Read Online The Maidenhead by Parris Afton Bonds - Free Book Online
Authors: Parris Afton Bonds
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over a fire after being wrung out. “I beseech the council to allow me to represent Mistress Brown."
"What?" Yeardley asked, his white brows climbing above his wrinkled forehead. “By whose authority?”
"Her own."
"Your credentials?" Radcliff drawled.
So the man still didn’t recognize him. As befitting his position of representative for the London Company, Radcliff sat indolently at the table to the right of the governor.
Yeardley’s cropped gray hair was bristling. “I am in charge here, Lord Radcliff, and I shall do the questioning." He looked at Mad Dog. “Now, sir, you have credentials to offer?"
Mad Dog flexed his fingers, feeling the tendons and muscles in his forearms tense and stretch. “I hold a bachelor of arts at Oxford and was a barrister at Lincoln’s Inn." He paused, then said, “In addition, I served as a member of King's Counsel at the Star Chamber."
The sound of collective breaths sucked between teeth whistled through the hall. The Star Chamber of Westminster Palace was notorious as a secret court. It was not responsible to Common Law, dispensed with juries, could examine witnesses and proceed on mere rumor, and could inflict torture and any penalty short of death.
The startled look of recognition in Radcliff s face was instantly replaced with a smug expression.
So Radcliff remembered now, did he? Their last meeting, thirteen years before, had resulted in Mad Dog’s ruin: with the annihilation of his emotions and the destruction of his mental faculties.
"Proceed then," Yeardley said.
With all eyes upon him, Mad Dog strode toward the female prisoner. Her eyes seemed abnormally large. He removed his straw hat and placed it gingerly upon her naked head, crisscrossed with minor cuts that doubtless had occurred while she resisted being shorn.
Her eyes glistened, then rapidly blinked back any suspicious moisture.
He faced the burgesses. He fell back on those years of studying law and finding ways of evading statutes as easily as if he had never fled the bar. “As Mistress Brown pointed out, no one has come down with the pox in the previous fortnight. Neither have the bachelors who gave over their possessions to Mistress Brown given up their ghosts."
His tone was casual, bantering, exactly right, he felt. "The primary charge against her, as I understand it, is of killing a cow by sucking it dry of its milk the night before the marriage ceremonies were conducted. I call Master James Harwell to testify."
The round little man with pipe stem legs came forward, his flat cap in hand. He glanced nervously at his wife. The raw-boned woman gave a reassuring wink.
“Master Harwell," Mad Dog said, "what did Mistress Brown ask as a fee for her services for you?"
“A milk cow."
“Did you give her a milk cow?"
Harwell twisted his cap in his hands as if it were rosary beads. "Well . . . yes. And no."
"Prithee, would you explain your answer to the court."
"I gave her a cow that will produce milk."
"Will produce?"
"I gave her a heifer."
“Which means?”
"That the cow has not produced a calf yet."
"Which means, does it not, that until a cow produces a calf, the cow can produce no milk?”
“Aye.”
Mad Dog turned back to the burgesses and the council members. "Which means, gentlemen, that a witch cannot suck a cow dry of its milk if it never had milk to begin with."
Murmuring erupted again. Yeardley pounded his mallet for order. "There still remains the charge that Mistress Brown killed the cow. That she has the Evil Eye. That with one eye green and the other brown, 'tis considered a sign of the Devil."
Mad Dog scanned the attentive faces. “Didst anyone witness Mistress Brown actually kill the cow?"
Not a single person stirred. Then Radcliff rose from behind the table. The white ruff around his neck accentuated his falcon-red eyes. "I did."
“You assert that you were in the churchyard the night before the marriage ceremonies were conducted?”
An easy smile curled Radcliff’s
"What?" Yeardley asked, his white brows climbing above his wrinkled forehead. “By whose authority?”
"Her own."
"Your credentials?" Radcliff drawled.
So the man still didn’t recognize him. As befitting his position of representative for the London Company, Radcliff sat indolently at the table to the right of the governor.
Yeardley’s cropped gray hair was bristling. “I am in charge here, Lord Radcliff, and I shall do the questioning." He looked at Mad Dog. “Now, sir, you have credentials to offer?"
Mad Dog flexed his fingers, feeling the tendons and muscles in his forearms tense and stretch. “I hold a bachelor of arts at Oxford and was a barrister at Lincoln’s Inn." He paused, then said, “In addition, I served as a member of King's Counsel at the Star Chamber."
The sound of collective breaths sucked between teeth whistled through the hall. The Star Chamber of Westminster Palace was notorious as a secret court. It was not responsible to Common Law, dispensed with juries, could examine witnesses and proceed on mere rumor, and could inflict torture and any penalty short of death.
The startled look of recognition in Radcliff s face was instantly replaced with a smug expression.
So Radcliff remembered now, did he? Their last meeting, thirteen years before, had resulted in Mad Dog’s ruin: with the annihilation of his emotions and the destruction of his mental faculties.
"Proceed then," Yeardley said.
With all eyes upon him, Mad Dog strode toward the female prisoner. Her eyes seemed abnormally large. He removed his straw hat and placed it gingerly upon her naked head, crisscrossed with minor cuts that doubtless had occurred while she resisted being shorn.
Her eyes glistened, then rapidly blinked back any suspicious moisture.
He faced the burgesses. He fell back on those years of studying law and finding ways of evading statutes as easily as if he had never fled the bar. “As Mistress Brown pointed out, no one has come down with the pox in the previous fortnight. Neither have the bachelors who gave over their possessions to Mistress Brown given up their ghosts."
His tone was casual, bantering, exactly right, he felt. "The primary charge against her, as I understand it, is of killing a cow by sucking it dry of its milk the night before the marriage ceremonies were conducted. I call Master James Harwell to testify."
The round little man with pipe stem legs came forward, his flat cap in hand. He glanced nervously at his wife. The raw-boned woman gave a reassuring wink.
“Master Harwell," Mad Dog said, "what did Mistress Brown ask as a fee for her services for you?"
“A milk cow."
“Did you give her a milk cow?"
Harwell twisted his cap in his hands as if it were rosary beads. "Well . . . yes. And no."
"Prithee, would you explain your answer to the court."
"I gave her a cow that will produce milk."
"Will produce?"
"I gave her a heifer."
“Which means?”
"That the cow has not produced a calf yet."
"Which means, does it not, that until a cow produces a calf, the cow can produce no milk?”
“Aye.”
Mad Dog turned back to the burgesses and the council members. "Which means, gentlemen, that a witch cannot suck a cow dry of its milk if it never had milk to begin with."
Murmuring erupted again. Yeardley pounded his mallet for order. "There still remains the charge that Mistress Brown killed the cow. That she has the Evil Eye. That with one eye green and the other brown, 'tis considered a sign of the Devil."
Mad Dog scanned the attentive faces. “Didst anyone witness Mistress Brown actually kill the cow?"
Not a single person stirred. Then Radcliff rose from behind the table. The white ruff around his neck accentuated his falcon-red eyes. "I did."
“You assert that you were in the churchyard the night before the marriage ceremonies were conducted?”
An easy smile curled Radcliff’s
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