you might have experienced, and can also cause discomfort, particularly when passing stools.’

Sahid looks at his guards. ‘You two, outside.’ He doesn’t bother looking at Phil, just raises his voice a fraction. ‘You too.’

They obey him. It wouldn’t occur to them not to. The door closes.

‘And if I’m unlucky?’

No point not giving it to him straight.

‘The symptoms you described to me just now can be indicative of bowel cancer.’

Wolfe gives him a second or two. No one wants to hear that word. And if word gets around that Sahid is seriously ill, his position as head of the Muslim Boys, the most powerful gang in Parkhurst, will be undermined. And there is always another gang just waiting for the opportunity to strike.

‘This is not a diagnosis, mind you. You need to see Dr Evans, have him carry out tests. If he refuses to refer you, remind him that under the Prison Act you have the right to prompt medical attention.’

‘Is there anything I can do in the meantime?’

The man is scared. There really is no leveller like cancer. ‘Assume it’s haemorrhoids. Tell everyone it’s haemorrhoids. Increase the fibre in your diet, if at all possible, and drink plenty of fluids, especially
water. Avoid painkillers that contain codeine, it can make constipation worse.’

Sahid gets to his feet. ‘Thank you, Doctor.’ He glances back, at the supplies that, of course, Wolfe isn’t allowed to have, but that are tolerated because these informal daily surgeries help to keep the peace in the block. And go some way towards repairing the damage when peace doesn’t hold out.

‘I’m sorry about what happened this morning,’ Sahid says. ‘In the lavatories, I mean. I hope you know it was nothing to do with my people.’

‘No harm done,’ says Wolfe, even though he’s still sweating when he thinks about it.

‘Anything you need?’

Sahid and his contacts are among Wolfe’s main suppliers. When drugs, money and phones are smuggled into prison, a packet of aspirin or a roll of medical plaster often slips its way in too.

Wolfe and Phil have already been through the stock. ‘We’re getting low on paracetamol, as always. Ibuprofen would be good too. Bandages and plasters always needed. Any donations gratefully received. Ideally not smuggled in up someone’s arse.’

‘I’ll make enquiries if Superdrug can deliver.’

‘And that map I asked you about?’

‘That’s in hand.’ The other man nods as he gets to his feet.

The door opens. There is a blast of noise and stale disinfectant from the corridor. Something is kicking off somewhere close. In the next cell, music begins, full volume. Sahid’s Muslim Boys have largely put a stop to non-Islamic music on the wing, but when disguising the sound of a fight, it’s tolerated.

Wolfe turns to the window. He shouldn’t, it never ends well, but sometimes the temptation to look at the outside world, even a tiny square of it, is irresistible. The smell of tobacco and stale feet tells him that Phil is back.

‘Who’s next?’

‘Stan from H. Wanker’s been cutting himself again. I told him you wouldn’t see him unless he hands over his tool.’

Wolfe clenches his eyes shut and tells himself that this is a normal
day, he’s had a hard morning at the Bristol General, spent several hours in surgery. This afternoon will be bad too, consultations and meetings, a late finish, but then he can drive home and take his dog for a run in the forest.

He looks up at the green canopy, watches the light dance through. He can hear twigs breaking beneath his feet, the dry leaves scratching in tree hollows. Behind him is the soft padding of his dog’s paws.

And Daisy. He tries not to think of Daisy during the daytime, but sometimes she creeps in, is upon him before he can steel himself to keep her out. The glint in her eyes, the cold curve of her smile. Daisy, after all this time, the woman who will never leave him.

He takes a deep breath. And another. The panic is fading. He can go on. One more day. He nods at Phil, who is used to him by now. ‘Show him in.’

PROPERTY OF AVON AND SOMERSET POLICE. Ref: 544/45.2 Hamish Wolfe.

PROPERTY OF AVON AND SOMERSET POLICE. Ref: 544/45.2 Hamish Wolfe. Letter found in Wolfe’s cell at HMP Parkhurst. (NB: Of hundreds of letters received by Wolfe during his time at Parkhurst, this was one of fewer than a dozen that he kept. Most of that number were from the same anonymous author.)

THIS IS THE
third lockdown this month. Everyone is on edge, like dogs kept in a kennel that is too small. The slightest grievance, real or otherwise, gets blown out of all proportion. This one kicked off in the showers, as they often do, when they don’t start in the dining room, or the games room, or the exercise yard, or even chapel. Someone with a score to settle. A fist shooting out. A well-aimed boot kick. Two bodies thud together and crash to the ground. A second later, pandemonium.