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Authors: Pauline Melville
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sorry,’ Winsome summoned tears to her eyes. ‘I was so upset at the time I don’t know what I done with them.’
The woman behind the counter became embarrassed. There she sat in this temple of motherhood, this shrine to the pastel glories of maternity, laden with coats and baby pillows, crocheted bootees, festooned with little hanging mobiles, kiddies’ duvets and tiny towelling all-in-ones, surrounded by bright plastic rattles, soft cuddly toys and disposable nappies. And here she was faced with this cumbersome black woman with a badly scarred lip, crying because she had had a miscarriage. She gave Winsome a sympathetic look and went to whisper something in the supervisor’s ear. Returning quickly, she totted up the amount of the goods Winsome had handed her, reached into the till and gave Winsome the sum of thirty-eight pounds. As Winsome went to the door she felt the baby kicking inside her. She took a bus down the high street to another branch of Mothercare and paid for one or two items for the new baby. Then she walked home, picking up some okra and pumpkin from the market and stopping to buy a red cardboard bucket of chicken and chips from the Kentucky Fried Chicken as a treat for the kids.
‘And my client would like nine other offences against Mother-care to be taken into consideration.’
Winsome was hardly paying attention. Although the judge had allowed her to remain seated throughout cross-examination because of the advanced stage of her pregnancy, the weight of her belly was making her back want to break.
Her eyes wandered over the green leather upholstery of the pale wooden benches. From the start of the case the courtroom had felt like an office, an office where everybody else had some reason for being there, some business to do, except her. People walked up to other people and whispered. This was a country full of whisperers. That was one of the odd things about England. Nothing was what it seemed. Everything was camouflaged – buildings especially. Courts masqueraded as offices; blocks of flats were built to resemble multi-storey car parks; their National Theatre pretended to be a prison and the new prisons were disguised as modern college buildings. People too. People concealed their intentions. And the people with power were not the extravagantly dressed ones, the people with power were the dowdy ones. Winsome wondered briefly if Sonia was giving the kids their tea. She had expected to be home by now. The judge, a nondescript man with glasses, was scribbling like a clerk in an invoice department. On the panelled wall over his head was a carved crest mounted on a board the shape of a shield. Woven in and out of crosses, lions and roses were some words that Winsome could not make out. They were written in funny lettering. The first word spelt HONI. Trying to decipher the rest gave her a headache. She had a strange sensation, as if a piece of string was connected from the back of her head to her left eye, pulling it out of focus. Then she heard the judge saying:
‘I sentence you to twelve months’ imprisonment.’
Everyone began to gather their papers together as if the day’s work was over and it was time to go home. Winsome got up and vaguely prepared herself to go home too. A woman in a blue suit was plucking at her sleeve and saying in a kindly tone:
‘Come along, dear.’
Sitting in the green prison van with its horizontally barred windows, Winsome was still unable to grasp what had happened. She somehow felt that the van would drop her off at home on the way to wherever it was going and she would be in time to give the kids their tea. The van threaded its way through the busy main streets of north London and stopped in front of some enormous gates in a high red brick wall. The gates opened and they went through. She and two other women got out. She found herself in an asphalt yard surrounded by more red brick walls. In one of the walls was a small door. Another screw in blue uniform
The woman behind the counter became embarrassed. There she sat in this temple of motherhood, this shrine to the pastel glories of maternity, laden with coats and baby pillows, crocheted bootees, festooned with little hanging mobiles, kiddies’ duvets and tiny towelling all-in-ones, surrounded by bright plastic rattles, soft cuddly toys and disposable nappies. And here she was faced with this cumbersome black woman with a badly scarred lip, crying because she had had a miscarriage. She gave Winsome a sympathetic look and went to whisper something in the supervisor’s ear. Returning quickly, she totted up the amount of the goods Winsome had handed her, reached into the till and gave Winsome the sum of thirty-eight pounds. As Winsome went to the door she felt the baby kicking inside her. She took a bus down the high street to another branch of Mothercare and paid for one or two items for the new baby. Then she walked home, picking up some okra and pumpkin from the market and stopping to buy a red cardboard bucket of chicken and chips from the Kentucky Fried Chicken as a treat for the kids.
‘And my client would like nine other offences against Mother-care to be taken into consideration.’
Winsome was hardly paying attention. Although the judge had allowed her to remain seated throughout cross-examination because of the advanced stage of her pregnancy, the weight of her belly was making her back want to break.
Her eyes wandered over the green leather upholstery of the pale wooden benches. From the start of the case the courtroom had felt like an office, an office where everybody else had some reason for being there, some business to do, except her. People walked up to other people and whispered. This was a country full of whisperers. That was one of the odd things about England. Nothing was what it seemed. Everything was camouflaged – buildings especially. Courts masqueraded as offices; blocks of flats were built to resemble multi-storey car parks; their National Theatre pretended to be a prison and the new prisons were disguised as modern college buildings. People too. People concealed their intentions. And the people with power were not the extravagantly dressed ones, the people with power were the dowdy ones. Winsome wondered briefly if Sonia was giving the kids their tea. She had expected to be home by now. The judge, a nondescript man with glasses, was scribbling like a clerk in an invoice department. On the panelled wall over his head was a carved crest mounted on a board the shape of a shield. Woven in and out of crosses, lions and roses were some words that Winsome could not make out. They were written in funny lettering. The first word spelt HONI. Trying to decipher the rest gave her a headache. She had a strange sensation, as if a piece of string was connected from the back of her head to her left eye, pulling it out of focus. Then she heard the judge saying:
‘I sentence you to twelve months’ imprisonment.’
Everyone began to gather their papers together as if the day’s work was over and it was time to go home. Winsome got up and vaguely prepared herself to go home too. A woman in a blue suit was plucking at her sleeve and saying in a kindly tone:
‘Come along, dear.’
Sitting in the green prison van with its horizontally barred windows, Winsome was still unable to grasp what had happened. She somehow felt that the van would drop her off at home on the way to wherever it was going and she would be in time to give the kids their tea. The van threaded its way through the busy main streets of north London and stopped in front of some enormous gates in a high red brick wall. The gates opened and they went through. She and two other women got out. She found herself in an asphalt yard surrounded by more red brick walls. In one of the walls was a small door. Another screw in blue uniform
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