Grayling had long learnt a whole range of skills and sensitive antenna with which to play the game of office politics. He had that knack of attuning himself to the delicate nuances around him. He was also blessed with particularly sharp hearing, which enabled him to pick up on private conversations, that others fondly imagined were secret. His ability to persuade others with his silver tongue was linked with a very agile mind. Once, these gifts were used for selfish self-advancement, but now he saw himself as the protector of those like-minded idealists who would give him loyalty in return. Ironically, by learning to give unselfishly to others, he had avoided the trap that self-seeking paranoid careerists fell into of being unable to trust others, surrounded as they were by sycophants. From his distant observation of Ministers as they swanned around area on their royal progressions, they were the worst of that breed. He could tell it by their lying eyes.
The evil smile on Alison Warner's face had first told Grayling that there was bad news afoot, and made him more observant than normal. There had been that scurrying sensation of people and events, before they had all been summoned together to a meeting. As a result of this, he had immediately grabbed the phone and told John. Afterwards, he had sat in a darkened room and had put his head in his hands. He couldn't think straight for a while, and so his mind had drifted off in random directions.
He remembered how ages ago, he had watched John stride off in a determined fashion to eject Houghton from the post performance party which had celebrated the performance of "The Creation." He could sense from George's manner how unwelcome the man was, that his offstage presence jarred that sense of unity of feeling amongst both performers and audience. It was on Tuesday morning that had seen this same man, standing in the back row, watching blank faced as he came to give them all a pep talk, and stake his claim to set his foot on their backs as lord and master of them all. Everything that he had heard of him, since the performance of 'The Creation' was proved to the hilt. As he watched the man's mouth open and close meaninglessly, he couldn't help wondering and worrying if he had ever talked and thought like him.
Fortune somehow extracted some use from the ministerial visit. It was a lucky coincidence that saw him walk past the open door of Alison Warner's office and heard Houghton's unmistakable tones.
"Larkhall Prison. Make that urgent. I don't care if your staff are overworked. I want it done now." He snapped, the phone jammed against his ear, while Alison Warner looked on obsequiously. While he waited for the response, Grayling stepped out of sight.
"Staff, what would you do with them? At least if I book up a meal at the Ivey, they'll stay open for me, no matter when I turn up"
"Friday then? OK, but I'm not very pleased. It's up to you inspectors to get the results that I want, if you know what's good for you"
Grayling shot back out of sight as their gaze started to turn in his direction. With practiced ease, he trod silently and smoothly away from them back to his office, his face impassive in self-protection from anyone he might bump into.
It was an ordinary Tuesday when Karen sat back in her office. She had just finished doing Frances Myers' appraisal, and reflected on her military style of running her wing in contrast with Nikki's. She was smoking a cigarette prior to setting to work on her PC. Just then, the phone rang.
"Why, Neil." Her face broke into a smile, as that well-remembered voice sounded in her ear. "It's nice to hear from you"
"I'm afraid it won't be, Karen, when I've told you the news. I'm tipping you off that the prison inspectors are coming to visit you this Friday," hissed Grayling.
"But why haven't I been told of this?" Karen stammered slightly, her wits scattered.
"Officially, this is classed as a follow up inspection of that calamitous occasion four years ago when Sylvia was wing governor, can you believe it?"
"For that reason, no pre warning is necessary." Grayling's bitter tones resounded in her ear." In reality, our new home secretary Neil Houghton has ordered it to stitch your prison up"
"Some follow up. A bit late don't you think"
"You can say that again"
"But there's absolutely nothing for them to find"
"As far as you know, Karen. You need to make absolutely sure. He has ordered them personally to turn in a bad report on your prison. Think carefully, Karen. Just make sure that you cover your back. I'm relying on you."
The line went dead all of a sudden. Karen guessed that there was danger at hand on the other end of the line. She had to break off what she was doing and call her wing governors together, but couldn't in all conscience burden them with the wider political game. All she could do was to lay it on the line with them that they had to be especially sharp in the way they conducted themselves, and show the Home Office how a well-run prison operated. For the life of her, she couldn't see how they could write a damaging report and it bothered her. There must be something that she was missing. The cigarette smouldered away between her fingers as she sat, deep in thought.
"So what happens? I'm new to this game." Nikki enquired, after Karen retired to her room to write up Frances' appraisal. The wing governors stayed behind, sat round the long rectangular table, mulling over the implications of Karen's words and, in particular, to 'look surprised' when they call. Karen had been far too matter of fact to Nikki in her announcement of the news, as if she was pointedly avoiding sounding alarmist.
"We get this gaff cleaned up from top to bottom for a start." Frances declared tersely, and there was a murmur of assent to the obvious course of action.
"I don't know about the rest of you, but my wing has nothing to fear from any inspectors"
"Yeah, let them come, and go away and report a success story," chimed in another governor.
Nikki started to feel irritated with the drift of conversation, which was starting to turn into a turgid and formless game of one-upmanship and self-congratulation. This wasn't what was needed right now. Alarm bells rang in her mind of the three years that she'd been here the other side of the prison bars, there was not one sign of any inspectors. The nearest thing to that was the fashion-show all those years ago that, in her circuitous way, she had got cancelled for G wing and then later restored. It struck her as a savage irony that especially before Helen's time at Larkhall, this place was riddled with abuses from top to bottom and corruption was systematic. A sharp-eyed inspection team could have exposed the abuses for what they were if they knew what to look out for. Now, after all these years, they were turning up here after all the hard work done to clean the place up, in moral terms. Getting the Julies to slosh water around with mops and buckets struck her as a token effort but she supposed that she would have to go along with this charade. At least it was harmless.
"Just why are they coming"
"Search me. They come like London busses, either in droves or not at all. Who knows what goes on in the minds of the Home Office?" yawned the man the opposite side of the long table in complete disinterest.
"Hang on a minute, are there any areas that we could be pulled up on"
"It's a turn up for the book for you to admit that G wing isn't perfect." cut in one of the more cynical wing governors, who was content to see this wash over him.
"Nikki's right. Instead of giving ourselves all pats on the back and telling ourselves that we walk on water, why not trying to work out where our weak points might be? Karen was saying in not so many words that they might be looking for bad news if you'd only bothered to listen"
"I wasn't around the last time the inspectors visited. Someone remind us all what happened"
"There was a total cock-up on G wing. Your friend Sylvia was prancing around trying to confiscate crisps and chocolate, after it turned out that some clever Charlene had fiddled the personal spends computer to add up rather than take away. Oh yes, Maxi Purvis's dead body, all wrapped up in bin liners, rolled out on the chapel floor in full view of the inspectors. After this, things only got better."
The more they talked, the more the stuck record was repeating itself.
"This doesn't add up. Either this is just a routine inspection, in which case we have basically nothing to fear or else this is a set up. We've got a new 'hang them and flog them' Home Secretary, but I can't work out why he should have it in for our prison. I can't see how he could set us up unless there's something we're missing"
The meeting rambled on for a while longer and fizzled out to a halt. They had business to sort out on their wings.
"You look as if you've got a lot on your mind, Nikki"
"Eh"
"And all the prison officers are dead jumpy all of a sudden"
"Yeah"
"You ain't listening," came Denny's blunt follow up to Julie Saunders' more polite remark to Nikki as she came to pass the time of day.
"I'm sorry. I've got something on my mind that's bothering me"
"A problem shared is a problem solved, that is, if it is something you can talk to us about." Julie Saunders proclaimed.
Nikki sighed and looked round the atrium. She was starting to get jumpy about everything that moved on the wing and a few things that didn't. She couldn't get away from the feeling that she was in the frame, even though logic and Karen's appraisal of her had told her how well she had done.
"We'll go over to your cell." Nikki murmured to the other three.
"I ain't tarting myself up for those stuck up tossers to make the prison look good, not even for you Nikki," was Denny's reaction. "You know what I'm like. I did it once for Yvonne to stop her getting banged up over O'Kane's death and that was enough.
"I promise you it won't come to that,' Nikki grinned.
"So, while you're wining and dining all the top nobs, showing them round the servery and the cells, don't we get a look in?" Julie Saunders asked with that questioning expression on her face.
"I suppose so," came her vague response. She had not thought of that one.
"Or will they eye up who they might want to give them the old guided tour like in secret. You wouldn't want that evil bitch, Natalie Buxton let loose on them, would you"
"Why should they pick her out from all the others? It's not as if she's special."
"Excuse me, Nikki but all she's got to do is to wear her lowest top and flash her tits at them. You got to admit it, she's got that sort of glamour and pulling power even though it chokes me to admit it"
"But they are supposed to be professionals"
"You are and so's Miss Betts, Gina, Dominic and the rest except Bodybag but that don't mean to say that they are. Still, you're bound to know more about them than we do. "
New dimensions opened up about the inspection and Nikki started to get worried. She didn't know any more than the others but had just made the false assumption that, just because they were inspectors, they would be no less upright than she was. They were dead right. What she couldn't work out was how she had never spotted that one. She went off straight away in search of Gina.
Ken was on the gate, his manner as impassive as always. Inwardly, he was jumpy, having been tipped off that a couple of staff inspectors were going to call, but with no more details. He was nervous in case his tie wasn't quite straight, but far more at the prospect of putting on an act of appearing to be totally taken by surprise. The thought made him acutely self conscious, not helped by his painful awareness that he was no actor. The minutes ticked by in a way that felt like hours and his ears were trained on the sounds of any approaching cars. He had had three false alarms so far this morning.
Suddenly, while his attention was wandering, two smart suited men casually strolled up to him as if they owned the place and flashed their ID at him. The pictures of Mr. Simpson and Mr. Traynor announced themselves with as much authority as their physical presence.
"You've come to see the Governor, I suppose"
"We've come to do more than this. We're from the Home Office, and we've come to do a snap inspection of everything from the lightning conductor to the basement." The elder of the two men said in steel hard tones.
"You mean you're here to do an inspection on the prison"
"Got it in one. You'll rise high in the prison service with brains like yours," the younger man retorted sarcastically.
"You'd better sign in and I'll phone up the governor. I suppose I'll be seeing you around"
"Don't worry you will. You're first down on the list to check over security as soon as we can get to you"
Ken gulped. He was not ambitious but least of all would he have wanted to be in Miss Betts shoes even if his feet had fitted them.