The old courthouse

It was after dinner (lobster ravioli with eel and caviar foam – mmmm!) that I read up on the history of the rather splendid hotel in which I was staying in Utrecht. It seems that it was formerly the city’s court complex – a past that was sure to inspire my creative juices.

I imagined a young woman, freshly sentenced, being led up the stairs that I’d just climbed, and brought into the self-same room. Only in those days, it had been far from the luxurious designer affair in which I was staying: instead, it was bare save for a stout wooden table.

The guard who’d brought her from the courtroom would unlock her handcuffs. The punishment officer would command her to strip and bend over the end of the table, the guard taking up position to hold her firmly by the wrists as the flogging was inflicted – slowly, purposefully, harshly.

And what, pray, of that courtroom downstairs, in which she’d been sentenced? The judge would have paused before condemning her to her fate, and asked her guardian whether he had anything to say in mitigation. But he, the local mayor, would have spoken clearly and solemnly: “I’ve made it very plain that I’m not prepared to tolerate the declining standards of behaviour of our younger residents, your honour. I’ve called publicly for strict measures to be taken, without exception, and I stand by those pronouncements.”