Days Twenty-Six and Twenty-Seven: Exercise.
Next morning my period started, and I just had time to insert one of the prison-issue tampons before the call came for slopping-out. Our clean clothes had still not arrived, so wearing only our prison sandals we lugged the bucket out into the corridor, and joined the tens of other naked women in the queue. There was more ribaldry than usual: somehow being naked together in the showers was taken as normal, whereas here in the corridor it was something to be noticed and remarked upon, and in my case to feel self-conscious about. However, it didn't last long, because the whole line was buzzing with the events of the previous evening. Gossip was being passed along like lines of falling dominoes, everyone was asking questions or relaying snippets, and what we picked up was this:
Normally, whilst most of the Wardens are supervising Showers, two stay behind to gather up the laundry and distribute clean clothes. One is Hackett, the Admin Officer, and the previous day she had been joined by Wilkes. Just as they were about to start, Wilkes felt ill with severe stomach pains. Hackett took her to the Prison Doctor, who decided she ought to go to hospital, so Hackett immediately drove her there.
After Showers, six prisoners were ordered to collect up the discarded clothes. They pushed the laundry trolley -- a wire-sided cage on wheels -- along the corridors, supervised by Bradley and Clark. This was what Rose and I had heard. The trolley was about three-quarters full, and had just turned around a corner, when one of the prisoners, a girl named Parker, suddenly scrambled up the wire mesh and plunged head first inside. Before the trolley came in sight of the Wardens again, she had burrowed down inside the heap of unwashed clothes.
The Wardens did not notice. The prisoners had been spreading out, collecting clothes from different passages, gathering them up from outside many doors. No-one noticed there was one prisoner short -- or if they did, when the job was finished, they assumed she was back in her cell.
Because everything was behind schedule, the clean uniforms were not distributed at their usual time, and it was only when the dinner round began that Parker was missed.
That was when the alarm had sounded.
But what had happened to Parker?
That was where the facts ended and speculation began. She wasn't back in her cell, that much was confirmed by her cellmate. And she certainly wasn't in the slopping-out queue. One prisoner claimed she had heard footsteps in the night, and a door opening and closing: perhaps it was Parker, being put into a cell on her own? Other prisoners said they had heard footsteps, but claimed it was just the Wardens doing a night time search.
"She was crazy," said the woman behind us, staring at my tits as she spoke. "The first place they'd search was the laundry trolley."
"If so they didn't find her," said a black woman passing us with an empty bucket.
"She'd have scrambled out," said the woman in front. "She could have hidden anywhere."
"She'd never get out of the prison though," said the woman with the bucket.
"Keep moving," shouted Clark, who seemed more bad-tempered than ever. The black woman walked off down the corridor with her bucket, her cellmate at her side.
"She'd do best to stay inside the trolley," said the woman in front, twisting back her head.
"She'd be discovered as soon as they tipped out the laundry," said the woman behind.
"But they don't tip it out, do they?" said Rose. "They wheel it straight onto the van."
The woman behind worked her jaw silently, as the implications of this sunk in. Then the queue moved forward again, and it was our turn to empty our slops into the stinking latrine. Rose did this with great care: we did not want anything splashing onto our bare legs.
"Get a move on," ordered Clark, as we walked back past the line of women, all still speculating on Parker's fate.
"Who is she?" I asked Rose when we were back in our cell. "Do you know her?"
"Plump little blond girl, if I've got the right one," said Rose. "Not been here long. I don't know what she's in for."
"What do you think has happened to her?"
"I don't know," said Rose. "But I wouldn't like to be in her shoes when they catch her."
So it remained a matter for speculation, for the Wardens were all tight-lipped, even Raymond, who brought round our clean uniforms later that morning.
The next day at slopping-out the word was that Parker had been recaptured and was back at Sparsebrook. No-one could elaborate on this, or explain how they knew: perhaps a Warden had let something slip, or perhaps someone had heard Parker's voice. Wherever she was, though, she was still not back in her cell.
Since it was Exercise that afternoon, I had other things on my mind. Happy anticipations of seeing Prana and wondering if we would have sex; troubled thoughts about Micky, wondering if she was going to attach herself to me again, and if I would need to gently dissuade her from getting too close.
As always when Exercise beckoned I was anxious about the weather. One of the worst things about being locked up was that we had no idea what was happening outside. I could half-sense rain, and I thought that wind made me agitated -- but since there was no way of confirming the weather, I could never be sure.
Several times I had eyed the air vents, at the top of the wall above the wash-basin. These were just bricks with slits in them, but the slits were so angled that it was impossible to see through them, or even detect any light. I had wondered if it would be possible to see through the slits if I could climb up and put my eye close. Now I decided that it would be such a boon to know what the weather was like I would give it a try. I discussed this with Rose, and she agreed to stand with her back to the door, so that if anybody tried to enter I would have enough time to jump down.
I stood on the bed, then gingerly put first one then the other foot into the basin. Memories of the time Dawes had caught me came flooding back, and I nearly climbed straight back down. By leaning forward into the wall I could keep my balance. It was tricky leaning to one side, but by spreading my arms and pressing my hands against the wall I could bring my face to within a few inches of the brick.
I felt a very faint touch of air, fresh air, on my cheek. It was tantalising, like a faint flick of a finger over my clitoris: I was so close to the elements, so close to the outside. I tried to draw the air into my lungs, but there was hardly enough to register. By angling my head I could feel the air on my eye. And I could make out just the faintest suggestion of light: light which did not pass through the angled ventilation slits, but was caught and held there.
I climbed back down. I had no more sense of the weather outside than I had had before.
In fact it was pleasant enough: not as balmy as the previous week, but from the few tiny flowers that had appeared through the cracks in the concrete it was clear that the season had advanced. There was an extra buzz amongst the women, a curiosity about Parker, a hope that somebody would be in the know.