The Hangman’s Daughter

CHAPTER 11

SUNDAY APRIL 29, A.D. 1659 SIX O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING

Simon was awakened by a creaking noise, a soft sound that had insinuated itself into his dreams. In a second, he was wide awake. Next to him, Magdalena was still in deep sleep. Her breath was even, and the smile on her lips suggested she was in the midst of a beautiful dream. Simon hoped that she was dreaming of last night.

He had walked with Magdalena along the river to gather herbs. He had tried not to say a word about the recent events in Schongau. At least for a brief moment he wanted to forget. He didn’t want to think of the man they called the devil, who was intent on murdering him. He didn’t want to think of the midwife in the town jail, who was still unconscious, nor the dead children. Springtime was here, the sun was shining warmly, and the waters of the Lech burbled along softly.

After a good mile through the meadowland along the riverbank they reached Simon’s favorite spot, a small gravelly cove that could not be seen from the path. A large willow spread its branches over the cove, so that the river behind it sparkled through the leaves. In recent years he had often come to this spot when he wanted to sit and think. Now he was looking out over the river with Magdalena. They talked about the last market day, when they had danced together and people’s tongues were wagging at the tables all around. They told each other about their childhood. Simon spoke of his time as an army surgeon, and Magdalena of the fever that had laid her low for many weeks when she was seven years old. During that time she had also been taught to read by her father, who remained at her bedside day and night. Ever since then she helped him mix his potions and grind his herbs, and she always learned something new when she rummaged through her father’s books.

To Simon it seemed like a miracle. Magdalena was the first woman he could discuss books with. The first woman to have read Johann Scultetus’s Wundarzneyisches Zeughaus or Surgical Armory, and to know the works of Paracelsus. Only now and then did he feel something like pangs of regret when he remembered that this girl could never become his wife. As the hangman’s daughter she was dishonorable, and the town would never permit their union. They would have to go to some foreign country, a hangman’s wench and a traveling field surgeon, and they would have to live by begging in the streets. But then, why not? His love for this girl was so strong now, at this moment, that he would readily give up everything for her.

All afternoon and evening they had talked, and all of a sudden they could hear the ringing of the six o’clock bell from the parish church. In another half hour the gates of Schongau would be closed. They knew that they would never get back in time. And so they went to an abandoned barn nearby, where Simon had already slept on previous occasions, and there they remained for the night. They talked on, laughing over the pranks they played as children long ago. Schongau, its gossiping burghers and both of their fathers were far, far away. From time to time Simon ran his hand across Magdalena’s cheek or stroked her hair, but every time his fingers approached her bodice she smiled and pushed him away. She did not yet want to give herself to him, and Simon accepted it. At some time in the night they had fallen asleep next to each other like two children.

At the break of dawn, the creaking of the barn door woke Simon out of a light sleep.

They had settled down high up under the roof, from where a ladder descended to the barn floor. Carefully, the physician peered around a bale of straw and far down to the barn floor. He saw that the door was open a crack and the first light of dawn was shining through. He was sure that he had closed the door the evening before, if only to keep out the cold. Silently he slipped on his trousers and cast a last glance at Magdalena, who was still asleep. Directly below him, hidden by the wooden floor of the loft, he could hear shuffling steps approaching the ladder. Simon felt around in the straw for his knife, a perfectly honed stiletto he had already used for dissecting corpses and amputating the limbs of wounded men. With his right hand, he firmly gripped the handle, and with his left hand he pushed an especially large bale of straw directly to the edge of the loft.

Below him a figure appeared. He waited for a moment, then gave the bale a last shove so that it fell directly onto the figure. With a piercing cry Simon jumped after it with the intention of pulling the stranger to the floor and, if necessary, stabbing him in the back.

The man ducked to the side without even looking up and the bale hit the floor next to him, bursting into a cloud of dust and straw. At the same time the man raised his arms and warded off Simon’s attack. The physician felt strong fingers grabbing his wrists in a viselike grip. Groaning with pain, he released the stiletto. Then the figure rammed a knee into his abdomen so that he sank forward to the floor. All went dark before his eyes.

Blind with pain he crawled around on the floor, desperately feeling for his knife. A boot came down on his right hand, softly at first, then harder and harder. Simon gasped for air as something started to crack inside his wrist. Suddenly the pain eased. The figure, which he was able to see only as through a fog, had removed the foot from his hand.

“If you seduce my daughter again I’ll break both your hands and lay you out on the rack, understand?”

Simon held his abdomen and crawled some distance away.

“I didn’t…didn’t touch her,” he groaned. “Not like you think. But we…we love each other.”

The response was a dry, suppressed laugh.

“I don’t give a damn! She’s a hangman’s daughter, have you forgotten that? She is dishonorable! Do you want to expose her to even more ridicule, just because you can’t control yourself?” Jakob Kuisl was now standing directly over Simon and rolled him over on his back with his foot so that he was able to look directly into his eyes.

“Be glad I didn’t castrate you on the spot,” he said. “It would’ve saved you and some girls in town a whole lot of trouble!”

“Leave him alone, Father.” Magdalena’s voice came from the loft above. She had been awakened by the noise of the fight and was looking down, still sleepy-eyed and with straw in her hair. “If anything, I seduced Simon and not the other way around. And besides, if I am dishonorable anyway, then what does a little more matter?”

The hangman shook his fist at her. “I didn’t teach you reading and curing the sick so that you could get yourself knocked up and shamed and chased out of town. Can you imagine me having to place the mask of shame on my own daughter!”

“I…I can provide for Magdalena.” Simon, still rubbing his groin, replied again. “We could go to another town, and there we could…”

Another blow hit him on his unprotected side, in his kidneys, so that he doubled up again, gasping.

“What could you do? Nothing. Do you want to go begging or what? Magdalena is going to marry my cousin in Steingaden, that’s been agreed. And now come down here!”

Jakob Kuisl shook the ladder. Magdalena’s face had become white.

“Who is it I’m supposed to marry?” she asked, her voice flat.

“Hans Kuisl of Steingaden, an excellent match,” growled the hangman. “I talked to him about it just a few weeks ago.”

“And this is the way you’re telling me, here to my face?”

“One way or the other, I would have told you sooner or later.”

Another bale of straw hit the hangman’s head, nearly knocking him down. This time he hadn’t expected it. Simon couldn’t help grinning in spite of his pain. Magdalena had inherited her father’s quick reactions.

“I’m not going to marry anybody,” she screamed down. “Especially not fat Hans from Steingaden. His breath stinks, and he no longer has any teeth! I’m staying with Simon, just so you know!”

“Stubborn wench,” growled the hangman. But at least he seemed to have given up the idea of dragging his daughter home. He headed for the exit, opened the door, and the morning sun flooded the barn. Briefly he stopped in the light.

“By the way,” he muttered as he walked, “they found Johannes Strasser dead in a barn, in Altenstadt. He, too, had the mark on him. I heard it from the servant girl at Strasser’s inn. I’m going to have a look at that boy. If you want to, you can come along, Simon.”

Then he stepped out into the cool morning. Simon hesitated briefly. He glanced up at Magdalena, but she had buried herself in the straw and was sobbing.

He looked up at her and whispered, “We…we’ll talk later.” Then he followed the hangman out, limping.

For a long time they walked along in silence. They passed the raft landing, where the first rafts were already tying up at this early hour, then turned to the left on the Natternsteig to reach the road to Altenstadt. They deliberately avoided going straight through town, as they wanted to be alone. Here on the narrow footpath winding its way below the town wall, not a soul could be seen.

Finally, Simon spoke up. He had been thinking it over for a long time and was choosing his words carefully.

“I…I’m sorry,” he began haltingly. “But it is true, I love your daughter. And I can provide for her. I have attended the university, even though I didn’t finish. I ran out of money. But I have enough to hold my head above water as an itinerant surgeon. That, together with all that your daughter knows…”

The hangman stopped and looked down from the rise into the valley below, where the forest extended all the way to the horizon.

He interrupted Simon without turning his eyes from the scene in front of him. “Do you have any idea what it means to earn your daily bread out there?”

“I’ve already traveled around with my father,” replied Simon.

“He cared for you, and for that you should be forever thankful,” said the hangman. “But this time you would be alone. You would have to take care of your wife and your children. You would have to go from one country fair to another, a quack advertising his cheap tinctures like sour beer, getting rotten cabbage thrown at him and being mocked by peasants who know nothing about your healing arts. The learned physicians would make sure that you get thrown out as soon as you set foot in their town. Your children would die of hunger. Is that what you want?”

“But my father and I, we always had an income…”

The hangman spat on the ground. “That was during the war,” he continued. “When there is war, there’s always something one can do. Sawing off limbs, cleaning out wounds with oil, dragging off the dead, and covering them with lime. Now the war is over. There are no more armies to follow. And I thank God for that!”

The hangman started walking again and Simon followed a few steps behind him.

After a few minutes of silence, he asked, “Master, may I ask you a question?” Jakob Kuisl continued walking and spoke without turning around.

“What do you want?”

“I heard you haven’t always been in Schongau. You left this town when you were about my age. Why? And why did you return?”

The hangman stopped again. They had almost circled the entire town. Before them, on the right, the road to Altenstadt appeared. An oxcart trundled slowly along the road. Beyond, the forest stretched all the way to the horizon. Jakob Kuisl remained silent for such a long time that Simon began to think he would never receive an answer. Finally the hangman spoke.

“I didn’t want a trade that forced me to kill,” he said.

“And what did you do instead?”

Jakob Kuisl laughed softly.

“I killed all the more. Indiscriminately. Aimlessly. In a frenzy. Men, women, children.”

“You were a…soldier?” asked Simon carefully.

The hangman was again silent for quite some time before answering.

“I joined Tilly’s army. Scoundrels, highwaymen, but also honest men and adventurers, like myself…”

“You told me once that you were in Magdeburg…” Simon asked again.

A brief shudder went through the hangman’s body. Even here in Schongau, people had heard the horror stories about the fall of the town in the far north. The Catholic troops under General Tilly had practically leveled the place, and only very few inhabitants had survived the massacre. Simon had heard that the soldiers had slaughtered children like lambs, had raped women, and after that had nailed them to the doors of their homes like our crucified Savior. Even if only half the stories were true, it was enough to make Schongauers utter prayers of thanks for having been spared such a bloodbath.

Jakob Kuisl marched on. Walking briskly, Simon caught up with him on the road to Altenstadt. He sensed that he had said too much.

“Why did you come back?” he asked after a while.

“Because a hangman is necessary,” mumbled Jakob Kuisl. “Otherwise everything goes to the dogs. If there has to be killing, then at least it should be the right kind, according to the law. And so I came home to Schongau so that things would be in order. And now be quiet. I have to think.”

Simon tried one last time: “Will you think it over again, about Magdalena?”

The hangman gave him an angry look from the side. Then he walked on at such speed that Simon had trouble keeping up with him.

They had been walking side by side for a good half hour when the first houses of Altenstadt appeared. From the few sentences Kuisl had uttered during that time, Simon was able to gather that Johannes Strasser had been found dead very early that morning in his foster father’s stable. Josepha, one of the servant girls at the inn, had discovered him among the bales of straw. After telling the innkeeper, she ran over to the hangman’s house in Schongau to get some Saint-John’s-wort. When woven into a wreath it was supposed to help ward off evil powers. The servant girl was convinced that the devil had taken the boy. The hangman gave Josepha the herb and listened to her story. He left shortly thereafter, stopping only to give his daughter’s lover a good thrashing before continuing on his way. In the gray morning light he had simply followed their tracks and had easily found the barn.

Now they were both standing in front of the inn at Altenstadt, which Simon had visited only a few days earlier. They were not alone. Local peasants and wagon drivers were crowded in the square around a makeshift bier nailed together from a few boards. They were whispering-some of the women held rosaries in their hands and two servant girls knelt at the head of the bier and prayed, their bodies swaying back and forth. Simon also recognized the village priest of Altenstadt in the crowd and heard mumbled verses in Latin. When the people in Altenstadt noticed that the hangman was approaching, some of them made the sign of the cross. The priest interrupted his litany and stared at the two, his eyes flashing with hostility.

“What is the Schongau hangman doing here?” he asked suspiciously. “There’s no work for you here! The devil has already done his work!”

Jakob Kuisl wouldn’t be put off. “I heard there was an accident. Perhaps I can help?”

The priest shook his head. “I told you already, there’s nothing to be done. The boy is dead. The devil surely got him and branded him with his mark.”

“Just let the hangman come!” It was the voice of Strasser, the innkeeper. Simon recognized him among the peasants standing around the bier. “Let him see what that witch did to my boy, so that he may give her an especially slow death!” The face of the innkeeper was white as chalk and his eyes glowed with hatred as he looked back and forth between the hangman and his dead foster son.

Inquisitively, Jakob Kuisl stepped closer to the bier. Simon followed him. It was nailed together from planks and covered with fresh pine twigs. The scent of their sap could not entirely cover the stench coming from the corpse. Johannes Strasser’s body was already showing black spots on the limbs, and flies were buzzing around his face. Someone had mercifully put two coins on the open eyes that were wide with horror as they stared up at the sky. There was a deep cut below the chin which extended nearly from one ear to the other. Dried blood stuck to the boy’s shirt, which was crawling with flies as well.

Simon couldn’t help wincing. Who would do such a thing? The boy was twelve years old at the most and his greatest sin so far had probably consisted of swiping a loaf of bread or a pitcher of milk from his foster father. Now he lay here, pale and cold, having met a bloody death at the end of a much too short, unhappy life. Tolerated but never loved, an outcast even in death. Even now there was no one who would shed sincere tears for him. Strasser stood at the bier with his lips pressed together, furious and full of hatred for the murderer but not actually grieving.

The hangman turned the Strasser boy’s body gently on its side. Below the shoulder blade was the purple mark, blurred but still quite visible, a circle with a cross extending beneath it.

“The devil’s mark,” whispered the priest, crossing himself. Then he intoned the Lord’s Prayer.

“Pater noster, qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum…”

“Where did you find him?” asked Jakob Kuisl without taking his eyes from the corpse.

“In the stable, all the way in back, hidden under some bales of straw.”

Simon looked around. It was Franz Strasser who had spoken. Full of hatred, the innkeeper looked down on what had once been his ward.

“He must have been lying there all the time. Josepha went to look this morning because of the smell. She thought it was some dead animal. But then it turned out to be Johannes,” he mumbled.

Simon shivered. It was the same kind of cut that little Anton Kratz had a few days ago. Peter Grimmer, Anton Kratz, Johannes Strasser… What about Sophie and Clara? Had the devil caught them too by now?

The hangman stooped down and began to examine the corpse. He brushed his fingers across the wound, looking for other injuries. When he did not find anything he sniffed at the body.

“Three days, no more,” he said. “Whoever killed him knew his business. A clean cut through the throat.”

The priest eyed him angrily from the side. “That’s enough now, Kuisl,” he barked. “You can go. This is the church’s business. You look after that witch in your own town, that Stechlin woman! She’s responsible for everything here, after all!”

Strasser, standing next to him, nodded. “Johannes was often at her place. Together with the other wards and with that redhead Sophie. She bewitched him, and now the devil is coming for the souls of the little children!”

Many people could be heard murmuring and praying in the crowd. Strasser felt encouraged.

“Tell those big shots in town,” he shouted at the hangman, his face red with wrath, “that if they don’t clean up that brood of witches soon, we’ll come and get them ourselves!”

Some of the peasants agreed loudly as he continued his harangue. “We’ll hang them on the highest gable and light a fire underneath. Then we’ll see who else is in bed with them!”

The priest nodded deliberately. “There’s truth to that,” he said. “We cannot just look on as our children fall victim to the devil, one by one, without stopping him. The witches must burn.”

“The witches?” asked Simon.

The priest shrugged. “It is obvious that this cannot be the work of one single witch. The devil is in league with many of them. And furthermore…” He lifted his index finger as if to provide the final proof in a logical chain of arguments. “The Stechlin woman is in jail, isn’t she? Then it must be someone else! Walpurgis Night is coming very soon! Most likely Satan’s lovers are already dancing with the Evil One in the forest at night and kissing his anus. Then they swarm into town, naked and besotted, to drink the blood of innocent little children.”

“Come on, you don’t believe that, do you?” interjected Simon, his voice somewhat uncertain. “These are just horror stories, nothing more!”

“The Stechlin woman had flying salves and witch hazel in her house,” cried one of the peasants farther back in the crowd. “Berchtholdt told me so. He was there during the torture. Now she cast a spell to make herself unconscious so as not to betray her playmates! And on Walpurgis Night they’ll come and get more children!”

Franz Strasser nodded in agreement. “Johannes was in the forest a lot. They probably lured him there. He always babbled something about some kind of a hiding place.”

“A hiding place?” asked Jakob Kuisl.

For the past few minutes the hangman had been examining the corpse in silence, even taking a close look at the blood-smeared hair and fingernails. He had also inspected the sign once more. Only now did he seem to take an interest in the conversation again.

“What kind of hiding place?”

Franz Strasser shrugged.

“I already told the physician,” he mumbled. “Somewhere in the forest. Must be some kind of cave. He was always covered with dirt when he returned.”

One more time the hangman contemplated the boy’s fingers, now rigid in death.

“What do you mean by ‘covered with dirt’?” he asked.

“Well, full of clay, you see. It looked as if he had been crawling around somewhere.”

Jakob Kuisl closed his eyes. “Damn it all! I’m a complete idiot,” he mumbled. “It’s so clear, and I didn’t see it!”

“What…what is it?” whispered Simon, who was standing next to him and had been the only one to hear the hangman’s words. “What didn’t you see?”

Jakob Kuisl grabbed the physician by the arm and pulled him away from the crowd. “I…I’m not entirely sure yet,” he said. “But I believe I know now where the children’s hiding place is.”

“Where?” Simon’s heartbeat quickened.

“There is something else we must check out first,” the hangman whispered, swiftly taking off down the road in the direction of Schongau. “But for that we’ll have to wait until it’s dark.”

“Tell the highborn gentlemen we are not going to just stand by and wait much longer! The witch must burn!” Franz Strasser called after them. “And that redheaded Sophie, we’re going to look for her ourselves in the forest. With God’s help we shall find that hiding place, and then we shall smoke out that witches’ nest!”

Hooting and cheering broke out, and through it all the priest’s high voice could be heard intoning a Latin hymn, though they could make out only a few words.

“Dies irae, dies illa. Solvet saeclum in favilla… Day of wrath, that day of burning! Earth shall end, to ashes turning…”

Simon bit his lip. The day of wrath was indeed close at hand.

Court clerk Johann Lechner blew sand over what he had just written and then rolled up the parchment. With a nod he enjoined the bailiff to open the door to the small chamber. As he rose, he turned once more toward the Augsburg wagon driver.

“If you told the truth, you have nothing to fear. The brawl is of no interest to us…at least not yet,” he added. “We only wish to know who set fire to the Stadel.”

Martin Hueber nodded without looking up. His head was hanging over the table, and his skin was pale and sallow. Just one night in the detention room and the anticipation of possible torture had been sufficient to transform the formerly arrogant wagon driver into a bundle of misery.

Johann Lechner smiled. If the Fuggers’ delegates were really going to come in the next few days and insist indignantly that their wagon driver be handed over to them, they would find a repentant sinner. Lechner would then generously order his release. It was quite possible that Martin Hueber would still have to sit in jail in distant Augsburg, if only to atone for his superiors’ embarrassment…Lechner felt certain that next time the Augsburg merchants would be much more deferential.

On the whole, Martin Hueber had confessed to what he had already hinted yesterday. Less than two weeks ago, some of his men were involved in a brawl at the Stern, on which occasion Josef Grimmer had thrashed one of them so soundly that he had to be taken to the infirmary. Together with a gang of cronies they had then sneaked down to the raft landing on Tuesday night in order to teach the Schongau guards a lesson they wouldn’t forget. But by the time they reached the Stadel, it was already burning. Martin Hueber did see a few figures looking like soldiers running away from there, but he had been too far away to make out more than that. A brawl occurred afterward nevertheless, but only because the Schongau men had suspected them of arson.

“And who do you think set fire to the Stadel?” Lechner asked just before leaving, as he was already standing in the door.

Martin Hueber shrugged. “Those were foreign soldiers, not from around here. That much is certain.”

“It’s just strange that no Schongau guard had noticed them, only you fellows from Augsburg,” Lechner added.

The wagon driver resumed his lament. “By the Holy Virgin Mary, I told you already! Because the Schongauers were so busy putting out the fire! And besides, it was difficult to make out anything with all that smoke!”

Johann Lechner gave him a piercing look. “May our Savior keep you from lying,” he murmured. “Otherwise you’ll hang, and I won’t give a hoot that you are a wagon driver for the Fuggers or, for all I care, the emperor himself.” He turned to leave.

“Give the prisoner some warm soup and a piece of bread, by God!” he called back to the bailiff as he went down the stairs to the Ballenhaus. “After all, we are no monsters!” Behind him the door of the cell fell shut with a squeak.

Johann Lechner stopped once more on the worn steps and from this high vantage point surveyed the town’s warehouse. In spite of worm-eaten beams and peeling paint, the hall was still Schongau’s pride. Bales of wool, cloth, and the finest spices were stacked up to the ceiling in places. A scent of cloves hung in the air. Who could be interested in seeing this wealth go up in flames? If they really were soldiers, they must have been under someone’s orders. But whose? Someone in Schongau? An outsider? Maybe in fact the Augsburgers? Or could it have been the devil himself, after all? The court clerk furrowed his brow. He must have missed something, and he could not forgive himself such a thing. He was a man of perfection.

“Sir! I have been sent by Andreas, the bailiff at the jail.” Johann Lechner looked down, where a young lad in wooden clogs and a threadbare linen shirt had just come through the door. He was out of breath and his eyes sparkled.

“The bailiff Andreas?” Johann Lechner asked inquisitively. “What does he want?”

“He says the Stechlin woman is awake again, and she’s howling and whining like ten furies!” The boy was standing on the lowest step. He was not yet fourteen years old. Expectantly he looked at the court clerk. “Are you going to burn her soon, sir?”

Johann Lechner looked at him with satisfaction. “Well, we shall see,” he said as he placed a few small coins in the boy’s hand. “Just go look for the physician now, so that he may confirm the good health of the Stechlin woman.”

The boy had already run off when he called him back once more.

“But get the old physician, not the young one! Do you understand?” The boy nodded.

“The young one is a little too…” Johann Lechner hesitated, then he smiled. “Well, we all want to see the witch burning soon, don’t we?”

The boy nodded. The ardor in his eyes almost frightened Lechner.

Rhythmic knocking, as if a heavy hammer was being pounded again and again against a door, had awakened Martha Stechlin. When she opened her eyes, she noticed that the hammer was raging inside her body. A pain such as she had never experienced before ran through her right hand at regular intervals. She looked down and saw a shapeless black and blue pig’s bladder. It took her a while to realize that this bladder was in fact her hand. The hangman had done a good job with the thumbscrews. Her fingers and the back of her hand were now swollen to more than twice their normal size.

She vaguely remembered having drunk the potion Jakob Kuisl gave her. It had tasted bitter, and she could imagine what it contained. She was a midwife, after all, and familiar with drugs made of thorn apple, monkshood, or mandrake. In small doses, Martha Stechlin had often used those as painkillers during childbirth. Of course no one was supposed to know this, as those plants were widely reputed to be witches’ herbs.

The drink the hangman had given her was so strong that she could only vaguely remember the events that had followed. She had been tortured, but the court clerk, the witnesses, and also the hangman had been strangely far off, their voices sounding like fading echoes. She had not felt any pain, only a pleasant warmth in her hand. Then the blackness had come, and now finally the rhythmic pounding that had brutally fetched her back from the land beyond fear and suffering. The pain flowed into her like water into an empty vessel, filling her completely. She began to scream and to shake the bars of her cell with her undamaged hand.

“Well, you witch, can you feel the fire yet?” shouted Georg Riegg, the raftsman, from the adjoining cell. He and the guardsman from the raft landing were still imprisoned with her. Martha Stechlin’s screams were a welcome diversion.

“Why don’t you witch yourself out of here, if you can, or did the devil abandon you?” sneered Georg Riegg.

The guardsman who was locked up together with him grabbed his shoulder. “Stop, Georg,” he admonished him. “The woman is in pain. We should call the bailiff.”

But that was no longer necessary. Just as the raftsman was about to launch himself into yet another hateful tirade, Andreas the jailkeeper opened the door to the keep. The screaming had awakened him from his nap. When he saw that Martha Stechlin was rattling the bars he left in a hurry. Her sobbing and crying followed him out into the street.

Just half an hour later, the witnesses, Berchtholdt, Augustin, and Schreevogl, were informed and summoned to the jailhouse. There Johann Lechner was already waiting for them with the doctor.

Old Fronwieser was the town’s most compliant henchman, meekly assenting to anything they asked him to do. Just now he was stooping down over the midwife, winding a damp cloth around her swollen hand. The cloth was spotted and stank as if it had been used in the past to cover other bodies.

“Well?” asked the court clerk as he contemplated the sobbing midwife with as much interest as he would some rare, mutilated insect. Her cries had now become a constant wailing, like that of a child.

“A simple blood swelling, nothing more,” said Bonifaz Fronwieser, tying the cloth into a tight knot. “Of course the thumb and the middle finger are probably broken. I gave her a compress of arnica and oak bark. It’ll make the swelling go down.”

“What I want to know is whether she is ready to be interrogated,” Johann Lechner insisted.

The doctor nodded obsequiously as he packed up his bag of ointments, rusty knives, and a crucifix. “However, I’d use her other hand for continuing the torture. Otherwise there is a risk she may again lose consciousness.”

“I thank you for your pains,” said Lechner, placing a whole guilder in Bonifaz Fronwieser’s hand. “You may withdraw now. But stay within reach and we shall call you if we need you again.”

Bowing and scraping, the physician took his leave and rushed out into the street. Once outside, he shook his head. He could never understand the necessity of healing someone who had already been tortured. Once the painful interrogation had started, the poor sinners almost inevitably ended at the stake or, like shattered dolls, on the wheel. The midwife would have to die one way or the other, even if his son Simon was convinced of her innocence. At any rate, Fronwieser had at least earned some money because of her. And who knows? It was quite possible that he would be called back once more.

Contently he played with the guilder in his pocket as he headed for the market square to buy himself a hot meat pie. The treatment had whetted his appetite.

Inside the torture cellar, the witnesses and the court clerk had already taken their places on their chairs. They were waiting for the hangman to bring down the midwife and render her compliant. Johann Lechner had ordered wine, bread, and slices of cold meat prepared for all of them, because today the interrogation might last a little longer. Lechner considered Martha Stechlin to be hardheaded. Never mind, however. They had at least another two days until the Elector’s lieutenant and his entourage would make their appearance and start living at the town’s expense. By then the midwife would have confessed. Lechner was certain of that.

But the hangman had not yet arrived, and without him they couldn’t get started. Impatiently, the court clerk drummed his fingers on the tabletop.

“Kuisl has been told, hasn’t he?” he asked one of the bailiffs. The bailiff nodded in reply.

“Probably drunk again,” witness Berchtholdt piped up. But he also looked as if they had dragged him not from his bakery, but from one of the inns behind the market square. His clothing was spotted with flour and beer, his hair was ruffled up in tufts, and he smelled like an empty beer keg. He guzzled down his wine and refilled the goblet.

“Easy does it,” Jakob Schreevogl admonished him. “This isn’t a beer hall get-together but a painful interrogation.” Secretly he hoped the hangman had run away and that they therefore couldn’t proceed with the torture. Yet he knew that this was unlikely. Jakob Kuisl would lose his job, and in only a few days an executioner from Augsburg or perhaps from Steingaden would take his place here. But even a delay of a few days could be enough to find the real murderer or murderers. By now, Jakob Schreevogl was quite convinced that Martha Stechlin had been unjustly imprisoned.

The witness Georg Augustin sipped at his wine goblet and straightened out his white lace collar.

“Perhaps the hangman doesn’t realize that we don’t have unlimited time on our hands. These interrogations cost me a whole bunch of guilders each time.” He cast a bored glance at the instruments of torture as he continued to speak. “Our wagon drivers will just sit around forever in the Stern unless we keep after them. And the paperwork doesn’t get done all by itself either. So for heaven’s sake, let’s get started!”

“I am sure the witch will confess today, or tomorrow at the latest,” Lechner said, trying to calm him down. “Then everything will be back to normal again.”

Jakob Schreevogl laughed to himself. “Back to normal? You seem to forget that there is a devil on the prowl out there, a devil who has killed three children by now. And my beloved Clara is God knows where!” His voice broke and he wiped a tear from the corner of his eye.

“Don’t make such a fuss,” snapped Georg Augustin. “Once the witch is dead, the devil will come out of her and will disappear to wherever he came from. And your Clara will surely show up again.”

“Amen,” mumbled the witness Berchtholdt, belching audibly. In the meantime he had started his third goblet. His eyes were glassy as he stared into space.

“And anyway,” Georg Augustin continued, “if it had gone the way my father wanted, we would have started this interrogation much earlier. Then Martha Stechlin would already be burning at the stake, and the matter would be settled.”

Jakob Schreevogl clearly remembered last Monday’s council meeting, when blind Augustin had reminded the gentlemen of the great Schongau witch trial seventy years ago and had urged a quick resolution. Five days had gone by since then, and to Schreevogl it seemed like an eternity.

“Be quiet!” Johann Lechner shouted at the son of the blind alderman. “You know very well that we couldn’t continue any sooner. If your father were here in your place, we would not have to listen to such gibberish!”

Georg Augustin winced at this rebuke. For a moment it seemed he wanted to say something, but then he reached for the goblet and looked again at the torture instruments.

While the gentlemen were arguing among themselves downstairs, the hangman silently sneaked into the midwife’s cell. Under the watchful eyes of two bailiffs he removed the chains from the sobbing midwife and helped her sit up.

“Listen to me, Martha,” he whispered. “You must be strong now. I am very close to finding the real culprit, and then you will get out of here, as God is my witness. But today I shall have to hurt you once more. And this time I cannot give you any potion. They would notice it. Do you understand me?”

He shook her gently. The midwife stopped sobbing and nodded. Jakob Kuisl’s face was now very close to hers, so that the bailiffs could not hear him.

“Just make sure you don’t confess anything, Martha. If you confess, everything is lost.” He took her delicate, ashen face between his huge paws.

“Do you hear me?” he asked once more. “No confession…”

The midwife nodded again. He hugged her closely, then they climbed down the stairs to the torture cellar.

Hearing Martha Stechlin’s bare feet on the stairs, the witnesses immediately turned their heads in her direction. Conversation stopped; the show could begin.

Two bailiffs set the accused woman down on a chair in the center of the room and bound her with heavy rope. Her eyes darted fearfully back and forth between the aldermen and finally settled on Jakob Schreevogl. Even from his place behind the table he could see how her rib cage was frantically moving up and down, much too rapidly, just like a young bird in mortal fear.

Johann Lechner began the interrogation. “We were interrupted last time,” he said. “I would therefore like to start over from the beginning.” He unrolled a parchment scroll in front of him and dipped his quill into the inkwell.

“Point one,” he intoned. “Does the delinquent have witches’ marks to show that could serve as evidence?”

Berchtholdt the baker licked his lips as the bailiffs pulled the brown penitent’s garment over Martha’s head.

“In order to avoid any disputes like last time, I shall conduct the examination myself,” said Johann Lechner.

He scrutinized the midwife’s body inch by inch, checking under her armpits, on her behind and between her thighs. Martha Stechlin kept her eyes closed. Even when the clerk poked his fingers into her genitals she did not weep. Finally, Lechner stopped. “The mark on the shoulder blade seems to be the most suspicious of them. We shall do the test. Hangman, the needle!”

Jakob Kuisl handed him a finger-long needle. Without hesitating the clerk pushed the needle deep into the shoulder blade. Martha Stechlin’s scream was so shrill that Jakob Kuisl winced. They were starting and there was nothing he could do about it.

Johann Lechner observed the point of entry with great interest. Finally he smiled, satisfied. “Just as I thought,” he said, returning to the desk and sitting down behind his writing implements. He started to write, speaking aloud as he did so: “Defendant’s clothes removed. I stuck her with a needle myself and discovered a point from which no blood flowed-”

“But this is no evidence,” Jakob Schreevogl objected. “Any child knows that hardly any blood flows across the shoulder bone! And furthermore-”

“Juryman Schreevogl,” replied Lechner, interrupting him. “Did you notice that this mark is at the exact same spot where the children had their marks? And that this mark, if not exactly identical, nevertheless looks very similar?”

Jakob Schreevogl shook his head. “A birthmark, nothing more. Never in a lifetime will the Elector’s secretary let you call this evidence!”

“Well, we’re not done yet after all,” said Lechner. “Hangman, the thumbscrews. This time we’ll take the other hand.”

Martha Stechlin’s screams rose from the torture cellar through the narrow windows of the keep into the town. Anyone in the vicinity briefly interrupted their work and crossed themselves or prayed a Hail Mary. Then they continued whatever they had been doing.

The burghers were sure that the witch was receiving her just punishment. She was still obstinate, but soon enough she would spit out her nefarious doings to the honorable aldermen, and then it would finally be over. She would confess her whoring with the devil, and the wild nights with him when together they drank the blood of the innocent little children and branded them with the mark of the devil. She would tell of the orgiastic dances, and how she had kissed the devil on his backside and had done everything the devil asked. She would tell of the other witches who had ridden with her through the air on their brooms, excited by pungent witches’ salve that they had smeared on their genitals. Wanton wenches, all of them! And many a good Schongauer was salivating at the mere thought of it. And many a Schongau housewife could well imagine who these other witches were: the neighbor with the evil eye, the beggar woman over in the Munzgasse, the maid who was pursuing the good, unsuspecting husband…

At a stand in the market square, Bonifaz Fronwieser was just biting into his warm pastry when Martha Stechlin’s screams could be heard coming from the dungeon. Suddenly the meat tasted old and rotten. He threw the rest to a pack of dogs running about and then headed home.

The devil had entered Clara and wouldn’t let go of her. The girl threw herself from one side to the other on her bed of brushwood. Cold sweat stood on her brow; her face was waxen like a doll’s. Again and again Clara mumbled in her sleep and at times cried out with such force that Sophie had to hold her mouth closed. At that moment the devil seemed to be very close to her again.

“He…he’s gotten hold of me. No! Go away! Go away! Hellish claws…the heart from the body…it hurts so…so much…”

Gently Sophie kept pushing her little friend back on her bed and wiped her hot brow with a wet rag. The fever had not let up. On the contrary, it had become stronger and stronger. Clara was glowing like a little oven. The drink Sophie had given her provided only temporary relief.

Sophie had now watched over her for three nights and four days. Only rarely did she go outside to gather berries and herbs or to pilfer something edible from one of the surrounding farms. Yesterday she had caught a chicken, killed it, and at night made hot soup for Clara. But she was afraid that someone would see the fire and soon went back inside. Her fears were not unfounded. She had heard footsteps in the night. They had passed very close to her hiding place and then had left again.

One time she had gone to the raft landing and had asked a boy to tell the alderman Schreevogl that his foster daughter was well. She had considered that a pretty good idea at first. But when that physician showed up in the forest, she cursed herself for it. And all the more when the devil himself appeared, coming as if from nowhere. She dropped quickly into a ditch covered with shrubs, and the man with the bony hand ran past her, toward the physician. Since then she did not know whether the young physician had been killed or had gotten away. She only knew that her pursuers were very close.

Last night she had considered several times whether to go into town and tell the whole story. Perhaps she could tell it to the physician, providing he was still alive, or to the hangman. They both seemed to be on her side. She could tell them everything, and Clara would be rescued. Perhaps they would only clap the midwife in the stocks, or her foster parents would have to pay a fine because their ward had gotten involved with things that were none of her business. Perhaps she would get away with a good spanking and nothing more. Perhaps everything would still be all right.

But that certain premonition of things that she’d always had, and which had made her the leader of the other children, told her that she wouldn’t be believed, that things had gone too far already, and there was no way back now.

Next to her, Clara cried out again in her sleep. Sophie bit her lip and tears ran down her face, which was smeared with dirt. She no longer knew where to turn.

Suddenly, she heard shouts from far away, laughter and shouting that could be heard way down here in her hiding place. Sophie kissed Clara on her forehead and moved to a spot with a good view over the forest.

Shadows were flitting among the trees. Dusk had fallen, and at first she could not distinguish the individual figures. Soon, however, she heard dogs barking. Carefully Sophie pushed herself up a few inches higher. Now she recognized the men. They were peasants from Altenstadt, Franz Strasser, Johannes’s foster father, among them. The big dog he was holding on a leash was pulling him toward the hiding place. Quickly Sophie crouched down and crawled to where she could no longer be seen. The voices of the men had a strange echo, as if coming from the far end of a long tunnel.

“Let’s stop now, Franz!” one of the men called out. “We have been looking all day, and it will be dark soon. The men are tired and hungry and want to go home. Let’s continue looking for this hiding place tomorrow.”

“Just wait a moment! Just look here!” shouted Franz Strasser in reply. “The dog smells something!”

“What do you think he smells?” the other one said, laughing. “The witch? He’s smelling Sepp Spanner’s bitch. She’s in heat. Can’t you see how it pulls him off?”

“You dumb ass! This is something else. Look, he’s going completely crazy…”

The voices had come closer. Sophie held her breath. Now they were directly above her. The dog started to bark.

“There must be something around here,” murmured Strasser. “Let’s search the area around here, and then we’ll let it be.”

“All right then, just around here. The dog is really acting crazy…”

Sophie heard shouting and hooting. The other peasants were becoming impatient. She heard steps above her, pacing back and forth on the gravel. The dog’s panting sounded as if he were about to choke as he obviously was straining on the leash so hard that he was almost strangling himself.

At this moment Clara began to scream again. It was a long scream of fear, as once again she was overcome by the shadows of darkness that were scratching her soft young skin with long fingernails. As soon as Sophie heard the scream she threw herself down quickly next to Clara and closed her mouth with her hand. But it was too late.

“Did you hear that?” asked Strasser excitedly.

“Hear what? Your dog is panting and barking. I can’t hear anything else.”

“Damn cur, be quiet, will you!”

Sophie could hear a kick and then the dog’s whimpering. The dog was finally silent.

“Somebody did scream. It was a child.”

“Nonsense, the dog was howling. The devil must have taken a shit in your ears.”

There was laughter. The shouts of the others became fainter.

“Hogwash. I am sure it was a child…”

Under Sophie’s strong hands, Clara was tossing back and forth. Sophie was still holding her mouth closed even though she was afraid of suffocating the girl. But Clara could not be allowed to scream. Not now!

Suddenly she could hear a frightened panting above her. “Look, the dog!” called Franz Strasser. “He’s starting to dig! There is something here!”

“True, he’s digging…what in the world is he…”

The other man’s voice turned to loud laughter.

“A bone, a stupid bone, that’s what he’s dug up! Ha-ha, that’s sure a devil’s bone!”

Franz Strasser began cursing. “You stupid cur, what are you doing? Leave it alone or I’ll beat you to death!”

More kicks and whimpering. Then the steps retreated. After a while, nothing could be heard anymore. Nevertheless Sophie’s hand remained clamped over Clara’s mouth. She held her delicate head as in a vise. The sick girl’s face had turned blue by now. Finally Sophie released her, and Clara sucked air into her lungs, gasping, as if she were about to drown. Then her breathing became more regular. The shadows had withdrawn. She drifted into a quiet sleep.

Sophie sat next to her and wept without making a sound. She had almost killed her friend. She was a witch; people were right. God would punish her for what she had done.

While Martha Stechlin was being tortured, Simon Fronwieser was sitting in the hangman’s house making coffee. He was still carrying a handful of the foreign beans in a small pouch on his belt. Now he had ground them up in the executioner’s mortar and had set a pot with water on the fire. When the water was at a boil he used a pewter spoon to put a little of the black powder in the pot and stirred. Immediately, a sharp aromatic fragrance spread through the house. Simon held his nose directly over the pot and breathed it in. The scent cleared his head. Finally he poured some of the brew into a mug. As he waited for the grounds to settle he thought about everything that had happened in the past few hours.

After their brief detour to Altenstadt he had walked Jakob Kuisl home, but the hangman did not want to disclose the meaning of his enigmatic words at the end of their visit to Strasser’s. Even when Simon had insisted, he only told him to be available during the night, and that they had come quite a bit closer to the solution. Then the otherwise grim hangman smiled quietly. For the first time in days, Simon had the feeling that Jakob Kuisl was highly pleased with himself.

This bliss was instantly disrupted when they arrived at the hangman’s house in the Lech quarter. Two bailiffs were already waiting at the door to tell Jakob Kuisl that the Stechlin woman was again ready to be interrogated.

The hangman’s face suddenly turned white.

“So soon?” he murmured, stepping inside and reappearing a short time later with the necessary tools. Then he took Simon briefly aside and whispered in his ear, “Now we can only hope that Martha remains strong. In any case, be at my house tonight at the stroke of midnight.”

Then he had trudged off behind the bailiffs, up to the town, with a sack slung over his shoulders filled with thumb-and leg screws, ropes, and sulfur sticks that could be inserted under the fingernails and lit. The hangman walked very slowly, but finally he disappeared beyond the Lech Gate.

When Anna Maria Kuisl stopped to pick up Simon in front of the house a short time later, she found him staring into space. She poured him a goblet of wine, ran her hand over his hair, and then went to market with the twins to buy bread. Life went on, even if three little boys were dead and a presumably innocent woman was suffering unspeakable torture at this very moment.

Simon went into the hangman’s spare chamber carrying the steaming brew and started to leaf aimlessly through some books. But he couldn’t really concentrate and the letters danced before his eyes. Almost gratefully he looked around when the squeaking door behind him announced a visitor. Magdalena was standing there, her face tearstained, her hair tangled and unkempt.

“Never, never will I marry the Steingaden hangman,” she sobbed. “I’d rather go and drown myself!”

Simon winced. With all the ghastly events of the last few hours he had completely forgotten Magdalena. He slammed the book shut and took her in his arms.

“Your father would never do such a thing, not without your consent,” he said, trying to console her.

She pushed him away. “What do you really know about my father!” she cried. “He is the hangman. He tortures and kills, and when he isn’t doing that, he sells love potions to old hags and poison to young sluts to kill the brats inside them. My father is a monster, a fiend! He’ll marry me off for a few guilders and a bottle of brandy without batting an eye! To hell with my father!”

Simon held her tightly and looked into her eyes. “You mustn’t speak like this about your father! You know that it’s not true. Your father is the hangman, but God knows somebody must do it after all! He is a strong and a wise man. And he loves his daughter!”

Crying she clung to Simon’s doublet, shaking her head again and again. “You don’t know him. He is a monster, a monster…”

Simon was standing at the window looking vacantly into the herb garden, where the first green shoots were starting to appear in the brown earth. He felt so helpless. Why couldn’t they simply be happy together? Why were there always people telling them how to live their lives? His father, Magdalena’s father, the whole damn town…

“I just talked with him, with your father…about us,” he began suddenly.

She stopped sobbing and looked up to him questioningly.

“And what did he say?”

Her eyes were so full of hope that he impulsively decided to lie.

“He…he said that he would think it over. That first he wanted to see if I was good for anything. Once the matter with Martha Stechlin was settled, he would make up his mind. He won’t exclude the possibility, that’s what he said.”

“But…but that’s wonderful!”

Magdalena wiped the tears from her face and smiled at him with puffy eyes.

“That means all you have to do is help him get Martha Stechlin out of the keep.” With every word her voice became firmer. “Once he sees that you’ve got something inside your head he will also trust you with his daughter. That has always been what counted for my father. That a person should have something inside his head. And that’s what you are going to prove to him now.”

Simon nodded but avoided looking directly at her. In the meantime Magdalena had again gotten a hold of herself. She poured a goblet of wine and emptied it in one gulp.

“What did you find out this morning?” she asked, wiping the back of her hand across her mouth.

Simon told her about the death of the Strasser boy, and that the midwife had regained consciousness. He also told Magdalena of her father’s hints and their planned meeting in the coming night. She listened attentively and only here and there interjected a short question.

“And you say Strasser had noticed that Johannes had often been covered with clay?”

Simon nodded. “That’s what he said. And then your father gave him such a funny look.”

“Did you get to look at the dead boy’s fingernails?”

He shook his head. “No, but I believe your father did.”

Magdalena smiled. Simon suddenly thought he was looking into her father’s face.

“What are you grinning about? Do tell me!”

“I think I know what my father wants to do with you tonight.”

“And what is that?”

“Well, he probably wants to have another look at the fingernails of the other boys.”

“But they were buried long ago in the cemetery at Saint Sebastian’s!”

Magdalena gave him a wicked grin. “And now you know why you’ll only get going at midnight tonight.”

Simon’s face turned white. He had to sit down.

“You…you think?”

Magdalena poured herself another goblet of wine. She took a deep gulp before continuing.

“Let’s just hope the two boys are really dead. Who knows, the devil might’ve really gotten into them. Best take a crucifix along. You never know…”

Then she quickly kissed him on the mouth. She tasted of wine and earth. It was better than coffee.