A Fine Madness by Alan Judd (best classic books TXT) 📕

He never finished because the gaolers took hold and yanked him away.

‘Another simple man,’ whispered Christopher. ‘But a foolish one, which – happily – you are not.’

Afterwards I persuaded a sub-warden of the Tower to show us the cells. We first saw those where noble prisoners were held, along with the wealthy whose fate was not decided. They were half-decent quarters such as I have now, thanks to your interest in me, sir. Some were truly generous, such as those in which Sir Walter Ralegh was subsequently imprisoned for sixteen years while writing his great history of the world. Christopher, of course, knew Ralegh and his fellow free-thinkers and it is ironic that we lingered at that door, not knowing how their fates would entwine.

Then we were taken down to the lower cells where the meaner sort were kept, along with those already condemned or awaiting torture. These – as perhaps you have heard, sir, though I hope you have been spared personal acquaintance? – are dark, damp, noisome places often lit only by gratings at ground level and sometimes not at all, unless by flares and candles in the hands of gaolers. We traversed a long tunnel past these grim cellars at the end of which was a great door.

Our warden paused. ‘Do you wish to see the chamber, sirs? The confessing chamber, we call it. It is in use today.’

I knew what that meant and would have been content to stop there but Christopher’s thirst for the vicarious was not slaked. He wanted to go in.

‘I must ask you to be silent for fear of interrupting the conversation,’ our warden cautioned us.

The great door creaked back to reveal a flight of wooden stairs leading down into a cavernous basement. The air was heavy with smoke from torches in the walls and the only other light came from two gratings giving onto the moat. The floor was solid rock laid with rushes. In the middle of the chamber, lit by four torches on poles, was the rack. Since that machine seems to have fallen out of use now and there is even, I hear, talk of a law to prohibit it, I shall briefly describe it for you, sir. It comprised a rectangular wooden frame with sides about a foot high and inside at each end a wooden roller which could be turned upon a ratchet by poles inserted into slots. Attached to each of these rollers were two chains to which the hands and feet of the victim were tied. When the victim was stretched between them his whole body was lifted from the ground and suspended under tension, which was increased, notch by notch, according to whether he answered the questions. His shoulders, hips, ankles, knees, elbows and wrists were gradually pulled apart and dislocated, and his tendons and muscles so stretched that those who resisted long were often unable to walk or stand at their trials. It is said there were some few who withstood all torture without confessing, but they were rare. Almost all talked, the sensible ones merely upon being shown the rack, sometimes with their predecessor still stretched upon it.

There was a racking that day. A man in a dark tunic and breeches was suspended, while a man at each roller held the poles in their ratchets. Three other men were at the side of the rack, one kneeling to address the victim. Another, a lawyer, to judge by his robe, stood watching. A third, younger, sat at a low desk with quill, paper and ink. The scene was lit by the flickering flares and the only sounds were the murmured words of the kneeling man, which we could not make out.

Our warden stopped us some yards away. ‘We must not intrude,’ he whispered, as if it were a religious ceremony.

As in a sense it was. The man being racked was the priest John Ballard. Christopher recognised him and murmured in my ear. I think I have said enough to you, sir, to indicate that I have never been as much at ease with racking and other tortures as some men are. I don’t think Mr Secretary or Lord Burghley were, either, though they accepted its necessity and occasionally attended a racking themselves to be sure that the correct questions were put. I accepted the necessity of it but the fact, the sight of it, left me out of sorts for days. I endured it only by reminding myself of the many of my own faith, loyal men and women, who had been stretched, hanged and burned alive during the reign of Bloody Mary. Then it was Protestants who were racked, now Catholics, almost as if it were a rite of passage. Save that the Catholics were not racked merely for being such but only if they threatened the security of the state. That, at least, was how it was supposed to be.

I could not look at Ballard’s suspended body for long but Christopher, whose face I fancied was paler than usual, stared intently. It was as if he sought to absorb, to soak up everything from the scene. The man kneeling by the rack spoke in an undertone, softly, monotonously, as if mouthing a catechism. He paused for some seconds, during which the only sounds were the crackling of the torches and the breeze through the gratings. Then he raised his forefinger and nodded at the man with the pole at the head of the rack. Speaking distinctly this time, he said, ‘One more.’

The man removed his pole from one notch and carefully inserted it into the next. Then he leaned against the pole and pushed it forward. There was a single loud click of the ratchet.

For another second or two there was silence, then a small but very distinct plop as something was plucked out of its joint. This was immediately followed by a prolonged strangled sound, not a full-throated scream but one that sounded as if it too were being