A Walk With the Dead by Sally Spencer

one man – and that, remember, was in Victorian times, when conditions for most people were a lot rougher than they are now.’
    â€˜I imagine they were,’ Baxter said.
    â€˜So we have cells which the Victorians considered were just about good enough for
one
prisoner, and we’re putting two or even three men in them now, because we don’t have any choice in the matter. And if one of those men has the shits in the middle of the night, the others have to live with the stink until morning slopping out time.’
    â€˜I know what you’re doing,’ Baxter said quietly.
    â€˜Do you?’ Jeffries asked, with a hint of aggression in his voice. ‘Then why don’t you explain to me exactly what that is.’
    â€˜You’re trying to show me what strain you’re all under – the prisoners as well as the guards. You hope that by doing that, you’ll get me to make allowances for the fact that things don’t always go as they should do.’
    â€˜And will you?’ Jeffries asked.
    â€˜I’m not some academic who’s just stepped out of his ivory tower and expects everything beyond that tower to be perfect,’ Baxter said. ‘I live in the real world. I run a police force that operates within a flawed system, and I accept that certain corners have to be cut and certain regulations ignored in order to make that system work. So sometimes, when I see there are things not being done exactly by the book, I deliberately look the other way.’
    â€˜That’s a sensible attitude,’ Jeffries said.
    â€˜But there are principles I have to stick by, and actions that I can’t ignore,’ Baxter continued. ‘I will not tolerate my officers taking bribes, intimidating witnesses or doing favours for their mates, for example, and if they cross any of those lines, there are no second chances – they’re out of the force and probably in gaol.’
    â€˜That’s all very interesting, but I’m much more interested in finding out how you’ll apply these “principles” of yours to this prison,’ Jeffries said.
    â€˜Oh, that’s very simple,’ Baxter told him. ‘If there’s nothing your men could have done to prevent Jeremy Templar’s suicide, they’re in the clear, and if there was something they could have done, then they’re not.’
    â€˜We’ve already explained that there weren’t the funds to box in all the pipes,’ Jeffries said.
    â€˜And I accept that,’ Baxter countered. ‘I also accept that if a man really wants to kill himself, he’ll eventually find a way, however careful those around him are.’
    â€˜In that case, I don’t see why you’re here at all,’ Jeffries said.
    â€˜Don’t you?’ Baxter asked. ‘Then perhaps I’d better explain it to you. Templar committed suicide because he found life intolerable, and the reason he found life intolerable was because of the attacks on him by other prisoners. So the real question is – could your men have prevented those attacks?’
    â€˜I don’t think that
is
the real question,’ Jeffries said.
    â€˜Then what is?’
    â€˜The real question is not whether they could have prevented those
four
attacks – it’s how many more attacks on him there
might have
been if my lads hadn’t been doing the best they could in nearly impossible circumstances. And we’ll never know the answer to that – because if something didn’t happen, you can’t prove it was ever going to.’
    He had a point, Baxter admitted. And maybe he was right – maybe his men, rather than being
inefficient
, had been as efficient as was possible in the circumstances. But at this stage of the inquiry, it was far too early to reach any such conclusion.
    â€˜Who fills in the time sheets?’ he asked the chief officer.
    â€˜What do you mean by time sheets?’