She made her way down the landing, heading for the stairwell that was situated halfway along, consciously veering wide of the various clusters of inmates, hoping that no one would pay her too much attention.

Talk broke off as she passed by. Cold suspicious looks over the shoulder, followed by furtive whispering. Gossip was the lifeblood of a place like this where people had too much time on their hands. If only she knew what they were talking about. Judging by the general vibe, she was certain Alice’s murder wasn’t far from their lips.

Her efforts to remain inconspicuous proved to be in vain. Ahead of her, she saw that a group of eight or so inmates had noticed her approaching. It was probably because she was new and they didn’t recognise her. A preliminary pang of anxiety shot through her.

It was becoming apparent that the prison was full of different cliques, formed for the purposes of company and mutual self-protection. This particular group looked like they’d come straight off some particularly grim council estate: hard eyes, hard faces, hard lives. They were watching her and conferring amongst themselves and it didn’t look like they were saying nice things.

She put her head down and increased her pace slightly as she passed by them…

And suddenly she found herself sprawled face-down on the cold concrete surface of the landing, the palms of her hands stinging with the impact of the floor.

She lay there stunned and bewildered for a few moments before it sunk in that one of them had deliberately tripped her up. She turned her head and saw the culprit – a slight, skinny girl with carrot-coloured hair, who was grinning at her unpleasantly.

‘Whoops!’ said the girl, looking to her companions for approval.

They all sniggered.

Bailey felt a cold anger consume her. How dare they? She pulled herself to her feet. Stay calm, she thought, taking a deep breath. No rash actions.

She shot a long hard look of contempt at the one who’d tripped her up. She was clearly the smallest and weediest of the group, the kind of pathetic hanger-on who would have sucked up to the bullies at school.

The girl puffed her chest out aggressively.

‘What are you gonna do about it?’ she sneered.

If she’d had the inmate to herself, Bailey could quite easily have subdued her and taught her a painful lesson in why it was important to be nice to people; but, like any true coward, the girl was operating from within the safety of a group. A confrontation would thus be risky. Anyhow, Bailey had more important things to focus on.

She turned away from them and continued on her way, ignoring their jeers.

She was glad to reach the stairwell and get away from them. As she descended the metal flights of stairs, it occurred to her that perhaps she should have made more of an overt effort to stand up for herself. Because she hadn’t, they might try it on again. Too late now though.