The Forest - Edward Rutherfurd [250]
But now, it seemed to Dame Alice, that she had a small opportunity. Pretending to wake, she stared at the trooper and then called out: ‘Why, My Lord, this is the man who stole my best linen.’
But it did no good. Jeffreys passed rapidly on to other matters until at last he came to Alice: what, he demanded contemptuously, had she to say for herself?
It was simple enough. She told him she’d stayed in London throughout Monmouth’s rebellion. He interrupted this statement twice. She had no quarrel with the king. He treated this with contempt. She had no idea that her visitors were involved in the rebellion. She even produced a witness who swore that Nelthorpe the outlaw had never said his name.
But Judge Jeffreys knew how to deal with that. ‘We have heard enough,’ he cried. ‘Send this witness away.’ He turned savagely back to Alice. ‘Have you more witnesses to call?’
‘No, My Lord.’
‘Very well.’ He turned to the jury. ‘Gentlemen of the jury,’ he began.
‘There is, My Lord, one point of law,’ Alice now interrupted.
‘Silence!’ he cried. ‘Too late.’
There was, quite clearly, no valid case against her. This did not slow Judge Jeffreys in his flow. He reminded the jury that the Lisles were regicides, that dissenters were natural criminals, that Monmouth’s rebellion was horrible and that Monmouth’s morals were unclean. That this was all both nonsense and irrelevant was not, to the judge, important.
Only at the end of his tirade did one of the jurymen ask a question. ‘Pray, My Lord,’ he desired to know, ‘is it a crime to receive Hicks the preacher if he has not yet been convicted, but only accused of treason?’
‘A vital point of law,’ Peter whispered to Betty.
Indeed, it was the only point of law raised in the entire trial. For under English law you could not be accused as an accessory when the person you helped had merely been accused, but not convicted, of treason. Clearly this was only right, since otherwise an accessory might be sentenced for helping a man who was afterwards judged to be innocent. As Hicks was still awaiting trial, he wasn’t yet a traitor. The case against Alice, feeble as it already was, would completely fall to the ground.
The Lord Chief Justice saw the trap. ‘It is all the same,’ he blandly declared. And the court was silent.
‘That’s a lie,’ Peter whispered. ‘That’s not the law.’
‘Say something,’ Betty whispered back.
But the four judges beside Jeffreys, and the lawyers and the clerks, were all silent.
The jury returned in half an hour. They said she was not guilty.
Judge Jeffreys refused to accept their verdict and sent them away again. They came back a second time and said she was not guilty. He sent them off again. A third time they came and said the same.
And now Judge Jeffreys swore an oath. ‘Villains,’ he cried, ‘do you dare to mock this court? Do you not understand I can attaint every one of you for treason too?’
They came back once more after that and found her guilty.
Then Judge Jeffreys sentenced her to burn.
The room was not large, but it was clean and light. The bars on the window were not too noticeable. It was still morning. They could be grateful for these small mercies at least.
Dame Alice was not to be burned. The bishop and clergy of Winchester had appealed at once to the king. They did not want such a thing done in their cathedral city. Quite apart from anything, as news of the outrageous trial spread through the city and across the Forest, they were afraid of a riot. Today, then, in the afternoon, Dame Alice Lisle was to have her head struck off.
There were only Betty and Tryphena with her now. The others had all gone: children and grandchildren, she had said goodbye to them all. The room was quiet.
Peter was in London. Betty had not spoken of him to her mother and, strangely, she had not thought of him so much. Perhaps, if they had known each other longer, she might have