The Hangman's Daughter (14 page)

His father placed a cold, stiff hand on his shoulder. Simon recoiled.

“Martha Stechlin isn’t a witch,” he whispered.

“Even so,” said his father, “Lechner wants her to be one, and it’s better for the town as well. Besides…”

Bonifaz Fronwieser grinned, giving his son a fatherly pat on the shoulder.

“Between the hangman, the midwife, and ourselves there are too many here in town who want to make a livelihood from curing the sick. Once the Stechlin woman is gone, there’s more work for us to do. Then we’ll be able to get by. You can help with the births; I’ll leave that all to you.”

Simon jumped to his feet. The beaker fell from the table into the glowing embers on the hearth; the coffee sizzled as it hit the cinders.

“That’s all you ever think about—your livelihood!” he shouted. Then he hastened to the door. His father rose on the bench.

“Simon, I…”

“Have you all lost your senses, or what? Don’t you realize there’s a murderer at large? You’re only thinking about your bellies, and out there someone’s killing children!”

Simon slammed the door and rushed out into the street. The neighbors, startled by his shouts, peeked out of their windows.

Simon looked up angrily.

“Why don’t you mind your own business!” he shouted. “You’ll see! Once the Stechlin woman has been burned, the fun will start for real. And then one more will burn, and one more, and one more! And finally, it’ll be your turn!”

He stomped off to the tanners’ quarter, shaking his head. His neighbors watched as he left. Yes, it was true. Since Fronwieser’s son had taken up with the hangman’s daughter, he wasn’t his old self anymore. She must have bewitched him, or at least turned his head, which amounted to the same thing, anyway. Perhaps more people had to burn in Schongau after all before order could finally be restored.

The neighbors closed their shutters and returned to their breakfast porridge.

With quick strides, Jakob Kuisl took the narrow path from his house down to the river. After a few minutes’ walk upstream on the towpath, he reached the Lech Bridge.

Clouds of smoke were still rising from the ruins of the Stadel and there were occasional glowing embers. Sebastian, the second bridge sentry, was sitting on a bridge pile, leaning on his halberd. When he saw the hangman he saluted him with a tired nod. The short, squat sentry always carried a jug under his overcoat on cold days. This morning, Sebastian needed his drink more than ever. Since his comrade had been imprisoned, he had to do two men’s sentry duty. It would be another hour until he was relieved, and he had been at his post the entire night. Also, he could swear that the devil himself had flitted right past him in the dead of night, a black stooped shadow, with a limp.

“And he waved at me; I saw it clearly,” Sebastian whispered to the hangman, kissing the small silver crucifix he carried around his neck on a leather thong. “Have mercy on us, Holy Mary! Since the Stechlin woman has been practicing her foul sorcery here, the spirits of hell are walking about in town, I’m telling you.”

Jakob Kuisl listened attentively. Then he took leave of the sentry and passed over the bridge, heading for Peiting.

The muddy country road meandered through the forest. Frequently he had to walk around puddles and potholes that seemed particularly deep after the severe winter. In some places the road was practically impassible. When he had walked half a mile he came upon an oxcart that was stuck in the muck. The peasant from Peiting who owned it was laboring to push it from behind but couldn’t dislodge the stuck wheel. Without even waiting to be asked, Kuisl braced his massive body against the vehicle and with one push the cart was free.

Instead of thanking him, the peasant murmured a prayer, careful not to look into the hangman’s eyes. Then he hurried around to the front of the cart, jumped into the driver’s seat, and swung his whip. With a curse, Kuisl hurled a stone after him.

“Off with you, Peiting idiot!” he shouted. “Or else I’ll hang you by your whip!”

It was nothing new to the hangman that many people avoided contact with him. But he still was hurt by it. He hadn’t expected gratitude but at least a ride on the cart. As it was, he would have to plod along the muddy path. The oaks that lined it offered little shade. Again and again his thoughts returned to Martha Stechlin, who was brought closer to torturing and the stake with every peal of the bell.

It’ll have to start this afternoon,
he thought.
But I might be able to stall a bit…

When a deer path opened to his left, he bent down and slipped beneath the branches into the forest. The trees surrounded him with a silence that once again comforted him. It was as though the good Lord was holding a protective hand over the world. Morning sunlight was breaking through the foliage, throwing specks of light on the soft moss. Late snow was still on the ground in some places. A cuckoo was calling from afar, and the buzzing of gnats, bees, and beetles hung in the air. As Kuisl was walking through the forest with determined steps, he kept getting entangled in cobwebs, which clung to his face like a mask. The moss muffled the sound of his steps. It was here in the forest that he truly felt at home. Whenever possible, he came here to gather herbs, roots, and mushrooms. It was said that nobody in Schongau knew as much about the plant kingdom as the hangman.

The cracking sound of a breaking branch caused him to stop short. It came from the right, from the direction of the road. Now another breaking sound could be heard. Somebody was approaching him, and this somebody was trying to sneak up on him. He wasn’t doing it particularly skillfully.

Jakob Kuisl looked around and noticed a fir branch that reached down almost to his head. He pulled himself up on it until he disappeared among the branches. A few minutes later, the steps had come closer. He waited until the sound was directly underneath him, then he dropped.

Magdalena heard him at the last moment. She leapt forward and turned around to see how her father landed hard on the ground right behind her. Just before the impact Jakob Kuisl had realized who was underneath him and rolled to the side. Now he rose to his feet, angrily brushing snow and fir needles from his doublet.

“Are you crazy?” he hissed. “Why are you are you running through the forest like a highwayman? Shouldn’t you be home with Mother, helping her grind herbs? Stubborn woman!”

Magdalena swallowed hard. Her father was known for his sudden outbreaks of rage. Nevertheless, she looked him straight in the eye as she answered.

“Mother told me you were here on account of the Stechlin woman. And so I thought I might be able to help you.”

Jakob Kuisl laughed out loud.

“Help me? You? Help your mother; there’s enough work to do there. And now shove off, before you’re in for a spanking.”

Magdalena crossed her arms.

“You can’t just send me away like a little girl. At least tell me what you’re intending to do. After all, Martha brought me into the world. As long as I can remember, I have carried herbs and ointments to her place every week. And now I shouldn’t be concerned about her fate at all?”

The hangman sighed. “Magdalena, believe me, it’s better like this. The less you know, the less you can gossip. It’s enough that you have a fling with the young physician. People are already talking.”

Magdalena smiled her innocent little girl’s smile, with which she had always been able to wangle candy from her father.

“You like Simon too, don’t you?”

“Stop that,” he grunted. “Who cares if I like him. He’s the physician’s son, and you’re the hangman’s daughter. So stay away from him. And now off you go to help your mother.”

But Magdalena wasn’t ready to give up yet. As she was searching for words, her eyes roamed the forest. Behind a hazel-nut bush she suddenly noticed something bright and white.

What if that was…?

She hurried over and dug up a white star-shaped flower that she handed her father with dirt-stained hands.

“It’s a hellebore,” he said, raising the flower to his nose and sniffing it. “It’s been a long time since I saw one hereabouts. You know they say witches make an ointment from it that helps them fly on Walpurgis Night.”

Magdalena nodded. “Goodwife Daubenberger from Peiting told me about it. And she believes that the murders of the children are somehow connected with Walpurgis Night.”

Her father looked at her incredulously. “With Walpurgis Night?”

Magdalena nodded. “She thinks it can’t be a coincidence. In three days it’ll be the witches’ sabbath, and then they’ll fly and dance along the Hohenfurch Road, and—”

Jakob Kuisl interrupted her brusquely. “And you believe this rubbish? Go home and do the washing. I don’t need you here.”

Magdalena looked at him angrily. “But you just told me that there are witches and flying ointment!” she shouted, kicking against a fallen tree trunk. “Now what’s the truth?”

“I said that’s what people
say.
That’s something different,” Kuisl said. He sighed, and then he gave his daughter an earnest look. “I believe that there are evil people,” he continued. “And I don’t care if they are witches or priests. And, yes, I believe there are potions and salves that make you
believe
you’re a witch. That make you wicked and like a cat in heat and, for all I care, that make you fly.”

Magdalena nodded. “Goodwife Daubenberger knows the ingredients of this flying salve.” In a hushed voice, she listed them. “Hellebore, mandrake, thorn apple, henbane, hemlock, belladonna…The old woman showed me a number of herbs in the forest. We even found a baneberry plant once.”

Jakob Kuisl looked at her incredulously.

“A baneberry plant? Are you sure? I haven’t seen one in my entire life.”

“By the Holy Virgin, it’s true! Believe me, Father, I know all the herbs around here. You’ve taught me a lot, and Goodwife Daubenberger showed me the rest.”

Jakob Kuisl eyed her skeptically. Then he asked her the names of several herbs. She knew them all. When she had answered all of his questions satisfactorily, he asked for a certain plant and whether she knew where it could be found. Magdalena thought briefly, and then she nodded.

“Take me there,” said the hangman. “If it’s true I’ll tell you what I’m planning.”

After a good half hour’s walk they had reached their destination: a shady clearing in the forest, surrounded by rushes. Before them lay a dried-up pond dotted with grassy islets. Behind that was a swampy meadow in which something purple was somewhat visible. There was the scent of a bog and peat in the air. Jakob Kuisl closed his eyes and breathed in the aroma of the forest. Among the resinous pine needles and the damp smell of moss he could distinguish the gentle fragrance of something else.

She was right.

Simon Fronwieser’s anger had cooled a little. After the quarrel with his father he had hurried to the market square with a red face and eaten a small breakfast of dried apple rings and a piece of bread at one of the many stalls there. As he was chewing on the tough, sweet rings his anger subsided. There simply was no point in getting angry with his father. They were far too different. It was much more important to keep a cool head. Time was pressing. Simon frowned.

The patrician Jakob Schreevogl had told him that the Elector’s secretary would arrive in Schongau in a few days’ time to pronounce his sentence. Before then a culprit had to be found, as the aldermen had neither the inclination nor the means to feed the prince’s representative and his entourage longer than necessary. Furthermore, court clerk Lechner needed peace and quiet in his town. Unless order was restored by the time His Excellency Wolf Dietrich von Sandizell appeared, the clerk’s authority in Schongau would be seriously jeopardized. Therefore, they had three days left, perhaps four at the most. It would take the entourage of soldiers and servants that long to make their way to Schongau from the distant country residence at Thierhaupten. Once the secretary was in town, neither Simon nor the hangman nor the Almighty could save Martha Stechlin from the flames.

Simon stuffed the last apple ring into his mouth and crossed the crowded market square. Time and again he had to step out of the way of maids and farmers’ wives at the farmstands quarreling over meat, eggs, and carrots. One or the other gave him a longing glance. Without paying any attention to it, he turned into the Hennengasse, where Sophie’s foster parents lived.

The red-haired girl had been continually on his mind. He was certain she knew more than she let on. Somehow she was the key to the mystery, even if he wasn’t sure what exactly her role in it was. Yet as he reached the small house wedged in between two larger half-timbered houses in need of a fresh coat of paint, a bitter disappointment awaited him. Sophie hadn’t come home for two days. Her foster parents had no idea where she was.

“That brat will do whatever she likes,” grumbled Andreas Dangler, the linen weaver, who had taken care of the child since her parents’ death. “When she’s here she eats us out of house and home, and when she’s supposed to be working she’ll just hang around in town. I just wish I’d never agreed to the whole business.”

Simon wanted to remind him that the town paid him a handsome compensation for taking care of Sophie, but he contented himself with a nod.

Andreas Dangler continued to fume: “I wouldn’t be surprised if she was hand in glove with that witch,” he said, spitting on the ground. “Her mother, the wife of Hans Hörmann, the tanner, was just the same. She cast a spell on her husband, driving him to an early grave, and then she died of consumption herself. The girl was always stubborn, thought herself to be something superior to everyone else and wouldn’t sit at a table with us weavers. Now she has what she deserves!”

He was leaning against the door frame, chewing on a chip of pinewood. “If I had my way, there’d be no need for her ever to return here. She has probably run off before the same thing happened to her as did to the Stechlin woman.”

As the linen weaver continued his complaints, Simon sat down on a dung cart next to the house and took a deep breath. He had the feeling he wasn’t going anywhere like this. He’d have loved to smack the nagging Dangler right in the face. Instead, he only interrupted his grumbling. “Did you notice anything about Sophie lately? Has she been acting differently?”