‘Got another one of you bastards,’ said the prison officer.

Charlie knew he’d have to say something. ‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Know what we did with spies in the war?’ Hickley was ex-Guards.

‘No.’

‘No what?’

‘No, Mr Hickley.’

‘We used to shoot them.’

Bollocks, thought Charlie. Hickley had never seen a spy in his life; probably hadn’t even seen combat. Hickley was a base camp type, a coal whitewasher and latrine scrubber.

‘I think we still should,’ said Hickley.

Providing his didn’t have to be the guilty finger on the trigger. Christ, how he’d like to have kicked the bullying bugger right in the crotch, thought Charlie.

‘What’s wrong with your boots?’ demanded the officer.

‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing what?’

‘Nothing, Mr Hickley.’

‘They’re unlaced.’

‘There isn’t a regulation,’ said Charlie, who’d checked.

‘I like a tidy landing.’ Hickley was shaven-headed and hardbodied from exercise and had a sergeant’s voice that echoed, so that everyone along the corridor could hear. ‘Undone boots aren’t tidy.’

Charlie said nothing.

‘So lace them up.’

Charlie allowed the look, too brief for him to be accused of insolence but sufficient for the man who’d faced hostility on a hundred parade grounds to know he meant it. Then he knelt, cautious against upsetting either his pot or that of the man directly behind him, and secured his boots. He did it carefully, tugging each loop through its socket and taking his time over the knots; the murmuring and shuffling grew behind him and at last he was aware of Hickley’s shift of impatience. Charlie went slowly on, adjusting and tightening the laces.

‘Get up!’

‘I haven’t tied them yet.’

‘I said get up.’

Charlie stood, as slowly as he had descended, to confront the officer. Hickley’s face burned red, except for the white patches of anger on his cheeks.