Gallows Thief (Extract)

Sir Henry shook his head.  “Sold his commission, gave the money towards the keep of his mother and sister.”

“He keeps his mother?  That dreadful woman?  Poor Sandman.” Logan laughed softly.  “But Eleanor, surely, is not without suitors?”

“Far from it,” Sir Henry sounded gloomy.   “They queue up in the street, Logan, but Eleanor finds fault.”

“She’s good at that,” Logan said softly, though without malice for he was fond of his friend’s daughter, though he thought her over-indulged. It was true that Eleanor was clever and too well read, but that was no reason to spare her the bridle, whip and spur.  “Still,” he said, “doubtless she’ll marry soon?”

“Doubtless she will,” Sir Henry said drily, for his daughter was not only attractive but it was well known that Sir Henry would settle a generous income on her future husband.  Which was why Sir Henry was sometimes tempted to let her marry Rider Sandman, but her mother would not hear of it.  Just would not hear of it.  Florence wanted Eleanor to have a title, and Rider Sandman had none and now he had no fortune either, and so the marriage between Captain Rider Sandman and Miss Eleanor Forrest would not now take place, and then Sir Henry’s thoughts about his daughter’s prospects were driven away by a shriek from the doomed girl, a wailing shriek so pitiful that Sir Henry turned in shocked enquiry to see that James Botting had hung one of the heavy noosed ropes about her shoulders and the girl was shrinking from its touch as though the Bridport hemp was soaked in acid.

“Quiet, my dear,” the Reverend Cotton said, then he opened his prayer book and took a step back from the four prisoners who were all now pinioned.

“This was never the hangman’s job,” James Botting complained before the Ordinary could begin reading the service for the burial of the dead.  “The irons was struck and the pinioning was done in the yard, in the yard, by the Yeoman of the Halter!  By the Yeoman of the Halter!  It was never the hangman’s job to do the pinioning!”

“He means it was done by his assistant,” Logan muttered.

“So he does know why we’re here?”  Sir Henry commented as the Sheriff and Under-Sheriff, both in floor length robes and wearing chains of office and both carrying silver-tipped staves, and both evidently satisfied that the prisoners were properly prepared, went to the Keeper who formally bowed to them before presenting the Sheriff with a sheet of paper.

“‘I am the resurrection and the life,’” the Reverend Cotton intoned in a loud voice, “‘he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.’”

The Sheriff glanced at the paper, nodded in satisfaction and thrust it into a pocket of his fur-trimmed robe.  Until now the four prisoners had been in the care of the Keeper of Newgate, but now they belonged to the Sheriff of the City of London who, formalities over, crossed to Sir Henry with an outstretched hand and a welcoming smile.  “You’ve come for the breakfast, Sir Henry?”

“I’ve come as a matter of duty,” Sir Henry said sternly, “but it’s very good to see you, Rothwell.”

“You must certainly stay for the breakfast,” the Sheriff said as the Ordinary recited the prayers for the burial of the dead.  “They’re very good devilled kidneys.”

“I could get a good breakfast at home,” Sir Henry said.  “No, I came because Botting has petitioned for an assistant and we thought, before justifying the expenditure, that we should judge for ourselves whether or not one was needed.  You know Mister Logan?”

“The alderman and I are old acquaintances,” the Sheriff said, shaking Logan’s hand.  “The advantage of giving the man an assistant,” he added to Sir Henry in a low voice, “is that his replacement is already trained.  And if there is trouble on the scaffold, well, two men are better than one.  It’s good to see you, Sir Henry, and you, Mister Logan.”  He composed his face and turned to Botting.  “Are you ready, Botting?”

“Quite ready, sir, quite ready,” Botting said, scooping up the four white bags and thrusting them into a pocket.

“We can talk at breakfast,” the Sheriff said to Sir Henry.  “Devilled kidneys!  I smelt them cooking as I came through.”  He hauled a turnip watch from a fob pocket and clicked open its lid.  “Time to go, I think, time to go.”

The Sheriff led the procession out of the Association Room and across the narrow Press Yard.  The Reverend Cotton had a hand on the girl’s neck, guiding her as he read the burial service aloud, the same service that he had intoned to the condemned prisoners in the chapel the day before.  The four prisoners had been in the famous black pew, grouped about the coffin on the table, and the Ordinary had read them their burial service and then preached that they were being punished for their sin as God had decreed men and women should be punished.  He had described the waiting flames of hell, told them of the devilish torments that were even then being prepared for them, and he had reduced the girl and one of the two murderers to tears.  The chapel’s gallery had been filled with folk who had paid one shilling and sixpence apiece to witness the four doomed souls at their last church service.

The prisoners in the cells overlooking the Press Yard shouted protests and farewells as the procession passed.  Sir Henry was alarmed by the noise and surprised to hear a woman’s voices calling insults.  “Surely men and women don’t share the cells?”  He asked.

“Not any longer,” Logan said, then saw where his friend was looking, “and I assume she’s no prisoner, but a lady of the night, Sir Henry.  They pay what’s called Bad Money to the turnkeys so they can come and earn their living here.”

“Bad Money?  Good Lord!”  Sir Henry looked pained.  “And we allow that?”

“We ignore it,” Logan said quietly, “on the understanding that it’s better to have whores in the prison than prisoners rioting.”  The Sheriff had led the procession down a flight of stone stairs into a tunnel that ran beneath the main prison to emerge at the Lodge and the gloomy passage passed an empty cell with an open door.  “That’s where they spent their last night,” Logan pointed into the cell.  The doomed girl was swaying and a turnkey took her elbow and hurried her along.

“We brought nothing into this world,” the Reverend Cotton’s voice echoed from the tunnel’s damp granite walls, “and it is certain we can carry nothing out.  The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the Name of the Lord.”

“I didn’t steal anything!”  The girl suddenly screamed.

“Quiet, lass, quiet,” the Keeper growled.  All the men were nervous.  They wanted the prisoners to cooperate and the girl was very close to hysteria.

“Lord, let me know mine end,” the Ordinary prayed, “and the number of my days.”

“Please!” the woman wailed, “no, no!  Please.”  A second turnkey closed on her in case she collapsed and had to be carried the rest of the way, but she stumbled on.

“If they struggle too much,” Logan told Sir Henry, “then they’re tied to a chair and hung that way, but I confess I haven’t seen that happen in many many years, though I do remember that Langley had to do it once.”

“Langley?”

“Botting’s predecessor.”

“You’ve seen a number of these things?”  Sir Henry asked.

“A good few,” Logan admitted.  “And you?”

“Never.  I just conceived today as a duty.” Sir Henry watched the prisoners climb the steps at the end of the tunnel and wished he had not come.  He had never seen a violent death.  Rider Sandman, who was to have been his son-in-law, had seen much violent death because he had been a soldier and Sir Henry rather wished the younger man was here.  He had always liked Sandman.  Such a shame about his family.

At the top of the stairs was the Lodge, a cavernous entrance chamber that gave access to the street called the Old Bailey.  The door that led to the street was the Debtor’s Door and it stood open, but no daylight showed for the scaffold had been built directly outside.  The noise of the crowd was loud now and the prison bell was muffled, but the bell of Saint Sepulchre’s on the far side of Newgate Street was also tolling for the imminent deaths.

“Gentlemen?”  The Sheriff, who was now in charge of the morning’s proceedings, turned to the breakfast guests.  “If you’ll climb the steps to the scaffold, gentlemen, you’ll find chairs to right and left.  Just leave two at the front for us, if you’d be so kind?”

Sir Henry, as he passed through the towering arch of the high Debtor’s Door, saw in front of him the dark hollow underside of the scaffold and he thought how it was like being behind and underneath a stage supported by raw wooden beams.  Black baize shrouded the planks at the front and side of the stage which meant that the only light came from the chinks between the timbers that formed the scaffold’s elevated platform. Wooden stairs climbed to Sir Henry’s right, going up into the shadows before turning sharply left to emerge in a roofed pavilion that stood at the scaffold’s rear.  The stairs and the platform all looked very substantial and it was hard to remember that the scaffold was only erected the day before an execution and dismantled immediately after.  The roofed pavilion was there to keep the honoured guests dry in inclement weather, but today the morning sun shone on Old Bailey and was bright enough to make Sir Henry blink as he turned the corner of the stairs and emerged into the pavilion.

A huge cheer greeted the guests’ arrival.  No one cared who they were, but their appearance presaged the coming of the prisoners.  Old Bailey was crowded.  Every window that overlooked the street was crammed and there were even folk on the rooftops.  “Ten shillings,” Logan said.

“Ten shillings?”  Sir Henry was bemused again.

“To rent a window,” Logan explained, “unless it’s a celebrated crime being punished in which case the price goes up to two or even three guineas.”  He pointed at a tavern that stood directly opposite the scaffold. “The Magpie and Stump has the most expensive windows because you can see right down into the pit where they drop.”  He chuckled.  “You can rent a telescope from the landlord and watch ‘em die.  But we, of course, get the best view.”