The Quality of Mercy

“And thy salvation in the Hereafter.”

“And my salvation in the Hereafter.”

“Thou art a wretched sinner, but thou dost make penitence on this day for all thy previous sins.”

“I am a wretched sinner, but I do make penitence on this day for all my previous sins.”

“And pray for the mercy of Christ.”

“And pray for the mercy of Christ.”

“In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti.”

“In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti.”

“Fernando Lopes,” cries the Inquisitor, “for thy free confessions, thou warrant mercy. Thou shalt be relaxed to the secular arm for punishment, but shalt be garroted in a swift manner as a reward for thy free confessions and thy pledge of oath to the True Faith.”

The guards unbound the prisoner’s limbs and lead the limp, burnt man over to an open iron collar attached perpendicularly to a metal post. As the collar is clamped shut around his scrawny neck, Lopes begs for his life, but his whines are cut short at the first turn of the screw.

The collar tightens. Lopes gasps and clutches at the metal band constricting his throat.

The screw is turned again.

Lopes’s pasty face takes on the blue tinge of strangulation.

The screw makes a final revolution, and Lopes’s arms, legs, and bowels relax.

The crowd roars at the sight of the lifeless body.

A few minutes later a warder loosens the screw and removes the collar. Lopes tumbles to the ground, a pile of dead bone and skin. The body is dragged by the hair to a pyre. After securing the corpse to the stake, the sentry notices that the head is dangling precariously from its broken neck. He grabs a handful of Lopes’s hair and ties it around the stake. The head is now sufficiently upright, dead eyes gaping at the galleries. Satisfied, the sentry walks away to join his ranks.

The corpse will be burnt at the conclusion of the ceremony—the grand finale that serves as a caveat for those who contemplate straying from the catechisms of the Church.

Don Henrique turns his attention to the woman next to me. She, like me, is a relapso—a converso found guilty of Judaizing. She admits her guilt freely. She begs for another chance, not for her, but for her unborn child. Her pleas, though acknowledged, merit her no special favors. She makes a final effort to save her baby. Let her be punished by death, but cannot the tribunal wait until after the baby is born?

The answer is no. She is garroted after reaffirming her faith to the cross.

Three more men are placed in the iron collar—two for Judaizing, one for sodomy with his stableboy. Two more women. Another man. Another woman. Deep into the night until Don Henrique eyes the last victim—me.

I am nineteen, with gray eyes that used to shine like newly pressed coins. Once my hair was beautiful. It is now a cap of untamed dusty curls that fall past my waistline. My face is covered with sores, my lips cracked open, oozing blood. My teeth are gone, having been rooted out with tongs as punishment for biting a jailer. My nude gums are uneven nodules of angry red flesh.

A guard gags me. I fight viciously against leather restraints that bind my arms and legs. Two guards are holding me in place, but the sweat on their faces bespeaks the intensity of my struggles.

“Teresa Roderiguez!” the Inquisitor announces. “Filthy wretch of a daughter. Have thee anything to say in behalf of thy defense?”

I nod.

“Remove the morgaza,” orders Don Henrique.

As one of the sentries pulls off the gag, I yell,

“A pox on thee!”

Don Henrique stiffens with rage. I am glad. He shouts, “Wretched, filthy dog! Save thy soul!”

I spit in his direction.

The Inquisitor raises his fist and cries, “Thou shalt burn in Hell continuously lest ye make confessions!”

I say, “I piss on thy confessions!” I spit again.

“Putrid agent of the Devil—”

“I am a Jew! I shall die a Jew!”

“Aye, the witch dost admit her heresy!” Don Henrique says to the audience. He faces me. “Thy ghastly, bull-dunged body shall be a playmate for the Devil lest thou make thy confessions to Christ—”

“I shit on thy Christ! Shma Yisroel, Adonai—”

“Silence! Gag the filth!”

The rag is stuffed back into my mouth.

“Light the dog’s feet!”

A torch is held under my soles. The flames tickled, then burned the callused flesh, causing it to blister and wrinkle like roasted chestnuts. I scream. The agony causes me to buck harder than before.

“Have thee something to say now, Teresa Roderiguez?”

I nod.

“Remove the morgaza,” the Inquisitor says.

A sentry sighs and pulls the rag out of my mouth.

I scream, “Shma Yisroel, Adonai—”

“Replace the morgaza! For thy obstinance, bitch, shalt thou burnest. To the quemadero shalt thou be placed alive, and there shalt thou be raped by the Devil for eternity!”

The guard pulls me to the stake. I fight him, attempt to land blows and kicks with my bound arms and legs.

It is useless.

As I thrash, they strap me onto the pyre and the Inquisitor offers his torch to King John. His Royal Highness rises, straightens his cape, then takes the arm of his Queen. Both monarchs step down from their thrones and, heavily guarded, walk to the pyre where I am jerking and twitching. The torch passes from the Inquisitor to the King, then again from the King to the Queen. With the help of her husband, the Queen grazes the torch against the bottom layer of the pyre and the wood erupts into flames.

As the fire creeps upward, toward my feet, the crowd begins to stir. Smoke soon envelops me, the hot breath of the stake erupting into an open conflagration of skipping plumes. I howl in pain, then cry out a single word—Adonai.

I hear the crackle of flames, the screams and cheers of the crowd, the bleating of goats. I smell my own burnt flesh …