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You are reading from:
ATTACK ON THE TOWER OF LONDON
(BOOK 19)
by Roy MacGregor
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Travis Lindsay had no sense of passing out.
Had it been presented to him as an option - "Look, kid, you can either
keep staring at this grisly sight or you can be unconscious" - he would
have happily volunteered to black out and crash to the floor in front of
the rest of the Screech Owls.
But he'd had no choice whatsoever in the matter.
One moment Travis was staring at the naked, bloodied body swinging from
the rope, its desperately clawing hands tied behind its back, and the
next moment he was sinking into oblivion, darkness drawing over him like
a welcome comforter.
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He could take no more of the Chamber of Horrors.
Travis was not aware of Muck and Mr. Dillinger grabbing him and carting
him off to the first-aid room. He did not see his so-called best
friend, Nish, snickering so hard it seemed his big tomato of a face was
going to explode. He did not know that Sarah Cuthbertson, too, had
staggered, and would have gone down had Sam and Fahd not grabbed her.
And he certainly did not hear the tall woman in the uniform say, "It
happens all the time," her red lipstick splash of a smile seeming
horribly out of place in a room where a beaten and naked man was
swinging from a rope, where bloodied heads were on display beside the
terrible contraption that had lopped them off, and where, to the sounds
of agonizing screams and creaking machinery, a heavy wheel was crushing
the very life out of a nearly naked young man with long flowing hair.
Travis had felt fine as the tour guide for Madame Tussaud's waxworks
museum took the team through the rooms filled with look-alike figures
of movie and rock stars - he'd borrowed Data's digital camera to take a
shot of Nish with Nish's great hero, Elvis Presley - and he'd been fine
as Muck lingered over all those boring figures from history like
Napoleon and Horatio Nelson and more kings and queens than you'd find in
a pocketful of British change.
And he had even been okay, if barely, when they first entered the
Chamber of Horrors and heard the spine-tingling, gut-wrenching sound
effects rising from the corner where the young man was being tortured on
the wheel.
He'd survived a look at Vlad the Impaler, the first figure on display as
the Screech Owls had crowded into the eerily lit room. He'd listened
patiently as the tour guide calmly explained how old Vlad used to get
his kicks out of tossing women and children onto sharpened stakes and
laughing as they slowly died. He'd looked, not once, but twice, at the
longhaired, moustachioed ruler as he stood by a bloodied stake holding
up a severed head like it was some trophy bass he'd just caught.
He'd survived a peek at Joan of Arc, the pretty teenager burning at the
stake, and all the various kindly-looking British murderers who used to
do nasty things, such as drown their wives in acid baths or brick them
into their kitchen walls.
He had even coped with the realistic sight of Madame Tussaud herself as
she stood in a Paris graveyard, a lantern raised in one hand as she
searched for the severed head of Marie Antoinette so she could capture
the French queen's surprised look just as the guillotine fell.
But Guy Fawkes he could not handle.
In all his life, in all his many nightmares, Travis had never seen a
sight so horrific. The body of Fawkes hung from a rope - his naked skin
slashed by knives and whips, his hands tied behind his back - as his
dark-bearded executioner regarded him with stern delight.
The sight had been bad enough, but the tour guide's description of
Fawkes - spoken in a lovely English accent that might as well have been
talking about floral arrangements - had been the final straw.
"You come from Canada, where you celebrate something called Hallowe'en,
I believe . . ."
"Just had it!" shouted Fahd.
"Yes, well, in this country we have Guy Fawkes Day, which will happen
later this week. It's sort of like your Hallowe'en. There will be
bonfires all over Britain on the night of November 5, all in memory of
this gentleman you see here swinging from the rope . . ."
"No way!" said Derek.
"Guy Fawkes was hanged in the year 1606 - that's about four hundred
years ago - after he and several other men were caught plotting to blow
up the Houses of Parliament. He was, many say, the world's first
terrorist. And to set an example to anyone else who might be thinking of
committing such an act, he was given the most awful punishment
imaginable. The hanging you see here was the gentle part of it . . ."
"Sick!" said Sam.
"Very sick," the guide said, her lipstick smiling. "Guy Fawkes was
sentenced by the British courts to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. He
would be hanged until almost dead - this is what we have on display here
at Madame Tussaud's - and then, while he was still barely alive, they
would take a sword and disembowel him, burning his entrails before his
face as he was forced to watch.
"The last sensation he would ever feel would be the executioner's
broadaxe coming down upon his neck."
"I'M GONNA HURL!" Nish shouted out, laughing like a maniac.
The tour guide held up a long finger, with a perfectly manicured nail at
its tip.
"That would not be the end of it," she said, still smiling primly. "Even
after his head was cut off, the punishment would continue. His body
would be quartered by tying the arms and legs to four workhorses and
driving them in four differ-ent directions until it split into pieces -
that's what they mean by Śhanged, drawn, and quartered' - and the
quarters would be dragged through the streets of London and displayed on
stakes in prominent places, most often London Bridge. The dignified
public of London would stroll across the bridge to see the heads of the
latest criminals that had been executed. Often they would be left there
until the birds had picked the skulls clean."
"Gruesome," said Simon.
"Sweet," said Nish.
"Sickening," said Sam.
"Awesome," said Nish.
"I want outta here," said Lars.
"I wanna be here!" said Nish. "My very own display - ŚWayne Nishikawa -
the World's Most Twisted and Evil Hockey Player'!"
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