The Eye in the Door (4 page)

Why to the house? Anybody who knew him well enough to know his name would be on the list of subscribers must also know he was staying at his club. But then perhaps they also knew he visited the house regularly, to check that everything was all right, and… other things.

He mustn’t fall into the trap of overestimating what they knew. At the moment he was doing their job for them.

Opening the letter like this in his own home was in some ways a worse experience than opening it at the club would have been. His damaged house leaked memories of Jane and the children, and of himself too, as he had been before the war, memories so vivid in comparison with his present depleted self that he found himself moving between pieces of shrouded furniture like his own ghost.

There was nothing to be gained by brooding like this. He made sure the fallen plaster was caught on the dust-sheet and had not seeped underneath to be trodden into the carpet, shuttered the windows, replaced the photograph beneath the dust-sheet, and let himself out.

Rain was falling. As he left the square and started to walk briskly down the Bayswater Road, reflections of buildings and shadows of people shone fuzzily in the pavements, as if another city lay trapped beneath the patina of water and grease. He kept his head down, thinking he would go to see Ross tonight, and remembering too that he was due to see Rivers next week. He passed the Lancaster Gate underground with its breath of warm air, and walked on.

In Oxford Street a horse had fallen between the shafts of a van and was struggling feebly to get to its feet. The usual knot of bystanders had gathered. He was going to be
all right
. He was…

Suddenly, the full force of the intrusion into his home struck at him, and he was cowering on the pavement of Oxford Street as if a seventy-hour bombardment were going on. He pretended to look in a shop window, but he didn’t see anything. The sensation was extraordinary, one of the worst attacks he’d ever had. Like being naked, high up on a ledge, somewhere, in full light, with beneath him only jeering voices and millions of eyes.

Prior sat in the visitors’ waiting-room at Aylesbury Prison, right foot resting on his left knee, hands clasping his ankle, and stared around him. The shabbiness of this room was in marked contrast to the brutal but impressive blood-and-bandages facade of the prison, though the shabbiness too was designed to intimidate. Everything – the chipped green paint, the scuffed no-colour floor, the nailed-down chairs – implied that those who visited criminals were probably criminals themselves. A notice on the wall informed them of the conditions under which they might be searched.

Prior looked down at his greatcoat and flicked away an imaginary speck of dust. This was not the battered and stained garment that Myra had so foolishly refused to lie on, but an altogether superior version which had cost two months’ salary. In these circumstances, it was worth every penny.

The door opened and the wardress came in. With very slightly exaggerated courtesy, Prior rose to his feet. Sad but true, that nothing puts a woman in her place more effectively than a chivalrous gesture performed in a certain manner.

‘Yes, well, it does seem to be in order,’ she said.

He nodded. ‘Good.’

‘If you’d like to come this way.’

He reached the door first and held it open. He wasn’t inclined to waste sympathy on her, this middle-aged, doughy-skinned woman. She had her own power, after all, more absolute than any
he
possessed. If she were humiliated now, no doubt some clapped-out old whore would be made to pay.

He followed her down the corridor and out into the yard.

‘That’s the women’s block,’ she said, pointing.

A gloomy, massive building. Six rows of windows, small and close together, like little piggy eyes. Prior looked at the yard. ‘But surely the men can see the women when they exercise?’

‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘They can’t see out of the windows. They’re too high up for that.’

He asked her one or two questions about the way the prison was run, how the shift system worked, whether transport to the prison was provided. It had occurred to him that it might not be some anonymous whore who paid for his victory, but the woman he had come to see, and he was anxious to avoid that. ‘Shift working must be quite difficult,’ he said. ‘Particularly for women.’

They stood in the cold yard while he got the story of her ailing mother. Then he held the door of the women’s block open for her, and this time she blushed instead of bridling, since the gesture was being offered in a different spirit. Or she thought it was.

Another corridor. ‘I know this is terribly irregular,’ he said. ‘A man seeing a female prisoner alone. But you do understand, don’t you? It is a matter
of security
…’

‘Oh, yes, yes. The only reason I questioned it was her being confined to the cell. We know all about security. We’ve had a leader of the Irish rebellion in
here
.’ An internal struggle, then she burst out, ‘She was a
countess
.’

Her face lit up with all the awe and deference of which the English working class is capable. Oh dear oh dear.

‘Roper’s a different kettle of fish,’ she went on. ‘Common as muck.’

They went through another set of doors and into a large hall. Prior would have liked some warning of this. He’d expected another corridor, another room. Instead he found himself standing at the bottom of what felt like a pit. The high walls were ringed with three tiers of iron landings, studded by iron doors, linked by iron staircases. In the centre of the pit sat a wardress who, simply by looking up, could observe every door. Prior’s escort went across and spoke to her colleague.

Prior looked around him, wondering what sort of women needed to be kept in a place like this. Prostitutes, thieves, girls who ‘overlaid’ their babies, abortionists who stuck their knitting needles into something vital – did they really need to be here? A bell rang. Behind him the doors opened and a dozen or so women trudged into the room, diverging into two lines as they reached the stairs to the first landing. They wore identical grey smocks that covered them from neck to ankle and blended with the iron grey of the landings, so that the women looked like columns of moving metal. Evidently they were not allowed to speak, and for a while there was no sound except for the clatter of their boots on the stairs, and a chorus of coughs.

Then a youngish woman turned her head and noticed him. Instantly, a stir of excitement ran along the lines, like the rise of hair along a dog’s spine. They broke ranks and came crowding to the railings, shouting down comments on what they could see, and speculations on the size of what they couldn’t. Somebody suggested he might like to settle the matter by getting it out. Then a
short square-headed woman jostled her way to the front and lifted her smock to her shoulders, high enough for it to become apparent that His Majesty’s bounty did not extend to the provision of knickers. She jabbed her finger repeatedly towards the mound of thinning hair. Then a whistle blew, wardresses came running, and the women were hustled back into line. The tramp of feet started again, and soon the landings were empty and silent, except for the banging of doors and the rattle of keys in locks. The entire incident had taken less than three minutes.

Prior’s wardress came back. ‘That’s a relief,’ he said. ‘I was beginning to feel like a pork chop in a famine.’

This did not go down well. ‘Roper’s on the top landing,’ she said.

Their boots clanged on the stairs. Looking down now at the empty landings, Prior was puzzled by a sense of familiarity that he couldn’t place. Then he remembered. It was like the trenches. No Man’s Land seen through a periscope, an apparently empty landscape which in fact held thousands of men. That misleading emptiness had always struck him as uncanny. Even now, as he tramped along the third landing, he felt the prickle of hair in the nape of his neck.

The wardress-stopped outside No. 39. She bent and peered through the peephole before unlocking the door. ‘Here you are,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to lock you in. When you’re finished just bang on the door. I’ll be along at the end. Good loud bang, mind.’ She hesitated. ‘She’s been on hunger strike. You’ll find her quite weak.’

He followed the wardress into the room. It seemed very dark, though a small, high, barred window set into the far wall let in a shaft of light. The reflection of the bars was black on the floor, then suddenly faded, as a
wisp of cloud drifted across the sun. As his eyes became accustomed to the dark, he saw a grey figure huddled on the plank bed, one skinny arm thrown across its face. Apart from the bed, the only other furnishing was a bucket, smelling powerfully of urine and faeces.

‘Roper?’

The figure on the bed neither moved nor spoke.

‘This is Lieutenant Prior. He’s come to talk to you.’

Still no response. For a moment he thought she was dead, and he’d arrived too late. He said, ‘I’m from the Ministry of Munitions.’

Her face remained hidden. ‘Then you’d better bugger off back there, then, hadn’t you?’

The wardress clicked her tongue. ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ she said. She glanced round the bare cell. ‘Do you want a chair?’

‘No, I can manage.’

‘He’ll not be stopping long enough to need a chair.’

The door banged shut. He listened for the sound of retreating footsteps. He walked closer to the bed. ‘You know, if you co-operate, there could be a chance of remission.’

Silence.

‘That’s if you give us the information we need.’

Her eyes stayed shut. ‘I’ve told
you
once already. Bugger off back to London you greasy, arse-licking little sod.’

At last he heard the clump of boots on the landing. ‘Prison hasn’t done much for your language has it, Beattie?’

Her eyes opened. He moved so that the light from the window fell directly on to his face.

‘Billy?’

He went closer. She looked him up and down, even touched his sleeve, while a whole army of conflicting
emotions fought for possession of her face. She settled for the simplest. Hatred of the uniform. ‘Your dad must be turning in his grave.’

‘Well, I expect he would be if he was
in
it. He isn’t, he’s alive and kicking. My mother, mainly.’ She’d never liked him to talk about his father’s treatment of his mother. Now, with that remark, they were back in Tite Street, in the room behind the shop, beef stew and dumplings simmering on the stove, Hettie peering into the mirror above the mantelpiece, tweaking curls on to her forehead. Before the sense of intimacy could be lost, he went and sat on the end of her bed, and she shifted a little to make room for him. ‘You’ll never guess what
I
’ve just seen,’ he said in the same gossipy tone, and lifted an imaginary smock above his head.

Her face lit up with amusement. ‘Mad Mary,’ she said. ‘Eeh, dear me, everybody sees that, chaplain, governor. I says, “Put it away, Mary, it’s going bald.” But you can’t reason with her, she’s away to the woods is that one, but you’d be surprised how many are. There’s women in here should
never’
ve been sent to prison. They need help. Hey, and we’ve had a countess; an Irish rebel, I met her in the yard. She says, “You’re the woman who tried to kill Lloyd George. Let me shake your hand.” I says, “Well, it’s very kind of you, love, but I didn’t.”’

‘Didn’t you?’

‘’Course I bloody didn’t.’ She stared at him. ‘Did I try to kill Lloyd George by sticking a curare-tipped blowdart in his arse? No. I. did. not. Now if you’re asking, “Suppose you
had
a curare-tipped blowdart and Lloyd George’s arse was just here, would you stick it in?” ‘course I bloody would, because there’ll be no peace while that bugger’s in power.’

Prior shook his head. ‘You can’t fasten it on to
one
person like that.’

‘Can’t you?
I
can.’

‘I don’t see how you can derive that from a Marxist analysis.’

‘Bugger Marxist analysis, I hate the sod.’

He waited. ‘Enough to kill him?’

‘Yes, enough to kill him! And I wouldn’t feel guilty about it either. Any more than he feels guilty about the millions and millions of young lives he’s chucked away.’ She fell back, her mouth working. ‘I’m not your milk-and-water, creeping Jesus sort of pacifist.’

‘It might’ve been better if you hadn’t said all that in court.’

‘I told the
truth
in court. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.’ She laughed. ‘Bloody fatal, that was. Do you know, Billy, I’ve seen the time I could con anybody into anything, when I was a young woman. Now they ask me a simple question and the truth pours out.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s mixing with bloody Quakers, that’s what’s done it. Good Christian company’s been the ruin of me.’

‘So you didn’t plan to kill him?’

‘The poison was for the dogs.’

She hitched herself up the bed and propped her head against the wall. It was possible in this position to see how emaciated she was, how waxy her skin. Her hair, which had been brown the last time he saw her, was now almost entirely white. Thin strands escaped from the bun at the back of her head and straggled about her neck. He started to speak, but she interrupted him. ‘What are you here for, Billy?’

‘To help you.’

She smiled. ‘So what was all that about information?’

‘I had to say that. She was listening.’

‘But you
are
from the Ministry of Munitions?’

“Course I am. How do you think I got in? Doesn’t
mean I’m here for information, does it?’ He leant forward. ‘Think about it, Beattie. What information have you
got?’

She bridled. ‘You’d be surprised. People coming in and out.’ Then she pulled a face. ‘Actually, there’s not that many politicals in here. They’re all on about their fannies. You lose patience.’

‘I want you to tell me what happened.’

‘You mean you don’t know?’

‘I haven’t got a transcript of the trial.’

‘Haven’t you? You do surprise me. Why don’t you go and talk to Spragge?’