The Dark Monk

10

EARLY THE NEXT morning, Simon and Benedikta set out for Wessobrunn on horseback. They avoided major roads leading north along the Lech River that might be under the robbers’ surveillance. Instead, they crossed the bridge over the Lech to Peiting and, from there, headed directly toward Mount Hoher Peißenberg, which towered like a giant above the villages and little towns in the otherwise flat countryside. The blizzard of the last two days had passed, and the air was clear and pure. The sun shone so brightly in the blue sky that Simon had to close his eyes whenever he looked too long at the snowy fields and trees.

In the last hour, Simon had often glanced back. Whenever he and Benedikta left a clearing and entered the endless forests around the mountain, the feeling came over him that he was being watched. It felt like an itch between his shoulders, and Simon expected any moment to hear the twang of a bowstring or the rattle of a saber. Whenever he turned around, though, all he saw was an impenetrable thicket of pines. Occasionally, a startled bird flew away, squawking, or snow trickled softly down from branches. Otherwise, silence prevailed.

In many places, the blizzard had bent the trees down like reeds, and from atop his horse, Simon looked down on wide swaths of downed trees in the forest. At least the farmers wouldn’t complain this winter about a lack of firewood.

“Don’t look so cross!” Benedikta called to him. “It doesn’t go well with your beautiful eyes. The robbers are on the Lech, not here. What is there of any value here?”

In contrast to Simon, the businesswoman seemed carefree, humming a French tune and spurring her horse on across the wide clearings. Simon had trouble keeping up with her. He’d borrowed the hangman’s old mare again for their ride to Wessobrunn. Walli seemed to have gotten somewhat used to him, but she stopped from time to time whenever something green poked its head out of the snow cover. Then even kicking her wouldn’t get her to move. Occasionally, she snapped at Simon or tried to throw him off, but the medicus was determined to teach the beast some manners. The horse came to a dead stop again and tugged calmly at a weed poking its head up out of the snow. Simon tugged desperately on the reins and dug his heels into Walli’s scrawny body, but he might as well have been sitting on a rock.

Benedikta watched him struggle, grinned, then put two fingers to her mouth and whistled.

“Allez hop, viens par ici! Giddyap, this way!”

As if the horse had just been waiting for Benedikta’s command, it started to move again.

“Just where have you learned to deal with horses like that?” Simon asked, patting Walli on the rump and trying to catch up.

“My mother comes from a family of Huguenots who fled from the French Catholics.” Benedikta brought her horse into a faster trot. “A respected family from the area around Paris with an estate and property. She learned to ride as a child and no doubt passed this love along to me. Je suis un enfant de France!” She laughed, racing off.

Simon dug his heels into Walli’s sides, trying to keep up with Benedikta, and for a brief while they rode side by side.

“France must be gorgeous!” he cried to her. “Paris! Notre Dame! Fashion! Is it true that the city blazes with the light of a thousand lanterns at night?”

“In your Schongau, I’d be pleased to see even a dozen lanterns. And people smell better in Paris.” She gave her horse a slap. “But now, enough of this foolishness. The last one to reach the edge of the clearing pays for the first round of muscatel in Wessobrunn! Allez, hue, Aramis!”

Her sorrel leapt forward and raced to the edge of the clearing, while Walli plodded along listlessly, clearly in the hope of finding a few tasty blades of grass at the forest edge.

As they approached Peißenberg, they turned left, heading north, and, two hours later crossed through a dense forest of firs interspersed with dark-green yews.

“Keep an eye on your horse. The trees are very poisonous, so make sure she doesn’t eat the leaves or the hangman will wring your neck,” Benedikta warned.

Simon nodded. He didn’t want to think what Jakob Kuisl would do to him if he had to flay his own horse. Probably, he’d stick Simon up to his neck in a vat of tannic acid. The medicus was still lost in thought, pondering how indebted he really was to the hangman, when he suddenly felt the urgent call of nature.

“Benedikta, excuse me, but I…” He smiled with embarrassment and pointed to the yews on the left. “It will take only a moment.”

“If you’ve got to go…” she said, winking. “But don’t let the bad fellows catch you with your pants down.”

Entering a thicket of yews, Simon squeezed past sharp branches and opened the buttons of his coat and trousers. When he was finished, he paused to enjoy a moment of peace and tranquility in the forest.

At this moment, Simon had the unmistakable feeling that someone was watching.

It was a warm, tickling sensation on his back; he was petrified when, a moment later, he heard a crackle behind him. Slowly, he buttoned up his trousers and moved farther back into the thicket. Instead of going back to the road, he turned left, jumped down into a ditch in front of him and crawled along on the ground parallel to the road. For protection, he picked up a branch about the length of a club, which had broken off in the blizzard. Finally, he crossed through another thicket and, in a wide circle, returned to where he’d started. Holding the club tightly, he moved forward, trying not to make a sound. Just behind a large fallen tree he came to a stop.

Ten paces in front of him, a man was leaning against a tree.

He was wearing the red Turkish trousers of a mercenary foot soldier and a gray jacket from which a sword and powder horn hung. In his right hand he held a musket like a walking stick. He was looking out at the road, where Benedikta was waiting. Suddenly, the man put his hand to his mouth and let out a very realistic-sounding caw like that of a jay. Another caw answered, then a third. The man nodded with calm satisfaction, pulled a dagger from his waistband, and began cleaning his fingernails, all the while keeping a close eye on the road.

Simon clutched the cudgel so tightly that his knuckles turned white and he had trouble swallowing. An ambush! Judging from the signals, there had to be at least three men. The physician looked around at the bushes and yews but couldn’t see any other men. They were probably hiding on the other side of the road. Simon rose cautiously, trying to formulate a plan. He had to warn Benedikta and then ride away as soon as possible! He could only hope the highwaymen didn’t have horses.

As quietly as possible, Simon crept back through the thicket of yews. The crackle of even a tiny branch sounded to him like a peal of thunder, but finally he reached the road. When he emerged from the ditch with twigs in his hair and trousers wet from the snow, Benedikta looked down at him in amusement.

“Did you find a badger hole to do your business? As far as I’m concerned, you could have just gone in the ditch.” Then she noticed the anxious expression on his face and turned serious. “What happened?”

Simon mouthed his next words. “Robbers. On both sides of the street. We have to get out of here.”

Again, one jay call followed another.

Benedikta hesitated briefly. “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “As long as we’re on our horses and keep moving, they can’t catch us.” She grinned and pointed to her skirt pocket. “Don’t forget, I’m not completely defenseless. Allez!”

Her horse bounded forward and galloped away, and to Simon’s great relief, Walli promptly followed. The medicus thought he saw something move behind the trees. He expected to hear the crack of a shot, the whistle of a bullet, or the pain of one impacting his shoulder-but nothing happened.

Clearly, they had shaken off the robbers.

But how? Had he been mistaken? He’d expected that, at the very least, the men would shoot at them with their muskets or crossbows as he and Benedikta rode away. But there was no time to think. The horses raced off, and Benedikta was already entering another part of the forest far ahead. Her laughter dispelled his dark thoughts. Perhaps the highwaymen had simply decided to wait for a more promising victim.

Soon they left the yew forest and a large clearing opened up in front of them. The road climbed steeply, lined by houses on both sides. Simon breathed a deep sigh of relief. They’d reached the village of Gaispoint, and high above them, on a hill, was the Wessobrunn Monastery.

As the medicus looked around, it struck him how well maintained the houses looked. Many of them were built of stone and had obviously survived the war with little damage. Many stucco workers had settled in Gaispoint to take advantage of the booming construction business in the surrounding churches and monasteries. The physician had heard that the Gaispoint stucco workers were well known and highly regarded in Venice and as far away as Florence and Rome. At present, the stucco workers were engaged principally in restoring the neighboring Benedictine monastery to its former glory. Even though the Swedes had left the village largely untouched, they had plundered and set fire to the monastery itself.

Simon and Benedikta rode over a narrow bridge toward the rectory. The grounds seemed gloomy in the light of the setting sun. Parts of the encircling wall had collapsed, and many of the outer buildings had been burned down by the marauding soldiers. Loose stucco was crumbling from the church walls, and all that remained of the well house roof was the timber frame. Crows rose up from a heavy layer of ice covering the fountain and flew off. Only the squat bell tower standing off behind the parish church seemed to have weathered the tumultuous times.

Benedikta knocked on the heavy door of the main house, but it took a while before someone answered. A bald monk peered out at them suspiciously through a narrow crack in the door.

“Yes?”

Benedikta put on her sweetest smile. “We’ve ridden a long way to see this famous monastery. It would be a great honor for us if the abbot-”

“Abbot Bernhard is not available now. Go over to the tavern next door, and perhaps tomorrow-”

Sticking his foot in the crack, Simon pushed the door open a bit. The monk stepped back, startled.

“My companion has come all the way from Paris to view the famous Wessobrunn Prayer,” the medicus said in a commanding tone. “Madame Lefèvre is not accustomed to waiting, especially as she is considering a substantial donation to the monastery.”

Benedikta looked at him for a moment in astonishment, then joined in the game. “C’est vrai,” she mumbled. “Je suistrès fatiguée…”

For a moment, the monk looked confused, then finally ushered them into the vestibule.

“Wait a moment,” he said, disappearing through a doorway.

“A substantial donation?” Benedikta whispered. “What were you thinking? I don’t have anything substantial to give.”

Simon grinned. “It won’t necessarily get to that point, Madame Lefèvre. All we want is to see this prayer. I do believe we shall have to leave tomorrow in a great hurry. Compris?”

Benedikta smirked. “Simon Fronwieser,” she whispered, “it seems I’ve underestimated you until now.”

At that moment, a side door opened on a tall black-robed monk with penetrating eyes. Breadcrumbs still clung to his mouth, which he wiped with his sleeve. His Excellency had clearly been disturbed at supper.

“I am Abbot Bernhard Gering,” he said. He was at least two heads taller than Simon. Looking down, he asked, “What can I do for you?”

The abbot raised his eyebrows as if he were examining a bug in the monastery kitchen. Obviously, Father Bernhard was hungry and thus rather ill-disposed. His pronounced nose reminded Simon a bit of Jakob Kuisl’s.

“Ah,frère Bernhard,” Benedikta sighed, extending her hand. “Comme c’est agréable de faire la connaissance de l’abbé de Wessobrunn!”

Father Bernhard hesitated, then smiled wanly. “You come from France?” he asked in a much softer voice as he shook her hand.

Benedikta smiled back. “De Paris, pour être précis. Business matters in Augsburg have brought me to your beautiful isolated region.” She pointed to Simon. “My charming guide offered to show me the way to your monastery. In Paris, I heard of your…comment dit-on…Wessobrunn Prayer, and now I am dying to see it.”

Suddenly, the abbot perked up. “Paris, you say? I spent part of my younger years in Paris! What a wonderful city! Parlez-moi de Paris! J’ai appris que le Cardinal Richelieu a fait construire une chapelle à la Sorbonne.”

Simon closed his eyes and said a quick prayer. Hearing Benedikta speak the purest Parisian French with the abbot, he opened his eyes again. Father Bernhard nodded and smiled, and now and then posed an interested question. He suddenly seemed years younger, as if he’d fallen under a spell.

After just a few moments, Bernhard Gering led them to his private quarters, where excellent French wine and tender chicken awaited them. The medicus grinned. It was astonishing how a foreign language could open doors. Then he feasted on the coq au vin.

Outside the monastery gates, two monks huddled in a niche against the biting winter wind. A blizzard was brewing again and tugged at their black cowls. A thin layer of snow had fallen on the backs of the horses standing next to them. These men were not Benedictines like the monks of Wessobrunn, and though they would never admit it, they despised their brothers inside the monastery. The Benedictines prayed, ate well, and drank. They spent their tithes on stucco and gold leaf and honored God by reveling in pomp and splendor. They’d lost sight of what was sometimes necessary-a strong hand to free the rose of God from the rampant weeds.

These two monks belonged to an order that thought of itself as Christendom’s elite. For centuries, these brothers had been on the frontlines of the war against the heretics. Other monks quietly tended their cloister gardens and decorated their churches, but these monks were destined for higher things! Their third man had returned to Augsburg, and now they were waiting here in the cold, as they had promised not to let the two busybodies out of their sight. As God’s watchdogs, they followed their master undeterred through storms and snow.

They didn’t notice that they themselves were being observed.

“Up here?” Simon glanced up a steep staircase leading to the clock tower attic. Wind was whistling through the stairwell and shaking the entire roof truss, so that more than once the physician reached out and frantically grabbed hold of the railing.

“Just a security measure,” the abbot remarked, wiping cold sweat from his forehead. He stopped for a moment to catch his breath. “During the Great War, we took all the monastery’s books up here. It’s the safest place around here. The tower is ancient and as solid as a fortified castle.”

Groaning, he continued upward, followed by Simon and Benedikta. The medicus examined the unplastered walls in the light of their lantern. The walls were several feet thick and interrupted only by the occasional narrow embrasure.

During the meal, Benedikta had repeated her wish to Abbot Bernhard to see the Wessobrunn Prayer. Her father, who came to Paris from Germany, had often told her about the oldest prayer in the German language, with its simple yet stirring words. When she found it necessary to travel to Augsburg on a business matter, she decided to take a detour to Wessobrunn and make a donation to the monastery to support the library. The prospect of a pending windfall made it easy to convince the abbot to show them the prayer that very night.

After a few more turns on the clock tower’s spiral staircase, they finally reached the attic. A trapdoor opened on the area directly under the roof. Simon peered in, moving the lantern around in a circle, and saw mountains of books and boxes scattered amid timber, trunks, and moth-eaten bundles of cloth, completely filling the attic.

With a barely suppressed cry of excitement, the medicus rushed to the first pile and began leafing through the books there. The first one was a yellow, faded copy of Seneca’s De vita beata, and next to it lay an illuminated edition of Paracelsus’s Großer Wundarzeney filled with detailed engravings and brilliant initials. Simon examined the books. Digging through the pile, he found a huge illustrated Bible and, right after that, the collected works of Aristotle, something he hadn’t held in his hands since his days as a student in Ingolstadt. This was no cheap printed copy, however, but handwritten, with marginalia in an elegant script. When he took it in hand and opened the ribbon, a cloud of dust swirled up. He had to sneeze, and the light from the lantern flickered.

“Careful with the fire,” murmured the abbot, who had disappeared behind some tall crates in a corner. “One false move and all of Western culture goes up in flames!”

Simon gingerly set his lantern down atop a pile of books and, sitting cross-legged on the floor, immersed himself in the world of letters. He felt neither the cold nor the wind whistling between the loose tiles of the roof.

It was Benedikta who shook him by the shoulder and roused him from his daydreams.

“Forget the books; we don’t have time!” she whispered. “Once we have the treasure in hand, you can buy all these books, for all I care, and lock yourself up with them for the rest of your life. But come now!”

In the meanwhile, the abbot reappeared from the rear of the attic carrying a small trunk closed with a heavy padlock. He took a key out from under his habit and opened the box decorated with silver fittings. Resting on a red velvet lining inside was a simple cross and, at the bottom, a single book bound in bright calfskin.

With slender fingers, the abbot opened two golden clasps along the side of the book, then turned the brittle parchment pages until he found a certain passage in the middle. Simon leaned over to get a closer look. Some of the letters were red, the color of dried blood in the lantern light, and others were written in fine dark-brown flourishes and only slighted yellowed. Despite their age, they were quite legible. “The Wessobrunn Prayer,” he whispered.

Abbot Bernhard nodded. “It’s many hundreds of years old,” he said, passing his hand gently over the page. “A treasure dating from the time the German Empire was still a primeval forest inhabited by heathens and wild animals. The prayer sounds like an ancient magic spell, and we Benedictines guard it like no other document.”

He sighed, quoting the beginning of the prayer with his eyes closed.

“This is what I learned among mortal men as the greatest wonder. That there was neither the earth nor the heaven above. Nor was there any tree nor mountain. Neither any star at all, nor any other thing, neither sun nor moon, nor the sparkling sea…”

Simon quickly read it through, but nothing stood out as a clue about where to turn next. Finally, he cleared his throat and interrupted the abbot’s monologue.

“Yes, a wonderful prayer, Your Excellency. Where was it stored before?”

Abbot Bernhard stopped and gave him a bewildered look. “Before?”

“Well,” said Simon, “I mean before it was brought to this tower during the Great War.”

Bernhard Gering smiled. “Ah, that’s what you mean. Well, it was in a little chapel in the rectory. We just barely had time to rescue the document. A few days later, the Swedes came to loot and pillage. The chapel, too, was burned to the ground.”

Simon gulped, and Benedikta, who stood beside him, turned even paler than usual. “Completely?” she asked.

“Yes, completely. We even carted away the foundations, and now a little herb garden is there in the summer. But are you feeling well?” Bernhard looked at them anxiously. “It was just a little chapel, after all, with no holy relics or church treasure, and the prayer, as I said, we were able to save. Were you acquainted with the little church before the war?”

Benedikta came to Simon’s aid. “My guide no doubt often prayed there as a child.” She turned toward the abbot. “Was anything else saved from the church along with the Wessobrunn Prayer? A picture? A statue? Perhaps a memorial plaque?”

The abbot shook his head. “Unfortunately not. Everything was destroyed. And there were no memorial plaques in the chapel. Did you want to go there to pray?”

Simon nodded. His head was spinning. They had placed such great hope in the prayer, in finding something that would give them a clue in their search for the treasure, but all they found was an ancient parchment that didn’t help at all. Was this the end of the search? Had the secret of the Templars’ treasure been buried forever with the destruction of the Wessobrunn chapel?

One last time, Simon scanned the lines, silently mouthing the verse to himself.

…that there was neither the earth nor the heaven above. Nor was there any tree…

Simon stopped short. They had overlooked something.

Tree…

Unlike the lines in the crypt of the ruined castle, the word here was not written in capital letters. So was there perhaps a certain tree here, and not in Peiting?

It was Benedikta who interrupted the silence. She, too, seemed to notice the discrepancy. “Is there perhaps somewhere around here a tree with some special significance?” she asked, trying to seem casual.

“A special significance?” The abbot looked even more confused. “What do you mean-”

“Ah, oui, excusez-moi,” Benedikta interrupted. “This is a prayer about the miraculous powers of nature, the heavens, the mountains, and trees. I am a devout soul in search of a powerful place for my prayer. Perhaps a tree?”

Bernhard’s face brightened. “Ah, yes, the old Tassilo Linden southeast of the monastery! An ancient tree blessed by God! Duke Tassilo is said to have dreamed there of the three wellsprings that later made this place famous. An excellent place to pray!”

“How old is this linden?” Simon asked.

“Certainly hundreds of years old. It has four trunks that have grown together, and some people consider this a symbol of the four elements. The Tassilo Linden is the most famous tree in our area.”

“Your Excellency,” Benedikta interrupted, “could you do us a great favor?”

“But of course.”

“Would you take us to this tree tomorrow morning? I believe it would be the perfect place for me to open my soul to God at daybreak.” She smiled at the abbot. “Surely, it will be revealed to me there what sum I should finally donate to the monastery.”

“Under these circumstances,” said the abbot, “I’ll make sure that no one will be there to disturb you tomorrow. And please include the monastery in your prayers.”

Simon nodded. “We shall do that. Your Excellency?”

“Yes, my son?”

“Might I borrow some books until tomorrow morning?”

The abbot smiled. “But of course. I’d be delighted if someone would read them again.”

After assembling a stack of books, Simon staggered down the stairs with his hands full. It would be a long night.

Magdalena was lying in a ship’s hold, being rocked gently side to side by waves that beat against the hull. She had difficulty keeping her eyes open as the sound of the water and the constant back and forth lulled her to sleep. A storm was brewing outside, however; the rocking became more violent, and she was thrown back and forth in the little ship like loose cargo. She would have to go up on deck to see what was wrong up there.

She stood up. Her head banged against a wooden wall, and with a cry of pain, she sunk back down again.

The pain woke her up, and the dream floated away like a cloud. She was not on a ship at all, but inside a tiny wooden crate. The rocking was from the movement of a wagon. Magdalena could hear the snorting of horses and a monotone hissing sound and, after a while realized it was the sound of runners of a sled being pulled through the snow. So it was not a wagon, but a sled that was taking her somewhere in a box. Now she could feel the cold coming through the slats of the box. A shaft of light entered through the cracks-too little to see more than a few indistinct figures rushing by. Her head pounded as if she had drunk a whole barrel of wine by herself.

Magdalena measured the narrow space around her with her hands and feet and quickly realized that the box was exactly the size of a coffin. Had she died perhaps and come back to life? Was someone taking her to the cemetery to bury her alive?

Or was she already dead?

“Help! Is someone there?” Her voice was nothing more than a soft wheezing sound. “I’m not dead! Get me out of here!”

The long, drawn-out call of a coachman was audible as he brought the sled to a stop. The shaking finally stopped and a crunching sound could be heard as someone trudged through the snow toward the box. Magdalena’s heart began to pound. Someone had heard her, and she was safe! In no time, the gravedigger would realize his error and break open the coffin. She would laugh in his face and tell him-

“Shut your damned mouth, Hangman’s Daughter, or I’ll dig a hole six feet deep and stick you in it, just like we used to do with sluts like you.”

Magdalena fell silent. She recognized the voice at once-it was the man who had stuck her in the arm with the dagger, the man the other brothers had called Brother Jakobus. The name brought memories flooding back: the cathedral, the cross around his bishop’s neck, the subterranean vault, the meeting. There must have been poison on the tip of the dagger that had paralyzed her and finally made her pass out-the same poison that had also made her father lose consciousness. Brother Jakobus was obviously taking her away somewhere to dispose of her.

But where?

“Listen, we’ll soon be going by a security post.” The man now sounded somewhat conciliatory. “Don’t make a sound, do you understand? Not a sound! I don’t mean to kill you, because we still need you, but if I have to, I will. Did your father ever tell you how long it takes to suffocate when you’re buried alive?”

Brother Jakobus did not wait for the answer but climbed back up to the coach box, judging from what she could hear. With the crack of a whip, the sled moved forward again.

Magdalena tried to put her thoughts in order. The monk knew her and her father! He was probably the man with the violet perfume who had been watching her all along in Schongau and Altenstadt. By coincidence, he’d run into her again in Augsburg. He was apparently out to find the Templars’ treasure, and clearly, there were many more people involved.

Magdalena shuddered. Only now did she remember she’d recognized the bishop among those disguised figures. It seemed clear he was the leader of this insane plot. The bishop had spoken of a brotherhood. What order could he have meant? And what treasure were these men looking for? What treasure could be so great as to turn pious, influential Christians into merciless killers?

Magdalena’s thoughts were interrupted when the sled suddenly stopped. She could hear voices-apparently, the watch post.

“Where are you going with the coffin, Father? We don’t need any plague victims in town!”

“Don’t worry, my son. An elderly brother of mine has gone to join God. I’m taking him back to his hometown.”

Magdalena was tempted to scream, but then she remembered what the monk had said.

Did your father ever tell you how long it takes to suffocate when you’re buried alive?

She kept quiet. Finally, the guard let them pass, and the sled continued its journey. She could hear footsteps outside, laughter, and individual voices. Someone with a strong Swabian accent was hawking hot chestnuts. Where was she? Where was the man taking her? She had no idea how long the poison had knocked her out. One day? Two?

Again the sled stopped, and she could hear the muffled sound of Jakobus’s voice. He was speaking with someone, but the conversation was too faint for her to understand anything. Suddenly, the coffin began to shake. Magdalena felt herself being lifted up and then carried down a flight of stairs. Imprisoned in her coffin, she slid from one side to the other.

“Careful, careful!” Brother Jakobus scolded. “Have some respect for the dead!”

“Where your brother is, it won’t bother him anymore,” she heard a deep voice reply grimly. Then the coffin fell to the ground, and Magdalena suppressed a cry of pain. She could hear coins being counted out, then heavy steps struggling up the stairway again. After that, only silence.

Magdalena waited a moment, then groped at the boards above her. Certainly, Brother Jakobus wanted to rest and had put up for the night in some inn. Would she be able to loosen the boards a bit now? Her father said that coffins were often very carelessly nailed together. After all, nobody figured the dead would want to escape their last resting place.

Pressing with both hands against the top of the coffin to check how secure the boards were, she heard a ripping sound. Someone was prying a board off the lid! A moment later, a bright light shone into the coffin through the crack, and a head with a monk’s haircut peered in above her. Brother Jakobus was shining his torch inside. His face was only a few inches from hers, but she wasn’t able to reach up and seize him since her arms were still pinned beneath the cover. A strong scent of violets filled her nose.

“Well, Hangman’s Daughter?” Brother Jakobus asked, passing his hand almost sympathetically over her cheeks. “How do you like your bed? Does it make you think of Judgment Day? Are you overcome with weeping and trembling? The wrath of the Lord catches up with everyone sooner or later.”

In answer, Magdalena spit in his face.

The monk wiped the spittle from his cheek and his eyes narrowed to little slits. But then he smiled. “You slut. Women have always brought sinfulness on mankind, and you shall pay for it in eternity!” He closed his eyes briefly. “But you, too, are part of God’s plans, at least for now…” He moved briefly out of her field of view and, seconds later reappeared with a wet sponge in hand. “Until then, I’ll have to silence your fresh, malicious tongue. Our journey is not yet over, and before then, your shouts might betray our cause.” As he spoke the last of these words, he pressed the sponge down over Magdalena’s face. “And I will take no pity on your children, for they are sons and daughters of a whore…” the monk whispered.

The hangman’s daughter writhed about, attempting in vain to call for help, but trapped beneath the boards, she couldn’t pull her head away. She held her breath, whimpering, as Brother Jakobus pressed the sponge down harder and harder against her face.

The monk looked up to the heavens, murmuring quietly. “Your mother is a harlot, and she who gave birth to you is an abomination. Thus, behold, I will block your way with thorns and erect a wall that you may not find your way…”

When Magdalena was finally overcome by the need to breathe, she opened her mouth in a stifled cry and a bitter fluid filled her throat. She could smell poppy seeds and the fragrance of herbs that her father used in relieving the misery of condemned men on their march to the gallows. Paris quadrifolia, ranunculus, wolfsbane…Now the voice of the monk sounded like a distant, monotone chant.

“Mine is the vengeance, saith the Lord…”

Then her world turned black and she sank back into the coffin, which now felt like a bed of fine linen. The last thing she perceived was the sound of a hammer pounding on the wood.

Death is knocking at my door…They’re coming to take me away to Last Judgment…

With vigorous blows, Brother Jakobus hammered new nails into the coffin.

Simon was awakened by the little bells sounding for the laudes, the Benedictines’ morning prayers. Although he’d pored over the books from the Wessobrunn Monastery library late into the night, he was wide awake now. He quickly washed his face and hands with the ice-cold water in a basin alongside the bed and ate a piece of dry bread. Then he hastened outside. Benedikta, who had already gotten directions from Abbot Bernhard to the Tassilo Linden, was waiting for Simon in the monastery yard. Together, they walked through the gate alongside the parish church. To their left were the three ice-filled springs and the well house. Along the outside of the monastery wall, a path led down into the valley. It soon veered away from the wall, and the path became icy and slippery as they entered a snow-covered deciduous forest. A few times Simon nearly fell, cursing and grabbing hold of branches in the dense growth of trees. A little stairway with worn steps led down into the valley. Finally, they reached a shadowy clearing, and in the middle stood an enormous tree, larger than any they had ever seen. They stopped and gazed at it in awe.

“The Tassilo Linden,” Simon whispered. “The word tree in the Wessobrunn Prayer! It must be this tree. In any case, it’s surely the oldest and most striking one here, if not in all of the Priests’ Corner.”

The linden, at least one hundred feet tall, had four trunks that grew up out of one. In winter, stripped of its leaves, it looked like the withered hand of a giant witch, its clawlike fingers reaching for the sky.

Simon looked around. Once again, as in the yew forest the day before, he had the feeling he was being observed. He looked all around the dense forest surrounding him but couldn’t see a thing. The monastery loomed up in the distance, somewhere a little rivulet was gurgling in an icy brook, and from far up in the branches of the linden tree came the lonely sound of an angry crow. Simon watched as it spread its wings and flew away. Suddenly, a ghostly stillness fell over the clearing.

Benedikta broke the silence. “There has to be a clue here somewhere!” she said, walking toward the tree. “Perhaps higher up,” she said, craning her neck. “I suggest I look around down here and you climb up to the top of the tree.”

“The top?” Simon followed her gaze upward. “That’s a full hundred feet! I’ll break my neck.”

“Oh, come now!” Benedikta shook her head. “You don’t have to climb all the way to the top. After all, it was at least several hundred years ago that this Templar hid something here. At that time, the tree was not as high. So come on, allez hop!”

She stooped over and began to examine the roots and knotholes at the base of the linden. Uncertain, Simon stood around for a moment, then sighed and looked for a something to grab on to.

The bark was icy and slippery, and he kept sliding back down. Finally, he got a good grip between the trunks of the tree. He pulled himself up from one branch to the next, stopping whenever he found a knothole. Holding on with one hand, he groped inside each hole with the other. He found wet, slippery foliage, acorns, and beechnuts that squirrels had stashed there for the winter, and a handful of slimy mushrooms.

But nothing else.

The crow returned, settling on a nearby branch, observing with curiosity this two-legged creature searching the knotholes for food. Simon felt like a little boy whose playmates had promised him a treasure and only now noticed he’d been hoodwinked. “This is going nowhere!” he called down to Benedikta. “Even if the Templars did hide something here, the ravens and magpies took it long ago.” He looked down, where Benedikta was still searching around on the ground.

“Look in the other branches!” she called up to him. “We mustn’t give up when we’re so close!”

Simon sighed. Why did he always let women boss him around? He reached for a thick branch of the second tree trunk and moved forward slowly. Benedikta looked very far away now, a little dot of color almost swallowed up in the white snowdrifts down below. He tightened his grip on the icy branch. If he fell now and hit his head down below, it would burst like a wet snowball.

Finally, he reached the second trunk. The branches seemed strong, so he kept climbing until he was nearly at the top, with a view of the entire valley. In the distance, he saw the Ammersee sparkling in the sunlight and, on a hill even farther away, the tiny monastery of Andechs. On the other side, the Hoher Peißenberg rose up from the flat land, a distant foothill of the Alps peeking in and out of the clouds. Simon looked back at the monastery again and then around the forest surrounding it. Bare beech trees, snow-covered firs, a man in the branches…

A man?

Simon blinked, but his eyes had not deceived him. Barely a hundred feet away, someone was watching him from behind the branch of a fir.

At his side, the stranger held a crossbow, with the bowstring tightened and poised to shoot. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and a leather uniform, from which a heavy dagger or hunting knife dangled. When he saw that Simon had caught sight of him, he disappeared into the undergrowth.

Simon was so puzzled that he couldn’t speak at first. For moment, he thought he’d seen a ghost. When he calmed down again, he leaned over as far as possible.

“Benedikta, look over there! There’s a man hiding in the underbrush! We’re being-”

At that moment, the branch Simon was standing on broke under him like a brittle bone. He could feel branches brushing past his face, and his heart started to pound. It took him a moment to realize he was really falling. He reached out in all directions in hopes of grabbing hold of a branch. The world around him was a blur of sky, earth, and branches that lashed him as he went by.

Suddenly there was a large ripping sound and Simon’s fall was broken.

He dangled helplessly a full ten feet over the ground, swaying back and forth like a marionette on a string. Looking up, he could see that a sharp branch had slit his jacket open from his waist almost to his collar.

Down below, Benedikta stared up at him open-mouthed. “My God, Simon! What are you doing up there?”

“What do you think? I was falling to my death! Up there in the tree I saw a man with a crossbow observing us, and-”

“Simon, first calm down. Try to grab hold of something close by.” Benedikta pointed to a branch that stood out at a right angle. It was about the thickness of an arm and looked solid. Simon tried to reach it but was just a few inches short. Carefully, he began to rock back and forth, coming closer to the branch each time. Above him, his jacket ripped a bit more. He was able to grab the bough just as the jacket finally tore into two halves with a loud rip. He felt a strong tug, he fell a bit more, and then he was able to get both arms around the bough. He hung there, his legs thrashing the air, and had no idea what to do next.

At this moment, he caught sight of the golden tablet right in front of him.

It was only about the size of a hand, and the bark of the tree had grown over it like a thick lip. It looked as if the tree had been eating away at the tablet, assimilating it bit by bit over the course of centuries. But the words in its center, inlaid in gold, had been unaffected by the wind, snow, rain, and hail and were quite legible.

Still suspended from the bough, Simon mumbled the engraved Latin lines as the crow came fluttering back and settled on the bough next to him, watching over his shoulder with curiosity.

IN GREMIO MARIAE ERIS PRIMUS ET

FELICIANUS. FRIDERICUS WILDERGRAUE

ANNO DOMINI MCCCX XVIII.

Despite the precarious position he was in, he couldn’t help but laugh aloud.

“Ha! This damned Templar,” he shouted so loudly it echoed all through the forest. “The sly, old devil! He did hide the message here-you were right!”

“What are you talking about?” Benedikta craned her neck to see better. “What’s up there? Tell me!”

Simon stopped laughing. His arms had begun to ache as if he were attached to the torture rack with big, heavy rocks pulling him down by the legs.

“A golden plaque up here…” he groaned. “From Friedrich Wildgraf a year before his death. And a saying…”

“What kind of a saying?”

“Damn! First get me get down from here!”

Benedikta grinned. “How about just letting go?”

“Letting go? It’s at least twelve feet down!”

“Oh, come now…ten, at most. Shall I catch you?”

Closing his eyes, Simon counted slowly to three, then let go.

With a loud shout, he fell kicking and floundering into a soft snowdrift at the foot of the tree. The landing was pleasantly soft. He lay there for a moment, checking that nothing was broken, but he seemed fine-something you could not say about his trousers.

“Damn, Benedikta!” he cursed as he thrashed about trying to free himself from the drift. “Who had the crazy idea of climbing up such a tall tree without a rope? I could have broken my neck!”

Benedikta shrugged. “At least it was worthwhile. Now tell me what it says up there on the plaque.”

Simon was about to speak when he remembered the man in the fir tree. In one desperate leap, the medicus extricated himself from the snow. “We have to get out of here at once! The fellow in the tree was armed, and there are surely others here in the forest.” He hobbled down the path as fast as he could, his tattered jacket fluttering behind him. “We’ve got to get back to the monastery! Follow me!”

Sighing, Benedikta ran after him.

Forty feet above, the stranger with the crossbow watched them leave. He raised his hands to his mouth and mimicked the caw of a jaybird.

Court Clerk Johann Lechner sat in his office, chewing on his quill pen and double-checking the city’s ledgers. The result was disastrous. The constant attacks in recent days had brought traffic almost to a standstill. All commercial goods transported along the major highways from Augsburg over the Brenner Pass and the Fern Pass had to be stored temporarily in Schongau. While the city collected a nice tax on every single bale, the Ballenhaus, the storage warehouse, and the Zimmerstadel down on the Lech were practically empty now. And the recent snowstorm had delivered the final blow. Schongau was bleeding to death, and the clerk had no idea where to get the money to pay the city’s long-overdue bills.

Johann Lechner sighed. The council had raked him over the coals that morning. The patricians respected him, but only as long as he was looking out for their interests, and Lechner had to wonder-and not for the first time-why he actually did so. The daily squabbles with these fat, pompous gas bags-who had nothing to think about but their next glass of wine, or their next shipment of salt or wool, or about how strenuous the trips to Munich and Augsburg were by coach-were the cause of all the miserable, unending paperwork. The city was a clock that had to be wound every day, and if it weren’t for him, Lechner was sure Schongau would wither away and become just another small provincial town.

That made it all the more important for him to put his foot down, to do something to make it clear that nobody could just come along and spit in the town’s face, and certainly not a band of filthy, ragged highwaymen and cutthroats.

There was a knock on the door. Lechner drew a line under the last entry and straightened his cap before calling out for his caller to enter.

Jakob Kuisl had to stoop to avoid bumping his head on the low doorway. His huge form completely filled the opening.

“You called for me, Your Excellency?”

“Ah, Kuisl!” Johann Lechner said, motioning for him to take a seat. “How strange…I was just thinking of you. Well, how was the excursion with Burgomaster Semer?”

“You know…?”

“Of course I know. We talked about it in the council meeting. The other gentlemen are not exactly pleased that you are giving Semer special treatment. Now his business is booming, and the rest are sitting around twiddling their fingers. Or were you attacked?”

Kuisl shook his head. “No, there were no crooks or gangsters anywhere. But we also didn’t tell anyone which route we were going to take.”

The clerk frowned. “Do you really think someone on the city council is listening in on the others and sending thugs out to get them?” Johann Lechner smiled, toying with the goose quill. “Tell me frankly, who do you suspect? That ambitious fellow Schreevogl or one of the four burgomasters-or perhaps, me? Are you going to put me on the rack and make me confess?”

Kuisl didn’t react to the clerk’s scornful tone. “The city council is the place where town leaders discuss business,” he replied simply. “If anyone wants to listen, that’s the best place to do it. All the patricians are equally suspect.”

Amused, the clerk shook his finger at the hangman. “The aldermen a group of murderers? Kuisl, Kuisl…It would be best to keep that idea to yourself. Executioners have been strung up on their own gallows for voicing suspicions far less serious than that. Besides, you’re forgetting the merchant from Augsburg-this Weyer fellow. He wasn’t at the council meeting, but he’s dead and buried now just the same.”

Jakob Kuisl shrugged. “We’ll see how it all fits together. Semer, in any case, didn’t talk to anyone and arrived safe and sound in Landsberg.”

“I hear you asked the burgomaster a favor,” Lechner said, abruptly changing the subject. “You wanted him to make some inquiries for you.” The clerk looked up at the ceiling, feigning indignation. “The burgomaster is now the hangman’s messenger boy, o tempora, o mores! What’s the world coming to? Can you let me know what’s so important you absolutely must know it, Kuisl?”

“No.”

The clerk paused, stunned. “I beg your pardon?”

Kuisl shrugged. “That’s my business. I’ll let you know when I have news.”

Lechner was silent for a moment; then he nodded. “As you will.” He pushed the papers in front of him to one side and pulled a large notebook from a bookshelf alongside the desk. “Let’s get to the reason I asked you to come.” He leafed through the book as he continued. “Scheller and his gang had their trial today, and-”

“They had what?” Kuisl sat bolt upright in his chair.

“Don’t interrupt me,” Lechner said, giving the hangman a severe look. “As I said, we put the gang on trial this morning in the Ballenhaus. It lasted just a quarter hour. Your presence wasn’t necessary.”

“And Burgomaster Semer?”

“He was informed and agreed to the procedure. The execution is set for this coming Saturday; that’s in three days.” He cleared his throat. “Unfortunately, I was not successful in arranging the type of execution you requested. You’ll have to torture Scheller on the wheel.”

Kuisl could no longer stay seated. “But you gave me your word!” He jumped up so violently that his chair tipped backward and crashed to the floor. “I’m indebted to Scheller!”

The clerk shook his head as if he were speaking with a child. “Please, Kuisl! Indebted…to the head of a band of robbers?” He pointed at the chair on the ground. “Now please pick it up. We still have some things to discuss.”

Jakob Kuisl took a deep breath and stood there, his arms crossed.

“Believe me,” Lechner continued, “it’s the best thing for the city. We have to set an example. Every gang of robbers from here to Landsberg will hear Scheller scream. It will be a lesson to them. Besides”-he tapped his goose-quill pen on the document in front of him-“the execution will bring money back into the city coffers. We’ll have a big celebration with dancing, music, mulled wine, and roasted chestnuts. People need a change of pace after these cold, anxious days.” He leafed through the pages of the book. “You see, there are some things that have to be done. First, the execution site has to be cleaned. Also, I’ve checked and one of the beams is rotten. And down below, in the square, we’ll need some gallows-at least three of them. And seats with canopies for the patricians so the fine gentlemen don’t freeze their behinds off in the cold. I’m afraid the hunt for the other gangs of robbers will have to wait a bit.”

The hangman, who had listened stoically to Lechner’s words, stirred again. “And what about the children and the women?” he asked.

The clerk nodded. “They’ll go free, as promised. We’ll hang only the men and older boys. Scheller will be tortured on the wheel. Believe me, there were people on the council who wanted to hang the women and children, too.” He smiled at Kuisl. “You see, I’m trying to meet you halfway. Now get started. By Saturday noon everything has to be ready.”

With a nod, Lechner dismissed the hangman, who headed for the exit as if in a trance. After he closed the door behind him, the clerk groaned. He would never understand this pigheaded Kuisl! Torture on the wheel paid a full thirty guilders, yet Kuisl reacted as if he were being asked to string up his own daughter. Lechner watched out the window as the large man walked away. A strange man, this hangman, he thought. Strong, bright, but a little too sentimental for his job.

And definitely too curious.

Once more, Lechner removed the letter from under the table. Written on the finest stationery, it had arrived that morning. He could see from the seal that the messenger who had been here a few days earlier had spoken the truth. Someone very powerful wanted to do everything possible to keep the hangman from asking too many questions in Altenstadt.

Johann Lechner cast a final glance at the seal, just to make sure it was genuine, then held the letter over a candle on his desk. Flickering, the fire ate its way through the thin paper until there was nothing left but ashes. The instructions in the letter had been clear. No proof, no written documents, no evidence that would reveal the identity of the client.

Johann Lechner counted out the freshly minted coins that had accompanied the letter. The money would help the city, as would the executions. Once again, the clerk was at peace with himself and the world.

Simon and Benedikta arrived in Schongau early in the evening. During the entire trip back, they’d been wondering about the strange words on the plaque, but also about the man who had watched them from the top of the fir. Was he part of the same gang that had been spying on them on the way to Wessobrunn? But why, then, hadn’t the robbers attacked? Why were the two of them being observed and followed?

Simon escorted Benedikta to her quarters at Semer’s inn, where she convinced him to remain a while for a glass of wine in the tavern.

“Is it possible these are the same men who were hanging around this area a few days ago?” Simon asked. “The same ones who ambushed the hangman in the crypt? Magdalena told her father about a few black-robed strangers in Strasser’s Tavern in Altenstadt who were speaking Latin. Perhaps they’ve been following us the entire time, and-”

“Magdalena is a little girl who probably doesn’t know a word of Latin,” Benedikta interrupted. “Perhaps they were just itinerant Benedictines saying their prayers before they ate.” She winked at him. “You’re beginning to look at every stranger like a murderer.” She put her hand around Simon’s arm, but he quickly pulled away.

“Don’t you sense that our every move is being watched?” he asked with alarm. “A highwayman who doesn’t attack, the man in the fir…That can’t all be a coincidence!”

“I think you’re just imagining things!” Benedikta laughed. “Now I’ll tell you what I think. The man you saw yesterday in the yew forest was a highway robber. We escaped. And the man in the fir tree was nothing but a figment of your imagination. You can’t even give a good description of what he looked like.”

“I know what I saw.” There was a long pause. When Simon spoke again, he decided to put all his cards on the table. “You’re right,” he said. “Perhaps it’s all just my imagination. Perhaps Andreas Koppmeyer was murdered for some completely different reason. Tell me, Benedikta, your brother surely must have left a will. What does it say?”

Benedikta stared back at him in astonishment and took a deep breath. “So that’s what you think!” she finally blurted out. “You suspect me of having killed my brother! You have no doubt been harboring this suspicion for a long time, haven’t you?”

“What does the will say?” Simon persisted.

Benedikta looked at him angrily, with her arms crossed. “I can tell you. I’m inheriting a leather-bound Bible from my brother, an old armchair, and a cookbook he wrote himself. And forty guilders that will hardly make up for the losses my wine business has incurred in the meanwhile.” She leaned over to Simon. “Those are his personal bequests. Everything else goes to the church!”

Simon winced. He hadn’t once stopped to think that the priest’s possessions would, in fact, for the most part, revert back to the church after his death. In all likelihood, Benedikta had probably inherited no more than these few worthless things.

“And if that were the case,” she continued, now in such a rage that other guests turned around to look at her, “why on earth would I want to hang around Altenstadt near the scene of the crime? Wouldn’t I have just poisoned my brother, gone back to Landsberg without anyone noticing, and waited there for news of his death? Nobody would have suspected anything.” She stood up quickly, knocking over her chair. “Simon Fronwieser, you’re really out of line.” Benedikta ran out, slamming the door behind her.

“Well, Fronwieser?” The brewer’s journeyman, Konstantin Kreitmeyer, looked over at him and grinned. “Trouble with women again? Better stay with your hangman’s daughter. She’s crazy enough for you.”

Some other brewer’s journeymen at Kreitmeyer’s table laughed and made a few obscene gestures.

Simon swallowed the rest of his wine and stood up. “Oh, shut your mouths!” He put a few coins on the table and left the tavern to a further chorus of lewd remarks.

Instead of turning into the Hennengasse and going home, Simon headed toward the Lech Gate. He couldn’t possibly sleep the way he felt now. He had acted like such a fool with Benedikta! How could he even imagine she’d poison her own brother? Further, the journeyman’s words had set him thinking of Magdalena again. Was she already on her way home from Augsburg? Perhaps her father had heard from her. Simon longed for a hot cup of coffee. The only thing awaiting him at home was work and a carping father who was fed up with his son’s escapades. The last time Simon visited the hangman, he brought Anna Maria a little bag of coffee beans, and he wondered now whether the hangman’s wife would brew him a cup of his favorite drink. He decided to pay the Schongau executioner a visit.

Before long, he was down in the Tanners’ Quarter, knocking on the front door of Kuisl’s house. The moment Anna Maria Kuisl opened the door, he could see something was wrong. The face of the otherwise vivacious woman seemed pale and drawn.

“It’s good you have come,” she said, motioning for Simon to enter. “Maybe you can cheer him up a little. He’s started to drink again.”

“Why?” asked Simon, taking off his wet coat and torn jacket and hanging both up to dry alongside the stove.

Anna silently eyed the ruined clothing, then went to look for a needle and thread in a drawer. “Lechner says my husband has to break Sheller on the wheel,” she said as she started sewing up the torn garment. “It’s going to happen in three days, even though Jakob gave his word to the robber chief. It’s a rotten group up there in the city council-they have money coming out their ears, but don’t care a bit about honor and decency!”

The medicus nodded. He’d become accustomed to the hangman’s excesses. Before executions, Kuisl would go on drinking binges, but amazingly, when the time came for the actual execution, he’d always completely sobered up again.

Simon let Anna Maria grumble on while he went over to the main room, where he found the hangman leaning glassy-eyed on the gallows ladder and brooding. The sweet odor of alcohol and sweat drifted through the room. On the table, a few opened books lay alongside an open bottle of brandy, and in a corner of the room, the pieces of a smashed beer stein flashed in the dim light. Kuisl’s face shone in the light of the fire as he prepared to take another mighty swig.

“Drink with me or leave me alone,” he said, slamming the bottle back down on the table. Simon put a fat-bellied clay cup to his mouth and sipped on its contents. It was something very strong that the hangman made from the fermented apples and pears from his orchard. Presumably, there were also a few herbs mixed in, which the medicus didn’t even want to know about.

“We found a new riddle in Wessobrunn,” Simon said abruptly. “Some words up in a linden tree. I thought you might be able to make some sense out of them.”

Kuisl belched loudly and wiped the corner of his mouth. “Who gives a damn? But go ahead, spit it out. You can’t just keep it to yourself.”

Simon smiled. He knew how curious the hangman was, even when he was stoned. “It goes like this: In gremio Mariae eris primus et felicianus.”

Kuisl nodded, then translated aloud. “You will be first at Mary’s bosom, and a happy person.” He broke into a laugh. “Just a pious sentiment, nothing more! That can’t be the clue.”

He picked up the bottle again with a vacant look, one that Simon had trouble reconciling with Kuisl’s other, sensitive and educated side. People were always astonished that the executioner knew Latin so well, even when he was completely soused. They would be even more astonished if they looked around the hangman’s library and saw all the books in German, Latin, and even Greek, written by scholars still completely unknown in most German universities.

“But it must be the next riddle,” Simon objected. “He put his name at the bottom of it. Friedrich Wildgraf, anno domini 1328-a year before his death.”

Kuisl rubbed his temples, trying to think clearly. “Well, it’s not anything from the Bible that I can remember,” he growled. “And I know most of those biblical aphorisms. You wouldn’t believe how pious people become when it’s time for them to die. I’ve heard it all, but never these words.”

Simon swallowed before continuing. Jakob Kuisl’s father had been the local hangman before him, and before that, his grandfather-a true dynasty of executioners now extending over a whole host of Bavarian cities and towns. The Kuisls had probably heard more whining and pious words than the Pope himself.

“If it’s not from the Bible, maybe it’s some secret message,” Simon said, repeating the words. “You will be first at Mary’s bosom, and a happy person. What does that mean?”

The hangman shrugged before picking up the bottle again. “Damned if I know. What’s it to me, anyway?” He took such a long swig that Simon was afraid he might choke. Finally, he put the bottle down again. “For my part, I’m going to break Scheller on the wheel on Saturday, and there’s nothing more I can do to help you. Till then, there’s a lot to do. The people want a spectacle.”

Simon could see from the hangman’s bloodshot eyes that the bottle was almost empty. Jakob Kuisl was leaning farther and farther over on his stool. A whole bottle of brandy apparently was a little too much even for a big, broad-shouldered man six feet tall.

“You’ll need some medicine,” Simon sighed, “or you won’t have a clear head tomorrow.”

“Don’t need no medicine from you goddamned quacks. I’ll make my own.”

Simon shook his head. “This medicine is something only I have.” He stood up and walked over to the living room, where Anna Maria was still sitting at a table mending the rip in the Simon’s jacket.

“Make a strong cup of coffee for your husband,” Simon said. “But don’t skimp on the beans. It’ll only work if it’s strong enough for the spoon to stand up in the cup without falling over.”

Magdalena awoke to a monotonous humming sound that grew louder and louder until she thought her head would split. Her headache was even worse than the last time she woke up. Her lips were so rough and dry that when she passed the tip of her tongue over them, they felt like the bark of a tree. She opened her eyes, blinded at first by bursts of light, but after a while the flashing stopped, things came into focus-and what she saw was paradise!

Cherubs fluttered around the head of the Savior, who was wearing a crown and looking down at her compassionately from the cross. St. Luke and St. John were off to one side, keeping watch over the starry heavens, while down below, the serpent Lucifer writhed about, impaled by the lance of the Archangel Michael, and high above, the twelve apostles sat enthroned in glory on the clouds. All the figures were ablaze in gleaming gold, bright silver, and all the shimmering colors of the rainbow. Never before had Magdalena seen such splendor.

Was she in heaven?

At least I’m no longer lying in the coffin, she thought. That’s an improvement, in any case.

As soon as she turned her head, she could see she was not in heaven, but in a sort of little chapel. She lay on her back on a stone altar surrounded by four burning candles. The walls of the whitewashed room were so densely covered with lavish oil paintings depicting various scenes from the Bible that there was hardly any space between them. Sunlight entered the room from the east through a tiny window, but the stone was so cold that her muscles felt like ice.

The murmuring came from one side. Turning her head a bit farther, Magdalena could see Brother Jakobus dressed in a simple black robe kneeling before a small altar to the Virgin Mary, his head bowed in quiet prayer. A golden cross with the two beams dangled at his chest.

“Ave Maria, the Lord be with you, blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your body, Jesus Christ…”

Magdalena tried to sit up. Could she flee without the monk noticing? Only a few steps behind her, she spotted a low wooden door with a golden handle. If she could only get to it…

When she tried to prop herself up, she found she was bound by her hands and feet like a lamb on its way to slaughter.

Christ, Lamb of God, who bears the sins of the world…

Magdalena panicked remembering the words from the Bible. What did this madman intend to do with her? Was he going to sacrifice her on the altar? Was this the reason for the lighted candles? Another Bible quotation came to mind.

God spoke to Abraham: Take your son Isaac, whom you love, and bring him to the mountain as a sacrifice…

The monk’s monotonous chant grew louder and higher in pitch until he was almost screaming in a falsetto. Magdalena tried to fight the fear rising in her and forced herself to breathe calmly and evenly. Perhaps she could even manage to crawl through the door? Crawling, creeping, hopping-it didn’t matter. She just had to get away from here. She rocked back and forth, managing to reach the left side of the altar. Just a few more inches and she would be there. She could already feel the edge underneath her when she tipped over and fell…

Her feet bumped against a large candlestick, which fell to the ground with a crash.

The singing stopped abruptly. She could hear footsteps, and a moment later, Brother Jakobus stood over her, his dagger drawn. Magdalena screamed as he pointed the dagger at her.

“Hold your tongue, stupid woman. Nobody is going to hurt you.” The monk cut the cords tying her hands and stepped off to one side. “If you promise to hold still, I’ll cut off the shackles on your feet as well. Do you promise?”

Magdalena nodded and was free a moment later. She stood up and tried to move her arms and legs but was still too weak even to remain standing. Breathing heavily, she sank down onto one of the pews and felt as if she were going to pass out.

“The poison does that to you,” Brother Jakobus said, sitting down on the bench alongside her. “A mixture of opium poppies and a few rare plants from the nightshade family. You’ll feel weak for a while; then it will pass.”

“Where…where am I?” Magdalena rubbed her wrists, which tingled as if ants were crawling around inside them.

“That’s of no concern to you,” the monk said. “This is a place where no one will disturb us. The walls are thick, and not a sound can penetrate the windows. A wonderful place to find God.”

He let his gaze wander over the splendid fresco on the ceiling. “Don’t worry. For now, you are our guarantee that your father won’t disturb us, and later…” He looked her directly in the face with what suddenly seemed like a soft, tender look. Again, the sweet scent of perfume wafted over to her.

“Magdalena…” he sighed. “The name brings many things to my mind.” He paused for a long time. “You do know Mary Magdalene, don’t you?” he asked suddenly. “The woman who was always at our Savior’s side? The patron saint of whores and adulteresses, and unclean women like you…”

She nodded. “My father named me for her.” Her voice sounded strange and grating after having remained silent for so long.

“Your father is a smart man, Magdalena. A…prophet, one might say.” Brother Jakobus laughed, bending his haggard, hunched body down to her like a scarecrow in the wind and passing his long fingers gently over her dress-hands as slender and delicate as a woman’s. “St. Mary Magdalene…” the monk whispered. “You really do resemble your namesake-beautiful and clever, but a pariah. A dirty hangman’s daughter, the scum of the city. A pious whore who secretly devotes herself to the sins of the flesh.”

“But-”

“Silence!” The monk’s voice sounded shrill again. “I know women like you only too well! Haven’t I seen you with your physician friend? So do not lie to me, Daughter of Eve!”

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and finally managed to calm down again. “But you are a believer, I can see that,” he said, laying his hand on her forehead as if to bless her. “Deep inside you, there is a good heart. You women are not all bad. Even Mary Magdalene became a saint, and you, too, can be saved.” His voice fell to a whisper now, and Magdalena struggled to hear what he was saying.

“Do you know the Bible, Hangman’s Daughter?”

He was still holding his hand on her forehead. Magdalena decided to remain silent, and he kept on speaking without waiting for an answer.

“Luke, Chapter Eight, Verse One. Jesus was traveling with a few women he had healed and saved from evil spirits, among them Mary Magdalene, from whom he had driven out seven demons. Seven demons…” The monk’s eyes flashed in the light of the candles. “You, too, are possessed by seven demons, Magdalena, and I will drive them out later, once your task here has been completed. Then you will be pure and good, a chaste maiden. Do not be troubled. We will find a place for you here in the monastery.”

He walked toward the door, but then he stopped and turned around to her again.

“I will save you, Magdalena.”

The monk smiled, then opened the door and disappeared. There was a grating sound as a key turned in the lock, then footsteps that became fainter until they finally faded away.

The hangman’s daughter remained behind with the angels, the evangelists, and a savior. Two women knelt at the foot of his cross and wept.

Simon looked into the rigid eyes of the man laid out on the bed in front of him and put down his doctor’s bag. The medicus didn’t have to listen to his heart, feel his pulse, or put a mirror under his nostrils anymore. He knew the man was dead. Gently, he closed the old man’s eyes, then turned to the deceased’s wife, who stood alongside, whimpering.

“I’ve come too late,” Simon said. “Your husband is already in a better place.”

The farm woman nodded, looking intently at her husband as if her gaze alone could bring him back to life. Simon guessed she was in her mid-forties, but the hard work in the fields, the yearly births, and the bad food made her look older. Her hair was gray and unkempt, and deep wrinkles had formed in the corners of her mouth and eyes. A few rotting, yellow stumps of teeth could be seen behind her cracked lips. Simon wondered if Magdalena would look like this in twenty years.

Simon had been up all night thinking about the hangman’s daughter. How was she doing in Augsburg? Her father had received no news from her yet, though he expected her return at any moment. But because of the blizzard, it was quite possible she’d be further delayed. No doubt she was waiting to join a group of merchants who awaited better weather-and an end to the attacks.

A child’s cry startled Simon out of his thoughts. A girl about four years of age was fondling the face of her dead father, and at the back of the room, six more of the farmer’s children were standing about with lowered heads. Two of them were coughing loudly; the medicus hoped they hadn’t caught the fever, too.

In the last two weeks, over thirty people had died in Schongau from the mysterious illness, most of them the elderly or children. Along the city wall, St. Sebastian’s Cemetery was filling up, and a number of the old graves holding victims of the plague were now being turned over to make room for the new arrivals. Simon and his father had tried everything. They had bled their patients, given them enemas, brewed them a drink of linden blossoms and wild marjoram. Bonifaz Fronwieser had even leafed through the pages of the so-called Dreckapotheke, or Dirty Pharmacy, in search of a magic potion for fever. When his father started mixing dried toads in vinegar and making powder from mouse droppings, Simon ran out of the treatment room, cursing.

“Faith, it’s faith that helps,” his father called after him.

“Faith! Is that the best we can do?”

The very thought of what his father was doing made Simon curse under his breath. Mouse droppings and dried toads! Next they’d be painting pentagrams and magic signs on the doors of the sick. If only he had some of that Jesuit’s powder! The physician was sure this medicine, acquired from the bark of a tree in the West Indies, would quickly reduce the fever. Simon had long ago used his last bit of it, however, and the next Venetian merchant would not be heading their way until the mountain passes were open again.

Once more, he turned to the farm woman and her coughing children. “It’s important now that you bury your husband as soon as possible,” said Simon. “He could be carrying something that will infect you and the children as well.”

“A…spirit?” the farm woman asked anxiously.

The physician shook his head in resignation. “No, not a spirit. Think of them as tiny creatures that-”

“Tiny creatures?” The woman’s face became even paler. “In my Alois?”

Simon sighed. “Just forget about that and bury him.”

“But the ground is frozen, and we’ll have to wait until-”

There was a knock at the door. Simon turned around to see a dirty little boy in the doorway, looking up at him with a mixture of fear and respect.

“Are you the Schongau physician?” he asked finally. Simon nodded. Secretly, he was happy to be addressed this way, because most residents still regarded him as nothing more than the coddled son of the local doctor, a dandy and a womanizer who had run out of money at the university in Ingolstadt.

“The…the Schreevogls have sent me,” the boy said.

“I’m supposed to tell you that Clara is coughing up snot and mucus. And please, can you stop by as soon as possible?”

Simon closed his eyes in a silent prayer. “Not Clara,” he murmured. “God, not Clara.”

He grabbed his doctor’s bag and, after exchanging a few more words with the farmer’s family, rushed off after the boy. On the way to the marketplace where the Schreevogls lived, Simon couldn’t help thinking of Clara. So much had happened in the last few days that he’d completely forgotten her! Usually, he stopped to pay a visit to his little friend several times a week. And now she was sick; perhaps she even had this terrible fever!

Maria Schreevogl was waiting for him by the front door. As so often, she appeared pale and agitated. Simon never understood what the patrician saw in the overly pious, sometimes hysterical woman. He assumed there were financial considerations involved in the marriage. Maria Schreevogl’s maiden name was Püchner, and she came from an old influential family with political connections.

“She’s in bed up in her room!” the woman lamented. “Please Mary, Mother of God and all saints, don’t let it be this fever! Don’t let this happen to my Clara!”

Simon hurried up the wide staircase and entered the room of the sick girl. Clara lay in her bed coughing, her pale face peeking out from a thick comforter.

Her stepfather, Jakob Schreevogl, sat anxiously at the edge of the bed. “Thank you for coming so quickly, Fronwieser,” he said, standing up. “Would you like something to drink-perhaps some coffee?”

Simon shook his head, noticing with concern that the patrician peered back at him with vacant eyes. The councillor looked like he was in a trance. Just the evening before, he’d returned with the hangman from their trip with Karl Semer, and clearly, he was severely shaken by the news of his daughter’s sickness.

Simon bent down to look at Clara. “Clara, it’s me, Simon,” he whispered, but Clara didn’t react. Her eyes were closed and she was breathing fast. In her sleep her whole body shook from time to time with a coughing fit. The physician placed an ear to her chest and listened to her breathing.

“How long has she been this way?” Simon asked, trying to speak over the crying and wailing of Schreevogl’s wife, who had followed him into the room, anxiously passing rosary beads through her fingers.

“Just since yesterday,” Jakob Schreevogl replied. “The fever came on in the evening, very quickly. Since then we haven’t been able to talk to her. Good Lord, woman, be quiet for a moment!”

The praying stopped. “Does she have the fever, Simon?” Maria Schreevogl asked through tears. “You can tell me! Oh, good Lord, does she have it?” She stared at the medicus wide-eyed.

Simon hesitated. The sudden onslaught of the illness, the rasping cough, the high fever-everything pointed to Clara’s having been infected. Once more the medicus cursed himself for not having been able to ask Magdalena to pick up some medications for him in Augsburg. Perhaps the apothecaries there even had the Jesuit’s powder! But now it was too late.

When Simon remained silent, that was sign enough for the patrician woman.

“St. Barbara, I will lose her!” she moaned. “St. Quirinus, help us!” She fell to her knees, fingering her rosary beads again.

Her husband tried to ignore her and turned to address Simon in a serious voice. “What can we do?”

Simon struggled to look him in the eye. “I’ll be honest with you, Schreevogl,” he said. “I can make a compress for her and a cup of tea, but that’s about all. Beyond that all we can do is wait and pray.”

“Saint Primus, Saint Felicianus, be with us in our hour of need and sickness!” Maria Schreevogl’s voice turned shrill as she placed a chain of sacred amulets around Clara’s neck.

“That will never cure her, woman,” said Jakob. “Better to make her a cup of linden blossom tea. I think the cook still has some in the kitchen.”

Maria hurried out the door wailing, and Simon bent down again over Clara.

“I’ll put a salve on her chest,” he said. “One of the hangman’s recipes-calamint, rosemary, and goose fat. That will at least alleviate the cough.”

He opened Clara’s shirt and began applying the salve, leaving the chain with the saint’s images in place-it couldn’t hurt, in any case.

As he rubbed the salve on, his gaze fell on the individual figures pictured on the chain’s silver coins, each engraved with a figure and a name, just as in the basilica in Altenstadt-St. Barbara, St. Quirinus, St. George, and of course, St. Walburga, patron saint of the sick and of women in labor.

But there were some here whom he had never heard of-St. Ignatius, who kept watch over children and difficult births; St. Primus again; and St. Felicianus, to whom Maria Schreevogl had prayed earlier.

Suddenly Simon stopped rubbing the child’s chest and reached for two amulets on the chain in front of him, staring at the names.

St. Primus, St. Felicianus…

The two amulets felt like two clumps of ice in his hand. How could he have been so blind?

With a choked voice, he turned to Jakob Schreevogl and asked, “Can we withdraw for a moment to your library?”

The patrician raised his eyebrows. “Do you think you might be able to find a medicine for this sickness there? I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you. My collection of medical books is limited.”

Simon shook his head. “No, I’m looking for a book on the lives of the saints.”

“On the lives of the saints?” Jakob Schreevogl looked back at him in astonishment. “I think my wife has something like that. But why-”

“Let’s just go to the library. For the time being, there’s nothing else we can do here, in any case. If my suspicions are right, I’ll soon be able to buy Clara the best medicine in all of the Priests’ Corner. And a Paracelsus bound in gold leaf for you. You have my word on that.”

Jakob Kuisl set out on the painful mission. He almost felt like a condemned man on the way to the scaffold. The strong coffee the day before had helped him over the worst of his hangover, but his head still felt like a sack full of stones. But it wasn’t the headache that troubled him the most; it was that he had broken his word.

When the bailiff Johannes saw the mood Kuisl was in, he quickly stepped aside to allow the hangman to enter the dungeon.

“A load of work, ain’t it?” he called after him. “It will be a bloody show on Saturday when you break the prisoner on the wheel. I hope everyone has a ball. You’ll break every bone, heh? I’ve bet two hellers that Scheller will still be screaming the next day.”

Kuisl ignored him and trudged straight to the cell holding the robber chief and his gang. A quick glance assured him that this time, in contrast to the last, there were blankets, water, and fresh bread. The sick boy, too, seemed better. The medicine appeared to have helped.

Hans Scheller stood directly behind the bars, his arms folded. As the hangman approached, the robber chief spat in his face.

“The gallows, huh?” he growled. “A clean, quick matter? Bah! Damn liar! It’s going to be slow, one blow after the other, and I trusted you, you goddamned hangman!”

Jakob Kuisl slowly wiped the spit from his face. “I’m sorry, whether you believe me or not,” he said calmly. “I tried, but the authorities wanted to see screaming and wailing. So be it,” he said, stepping right up to Scheller. “But we can still put one over on these fat cats,” he whispered softly so that those standing around couldn’t hear.

Hans Scheller looked at him in disbelief. “What are you thinking of?”

Jakob Kuisl looked around to see if anyone was listening, but the other robbers were too wrapped up in their own concerns, and the bailiff Johannes preferred to wait outside. Finally, the hangman took a little leather bag out of his coat. He opened it, and a little brown ball rolled into his wrinkled hand, a pill no larger than a marble.

“One bite and you’ll be with our Lord,” Kuisl said. He held it up like a valuable pearl. “I made it especially for you. You won’t feel any pain. Just put it in your mouth, and when I strike, bite into it.”

Taking the pill in his slender fingers, Scheller gave it a closer look. “No pain, you say?”

Kuisl nodded. “No pain, believe me, this is something I understand.”

“And what about the big show?” Scheller whispered. “The people will be disappointed. I’ve heard they sometimes hang the hangman himself if things don’t go as planned. They’ll think you haven’t done your job right.”

“Let me worry about that, Scheller. Just don’t take the poison now or the aldermen might decide to take out their anger on the others. Afterward, I’d have to break the boy on the wheel, too.”

The robber chief was silent for a long while before turning back to the hangman. “Then it’s right what they say about you, Kuisl.”

“What do they say?”

“That you are a good hangman.”

“I’m a hangman, but not a murderer. We’ll see each other again on Saturday.”

Jakob Kuisl turned and left the dungeon. For a long time, Hans Scheller rubbed the little ball between his fingers. He closed his eyes and tried to prepare himself for his long journey into darkness.

They found the book about saints at the far end of the shelf between the works of Plato and a dog-eared farmers’ almanac that had made its way into Schreevogl’s library unbeknownst to him. Presumably, his wife had acquired it from some itinerant merchant, along with the volume on the saints, the book of hymns and prayers, and the large eight-pound family Bible.

With the little book in hand, Simon summarized what he and the hangman had found in the crypt. He told Schreevogl about the riddles, of the feeling he was being constantly observed, and of his most recent find with Benedikta in the Tassilo Linden tree near Wessobrunn.

“We’re firmly convinced that all these riddles will lead us to the Templars’ treasure!” he concluded as he returned the other books to the shelves. “A treasure that the master of the German Templars, Friedrich Wildgraf, intentionally hid far away from the great cities. Not in Paris, nor in Rome, but right here in rural, provincial Bavaria, where he felt his treasure would be safe from the French king. The riddles are posed in such a way that only locals can solve them!”

Jakob Schreevogl was leaning against the edge of the table and listening with growing interest to what the medicus was telling him.

“It’s possible that Friedrich Wildgraf passed along his knowledge to his sons and grandchildren here in Schongau,” Simon continued, “and we assume that this line died out at some point and knowledge of the treasure and the riddles with it.”

“And what does the most recent riddle say?” Jakob Schreevogl asked.

Simon looked warily out the window to see if anyone was watching. Only then did he continue in a soft voice. “It says, In gremio Mariae eris primus et felicianus. I thought for a long time it was just a pious saying from the Bible, something like, You will be first at Mary’s bosom, and a happy person.”

“And what does it really say?”

“I’ll tell you when I’ve found the right passage in this little book.” Simon leafed through it, finally stopping to read a passage to himself. “I was right!” he exclaimed, then lowered his voice again to a whisper. “It’s not a saying from the Bible, but simply a sentence that conceals two names-Primus and Felicianus. Translated, the names mean ‘the first’ and ‘the happy,’ but they are also the names of two saints from ancient Rome. Here!” He pointed to a page showing two fettered, naked men being tortured on the rack by a hangman’s helpers. Nevertheless, the two saints smiled, knowing they would soon meet their Savior.

“Primus and Felicianus were two Christian Romans who were tortured and finally beheaded on the order of Emperor Diocletian,” Simon continued excitedly. “But first they were able to convert thousands of Romans, according to this book, through pure steadfastness.”

“But that was in Rome!” Schreevogl objected. “Didn’t you just say that this Templar intentionally chose our provincial area over the great cities? That can’t be the riddle’s solution.”

The physician grinned and waved the little book around. “Don’t come to any hasty conclusions, Your Honor. Primus and Felicianus were buried in Rome, indeed, but eventually their remains were moved to another place, where they’re still revered today.”

In the meantime, Jakob Schreevogl had gotten up out of his chair. “And where is that?” he asked. “Don’t make all this sound so dramatic!”

Simon closed the book and placed it back on the shelf. “The Benedictine Monastery in Rottenbuch, just a few miles from here.”

Schreevogl looked at him in disbelief. “Rottenbuch?”

Simon nodded. “A monastery, which, by the way, is devoted to worship of the Virgin Mary. Primus and Felicianus at Mary’s bosom. That’s the solution!” He slapped himself on the forehead. “I’m so stupid! As a child, I even went on a pilgrimage there to honor the two saints!”

Schreevogl smiled. “And if I know you, you’re probably already planning another pilgrimage there.”

Simon was already at the library door when he stopped to contemplate. “I won’t go until Clara gets better,” he said. “Your girl is worth more than any treasure in the world.”