Last Rituals

CHAPTER 16

Thora was holding a small tan leather wallet that she had taken out of the middle of the wad of papers. The wallet was fastened with straps and she had undone them to examine the contents. The leather was still as soft as a glove to the touch, even though it was probably old. It was at least sixty years old, judging from the insignia printed on it: "NHG 1947." But it was the contents rather than the wallet itself that caused her surprise. "What can this be?" she asked, glancing curiously at Matthew. She pointed to some old letters that were revealed when the wallet was openedancient letters, in fact, because judging from their appearance and script they were much older than their container.

Matthew regarded the wallet in astonishment. "Was that among the papers in the box?"

"Yes," Thora said, thumbing through the uppermost letters to count them. She was startled by a wordless howl as Matthew snatched the wallet from her.

"Are you crazy?" he shouted, closing the wallet and flipping the straps back over it in a rush, rather clumsily because of the steering wheel and the cramped seating in the front of the car.

Thora watched his efforts in bewilderment without saying a word. When Matthew had closed the wallet he placed it carefully in the backseat. Then he wriggled out of his coat and covered the wallet with it, making sure that the lining and not the damp outside touched it. "Shouldn't we move the car?" asked Thora to break the silence. It was half backed out of the parking space, jutting into the street.

Matthew grabbed the steering wheel with both hands and exhaled heavily. "Excuse my behavior. I didn't expect to see those letters in some crummy cardboard box from the police." He backed out into the street and drove away.

"What are they, if I may ask?" Thora said.

"They're very old letters from Harald's grandfather's collection, some of the most valuable ones. Actually they're priceless, and I can't understand why Harald sent them to Iceland. I'm certain the insurance company thinks they're still in the bank vault, as they had agreed." Matthew adjusted the rearview mirror to keep an eye on his precious cargo. "A nobleman from Innsbruck wrote them in 1485. They describe Heinrich Kramer's campaign against witches in the city, before witch hunts became widespread."

"Who was Heinrich Kramer again?" Thora knew she ought to recognize the name but simply drew a blank.

"One of the two authors of The Witches' Hammer," Matthew replied. "He was the chief inquisitor in several regions that now mostly belong to Germanydoubtless a warped personality, he had a particular grudge against women. As well as chasing imaginary witches he persecuted Jews and blasphemers, in fact almost any group that was an easy target."

Thora remembered the article she had read on the Internet. "Yes, right." Then she added in surprise: "So are these letters about him?"

"Yes," Matthew said. "He went to Innsbruck. Maybe he came and saw, but he definitely didn't conquer. It started well for himhe launched an inquisition using extreme violence and torture, and the suspects, fifty-seven women, were not allowed any legal defense. The local clerics and secular authorities were appalled at the trials. Kramer made such a show about the alleged witches' sexual activities that the bishop was outraged and banished him from the city. The women he had detained were released but they were in a sorry state after persistent torture. The letters describe his treatment of the scribe's wife. As you can imagine, it doesn't make particularly pleasant reading."

"Who was he writing to?" Thora asked.

"All the letters are addressed to the Bishop of Brixen, George II. Gosler. The same bishop who had Kramer expelled from the city. I have a feeling the letters played some part."

"How did Harald's grandfather get hold of them?"

Matthew shrugged. "Lots of things went up for sale in Germany at the end of the war. The Guntliebs invested their assets to hedge the bank against the devaluation of the mark that left most people penniless after the war. It's not a conventional bankordinary depositors don't put their money in it and never have. In many ways, it was thanks to Harald's grandfather that his clients didn't lose everything. He was quick to see where things were heading and was able to exchange funds and invest without drawing a lot of attention to himself. So he was in a good position to snap up various things when the economy took a dive."

"So who owned the letters and sold them to him? Letters from the fifteenth century aren't something people keep safe for a rainy day."

Matthew looked puzzled. "I have no idea. These letters aren't in any records or referencesthey could be forgeries, for that matter. Very good forgeries, though, if that's the case. Harald's grandfather wouldn't go into detail about the purchase. The initials on the wallet are hisNiklas Harald Guntliebso they don't give a clue as to the previous owner. I suspect that they were stolen from the Church at some stage." Matthew drove along Snorrabraut and flicked his blinker to change lanes. They had agreed it was best to keep the computer at Bergstadastraeti and were heading there. Soon they would need to make a right turn, and they were in the left lane now. But no one would let Matthew mergeif anything, the other drivers seemed determined to prevent him and force him over the bridge to Fossvogur. "What's wrong with you?" Matthew muttered at them.

"Just change lanes," advised Thora, accustomed to such behavior. "They're more worried about their own cars than controlling your route."

Matthew took the plunge and slipped into the other lane with no harm done apart from a loud beep from the car he had to squeeze in front of. "I'll never get used to driving in this country," he said in astonishment.

Thora just smiled. "What do the letters saywhat happened to the woman?"

"She was tortured," Matthew replied. "Brutally."

"I didn't suppose you could torture people any other way," Thora said, hoping for a more detailed description. "What did they do to her?"

"The scribe talked about paralyzed arms and a leg crushed by an iron boot. And both her ears were cut off. There was bound to have been more that wasn't worth putting on paper. Cuts and the like." Matthew glanced away from the road at Thora. "As far as I remember one of the last letters ended something like this: 'If you are looking for evil, it is not to be found in what is left of my beloved young and innocent wife. It lies in her accuser.'"

"My God," Thora said, shuddering. "You really remember that well."

"It's not so easy to forget what the letters say," Matthew replied dryly. "Of course it's not all he wrote about. There were endless attempts to have her released, from legal arguments to what you could call outright threats. The man was at his wit's end. He loved his wife with all his heart; she was the most beautiful of maidens, if his words are to be believed. They hadn't been married for long."

"Was he allowed to visit her in prison? Weren't the letters written while she was still detained?"

"Yes and no," Matthew said. "He wasn't allowed to see her, but one of the guards took pity on her and passed on messages which became more and more hopeless and sad, the scribe says. And as regards your second question, all the letters except one were written while she was in prison and the husband was working on her release. That was written after she was let out. It describes a fate that's worth bearing in mind when we complain about our own troubles."

"In what way?" asked Thora, without really wanting to hear the answer.

"You have to remember that in those days, medicine wasn't anything like what we know today, just nonsense really. You can't begin to imagine how much pain the sick and injured went through, let alone the mental state of a pretty girl who had been much admired for her looks. When she was released, one of her feet and all her fingers were crushed to powder. No ears. Her body covered in knife marks from searching for spots on her that would not bleed. And other things that are only hinted at and not described. What would you do under such circumstances?" Matthew looked at Thora again.

"Did she have children?" Thora asked. Instinctively her hand moved up to her earshe had never thought about how indispensable a part of someone's appearance they were.

"No," said Matthew.

"So she committed suicide," said Thora, without pausing to think. "You can put up with endless suffering and pain for your children, but not for much else."

"Bingo," Matthew said. "They lived on an estate by a brook and she hobbled over there the night she got home and threw herself in. If she'd been in better shape she could have swum to safety, but wearing a heavy dress, which was the fashion then, with a useless leg and hands, she wasn't capable of much."

"What did he dois that mentioned in the letter?" asked Thora, trying to keep the thought of the young woman out of her mind.

"Yes, it is. In the last letter he says he has taken away the most precious thing in Inquisitor Kramer's life, just as Kramer had taken the most precious thing in his lifeand now it's on the long path to hell," Matthew said. "It doesn't say who or where the victim of his vengeance was, nor how hell came into the picture. Contemporary records give no further hints. Then he tells the bishop to sleep wellaccuses him of failing to answer his appeals in time and says that is a matter for God's servant to answer to his master. Then he quotes from the Old Testament, which as you know is about something quite different from forgiveness. I can't explain it exactly but his last words are some kind of veiled threat, which I don't know whether he carried outthe bishop died a few years later. He may well have got rid of the documents, not wanting them to be preserved in the Church archive."

"That sounds dubious," said Thora. "If he wanted to get rid of them, why didn't he burn them? They weren't exactly short of fires."

Matthew concentrated on steering into a parking spot near Harald's apartment. The ones directly outside it were full. "I don't knowmaybe he visualized Saint Peter and God and didn't want to draw attention to the content of the letters by burning them. Smoke rises up to heaven, after all."

"So you think the letters aren't forgeries?" Thora asked.

"No, I didn't say that. There are certain points in them that don't fit."

"Such as?"

"Mainly allusions to that awful book of Kramer's. The scribe calls it a flowery account that does little to conceal the diabolical origin of its contents."

"Couldn't he mean The Witches' Hammer? After he wrote it, Kramer must have used it in his investigations of these so-called witches. I would assume he practiced what he preached."

"That doesn't fit," Matthew said. "That extraordinary piece of literature is said to have been published in 1486."

"Have the paper and ink from these letters been dated?" Thora asked.

"Yes, they more or less fit but that's not crucial. Forgers have used old paper and old ink or paint to deceive owners who can afford to have such tests done."

"Old ink?" repeated Thora doubtfully.

"Yes, or something resembling it. They make ink from old substances or dissolve it from old documents that aren't likely to fetch a high price. It produces the same result."

"What a lot of bother to go to," Thora said, relieved that she had never decided to become a forger.

"Hmm," said Matthew as they got out of the car.

"But why did Harald have the letters?" she asked. "Did he believe they were genuine or forged?"

Matthew shut the door to the driver's seat and opened the rear door. After carefully wrapping the wallet of letters inside his jacket, he placed it on top of the box and bent over to pick everything up. If he was cold in just his sweater, he didn't show it. "Harald was convinced they were genuinehe was obsessed with the riddle of who or what it was that Kramer lost in the scribe's revenge. He made countless searches to find an allusion to it in documents from all over Germany and even went to the Vatican library for that specific purpose. But he couldn't find a scrap of evidence. Kramer isn't so well known in other respects; he was around more than five hundred years ago."

Thora noticed footprints in the snow at the corner of the building, leading toward the front door of Harald's apartment. She gestured to Matthew with her chin to indicate these fresh signs of trafficthe footprints only led in one direction so they could hardly have been left when the post or newspapers were delivered. With a finger to his lips, Matthew made his way around the side of the building. Thora followed quietly.

As they rounded the corner, they saw a man standing a short distance from the front door. He had backed away to look up at the windows on the upper floor. He gave a start when he saw Thora and Matthew. His mouth moved silently for several seconds before he finally stammered: "Did you know Harald Guntlieb?"