The Poisoned Pilgrim: A Hangman's Daughter Tale (22 page)

J
AKOB KUISL SAT
in the last row of the choir stall with his hood pulled far down over his face, observing the other monks.

The hangman whispered a soft curse not in keeping with his sacred surroundings. In the early hours of the morning, Magdalena had persuaded him to attend morning mass and keep his eyes open. That damned woman had inherited his own stubbornness. After a long discussion, Kuisl eventually grumbled his assent in playing this foolish masquerade one more day. Inwardly he had to admit that his curiosity was awakened, and in any case, his best friend’s life was at stake.

Attentively, the hangman looked around the church, which was filled to the last seat. Children wailed, a number of people were coughing and sniffling, and somewhere he heard a door slam shut. The mass should have started more than a quarter of an hour ago, and the many hundreds of pilgrims in the congregation were murmuring restlessly.

The monks in the choir stalls, also visibly irritated, whispered among themselves, and the hangman gathered from the bits of conversation that they were all waiting for the abbot and
the prior, who was to lead the service today. When Kuisl looked down he noticed that the count’s seat was empty, as well. His wife was struggling to control their noisy children and kept looking to the church portal, as if expecting to see her husband enter at any moment.

The hangman leaned back in the hard seat and tried to attract as little attention as possible—an attempt that was bound to fail, if only because of his huge size. Half an hour ago, when he entered the upper balcony, he caused some commotion among the monks until Brother Eckhart, annoyed, finally informed his colleagues that the large stranger was an itinerant Minorite whom the abbot had in fact permitted to stay at the monastery.

By now the excitement over his presence had subsided, and fewer people were staring at him, allowing the hangman to eavesdrop on their conversations.

“This is the first time both the abbot and the prior have overslept the morning mass,” a scrawny monk to Kuisl’s right was saying, while his neighbor in the next pew, an elderly man with a bald head, nodded in agreement.

“Let’s just hope it’s nothing more serious,” the bald one whispered. “Did you see how pale and breathless Brother Maurus was yesterday evening at dinner? If you ask me, it’s this fever going around. God forbid that we have to elect a new abbot soon.”

“Well, then the prior would finally get the position he’s been seeking for so long.” The scrawny monk giggled softly. “If he hasn’t caught the fever himself. After all, he’s not here either.”

“Shh, quiet. Look, they’re just coming out of the relics room.” The bald man pointed at a low door to the right of the choir stalls, from which the abbot and the prior were just emerging. Kuisl could sense at once that something was wrong. Both Maurus Rambeck and Brother Jeremias looked as if they’d just seen the devil himself. They were pale, and beads of sweat stood out on their foreheads. Rambeck’s lips were trembling as he bent
down to speak to the old librarian in the first row of the stalls, whispering a few words in the old man’s ear, whereupon the latter cringed and also turned white. In the meantime, the prior had turned to Brother Eckhart and the young novitiate master, who raised his hand to his mouth in horror.

The hangman frowned. What the devil was going on here?

At that moment, Count Wartenberg entered the church, letting the heavy wings of the portal close behind him with a thud. He appeared greatly angered and was trembling all over as he walked with quick, energetic strides to his pew and dropped into his upholstered seat. When his wife bent over to him anxiously, he rudely brushed her aside and stared straight ahead in silence. Even far up in the stalls Kuisl could see how the count’s eyes were flashing with anger.

What in the world has happened?
the hangman wondered.
Has someone else been murdered?

Just as Kuisl was about to turn again to eavesdrop on the two monks to his right, he noticed that the abbot and the prior, along with the cellarer Eckhart and the old librarian, had headed back to the low door at the other end of the balcony and disappeared in the direction of the holy chapel. The novitiate master hurried down a stairway into the nave and began reciting the mass in a loud, trembling voice.

“In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti, Amen…”

The pilgrims rose, and the organ behind the stalls began to play. Fervently, the many hundreds of pilgrims joined in singing the Laudate Deo along with the simple monks, who looked around at one another in surprise. Evidently they didn’t know what was going on either.

For a brief moment, the hangman remained seated, then decided it was time to act. Coughing and blowing his nose loudly, he rose, feigning sickness. He held his hand in front of his mouth
as he pushed his way through the crowds of monks. By now every one of them feared catching the fever from his Brothers, so when the Minorite visitor appeared to be suffering from this damned illness as well, everyone was glad to step aside to make room for him.

Kuisl reached the end of the choir stalls just as the fat cellarer stepped into the inner sanctum and closed the little door behind him. The hangman hurried over, paused a moment, and just as the monks in the choir stalls knelt and lowered their heads to pray, pushed down the door handle and silently followed the four clergymen inside.

The voices of the singing pilgrims sounded distant and muffled as the door closed behind him. A little stairway with ancient, heavily worn stone steps led upward, lit only by a torch on the wall. Above him, the excited voices of the Benedictines echoed through the stairwell as if the monks were standing in a vault nearby.

Carefully Kuisl slunk up the few steps. On the walls hung numerous framed pictures depicting the miracles experienced by individual pilgrims. The hangman ignored these, concentrating instead on the voices that seemed to be approaching.

Suddenly he came to a small antechamber. On the far side of the chamber was a heavy iron door reinforced with nails and metal struts. Three colorful coats of arms hung on the portal at eye level, and on the wall next to a chest were three iron bars evidently serving as bolts. On the sides of the door, Kuisl could see the corresponding locks.

The hangman tiptoed the last few yards through the little antechamber, relieved to see that the iron door was ajar. Through a small crack he could look into the room beyond, dimly lit by two tiny barred windows. He held his breath.

The holy chapel, the inner sanctum.

It was shaped in the form of a cube and made of stone, with little niches and shelves on each side. All kinds of objects were
stored here—chalices, crosses, and little boxes, some so rusted and covered with verdigris that they seemed to have rested here since ancient times. Straight ahead, the four clerics assembled around a small altar covered with a red velvet cloth.

It took Kuisl a moment to see what was disturbing about this sight: the altar was bare.

The monks standing there seemed to be involved in a violent dispute. They raised their hands, tore at their hair, and kept crossing themselves as if trying to ward off evil. Pater Eckhart, the cellarer, was speaking at the moment.

“But that… that’s not possible,” he ranted. “It’s simply impossible that any mortal being could have stolen the monstrance with the hosts from this room.”

“But nevertheless, it happened, you jackass,” the prior replied. “So let’s stop and think
how
that could have happened before anyone outside learns about it. This could cost all of us our heads.”

“If I were you, I’d be afraid of losing my head, too,” the old librarian murmured. “After all, you had one of the three keys needed to open the room, didn’t you?”

The prior’s face turned crimson. For a moment he seemed ready to grab the old man by the throat, but then he simply jabbed him in the chest with his forefinger. “Are you trying to say that
I
have something to do with the disappearance of the hosts? Don’t forget, you need three keys to open the room. The other two keys are held by Brother Maurus and the count. Do you seriously believe that we conspired to steal the hosts? Is that what you think?”

“Stop this, Brothers,” said the abbot wearily. He looked as if he’d resigned himself to his fate and was awaiting the eternal fires of damnation. “We won’t get anywhere if we just stand here condemning one another,” he continued in a soft voice. “What we need to think about is what to do if the hosts haven’t reappeared in time for the festival.”

The prior shook his head, as if he still couldn’t fathom the situation. “Just how is this possible?” he wailed. “When we opened the relics room with the count last night, everything was in its proper place. And then only a few hours later, the hosts had disappeared. From a room with barred windows locked by three sliding bars with three different keys. By God, I swear that I haven’t let my own key out of my sight for a moment.” He reached for a chain around his neck with a single key dangling on it. “I wear it even when I’m sleeping.”

Now the abbot took his key out from under his robe, as well. “The same is true for me,” he said, wearily. “To tell the truth, I have no idea where the count keeps his key, but last night and this morning he was wearing it on his belt.”

“Why did you two enter the room again with the count this morning?” the librarian asked. “The room was supposed to be kept locked until the festival.”

Prior Jeremias sighed. “Because the count asked us to. He said he had to pray again in the inner sanctum before mass. Do you want to deny the request of a Wittelsbach? You know yourself that we’re at the complete mercy of the elector.”

“You shouldn’t have let him into the room last night,” the librarian scolded. “That just put stupid ideas into his head. Why in heaven’s name is the count here so early? He normally doesn’t show up until the festival.”

“That’s strange indeed,” the prior agreed. “On the other hand, it was actually Maurus’s idea to visit the relics room one more time yesterday. Why was that, Maurus?”

“Damn it! Because I had a vague suspicion that something was wrong,” the abbot replied in a trembling voice. “And as you can see, my suspicion was correct. But why are you asking me all these questions?
You,
Jeremias, must be happy the hosts have vanished. If word of this gets around, I’ll lose my post as abbot, and I know you have been just waiting to follow in my footsteps.”

“Slander!” Prior Jeremias shouted. “Nothing but slander. We should have called the judge in Weilheim long ago. Everything is out of hand here. Can’t you see you’ve lost control of everything that’s going on?”

“How dare you—” the abbot started to say, but at that moment Kuisl leaned forward, snagging the shoulder of his robe on one of the votive pictures, which brought the heavy frame crashing to the ground. He bit his lip to keep from cursing out loud, but the damage was done.

“Quiet,” the librarian whispered. “There’s someone out there.”

“That’s the golem,” wailed Brother Eckhart. “Oh, God! He’s coming to get us. This is the end for us. Holy Mary, pray for us now and in the hour—”

“Silence, you idiot,” the prior interrupted. “Let’s just see what’s going on out there.”

As silent as a shadow, Kuisl slipped away from the wall and dashed down the stairway as the sound of footsteps could be heard behind him. In just a few moments, he made it out the door and took his place again among the monks who were now listening to the homily of the nervous novitiate master.

Kuisl knelt down, folded his hands, and silently moved his lips as if in prayer. But thoughts were already churning around in his head as he struggled to piece together everything he’d learned in the last quarter hour. Events fluttered through his mind like pages ripped from a book and seemed to escape each time he thought he had found two pieces that fit together.

Kuisl gnawed on his lips and ground his teeth like huge millstones. For the first time, the hangman sincerely regretted that monks weren’t allowed to smoke during mass.

“There are three sliding bars,” Simon said excitedly as he prepared a brew of willow bark in the rear of the foul-smelling hospital ward. “Three bars that can be unlocked only by three
different people using three different keys. In this chronicle from the monastery library, everything is described exactly. The holy chapel is probably the safest chamber of holy relics in all of Bavaria.”

Lost in thought, the medicus stirred the boiling brown potion while Magdalena spread a salve of fragrant resin onto clothes she would later bind around patients’ chests. For a good hour, Simon and Magdalena had been looking after the numerous sick pilgrims. Every last bed in the ward was now taken, yet patients continued to arrive.

With a sigh, the hangman’s daughter brushed a lock away from her forehead and stretched her aching back. The mute assistant Matthias had been kind enough to take care of her children for a while and had gestured to Magdalena that he was taking the two youngsters to the beekeeper’s to fetch some honey. She hoped he would be more reliable this time than the night before. No doubt the two little monsters were covered with honey from head to toe by now.

“The holy chapel contains a few hundred relics now,” Simon continued excitedly, as he poured the brew from the bark through a sieve. He had been up studying the Andechs chronicle half the night. He was pale and had rings under his eyes, but as so often, the study of old books had worked him into a highly excited state. “Among the sacred objects are Charlemagne’s cross of victory and the wedding dress of Saint Elizabeth,” he recounted excitedly. “But the most valuable things are still the three sacred hosts. They were here when all that stood on the mountain was a castle, and that was many hundreds of years ago. When the castle was destroyed, the hosts were hidden away with other relics and appeared again only much later, as if by a miracle. Ever since then, they have been kept in that room, well preserved in a silver monstrance eighteen pounds in weight, which is probably worth as much as a wing of the monastery.”