The Philosophical Strangler by Eric Flint

And me? Well. Ahem. Ahem. Ignace the Great Thespian, at your service!

Actually, it was easy. On the way over to the courthouse, I figured it all out. All I had to do was act like a complete pedant. And hadn’t I—not so long before, either!—spent days and days in the company of Zulkeh of Goimr, physician? Sure and he was probably the greatest sorcerer in the world, but there was no question at all that he was the world’s pedant par excellence.

And so it was we breezed right through the guards into the courtroom.

“Blessed beyond measure are you, unworthy children!” I lectured Jenny and Angela in a loud voice, wagging my finger, as we walked down the corridor. “Thus to have the privilege of observing in person the great Judge Rancor Jeffreys! In full regalia—like unto the jurists of old! Why, did not the great Solon Laebmauntsforscynneweëld himself, in his classic Justice Begins With the Rope, compare Judge Jeffreys to the legendary—though, I admit, ’tis true that Hammurabi Sfondrati-Piccolomini has, in a recent monograph in the Journal of Avant-Garde Torture, advanced the argument that Jeffreys lacks—well! No need to wallow in Hammurabi’s pathetic reasoning. Nay, fie upon such witless notions! The man has absolutely no grasp of the dialectic. And his epistemology! Scandalous, scandalous, there’s no other word for it! Unless, perhaps, the word be disreputable, or infamous, or contemptible, or ignominious, or execrable, or peccant, or oppobrious, or—”

Well, you get the idea.

Before you knew it, we were ushered into the galleries reserved for the aristocracy. Only challenged once, by an officious usher. But he fled before the torrent of my polysyllabic indignation.

Quite interesting, actually, the whole experience. Not, of course, the first time I’d been in the Royal Courtroom with Judge Rancor Jeffreys on the bench. But on all previous occasions I’d been seated down below. In the docks for the accused, to be precise.

And here came Judge Rancor Jeffreys, seating himself at the bench. Just as I remembered him. He was really a difficult man to forget, don’t you know. It wasn’t so much the stony face, the gleaming eyes, the lips like a vise, the nose like a hatchet, the chin like a spade, the jaws like the very crunch of fate. No, it was the way he dressed. Not the gloomy black robes, of course—you expect that on a judge. No, it was the great necklace of finger bones, the earrings made of babes’ skulls, the hangman’s noose for a necktie, the scalps woven into his wig, the tattoo of an Iron Maiden on his forehead, the gavel in the form of a miniature headsman’s axe. A disheartening sight he was, to the defendant in the dock. The cup of blood from which he refreshed himself throughout a trial didn’t help much, either.

Then they brought the Cat out and hauled her into the dock.

I won’t bore you with a recital of the charges. They were long, long, long. And mostly silly, although I liked the one about “interfering with a cleric in his pursuit of the Lord’s work.” And I thought “altering the voice of piety” was a very nice touch.

Best part was when the Cat was allowed to speak. This was usually the point where the accused threw themselves on the mercy of the Court. Never did any good, of course, but pleading innocence was always worse. Infuriated Judge Jeffreys, pleas of innocence did.

But the Cat wasn’t having any of it. A strange, strange woman. But she had a will of iron, and she just didn’t give a damn.

She started off by peering at Jeffreys through her bottle-bottom spectacles, inspecting him like he was a side of wormy meat.

“Boy, do you look like a side of wormy meat,” she said. “Why don’t you wash those scalps once in a while? They’re collecting flies. But it probably wouldn’t do any good—I’m sure you stink like the pits of hell all by yourself.”

She had a great, loud, piercing voice, the Cat, on the rare occasions when she wasn’t speaking softly. That day she wasn’t speaking softly. Oh no, not at all.

Jeffreys started to bellow with rage, but the Cat’s voice cut right through it like a foghorn.