They weren’t very expert, fumbling about, trying to get the noose right. In the end they managed it and pulled it tight. Good, and I hope my bloody head comes off, makes a right mess for you to clean up.
Frankly I could care less so you’d better get on with it and hang me.
***
The coroner’s court wasn’t even a sombre affair. Merely a formality because the law demanded it. There were neither friends nor relatives present because the deceased had neither. Just police and a local press reporter. It might make a paragraph in Friday’s Journal, depending upon how much there was to cover at the parish council meetings.
The coroner cleared his throat. He had an annoying habit of speaking quickly in a soft voice; those within the room leaned forward in an attempt to catch what he said. If it was anything interesting. Today nobody appeared interested. The clock on the wall said five minutes to one. Everybody present had their minds on lunch. Including the coroner himself.
The reporter scribbled indecipherable shorthand, often he could not read it himself when he got back to the office. Today it didn’t matter much, anyway.
‘Malcolm Palmer, late of…’ The reporter missed the address. ‘Had been undergoing psychiatric treatment but refused it a month ago. Devastated by the death of his wife… An accident but he kept the body at home for a week… charged with failing to report a death. He collapsed in court and was referred for the afore-mentioned treatment. He became a recluse; the neighbours had not seen him for weeks. Suffered from depression and delusions…’
A rustle of papers; the clock on the wall said two minutes to one, there wasn’t much time left. The coroner spoke even faster. Nobody was listening. ‘Found hanged from the stair banisters. Verdict: suicide whilst the balance of the mind was disturbed.’
Nobody could have cared less.
Sabat: The Robber’s Grave
(additional story)
1821
The small courtroom at Welshpool was crowded, mostly with sensation seekers anticipating a death sentence. Judge Winderholme’s lined features wore an expression that could only be termed as boredom. This trial had lasted for most of the day when he could have pronounced a guilty verdict hours ago. Yet he was compelled to listen to the witnesses’ somewhat garbled evidence against the accused. He stifled a yawn. Just another ten minutes would bring it to a conclusion. His fingers toyed with the black cap on his knee.
In the dock, head bowed, stood John Davies, a plasterer and slaterer, a resident of Montgomery. He was accused of assaulting William Jones, a labourer, and robbing him of a watch worth all of fifty shillings. Both witnesses, Walter Hughes and William Lewis had not actually been present at the assault but had heard Jones’s cries for help and upon going to his aid had glimpsed Davies in the distance. They had also come upon the missing watch lying on a path, the one upon which Davies had departed the scene.
Davies denied assault and theft which was only to be expected. Jones had identified the watch as being the one stolen from him. The judge stifled another yawn; it was a clear cut case in his view, otherwise this trial might well go on for several more hours.
‘I am innocent,’ Davies’s voice trembled. ‘I never touched William Jones nor stole his watch. It is a frame up because of a previous disagreement I had with these liars!’
‘Silence!’ The judge unravelled the square of black cloth and draped it over his balding head. ‘John Davies, this court finds you guilty of assault and theft. Hence, I sentence you to be hanged by the neck until you are dead and may the Lord have mercy upon your soul.’
A small crowd had gathered in Montgomery for the public execution, an exciting event in this sleepy Welsh town. Davies stood upon the gallows and the hangman draped the loop of rope around the doomed man’s neck. Dark clouds gathered in the sky overhead and a bolt of lightning lit up the grim scene below. Thunder crashed and a heavy downpour began.
Suddenly John Davies straightened up, addressed the spectators in defiant tones.
‘I go to my grave an innocent man, wrongly executed for a crime which I did not commit. Let this wrongful act lie upon all your consciences and may God prevent grass from growing upon my grave as a sign of my innocence.’
Another crash of thunder drowned the excited chattering of the crowd as the body of John Davies dropped and swung.
His grave was situated on the far side of the parish cemetery well clear of the rows of tombstones. It was marked by a basic wooden crucifix simply carved “The Robber’s Grave.” As the years passed, there was no sign of growth upon the ground above his burial site. It was muttered with no small amount of awe by local inhabitants that this in itself was proof that an innocent man had paid the supreme penalty upon the lying by so-called witnesses to a crime which had never taken place.
2018
Mark Sabat was tall and very agile for one in his mid to late sixties, his hair and moustache still black apart from a few wisps of grey. His long career as a private detective who investigated cases which had an occult implication was drawing to a close. Retirement beckoned, much to the disappointment of his few police associates who had held him in esteem for many years. There were others who doubted his unique findings and were glad that he would no longer be called upon to investigate crimes which had inexplicable backgrounds.
Throughout the years he had been fighting against the soul of his evil brother, Quentin, who
