Reaper Wing residents allowed in recreation yard last night in accordance with Dr Glass’s instructions. (6.45 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.) However, tonight several displayed reluctance to return to wing afterwards, and two were downright defiant and had to be sedated, although nets did not have to be used this time, which is one mercy.
Matron Prout called in Dr Glass, and asked for his approval in putting a stop to this recreation hour. However, Dr Glass says very firmly that it must continue, since it’s the only fresh air (and degree of normality) Reaper Wing residents are likely to get. Pointed out that isolated outbreak of childish tantrums hardly on level with French Revolution.
Memorandum to Kitchens
Please to ensure that patients in Reaper Wing are only served with plain bread and water for the next two days–a light diet is very beneficial in calming agitated patients.
There is no need for Dr Glass to be informed of this small and unimportant alteration in their routine.
Signed F. Prout (Matron)
Latchkill Asylum for the Insane
Day Book: Tuesday 28th September
7.00 p.m.
Matron caught Dora Scullion and Nurse Bryony Sullivan smuggling supper tray into Reaper Wing. (Vegetable broth and slice of cold roast lamb from midday dinner.)
Both reprimanded by Matron.
Memorandum to Bursar
Please ensure that the week’s wages for Dora Scullion (skivvy) and Bryony Sullivan (nurse) are docked by three shillings and five shillings respectively.
Signed F. Prout (Matron)
Antonia did not feel like eating, but she heated some tinned soup for herself, and fed the remains of the smoked salmon to Raffles. There would be a perfectly innocent explanation as to how he had got in–perhaps Godfrey Toy had a key to the cottage and had let the cat in by mistake. This did not explain how Raffles had got the salmon out of the fridge, but it was either that or back to the ghosts or Antonia’s own madness. No contest, then. Sorry, Godfrey, for the moment you’ll have to be first suspect.
After the soup, she carried a cup of tea back to her favourite part of the cottage, the dining area by the stairs, and flipped on the laptop. The wall light directly over the table cast a pool of soft light, and the heater near the stairs gave out a pleasant warmth. Raffles padded across the floor to inspect the laptop, and apparently satisfied that it did not provide either a threat or an amusement, curled himself up at the foot of the stairs with the tolerant air of one prepared to keep the humans company until something more alluring turned up. It was rather comforting to have him there; Antonia had forgotten how companionable cats could be. She had forgotten quite a lot about companionship during the past five years.
After the rape in the showers, and after her attackers had gone swaggering back to the block, she had been violently sick. She had managed to turn on the shower taps and crouch shivering beneath the jets of water, trying to wash away the smell and the feel and the taste of what had happened.
She did not intend to report the attack. It did not take much logic to know that to do so would only cause further trouble, but her head and mouth had been knocked against the edge of the shower cubicle, and a small scalp wound was bleeding quite badly. It was noticed of course, and she was taken to the prison’s infirmary. When she came out, she was moved to what was termed the high-risk wing.
In a curious way, this had been much easier. There she was with the real killers and the child beaters, all of them herded together in one section for protection from the rest of the prisoners–it had seemed that the stories about ordinary thieves and drug dealers hating child molesters were perfectly true–but because of her training she found these women much easier to deal with. A great many of them had suffered abuse in their own childhoods, and some of them displayed unmistakable signs of mental illness, but a number of them were intelligent and articulate, diligently attending classes for creative writing or art or taking Open University degree courses. After a while Antonia even formed one or two wary friendships and managed to forget, sometimes for quite long stretches, that these were women who had committed vicious murders or were guilty of violence against children.