A woman—no, hardly more than a girl. She was thin and wretched, but a fierce anger burned in her eyes as they met Nick’s and he nodded in recognition of another unbowed spirit.
His head thudded unmercifully and he put up a hand to rub where it hurt worst, over his right eye. Used to the weight of the shackles, he misjudged the gesture and hit himself a painful blow. Go home Kat. He tried to send the message but could sense no answering recognition. He hated the thought that she would see him die not some heroic death but merely a shameful, undignified, choking end.
The crowd of fashionable onlookers shifted, parted and he saw a face he recognised. It was that young lawyer. What was his name? Brigham, that was it. He seemed to be alone. His eyes met Nick’s and he nodded, then made a strange gesture with his clasped hands as though tugging.
Nick understood him. He had one friend in this mob at least, one person who was prepared to stand at the gallows’ foot and swing on his legs to make a merciful end come sooner. He raised a hand in silent acknowledgement and salute and the young lawyer nodded again, raised a hand in response and turned to burrow back through the crowd.
The ragged line of the condemned began to shuffle forward, the doors opening ahead. The roar of the crowd was suddenly loud in their ears. From behind he was suddenly elbowed in the kidneys and the thin young woman pushed past him. ‘Ladies first!’ she shouted in an unmistakeable East London accent. ‘I’m not waiting around while you deal with all these ‘ere coves. I’m going first while the audience is freshlike.’
There were sniggers and the gaolers grinned, pushing her forward to the front of the desperate queue. Had no one but he seen the tears on her cheeks? Nick wondered. She was desperate to end the waiting, terrified of having to see what was happening before her, that was all.
The next twenty minutes passed in a daze. He fixed his eyes on the head in front of him and on nothing else as they slowly shuffled forward, stopped, waited uneasily, then moved again. What was happening in front he ignored, focusing instead on the grizzled hair, the scarred neck and the occasional flea on the man before him.
Then he was out in the sunshine and his turn was next. He looked up, over the heads of the mob, over the top of the gallows and concentrated on nothing but the memory of a trusting, fragrant, soft body nestled against his and the passionate intensity in a pair of brown eyes locked with his. I promise.
There was a thud, sickeningly familiar now, and the crowd yelled louder. He shut his ears to the noise. Minutes passed, then he was pushed forward. Time to die, he told himself. Time to show them how a Lydgate dies. The trap gave slightly under his feet as he planted them firmly on it. He dropped his gaze and scanned the crowd with an impassive face.
‘Black Jack! Black Jack!’ The shout was a chant, the upturned faces a blur.
The noose was hard and rough around his neck and he made himself not resist as the knot was jerked tight under his left ear. Not long now, Kat.
With a crack and a jolt the trap gave way under him and he fell, to be brought up with a sickening wrench. The pain was incredible, stars spun in front of his eyes, the world went red, black, then red again as he gagged for breath, but there was none to be had.
Arms wrapped themselves around his legs and dragged down as a woman’s voice screamed ‘No!’ and another body hurtled through the trap beside him. The weight on his legs vanished and he was being lifted. Frantically he dragged air down into his lungs through his tortured throat.
The noose was jarring, moving, rasping at his neck, then suddenly gave way and he was falling, colliding with bodies. This was hell. He was dead and falling into hell. The blow as his head met the cobbles sent him spinning into darkness.
Darkness. Now they were trying to drown him. Nick coughed and spat as water trickled into his mouth and a voice he knew said, ‘Is he breathing?’
Katherine struggled against Arthur’s restraining arms, straining to see as the men clustered round Nick. ‘Let me go! Is he alive?’ She had been too late, too late by only minutes. Her lungs ached from the frantic race through the crowded streets, her head throbbed with pain and her throat was raw from that single scream which had been wrenched from her as she saw the trap open. Nick … I failedy you.
John, who was bending over the figure sprawled on the table in the anteroom, looked up and nodded. ‘Aye, Miss Katherine, he’ll do. He’ll have a powerfully sore throat for a while yet, though.’
‘Thank God. Oh, thank God. Arthur, will you please let me go!’ Katherine shook off the anxious lawyer’s grip and ran to bend over Nicholas. She took his filthy hand in hers and rubbed it. ‘Why does he not open his eyes?’
In response the limp figure stirred, coughed and said, ‘Urgh.’ He coughed, grimaced and tried again. ‘Hell.’ It sounded more like a statement than an oath.
‘Nick, open your eyes,’ Katherine urged.
There was a long moment of stillness, then, with an effort that was almost tangible, he dragged his lids open and stared up at her.
Katherine gasped; his eyes were red with broken blood vessels. ‘Nick …’
‘Kat?’ He broke off, coughing desperately. ‘Told you not to come.’
Katherine pulled off her pelisse, rolled it up and pushed it under his head. ‘Do not try and talk. Someone, please fetch me water.’
‘Katherine.’ He was not taking the slightest notice of her words. ‘I’m not dead?’
‘Of course not,’ she snapped, the nervous tension of the last few hours breaking down her control at last. ‘Now be quiet, for goodness’ sake, and lie still and we will … we will …’ Suddenly she was shaking. Arthur started forward, John swore under his breath and elbowed the younger man aside and Nick, moving like a marionette with half his strings cut, lurched into a sitting position then on to his feet.
‘Kat, Kat, don’t cry.’ She found herself gathered into his arms and held against a very malodorous frieze coat. It felt marvellous. ‘Kat, what have you done to your head?’
She had forgotten it; now the pain over her eye returned with a vengeance. ‘Carriage accident.’ Justice Highson spoke. ‘We would have been here yesterday evening if it had not been for that. But never mind that now. You, young man, should be in bed and your wife should not be in this place.’
Katherine pulled herself together. ‘Oh, yes, please let us go home! Governor, will we be able to get out now?’
She found she was still clinging to Nick, although which of them was holding the other up she was not quite certain.
‘John, help Mr Lydgate. Is the coach near? I can hardly recall where we got out and began to run.’
‘Near enough, if the Governor can get us out away from the crowd,’ John said stolidly. ‘Come here, sir, you put your arm over my shoulders, we’re much of a height. There we go.’
They made slow progress down the maze of passages. Katherine could not bring herself to look at Nick, to see more closely the purple swollen flesh of his throat where they had cut the noose away or the frightening bloodshot eyes. She just wanted them all out of this place. At the gateway she turned and held out her hands to Mr Highson.
‘How can I thank you, sir? I feel so guilty for your injuries.’
‘Nonsense, my dear.’ The magistrate shifted his left arm, which was resting in a sling, and grimaced. ‘A sore head and a dislocated shoulder are a small price to pay. Think how I would feel with an innocent man’s life on my conscience. I’ll be off now, you will want to get home. Goodbye, my dear Mrs Lydgate. Write and let me know how your husband goes on.’
Impetuously she put her arms around him and kissed his empurpled cheek. He smelt of snuff and Spanish leather and reminded her suddenly of her father.
‘Now you just sit here a minute, sir.’ John was propping Nick into a corner embrasure. ‘I’ll be back directly if