‘Ah!’ roared the Judge. ‘Was ever such unparalleled impudence? Was there ever such brazen effrontery? Guilty, quotha! Have they expressed their repentance for this sin against a most kind and long-suffering monarch! Put down those words on the record, clerk!’
‘They have refused to express repentance, your Lordship!’ replied the counsel for the defence.
‘Oh, the parricides! Oh, the shameless rogues!’ cried the Judge. ‘Put the forty together on this side of the enclosure. Oh, gentlemen, have ye ever seen such a concentration of vice? See how baseness and wickedness can stand with head erect! Oh, hardened monsters! But the other eleven. How can they expect us to believe this transparent falsehood—this palpable device? How can they foist it upon the Court?’
‘My Lord, their defence hath not yet been advanced!’ stammered Master Helstrop.
‘I can sniff a lie before it is uttered,’ roared the Judge, by no means abashed. ‘I can read it as quick as ye can think it. Come, come, the Court’s time is precious. Put forward a defence, or seat yourself, and let judgment be passed.’
‘These men, my Lord,’ said the counsel, who was trembling until the parchment rattled in his hand. ‘These eleven men, my Lord—’
‘Eleven devils, my Lord,’ interrupted Jeffreys.
‘They are innocent peasants, my Lord, who love God and the King, and have in no wise mingled themselves in this recent business. They have been dragged from their homes, my Lord, not because there was suspicion against them, but because they could not satisfy the greed of certain common soldiers who were balked of plunder in—’
‘Oh, shame, shame!’ cried Jeffreys, in a voice of thunder. ‘Oh, threefold shame, Master Helstrop! Are you not content with bolstering up rebels, but you must go out of your way to slander the King’s troops? What is this world coming to? What, in a word, is the defence of these rogues?’
‘An alibi, your Lordship.’