Why Kill the Innocent

by C. S. Harris

  The house they’d selected lay almost directly opposite the scaffold and, like most of the other buildings overlooking the street, rented out its windows for hangings. As they reached the door, the slow, mournful tolling of a bell began somewhere deep inside Newgate. The bell would continue tolling until the last of the day’s condemned prisoners was cut down, dead. Hero thought it must be hideous, living within the sound of that bell.

  “Hear that?” said the portly house owner, pocketing their money. He jerked his balding head toward a steep, narrow staircase behind him. “That means the condemned’ve already been brought into the yard to have their irons struck off. Best hurry.”

  “How many hangings have you attended?” Hero asked Alexi as they climbed the worn ancient steps.

  “Just one. A friend of mine was hanged not long after I arrived in London. I promised I’d be there for him, and I was.”

  Hero suspected there was more to the story than that, but she had no intention of asking for details. There was much about this Frenchwoman that remained a mystery to them all.

  The wide casement window of their chosen chamber looked down on the scaffold across the street. Essentially a large wooden platform draped with black cloth, it reminded Hero of a stage—which she supposed in a sense it was. The scaffold was always erected just outside the prison’s lodge, directly in front of what was known as the Debtors’ Door, so that the condemned would not be seen by the crowd until they mounted the steps to the platform itself. A small roofed shelter with chairs stood at the rear of the scaffold for important officials, and soldiers with pikes were stationed around the perimeter, guarding it. It struck Hero, watching the nervous way the men clutched their pikes, that beneath the crowd’s typical air of excitement and anticipation lay something else, something hostile and angry.

  “Who else is being hanged today? Do you know?”

  “Three men. Poachers, I think,” said Alexi.

  It did much to explain the mood of the crowd. Murderers and their like were usually greeted with jeers and catcalls, and often pelted with rotten food or even stones. But most of the people in the street were desperately poor themselves; their sympathies would lie with those about to die.

  The bell of the nearby church of St. Sepulchre joined the Newgate bell and began to toll, sounding the death knell. Alexi thrust open the old-fashioned windows and cold air rushed in, bringing them the roar of the crowd and a chorus of more distant shouts that rose up from within Newgate: The prisoners in the cells fronting the yard were calling farewells and encouragement to the condemned on their way to the lodge.

  Alexi said, “They’re coming.”

  There was a noticeable stirring in the crowd below. The sheriff and undersheriff of the City of London emerged from the covered stairway first, their eyes narrowing as they came into the strengthening daylight. Clothed in long, fur-trimmed robes with the heavy chains of their offices around their shoulders, both held ceremonial silver-tipped staves and solemnly took their seats along with a scattering of other officials.

  The Ordinary, or prison chaplain, came next, his head bowed over his prayer book. A hush of anticipation fell over the crowd, so that Hero could hear his deep, mournful voice intoning the burial service. “‘O God, whose days are without end and whose mercies cannot be numbered: Make us, we pray, deeply aware of the shortness and uncertainty of human life . . .’”

  Hero curled her hands over the windowsill in front of her and leaned forward, sucking the cold, foul air deep into her lungs. She knew a strange sense of unreality, as if a part of her somehow refused to accept that this was happening, that she was watching the bizarre spectacle of her government setting about deliberately murdering four desperately impoverished human beings with a degree of pomp and solemnity that suddenly struck her as obscene.

  A turnkey appeared at the top of the stairs, and Hero said, “She’s first.”

  Amy Hatcher reached the last step, stumbling and blinking at the brightness as she emerged into the light. She had the heavy hemp noose that would be used to kill her draped around her shoulders, and in her arms she clutched a small bundle that Hero realized was her baby.

  “Oh, Lord,” Hero whispered, watching the poor girl stagger on the rough planking. Terror distorted her red tear-streaked face, and her chest jerked visibly with each rapid, shallow gasp of air. At the sight of the heavy beam above her, she tried to shrink back, her head shaking from side to side as she pleaded, “Oh, please, no. Please, no.”

  “Why is she still holding her child?” said Hero.

  “It’s probably the only way they could get her out here without dragging her.”

  The three condemned men who came behind Amy had their hands tied together in front and their elbows pinioned tight against their torsos. All moved awkwardly without their leg irons, as if they had become so accustomed to their weight that they now found it difficult to walk without them.

  A roar went up from the spectators. “Hats off! Hats off so we can see!” The men in the crowd whipped off their tall hats.

  Hero found herself watching the watchers. Not only was the street below crammed with a surging, shoving crowd, but every window overlooking the space was occupied by gawkers affluent enough to pay for a better view of the spectacle. On the roof of a nearby house she could see a man with a telescope trained on the condemned; a well-dressed young woman with a pair of opera glasses leaned out a window of the inn next door. Judging by the faint smile curling the woman’s lips, she was not here to support any of those doomed to die. Then a turnkey snatched the child from Amy Hatcher’s arms, and the condemned girl began to scream and struggle against the hands that reached out to hold her.

  “My baby! Oh, God, no, please don’t take her! Give me just one more minute with her. Oh, please don’t do this.”

  The sheriff tightened his hold on his staff, his lips pressing into a thin line of distaste, as if there were something unseemly, something un-English about a young mother objecting to her own murder and what would surely be the inevitable death of her orphaned babe. The condemned were expected to cooperate, to “make a good end” and die repenting their sins and commending their spirits to God. Amy Hatcher was not supposed to create a scene, screaming and crying and half fainting, so that two turnkeys had to hold her up, one at each side, while her wrists were bound with cords and her elbows pinned to her body. The rope was taken from her thin shoulders and affixed to one of the black butcher’s hooks in the heavy beam above while the noose was slipped over her head.

  “‘Lord Jesus Christ,’” prayed the Ordinary, his voice booming, as if he could somehow drown out her hysterical pleadings, “‘by your death you took away the sting of death: Grant to us your servants so to follow in faith where you have led the way. . . . ‘”

  The baby was wailing now, too, her thin, reedy cry intertwined with the mother’s frantic pleadings. “Oh, please—”

  A hush had fallen over the watching crowd, their upturned faces rapt as the three condemned men were led onto the trapdoor beside Amy and carefully positioned on the marks chalked there. One of the men was older, perhaps in his late thirties. But the other two were heartbreakingly young, still boys: a man and his two sons. All three were doing their best to “die game,” their heads held high and grim half smiles plastered in place. But Hero could see their legs shaking, see the sweat that glistened on their pinched pale faces despite the cold.

  The sheriff said something, and one of the turnkeys stepped forward to bind the woman’s skirts around her legs with a strap to keep them from billowing up immodestly as her body fell. Because heaven forbid, thought Hero, that the multitude gathered to watch her die a hideous, painful death should be given a glimpse of her ankles.

  “‘. . . receive them into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace and into the glorious company of the saints in light,’” prayed the Ordinary, closing his prayer book. “Amen.�
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  All four condemned prisoners were now in place, the nooses around their necks, and the executioner stepped forward to yank the white hoods down over their faces. Then, at the sheriff’s signal, the hangman pulled the lever that slid back the timbers supporting the long trapdoor. One of the doomed boys shouted, “Lord, have mercy on me!” as the trap fell with a loud crash that echoed around the street.

  Four bodies dropped with an ugly jerk. But the distance they were allowed to fall was short—just eighteen inches. And so, rather than breaking their necks, the ropes simply began to strangle them. Slowly.

  “Oh, no,” whispered Hero as the dying prisoners writhed in agony, twisting and twitching helplessly, the men’s legs kicking out spasmodically. Do the Morris dance on air, they called it. Dance the hempen measure, and cut a caper on the way to hell. All were euphemisms for hanging, cynical descriptions of the macabre jerks and gyrations performed by the condemned in their death throes.

  There had been a time, when executions used to take place out at Tyburn, when the doomed prisoners’ friends and loved ones could grasp the dying men’s and women’s legs and pull, thus speeding their deaths. But that was no longer allowed. Now those who could afford it paid the hangman to do basically the same thing. But such a luxury was beyond the means of a desperate woman condemned for stealing food or three poor poachers. And so the executioner simply stood with his arms crossed at his chest and watched them suffer.

  “I should have left her money for the hangman,” Hero said, stricken. “I didn’t think.”

  Alexi sucked in a shaky breath. “Neither did I.”

  An eternity later, Hero said, “My God. How much longer can it go on?”

  “Sometimes it can take as long as four or five minutes. It’s a horrible way to die—strangling. That’s why the French instituted the guillotine.”

  The young poachers’ bowels and bladders had released, staining their breeches. And still the dying fought to live, uselessly, hopelessly.

  Finally, one after the other, they ceased to struggle, until all four dangling bodies simply swayed heavily at the ends of their ropes. They would be left hanging like this for an hour before being cut down. St. Sepulchre’s bell gave one final clang and fell silent. The prison bell tolled on and on.

  The gathering of dignitaries beneath the pavilion rose to their feet and filed off the platform in a solemn procession. They would now retire to the Keeper’s house, where they would consume the traditional post-hanging breakfast of deviled kidneys.

  With the departure of the officials, the crowd of spectators pressed forward. Many would pay the hangman a shilling to touch the hands of the dead, which was believed to be a cure for warts and tumors and other growths. An executioner could make quite a tidy sum out of a hanging, since he would also be allowed to sell the clothes of the dead and to cut the ropes used to kill them into short lengths to sell as souvenirs.

  Hero glanced over at Alexi and was shocked to see the Frenchwoman’s face wet with tears. “It’s barbarism,” said Alexi, her accent unusually heavy. “How can anyone think this is right? To kill a starving seventeen-year-old girl for stealing a ham? A ham!”

  Reaching out, Hero grasped her friend’s hand, tight. And for a long moment, the two women simply held on to each other as the crowds dissipated below and the cold golden sun slid behind a new bank of clouds.

  Chapter 32

  “His name was Jack Donavon,” Sir Henry Lovejoy told Sebastian as the two men stood side by side, staring down at the ashen naked corpse of the man killed in the Strand.

  The body lay facedown on an old door propped up on two empty whiskey barrels in the taproom of the Black Swan on Fleet Street, for the viewing of the body of the deceased was an important part of any inquest. The jurors who’d been called to serve were still milling about, along with a number of curious onlookers. By law, any sudden, violent, or unexplained death required an inquest. And because there were so few places capable of holding the kinds of crowds gruesome dead bodies could attract, the proceedings typically were held in a public house or an inn.

  “So who was he?” asked Sebastian, his eyes narrowing as he studied the purple knife wound in the dead man’s back.

  “A generally unsavory character from the sounds of it, although by all accounts not a simple thief. I suspect he wasn’t after your purse.”

  “I didn’t think he was.”

  Sir Henry nodded. “Unfortunately, we’ve no idea who he was working for or who his companion—and inadvertent murderer—might have been.”

  “Lovely.”

  Sir Henry shivered. A fire had recently been kindled on the enormous old-fashioned hearth, but the blaze was meager, and the room was still cold enough that few of those present were inclined to remove their greatcoats. “You’ve no idea who might have an interest in seeing you dead?”

  “Not really.”

  A commotion near the door foretold the imminent arrival of the coroner. Sir Henry glanced behind them, then lowered his voice to say, “One of my lads did learn something you might find of interest: Edward Ambrose is in debt.”

  “Did your lad manage to discover why?”

  “The usual: mainly gambling, along with an unhealthy addiction to Bond Street tailors and high-end jewelers such as Rundell and Bridge.”

  “Any sign of a mistress?”

  “My lads say there is talk, but they’ve yet to verify it.” The magistrate pursed his lips in thought. “The debt obviously reflects poorly on Mr. Ambrose’s character. But unless he’s planning to acquire a new rich wife, I fail to see how it constitutes a motive for murder.”

  “It doesn’t—if Jane was murdered. But if Ambrose struck her in anger and accidently killed her, the debt might explain the nature of their quarrel.”

  “There is that.” Sir Henry shivered again and drew a handkerchief from his pocket to blow his nose. “You’ve seen the frozen river?”

  “Yesterday afternoon. Amazing, is it not?”

  Sir Henry nodded, although he looked more troubled than impressed. “There’s talk of setting up a Frost Fair. Personally, I fail to see the attraction of freezing in a tent pitched on ice simply to experience the dubious pleasure of drinking expensive beer or purchasing a useless trinket at twice its worth so that one may afterward boast that it was acquired on the Thames.”

  Sebastian laughed just as a constable came bustling into the taproom, clapped his hands loudly, and said, “Right, then, let’s get this started, shall we?”

  * * *

  As expected, the inquest returned a verdict of homicide by person unknown.

  Afterward, Sebastian joined Lovejoy for a ploughman’s lunch in the inn’s public room. The pub was crowded with a motley assortment of hangers-on from the inquest—shopkeepers and tradesmen, costermongers and apprentices, all loud and boisterous with lingering excitement from the morning’s entertainment.

  “I’ll never understand it,” said Lovejoy, nibbling without much appetite at a heel of bread. “Why would anyone want to deliberately look at the bloody corpse of a murdered man?”

  “Presumably for the same reason they attend hangings,” said Sebastian, his thoughts on the ordeal he knew Hero was going through.

  “I’ve never understood that, either. We hang felons in public as a warning to all potential lawbreakers; the spectacle is intended to put the fear of God into them. But in reality, all we do is provide the city’s pickpockets with a distracted crowd enjoying a free show.”

  Sebastian found himself smiling. “You’re suggesting public hangings might not work as a deterrent?”

  “One would deduce. As for hanging a man—let alone a woman or child—for stealing a handkerchief or a pheasant? I fear future generations will conclude we place little value on the lives of England’s poor.”

  Sebastian drained his ale and set it aside. “Future generations will be right.”

>   * * *

  Sebastian spent the next hour trying to find Edward Ambrose.

  The playwright’s nervous servants claimed ignorance of his whereabouts. In the end, Sebastian tracked Jane’s widower to a low tavern on Compton Street. From the looks of it, the place dated back to the last years of the seventeenth century, with low, dark beams overhead and sawdust on the floor and a wide hearth beside which Ambrose sat slumped. He had one hand wrapped around a bottle of cheap Scotch, and he looked up lazily when Sebastian slid into the opposite bench.

  “Ah. It wanted only that,” said Ambrose, raising the bottle to his lips without bothering to use the glass that stood near his elbow.

  “Bit early, isn’t it?”

  “Is it?”

  “So, are you drowning your sorrows or assuaging your guilt?” asked Sebastian.

  “You say that as if the two were mutually exclusive.”

  When Sebastian remained silent, Ambrose took another drink, then wiped his wet lips with the back of one hand. “I was a rotten husband to her. She was brilliant and beautiful and giving, and I took it all without appreciating any of it.”

  “And you hit her.”

  Something flared in Ambrose’s eyes, something that was hidden when he dropped his gaze to the bottle again.

  “Exactly how deeply in debt are you?” said Sebastian, then added when Ambrose’s head jerked up, “And don’t even think about trying to deny it.”

  Ambrose slumped back in his seat. “How the devil did you discover that?”

  “Did you think I would not?”

  Ambrose shook his head and swallowed hard.

  Sebastian said, “How deep?”

  Ambrose’s face twitched. “Nearly five thousand pounds. A large but not insurmountable sum for a man in my position. Theoretically.”