ctim down on a wooden sawhorse. Lying on his
back, he was low enough that the bent man could easily reach any part of
him. One of the executioners in red held the victim's mouth open, and
the little man reached in with one hand, pulled forth the tongue and
sliced it off. Like a jongleur producing an apple from his sleeve, he
waved the severed tongue at the crowd, then threw it. A forest of hands
clutched at it. Common people everywhere, Daoud recalled, believed that
parts of the bodies of condemned men could be used in magic.

It took a moment for Erculio to saw the heretic's nose off. With tongue
and nose gone, the condemned man's screams no longer sounded human. They
were like the bellowings of a steer being clumsily slaughtered.

Daoud realized that he was grateful for the problem that the little man
presented. It gave him something urgent to think about other than what
he was watching.

Erculio now stuck the knife, point down, in the platform and used both
hands to tear the heretic's eyeballs out. The tormented man was silent
now. He must have fainted. The little man danced about him, jabbing him
repeatedly with the knife until the screams started again.

Were the nobles and churchmen enjoying this as much as the common folk,
Daoud wondered. There seemed to be fewer prelates in red and purple on
the church and steps when he looked. Ugolini stood with his hands behind
his back, turning his eyes away from the scene in the piazza. De
Verceuil stared right at the victim, his little mouth open in a grin
showing white teeth. D'Ucello stood stolidly between his guards, his
arms folded. He did not seem to have moved or changed the expression on
his face since Daoud first saw him.

Simon de Gobignon was pale as parchment, and even as Daoud watched, the
young man turned and hurried into the cathedral.

_Weakling! It is because of you, too, that this man suffers, but you
cannot face it._

Erculio, dancing, grimacing comically under his black mustache, feinted
repeatedly with his knife at the condemned man's groin. When the shouts
of the crowd had reached a crescendo, he fell upon his victim and sliced
away testicles and penis with quick strokes. The heretic gave a long,
shivering howl of agony, then was silent. The little man tossed the
bloody organs into the air. An executioner in red caught them and threw
them to the other one, who in turn hurled them into the crowd.

_I hope dozens of them are killed in the scramble