‘While I was inside Georgio looked after my family. My wife divorced me. I accepted that, we’d grown apart anyway. But Georgio looked after them all. My son was at Ampleforth, Georgio paid his fees, and my daughter was at home with her mum. She went to a convent nearby. Georgio made sure she had enough money. You see, when I got life, a certain person I was in partnership with did a runner with all our money. My wife would have had to sell the house, everything, to make ends meet. I wrote to Georgio and he came up trumps for me. He also sorted out the slag who’d tucked me up. I did seven years before I was eligible for parole and I was out after eight years and five days. Georgio did a lot for me.

‘I’ll never forget him for that. I also told him that I owed him one, and I stand by that statement now. So you can tell him that I will move heaven and earth to help him, but I can’t make any promises. What he’s asked me is a biggy. But if it’s at all possible, I will make it happen. Now I can’t say fairer than that, can I?’

Donna shook her head, unable to take in what the man had said.

Georgio had done all that and he had never once mentioned it to her. And though she admired and respected him for helping this man’s family, another part of her was grievously wounded that he could have done all that without giving her so much as an inkling of it. He had never once mentioned it to her. She did not even know this man or his family had existed until today.

‘How’s he bearing up?’ Alan asked now.

Donna sipped her drink to wash down the tears that had welled up inside her.

‘Very well under the circumstances. He hates it in there, though. He was fitted up. A man called Wilson pointed the finger at him.’

‘I heard about that. Shame he’s brown bread, ain’t it? No chance of making him change his statement now, is there?’

Donna shook her head again. ‘None. There’s a man called Lewis involved. Georgio got into something with him, and now Lewis is on the Island with him. He’s making things very difficult for Georgio. He got in with the big boys, I’m afraid, right over his head. Now this is the upshot.’