Darren Craske - The equivoque principle

'Indeed it did, Bishop. Aiden Miller is still at large, last I heard,' said Hawkspear. 'Crawditch police are chasin' their tails as always.'

'Splendid…the fool's doing a wonderful job of spreading the fear for me,' said the Bishop. 'I almost wish I could employ him myself!' Courtney suddenly bent closer to the landlord's face. 'I happen to be in the middle of a very sensitive project here, Mr Peach, and cannot allow anyone to bring trouble to my door. Because of your loose tongue the police now know that an Irishman named Hawkspear paid you to supply one of Quaint's employees with a bottle of drugged whisky. You can understand why I'm a little upset, surely. And you-' he said, jabbing the Irishman in the chest. 'Next time use a bloody alias! Did they teach you nothing in prison?'

Hawkspear lowered his clear blue eyes and stared down at his feet like an insolent child. 'M'sorry, Bishop-I just wanted t'get it done, and get out. I didn't know that Quaint bloke would be sniffin' around.'

Reynolds stepped forwards from the shadows. 'Maybe we should remove the landlord's gag, Bishop? You did say you wanted him alive, right?' he offered, eying the landlord's pale, sweaty face. 'Look at him. He's on the verge of collapse. It's not like he's going anywhere, is it?'

'If you must,' said the Bishop. 'You're right, Mr Reynolds, I don't want the bastard passing out yet.'

Reynolds grabbed the ragged gag, and pulled it free from Peach's mouth. The landlord wheezed oxygen into his lungs, tasting the fresh air as if for the first time.

The Bishop cleared his throat. 'Mr Reynolds, would you be kind enough to hand me my bag?'

Reynolds looked around, and spied the cloth carpetbag on the crypt's stone floor. The Bishop snatched it from him and rummaged inside, pulling from it a pair of long-handled brass tongs and some squat, stub-bladed shears.

'I found these items in Westminster Abbey's archive room, Mr Peach. They're from an age when peasants like you would be slaughtered for not obeying the word of the Lord. The Good Old Days, as I like to refer to them. Too bad it all had to end, eh?' said an almost nostalgic Bishop Courtney. 'This instrument was designed to purge the Devil from a man's soul.' He held the shears up for Peach to see them more clearly, taking pleasure from opening and closing the sharp, metal blades. 'Shall we put them to the test?' He held the tongs closer to Peach's face, and a brief flicker of torchlight danced off the brassy metal of the tools.

The landlord's eyes glassed over with tears as he realised his fate. His hands bound behind his back, he begged for the Bishop's mercy.

'You don't have much breath left, Mr Peach. I wouldn't waste it if I were you.'

'But…please! I had no choice!' protested Peach.

'You have a loose tongue, sir-and what do we do to people with loose tongues, Mr Hawkspear?' asked the Bishop.

Hawkspear cackled like an old crone. 'We cut 'em off, my Lord.'

'Indeed we do, Mr Hawkspear! Indeed we do,' Bishop Courtney confirmed.

Reynolds placed his hand on the Courtney's shoulder, and the Bishop spun around, as if disturbed from a hypnotic trance.

'Is this really necessary, Bishop? You have the man bound,' he whispered.

Courtney's eyes flared. 'Mister Reynolds, if you please!' he seethed, as droplets of spittle formed on his bottom lip. 'I will thank you to remember your place.'

This had the desired affect on Reynolds, and he removed his hand quickly as ordered. 'I apologise, Bishop, I didn't mean to question you.'

'This man must pay penance!' squawked the Bishop.

With Hawkspear holding his captive's face firmly between his dirty, blood-stained fingers, the Bishop pushed the tongs towards his mouth, snapping the handles together. Peach tried to twist his face from the Irishman's grasp; writhing like a fox caught in a trap, but Hawkspear was far too strong. The landlord was weeping freely now, begging for forgiveness, for release-but none came. Peach clamped his mouth shut, tears streaming down his sweaty face. The Bishop advanced with the snapping tongs.

Again the Bishop pushed the tongs further into the man's mouth, trying to force it open, scraping teeth and tearing gums as it went. A sickening crack suddenly echoed around the confines of the crypt. Several of Arthur Peach's teeth snapped in half. The man himself was too stunned now to cry out, the pain too intense, as Courtney thrust the tools in further. The Bishop snapped with the tongs…and then slowly removed them from Arthur Peach's terrified mouth, revealing the landlord's tongue ensnared sharply between the brass pincers.

'Now, Mr Peach,' breathed the Bishop hoarsely, 'we shall hear how you plead for mercy without a tongue. Mr Hawkspear…take these, and show him what I mean,' he said, and handed Hawkspear the small, stub-bladed shears. The Irishman gladly held them tightly against the wrestling Peach's cheek-and with one sharp snip-he severed the tip of the man's tongue clean off. It fell to the floor with a wet thud.

The sustained shock was too much for Peach, and he collapsed onto his knees, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. A spurt of dark red blood spilled from his mouth, coating his broken teeth and torn gums. The man coughed, tasting the blood that gushed down his throat. Suddenly, Peach began convulsing wildly on the crypt's floor, his blood-stained hands flailing as if trying to snatch something in the air. He collapsed, shaking spasmodically, and spat a flurry of blood from his mouth, daubing his face in a crimson mask.

Reynolds pushed past Hawkspear and bent down to investigate. 'He's choking, damn it!' He searched Peach's eyes for some sign of life, but it was too late…the man was balancing one step closer to death than he was to life, and the scales were tipped in death's favour.

The Bishop and Hawkspear watched in fascination at the macabre scene playing out before them and, with a final twitch of his body, Peach arched his back, stiffened his fingers and then suddenly relaxed. The landlord's lungs exhaled like a bicycle with a slow, hissing puncture. The Bishop peered a little closer, rocking forward on the balls of his feet, risking a look into the dead man's eyes.

'The shock of it all was too much for him,' said Reynolds, staring at the body.

'The Bishop did what had t'be done, so he did,' snapped Hawkspear protectively.

'Mr Hawkspear, take the landlord's body up to the cemetery. Place it in the usual spot for the body-snatchers, as per our arrangement,' said Courtney, wiping his bloodied hands on his robes.

Hawkspear did as he was instructed. He bundled Peach's body up over his shoulder, and carried it slowly up the stone steps to the outside night.

'Arrangement?' quizzed Reynolds. 'You've got an arrangement with the body-snatchers now?'

'That is correct, Mr Reynolds,' Courtney said. 'As long as Mr Hawkspear provides them with a regular supply of fresh bodies, they have agreed to leave the cemetery untouched. I can't have those dreadful ghouls digging up the place looking for corpses now, can I?'

'And…why is that then? What do you care if they dig the graveyard up?'

'I was trying to tell you earlier, man, before we were rudely interrupted. It's far too late now. Don't worry, I'll reveal all in time. Now, I must retire to Westminster…you should go back to Crawditch, keep an eye on things,' the Bishop said, as he slapped Reynolds on the back like an old school chum. 'The plan nears its fruition, my friend. Sooner than he thought, the residents will find the prospect of staying in that place extremely unappealing, and we can conclude our business. I told you all it would take would be a few dead bodies turning up.'

'Yeah, but they're not turning up, are they? Not if you're selling them to the snatchers, at any rate. The folk of Crawditch are cowards, but all they're doing is talking right now,' said Reynolds. 'Talking about curfews, talking about businesses shutting up, and that's all. It's not enough. If you want this place ready in time for the Queen's orders, then we need to make a statement, Bishop! Something big.'