The Scribe (20 page)

Meanwhile, Theresa thought about the pitiful appearance of the bear. It was clear that, in its standing position, the weight of the hay made it accumulate in the belly, making the torso and shoulders sag. The front legs flopped down weakly, and the head, its mouth closed, seemed permanently stooped. Instead of it looking ferocious, she thought the animal looked like it had just been hanged.

She went out to look for Althar and tell him her thoughts, but she couldn’t find him, so she went back inside the cave to continue to ponder the problem without him.

When the old man finally returned he was speechless. Theresa had changed the position of the front legs so they were now raised ferociously above the animal’s head. In this pose, the hay accumulated around the shoulders, bulking them up. For the rear legs she replaced the hay with backstitched rags to keep them tight.

“And if we insert hay between the skin and the fabric, you won’t be able to see the bumps,” she explained.

Althar continued to survey her work, completely absorbed. He could see that Theresa had also positioned a dark stick in the mouth to keep the jaws open, giving the beast a menacing expression. It seemed impossible that this magnificent animal was the same pitiful scarecrow he had cast aside in frustration a little earlier.

They returned together to the bear cave at nightfall, tired but happy. On the way they stopped at the beehives to collect Theresa’s promised wax. When they arrived back at the cave, Althar greeted
Leonora with a loud kiss before telling her about the progress they’d made.

“My news is not so good,” the woman lamented. “The young man has taken a turn for the worse.”

Hoos lay in the corner, trembling and struggling to breathe. Leonora showed them a bloody cloth, and told them he had spat it out.

“Did he vomit or cough it up?” Althar tried to ascertain.

“How do I know? It all happened at once.”

“If he coughed it up, it’s bad news. Hoos, can you hear me?” he said into his ear. The young man nodded. Althar put his hand on his chest. “Does it hurt here?” He nodded again.

Althar grimaced and shook his head. The presence of blood in the young man’s spit could only mean a rib had pierced a lung and was now tearing at it. He cursed unceremoniously when he found out that Hoos had been exerting himself earlier in the day.

“If what I fear has happened, there will be nothing we can do,” he said to his wife as an aside. “Except pray, perhaps, and wait until tomorrow.”

Hoos spent the night coughing and moaning. Leonora and Theresa took turns tending to him, but even with their attention and care, he hardly improved. By morning, he was consumed by a fever. Althar knew that without the help of a physician he would die.

“Wife: Prepare some food for the road. We’re going to Fulda,” he announced.

They were ready by midmorning. Althar loaded the cart with the stuffed bear, the half-finished head, and the pebbles for the eye sockets. They lay Hoos Larsson on a pallet among the goods. Then Theresa gathered her belongings, and Althar packed up the food, as well as a bundle of skins to sell, and they said farewell to Leonora.

“I hope to see you again,” said Theresa, her eyes welling up.

“He’ll get better,” she said, giving her an equally teary kiss.

Their first day on the road went by without incident. They stopped only to eat some venison pie and empty their bladders. Hoos slipped in and out of consciousness, his fever still high. They spent the night by a stream, taking turns to keep watch. Theresa used this time to finish sewing the second bear head. When she inserted the false eyes it acquired a formidable appearance—or, at least in the dim light, that’s how it seemed. The next morning they set out again, and just after midday, they could make out plumes of smoke indicating that Fulda was near.

Though they were still some distance away, Theresa could make out the abbey and was impressed. On top of a large hill, dozens of buildings of all different colors crowded together. It appeared that for every inch of land where timber could be driven into the ground or a fence built, that’s what had been done. In the town center at the top of the hill stood the walls that protected the monastery, a cheerless, dark structure that blended into the mountain it was erected on. Lower down, on the slopes, scores of hovels, shacks, storehouses, and barns were jammed together alongside workshops and animal pens. It was such a jumbled confusion that it was difficult distinguishing where one structure began and another ended.

As they approached, the path grew wider until it became a broad road, with peasants and animals trudging up and down in a disorderly fashion. Outlying farmhouses, with their roofs of wattle and mud, lay scattered around the fields with hawthorn fences protecting the owner’s land. Eventually they reached the banks of the River Fulda, the boundary between the tortuous road and the entrance to the city.

An endless line of peasants waited their turn to cross the bridge into and out of the city. Althar covered his face with a hood and urged the horse on until they reached the end of the queue.

They crossed the viaduct after paying their toll to the guard in the form of a jar of honey. Althar grumbled, for he could have saved the expense had they forded the river a couple of miles downstream, but with the cart loaded down with the bears, and with Hoos in a bad way, he decided it would be best to use the bridge.

Entering the city walls, Theresa remained silent, entranced by the coming and going of people, the constant clamor, and the smell of pottage and unwashed bodies, intermingling with the stench of sheep, chickens, and mules that seemed to be wandering about with more freedom than their owners. For a moment she forgot her worries, distracted by cloth merchants, food hawkers, improvised taverns, and groups of street urchins scampering among the apple stands that festooned the great city gates. It all seemed so different and vast that for a moment she thought she had returned to her beloved Constantinople.

Althar guided the cart toward a side entrance to avoid the busy artisans’ quarter. They left the market behind them and climbed an empty alleyway until they came to a square where a web of streets converged. There they were forced to stop and make way for a procession from the abbey and then some other carts that had been waiting to continue toward the hill.

As they waited, Althar told Theresa that he knew a person in the city who would put them up. “But don’t tell Leonora,” he laughed, which took Theresa by surprise because they seemed to share everything with each other. Althar stopped the cart and told her to keep an eye on it while he made some inquiries. He made for a group of men, joking with each other around a jug of wine. After greeting them as if they were old friends, he returned looking down in the mouth. Apparently, the person he was looking for
had moved to the outskirts of town. At that moment there was a crack of the whip from the cart in front of them, and they all set off again.

In the vicinity of the abbey, he turned down a narrow street, scraping the sides with the cart’s wheels, and continued along a road that led east. Gradually the houses became older and darker, and the smell of cooking and spices gave way to a persistent stench of sour wine. When they reached a dilapidated home, Althar stopped the horse. But Althar dismounted and walked up to the house opposite with a door daubed in bright colors. It wasn’t in ruins, but it certainly needed some attention. The old man walked in without knocking. He soon returned, sporting a cheerful smile.

“Come on, they’re making us some lunch,” he said.

They unloaded the bears and their baggage and made themselves comfortable in the hostelry.

11

Helga the Black proved to be a most entertaining prostitute. As soon as she recognized Althar, she stuck her tongue out at him impudently, lifted her skirt to show him her knees, and said “sweetheart, come here!” before planting a loud kiss on his cheek. Then she turned to Theresa and asked about his prissy girlfriend. She continued to jest until she noticed the wounded man with them, which caused her to immediately stop her fooling around to start fussing over Hoos as though her life, and perhaps his, too, depended on it.

While she fussed, she told Theresa her story. She had worked as a barmaid until the day she discovered that sucking off a neighbor was more lucrative than doing it to her drunkard of a husband. So as soon as he died, she sold her house and opened a tavern to earn her living. They called her “the Black” because her hair was dark as charcoal and so were her fingernails. As she spoke, she frequently burst into laughter, her smile revealing several conspicuous gaps between her teeth. Theresa noticed that the rouge on her cheeks worked hard to hide her wrinkles, but despite this, she was still an attractive woman. As she changed Hoos’s bandages, Helga asked after Althar’s wife, and Theresa understood now why the old man had told her to keep his secret.

Theresa had never dealt with prostitutes before. In Würzburg she knew none, and indeed she was surprised there should be one so close to the abbey in Fulda. When the woman had finished fussing with Hoos’s dressings, she asked Althar about the severity of his injuries. He told her what he thought and she appeared to ponder deeply before responding. Finally, she said, “The only physician here is a monk who lives in the monastery, but he only attends to the Benedictines. The rest of us are at the mercy of the dentist-barber.”

“This isn’t just any old casualty,” said Althar irritably. “He needs someone who knows what he’s doing.”

“Well, let me know how you get on, my dear. I can’t turn up with a man at the abbey gate. And you can’t just turn up either: As soon as they realize who it is, you can be sure they’ll set the dogs on you.”

Althar stroked his beard. Helga the Black was right: In the monastery there were many who thought him responsible for the death of the abbot’s son. The only option was to call for the barber.

“His name is Maurer,” said Helga. “In the morning he tends to the sick and cuts hair, but by midday he’s already in the market tavern spending every penny he’s just earned.”

Althar nodded as if he understood. Then he asked Theresa to put her things under Hoos’s bed and accompany him. Helga would look after the patient.

“We’re going to the market,” he announced with a smile. “I almost forgot we have some bears to sell.”

When they arrived at the market, they had to set up shop on its periphery, for the best spots had already been claimed. The crowds thronged around stands selling food, ceramics, tools, implements, seeds, fabrics, and basketwork. It was market day and everyone was there to shop, gossip, and chatter about the mercantile, even though the same things were sold every week.

Althar parked the cart against a wall so he would only have to guard one side from the street urchins who took every opportunity to steal from him behind his back. In the cart, he lifted the bear up into a standing position, propping the other head beside it with some sticks.

He asked Theresa if she knew how to dance. She said she didn’t, but the old man didn’t seem to care. He ordered her to climb onto the cart and shake her behind anyway she pleased. Then he took out a hunting horn and blew on it.

First a few young lads appeared to imitate Theresa’s wiggling, but soon more onlookers arrived, drawn to the unusual spectacle before them, and before long a ring of people had formed around the cart.

“I’ll swap my wife for that bear,” a toothless peasant proffered. “Her claws are just as long and sharp.”

“Sorry, but I already have a wild beast for a wife,” said Althar with a laugh.

“That creature’s a bear you say?” said another man from the back. “You can’t even see its balls.”

The crowd guffawed.

“Come closer to its jaws and yours will shrivel up, too.”

The people laughed again.

“How much for the girl?” someone else asked.

“It was the girl who killed the bear, so imagine what she could do to you.”

There was another roar of laughter.

A boy threw a cabbage at them, but Althar swiftly grabbed him by the hair and gave him a shove that sent him scuttling back to the other youngsters. An ale merchant decided to take advantage of the situation and pulled his barrel up near the cart. Some drunks followed him, hoping for a handout

“This bear devoured two Saxons before we made the kill,” Althar announced. “Their skeletons were in his cave. He killed my
dog and wounded me,” he said, showing them an old scar on his leg from some unrelated accident. “And now he can be yours for just a pound of silver.”

Hearing the price, several onlookers turned away and walked off. Anyone in their right mind in possession of a pound of silver would buy six cows, three mares, or even a couple of slaves before the patched-up skin of a dead bear. The ones who stayed seemed more transfixed by Theresa, who was still dancing.

But there was one woman, wearing a coat of fine furs, who seemed to be admiring the animal quite a bit. She was accompanied by a little man of an elegant appearance who, upon seeing her interest, sent a servant to inquire about the price.

“Tell your master what he already knows,” said Althar. “One pound for the animal,” and he blew the horn again.

The servant went pale, but his owner appeared unperturbed when he learned the cost. He sent the servant back to offer half.

“Tell him I wouldn’t sell him a vixen for that price,” Althar responded. “If he wants to impress his lady, he can get his coin pouch out or risk his own backside and kill one himself.”

This time, when the couple heard his response, they turned away and disappeared into the crowds. However, when they had walked a few steps, Althar saw the woman look back at them. The old man smiled and starting packing up. “Time for a drink,” he announced to Theresa.

Before leaving, he managed to make a few deals: He sold a beaver pelt to a silk merchant for a gold solidus, and exchanged another with a baker for three pecks of wheat. Then he paid two boys to guard the bear, though not without warning them that he would skin them alive himself if he returned to find anything missing.

Althar and Theresa walked into a nearby inn, and sat near the window to keep an eye on the cart. Althar ordered two cups of wine and some bread and sausages, which were served to them
immediately. While they drank, Theresa asked him why he had refused to negotiate on the price for the bear.