The Poisoned Pilgrim: A Hangman's Daughter Tale (28 page)

“I still don’t know what to think of it,” he said softly. “But if you’re really afraid, let’s go back home to Schongau—today. You’ll be safe there.”

“And leave my father here by himself?” Magdalena shook her head. “That’s out of the question. He’s getting older and needs us more than he’ll admit even to himself. Besides, didn’t you yourself say that you have to finish that damned report for the abbot if we’re not to look guilty ourselves? Let’s stay here for the time being.” She ripped off an ear of barley and pulled it apart. “It would really be a big help to me if the lord and master would spend a little more time caring for his children. Tell the boys a bedtime story now and then and don’t spend all your time poking your nose in books and other people’s affairs.”

Angrily, Simon kicked a big rock at the side of the field. “You make it sound as if I enjoy doing it,” he scolded. “But I’m only helping your father.”

“If it only happened here in Andechs,” she replied, staring straight ahead toward some swallows flying low over the fields, “but it’s the same in Schongau. Day in and day out, you care for the sick and forget the healthy. Weeks can go by, and the boys hardly remember what you look like. Sometimes I think you’re not really there for us.”

“That’s my job, Magdalena,” Simon snapped back. “Don’t forget you married a bathhouse doctor, not a farmer who can spend all winter long in the house telling stories to his children.
People are always getting sick, day and night, at every time of year.” He looked at her defiantly, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “If you want, you can take off with that mute Matthias. The children seem to like him more than me, in any case. And without a tongue, he can’t gripe, either.”

“My God, how can anyone be so mean?” Magdalena turned away in disgust. “This man suffered more as a child in the war than you can even imagine. And he may be mute, but that certainly doesn’t mean he’s stupid. Just look at my father… He talks only when he has something to say, not like your wise-ass scholars who talk just to keep their mouths flapping.”

“I told you a hundred times not to compare me with your stubborn father. I’m a doctor and not a hangman.”

“And I’m a hangman’s daughter.” Magdalena stared off angrily into the distance where the children were looking at an empty bird’s nest. From here, they looked even smaller and more vulnerable than usual. “And my boys are the grandsons of a dishonorable hangman,” she whispered. “Something like that sticks to you like pitch—you never shake it off. Never.”

At that moment an indistinct figure appeared at the other end of the field of barley. At first it was barely visible in the blinding sunlight, but as it came closer, it gradually took shape: a huge monk striding through the grain. Magdalena couldn’t help but think of the Grim Reaper, coming to mow people down with his scythe.

When Kuisl arrived in front of them, Magdalena noticed a fire in his eyes that she knew only too well. A mixture of pride, disgust, and defiance—the way he often looked before an execution.

“I spoke with Nepomuk and have been thinking about it,” he mumbled, crushing a few hulls of barley absent-mindedly between his fingers. “The time has come for us to catch the real sorcerer.”

Down in the monastery dairy, the bolt was thrown back and the four soldiers from Weilheim crowded into the stuffy, low-ceilinged room, looking at the trembling figure at their feet with disgust.

“Get up, you bastard,” the leader demanded. “Your nap is over. Now we’re bringing you to the dungeon in Weilheim, where the executioner will deal with you. Your elegant coach is waiting for you outside.”

The other soldiers laughed. The monk whimpered and thrashed about as they pulled him outside to the oxcart with the wooden cage. Behind them the soldiers’ wagon and the district judge’s coach waited.

It had been a long time since Nepomuk was last out in the sun, so he had to blink to recognize the district judge himself standing alongside his coach, apparently just concluding a long conversation with the prior. The two approached the monk, who was covered with filth. He’d been lying in his own waste for four days, and he could smell it on himself now.

“So this is the famous warlock of Andechs,” said Count von Cäsana und Colle, scrutinizing the apothecary as he would an exotic captive animal. Twirling his gray mustache, he turned to the prior. “It’s good you let us know. A matter like this cannot remain just the concern of the monastery, and we must examine everything carefully. I can’t understand why the abbot didn’t call on the district court earlier.”

“His Excellency Maurus Rambeck is a distinguished scholar,” the prior replied with a shrug. “But he sometimes lacks a… well… broader view.”

Count von Cäsana und Colle nodded. “I understand. Well, we’ll surely find a solution for that.”

Until that moment, Nepomuk had listened to the conversation in silence. Now he turned to his former superior. “Brother Jeremias,” he pleaded, “you have known me for a long time. Do you really believe I’m responsible for these—”

“What I believe is of no importance,” the prior snarled, his eyes suddenly turning icy. “Only the trial will reveal your guilt or innocence.”

“But the matter has already been decided,” he burst out. “All these people have already made up their minds. You know what comes next, Brother. The executioner will torture me. You must not allow that. Please…”

But the prior had already turned away and returned to the coach with the count.

“I have complete confidence that the high court in Weilheim will reach a just verdict,” Nepomuk heard Brother Jeremias say. “Can I invite Your Excellency into the monastery for a glass of wine in the Prince’s Quarters?”

“I would be delighted, Your Reverence, but I fear we must put that off till another time,” the count responded. “We have some outstanding taxes to collect in this area, but I’m sure we’ll see each other again soon. Perhaps we can drink the wine then in the room of the new abbot.” He laughed, and the conversation grew fainter as the two walked away.

Nepomuk took a deep breath, turning his face to the blue sky where just a few white clouds passed by, heralds of a coming storm. The monk knew this was perhaps the last time he would see such a sky. From here on, only Jakob would be able to help him.

Though Nepomuk prayed fervently that the Schongau hangman’s suspicions were correct, he harbored no illusions about his chances of escaping torture and death at the stake. The mob had found its victim. Why should it spend any more time thinking about the real perpetrator—especially if this perpetrator was as influential and powerful as Nepomuk assumed.

Suddenly a calm came over him, his trembling stopped, and he murmured a silent prayer.

“Dear Lord, you are everywhere. Be also in me and make me
strong for what is to come. Give the Weilheim hangman a steady hand, and be a light unto the Schongau executioner on his way. No matter what happens, I ask for your blessing.”

“Get up, you ugly toad. The fire awaits you.” With a loud crack, one of the soldiers opened the front of the crate with a crowbar, then together they lifted the prisoner onto the cart like a calf going to slaughter and squeezed him inside. Nepomuk could hear them hammering nails into the box; then everything turned dark around him except for a few cracks along the top that gave him just enough light to make out the contours of the box. It was narrow and low around him. He sat crouched over and could smell the strong scent of fresh spruce.

“Giddyup.”

As the wagon started to rumble forward, Nepomuk had to brace himself on the sides of the box so as not to be flung back and forth. After a while he could hear a growing number of voices outside, nasty, angry voices.

“Hang the sorcerer! Hang him and burn him! Just like in hell!”

“Hey, little monk, see if your magic can get you out of this box. Or can’t you do it?”

“Curses on you, you beast. Holy Mary, punish him with pain, make him suffer and scream at the stake for a long time.”

Suddenly something struck the box from outside. This was followed by a hail of stones and then a loud thud. The noise swelled to a roar of shouting voices as more stones came raining down and the mob seemed to lose all control.

“Stop this,” the captain of the guards could be heard shouting. “This man will not avoid his just punishment, but it will be the district judge who punishes him and not you.”

Nepomuk pulled his legs to his chest and put his hands to his ears to keep from hearing the rest, but he could still feel how the crate was being pummeled.

My God, this box is not a prison at all, it’s protecting me,
he thought.
Without this box people would have no doubt ripped me to pieces long before.

A while passed before the pounding relented, then finally stopped completely. Removing his hands from his ears, Nepomuk heard just the squeaking wagon wheels and chirping birds now—thrushes, finches, and blackbirds singing in the forest. A narrow strip of sunlight fell through a knothole in the wood and directly onto Nepomuk’s face.

It was a gorgeous day.

But distant thunder announced the coming storm.

Just a few hours later, three cloaked figures moved through the little streets below the monastery, hunched over in the torrential rain striking their woolen capes obliquely and soaking them to the skin. Lightning flashed through the sky, followed immediately by earsplitting thunder. Dusk had turned into pitch-black night, and only a few lights were still burning up in the monastery. Simon looked up anxiously, squinting in the face of the driving rain.

“Couldn’t we have left a bit later?” he complained. “What a deluge. If we don’t watch out we’ll be washed down into the Kien Valley.”

The Schongau hangman turned around with a look of contempt. “What are you? A man of salt who will dissolve in the rain? It’s just water, not pitch or sulfur; your fine jacket will dry out again, and life will go on.”

“It certainly isn’t healthy to stomp through the rain in such weather.” Simon sneezed, as if to support his point.

“You could have stayed with the knacker in his comfy little house,” Kuisl snarled. “It would have been better that way. What a group—a silly bathhouse doctor and my own daughter. I’d feel a lot better if I had a few of my men from the war here now.”

“But this isn’t a war. We’re in Andechs,” whined Magdalena,
who, following Simon closely, was barely recognizable beneath her soaked headscarf. “And if you were any kind of a leader you would at least have let your troops in on your plans. Who is the damned sorcerer, anyway?” She was working herself up into a frenzy now. “Damn it all. You’ve been stringing us along since yesterday. Admit that you like keeping us in suspense.”

Kuisl grinned. “Let your father enjoy this moment. Besides, it’s dangerous to know too much in Andechs these days. It’s for your own good. You’ll have to put up with it just a bit longer.”

Simon and Magdalena followed the hangman up to the monastery. They forgot their argument earlier that day as soon as Kuisl told them they might that very night unmask the person who stole the hosts. In the meanwhile, the knacker and his mute assistant would care for the two sleeping boys. Magdalena had simply told the two men that she and Simon had to take care of the sick pilgrims, but now, in the silence and darkness occasionally punctuated by flashes of lightning, the hangman’s daughter wondered whether it wouldn’t have been better for them to stay back in the house on such a night, too.

Suddenly Kuisl turned sharply to the right, and the couple quickly realized where he was headed.

“The watchmaker’s workshop,” Simon groaned. “What in heaven’s name do you think we’ll find there?”

“I sent for someone to meet us,” the hangman replied without turning around. “I sent him a message, and if I’m right, he’ll show up.”

“And if he doesn’t?” asked Magdalena.

“Then I’ll head for Weilheim, give the executioner hell, and rescue Nepomuk from the dungeon all by myself.”

Magdalena cringed. “Then let’s just hope you’re right. I don’t want to see my father cut up into pieces, skewered on a spear, covered with tar, and set out on display all around Weilheim.”

The front of the watchmaker’s house had seemed so inviting
in bright daylight but now appeared gloomy in the rain and dark. Low-lying and tilting to one side, the house—with its garden in front and low wall—didn’t seem to fit in with its surroundings. The door looked locked, but when Kuisl gave it a push it swung open with a grating sound.

The hangman removed a lantern from under his cape and gazed at the strange objects before him—the crocodile on the ceiling, the broken furniture, the burn marks on the floor. Everything was just the way he’d found it the night before.

“We’re a bit early,” Kuisl said. “I’ve summoned our friend to come when the bells toll eleven o’clock, but I thought there would be no harm in arriving a bit early.” He grinned. “Not that we should expect any surprises.”

“What friend?” asked Simon, shaking the water from his hair. “By all the saints, won’t you tell us? I can’t think of anything more fun than to prowl around a haunted house, in thunder and lightning, where one man has been burned alive and another was presumably abducted by a golem.”

Without answering, Kuisl motioned his son-in-law to approach the narrow staircase leading to the second floor. “Come now, you coward,” he said with a mischievous smile. “I’ll show you something you’ll like. I promise.”

“Your word in God’s ear. If I must.”

The three of them passed through the assistant’s bedroom and up a narrow staircase into the small library Kuisl had discovered the evening before. When Simon saw the books, his mood changed dramatically. His fear vanished as he enthusiastically removed one after the other from the shelves and started leafing through them.

“This… this is a real treasure,” he gasped. “Just look.” He held up a stained folio volume. “The
Opus Maius
of the Franciscan Roger Bacon, with illustrations. It must be worth a fortune. And look here… Agrippa’s
De occulta philosophia.
”

“Wonderful,” Magdalena replied dryly. “But unfortunately
we’re not here to read but to catch a madman. Put the damned books back on the shelf and stop shouting.”