He glanced to his left and saw the prison chapel, the weather-vane spinning madly in the powerful breeze. The skeletal trees in the graveyard rattled their branches in the wind, bowing almost to touch the ground as the breeze battered them.
Ahead of him was the hospital wing, the familiar grey of the stonework matching the colour of the sky.
Nicholson entered, feeling the warmth immediately. He paused by one of the radiators to warm his hands before approaching the doors that led into the infirmary.
Inside, the wind rattled windows in their frames. One or two heads turned to look at him as he strode through, glancing at the occupants of the place.
A man who'd been scalded in the kitchens by cooking oil. Another, who'd been injured in a brawl during exercise, sported fifty-eight stitches from the point of his chin to the corner of his left eye. When he left the infirmary he was due to spend two weeks in solitary. His assailant was already there.
Another man had his leg in plaster, recovering from a broken ankle. He regarded Nicholson coldly as the Governor passed by.
A man in white overalls was busy collecting dirty bed sheets and towels, pushing the excrement, and bloodstained linen into a trolley he was pushing up and down the ward. He stepped to one side as Nicholson approached him but made sure that he left a sheet soaked with urine dangling from the trolley, hoping that Nicholson would brush against it.
He didn't.
Ahead of him, the guard at the locked door stood up as Nicholson nodded. The warder found the key he sought, unlocked the door and allowed Nicholson through.
The ward beyond was empty but for ten beds, only one of which was occupied.
There were no windows in the walls, the only light being provided by the banks of fluorescents set high in the ceiling. Walls and floors were of the same uniform grey.
The one bed that was occupied was at the far end of the ward. As Nicholson headed towards it his shoes beat out a tattoo on the polished floor.
There was a man standing over the patient looking down at the face completely encased in bandages. The man held a clipboard he was scribbling on. He was tall, his hair grey, his features wrinkled. His cheeks were sunken and the onset of years had given him heavy jowls.
He turned to face Nicholson as the Governor drew closer. Nicholson thought that he looked vaguely pleased to see him; a small smile hovered on his dry lips.
'Can you spare me some time?' said Nicholson.
Doctor Robert Dexter nodded.
FIFTY-SIX
The years had not been kind to Robert Dexter. The lines in his face had deepened into clearly defined wrinkles. The flesh of his forehead looked like pastry after someone has drawn a fork across it. He sighed and looked at Nicholson.
'Any progress?' the Governor said, nodding towards the man in the bed.
'I was just about to look,' Dexter said, his voice low and guttural.
With that he reached into the pocket of his white overall and took out a small pair of scissors. He cut the bandages close to the man's chin and began slowly unravelling them, pausing every now and then to lift the man's head. All that was visible was a small gap for his nose; the rest of his head was completely encased in gauze. Dexter continued with his task.
'If that delegation had got inside here the other day, you and I would be locked up in here,' said Nicholson.
'Does that bother you?' Dexter said.
'It's a change we were both prepared to take. We both knew the risks,' Nicholson said.
'What did they think of the electronic tagging idea?' Dexter wanted to know, still unwinding bandages.
'They liked it. Needless to say, I didn't mention our other little venture.'
'You won't be able to keep it secret forever,' Dexter exclaimed. 'Besides, secrecy wasn't my aim. Once the technique has been perfected there'll be no need to hide the truth.'
'And how do you propose to announce your findings, Dexter? By showing the world an example of your work?' He nodded in the direction of the man in the bed. The first layer of bandages was off. Dexter began on the next one.
'When it works, it'll be nothing to be ashamed of. It's what I've been working towards for most of my professional life,' the doctor said defensively.
'The world might applaud your achievement but I doubt if it will condone your methods,' Nicholson said, taking his eyes from the bandaged man to look momentarily at Dexter. 'Brain operations on convicted murderers.' He smiled. 'It'll be interesting to see how the Home Office reacts to that.'
'It was you who allowed me to work here; why do you ridicule me?'
Nicholson held up his hands.
'No offence meant.' He smiled again, 'I'm happy for you to do your work here.'
'It doesn't seem to bother you that it hasn't been altogether successful so far.'
Nicholson shrugged.
'I sometimes wonder if you realise what this work actually means, Nicholson. An end to man's violent tendencies… An end by the insertion of a device constructed and perfected by me.'
'Don't lecture me, Dexter.'
'If this work is successful it could mean an end to places like Whitely. An end to violence.'
'You're starting to sound like a refugee from a bad horror film. The role of mad scientist doesn't suit you.'
'What the hell is mad about wanting to stop violence?'
'Because it's a wasted dream,' hissed Nicholson. 'If you believe you can stop violence by your surgery, you're crazy. You've seen some of the men in here; you know what they're capable of. How can you hope to stop that with technology? I find the twisted nobility of your scheme rather amusing, all the same,' he added sardonically.
'You don't care whether it works or not, do you?' Dexter said. 'You never have. If the men die as a result of the surgery you don't care.'
'They're murderers. If we still had the death penalty they'd be hanged, anyway. You've become the executioner, Dexter. All you're doing is carrying out a sentence that the courts no longer have the power to impose. That's what I agree with. Not the ethics behind your work.'
'And what about the ones who've survived? It was you who allowed me to release them. If they'd been traced back to here, it would have been your responsibility.'
'We've been fortunate, so far,' the Governor said, looking down at the man lying in the bed.
Dexter was pulling the last layer of bandages away, using the scissors to snip off any loose pieces, exposing the face beneath. Only the bandages around his scalp remained. Slowly Dexter began to loosen those, too. 'What makes you think you can succeed now, when you couldn't all those years before?' Nicholson wanted to know. 'You were using surgery on your patients in the asylum.'
'When I was working in Bishopsgate I was using a different method,' Dexter explained. 'My colleague and I thought we could stop patients' psychotic tendencies by removing the parts of the brain responsible for triggering violence. I now know that was wrong,' He pulled more bandages away, 'Inserting the device inside the brain, actually placing it in the lateral ventricle ensures that the chemical is evenly spread around the brain.'
He pulled the last piece of bandage away, revealing the bald dome of his subject.
There was a thin cut running around the skull, stitched in several places but held, in others, by several
