Mrs Harris was sweating, her mouth dry, and she was trying so hard to stop herself crying that she wanted to go to the lavatory.
‘I want to be buried with him, you’ll make sure of that, won’t you? It’s all arranged and it’s all paid for. Mr Georgeson’s the man you ask for at the funeral parlour, he has everything ready for me. I don’t want flowers or anything like that, the money would be wasted. Once, a long time ago, when we were parted, he said that while I’d been away from him he’d been dying, little by little . . . Well, I know now what he meant. Since he’s been gone I’ve not had the will, somehow – not the strength I used to have – and I’m not going to fight any more. You see, I miss him so much, I just can’t go on without him. I’m not frightened, I’m going to be with him, where I should be. We weren’t like ordinary folk, we were closer, we were blood to blood.’
The bell rang, and Evelyne smiled so peacefully that Mrs Harris felt her heart break. She stood up and had to hold on to the bed to get her balance. ‘I’ll be here next Wednesday, lovey, and I’ll take care of your necklace, now I’d best be going.’
Evelyne looked like a young girl in her white nightgown, her long hair braided in plaits on each side of her head, her strange, dark, greenish eyes so large in her pinched face that it added to the childlike effect. Mrs Harris picked up her shopping bag to leave. She couldn’t even bring herself to kiss Evelyne, she knew she would break down and sob, so she bustled around and chatted about the bus she would more than likely miss.
‘Go on with you, and give my love to Dora. Don’t look back, don’t look back, it’s unlucky. Don’t look back . . .’ But when Mrs Harris reached the double doors leading into the corridor, she couldn’t help but turn. Evelyne had raised her skinny arms above her head, both hands waving goodbye, and she was smiling. She looked so happy, so at peace with the world. The tears rolled down Mrs Harris’ fat cheeks as she mouthed, ‘Goodbye, Evie, goodbye my love.’
‘Stubbs 4566, to the Governor’s office.’
Alex brushed his hair and Tom instructed him to ask for permission to wear his own togs, he didn’t want his ma seeing him in prison overalls at the hospital.
The Governor was sitting at his desk as Alex was led in by the screws.
‘Prisoner 4566, Stubbs, Alex, sir.’
The Governor looked up, removed his glasses and indicated a chair beside his desk. He waited until Alex had sat down before he carefully laid his glasses on the desk and gave a warning look to the two warders. He coughed, hesitating before he spoke. ‘I’m afraid, Stubbs, I have some very sad news for you – your mother died last night.’
Alex never moved a muscle, but he stared at the Governor as if he hadn’t heard.
‘I am deeply sorry, even more so as it took so long for permission to be granted for you to visit her, but these things cannot be helped. It is most unfortunate.’
Alex sprang over the desk and had the Governor by the throat before either of the guards could stop him. He was like a man possessed. The Governor screamed as he felt the air being squeezed out of his throat, and his head shook as though he were a rag doll. The guards couldn’t get Alex away, he was pressing his thumbs harder and harder into the Governor’s scrawny neck. One guard pulled at his hair and another kicked him in the groin as the alarm bell sounded.
Three more guards and half an hour later, Alex was handcuffed. With blood streaming from his head where he had been beaten he was led into solitary confinement. The Governor was rushed to hospital but was released the following day, and the whole prison was agog at what had happened. The number of guards Alex had taken out tripled and the stories so embroidered that his name was on everyone’s lips. He had eighteen stitches in his head, another twenty in his face and cheek, and his already broken nose was cracked again.
Alex smashed his fists against the wall until they bled. His bread and water were pushed through a hatch in the cell door, and even that he hurled at the walls. The Governor, when informed, remarked that if he carried on that way he would remain in solitary until he was controllable. ‘If he behaves like a wild animal, we shall treat him as one, and until he quietens down, leave him.’
In the fifth week a doctor was called in. He treated Alex’s hands, which were badly infected, and made notes that the man was deeply distressed. He prescribed sedatives and said the prisoner must be properly fed, force-fed if necessary. He requested an immediate visit from a psychiatrist.
The food was refused, and Dr Gordon was called in again. No psychiatrist had been to see Alex, who just sat very quietly in his own excrement, staring vacantly at the wall in a drugged, semi-catatonic state.
They should have been suspicious when Alex meekly held out his hands to be rebandaged. As Dr Gordon cut through the plasters, Alex punched him in the face and got hold of the scissors, held them at the doctor’s neck and demanded to be released. If he wasn’t, he would slit his throat. The warders stood by helplessly and Dr Gordon ordered them out of the cell, then still with his arm twisted behind his back but with no sign of fear he talked quietly to Alex. He asked Alex what he wanted. He would do his utmost to help, but what Alex was doing was an act of madness.
Alex wanted to go to his mother’s funeral. Time appeared to have stood still for him, he didn’t realize how long he had been in solitary confinement.
‘Alex, you know that’s not possible, now lad, you know that, why don’t you release me and I’ll do what I can? I give you my word, but what you are doing now will only add to your troubles.’
Alex stood at the open door of his cell, the screws in a row in front of him. He knew it was pointless, and he suddenly dropped his arm and threw the scissors aside. He turned to walk back into the cell and the screws moved, surrounding him as the doctor begged them to stay clear, even tried to physically pull them away from the prisoner. They threw Alex against his bed and out came the truncheons.
In a fury Dr Gordon went to the Governor, demanding that Alex be removed from solitary and treated.
‘There’s a war on, men are dying every minute of the day, and you want everything here to revolve around a prisoner who has blatantly and consistently fought the rules of this establishment? He’s only got himself to blame. If I allowed every man to behave as he has and get away with it, my position would be intolerable. We are overcrowded, understaffed – the man attacked me, for Chrissake, what do you expect me to do with him?’
Stony-faced, Dr Gordon sat and told the Governor quietly that the boy was grieving, he needed time. He needed help to face up to the fact that his mother was dead.
‘That boy, as you call him, Doctor, murdered his own father! You have his records, why don’t you read them?’
Dr Gordon said of course he had read Stubbs’ reports. He was the prison doctor, and his request for a psychiatrist had been ignored.
‘If there was one available, he would have been brought to the prisoner. As I have said, Doctor, there is a war on, and we are seriously understaffed and overworked. Right now, Stubbs is a hero to the rest of the men. If he goes unpunished, we will not be able to maintain any kind of discipline.’
Alex was removed to the hospital wing and remained there for another five weeks. He was drugged to keep him subdued, and the doctor used every power he had to get him transferred to a rehabilitation programme. He had spent a long time going over Alex’s records, and found them disturbing.
Due to Dr Gordon’s persistent efforts, a psychiatrist was eventually found and, after discussing Alex with the doctor, he agreed to take on his case.
Alex would not co-operate. He didn’t want any ‘nut doc’, he wanted to go back to his cell. Dr Gordon went in to see him, in his own time and purely because he wanted to help Alex. ‘Alex, if you want to get out, lead a normal life, you have to help yourself. First, you will have to go before the prison authorities. You’ve got a list of charges as long as your arm, and even with mitigating circumstances you could get another God knows how many years on your sentence . . . Talk to the man, he only wa
nts to help you, that’s all. Maybe we can do something for you.’
‘There’s fuck all wrong with me – I just want to get out an’ see me mother. Bastards, keeping me penned up in here. I just want out.’
‘Well, you’re going about it the wrong way. If I try to get permission for you to go to her grave, acting up like this will make them refuse to even consider it . . . Now, talk with the psychiatrist, just talk things through. Is that too much to ask? Can’t you do that for me?’
After a long pause Alex slowly nodded his head. Dr Gordon patted his shoulder. ‘Good lad . . . I’ll keep on coming, all right?’
Alex shook his hand and held it a fraction longer, as if he needed some sort of contact. He gave a strange, shy smile. ‘Thank you.’
Frank Nathan closed the cell door and winked at Alex as the key turned in the lock. He was not at all what Alex expected – his short, squat body was muscular, and the black hairs sprouting on his barrel chest were visible even though he was wearing a shirt and tie. Nathan was like a chimp, his big hands fuzzy with thick, black hair. Stubble seemed to appear on his chin as you watched him. He had a pug nose, as if he had been in the ring at one time, and a wonderful, raucous, rumbling laugh. He jerked his thumb at the cell door. ‘Looks like they don’t fuckin’ trust me, neither . . . Right, you an’ me are going to thrash a few things out. I’m here to listen. Sometimes I’ll ask you a few things, but on the whole I’m a bloody good listener. You smoke . . .? Here.’
Frank lit his cigarette and his powerful body made the chair creak alarmingly as he sat down. He folded his chubby hands over his belly and leaned forward. ‘My time’s valuable, so if you want to act like a prick, go ahead. I’ll just cross you off. There’s fellas who need me, an’ if you think you don’t, sod ya. If you don’t want to help yourself, then if you don’t mind my sayin’ so, you are well and truly fucked . . .’
Alex was taken off guard, not only by Nathan’s presence but by his gruffness, yet he liked him. There was something powerful and, more important, genuine, about the man.
‘Let’s start off with why you knocked the Guv’nor’s front teeth out.’ Nathan puffed on his cigarette and waited. Alex hesitated, and Nathan prompted him, ‘What is it, son? What do you want to say – best to get it off your chest . . .?’
Alex clasped and unclasped his hands, refusing to look up. His voice was quiet and strained, ‘She’s dead. Some way I’ve been thinking, maybe, just maybe, she’s still alive an’ you was all doing this to me to get at me. Like even you was tryin’ to deceive me.’
‘No, Alex, your mother is dead, and nobody has tried to deceive you in any way. It was just unfortunate that you couldn’t see her in hospital. No one realized how ill she was until it was too late.’
‘Aye, well, she was never one to complain – she was that sort of woman. She was a wonderful . . .’ He pressed his hands together until the knuckles were white.
‘Alex, it’s not wrong to cry for her. It’d be a release, don’t try to stop it. No one’s here to see you but me . . . Come on, son, cry for her, get it out of your system.’
Nathan watched Alex struggle to regain control of his emotions. He took Alex off guard with his next question. ‘Did you cry for your dad when he died?’ He could see the barrier – the feeling in the boy’s eyes was breaking him up, it was so desperate. Still Alex’s hands opened and closed spasmodically. Nathan kept up the pressure. ‘Did they love each other, your mum and dad?’
Unable to speak, Alex just nodded his head. His eyes never left Nathan’s face now, as if mesmerized by him.
‘They love you?’
Nathan could see the marks on Alex’s hands where he was inflicting pain on himself to control his emotions. Alex made a strangled, guttural sound. He wanted to tell Nathan they had loved him.
‘I didn’t hear you. You say they loved you or they didn’t?’
Alex’s voice was alien to him, childlike. He gasped out, ‘They loved me.’
‘What about your brother? You’ve got an older brother, haven’t you?’
There it was – Nathan saw it, the boy’s whole body altered. One moment he was helpless, a child in need, and the next the body was tight, the face set, the highly charged emotions under control. It was as if someone had stopped a dam bursting. The transformation fascinated Nathan. He knew he wasn’t dealing with a schizoid or a psychopath, as the prison had hinted. He also knew that to unlock the boy’s trauma would take time, time he didn’t have, wouldn’t be allowed.
‘I read about your dad. He almost made heavyweight champion of the world, didn’t he? Used to box meself, tell by me hooter. You box, Alex?’
The blue eyes met Nathan’s. The barrier was still there. Nathan tried again. ‘Did you want to follow in his footsteps? Eh? Big lad like you could fill out, maybe go on the heavyweight circuits – good set of shoulders on you. Mind you, you’d have to put on quite a few pounds. What are you, six-two, six-three? Your dad now, lemme see, I was readin’ up on him – six-four, wasn’t he, Alex?’
Rising from the bunk, Alex walked to the wall, leaned against it. Nathan showed no fear of him, just lit another cigarette. He hated having to cut corners, hated the pressure he was under. He had reached retirement age, but being wartime he had been roped in. But more than anything he hated knowing that time was against him. If he didn’t crack Alex fast, he wouldn’t get another chance. He also knew that if Alex didn’t get help, and fast, they would have a potentially lethal young man on their hands. ‘He ever hit you? That what made you go for him? Your dad a violent man, was he?’
That guttural sound again, the low moan, the hands moving rapidly.
‘Sit down, son . . . come on now.’
But Alex turned his face to the wall, and when he spoke his voice was strained, close to breaking. ‘He was gentle . . . I had a dog, he give me a dog. He never hit none of us.’
‘What about your ma?’
The fist slammed into the brick wall and Alex turned on him, eyes blazing. ‘No!’
‘All right, all right . . . what about your brother?’
There it was again. At the mention of the word ‘brother’, Alex recoiled. Nathan knew he had put his finger on it, but he had to get Alex sitting, had to calm him. But he knew his time was up, although he hadn’t looked at his watch once. At any moment the screws would bang on the door, and there were a lot more patients to see. ‘I am trying to arrange for you to visit your mother’s grave. You’d like that, wouldn’t you . . .? Maybe get some flowers . . . We’ll take it stage by stage, all right? And I’ll come and . . .’
Alex put his head in his hands and wept. He slumped on to the bunk, mumbling over and over that he wanted to see her, see his mother. Nathan stubbed out his cigarette and then put his hands on Alex’s head in a comforting, fatherly gesture. He had to go, and he felt badly about it, he could feel that the boy was ready to open up.
‘I can’t find my dream no more, I don’t seem to be able to lose myself anywhere no more.’
‘Maybe, son, that’s what the problem is, you’ve been trying to lose yourself. But we’ll find you, and we’ll do it together, okay? I’ll pull every string I can, I’ll get you out of here. You’ll say goodbye to your mum first, then – well, we’ll set about putting you together. You’ll have to take the punishment doled out to you, son, for the little fracas with the Guv’nor, but don’t let it get to you. I’m on your side, I give you my word . . .’
Later that night, Nathan sat in a pub with Dr Jim Gordon. He had already put away a few Scotches, and his pug face was flushed. Both men were depressed as Alex had had five years added to his sentence. The Governor, however, had promised that Alex would be allowed to visit his mother’s grave.
‘I need time. You can’t help a kid with his kind of problems in a few hours . . . I feel sorry for the bastard. Any chance we can get him out of the Scrubs, somewhere he can pick up his education? The lad’s clever, that’s one of his problems. If they keep him banged up in a cell, when he gets out y
ou’ll have a fucking killer on the loose. The key to Stubbs lies with his brother, I’d put money on it. You know if there’s any way I can get to him?’
The sirens sounded, and everyone in the pub had to run like hell as the bombs began to drop. The two men lost each other in the confusion. Nathan never made it to the shelter – he was killed by a second bomb one hour later – and Dr Gordon worked through the night, helping the injured. Prisoner Stubbs was forgotten.
Evelyne was buried in as neat and orderly a fashion as she had lived, with only Mrs Harris and a few other neighbours attending. There was no great fuss, no weeping, and no high tea afterwards. Mrs Harris, exhausted from the effort of standing by the grave, went home alone. She had shed her tears, and even when she went into number twelve the next day, to collect Evelyne’s things, she didn’t cry. She crept around the silent house, then locked up and took the key to the lawyers as requested.
Later that night the house took a direct hit. The blaze lit the sky, and Mrs Harris watched it from her bedroom window. ‘Dear God, there’s nothing left there now. Almost the whole street gone, and neither of those boys around to give a helping hand.’
Mrs Harris remembered then, and went to her dressing table. She took out the leather case containing the gold and pearl necklace and stared at it as Dora moved away from the window.
‘Well, that’s them finished, it’s as if they never existed. Sometimes it makes you wonder what life is all about.’
‘She wanted me to bury this with her, and I promised.’
‘What is it? Let’s have a look.’
‘It’s her necklace. She said it was like his talisman, that it had to be buried with them, and I promised . . .’
‘Bloody ’ell, Mum, this is real gold, an’ these are pearls. This must be worth a packet.’
Dora danced over to the mirror and slipped the necklace around her neck. ‘Oh, Mum, isn’t it beautiful? It’s so beautiful.’
The Talisman Page 12
