The Generator

The Generator

“It was a mistake.” It was his mantra, his motto, the only thing he could say. It was what he said to his father, right before he punched him in the face. What he said to the cops when they interrogated him and what he told the shifty-faced lawyer the state had appointed him.

But no one cared.

His cell mate laughed when he told him, a harsh sound from a harsh man, a man who had lived most of his life behind bars.

“You are a killer. No one believes a killer. No matter how young you are.” And Harold was young. He had only turned eighteen a week and a half ago. But it hadn’t mattered.

His cell mate Trevor knew what he was talking about. He was covered in crudely inked prison tatts, his nose squashed flat from fighting, and a puckered scar running horizontal beneath his chin. He was the kind of guy his mum would have made him cross the street to avoid and if there had been a street around, he would have done exactly that. Trevor was forty-two, and he had killed his first man when he was eighteen. Since then, to hear him tell it, there would be double the male population of Perth if he hadn’t been born.

Harold spent his first night in Fremantle Prison sobbing, a heart wrenching and desolate sound. It was the noise a boy made when he had lost his mother. Trevor put up with it for about an hour, and then he had slapped him soundly across both cheeks.

“We don’t do that in here.” He told him firmly, slapping him again for good measure, “You do that, your time in here is gonna be real bad.” Harold had dried his tears and taken control of himself. Then, he thanked his cell mate for his sound advice.

They spent most of their time, knee to knee across the narrow space between their beds, smoking and playing cards, some made-up Prison game called ‘chop’, that only Trevor knew the rules for. But Harold was learning.

It took a week for Harold to get his first visitor. Frankly, he was surprised when one of the screws said he had someone visiting. After what happened, Harold was certain his family had cut all ties with him. He walked into the dingy visit room and sat at the cracked table, his hands in plain sight in front of him. The room was crowded, and he was surrounded on all sides by other prisoners being visited by their family, kids running riot, wives sniffling, the guards watching.

A man entered, and he spared a quick wave to Harold at the table. It was his cousin Jared. He was impeccably dressed as always, and he removed his hat when the screw patted him down. The guard pointed the way and Jared thanked him. Like a thirsty man in need of a drink, Harold drank in the sight of his cousin. As always, his red hair was slicked down, his skin reddish from working out in the sun. Harold hadn’t been in Prison long, but it felt like he hadn’t seen a familiar face since forever. Jared was his favourite cousin. They had learned to drive in his Dad’s old FJ Holden across the paddock near their house. Without permission, of course, and Dad would never have found out if Jared hadn’t driven it through the electric fence. Harold had taken the blame for that one, of course. In fact, he remembered taking the blame for a lot of things Jared had done.

“Cousin.” Said Jared, but he didn’t put his hand out to shake, casting a wary eye at the sign at Harold’s back, warning the visitors not to touch the prisoners.

“Jared, it was a mistake.”

Jared nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“I just wanted to see my girlfriend for my birthday. I didn’t have any scratch. I couldn’t get any diesel. You know it was a mistake, don’t you?”

Harold sounded like a broken record; he had said the same thing so many times he was sure he said it in his sleep.

Jared only nodded.

“I didn’t know Jared, it was just a stupid mistake.” Jared nodded again, but his eyes seemed to narrow a little.

“You’ll tell Dad, won’t you? That it was a mistake? That I didn’t do it on purpose?”

Jared sat forward at the table but wouldn’t meet his eye.

“Jared? You’ll do that, won’t you? You’ll tell him?” To his ears, Harold sounded pleading, but he kept on, certain somehow, that if he could just get Jared to listen, things might turn out alright. If he could get Jared to speak to his Dad, this whole mess would get straightened out. He could go home. He was too young to be in this place. Too young to spend the rest of his life in Prison.

Jared was looking down at his hands, waiting for Harold to quieten so he could speak. Finally, he did.

“Remember the time we were up north working in that shearing shed during the summer? It was so hot and so sweaty, and we were getting paid a fiver a week to be roustabouts? How old were we then, fourteen? We were running around all day, cutting away the maggoty fly blown bits on the sheep and listening to the shearers swearing and there was all that noise, and we got all itchy from the wool and we would go home filthy and stinking to high heaven? At the end of the first week, we spent all the money on sweets and your mum gave you a hiding, because she needed that money to help pay for groceries?”

Harold nodded, not quite following. Of course, he remembered working on the farm; it was awful, and afterwards he never wanted to go back. But every year afterwards his Mum and Dad dropped him off for a few weeks through shearing season so he could help contribute to the family purse. Jared only had to do one season before he begged his parents not to go back. So, Harold went on his own. The last time he had even been able to keep a little money, enough for a night out in the city, but not much else. He had a proper job now, or at least he did a week ago, working in a timber yard. It was hard work, and as long as he lived at home, he had to give most of his wages to his Mum and Dad still.

“Remember that time your Mum caught you kissing Carol Murray at the church fair when you were thirteen and she tanned your hide so hard you couldn’t sit down for a week? Then you were forbidden to see Carol again.”

“Yes, but...”

“Or the time that you locked the outhouse door while your Mum was inside and wouldn’t let her out and when she finally got out, she chased you with the belt and you fell into the rose bushes and got torn up by the thorns?”

“Jared, what is this about?”

“Or the time you were supposed to buy your first car and then the generator broke down at home and you had to give your parents the money so they could get a new one?”

“Jared, yes, I remember all of those things. What is this about?”

“Nothing,” said Jared, finally looking up to meet his eye “I was just remembering.”

There was silence between them for a minute, a silence that seemed to stretch out, filled with all the things that were unsaid.

After a minute, Jared got up.

“I will be at your hearing next week, but I wouldn’t expect anyone else to be there if I was you.” He seemed to take a deep breath then.

“I’m sorry Harry, I will do what I can.”

He left then, not looking back, and a guard escorted Harold back down the dark corridors past the cold stone walls, back to his dangerous cell mate to wait.

Another week of ‘chop’, awful food and never-ending boredom, and Harold found himself led from his cell to a waiting van and from there to the courthouse.

It had been the longest and shortest week of his life. Short, because he didn’t feel prepared for what he would say to the judge and long because he had too much time to think. Too much time to imagine the flames as they took hold, to see the scorched walls and think about the mistake he had made.

He couldn’t get anyone to lend him a suit, so they walked him into the dock in his prison greens, shabby and well-used, probably worn by a thousand prisoners before him walking into the courthouse on a thousand different occasions.

He stood when he was supposed to and listened as best he could, but he had dropped out of school to work in his seventh year. There were a lot of words which went over his head.

In the gallery the regular people sat, and though he craned his neck, Harold couldn’t see anyone he knew. So much for Cousin Jared attending, he thought.

His lawyer was making a good case for bail, and the judge was nodding along. Harold had a little money saved. If he could just talk to his Dad, he would surely put up the rest. Harold didn’t want to stay in Prison. Not over such a small mistake.

“Unless there is anything further, I will set the bail at one thousand pounds.” The Judge looked down at Harold through a pair of spectacles balanced on the end of his nose, his wig slipping forward a little and his gavel poised.

A thousand pounds! It was an astronomical sum, far out of reach for Harold. But he thought maybe he could find a way. If he sold his car, borrowed from his uncles, maybe sold some of his tools and his grandfather’s watch, he might be able to swing it.

“Sorry, your honour, we have a representative from the family here who would like to say something.” The State prosecutor, looking all upper class in his perfectly tailored suit, held up a hand, and the judge gestured for him to get on with it.

The wooden door at the back of the witness stand opened and Jared stepped through. He did a strange little head bob movement to the Magistrate and took a seat, unfolding a piece of paper from his jacket pocket.

“Go ahead and read your statement, Jared.” The prosecutor urged, and Harold allowed himself a moment of hope. Jared had come to his rescue after all. Surely the words of a family member could sway the magistrate, surely now they would see it was all just a mistake.

“Your honour,” he began “I am here today on behalf of the family of the victim.” He paused to take a deep breath.

“The victim was an upstanding member of society, who cared well for her children and attended church every Sunday. She was charitable and kind, someone who would do anything for anyone that needed help. The family has asked that you deny bail on this occasion. Though Harold Quinn is the son of the deceased, it is the family’s opinion that the act was deliberate. It was an act of revenge for a series of punishments which have occurred over the last few years.” Another pause for a deep breath and Harold’s mouth was hanging open.

“The family believes that they would be in danger if the accused were to be released on bail, as they called the police upon witnessing the heinous crime as perpetrated by the accused.”

Suddenly Harold came to. It was as if he were watching the events unfold from outside his body, and then he snapped back to consciousness, his mouth moving before he could stop himself.

“Liar!” he shouted “It was all a mistake! All I wanted was a little diesel for my car, that’s all! I didn’t have any scratch! And when I could, I refilled the can for the generator. But I filled it with petrol by accident! I didn’t realise until Mum tried to light it to make tea in the morning! It was a mistake!” The bailiff and a cop descended on him then, trying to get him to quieten down, but Harold couldn’t stop.

“It was a mistake! A mistake!”

The cop pulled out his baton and laid into Harold until he stopped shouting and struggling, and he was borne away out of the court room.

A few days later, Harold was released from the infirmary, with a black eye and two broken ribs. He knew he looked a sight, and it hurt like hell, but it was nothing compared to Jared’s betrayal.

He spoke to his lawyer on the phone the day before, but it wasn’t good news. His bail had been denied, and the charges were upgraded from involuntary to voluntary manslaughter. He was looking at twenty years behind bars.

When he got back to his room, Trevor had the cards laid out ready.

“You look a sight, sunshine. One of the boys read in the paper, you are looking at twenty years. Looks like we’ll be stuck with each other for a while.”

Harold nodded and sat down on the thin mattress and picked up his pile of cards. He ached all over inside and outside. He was being blamed for killing his mother and he was locked away in the worst excuse for a Prison he had ever heard of. But Harold didn’t cry. You can’t cry in Prison; Trevor had taught him that. And Harold was learning.