The Poisoned Pilgrim by Oliver Pötzsch
“I have to,” the hangman interrupted curtly. “They’ll probably move Nepomuk to the dungeon in Weilheim today, and then no one will be able to help. I know the executioner there, and Master Hans makes everyone talk, even if he has nothing to say.”
“But what more do you want from Nepomuk?” Magdalena asked. “Are you just going to say goodbye?”
“Nonsense. I have something to ask him, and I pray to God he knows the answer. I should have asked him much earlier.”
Simon stared anxiously at his father-in-law. “Asked him what?” he demanded, tapping the hangman on the chest. “You say you know who stole the hosts. So who was it? For God’s sake, won’t you stop torturing us?”
Kuisl grinned, but there was a sad gleam in his eye. “Torturing is my specialty,” he replied softly. “If I need you, I’ll let you know in plenty of time. Until then, it’s best you know as little as possible, or you might do something stupid.”
Without another word, the hangman pushed a few pilgrims aside and turned to leave. Simon and Magdalena watched the huge man stride quickly away—bounding up and down like a ship being tossed about on a stormy sea—and then disappear into the crowd.
“Where’s Grandpa?” Peter asked, tugging his mother’s hand impatiently. “Why did he leave again so soon?”
Magdalena sighed. “Your grandfather is a stubborn fellow. Once he’s got his mind set on something, not even the pope himself could stop him.” She bent down and ran her hand through his hair. “Do me a favor, will you? Don’t be so stubborn when you grow up.” But she couldn’t keep from smiling. “Unfortunately, I’m afraid it runs in the family.”
As Kuisl ran past the many spectators and pilgrims, he cursed softly to himself. Finally he’d figured out what had been irritating him so much the night before in the watchmaker’s house. He could only hope it wasn’t too late.
When he finally arrived breathless at the dairy, he was disappointed to see that some of the soldiers from Weilheim had already taken up their posts. The big fellows, in their uniforms and armed with halberds and muskets, seemed far more daunting than the Andechs hunters who’d been guarding the apothecary until just a short while ago. Just the same, Kuisl had to try to get to Nepomuk. He pondered briefly what to do—then decided on the most outrageous option.
Mumbling Latin prayers, the hangman pulled his hood down over his face and approached the four soldiers, who eyed him suspiciously.
“Hey, you! In the black robe,” one of them shouted. Wearing a silver-coated cuirass, this one appeared to be the leader of the guards. “What’s your business here?”
“I’m looking for Brother Johannes, also called the warlock of Andechs. Is he in this dungeon?” Kuisl tried to sound as much as possible like someone accustomed to giving orders. He stood up straight, eyeing each of the soldiers severely.
“Uh… who wants to know?” the captain replied, a bit uncertain.
“Henricus Insistoris from the Augsburg convent of St. Magdalena. The bishop instructed me to examine this case on behalf of the church.”
It was such a bald-faced lie that Kuisl could only hope his self-confident manner alone would hoodwink the captain. Dominicans actually wore white tunics under their black robes, and the hangman took the name from an inquisitor he once knew. To fend off any objection, he stomped boldly over to the dungeon entrance.
“What are you waiting for?” he demanded. “Are you deaf or has the sorcerer already cast a spell to make your ears disappear?”
“But… but… the judge…” the captain ventured, hesitating.
“He knows about this. Don’t worry; the church will serve only to advise the high court, and everything else…” Abruptly the hangman stopped, studying a huge mole on the soldier’s unshaven cheek. “This mole…” Kuisl inquired, seeming greatly concerned. “How long have you had it?”
The captain blanched, nervously running his hand over the mole as his three colleagues looked at him curiously and whispered among themselves. “Well… since my childhood; that is, you could say… uh, forever.”
Kuisl slowly traced the outline of the mole with his finger. “It reminds you of a raven, doesn’t it? I once knew a witch who had a mole just like that. We burned her at the stake a few years ago in Landsberg.”
The captain’s face turned white. “My God, do you believe…” he stammered, but Kuisl was already squeezing past him.
“Leave faith out of it when you’re talking of the devil’s work,” he said casually. “And now open this door. I’d like to begin questioning this suspect. Or shall I question you first?”
In a fraction of a second, the captain had pushed the bolt aside and opened the door to the dungeon. Kuisl entered, blinking as his eyes got accustomed to the dim light inside. Finally he could make out the form of the ugly Nepomuk cowering against the wall in back. When the monk recognized his friend, he sat up, groaning.
“Jakob,” he said in a hoarse voice. “I thought you had forgotten—”
“Shhh,” said Kuisl, holding his finger to his lips. He turned around and called toward the door: “I will call you if I need a strong hand to help with my questioning. Until then, leave the two of us alone.”
Only too gladly, the soldiers closed the door. Murmuring could be heard out front, then a soft command from the captain to keep quiet. The hangman grinned.
“I’ve always wanted to do that—to carry on like a wise-ass scholar,” he said softly. “Not so hard, nothing but fancy drivel, yet people fall for it just the same.” He pulled down his hood, grinned, and wiped his face. “Now the four of them outside have plenty of time to check out the moles on their faces. I just hope none of them is smart enough to go and check with the judge.”
Nepomuk looked at his friend, horrified. “The judge? Do you mean the soldiers outside were sent by the judge?”
Kuisl suddenly turned dead serious. “I’m afraid I have bad news for you, Nepomuk. They want to take you to Weilheim today. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to stop it.”
Gasping, Nepomuk collapsed and buried his face in his hands. “Then I’m finished,” he whispered. “The Weilheim executioner will torture me. Oh God, Jakob, I’m so afraid. Not of death, but of the pain. We both know what comes next—the rack, the glowing tongs, the fire and sulfur—”
“Just be quiet and listen to me,” the Schongau hangman interrupted harshly. “What are you? The son of an executioner or a mouse?” He pulled his friend to his feet and looked him in the eye. “Remember the war, Nepomuk. Remember Breitenfeld. There’s always hope.”
Nepomuk nodded, staring off into space. He remembered. Back then, at the Battle of Breitenfeld, almost all of Tilly’s army had been wiped out by the Swedes; barely six hundred soldiers remained of forty thousand. Kuisl and Nepomuk had survived by hiding underneath a pile of corpses, where they listened to the screams of wounded soldiers being slaughtered by the enemy nearby.
“You survived Breitenfeld,” Kuisl murmured. “And you’ll survive this, as well. We hangmen were baptized personally by the devil, and it takes a lot more than cheap magic tricks to send us to hell.”
Then he told Nepomuk about the theft of the hosts from the holy chapel and the conversation he’d overheard between the monks. The apothecary listened to him in astonishment.
“If the district judge has even a spark of intelligence, he’ll realize there’s a connection between the murders and the theft,” Kuisl continued. “And you couldn’t have stolen the hosts—you would have had to fly out of here through the barred windows.”
Nepomuk nodded grimly. “That’s just what they’ll say I did.”
For a while, neither said a thing, and the buzzing flies and the muted conversations of soldiers out in the corridor were the only sounds. They both knew that Nepomuk was right, having seen all too often what an insignificant role reason and logic played in witch trials.
“Do you understand, Jakob?” the apothecary whispered. “This isn’t war; this is worse. The war was fought according to bloody
Again both fell silent. Then the hangman finally let out a curse and kicked a basket of cheese so hard that the soldiers outside temporarily stopped their chatter.
“Just the same, you can’t let it get you down, do you understand?” Kuisl finally whispered after making sure none of the soldiers had become suspicious. “At least for a few days. First they’re going to show you the instruments of torture, and then they’ll gradually increase the pressure. You know how it goes—whatever you do, just don’t confess. Once you confess, you’re finished.”
Nepomuk laughed nervously. “And how are you going to get me out? With a little sleight of hand?”
“Of course not. I’ll turn over the real sorcerer to the district judge, but to do that I need to find out a few things, and you can help me with that.”
The monk’s already prominent eyes grew even larger. “Do you know who the sorcerer is?” he gasped.
“I think I at least know who stole the hosts.”
Kuisl led his friend to one of the wooden crates along the wall, sat down beside him, and told him briefly what he’d learned. When he was finished, Nepomuk nodded thoughtfully.
“That’s… that’s incredible,” he whispered finally. “But that might just be the way it happened. What can I do for you?”
Lowering his voice, the hangman answered him. There wasn’t a moment to waste: outside they could hear the squeaking oxcart approach with the wooden box.
Shortly thereafter, Jakob rose to his feet and looked his friend straight in the eye again.
“Don’t give up,” he whispered. “Everything will work out. Dum spiro, spero—as long as you’re breathing, there’s hope.” Kuisl smiled apologetically. “That’s what condemned men sometimes write on the wall of their cells in Schongau. Comforting words, even if it doesn’t really help in the end. Let’s pray that this time at least it all works out.” Then the hangman turned and knocked on the locked door.
“Hey you out there,” he barked. “The first cross-examination is over. You can open the door now.”
The bolt slid to one side and the captain opened the door, looking off to one side so Kuisl couldn’t see the mole on his face again. The other soldiers also stood back. Evidently each had a birthmark somewhere on his body he was hoping to hide.
“May the Lord illumine our way on our difficult journey through life,” Kuisl said, making the sign of the cross. “We shall have to continue this examination in Weilheim, but unfortunately it’s becoming clearer that this case involves witchcraft, and perhaps even more than we suspected.” He leaned down toward the captain and whispered in a conspiratorial voice, “The devil likes to appear in the form of a monk and of soldiers. Did you know that?”
Holding his head high, the self-appointed inquisitor stomped off with an energetic stride, just as the noisy entourage of coaches, oxcarts, and soldiers came to a halt in front of the dairy. The guards descended slowly and headed toward the tavern for their well-deserved noontime beer. Clearly the transfer of the prisoner could wait until they’d quenched their thirst. None of the men paid any attention to the huge monk who quietly moved past them.
As soon as Kuisl rounded the next corner, he threw off the robe and ran toward the knacker’s house in Erling as fast as if the devil were chasing him. He’d been thinking about how he might catch the person who’d stolen the hosts. His assumptions had been correct. Now all he had to do was to lure the perpetrator into his trap.
When he arrived, he found his cousin pushing a dead calf off his cart. “Do you have a pen and paper?” he asked him breathlessly.
The knacker grinned and pointed at the stinking carcass. “If you can wait a few weeks, I’ll have the finest parchment for you. What a stroke of luck. I just picked up this animal—”
“Just shut up and give me a scrap of something,” he interrupted. “I’m not writing a Bible, just a letter.”
His cousin raised his eyebrows. “A letter? To whom?” Suddenly his face brightened. “Ah, your Anna-Maria, naturally. Send my best greetings to your sick wife.”
“I’ll… do that. Now quick, the piece of paper.”
Kuisl shuddered at the thought of his wife. Was she getting better, or had the cough gotten worse? But then he turned his thoughts back to Nepomuk. If Kuisl was right, he might be able to save his friend soon and return to his wife in Schongau. He followed the knacker into the house silently, where Graetz proudly handed over the paper, pen, and a pot of ink.
“Here you are,” he said. “It belongs to Matthias. When I can’t understand him, he sometimes writes things down. I myself can just barely write my name, which is all I need. It’s different with you educated hangmen—you flay people, but I just flay animal carcasses.” He laughed and went outside again to attend to the dead calf.
Kuisl sat down at the wobbly table and wrote a few lines in neat, straight letters. It was just a short note written hastily on a scrap of paper, but Kuisl hoped it would be enough to lure its recipient out of his hiding place.
He carefully folded the letter several times, then returned to the monastery to deliver it.
It was a message for the sorcerer.
Pursued by a raging beast, Magdalena ran with her children past the barley fields not far from Andechs.
Simon had stuffed ears of the grain in his jacket, and they stuck out of his sleeves like long fingers. Wagging his head playfully from side to side and occasionally letting out a deep growl, he emerged from the low bushes at the edge of the field.
“A bear!” shrieked three-year-old Peter, stumbling over his own little feet. “Father is an angry bear!”
“More like a clumsy dancing bear,” Magdalena replied, helping her elder son to his feet. “He’s certainly not big enough to be a bear.”
Paul looked at his father, as if still wondering whether Simon hadn’t really suddenly changed into a monster. He pointed his fingers, sticky with elderberry juice, at Simon, who was kneeling now in front of the children.
“Papa, good bear?” Paul asked anxiously.
Simon nodded and spread his arms out with a broad smile. “The best bear in the whole forest. You don’t have to be afraid.”
After the district judge had arrived from Weilheim, the four of them had gone for a walk through the fields around Andechs. For the first time in a long while, they were together as a family—without the pilgrims or Simon’s grouchy father-in-law, who was once again busy with his own concerns. The mild June sun shone down; there was a faraway scent of burning coal, and high over the fields, a buzzard circled in search of an unwary mouse. The children had been frolicking among the poppies along the edge of the field, but when their father suddenly appeared as a raging animal, the mood changed.
“How can you frighten the children like that?” Magdalena scolded. “Just look at Paul. He’s scared to death.”
“I’m sorry. I… I thought the children would enjoy it,” Simon stammered, pulling stalks of barley out of his jacket.
“Bear? Papa is a bear?” Paul asked again, clinging to his mother.
“Hah, does it look like they’re enjoying it?” Magdalena replied. “And tonight he won’t be able to sleep again.”
Simon raised his hands apologetically. “Fine, I understand. It won’t happen again. But what’s wrong with you?” he asked, shaking his head. “I’ve never known you to be so anxious.”
“You would probably be anxious, too, if some madman kept trying to kill you.”
Simon sighed. “Do you still believe that the shadowy figure in the tower and the stray bullet in the forest weren’t accidents?”
“For God’s sake, that was no stray bullet,” Magdalena snapped back. “How often do I have to tell you that? And that falling sack was also intended for me.”
“What falling sack?”
Magdalena hesitated. She still hadn’t told Simon about the sack of lime that fell from the scaffolding two nights ago and j
“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.”