Sleeper Cell

2

'Golzar, visitor.'

She glanced at the nurse. 'Who is it?'

'I don't know. Governor phoned through to say a man's on his way to see you. Come on.'

'Here? Not in the interview suite?'

'Why, you thinking of making a run for it?' He smiled. 'No: we'll get you a room in the treatment annex. You don't want to go where they have to screw the furniture down.'

Golzar wiped her hands on the towel draped across her knees and stood up. Her cell, like all the cells on F Wing, had its own tiny wash room and she went through and ran a glass of water. Her midday pills were still in the little paper cup that the orderly had brought half an hour earlier and she quickly swallowed them. Her face in the steel mirror was shiny with fluocinonide cream and a pulse beat in her neck.

'Miss Golzar?' the nurse said.

She stepped out of the cell. 'One man?' she said.

'Why don't we go and find out?' He motioned for one of the guards.

'Don't cuff me,' Golzar said. The nurse gave her a sympathetic look. 'Please.'

'It's standard procedure,' the nurse said. 'Got to be done. Put your hands out in front of you.'

She did and the rigid handcuffs were snapped around her wrists. Her only means of defence was lost. If someone had been sent to kill her, this time they were going to succeed. The nurse consulted his clipboard.

'The activities room's empty,' he said. 'I'll send your visitor down when he arrives.'

The guard took her by the elbow and walked her towards the treatment annex.

Raha Golzar had been in Low Newton Prison for fifteen months now, a paranoid schizophrenic with an IQ of 180 but living in a world of unstable and dangerous fantasy. At least, that was what her file said. There had been no arrest, no trial, no legal process. They had lured her into a trap. Someone high up had decided she was a liability; they needed her off the streets. Even in liberal Britain, they had ways of making their enemies disappear. For a while at least.

Between pointless meetings with her psychiatrist she participated in their structured activities, learned to cook, meditated or played chess. She even sang 'Yellow Submarine' once. But all she really did was wait. She rarely spoke to any of the other women on the wing, and only to the guards and nurses when it was in her interest to do so. They'd tricked her once; they wouldn't do it again.

The guard unlocked the door to the activities room and led her in.

She sat in one of the dark green Chesterfield sofas and flexed her wrists in the cuffs. Sun streamed in through the window and the room was uncomfortably hot. She hated the English summer. Her immune system was shot from years of abuse and she found the damp, humid climate unbearable.

Her visitor was brought into the pale green room five minutes later. Tall, athletic and wearing an immaculate wool suit even on this hottest of days, he had the bearing of a high-ranking official.

'Raha Golzar?' he said.

She nodded.

'My name is Donald Aquila,' he said. 'I've been retained as your legal counsel.' He took a file of notes from his case and opened it on the table between them.

'Could you leave us?' he said to the guard.

'Patients are not allowed to be out of sight,' the guard said.

'Then stand outside and watch through the door. This is a legal representation.'

The guard shrugged and stepped out. He left the door an inch or so ajar and leaned against the wall, watching through the narrow window.