The Walking Dead

He didn't blame himself. Never had done and wasn't about to start. Every man had a price. Damn certain, if enough noughts were racked up, Mr Justice Herbert who was God Almighty in court eighteen, had a price. He grinned at the thought of the big brown-paper parcel being slipped into the judge's grip. It didn't enter his mind that he should fight, kick and scratch against corruption. Christ, he needed the money. Pretty damn lucky that the offer had been to him, Jools Wright, who was deputy head of geography in a sink school filled to the gunwales with yobs and who had the original debt mountain, than to Rob, Baz or Vicky. It would be hard to keep a straight face when Mr Justice Herbert sent them out and Jools stated to the rest of them, 'I hear what you say, but on the basis of the evidence put before us, and disregarding the prejudice against the accused that the police evidence has tried to manufacture, I really cannot — in all honesty and sincerity — find the Curtis brothers guilty. No, I'm listening but I'm not about to change my viewpoint when the liberty of two citizens is involved. You can call me what you like but my vote is for an acquittal.' They'd be raging at him — but in his wardrobe there was a parcel of money…When he opened the door to Hannah's flat, he smelt the cooked breakfast.

She wore only the long sports shirt he'd given her and an apron. In the routine, they'd have breakfast in bed, then the trays would go on the floor and it was back to what Heaven sent.

He told her he thought he had a cold coming on, wasn't himself, but that he'd have thrown it off by next weekend. They had breakfast in the kitchen. An hour later he rang his father and told him, it was necessary to be consistent in his deceit, that he was on his way home to Babs. He didn't talk while he ate, as if his silence was a symptom of his cold, but he could see Hannah's annoyance, which seemed to say she thought she'd been short-changed. He was far away, thinking of the brothers and whether on Monday morning, tomorrow, he'd have the bravado to look them in the eyes because he'd taken their money.

* * *

They walked round the exercise yard.

'Nothing to do but wait,' Ollie Curtis said. 'I hate waiting.'

It was a banal remark, but true. It was the third time that the younger brother had made it, and they were only on the fourth circuit of the small area used by Category A remand prisoners, and they would get in another twelve circuits before the prison officers called them in and locked them up.

His voice spattered on: 'Can only wait for the morning. I suppose then we'll hear fast enough what Benny's done for us, get it from the brief. I'm with you, Ozzie, it's the only bloody chance. I reckon you're right. The witness won't stand up to another year of hanging about. The mistrial's all we've to look to, then going after that witness, but the waiting's a bastard.'.

Beside him, Ozzie had his hands deep in his pockets, his head down, and he trudged the circuit at pace.

'What you reckon, Ozzie, are you feeling good or what?'

The elder brother shrugged, his mind elsewhere. Young Ollie was always a dripping tap and talked when there was nothing to say. The 'only bloody chance' was with the Nobbler. Why? Because they were in Belmarsh where the security was tighter than it was at any other gaol in the country. There was a joke question among the 'ordinary'

remand men: 'Where is the biggest and most flourishing Al Qaeda cell in the country?' And a joke answer: 'In Belmarsh.' The hate guys, the bomb-plotters, had damn near half a landing to themselves. They had their own cook and their own religion man and the officers stayed off their backs. But them being there meant more wire on top of the outer walls, and more supervision, and guns outside in the locked-up boots of the armed-response vehicles. Where the brothers walked now, in the piss-poor little yard, there was a heavy tangle of reinforced wire above them. And it would be no better when they went to court because there were more guns in the escort vehicles, and guns at the Snaresbrook holding cells and round the courtroom. The Nobbler was the 'only bloody chance' because the option of a break-out did not exist. In a year and a month on remand, Ozzie Curtis had searched for a chink of light peeping through the security, and had yet to see it.

'By now Benny'll have done his approach,' Ollie Curtis said. 'You think this jerk would double-cross us, take the money and not do the business? It's a hell of an amount of money, and there's no guarantee. Would he dare?'