Part Eighty
Jo feverishly stabbed at the dial as she pressed the numbers which would link her to Helen. She drummed her fingers on the telephone table as the audible metronome of the dialling tone drove her frantic to get through to Helen.
"Hi, neither Helen nor Nikki are in, if you want to leave a message for either one of us, speak clearly and leave your message after the pips. If it's urgent can you phone up on………" a friendly automated voice spoke with a pronounced Scottish accent. Despite this, it wound Jo up as the human being who could listen and respond was not there, only this shadowed response.
"Hi, it's Helen Wade here," the real human voice cut in with that fractional change of intonation to the real human voice.
"Helen, my name is Jo Mills. I am the barrister representing Karen Betts. I take it that you already know that I am asking you to tell me what you know and, if you are agreeable, to give evidence in court."
"Yes, my partner Nikki did mention some such matter to me. It is perhaps as well that I am talking to you direct instead of talking via a go between. You had better tell me exactly what you are after and just why you want to involve me in the matter," Helen replied in a precise, chilly, far from reassuring tone of voice.
They make these Wing Governors tough, winced Jo. I would far rather go three rounds with George in any court case you care to name.
"I was the prosecuting barrister in the Atkins Pilkinton case which you may have read about. In the course of the case, it came out that a key witness, Karen Betts who I understand that you know……."
"Yes, I knew her only too well," Helen's grim anger filled voice cut in and the past tense forcibly consigned her to an unwanted part of her past life.
"………had been raped by one of the other witnesses in the trial, Mr Fenner. It's a long story but when Karen Betts gave her evidence the defense hauled her over the coals for her brief involvement with Mr Atkins whose mother, Yvonne Atkins you know."
"…………not exactly the best move in her life," Helen replied dismissively.
"From talking to Karen I know that she bitterly regretted her involvement with Mr Atkins as much as anyone when she found out that she was used for the purposes of the two people who were later put in the dock. What came to light is that her ill judged decision to involve herself with Mr Atkins stemmed directly from her traumatic experience at the hands of Mr Fenner, another man with whom she had a relationship and who totally deceived her. She feels now that he should be put in the dock as a serial abuser of women who will get worse the longer he is allowed to get away with it. I know that you have every reason not to get involved because of what I understand was a very painful period in your life but I am asking you, at the very least, to tell me what you know about Mr Fenner's crimes. You were at the centre of all the investigations and you have the most authority. There is no one who knows more from that side than you. Please, Helen, I am asking you nicely."
There was a long silence where Jo could hear her own breathing and the matter hung in the balance. Helen felt so intensely that there is a world of difference in watching an angst ridden TV programme and actually living it and this woman was a well meaning stranger to all that had happened. Good motives are not enough, she thought bitterly. A part of her mind wanted to slam the door shut on this woman and the locked up feelings of hurt and pain which were threatening to escape as they talked. The back of Helen's mind secretly admitted how persuasive she was in talking in their shared language of intelligence and incisive reason.
"Go on, I'm listening," Helen replied in a more guarded tone.
"We ought to talk about what it is that divides you from Karen Betts. What sort of relationship did you have with her?"
A sudden onrush of memories flooded into the present of the fresh faced respectful friendly Prison Officer with a pleasant smile who was one of the few like minded liberals like herself. How grotesque was her bitter farewell to Karen that she was 'sick and tired' at explaining to an uncomprehending and hostile Karen that Fenner was a 'misogynist bastard'.
"I liked her at the beginning ….she didn't like Jim Fenner any more than I did, or so I thought," Helen replied in halting tones where her anger and hurt broke through the hard veneer. "She had been with me when I interviewed Shell Dockley when she came in ,all bruised and battered by Fenner. She said that he did it when he had accused her of making poison pen phone calls to his wife. I even had a drink with her when I warned her what sort of a devious bastard he was and to watch him. I thought she understood but by some process that I couldn't keep track of she ended up in a relationship with him. I got angry with her for being so blind when she took his side in any row I had with him. I never really wanted an argument with her but she was the one who forced it all the time. If she had stuck with me and kept away from that bastard, we could have got rid of him. I blame her for what happened when she should have known better. A part of me thinks that she got everything that was coming to her."
"And the other half, Helen?" Jo asked softly.
"I don't know," Helen confessed in bewilderment, her voice slow, feeling its way in contrast to the earlier steely certainties. "Perhaps I don't want to know as it all happened a long time ago and I want to keep it that way."
"Perhaps she isn't the Karen Betts that you know. For a start, she's in a relationship with Yvonne Atkins."
"Nikki told me that one," And Jo heard a faint shadow of a laugh down the phone. "All right, I'll tell you what you want to know but don't think for one moment that I'm going soft on her or you. Let me make that totally clear." Helen's Scottish accent broadened as her voice ended on a forceful and confident tone.
"Let's start from the beginning. Can you tell me your impressions of him, what makes him tick," Jo enquired.
"There was something about Jim Fenner that rang loud warning bells in me from the very start, the way he'd smile to your face and stab you in the back . He isn't an ordinary crude liar as he'll mix in truth to suit his purposes and he'll run rings round you if you let him. Knowledge is power and he made it an art form to manipulate that for his selfish purposes and to set people against each other, like…..he did with Karen and myself now I come to think of it.He also had it in for me as a young female graduate in authority over him. You may have come across the kind of man who feels that strong women are a threat.That is Jim Fenner to a T.When I first came to G Wing as an inexperienced Wing Governor I didn't know the half of what went on. I found out the hard way."
The harshness in Helen's voice stood out a mile to Jo and it struck an immediate chord with her when she remembered her early days as a practising barrister. She was made to feel an unwelcome intruder into the very mannered Old Etonian boys club who had their own secretly coded conversations. They saw her that in the very act in assuming their own uniform of wig and gown that it threatened their masculinity. Times had changed in her own formerly male dominated profession ,thought Jo, but Helen was not so lucky.
"That is very helpful, Helen, comparing him to what I've seen of him as a witness in court. Do you want to talk about Rachel Hicks first, or Shell Dockley? It's your choice," Jo astutely asked Helen
"There was something creepy about the way he was with the prisoners, his 'fan club' as Nikki told me a long long time ago. You work at a prison and after a while, you develop feelers for what is going on or else something will go on under your nose and you'll never know it. I could tell that there was obviously something between Shell Dockley and Fenner but there was nothing you could ever pin on her as a young prison officer told me once. Thinking back on it, she got protection from him as G Wing's most dangerous bully in return for sex," Helen's reflective, slow paced voice curled its way down the phone line into Jo's very sharp memory.
"There was always something remote and withdrawn and waiflike about a young single mother called Rachel Hicks. Before she committed suicide, she trashed her cell which was totally out of character. Unfortunately her personal officer hadn't seen much of her but Fenner had 'taken an interest in her.'" Helen spoke the last italicised words with real sarcasm and bitterness. "I interviewed her myself and there was something about her that I could not put my finger on, apart from Fenner's very convincing explanation as he just happened to pop in that her child had just been taken into care. Shell Dockley had got wind of Rachel and had got jealous. With the help of her sidekick, Denny Blood who shared the four bed cell with Rachel Hicks ,they bullied her till she couldn't take any more."
Helen's voice slowed down as she got to the end of the story which recalled her own feelings of guilt that such a thing had happened while she was in her charge.
"I investigated the matter of her suicide myself to find out why , in a four bed cell of all places, she had hanged herself. It was Denny Blood, Shell's sidekick who first told me about Fenner, Dockley and Rachel Hicks as I've told you but her position was compromised. My suspicions became certainties when another prisoner with no axe to grind also tipped me off. It wasn't till Fenner beat up Shell Dockley and she came to me and Karen that I got the full truth from her that the man had been screwing both of them and, of course, Fenner had never told me one word of all this. I went straight to Mr Stubberfield, the Governing Governor who was thick as thieves with Fenner and he was going to believe all that crap that Shell Dockley had been 'knocking her head on the floor'. I forced him to suspend Fenner while an investigation took place. He made it quite clear that this enquiry was going to be a whitewash job to sweep everything under the carpet and I resigned on the spot."
"How did you get back to working at Larkhall and why? I thought you would have had enough of the place?" Jo asked out of interest.
"I was unemployed for a while and eventually came across a Home Office research job working for Area Management into why this country has such a high proportion of women lifers. That involved me spending occasional time at Larkhall to begin with and then I got more involved there with my responsibility for the lifers on the Home Office programme."
"It must have been tough to go back there."
"It happens," Helen replied far too casually for Jo's liking. "I had my duty to do anyway," she finished in Jo's own words. She wasn't going to talk about the background of her relationship with Nikki to a perfect stranger especially the way her growing desires had pulled the opposite way from the clear knowledge that she was breaking the biggest rule in her book of professionalism.
"I was going to ask you about the time Shell Dockley stabbed Fenner. Before we get on to that, can you think of anything relevant that happened before then."
Helen's mind was working freely. Somehow the fear of even talking about her days at Larkhall was dissipating and talking to an intelligent stranger was paradoxically easier.There wasn't any emotional involvement from that person being too closely connected to the events.
"Apart from crossing swords with Fenner on my first day, I can't think of anything significant. I was away from Larkhall that night so the first I knew was a phone call from Karen saying that there was an emergency on and they needed everyone.I tried to gently talk Shell Dockley into giving up the broken bottle that she was threatening Fenner with and to give herself up voluntarily. Just at the point when I was succeeding, Karen Betts stuck her oar in and had the door broken down and Shell Dockley dragged out screaming. I can't remember much else as I was called away to deal with a disturbance on the wing. Karen was there to deal with the aftermath," Helen finished shortly.
"Can you tell me about what you found out in your investigation."
"That night, there was a wedding celebration for one of the prison officers and some of the prisoners were there serving drinks for the guests, I know, not the decision I would have made, especially allowing Shell Dockley to be there. I found out that she had smuggled a broken bottle from out of the party and that Fenner had escorted her back to her cell. I found out from Yvonne Atkins that she had wound her up by saying that Fenner and Karen Betts were sleeping together. While I suspected Fenner's motives in going back with her to her cell, I couldn't conclude otherwise that Shell had fully intended in advance to stab Fenner and had to let him off the hook.I interviewed Shell herself and she gave me a cock and bull yarn about why she had the broken bottle".
"What's your opinion of Shell Dockley? The relationships between you and the two of them are far from clear to me."
Helen silently nodded to herself in appreciation at the very good question.
"Shell Dockley ended up in prison for torturing and killing another woman she was jealous of," Helen said flatly to Jo's horror. "She was as adept a liar as Fenner and kept grudges. She got a kick out of inflicting cruelties. I was never close to her but Karen may know more of her background than I do. She and Nikki hated each other's guts as did Nikki and Fenner. When I came to Larkhall, Shell Dockley was in a favoured position thanks to Fenner and the Old boys network, and Nikki was the outcast. I incurred Shell Dockley's emnity as I broke up Fenner's cosy arrangement and ensured Nikki was treated fairly. However, when Dockley caused trouble for Fenner, they fell out and Dockley came to me for help. I felt genuinely sorry for her and was horrified at the sight of her injuries . I never trusted her any more than Nikki did. Have I made things clear, Jo?" Helen said, having violently compressed a whole complexity of cross cutting allegiances and strong emotions into a few short sentences.
Nikki smiled to herself in the background when she heard this as she knew Helen would be better off if she kept away.
"Perfectly, Helen. I am grateful for you explaining matters so lucidly." Jo meant this as she had experience of clients stories meandering all over the place, glossing over important details while introducing all sorts of irrelevancies.If she could persuade her to stand up in court, she had that assured grip of facts and real strength of personality that was obvious even on the phone. What she would be like in person would be doubly powerful and convincing.
"I have a question to ask which involves you personally. I have had sight of a report that you wrote of the time when Fenner assaulted you. Is there anything you wish to add to it?" The sensitive way that Jo gently forewarned Helen gave her a chance to mentally prepare herself.
"I popped into the PO's room on a deserted evening only to pick up a file and had another verbal run in with him the same as I had done a week or so previously.Of all the evil things I had seen Fenner do or heard that he'd done, I never thought that it could happen to me. In the end, I broke away and ran for it before he could do me any more harm. They say," and Jo heard Helen audibly struggling for control to reduce everything down to a general dispassionate analysis, "that a lot of women who are sexually assaulted know the man responsible. It's not done as much as one might think by some stranger down a dark alley. Still, I was lucky, he only put his hand between my legs, nothing like what he did to Karen from what I've heard."
Helen finished on a note that horribly understated her feelings of total horror and the image flashbacks.
"Do you want to have a break, Helen?" Jo asked.
"Let's carry on. I want to get everything out into the open," She said with a determined emphasis which Jo found had a peculiar edge to it. "Do you want to hear my thoughts on what really happened when Shell Dockley escaped from Larkhall?"
"Go ahead," Jo said politely.It took the edge off the situation if Helen started to take control and was a good omen for her possibly agreeing to testify as a witness. Things were looking up after a tricky start and it looked as if Helen was psyching herself up to decide to testify in court after all.
"Nikki has helped me to piece together a few things about my time at Larkhall which I didn't understand. Shell Dockley would make all sort of veiled threats against him to undermine him when he came back on duty after many weeks sick leave . Anyway, soon after the sexual assault, a TV company came to Larkhall to make a documentary and Stubberfield, that fool of a man, saw it as a way to make cheap publicity totally blind to the way that the whole thing could blow up in our face. Shell Dockley and two others sneaked out in the middle of the mayhem you might expect in a church service where the cameras were on the congregation. Very conveniently, Shell Dockley had left under her bed a bar of soap as a mould so a spare key could be cut of the door at the back of the chapel. They unlocked this and stole the TV company's van. Still more conveniently, she had left a supposed diary which appeared to suggest that the lifer's group that I ran which she was part of was badly supervised."
"In what way was the diary suspect evidence?" Jo enquired.
"The opening line supposedly six weeks before her breakout said 'I want to escape.' Now I was very closely involved with the lifers in the group and they were all encouraged to keep a diary so that their thoughts and feelings could be directed openly and to focus their feelings towards a more constructive use of their time and to maximise their potential. Shell Dockley may have many gifts but literary efforts were not amongst them in keeping diaries. She was a trouble maker in all the group meetings.The whole thing was too suspect for words as I told the investigators from Area that an up to date diary suddenly appeared . Just how they got hold of the keys to the van I don't know but I can see to whose interest it was for her to escape and for both of them to use the incident to damage my reputation. I told them that the key that was cut to aid their escape would be done on the outside and by no stretch of imagination would the bar of soap be brought back into Larkhall except to incriminate me To whose advantage is the obvious question and it clearly points to Shell Dockley and Fenner."
To Jo, Helen was on a roll as she talked and her rapid incisive command of the facts and her ability to articulate them fluently showed her that the Home Office's gain as a Wing Governor was the legal profession's loss as a potentially fine barrister. Jo heard Helen take a swallow of liquid as, unknown to her, Nikki had silently passed her a glass of water as Helen's voice was being strained by all her talking.
"The last link in the chain is the O'Kane brothels. Virginia O'Kane, an owner of a chain of brothels had been locked up and it was Yvonne Atkins, who knows pretty well everything that went on at Larkhall, who tipped me off that Fenner was running the brothels on the side and taking a cut out of the takings. This was my chance to see the back of Fenner and I staked out the main brothel for night after night till I was dropping with fatigue. Yvonne's daughter found out that he was passing himself off as John Farmer…."
"He has to be the same person, Helen. What a transparent disguise," exclaimed Jo.
"……….suspecting something is one thing but proving it is quite another matter as you should know," And that shrewd thrust taught Jo that Helen was definitely in the wrong business as a psychologist or otherwise, had an alternative career. "It wasn't till I found out when and where he was going to pick up the takings and I confronted him one dark night when he was coming out of the massage parlour," Helen exclaimed. "He was actually trying to tell me that he had been there as a punter. That was a first that he had ever admitted anything along that line. I pushed the matter and he threatened me and had me up against a wall. I took the risk of a lifetime and conned him into thinking that I had an accomplice with a handy long range camera and he caved in. The morning after, I confronted him and insisted on his written resignation."
"That's incredible what you've told me, Helen. You've told me that you have direct evidence of him violently assaulting women, your own experience that matches what has also happened to Karen Betts, that he has a record of sexually exploiting women in his charge and that he is totally sleasy and corrupt.You would make a great witness in court both in what you know and in your grasp of the facts."
"And that is what I'm not about to become. I'm sorry Jo, I accept entirely what you say and you almost sound like the way I used to talk a few years ago but I'm not going into the witness box. I've told you what I know and that is as far as I'm prepared to go."
There was a deep silence that lasted far longer than the wall clock where Jo was, ticked out the time. The story had built up from an uncertain start, had gathered pace and rhythm and had built up to a crescendo to be capped by the inevitable conclusion. Except that the story had stopped dead. Jo could hear her own breathing while Helen had hardened her heart as she had known in advance that she must. Then one question popped out of nowhere in Jo's mind and it took words.
"Why did you leave Larkhall?"
Jo could almost feel the tension in Helen while Nikki came silently behind her and gently placed her hands on Helen's tense shoulders. Helen wrestled with the dilemma to tell and the huge risk she was taking but as Nikki said nothing, Helen plucked up the courage to say.
"If I tell you, Jo, I must advise you that I had broken the law."
"Don't worry, Helen. I don't work for the prison service and, after all I have heard, perhaps I am lucky in my career in whom I work with."
Helen was oblivious of the irony in Jo's words when she recalled the slippery Sir Ian Rochester and Lawrence James.
"All right. It's simple. Fenner found out that I had been having a relationship with Nikki when she was a prisoner in my charge, that she had broken out to land herself on my doorstep the night that Fenner was stabbed and I had slept with her. It's funny that expression," and Helen's laugh was artificial to cover up the tension she felt, "the one thing Nikki and I did not do was sleep, not after all those months that this had been denied to us. I smuggled Nikki back to Larkhall and went on to help get Dockley out of her cell. Fenner remembers all this. If I testify against him, that will be brought up. I dare not take that risk and I insist that you respect our feelings on the matter. One way or another, Fenner must be brought to account but I can't help you out this way."
Jo felt deflated that the chance of a lifetime to build up her case had tantalisingly slipped out of reach. She couldn't blame her but it was no consolation. Helen in contrast, felt that she had been delicately edged towards a cliff's edge that only she could see and she had thrown herself back from going over the edge. She felt sweaty, relieved that she had done the right thing but still felt a trace of that feeling of guilt that she wasn't the Helen Stewart who would have gone into battle. She had moved on.
"You aren't angry with me Jo?" Helen asked. Somehow it was important that she was well thought of by this barrister whose face she didn't even know.
"How can I be, Helen," Jo reassured her with all the sincerity she could summon up. "You deserve a lifetime of contentment with Nikki."
And she meant that and hoped that someday she could achieve a similar peace of mind in her life.
Jo feverishly stabbed at the dial as she pressed the numbers which would link her to Helen. She drummed her fingers on the telephone table as the audible metronome of the dialling tone drove her frantic to get through to Helen.
"Hi, neither Helen nor Nikki are in, if you want to leave a message for either one of us, speak clearly and leave your message after the pips. If it's urgent can you phone up on………" a friendly automated voice spoke with a pronounced Scottish accent. Despite this, it wound Jo up as the human being who could listen and respond was not there, only this shadowed response.
"Hi, it's Helen Wade here," the real human voice cut in with that fractional change of intonation to the real human voice.
"Helen, my name is Jo Mills. I am the barrister representing Karen Betts. I take it that you already know that I am asking you to tell me what you know and, if you are agreeable, to give evidence in court."
"Yes, my partner Nikki did mention some such matter to me. It is perhaps as well that I am talking to you direct instead of talking via a go between. You had better tell me exactly what you are after and just why you want to involve me in the matter," Helen replied in a precise, chilly, far from reassuring tone of voice.
They make these Wing Governors tough, winced Jo. I would far rather go three rounds with George in any court case you care to name.
"I was the prosecuting barrister in the Atkins Pilkinton case which you may have read about. In the course of the case, it came out that a key witness, Karen Betts who I understand that you know……."
"Yes, I knew her only too well," Helen's grim anger filled voice cut in and the past tense forcibly consigned her to an unwanted part of her past life.
"………had been raped by one of the other witnesses in the trial, Mr Fenner. It's a long story but when Karen Betts gave her evidence the defense hauled her over the coals for her brief involvement with Mr Atkins whose mother, Yvonne Atkins you know."
"…………not exactly the best move in her life," Helen replied dismissively.
"From talking to Karen I know that she bitterly regretted her involvement with Mr Atkins as much as anyone when she found out that she was used for the purposes of the two people who were later put in the dock. What came to light is that her ill judged decision to involve herself with Mr Atkins stemmed directly from her traumatic experience at the hands of Mr Fenner, another man with whom she had a relationship and who totally deceived her. She feels now that he should be put in the dock as a serial abuser of women who will get worse the longer he is allowed to get away with it. I know that you have every reason not to get involved because of what I understand was a very painful period in your life but I am asking you, at the very least, to tell me what you know about Mr Fenner's crimes. You were at the centre of all the investigations and you have the most authority. There is no one who knows more from that side than you. Please, Helen, I am asking you nicely."
There was a long silence where Jo could hear her own breathing and the matter hung in the balance. Helen felt so intensely that there is a world of difference in watching an angst ridden TV programme and actually living it and this woman was a well meaning stranger to all that had happened. Good motives are not enough, she thought bitterly. A part of her mind wanted to slam the door shut on this woman and the locked up feelings of hurt and pain which were threatening to escape as they talked. The back of Helen's mind secretly admitted how persuasive she was in talking in their shared language of intelligence and incisive reason.
"Go on, I'm listening," Helen replied in a more guarded tone.
"We ought to talk about what it is that divides you from Karen Betts. What sort of relationship did you have with her?"
A sudden onrush of memories flooded into the present of the fresh faced respectful friendly Prison Officer with a pleasant smile who was one of the few like minded liberals like herself. How grotesque was her bitter farewell to Karen that she was 'sick and tired' at explaining to an uncomprehending and hostile Karen that Fenner was a 'misogynist bastard'.
"I liked her at the beginning ….she didn't like Jim Fenner any more than I did, or so I thought," Helen replied in halting tones where her anger and hurt broke through the hard veneer. "She had been with me when I interviewed Shell Dockley when she came in ,all bruised and battered by Fenner. She said that he did it when he had accused her of making poison pen phone calls to his wife. I even had a drink with her when I warned her what sort of a devious bastard he was and to watch him. I thought she understood but by some process that I couldn't keep track of she ended up in a relationship with him. I got angry with her for being so blind when she took his side in any row I had with him. I never really wanted an argument with her but she was the one who forced it all the time. If she had stuck with me and kept away from that bastard, we could have got rid of him. I blame her for what happened when she should have known better. A part of me thinks that she got everything that was coming to her."
"And the other half, Helen?" Jo asked softly.
"I don't know," Helen confessed in bewilderment, her voice slow, feeling its way in contrast to the earlier steely certainties. "Perhaps I don't want to know as it all happened a long time ago and I want to keep it that way."
"Perhaps she isn't the Karen Betts that you know. For a start, she's in a relationship with Yvonne Atkins."
"Nikki told me that one," And Jo heard a faint shadow of a laugh down the phone. "All right, I'll tell you what you want to know but don't think for one moment that I'm going soft on her or you. Let me make that totally clear." Helen's Scottish accent broadened as her voice ended on a forceful and confident tone.
"Let's start from the beginning. Can you tell me your impressions of him, what makes him tick," Jo enquired.
"There was something about Jim Fenner that rang loud warning bells in me from the very start, the way he'd smile to your face and stab you in the back . He isn't an ordinary crude liar as he'll mix in truth to suit his purposes and he'll run rings round you if you let him. Knowledge is power and he made it an art form to manipulate that for his selfish purposes and to set people against each other, like…..he did with Karen and myself now I come to think of it.He also had it in for me as a young female graduate in authority over him. You may have come across the kind of man who feels that strong women are a threat.That is Jim Fenner to a T.When I first came to G Wing as an inexperienced Wing Governor I didn't know the half of what went on. I found out the hard way."
The harshness in Helen's voice stood out a mile to Jo and it struck an immediate chord with her when she remembered her early days as a practising barrister. She was made to feel an unwelcome intruder into the very mannered Old Etonian boys club who had their own secretly coded conversations. They saw her that in the very act in assuming their own uniform of wig and gown that it threatened their masculinity. Times had changed in her own formerly male dominated profession ,thought Jo, but Helen was not so lucky.
"That is very helpful, Helen, comparing him to what I've seen of him as a witness in court. Do you want to talk about Rachel Hicks first, or Shell Dockley? It's your choice," Jo astutely asked Helen
"There was something creepy about the way he was with the prisoners, his 'fan club' as Nikki told me a long long time ago. You work at a prison and after a while, you develop feelers for what is going on or else something will go on under your nose and you'll never know it. I could tell that there was obviously something between Shell Dockley and Fenner but there was nothing you could ever pin on her as a young prison officer told me once. Thinking back on it, she got protection from him as G Wing's most dangerous bully in return for sex," Helen's reflective, slow paced voice curled its way down the phone line into Jo's very sharp memory.
"There was always something remote and withdrawn and waiflike about a young single mother called Rachel Hicks. Before she committed suicide, she trashed her cell which was totally out of character. Unfortunately her personal officer hadn't seen much of her but Fenner had 'taken an interest in her.'" Helen spoke the last italicised words with real sarcasm and bitterness. "I interviewed her myself and there was something about her that I could not put my finger on, apart from Fenner's very convincing explanation as he just happened to pop in that her child had just been taken into care. Shell Dockley had got wind of Rachel and had got jealous. With the help of her sidekick, Denny Blood who shared the four bed cell with Rachel Hicks ,they bullied her till she couldn't take any more."
Helen's voice slowed down as she got to the end of the story which recalled her own feelings of guilt that such a thing had happened while she was in her charge.
"I investigated the matter of her suicide myself to find out why , in a four bed cell of all places, she had hanged herself. It was Denny Blood, Shell's sidekick who first told me about Fenner, Dockley and Rachel Hicks as I've told you but her position was compromised. My suspicions became certainties when another prisoner with no axe to grind also tipped me off. It wasn't till Fenner beat up Shell Dockley and she came to me and Karen that I got the full truth from her that the man had been screwing both of them and, of course, Fenner had never told me one word of all this. I went straight to Mr Stubberfield, the Governing Governor who was thick as thieves with Fenner and he was going to believe all that crap that Shell Dockley had been 'knocking her head on the floor'. I forced him to suspend Fenner while an investigation took place. He made it quite clear that this enquiry was going to be a whitewash job to sweep everything under the carpet and I resigned on the spot."
"How did you get back to working at Larkhall and why? I thought you would have had enough of the place?" Jo asked out of interest.
"I was unemployed for a while and eventually came across a Home Office research job working for Area Management into why this country has such a high proportion of women lifers. That involved me spending occasional time at Larkhall to begin with and then I got more involved there with my responsibility for the lifers on the Home Office programme."
"It must have been tough to go back there."
"It happens," Helen replied far too casually for Jo's liking. "I had my duty to do anyway," she finished in Jo's own words. She wasn't going to talk about the background of her relationship with Nikki to a perfect stranger especially the way her growing desires had pulled the opposite way from the clear knowledge that she was breaking the biggest rule in her book of professionalism.
"I was going to ask you about the time Shell Dockley stabbed Fenner. Before we get on to that, can you think of anything relevant that happened before then."
Helen's mind was working freely. Somehow the fear of even talking about her days at Larkhall was dissipating and talking to an intelligent stranger was paradoxically easier.There wasn't any emotional involvement from that person being too closely connected to the events.
"Apart from crossing swords with Fenner on my first day, I can't think of anything significant. I was away from Larkhall that night so the first I knew was a phone call from Karen saying that there was an emergency on and they needed everyone.I tried to gently talk Shell Dockley into giving up the broken bottle that she was threatening Fenner with and to give herself up voluntarily. Just at the point when I was succeeding, Karen Betts stuck her oar in and had the door broken down and Shell Dockley dragged out screaming. I can't remember much else as I was called away to deal with a disturbance on the wing. Karen was there to deal with the aftermath," Helen finished shortly.
"Can you tell me about what you found out in your investigation."
"That night, there was a wedding celebration for one of the prison officers and some of the prisoners were there serving drinks for the guests, I know, not the decision I would have made, especially allowing Shell Dockley to be there. I found out that she had smuggled a broken bottle from out of the party and that Fenner had escorted her back to her cell. I found out from Yvonne Atkins that she had wound her up by saying that Fenner and Karen Betts were sleeping together. While I suspected Fenner's motives in going back with her to her cell, I couldn't conclude otherwise that Shell had fully intended in advance to stab Fenner and had to let him off the hook.I interviewed Shell herself and she gave me a cock and bull yarn about why she had the broken bottle".
"What's your opinion of Shell Dockley? The relationships between you and the two of them are far from clear to me."
Helen silently nodded to herself in appreciation at the very good question.
"Shell Dockley ended up in prison for torturing and killing another woman she was jealous of," Helen said flatly to Jo's horror. "She was as adept a liar as Fenner and kept grudges. She got a kick out of inflicting cruelties. I was never close to her but Karen may know more of her background than I do. She and Nikki hated each other's guts as did Nikki and Fenner. When I came to Larkhall, Shell Dockley was in a favoured position thanks to Fenner and the Old boys network, and Nikki was the outcast. I incurred Shell Dockley's emnity as I broke up Fenner's cosy arrangement and ensured Nikki was treated fairly. However, when Dockley caused trouble for Fenner, they fell out and Dockley came to me for help. I felt genuinely sorry for her and was horrified at the sight of her injuries . I never trusted her any more than Nikki did. Have I made things clear, Jo?" Helen said, having violently compressed a whole complexity of cross cutting allegiances and strong emotions into a few short sentences.
Nikki smiled to herself in the background when she heard this as she knew Helen would be better off if she kept away.
"Perfectly, Helen. I am grateful for you explaining matters so lucidly." Jo meant this as she had experience of clients stories meandering all over the place, glossing over important details while introducing all sorts of irrelevancies.If she could persuade her to stand up in court, she had that assured grip of facts and real strength of personality that was obvious even on the phone. What she would be like in person would be doubly powerful and convincing.
"I have a question to ask which involves you personally. I have had sight of a report that you wrote of the time when Fenner assaulted you. Is there anything you wish to add to it?" The sensitive way that Jo gently forewarned Helen gave her a chance to mentally prepare herself.
"I popped into the PO's room on a deserted evening only to pick up a file and had another verbal run in with him the same as I had done a week or so previously.Of all the evil things I had seen Fenner do or heard that he'd done, I never thought that it could happen to me. In the end, I broke away and ran for it before he could do me any more harm. They say," and Jo heard Helen audibly struggling for control to reduce everything down to a general dispassionate analysis, "that a lot of women who are sexually assaulted know the man responsible. It's not done as much as one might think by some stranger down a dark alley. Still, I was lucky, he only put his hand between my legs, nothing like what he did to Karen from what I've heard."
Helen finished on a note that horribly understated her feelings of total horror and the image flashbacks.
"Do you want to have a break, Helen?" Jo asked.
"Let's carry on. I want to get everything out into the open," She said with a determined emphasis which Jo found had a peculiar edge to it. "Do you want to hear my thoughts on what really happened when Shell Dockley escaped from Larkhall?"
"Go ahead," Jo said politely.It took the edge off the situation if Helen started to take control and was a good omen for her possibly agreeing to testify as a witness. Things were looking up after a tricky start and it looked as if Helen was psyching herself up to decide to testify in court after all.
"Nikki has helped me to piece together a few things about my time at Larkhall which I didn't understand. Shell Dockley would make all sort of veiled threats against him to undermine him when he came back on duty after many weeks sick leave . Anyway, soon after the sexual assault, a TV company came to Larkhall to make a documentary and Stubberfield, that fool of a man, saw it as a way to make cheap publicity totally blind to the way that the whole thing could blow up in our face. Shell Dockley and two others sneaked out in the middle of the mayhem you might expect in a church service where the cameras were on the congregation. Very conveniently, Shell Dockley had left under her bed a bar of soap as a mould so a spare key could be cut of the door at the back of the chapel. They unlocked this and stole the TV company's van. Still more conveniently, she had left a supposed diary which appeared to suggest that the lifer's group that I ran which she was part of was badly supervised."
"In what way was the diary suspect evidence?" Jo enquired.
"The opening line supposedly six weeks before her breakout said 'I want to escape.' Now I was very closely involved with the lifers in the group and they were all encouraged to keep a diary so that their thoughts and feelings could be directed openly and to focus their feelings towards a more constructive use of their time and to maximise their potential. Shell Dockley may have many gifts but literary efforts were not amongst them in keeping diaries. She was a trouble maker in all the group meetings.The whole thing was too suspect for words as I told the investigators from Area that an up to date diary suddenly appeared . Just how they got hold of the keys to the van I don't know but I can see to whose interest it was for her to escape and for both of them to use the incident to damage my reputation. I told them that the key that was cut to aid their escape would be done on the outside and by no stretch of imagination would the bar of soap be brought back into Larkhall except to incriminate me To whose advantage is the obvious question and it clearly points to Shell Dockley and Fenner."
To Jo, Helen was on a roll as she talked and her rapid incisive command of the facts and her ability to articulate them fluently showed her that the Home Office's gain as a Wing Governor was the legal profession's loss as a potentially fine barrister. Jo heard Helen take a swallow of liquid as, unknown to her, Nikki had silently passed her a glass of water as Helen's voice was being strained by all her talking.
"The last link in the chain is the O'Kane brothels. Virginia O'Kane, an owner of a chain of brothels had been locked up and it was Yvonne Atkins, who knows pretty well everything that went on at Larkhall, who tipped me off that Fenner was running the brothels on the side and taking a cut out of the takings. This was my chance to see the back of Fenner and I staked out the main brothel for night after night till I was dropping with fatigue. Yvonne's daughter found out that he was passing himself off as John Farmer…."
"He has to be the same person, Helen. What a transparent disguise," exclaimed Jo.
"……….suspecting something is one thing but proving it is quite another matter as you should know," And that shrewd thrust taught Jo that Helen was definitely in the wrong business as a psychologist or otherwise, had an alternative career. "It wasn't till I found out when and where he was going to pick up the takings and I confronted him one dark night when he was coming out of the massage parlour," Helen exclaimed. "He was actually trying to tell me that he had been there as a punter. That was a first that he had ever admitted anything along that line. I pushed the matter and he threatened me and had me up against a wall. I took the risk of a lifetime and conned him into thinking that I had an accomplice with a handy long range camera and he caved in. The morning after, I confronted him and insisted on his written resignation."
"That's incredible what you've told me, Helen. You've told me that you have direct evidence of him violently assaulting women, your own experience that matches what has also happened to Karen Betts, that he has a record of sexually exploiting women in his charge and that he is totally sleasy and corrupt.You would make a great witness in court both in what you know and in your grasp of the facts."
"And that is what I'm not about to become. I'm sorry Jo, I accept entirely what you say and you almost sound like the way I used to talk a few years ago but I'm not going into the witness box. I've told you what I know and that is as far as I'm prepared to go."
There was a deep silence that lasted far longer than the wall clock where Jo was, ticked out the time. The story had built up from an uncertain start, had gathered pace and rhythm and had built up to a crescendo to be capped by the inevitable conclusion. Except that the story had stopped dead. Jo could hear her own breathing while Helen had hardened her heart as she had known in advance that she must. Then one question popped out of nowhere in Jo's mind and it took words.
"Why did you leave Larkhall?"
Jo could almost feel the tension in Helen while Nikki came silently behind her and gently placed her hands on Helen's tense shoulders. Helen wrestled with the dilemma to tell and the huge risk she was taking but as Nikki said nothing, Helen plucked up the courage to say.
"If I tell you, Jo, I must advise you that I had broken the law."
"Don't worry, Helen. I don't work for the prison service and, after all I have heard, perhaps I am lucky in my career in whom I work with."
Helen was oblivious of the irony in Jo's words when she recalled the slippery Sir Ian Rochester and Lawrence James.
"All right. It's simple. Fenner found out that I had been having a relationship with Nikki when she was a prisoner in my charge, that she had broken out to land herself on my doorstep the night that Fenner was stabbed and I had slept with her. It's funny that expression," and Helen's laugh was artificial to cover up the tension she felt, "the one thing Nikki and I did not do was sleep, not after all those months that this had been denied to us. I smuggled Nikki back to Larkhall and went on to help get Dockley out of her cell. Fenner remembers all this. If I testify against him, that will be brought up. I dare not take that risk and I insist that you respect our feelings on the matter. One way or another, Fenner must be brought to account but I can't help you out this way."
Jo felt deflated that the chance of a lifetime to build up her case had tantalisingly slipped out of reach. She couldn't blame her but it was no consolation. Helen in contrast, felt that she had been delicately edged towards a cliff's edge that only she could see and she had thrown herself back from going over the edge. She felt sweaty, relieved that she had done the right thing but still felt a trace of that feeling of guilt that she wasn't the Helen Stewart who would have gone into battle. She had moved on.
"You aren't angry with me Jo?" Helen asked. Somehow it was important that she was well thought of by this barrister whose face she didn't even know.
"How can I be, Helen," Jo reassured her with all the sincerity she could summon up. "You deserve a lifetime of contentment with Nikki."
And she meant that and hoped that someday she could achieve a similar peace of mind in her life.