Jeffrey Archer


Hell

The first book in the Prison Diary series, 2002

To

Foul-Weather Friends


INVICTUS

Out of the night that covers me,Black as the Pit from pole to pole,I thank whatever gods may beFor my unconquerable soul.In the fell clutch of circumstance,I have not winced or cried aloud;Under the bludgeonings of chanceMy head is bloody, but unbowed.Beyond this place of wrath and tearsLooms but the Horror of the shade.And yet the menace of the yearsFinds, and shall find me, unafraid.It matters not how strait the gate,How charged with punishments the scroll,I am the master of my fate:I am the captain of my soul.

William Ernest Henley (1849-1903)

Volume One


Belmarsh: Hell


Day 1 Thursday 19 July 2001

12.07 pm

‘You are sentenced to four years.’ Mr Justice Potts stares down from the bench, unable to hide his delight. He orders me to be taken down.

A Securicor man who was sitting beside me while the verdict was read out points towards a door on my left which has not been opened during the seven-week trial. I turn and glance at my wife Mary seated at the back of the court, head bowed, ashen-faced, a son on either side to comfort her.

I’m led downstairs to be met by a court official, and thus I begin an endless process of form-filling. Name? Archer. Age? 61. Weight? 178lbs, I tell him.

‘What’s that in stones?’ the prison officer demands.

‘12st 10lbs,’ I reply. I only know because I weighed myself in the gym this morning.



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