Because they were traitors, Friend and Parkyns had been denied the final service of their loved ones. They’d been left to kick and jerk about for a full ten minutes, and then to swing for ten after that, before the Sheriff in attendance decided they were unconscious enough to be taken down and hacked apart according to law.
These were common felons today; and, if she’d never yet been called on to help, Sarah knew her duties. The trick was to hang onto the legs and pull with all her weight until they stopped kicking. Since there were two of them, it would have been better to rely on Polly’s stout build to keep the noose tight about the young man’s neck. She could then have knocked the air out of his chest.
But she had no broom, and he was too high for her to reach up with her fists. So, together, they held on tight about his waist and pulled for all they were worth.
Sarah noticed without registering the sobbed farewells and the louder cries of despair from the other helpers. Where sound mattered, she was most aware of the internal noises from a body that hadn’t yet, in its unreflective parts, realised it was dying.
“For God’s sake, stop struggling,” she whispered. “In the name of Christ, give up and die!”
Beside her, a sudden smell of excrements told that someone’s bowls were relaxed. On the other side, there was a splashing of piss.
Unable or unwilling to hear her continued urging, the young man fought desperately for breath. His chest heaved. His legs kicked. His bound hands fluttered and twisted. He had all the power of youth on his side, and there was no telling how long these agonies would go on.
She stepped back and stood on tiptoe. If she took hold of him under the arms, she could swing with her full weight. That should snap his neck, It would also give her cover to get rid of the Irishman’s packet of lies.
But he had to die first.
Guinea or none, there were things she couldn’t do to the living.
She should have guessed that, left to herself, Polly would go wrong. Instead of holding on tight, she’d got the breeches down. Moaning and shaking from the horror of the task she’d been set, she clamped hold of the smooth flanks and tried to pull again. The legs were kicking faster. Already turned inside out, the only reason the breeches weren’t on the ground was that they were caught on a shoe buckle.
Even before Sarah could begin to panic, the body went into an immense but brief spasm. Then it was still. She could still have slipped the packet somewhere inside the shirt.
But, in a choking fit of her own, Polly was flopping about on the ground. The young man’s last act had been to go off in her face. His mess was dripping off her chin, and was gathering a coat of loose dust.
Sarah stood away from the body. She looked at the other hanged men. Ned Heeler was dead. The blood trickling from his nose and mouth would soon stop. The others were mostly dead or unconscious. But the coiner’s knot hadn’t slid tight enough. Though she did her best, his mother hadn’t the weight to close off the choked buzzing from his throat.
She turned to face the silent crowd. Every pair of eyes seemed fixed on the coiner’s dying struggle. The rapt faces reminded her of a painting she’d seen exhibited in one of the finished parts of the new St Paul’s. Far at the back, many of them looking through spyglasses, every person of quality was on horseback or the roof of his coach.
She turned back to the young man. She’d seen him alive. All but embracing him as a lover, she’d felt his warmth and movement. Now he was dead, and it was her work. She had managed to break the neck. The head had flopped backwards, reminding her of a killed goose. It was a bedraggled and a shocking sight.
She flattened the wave of self-loathing she felt about to sweep over her. There was no time for that. She looked at Polly. Under cover of helping the silly girl to her feet, she could surely drop the Irishman’s packet into the breeches.
But someone was beside Sarah. “Come away, my child,” the drunken clergyman intoned. As if to steady himself, he put a trembling hand beneath the shirt. He clawed at the smooth belly
“He is now with Christ.”
He drew his hand away and sniffed his fingers.
“Your work is done,” he added with an appreciative smack of his lips. He took her by the arm and led her away from the gently rotating corpse.
She stopped at the edge of the crowd. “No,” she said with an attempt at firmness. “There is work yet to be done.”
Polly was crawling towards her, the dust stuck to her lower face now looking like a beard. The young man had no one to keep the surgeons from stealing his body. Sarah could go through the motions of bargaining before it was dragged off for anatomising. This was her last chance to finish the job.
The Irishman had said he’d be watching. She had to finish the job.
It was a lost chance. Even as she shook herself free of the clergyman, Sir John was hurrying forward.
“Cut that body down!” he shouted in alarm. He stopped by the young man and peered at a letter he hadn’t finished unfolding.
He pointed at one of the hangman’s assistants. “No one to touch the body or its clothing,” he snarled.