6.00 pm
I visit the canteen to purchase soap, razor blades, chocolate, Evian and phonecards, otherwise I’ll be dirty, unshaven, unfed and unwatered over Christmas, not to mention uncontactable. The officer on duty checks my balance, and finds I’m only ?1.20 in credit. Help!
DAY 154 WEDNESDAY 19 DECEMBER 2001
9.00 am
‘Archer to report to reception immediately, Archer to report to reception immediately.’
Now Mr Daff has retired, I’m not allowed the same amount of latitude as in the past.
I’ve received five parcels today. The first is a book by Iris Murdoch,
2.00 pm
I happily spend a couple of hours, assisted by Carl and a box of Blu-Tack, fixing prints by Albert Goodwin, Ronald Searle, Heath Robinson, Emmett, Geraldine Girvan, Paul Riley and Ray Ellis to the hospital walls. With over 900 Christmas cards littered around the beds, the ward has been transformed into an art gallery. (See opposite.)
5.00 pm
I return to the canteen. I’m only ?2.50 in credit, whereas I calculate I should have around ?18. It’s the nearest I get to losing my temper, and it’s only when the officer in charge says he’s been trying to get the system changed for the past year that I calm down, remembering that it’s not his fault. He makes a note of the discrepancy on the computer. I thank him and return to the hospital. I have no reason to complain; I’ve got the best job in the prison and the best room, and am allowed to write five hours a day. Shut up, Archer.
6.00 pm
I attend the carol service at six-thirty, where I read one of the lessons. Luke 2, verses eight to twenty. As I dislike the modern text, the vicar has allowed me to read from the King James version.
The chapel is packed long before the service is due to begin and the organ is played with great verve and considerable improvisation by Brian (ostrich fraud). The vicar’s wife, three officers and four inmates read the lessons. I follow Mr New, and Mr Hughes follows me. We all enjoy a relaxed service of carols and lessons, and afterwards there is the added bonus of mince pies and coffee, which might explain the large turnout.
After the service, Brian introduces me to Maria, who’s in charge of the Red Cross shop in Boston. She has brought along my box of paperbacks and asks if I would be willing to sign them. I happily agree.
DAY 155 THURSDAY 20 DECEMBER 2001
7.30 am
Record numbers report sick with near freezing conditions outside.
11.00 am
The last inmate to see the doctor is a patient called Robinson. He’s shaking and trying in vain to keep warm. I’ve been in prison long enough now to spot a heroin addict at thirty paces. While he waits for his appointment, Robinson confides that he’s desperately trying to kick the habit, and has put himself on a compulsory urine test every morning. He’s thirty-two years old, and has been in and out of prison for the past fourteen years.
‘I’m lucky to be alive,’ he says. ‘After I got nicked this time, I took the rap and let me mate get off in exchange for a promise he’d send me ten quid a week while I’m inside.’
The ‘friend’ died a few weeks later after injecting himself from a contaminated batch of heroin.
‘If the deal had been the other way round,’ Robinson suggests, ‘I’d be the dead man.’
12.30 pm
Over lunch I discuss the drug problem in prisons with the two gym orderlies, both of whom abhor the habit. I am shocked – can I still be shocked? – when Jim (burglary, antiques only) tells me that 30 per cent of the inmates at NSC are on heroin. But more depressing still, when Jim was here eight years ago for a previous offence, he says only a handful of the inmates were on drugs. What will it be like in ten years’ time?
1.00 pm
As I walk back from lunch, I see Brian and John, the CSV Red Cross workers, heading towards me. They’ve both been taken off the job and confined to the prison while an enquiry is being conducted. Maria, who runs the Red Cross shop in Boston, has been accused of smuggling contraband (twelve paperbacks) into the prison. Apparently she should have informed the gate staff of her request to have the books autographed by me. Brian tells me they left her in tears, and I am bound to say that what started out as a simple goodwill gesture has ended in turmoil; the Red Cross have been removed as participants in the CSV scheme, and Brian and John have lost their jobs. I resolve to find out if there is more to it – prison has taught me not to automatically take something on trust – and if there isn’t, to try to right this injustice.
8.00 pm
Carl suggests we watch
DAY 156 FRIDAY 21 DECEMBER 2001
9.00 am
Dr Walling is on duty today. He’s full of good cheer, and brings Christmas presents for Linda and myself. Linda gets a box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates, and he presents me with a bottle of Scotch. Linda quickly grabs the bottle, explaining that it’s against prison rules to offer prisoners alcohol. If I’d been caught with a bottle of whisky (actually I don’t drink spirits) I would have lost my job, and possibly have been sent to a B-cat with added days. Dr Walling looks suitably embarrassed.
12.00 pm
Simon (abduction of his son, mess orderly) drops in to deliver Linda’s sandwich lunch. While I make her a coffee, Simon tells me he’s moving room today. His room-mate, a married man with two children, asked him last night if he’d ever considered being bisexual. Simon tells me that he jumped out of bed, got dressed, left the room and demanded to be moved, as he didn’t want to be locked up with, in his words, ‘a raving faggot’.
8.00 pm
I watch
