genuflected with portly solemnity.
The sound of running footsteps made him turn.
'Why, Humphrey! What means this haste?'
'I must speak with you, sir.'
'And so you shall but not by bursting in like a runaway bull. This is the Lord's house, Humphrey, and we must accord it all due respect. Hold there, man.'
'I obey you straight.'
And catch your breath, dear fellow.'
Humphrey Budden leaned on one of the pews as he gulped in air. A big, broad man of florid hue, he had run much further than his legs or lungs had desired and he was now bathed in perspiration. Miles Melhuish walked down the aisle towards the glistening parishioner and tried to guess at the crisis which had brought on this uncharacteristic lapse. Budden was a respected figure in the town, a conscientious lacemaker who helped to keep the name of Nottingham at the forefront of his trade. Since his marriage the previous year, he had been the happiest of men, honest, affable, upright, regular in his devotions and often given to charitable impulse. Yet here was this same Humphrey Budden, charging into church, panting like a dog and sweating like a roast pig.
The vicar put a consoling arm around him.
'Fear not, my son. God is with you.'
'I need him mightily, sir.'
'To what end, Humphrey?'
'I can hardly bring myself to tell you.'
'Succour awaits.'
'The sound still fills my ears.'
'What sound?'
'And the sight torments my mind.'
'You are trembling with the shock of it.'
'I came straight here, sir. God is my last resort.'
'How may he help you?'
Humphrey Budden bit his lip in embarrassment then cleared his throat. It had been far easier to carry his message to church than to deliver it. Words rebelled.
Miles Melhuish tried to prompt him gently.
'Are you in trouble, my son?'
'Not me, sir.'
'Your wife?
'Indeed.'
'What ails the good woman?'
'Oh, sir…'
Humphrey Budden began to weep helplessly. The calamity which had brought him so recklessly into the church had deprived him of speech. Easing him down into a pew, the vicar sat beside him and offered up a silent prayer. Budden slowly regained some control.
'Tell me about Eleanor,' said the priest.
'I love her so much!'
'Some accident perchance?'
'Worse, sir.'
'She has fallen sick?'
'Worse still.'
'Dear Lord! Has she passed away?'
'Worse even than that.'
Melhuish coaxed the story out of him. Even in its garbled form it was enough to make the man of the cloth forget both his paunch and his place. Gathering up his belly in both hands, he led the way towards the door at a steady trot with Budden in close pursuit. They ran out into the churchyard then through the gate that opened on to Angel Row. The house was a couple of hundred yards away and the effort of reaching it took them both near exhaustion but they did not pause. Above the sound of their breathing, they heard a noise that froze their blood and put a last spurt into their legs.
It was the scream of a woman. Not the sudden yell of someone in pain nor yet the anguished cry of someone in distress. It was a weird, continuous, high-pitched howl of a wild animal, a noise so intense and unnatural that it did not seem to come from a human throat at all. Budden opened the front door and ushered the priest into a room that already had some occupants. Four terrified children were clustered around the skirts of an old servant, gazing up in horror at the bedchamber above their heads.
Humphrey Budden gave them a comforting squeeze then took his visitor up the stairs. During that short ascent, Miles Melhuish prayed more strenuously than even he had done in a long while. The sound was heart- rending. He had to force himself to follow the stricken husband into the bedchamber. What hideous sight lay within?
When his eyes beheld it, he crossed himself at once.
'Dear God in heaven!'
'Eleanor,' called Budden. 'Peace, good wife.'
But she did not even hear him. The wail continued with unabated fury and her hands clutched at her hair. Melhuish was dumbstruck. There in front of him, kneeling stark naked on the floor, swaying to and fro, staring at a crucifix on the wall, was a buxom woman in her twenties with flaxen hair trailing down her back towards a pair of round, beautiful, shuddering buttocks. It was a scene at once so frightening and erotic that Melhuish had to avert his gaze for a few seconds and call his righteousness to his aid.
Eleanor Budden was in the grip of some ineluctable passion. As her shriek soared to an even higher pitch, it spoke of pain and pleasure, of a torture suffered and a joy attained, of the misery of the damned and the joy of salvation. The mouth from which it came was twisted in a grimace but her face was luminescent with happiness.
'Eleanor,' said her husband. 'Look who is here.'
'She hears you not, Humphrey.'
'Stand forth where she may see you, sir.'
He motioned the priest forward until the latter was standing between the woman and the crucifix. The effect on her was immediate. Her howling stopped, her mouth fell shut, her hands went to her sides and her body no longer shook all over. The deafening cry was replaced by an eerie stillness that was almost as unsettling.
Eleanor Budden looked up at the parish priest with a reverential smile. The fever had broken at last. Both men dared to relax slightly but their relief was premature. A fresh paroxysm seized her. Lunging forward, she grabbed the vicar around the waist and buried her head in the ample folds of his flesh, emitting a sound that began as a low wheeze of excitement then built up quickly until it was a cry of pure elation. Firm hands were clutching his buttocks, soft breasts were pressing against his thighs and urgent lips were burrowing against him. The noise surged on to a climax then spent itself in a sigh that filled the room with carnality and made her whole frame shudder with sheer ecstasy.
She collapsed peacefully to the floor in a coma.
Miles Melhuish was still praying furiously.
Death moved through the streets of London every day and sent loved ones to an early grave but the citizens of London were still not satisfied. Private grief afflicted new families by the hour but there was still enough ghoulish interest left over to send a large crowd to Tyburn for the execution. Distraught people who had sat around doomed beds now found a sense of release as they jostled for position around the gallows. A public death carried an element of celebration. In the crude but legalized murder of some anonymous criminal, they could take a profound satisfaction and dispatch him into the afterlife with sadistic jeers. What was intended as a brutal warning to them became a source of entertainment.
