Purgatory: A Prison Diary Volume 2 (8 page)

Steve and his girlfriend were arrested, pleaded guilty and
were sentenced to seven years. She currently resides at High-point, while he
has gone from A- to B- to C-cat status in a couple of years (record time), and
is now living on the enhanced wing at Wayland with D-cat status. He doesn’t
want to move to an open prison because Wayland is near his home. He is also the
prison’s chief librarian. I have a feeling that you’ll be hearing more about Steve
in the future.

On the circuit round the perimeter we are joined by the
prisoner I shared a cell with on my first night, Chris (stabbing with a Stanley
knife). He tells me that the News of the World have been in touch with his
mother and will be printing a story on Sunday. He tries to assure me that he
has had no contact with them and his mother has said nothing.

‘Then it will only be three pages,’ I tell him.

When I return to my cell, Jules is looking worried. He’s
also heard that Chris will be featured in the News of
ike
World this Sunday. Chris told him that a lot of his friends and associates
don’t even know he’s in jail, and he doesn’t want them to find out. He attends
education classes twice a day and wants the chance to start a new life once
he’s been released. I just don’t have the heart to tell him that the News of
the World have absolutely no interest in his future.

We watch the news.
Still more August
storms.
At 10.30 Jules switches channels to Ally McBeal while I try
unsuccessfully to sleep. I’m not sure which is more distracting, the TV in our
cell, or the rap music emanating from the other side of the block.

I wake from a dream in which I had been using the
most foul
language when talking to Mary. I can’t explain it.
I write for a couple of hours.

I plug in Jules’s radio so that I can hear Mary’s interview
with John Humphrys. I shave while the news is on, and become more and more
nervous. It’s always the same. I am very anxious when William screens one of
the documentaries he’s been working on, or James is running the 800 metres, and
especially whenever Mary has to give a talk that lay people might expect to
understand. She’s first on after the news and handles all of John Humphrys’ questions
in that quiet academic way that could only impress an intelligent listener. But
I can tell, even after her first reply, just how nervous she is. Once Mary has
dealt with the Kurds and Baroness Nicholson, Humphrys moves on to the subject
of how I’m getting on in jail. That was when Mary should have said, ‘My
agreement with you, Mr Humphrys, was to discuss only matters arising from the
Kurds.’ Once Mary failed to point this out, he moved on to the trial, the
appeal and the sentence. I had warned her that he would. He has no interest in
keeping to any agreement made between her and the producer. And that’s why he
is such a sharp interviewer, as I know from past experience.

I call Mary, who feels she was dreadful and complains that
John Humphrys broke the BBC’s agreement and once the piece was over she told
him so. What does he care? She then tells me that the CEO of the Red Cross, Sir
Nicholas Young, was interviewed later, and was uncompromising when it came to
any suggestion that one penny raised for the Kurds in the UK had not been
accounted for. He went on to point out that I had nothing to do with either the
collecting or distribution of any monies. I suggest to Mary that perhaps the
time has come to sue Baroness Nicholson. Mary tells me that the lawyer’s first
priority is to have my D-cat reinstated so I can be moved to an open prison
before we issue the writ. Good thinking.

‘Don’t waste any more of your units’ she says. ‘See you
tomorrow.’

Disaster.
Darren reappears with my
washing. All fresh and clean, but the dryer has broken down for the first time
in living memory. I take the wet clothes back to my cell and hang the T-shirts
on the end of the bed, my underwear from an open cupboard door and my socks
over the single chair. The sun is shining, but not many of its rays are
reaching through the bars and into my cell.

Today is the first day of the fourth test match against
Australia, and Hussain is back as captain. He said that although we’ve lost the
Ashes (3-0), English pride is now at stake. I write for an hour and then turn
on the television at eleven to see who won the toss. It’s been raining all
morning. Of course it has; the match is at Headingley (Leeds). I switch off the
television and return to my script.

I’ve been writing for over an hour when the cell door is
unlocked. The governor would like a word. I go to the interview room and find
Mr Cariton-Boyce and Mr Tinkler waiting for me.

Mr Cariton-Boyce looks embarrassed when he tries to explain
why I can’t have any writing pads and pens or Alan Clark’s Diaries. I make a
small protest but only so it’s on the record. He then goes on to tell me that I
will not be moving to C block after all. They’ve had a re-think, and I’ll be
joining the adults on the enhanced spur, but – and there is always a but in
prison – as no one is being released until 29 August, I’ll have to stay put
until then.

I thank him, and ask if my room-mate Jules can be moved to a
single cell, as I fear it can’t be too long before the News of the World will
do to him exactly what they’ve done to every other prisoner who has shared a
cell with me. This shy, thoughtful man will end up being described as a drug
baron, and he doesn’t have any way of fighting back.

Governor CarltonrBoyce nods. Promises are never made in
prison, but he does go as far as saying,’ The next thing on my agenda is cell
dispersal, because we have eight more prisoners coming in tomorrow.’ I thank
him and leave, aware that’s about the biggest hint I’ll get.

Lunch.
Dale passes me two little
sealed boxes, rather than the usual single portion, and winks. I was down on
today’s menu for number three – vegetable stew – but when I get back to my
cell, I discover the other box contains mushroom soup. So I linger over the
soup followed by vegetable stew. It’s not Le Caprice – but it’s not Belmarsh
either.

I’m told that as part of my induction I must report to the
education department and take a reading, writing and numeracy test. When I take
my seat in the classroom and study the forms, it turns out to be exactly the
same test as the one set at Belmarsh. Should I tell them that I took the papers
only two weeks ago, or should I just get on with it? I can see the headline in
the Mirror: Archer Refuses to Take Writing Test. It would be funny if it wasn’t
exactly what the Mirror would do. I get on with it.

Gym.
It’s
circuit-training day, and I manage about half of the set programme – known as
the dirty dozen. The youngsters are good, but the star turns out to be a
forty-five-year-old gypsy, who is covered in tattoos, and serving an
eleven-year sentence for drug dealing. He’s called Minnie, and out-runs them,
out-jumps them, out-lifts them, out-presses them, and isn’t even breathing
heavily at the end. He puts me to shame; I can only hope that the youngsters
feel equally humiliated.

I’m back in time for a shower. David (whisky bootlegger) is
standing by my door. He tells me that he’s written the outline for a novel and
wants to know how to get in contact with a ghostwriter. This is usually a
surrogate for are you available? I tell him exactly what I tell anyone else who
writes to me on this subject (three or four letters a week): go to your local
library, take out a copy of The Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook and you’ll find
a section listing agents who handle ghostwriters. I assume that will keep him
quiet for a few days.

David returns clutching a copy of The Writers’ and Artists’
Yearbook and shows me a page of names. I glance down the list but none is
familiar. I have come across only a handful of agents over the years – Debbie
Owen, George Greenfield, Deborah Rodgers, Jonathan Lloyd and Ed Victor – but
there must be at least another thousand I’ve never heard of. I suggest that as
my agent is visiting me tomorrow, if he selects some names, I’ll ask Jonathan
if he knows any of them.

David returns with the list of names written out on a single
sheet of paper. He hands over a Diet Coke. He’s what Simon Heffer would
describe as ‘a proper gent’.

Supper.
Vegetable pie, two boiled
potatoes and a lump of petits pois, making
un
seul
pois.

I switch on the TV. Australia are 241 for 3, and Ponting is
144 not out. Together with Waugh, they’ve put on 170.1
switch
off. Why did I ever switch on?

After supper, I go down to the Association room to find Dale
(wounding with intent) and Jimmy (transporting Ecstasy tablets) playing snooker
for a Mars bar. It’s the first time I’ve seen Jimmy beaten at anything, and
what’s more, he’s being thrashed by a far superior player. It’s a subject I
know a little about as I was President of the World Snooker Association before
I was convicted. Jimmy whispers in my ear, ‘Dale beats everyone, but like any
hungry animal, he has to be fed at least twice a day. We take it in turns to
hand over a Mars bar. It’s a cheap way of keeping him under control.’ In case
you’ve forgotten, Dale is six foot three and weighs twenty-seven stone.

After the game is over, the three of us join Darren in the
exercise yard. Dale manages only one circuit before heading back
in,
exhausted, while the three of us carry on for the full
forty-five minutes. During the second circuit, I tell them about Derek, who did
the drawing of my cell (Belmarsh), and ask if they know of any artists in
Wayland. Jimmy tells me that there is a brilliant (his word) artist on C block.
I ask if he will introduce me.

‘Be warned, he’s weird,’ says Jimmy, ‘and can be very rude
if he takes against you.’

I tell Jimmy that I’ve been dealing with artists for the past
thirty-five years and I’ve never met one who could be described as normal. It’s
all part of their appeal.

‘I feel like a drink,’ says Darren as the evening sun
continues to beat down on us. ‘Know anyone who’s got some hooch?’ he asks
Jimmy.

‘Hooch?’
I say. ‘What’s that?’

They both laugh, a laugh that suggests I still have much to
learn. ‘Every block,’ says
Darren,
‘has a hotplate
man, a cleaner, a tea-boy and a painter. They’re all appointed by the screws
and are paid around twelve pounds a week. Every block also has a drug dealer, a
haircutter, a clothes-washer and a brewer. C block has the best brewer – for a
two-pound phonecard, you can get half a litre of hooch.’

‘But what’s it made of?’

The ingredients are normally yeast, sugar, water and orange
juice. It’s harder to produce during the summer months because you need the hot
pipes that run through your cell to be boiling in order to ferment the brew, so
it’s almost impossible to get decent hooch in August.’ ‘What’s it taste like?’

‘Awful, but at least it’s guaranteed to get you drunk,’ says
Jimmy. ‘
Which kills off a few more hours of your sentence,
even if you wake up with one hell of a hangover.
’

‘If you’re desperate,’ Darren adds, ‘fresh orange juice is
still on the canteen list.’

‘How does that help?’

‘Just leave it on your window ledge in the sun for a few
days, and you’ll soon find out.’

‘But where can you hide the hooch once you’ve made it?’

‘We used to have the perfect hiding place,’ Darren pauses,
‘but unfortunately they discovered it.’

Jimmy smiles as I wait for an explanation. ‘One Sunday
morning,’ Darren continues, ‘the number one brewer on our spur was found
roaming around inebriated. When breathalysed, he registered way above the
limit. The drug
squad were
called in, and every cell
on the spur was stripped bare, but no alcohol of any kind was discovered. His
hiding place would have remained a mystery if a small fire hadn’t broken out in
the kitchen. An officer grabbed the nearest fire extinguisher and pointed it in
the direction of the blaze, only to find that the flames leapt even higher. An
immediate halt was called by the chef who fortunately understood the effects of
ethanol,
otherwise the prison might have been razed to
the ground. A full enquiry was held, and three inmates were shipped out to
different B-cats the following morning, ‘on suspicion of producing hooch’.’

‘In fact,’ said Darren, ‘It wasn’t hooch they were guilty of
brewing. This particular strain of neat alcohol had been made by filtering
metal polish through six slices of bread into a plastic mug in the hope of
removing any impurities.’

I feel sick, without even having to sample the brew.

Jimmy goes on to point out that not only are some inmates
brighter than the officers, but they also have twenty-four hours every day to
think up such schemes, while the screws have to get on with their job.

‘But the best hooch I ever tasted,’ said Darren, ‘had a
secret ingredient’

‘And what was that, may I ask?’

‘Marmite.
But once the screws
caught on to how much yeast it contained, they took it off the canteen list’ He
pauses. ‘So now we just steal the yeast from the kitchen.’

‘Damn,’ I said. ‘I like Marmite; it was on the Belmarsh
canteen list.’

‘I don’t think that’s a good enough reason, my lord, to be
transferred back to Belmarsh,’ says Darren. ‘Mind you,’ he adds, ‘perhaps I
should have a word with the governor, now it’s known that you are partial to
it’