The Bawdy Basket by Edward Marston

tried to belabour him. Nicholas had to restrain Quilter from trying to go to his father’s assistance. It was, in any case, a futile urge. Quilter would never have barged his way through the press. Besides, his father’s attacker was quickly overpowered and hustled away. Quilter was shaking with anger.
    ‘Why do they goad him so?’ he asked. ‘Is he not suffering enough?’
    ‘Turn your head away,’ advised Nicholas.
    ‘From my own father? I would not do that even if they tear him to pieces with their bare hands. I want to see everything, Nick. Each remembered detail will fire my need for vengeance,’
    ‘Against whom?’
    A second question went unanswered as a fresh roar went up. Hauled from her cart, Jane Gullet was dragged towards a pile of faggots and tied to the post that stood in the middle of them. As the crowd spat and yelled, she replied with curses and dark laughter. On the gallows nearby was a more controlled spectacle. Helped up the steps by the hangman’s assistant, Gerard Quilter was met by a chaplain who asked him to repent his crime. Nicholas did not hear the reply in the tumult but he guessed its nature by the way that the prisoner bore himself. There was no admission of guilt, no sense of final capitulation. Head held high, Gerard Quilter was a visible symbol of the innocence that he professed. His son was duly proud of him.
    Nicholas did not watch the burning or the hanging. Public executions were anathema to him. They brought back unhappy memories of his time at sea, sailing with Drake on his circumnavigation of the world. Nameless cruelties had been inflicted during the voyage. Nicholas recalled only too well the occasions when he was forced to witness executions aboard the
Golden Hind
. Even if men were guilty of terrible crimes, he took no pleasure in the sight of their death. When a man was innocent – as he believed Gerard Quilter to be – he could not bear to look. Alone in the crowd, he averted his eyes. Others watched avidly, cheering as the noose was put around one prisoner’s neck and whipping themselves into a frenzy when the faggots were lighted beneath the other.
    Francis Quilter was on the verge of collapse. There weretwo tiny consolations for him. The hangman knew his trade. When the trap was opened and the body plunged, the prisoner’s neck was broken instantly. There was no lingering death. Gerard Quilter had been spared any additional agony. Divine intervention seemed to be responsible for the second consolation. A gust of wind came out of nowhere to fan the flames of the fire and to send the smoke so thickly across the gallows that it obscured the hanged man. Jane Gullet became the focus of attention, howling in anguish and defying the crowd to the last. Only when she was consumed by the flames did the collective hysteria start to abate.
    Taking his friend by the arm, Nicholas led him away.
    ‘You have seen enough, Frank,’ he said.
    ‘They’re no better than animals,’ muttered Quilter, gazing around. ‘What sort of people enjoy such horrors? And why must they be made public?’
    ‘The authorities believe that they are setting an example. Each victim who goes to his grave in such an appalling way stands as a warning to others.’
    ‘But why hang my father when they are burning a witch?’
    ‘It was a heartless decision.’
    ‘He did not belong in the company of that repulsive creature.’
    ‘Neither of them deserved the hatred and ridicule they provoked.’
    ‘Father was innocent, Nick!’ urged Quilter, bunching a fist to strike the palm of his other hand. ‘What we saw today was nothing short of judicial murder.’
    They fell silent and walked swiftly away. Pleased with the entertainment, the crowd was now dispersing with grim satisfaction. Nicholas hoped that his friend did not hear some of the bloodthirsty comments that came from the lips of other spectators. One woman complained bitterly that the hanging had been over too quickly, and that they had been