♦ ♦ ♦
Ned is alone, pacing off the final minutes in his cell. It is Christmas morning, gray, the drizzle turning to snow. The night before, Boyles had been in to pay his last respects, drunk as a hoot owl. He sang a couple of maudlin Irish tunes in a quavering baritone, took hold of Ned’s hand and told him he hoped to see him in a better world, then passed out in the corner. And Fanny had been in too — for the final farewells. Bruises like fermenting plums maculated her thighs, chafe marks gnawed at her wrists. There was a tattoo behind her ear (a Jolly Roger, in green), a fresh welt across her cheekbone, the lingering impressions of human teeth perforating her buttocks. She looked worn. Ned no longer cared. He flung himself into her with all the desperation of the doomed, his every cell crying out for survival, for the wedding of sperm and egg, for the sweet posthumous incubation of life. She left him at dawn, her face puffed with despair.
Quarter of seven. Fifteen minutes to go. He smokes his thirtieth pipe — panic beating at his ribs, his hand shaking — takes another pull at the bottle of gin Boyles left him, and bends to wipe a speck of dust from his shoes. Outside in the courtyard, the other prisoners are taking their exercise, huddled forms pressed to the walls and gathered in the corners like conspirators. Lucky bastards, he thinks, choked by a wave of self-pity. Absurdly, the strains of a Christmas carol keep pulsing through his head—”All is calm, all is bright”—and though he’s nearly polished off the bottle he feels as sober as a. . a judge. He laughs at the thought, a booming belly laugh that somehow gets out of control and pinches off into a shriek, crazed and bloodcurdling, the wail of an animal caught in a trap. “AAAaaaa-aaaaaaah!” he shrieks, “AAAaaaa-aaaaaaah!” But wait: what’s this? Footsteps?
They’re coming for him.
All at once he goes loose — his limbs heavy as wet mortar, spine slumping, eyehds drooping, feet splayed. A soothing serenity creeps over him, gripping him like a warm mitten. Now that the moment has actually come, he feels as calm as the average butcher or bootblack waking from his bed to the smells of holiday goose and figgy pudding. Got to die well, Ned Rise, he tells himself.
The turnkey stands at the door, flanked by two men with muskets. Ned throws his shoulders back and steps forward with all the composure of a prince gliding off to his coronation. Apart from an incipient pallor about the cheeks, he looks fit and trim, almost bubbling with health — thanks to Fanny he’s been well provided for. His hair is tied back with a bit of silver galloon, and he is dressed with panache in a blue velvet jacket, white silk hose, buckled pumps. Stay calm, he tells himself — don’t give in. But then another voice starts up in his head, a voice that keeps repeating, “But I’m going to die / But I’m going to die” like a litany. Die, die, die, echoes the blood pounding in his temples.
♦ ♦ ♦
A spotty crowd is gathered outside the wall for the executions — mainly hyenas and degenerates, and agents for dissectors hoping to claim the corpses. There is a small contingent of the gentility as well, fronted by Sir Joseph Banks and the Countess Binbotta. They sit in coaches parked along the street, or stand discreetly in the rear, lured from their hearths and wassail bowls by the grim logic of an eye for an eye. If any of them see any incongruity in attending an execution on Christmas Day, their faces — stern and wire-jawed — don’t show it.
By now the snow is coming down in earnest: nearly two inches of fine white powder smooths the muddy earth, softens the harsh lines of the gallows. The empty nooses are frosted like cakes, liveried footmen hurry to throw blankets over the backs of their masters’ horses, the spectators pull shawls and mufflers tight round their throats and close in on the gallows for better visibility. Thick as paste, the big wet flakes swirl out of the sky.
His elbows pinioned and knees unsteady, Ned stands at the main gate waiting for the ceremony to begin. Beside him, dressed in rags, are the two thieves condemned to hang with him. One of them is a tall, brutal-looking character, his hair cropped close, nose broken. There are tears on his face and he seems to be muttering prayers under his breath. He clutches a prayerbook in his sweaty fist as if it were a life preserver. The other unfortunate, Ned realizes with about as much surprise as a prospective hangee can muster, is a dwarf. Three feet high, with a carroty mass of hair flaming round his cheeks and crown like a brushfire. Without warning the dwarf suddenly turns and delivers a vicious kick to the lower leg of his companion.
“Cut yer blubberin’ and ‘ail Maryin’, arse’ole. Die like a man.”
“Lay off me, Ginger,” the big man pleads. “Ye’ve ‘ounded me into a life of crime — ain’t that damage enough?”
The dwarf turns his head away to spit on the cold stone floor. “Me ‘ounded you, eh? And ‘oo was it wanted to roll Lord Lovat when ‘ee come out of White’s gamblin’ ‘ouse, eh? And wot about the brilliant idea of peelin’ the gold-leaf paper off the inside of the Duke of Bedford’s coach? I don’t ‘ear you, pea brain,” the dwarf snarls, kicking the tall man a second time.
“Ye twisted little ‘omunculus!” the big man explodes, dropping his prayerbook and snatching at the dwarfs coiffure with both hands, “I’ll show ye ‘oo corrupted ‘oo.” Though the pinions severely restrict his maneuverability, he manages to come up with two fistfuls of bright orange hair, one on each side of the dwarfs head. “Son of a bitch!” he roars, shaking the little man as if he were a sack of feathers, while the dwarf in his turn tries to get a purchase on his antagonist’s groin.
At that moment however the gates draw back with an apocalyptic screech and the two combatants go limp, looking sheepish as the chaplain appears from a back stairway to lead the solemn procession out into the blue-white glare of the street. The driven snow rakes at Ned’s face, harsh and stinging, but he doesn’t turn his head or narrow his eyes, welcoming this little prick of sensation, this wonderful automatic quirk of the organism. In a few minutes there will be a final and absolute end to all sensation — to pleasure and pain, taste and smell, the soft pressure of Fanny’s lips, to hunger, bitterness, cold. Behind him the thieves have fallen silent, absorbed in their own reflections, awed by the shadowy prospect of death. As soon as they’d opened their mouths a corresponding channel had opened in Ned’s brain, and he recognized them as the bastards who’d robbed him and Boyles after the Bartholomew Fair. Somehow, the fact that they’ll soon get what’s coming to them seems a small consolation.
The sight of the three gibbets looming up out of the storm is a shock: save me, Ned prays, save me. I haven’t lived yet. Give me one more chance — just one more chance. But then he focuses on the immense black-hooded figure standing silent beneath the apparatus, and he knows it’s no use praying. The hangman’s grip is like a vise as he helps Ned up onto the box, center stage. A special high-rise platform has been built to accommodate the dwarf — he curses when the hangman hoists him under the armpits and sets him atop the box as if he were a mannequin. The big man is whimpering like a puppy: at the first sign of his weakness the rabble comes alive, spewing taunts and epithets. He has to be prodded before he’ll mount the box, and when the hangman secures the noose he cries out as if he’s been burned. The spectators seem to find this amusing, and a nervous titter works its way through their ranks.
“You men, poor sinners,” begins the chaplain, “bow your heads and beg forgiveness of Jesus Christ Our Lord. You will soon appear before the judgment seat of your Creator, there to give an account of all things done in this life, and to suffer eternal torment for your sins committed against Him, unless by your hearty and unfeigned repentance you obtain mercy—”