Ken Follett - A Column of Fire

Dan looked at the last page and said: ‘This is not my father’s signature.’ He showed it to the men nearest him. ‘Any one of you knows my father’s hand. This is not it.’

Several of them nodded agreement.

Julius said irritably: ‘He was not able to sign unassisted, obviously.’

Dan said: ‘So you stretched him until—’ He choked, tears rolling down his face, but he forced himself to go on. ‘You stretched him until he was unable to write — and yet you pretend that he signed this.’

‘Pretend? Are you accusing a bishop of lying?’

‘I’m saying my father never admitted to heresy.’

‘How could you possibly know—’

‘He did not believe himself to be a heretic, and the only reason he would have said the opposite was torture.’

‘He was prayerfully persuaded of the error of his ways.’

Dan pointed dramatically to his father’s hideous form. ‘Is this what happens to a man when the bishop of Kingsbridge prays for him?’

‘The court will not hear any more of this insolence!’

Ned Willard spoke up. ‘Where is the rack?’

The three priests looked at him in silence.

‘Philbert has been racked, that’s obvious — but where?’ Ned said. ‘Here in the cathedral? In the bishop’s palace? Underneath the courthouse? Where is the rack kept? I think the citizens of Kingsbridge are entitled to know. Torture is a crime in England, except when licensed by the Privy Council. Who has been given permission to carry out torture in Kingsbridge?’

After a long pause, Stephen Lincoln said: ‘There is no rack in Kingsbridge.’

Ned digested this fact. ‘So Philbert was tortured elsewhere. Do you imagine that makes it all right?’ He pointed a finger at Bishop Julius. ‘It doesn’t matter if he was tortured in Egypt — if you sent him there, you are the torturer.’

‘Be silent!’

Ned decided he had made his point. He turned his back and stepped away.

At that point Dean Luke stood up. He was a tall, stooped man of forty with a mild manner and thinnish greying hair. ‘My lord bishop, I urge you to be merciful,’ he said. ‘Philbert is undoubtedly a heretic and a fool, but he is also a Christian, and in his misguided way he seeks to worship God. No man should be executed for that.’ He sat down.

There was a collective sound of agreement from the watching citizens. They were mostly Catholics, but they had been Protestants under the two previous monarchs, and none of them felt entirely safe.

Bishop Julius gave the dean a look of withering contempt, but did not reply to his plea. He said: ‘Philbert Cobley is guilty, not just of heresy but of spreading heresy. As is usual in such cases, he is sentenced to be excommunicated and then burned to death. The execution will be carried out by the secular authorities tomorrow at dawn.’

There were several different methods of execution. Noblemen normally benefited from the quickest, having their heads chopped off, which was instant if the executioner was skilled, and took only a minute if he was clumsy and needed several blows with the axe before the neck was fully severed. Traitors were hung, disembowelled while still living, then hacked into pieces. Anyone who robbed the Church was flayed, his skin cut off him with a very sharp knife while he was still alive: an expert could take off the skin in one piece. Heretics were burned alive.

The townspeople were not completely taken by surprise, but all the same they greeted the sentence with a horrified silence. No one had yet been burned in Kingsbridge. Ned thought that a ghastly line was being crossed, and he sensed that his neighbours felt the same.

Suddenly Philbert’s voice was heard, loud and surprisingly strong: he must have been saving his remaining energy for this. ‘I thank God that my agony has almost ended, Julius — but yours has yet to begin, you blaspheming devil.’ There was a gasp of shock at this insult, and Julius leaped to his feet, outraged; but a condemned man was traditionally allowed his say. ‘Soon you will go to hell, where you belong, Julius, and your torment will never end. And may God damn your eternal soul.’

The curse of a dying man was especially potent, and though Julius would have scorned such superstition, nevertheless he was trembling with rage and fear. ‘Take him away!’ he shouted. ‘And clear the church — this court is closed!’ He turned and stormed out through the south door.

Ned and his mother went home in a grim silence. The Fitzgeralds had won. They had killed the man who cheated them; they had stolen the Willards’ fortune; and they had kept their daughter from marrying Ned. It was total defeat.

Janet Fife served them a desultory supper of cold ham. Alice drank several glasses of sherry wine. ‘Will you go to Hatfield?’ she asked him as Janet cleared away.

‘I still haven’t decided. Margery isn’t married yet.’

‘But even if Bart were to drop dead tomorrow, they still wouldn’t let her marry you.’

‘She turned sixteen last week. In five years’ time, she’ll be able to marry whoever she likes.’

‘But you can’t stand still, like a ship becalmed, for so long. Don’t let this blight your life.’

She was right, he knew.

He went to bed early and lay awake. Today’s dreadful proceedings made him more inclined to go to Hatfield, but still he could not make up his mind. It would be giving up hope.

He drifted off to sleep in the small hours, and was awakened by sounds outside. Looking out of his bedroom window he saw men in the market square, their movements illuminated by half a dozen flaming torches. They were bringing dry sticks for the execution. Sheriff Matthewson was there, a big man wearing a sword, supervising the preparations: a priest could condemn a man to death, but could not carry out the sentence himself.

Ned put on a coat over his nightshirt and went outside. The morning air smelled of wood smoke.

The Cobley family were there, and most of the other Protestants arrived shortly afterwards. The crowd swelled within minutes. By first light, as the torch flames seemed to fade, there were at least a thousand people in the square in front of the cathedral. The men of the watch forced the spectators to keep their distance.

The crowd was noisy, but they fell silent when Osmund Carter appeared from the direction of the Guild Hall, with another watchman, the two men again carrying Philbert between them on a wooden chair. They had to force their way through the crowd, who made way reluctantly, as if they would have liked to obstruct the progress of the chair but did not quite have the courage.

The women of the Cobley family wailed piteously as the helpless man was tied upright to a wooden stake in the ground. He kept slipping down on his useless legs, and Osmund had to bind him tightly to keep him in place.

The watchmen piled firewood around him while Bishop Julius intoned a prayer in Latin.

Osmund picked up one of the torches that had lit their night-time labours. He stood in front of Philbert and looked at Sheriff Matthewson, who held up a hand indicating that Osmund should wait. Matthewson then looked at Julius.

In the pause, Mrs Cobley started screaming, and her family had to hold her.

Julius nodded, Matthewson dropped his arm, and Osmund put the torch to the firewood around Philbert’s legs.

The dry wood caught quickly and the flames crackled with hellish merriment. Philbert cried out feebly at the heat. Wood smoke choked the nearest watchers, who backed away.

Soon there was another smell, one that was at once familiar and sickening, the smell of roasting meat. Philbert began to scream in pain. In between screams he yelled: ‘Take me, Jesus! Take me, Lord! Now, please, now!’ But Jesus did not take him yet.