it.
Day and night are the same. Fitful cold aching sleep, pain, thirst, tiredness even when asleep.
The straw moves underfoot with lice.
The air is stagnant. Breathing is hard because the air is so thick. Too much carbon dioxide. Not enough oxygen. Every breath keeps them alive and kills them off some more. One of the women has a fever.
The door opens. The gaoler is there with a dripping flare.
‘Nance!’ he shouts, and shoves the flare in the socket. He leaves them light while he takes the woman; it is his way of signalling something … what?
The flare throws grotesque shadows on the black stone walls of the cell. No, it is not the shadows that are grotesque; the women are grotesque. Shrunken, stooped, huddled, crippled, hollow-faced, racked and rattling.
Alizon uses her hands to make a play-theatre. Here is a rabbit. Here is a bird. Old Demdike sways back and forth in her soiled dress.
It is raining a little, and Jane Southworth goes to her station under the grille, opening her mouth to the rain. She lets the rain on her face be her tears. None of the women cry any more.
She thinks about Hell, and is it like this? She thinks that the punishments of the Fiend are made out of human imaginings. Only humans can know what it means to strip a human being of being human. She thinks the Fiend has a kind of purity that humans never have. She thinks that godliness is ridiculous because it exists to hide this; this stinking airless doomed cell. Life is a stinking airless doomed cell. Why do we pretend? She can smell strawberries. She knows she is going mad. Let the rain come.
A rat runs over her foot and drinks from the indent of her shoe.
Hoghton Tower
ALICE NUTTER AND Roger Nowell were riding ahead of their group. Alice said nothing about Constable Hargreaves or Jem Device or the events of the previous night. When Roger Nowell enquired after his fashion if she had slept well, she said she had. She hoped he had found his fugitive. He had not.
Potts was travelling with them. He was a poor rider and preferred a carriage, but roads in Lancashire were not so necessary as they were in London, and so Potts had to be content with bouncing along the ruts and bridleways in an open cart drawn by a farmer’s nag. He was bad-tempered enough from a night without sleep and not a single broomstick to be seen on Pendle Hill. He had been curious to meet Alice Nutter but she made him nervous. Something about the way she looked at him made him feel less important than he knew himself to be.
He was glad to be travelling behind the mounted party.
Roger Nowell was glad of it too. He and Alice were both distracted by their own thoughts and said little to one another.
Alice had woken well before dawn. Christopher was sleeping next to her, sleeping heavily like a man who has not slept enough for a long time, sleeping carelessly, on his back, his arm thrown out, like a child who is safe.
She had made him get up, taken him down the secret passageway between her bedroom and her study. Locked him in. Left him. She did not know if she would see him again. He wanted to leave for Lancaster. She knew that she loved him.
‘Hoghton Tower,’ said Roger Nowell, pausing his horse and breaking her thoughts. ‘It is a splendid house.’
They had reached the mile-long drive that led to the house. The de Hoghtons had come to England with William the Conqueror, but this house, fifty years old, had been built by Thomas Hoghton, who had scarcely been able to enjoy it. He would not renounce his Catholic faith and had been forced to flee to France.
‘He was harbouring Edmund Campion,’ said Roger Nowell, ‘Remember him?’
Alice remembered. ‘Burned alive for his faith.’
‘Thomas Hoghton was lucky to escape himself. He used his money to found the Jesuit Seminary at Douai in France,’ said Roger Nowell. ‘Christopher Southworth trained as a priest there.’
Alice glanced across at him, but his face was straight ahead, admiring the
Day and night are the same. Fitful cold aching sleep, pain, thirst, tiredness even when asleep.
The straw moves underfoot with lice.
The air is stagnant. Breathing is hard because the air is so thick. Too much carbon dioxide. Not enough oxygen. Every breath keeps them alive and kills them off some more. One of the women has a fever.
The door opens. The gaoler is there with a dripping flare.
‘Nance!’ he shouts, and shoves the flare in the socket. He leaves them light while he takes the woman; it is his way of signalling something … what?
The flare throws grotesque shadows on the black stone walls of the cell. No, it is not the shadows that are grotesque; the women are grotesque. Shrunken, stooped, huddled, crippled, hollow-faced, racked and rattling.
Alizon uses her hands to make a play-theatre. Here is a rabbit. Here is a bird. Old Demdike sways back and forth in her soiled dress.
It is raining a little, and Jane Southworth goes to her station under the grille, opening her mouth to the rain. She lets the rain on her face be her tears. None of the women cry any more.
She thinks about Hell, and is it like this? She thinks that the punishments of the Fiend are made out of human imaginings. Only humans can know what it means to strip a human being of being human. She thinks the Fiend has a kind of purity that humans never have. She thinks that godliness is ridiculous because it exists to hide this; this stinking airless doomed cell. Life is a stinking airless doomed cell. Why do we pretend? She can smell strawberries. She knows she is going mad. Let the rain come.
A rat runs over her foot and drinks from the indent of her shoe.
Hoghton Tower
ALICE NUTTER AND Roger Nowell were riding ahead of their group. Alice said nothing about Constable Hargreaves or Jem Device or the events of the previous night. When Roger Nowell enquired after his fashion if she had slept well, she said she had. She hoped he had found his fugitive. He had not.
Potts was travelling with them. He was a poor rider and preferred a carriage, but roads in Lancashire were not so necessary as they were in London, and so Potts had to be content with bouncing along the ruts and bridleways in an open cart drawn by a farmer’s nag. He was bad-tempered enough from a night without sleep and not a single broomstick to be seen on Pendle Hill. He had been curious to meet Alice Nutter but she made him nervous. Something about the way she looked at him made him feel less important than he knew himself to be.
He was glad to be travelling behind the mounted party.
Roger Nowell was glad of it too. He and Alice were both distracted by their own thoughts and said little to one another.
Alice had woken well before dawn. Christopher was sleeping next to her, sleeping heavily like a man who has not slept enough for a long time, sleeping carelessly, on his back, his arm thrown out, like a child who is safe.
She had made him get up, taken him down the secret passageway between her bedroom and her study. Locked him in. Left him. She did not know if she would see him again. He wanted to leave for Lancaster. She knew that she loved him.
‘Hoghton Tower,’ said Roger Nowell, pausing his horse and breaking her thoughts. ‘It is a splendid house.’
They had reached the mile-long drive that led to the house. The de Hoghtons had come to England with William the Conqueror, but this house, fifty years old, had been built by Thomas Hoghton, who had scarcely been able to enjoy it. He would not renounce his Catholic faith and had been forced to flee to France.
‘He was harbouring Edmund Campion,’ said Roger Nowell, ‘Remember him?’
Alice remembered. ‘Burned alive for his faith.’
‘Thomas Hoghton was lucky to escape himself. He used his money to found the Jesuit Seminary at Douai in France,’ said Roger Nowell. ‘Christopher Southworth trained as a priest there.’
Alice glanced across at him, but his face was straight ahead, admiring the
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