The Hangman’s Daughter

CHAPTER 6

THURSDAY APRIL 26, A.D. 1659 FOUR O’CLOCK IN THE AFTERNOON

Simon took a deep breath of spring air. For the first time in days, he felt fully free. At a distance he could hear the rushing of the river, and the fields were lovely in their rich green. Snowdrops shone between the birches and beeches, which had already started to blossom. Only in the shady patches between the trees could traces of snow still be seen.

He was strolling with Magdalena through the meadows above the Lech, on a footpath so narrow that he and Magdalena touched each other from time to time as if by chance. Twice she had nearly fallen, and each time she had held on to him for support. Longer than was in fact necessary.

After the conversation in the Stern, Simon had hurried down to the river. He needed a quiet moment to think things over and fresh air to breathe. He should have been mixing tinctures for his father, but that could very well wait until tomorrow. In any case Simon preferred to keep out of his father’s way now. Even at the deathbed of the poor Kratz boy they had not spoken. The old man had still not forgiven him for leaving the house to visit the executioner. Sometime, as Simon knew, his anger would blow over, but until then it would be better not to get in his way too often. Simon sighed. His father came from a different world, a world in which the dissection of corpses was considered blasphemous and the treatment of the sick consisted exclusively of purges, cuppings, and the administration of evil-smelling pills. He remembered something his father had said at the burial of a plague victim: “God decides when we shall die. We should not meddle in His handiwork.”

Simon wanted to do things quite differently. He wanted to meddle in the Lord God’s handiwork.

Down by the Lech Gate he met Magdalena, whose mother had sent her to gather wild garlic in the wetlands. She smiled at him in that way again, and he simply followed her. A few washerwomen were standing on the Lech Bridge; he could feel how they were staring at him, but that didn’t bother him.

All afternoon they rambled through the forest down by the river. When her hand brushed against his again, he suddenly felt hot. His scalp began to tingle. What was it about this girl that disturbed him so? Was it perhaps the charm of what was forbidden? He knew that he and Magdalena could never become a couple. Not in Schongau, not in this stuffy hole, where only a small suspicion was enough to send a woman to the stake. Simon frowned. Dark thoughts arose like thunderclouds.

“Is there something wrong?” Magdalena stopped and looked at him. She sensed that something was troubling him.

“It is…oh, nothing.”

“Tell me, or we’ll go back at once, and I’ll never see you again.”

Simon had to smile. “A terrible threat. Even if I believe you would never do it.”

“You wait and see. Well, then, what is it?”

“It’s…about the boys.”

Magdalena sighed. “I thought as much.” Near the footpath was a tree trunk, blown down in a spring storm. She pushed him toward it and sat down alongside. Her eyes looked into the distance. After a while she began to speak again.

“A terrible thing. I can’t get the boys out of my head either, Peter and Anton. I used to see them in the market square, especially Anton. He didn’t have anybody. As an orphan, you’re worth about as much as a hangman’s child. Nothing at all.”

Magdalena pressed her full lips together until they only formed a thin red line. Simon put his hand on her shoulder, and for a long time they said nothing.

“Did you know that all the orphans used to meet at Stechlin’s?” he finally asked.

Magdalena shook her head.

“Something happened there.” Simon looked out across the forest. A long way away the town walls of Schongau were visible.

After a while he spoke again. “Sophie said that they were all at Stechlin’s the evening before the murder. Then they all went home, except Peter. He went down to the river to meet someone else. Who could that have been? His murderer? Or is Sophie lying?”

“And what about Anton Kratz? Was he with the Stechlin woman too?” Magdalena was leaning against his shoulder now, her hand resting gently on his thigh. But Simon’s thoughts were elsewhere.

“Yes, indeed, Anton too,” he said. “And both of them had this strange sign on their shoulders, scratched into the skin with elderberry juice. On Anton it was a bit faded, as if someone had tried to wash it away.”

“He himself?” Magdalena’s head nestled against his.

Simon continued to gaze into the distance. “Your father found sulfur in Peter’s pocket,” he murmured. “And a mandrake is missing from the midwife’s house.”

Magdalena, surprised, sat up suddenly. As the hangman’s daughter she was well informed about magical ingredients.

“A mandrake? Are you sure?” she asked, obviously alarmed.

Simon jumped up from the tree trunk.

“Witches’ marks, sulfur, a mandrake…It all fits together, don’t you think? As if someone would like us to believe in all this spooky stuff.”

“Or if all this spooky stuff is in fact true,” whispered Magdalena. A cloud had passed over the warm spring sun. She pulled her woolen scarf over her shoulders.

“I visited Goodwife Daubenberger this morning,” she began hesitantly. “She told me about Saint Walburga.”

She told Simon about her conversation with the midwife and that she supposed the murders had some sort of connection with Walpurgis Night, which was just a week away. When she had finished, Simon shook his head.

“I don’t believe in these superstitions,” he said. “Witchcraft and such hocus-pocus. There must be some reason these children had to die.”

Suddenly Simon remembered the man with the bone hand. Both Sophie and the maid from the Stern had spoken of him. Had he really inquired about the merchant’s son? Or was that just one of Sophie’s fantasies? With annoyance he recalled that the girl had stolen quite a large sum of money from him. You couldn’t trust that child as far as you could throw her.

With a sigh he sat down again next to Magdalena on the tree trunk. He was feeling cold too. The hangman’s daughter saw that he was shivering and spread her woolen scarf over his shoulders. She sought his hand, found it, and led it slowly to her bodice.

Simon could not stop thinking about the man with the hand of bone. If he really existed and was responsible for what happened to the children, why had he killed them? What connection was there between the two victims, apart from their having been at Martha Stechlin’s on that night of the full moon?

And above all…

Who else had been with Goodwife Stechlin?

Magdalena looked at the young physician from one side. He had been so reserved all day. She had to know where she stood with him.

“Simon, I…” she began.

At this moment they heard in the distance the high-toned pealing of the alarm bell in the tower, carried to them by the wind. Here in the meadows, far away from the town, it sounded like the whimpering of a child. Something had happened! Simon felt a tightness in his chest. He jumped up and ran in the direction of Schongau. Not until he had run some distance did he notice that Magdalena was not following him.

“Come on, quick!” he cried. “And pray to God that there isn’t another corpse in the river.”

Magdalena sighed, then stood up and ran after Simon.

The hangman came running up the cellar steps of the dungeon, taking several of them at one stride. Behind him he heard the cries of the town clerk and the others, who were also hurrying to get out. The high-pitched tone of the alarm bell resounded through the town.

The bells in the watchtowers were rung only in extreme emergency, in case of an attack or a fire. Kuisl ruled out an invasion of hostile soldiers. There had been peace now for more than ten years. There were indeed still groups of marauding soldiers who concealed themselves in the woods and attacked isolated farmsteads, but Schongau was too big to be attacked by a handful of daring hooligans. There remained only a fire…

Most of the buildings in Schongau were still built of wood, and many roofs were thatched. If the wind was coming from the wrong direction, a smoldering fire could turn into a major conflagration and destroy the whole town. People were terrified of fire, and the hangman, too, was worried about his family.

When Jakob Kuisl reached the outer door of the keep he saw at once that the town was in no immediate danger. A thin column of smoke rose up from the other side of the town wall and spread out to form a cloud. The hangman supposed that the fire was down by the raft landing.

Without waiting for the others he hurried down the Munzstrasse to the Ballenhaus and turned left in the direction of the Lech Gate. Other burghers of Schongau, too, were hurrying to the gate to see what was happening. In the upper stories of the houses with a view over the river, curious people were again opening their shutters, which they had already closed for the night, and were looking down at the spectacle visible on the riverbank.

Jakob Kuisl ran through the Lech Gate and saw down at the raft landing that the Zimmerstadel had caught fire. The roof of the huge warehouse was ablaze. A small group of raftsmen had formed a bucket brigade and were pouring water on the flames. Others hurried to take crates and barrels out of the building. There was a rustling and cracking, and it did not seem to the hangman that the warehouse could be saved. Just the same, he ran toward the bridge to offer his help. He knew that a small fortune would be lost with every crate that went up in flames. Wool, silk, wine, spices…The Zimmerstadel held everything that was waiting to be shipped elsewhere in addition to serving as an overflow when there was no more room in the Ballenhaus.

When Kuisl got beyond the town gate, he stopped in his tracks. From up here he was able to see the entire landing area. Down by the dock a crowd of men could be seen engaged in a wild melee. Fists flew, some men already lay on the ground, and others were fighting with long boat poles. Kuisl recognized some of the wagon drivers and raftsmen, but there were strangers among them as well.

The evening sun was sinking behind the woods, and the men and the flames appeared in a surreal light. Jakob Kuisl couldn’t believe his eyes: these men were fighting, while only a few yards away the Zimmerstadel was in flames!

“Have you gone mad!” he cried and ran down the last few steps to the bridge. “Stop it! The Stadel’s on fire!”

The men did not seem to even notice him. They rolled on the ground. Some were bleeding from the forehead, and others had cuts and bruises on their faces. With his strong arms the hangman seized two of the men who were fighting and pulled them apart. Kuisl recognized one of the men, with a torn doublet, from various drunken brawls in the inns behind the market square. It was Georg Riegg of the Schongau wagon drivers. He was a noted ruffian but enjoyed a good reputation among his men. The other man seemed to be a stranger to the town. His lip was bleeding, and there was a deep cut over his right eyebrow.

“Stop it, I say!” Kuisl shook the pair until they took notice of him. “Go and help save the Stadel!”

“The Augsburgers started the fire. They can put it out!” Georg Riegg spat in the face of his adversary, who raised his fist for another blow.

Kuisl quickly grabbed them both by the hair and shook them before he spoke again. “What did you say?”

“He’s talking nonsense!” said the stranger. His accent revealed him as an Augsburger. He waved his arms wildly toward the burning Stadel. “Your watchmen were careless, and now we have to take the blame. But count us out! You’ll have to pay for the damage!”

Jakob Kuisl was aware of a movement behind him. He turned and saw from the corner of his eye a rafting pole poised to strike him. Instinctively he let the two ruffians drop and at the same time grabbed the shaft. With a jerk he pushed it away, so that the man at the other end fell screaming into the Lech. From his left side came another attacker, a solidly built raftsman, whom Kuisl recognized as one of the Augsburg guild. With a shout the raftsman charged at him. At the last moment Kuisl dodged and gave the man a strong blow from behind. Groaning, the Augsburger fell to the ground but got up a few seconds later to attack once more. He swung and missed. The next time he struck, the hangman caught his hand and squeezed until the man’s fingers began to crack. Step by step he forced the Augsburger toward the end of the pier. Finally he pushed him into the water and let go. With a splash the man disappeared in the river and resurfaced farther down the landing, where he tried to hold on to a wooden pile.

“Stop! In the name of the law, stop it!”

Johann Lechner had arrived at the landing with the watchmen. The four bailiffs, with other Schongauers, pulled the combatants apart.

“You there, get over to the Stadel! Take the buckets with you!” With curt orders the court clerk brought the situation under control, although it was now too late. The roof had fallen in, and every entrance to the interior of the building was blocked by red-hot beams. Whatever remained of the goods in there would sooner or later be reduced to ashes-hundreds of guilders’, worth. Charred chests and bales were piled up near the ruins of the Stadel, some of them still smoldering. A smell of scorched cinnamon hung in the air.

The bailiffs had herded the participants in the brawl into a corner of the landing and divided them into two groups, Schongauers and Augsburgers. Men on both sides glowered at each other, but seemed too exhausted to continue.

Jakob Kuisl could see Josef Berchtholdt, the brother of the master baker, among the Schongau fighters. His brother Michael was holding a damp cloth to Josef’s swollen left eye and hurling wild curses in the direction of the Augsburgers. The other two witnesses to the examination in the dungeon had disappeared into the crowd.

Meanwhile Bonifaz Fronwieser, Simon’s father, had also appeared, after being summoned by the court clerk. With water and linen bandages he began to treat the worst injuries. One of the Schongau wagon drivers had a stab wound to his upper arm. And among the Augsburgers, too, someone was bleeding from a wound in the thigh.

When Kuisl heard the voice of the court clerk he had quickly withdrawn from the fighters. Now he was sitting on one of the piles of the pier, sucking at his pipe, and observing the tumult on the landing.

It looked as if all Schongau had come down to the river to watch the spectacle. The line of people looking at the burned-out ruin went all the way back to the gate. Burning beams continued to crack and fall into the flames. The conflagration lit up the nearby forest like a midsummer bonfire as dusk slowly deepened.

In the meantime Lechner had found the watchman at the landing. He cowered before him, distraught, protesting his innocence.

“Believe me, master,” he whimpered. “We don’t know how such a fire could have broken out. I was just sitting here playing dice with Benedikt and Johannes, and when I turned around, there was the whole Stadel in flames! Someone must have set it deliberately, otherwise it wouldn’t have burned so quickly.”

“I know who started the fire,” cried Georg Riegg from the Schongau group. “It was the Augsburgers! First they kill our children, and then they set fire to our Stadel so that nobody will want to tie up their rafts here, and everyone will be frightened and avoid our town. The dirty bastards!”

Some of the Schongau wagon drivers became restive again. Stones flew and curses were heard, and it was only with difficulty that the bailiffs were able to keep the two groups apart.

“You think we’d set fire to our own goods!” cried a voice from the Augsburger group. The Schongauers began to mutter and curse. “You didn’t watch out properly, and now you want to put the blame on us! You’ll pay us back every penny!”

“But what’s that over there?” Georg Riegg pointed to the barrels and cases standing in front of the smoldering Stadel. “You had no trouble getting your own stuff out.”

“Liar!” the Augsburgers replied. It was almost impossible to restrain them. “We carried them out when the fire started. You guys just stood around yammering.”

“Silence, damn it!”

The voice of the court clerk was not particularly loud. Nevertheless there was something about it that compelled the others to silence. Johann Lechner’s eyes wandered over the two hostile groups. Finally he pointed to the Augsburg wagon drivers.

“Who’s the leader here?”

The huge man whom Jakob Kuisl had earlier pushed into the water stepped forward. Obviously he had succeeded in reaching the bank again. His wet hair hung down his face; his hose and doublet clung to his body. In spite of this he did not look as if he intended to be intimidated by a mere clerk from Schongau. The giant looked into Johann Lechner’s face and growled.

“I am.”

Lechner looked him up and down. “And what is your name?”

“Martin Hueber, head wagon driver for the house of Fugger.”

A few isolated whistles were heard. The Fuggers were now not nearly as powerful as they had been before the Great War, but their name still meant something. Anyone who worked for this family could count on powerful advocates.

If Johann Lechner had taken this into consideration, he didn’t let it show. He nodded briefly and said: “Martin Hueber, you will be our guest until this matter is cleared up. Until then you may not leave the town.”

Hueber’s face turned red. “You can’t do that. I’m only subject to Augsburg law!”

“I certainly can do that.” Lechner’s voice was quiet and penetrating. “You’ve beaten up people here, and there are witnesses to that. So you can sit here in our jail and drink water.”

Cheers and mocking laughter were heard from the Schongau raftsmen. The clerk turned to them.

“There’s no cause for merriment at all. Georg Riegg, as leader of this riot you’ll be held in the dungeon, and the lazy watchman at the bridge will keep you company. And then we’ll see who laughs last.”

Georg Riegg, the bridge watchman, and the Augsburger Martin Hueber, protesting loudly, were led away. On the bridge the wagon driver turned once more to the Schongau men.

“You’ll be sorry for this!” he cried. “The Fuggers will know tomorrow what’s happened here. And then God help you. You’ll compensate us for every bale. Every single one!”

Lechner sighed. Then he turned to the burgomaster who stood beside him with a face white as chalk.

“There’s a curse on this town. And all that since this witch killed the boy,” he said.

Burgomaster Karl Semer looked at him, wondering.

“Do you think that the Stechlin woman set fire-?”

Lechner shrugged. Finally he smiled.

“It’s possible. We must make sure that she confesses. That should clear the air, and everyone will be satisfied.”

The burgomaster nodded, relieved. Then the two aldermen made their way back into the town.

The little girl pressed a wooden doll to her narrow chest, from which a rattling sound emerged with every breath. Her face was pale and sunken, and deep rings had formed under her eyes. Again she had to cough, hard and painfully. Her throat hurt. In the distance she heard the others down by the Lech. Something had happened. She struggled to sit up in bed and look through the window. But she could only see the sky, some clouds, and a column of smoke between them. Her father had told her that everything was all right, she should not get excited, and she needed to stay in bed. Later the physician would come and help her if the cold compresses didn’t work. The girl smiled. She hoped the young doctor would come and not the old one. She liked the young doctor-once he had given her an apple in the market square and asked her how she was. Not many people asked her how she was, in fact nobody.

Clara was five years old when she lost her parents-first her mother, who after the birth of a little brother had not woken up again. Clara could still remember her mother’s laughter and her big friendly eyes, and that before she went to sleep her mother had often sung to her. As she walked behind the wooden coffin she imagined that her mother was just asleep and she would soon wake up and come home. Her father had held her hand. When the funeral procession had come to the new cemetery at Saint Sebastian’s Church and they were lowering the coffin down into the earth, he had grasped her hand so hard that she screamed. The women thought she was crying for her mother and patted her on the head.

After that her father steadily declined. It began with the same coughing that she herself now had, hard and dry. Soon he was spitting blood, and the neighbors looked down at her with pity and shook their heads. In the evening she often sat by her father’s bed and sang the same songs her mother had always sung. He had only her, and she had only him. His brothers and sisters had moved away because there were enough basketmakers in Schongau, or they were dead, just like the little brother, who, without his mother’s breast, had cried for three days and suddenly fell silent.

Her father died on a cold damp day in the fall, and they carried him to the same cemetery as his wife. The mother’s grave was still quite new, and digging was easy.

Clara spent the next weeks with the neighbor woman, together with a half dozen other children. At the table they fought over the only bowl of barley porridge, but she wasn’t hungry anyway. She crept under the bench near the stove and wept. She was all alone. If the neighbor sometimes gave her sweets, the others took it away from her. The only thing she had left was the wooden doll that her father had once carved for her. She never put it down, not during the day and not at night, for it was the last reminder of her parents.

A month later a friendly young man came. He stroked her head and told her that from now on she would be called Clara Schreevogl. He led her into a big two-story house directly by the market square. It had wide stairs and lots of rooms with heavy brocade curtains. The Schreevogls already had five children, and it was said that Maria Schreevogl could not have any more. They took her up like their own child. And when at first the other children gossiped behind her back and called her bad names, her foster father came and whipped them so hard with a hazel switch that they couldn’t sit down for three days.

Clara ate the same fine food, she wore the same linen clothes, but even so she noticed that she was different. She was an orphan, living off charity. When there was a family celebration, at Easter or on the Eve of Saint Nicholas, she felt there was an invisible wall between herself and the Schreevogls. She saw the affectionate looks and embraces of the others, unsaid words, gestures, and caresses, and then she ran to her room and wept again. Silently, so that nobody would notice it.

Outside she could hear shouting and bawling in front of the house. Clara couldn’t bear to stay in bed any longer. She pulled herself up, pushed the heavy eiderdown comforter to one side, and slid down onto the cold wooden floor. Immediately a feeling of dizziness came over her. She had a fever, her legs felt like wet clay, but nevertheless she dragged herself the few steps to the window and looked out.

Down by the Lech, the Stadel was on fire. Tongues of fire licked up into the sky, and all of Schongau had come down to the raft landing. Clara’s foster parents, the children, and the nurse-maid were also down there to witness the spectacle. They had left only her, the sick orphan, behind. In her wild escape three days before, she had fallen into the Lech. Before the current had carried her away she had managed, in the nick of time, to hold on to a bunch of rushes. She had crawled up the bank and run home through a swamp and thickets. She kept looking around for the men, but they had disappeared. The other children were gone too. Not until she had reached the oak tree near the Kuh Gate did she meet Anton and Sophie again. Anton looked at her with eyes wide with terror and cried again and again that he had seen the devil. He didn’t stop until Sophie gave him a box on the ear. And now he was dead, and Clara knew why. Although she was only ten years old, she could imagine what had happened. Clara was afraid.

At this moment she heard the squeaking of the front door. Her foster parents must have returned. Her first impulse was to call out to them, but something held her back. The Schreevogls’ arrival home was always accompanied by noise, doors slamming, children laughing, noise on the stairs. Even when the nurse came back from the market you could hear the rattling of keys and baskets being put away. But now it was deathly quiet, as if somebody had tried to open the door carefully and had been betrayed by the squeaking. Clara heard a creak on the stairs. Instinctively she ran back to the bed and crept under it. Dust got into her nose, she had to repress a sneeze. From her hiding place she saw the door of her room slowly opening. Two mud-stained boots paused on the threshold. Clara held her breath. They were certainly not her foster father’s boots; he paid great attention to his appearance. She didn’t know whose boots they were, but she recognized the mud on them. Clara’s shoes had looked just like that three days before. It was the mud from the swamp through which she had fled.

The men had come back, or at least one of them.

The dust made her nose itch again, she felt something tickling her right hand. As Clara glanced down, she saw a spider crawl over her finger and disappear in the darkness under the bed. She stifled a cry and stared at the boots still standing on the threshold. She heard the measured breathing of a man; then the boots disappeared. Steps tapped up the stairs to the rooms above. Clara listened carefully to the sound. It was different from the sound of normal steps. A dragging and scraping at regular intervals. She remembered the night of her flight. One of her pursuers had a strange gait. He had…limped! Clara was sure that the man up there on the stairs was the limper. Perhaps now he wouldn’t be so quick?

Clara waited a moment, then crawled out from under the bed and hurried on tiptoe to the open door. She looked up the stairs but couldn’t see anyone. The stranger must have gone into one of the upper rooms. Silently she crept downstairs.

When she had reached the entrance hall, she remembered that she had left her doll upstairs.

She bit her lip. In front of her the outside door stood wide open; she could hear the noise down by the river. The first people appeared to be making their way back to town.

Clara shut her eyes for a second, then hurried upstairs again and entered her room. There on the bed lay her doll. She picked it up and was just about to run downstairs again when she heard steps from above. Hurried steps.

The man had heard her.

The steps became quicker; the man was taking several stairs in one stride. Clara rushed out of the room, her doll pressed closely against her. On the threshold she glanced up the stairs. A black shadow seemed to fall over her, a bearded man in a cloak, his right hand stretched out toward her. It was the devil, and he had a white hand of bones.

Clara slammed the door of her room shut and bolted it. From outside something hit the door, and she could hear a voice cursing quietly. Then the man threw himself with his full force against the door, so that the frame shook. Once, twice…Clara ran to the window, which was still open. She wanted to call for help, but she was choked with fear. Only a hoarse croaking came out. Beneath her the street was still empty of people. A long way away she saw the crowds pressing through the Lech Gate back into town. She wanted to wave, but she realized that it would be useless. Probably the people would just wave back cheerfully.

Behind her, wood splintered. Clara turned and saw the point of a saber making its way through an ever-widening split in the middle of the door. She looked down again at the street in front of the house. Her room was on the second floor, about ten feet from the ground. Just next to the entrance of the house a peasant had left a cart with winter straw.

Without pausing to think Clara stuffed her doll down between her breast and nightgown and climbed over the sill. Then she slid down until she was hanging by both hands from the sill. Behind her the splintering was louder, a bolt was pushed aside. With a little cry Clara let go and fell straight into the hay wagon. She felt pain in her right shoulder as she scraped against the wooden frame. Without paying any attention to it, she scrambled over the side and slid to the ground. With straw in her hair and in her nightgown she fled along the street. She turned around once and saw the devil standing at the window, gesturing with his bone hand. He seemed to be calling something to her.

Farewell! We’ll meet again soon…

Clara heard voices in her feverish head. Everything swam before her eyes; her legs kept running as if by themselves. The rattling in her chest continued to throb while she staggered through the empty alleys. The devil was at her heels, and there was nobody who could help her.

When Simon and Magdalena finally reached the raft landing, most of the Schongauers had already returned to town. Fire-fighters were busy pushing down the smoking beams and pouring water on the remaining embers. Otherwise only a few onlookers were watching. At least the danger of the fire reaching the watchmen’s houses and the wooden pier had been averted.

Simon asked some of the men what had happened. Finally he noticed the hangman sitting on one of the wooden piles in the background smoking his pipe and thoughtfully contemplating the remains of the Stadel. As Simon and Magdalena approached him, he looked up.

“Well? Have you had a pleasant day?”

Simon felt the blood mounting to his face. Magdalena very sensibly looked in the other direction.

“I…we…I was helping Magdalena to gather wild garlic, and then we saw the smoke,” the physician stammered. He looked at the ruins and shook his head. “This is terrible. It will cost the town a fortune!”

The hangman shrugged.

“If it was anyone from the town…Our raftsmen say the Augsburgers set fire to the Stadel after taking their own goods out.”

Simon looked over his shoulder. There were indeed cases, bales, and sacks piled up at a safe distance from the smoking ruin. A few Augsburg raftsmen, casting black glances all around, stood near them and were obviously on guard.

“Well?” he asked the hangman. “What do you think?”

Jakob Kuisl took another drag on his pipe.

“Anyway, they put their goods in a safe place while we were fighting with them.” He stood up and stretched his legs.

Finally he muttered: “One thing is clear. The fire was set deliberately by someone. I’ve lit a few fires myself, for executions. It takes a bit of work to get it to burn well. You can’t just throw a torch on it.”

“Arson?” inquired Simon.

“You can bet your life on that.”

“But why?”

“Don’t know. But we’ll find out sooner or later.”

The hangman started walking toward the bridge. As he passed them he shook his head.

“In any case, there’s one good thing about the fire,” he said.

Simon walked after him.

“What is it?”

“If they question the Augsburgers and Schongauers about it, then we get a reprieve for the Stechlin woman. At any rate, she’s safe for today.”

Jakob Kuisl trudged over the wooden bridge. Suddenly he turned around again.

“Oh, I almost forgot. You should just stop by at young Schreevogl’s house. He asked me to tell you that his Clara is ill. And you send Magdalena home, understand?”

Simon turned to the hangman’s daughter. She smiled.

“Father likes you.”

Simon frowned. “You really think so?”

“Sure. Otherwise he’d have cut off your family jewels long ago and thrown you in the Lech. You can’t imagine how fast.”

The physician grinned. Then he considered what it must be like to have the hangman for an enemy. He hoped that Magdalena was right.

Jakob Kuisl headed back to the prison. In the meantime it was getting dark in the streets. A single bailiff was standing in front of the keep. They had left him there and ordered him to keep watch while all the others ran down to the raft landing. Since then a few of them had reappeared with Georg Riegg and the watchman at the bridge, had locked up the two of them without further comment, and had returned to the river again.

The young man looked worried. He seemed to be the only person in the town who didn’t know what had happened. And now the hangman had come back alone. Where were the others? The court clerk? The witnesses?

“That’s enough for today,” growled Kuisl and pushed the bailiff aside. “Time to leave. Just have to put the things away. Did you lock up the Stechlin woman again?”

The bailiff nodded. He was barely eighteen years old, his face deeply marked with smallpox. Finally he could no longer restrain his curiosity. “What’s been happening down there?” he asked.

“The Stadel burned down,” said Kuisl. “Want to go and look?”

The bailiff looked uncertainly behind him into the entrance of the keep. The hangman clapped him on the shoulder.

“The witch won’t run away, I’ll take care of that. And now off you go.”

The youth nodded thankfully, then handed the keys over to Kuisl. A few seconds later he disappeared behind the corner of the house next door.

Jakob Kuisl entered the interior of the keep. Immediately the chill of the stone walls enveloped him. A musty smell of urine and damp straw lay in the air. In the left-hand cell sat Georg Riegg and the bridge watchman. They had locked up the Augsburg wagon driver in the small but more comfortable room in the Ballenhaus, so as not to further provoke the powerful neighboring city.

The Schongauers seemed to have temporarily accepted their situation. Each had withdrawn into a corner of the cell and was dozing. When the raftsman saw the hangman, he jumped up and shook the bars of the grill.

“Kuisl, look here! They’ve locked us up with the witch. Do something, before she casts a spell on us,” he shouted.

“Shut your mouth.”

The hangman did not look at him and went on to the neighboring cell.

The bailiff had locked up Martha Stechlin again, but mercifully he returned her clothing to her. She had crept into a corner and covered her shorn head with both hands. As Kuisl approached the bars of the grille, a rat whisked between his feet.

“Martha, this is important,” he said. “Look at me.”

The midwife blinked at him.

“I need the names of the children,” he whispered.

“Which names?”

The hangman put his finger to his lips and nodded toward the other cell. Then he continued whispering.

“The names of the children who were with you the night before the murder. Every single one. If we are going to get you out of here, I must know what happened.”

Martha Stechlin told him the names. There were five. All except Peter Grimmer were orphans. Two of them were no longer alive.

Lost in thought, Jakob Kuisl drummed his fingers against the iron bars. These children must have some secret. He kicked out at another rat, slamming it into a corner, where it squealed and died.

“See you tomorrow, Martha,” he said, this time aloud. “Tomorrow it may hurt a bit, but you must be strong.”

“Ha, she’ll scream, the witch! And we’ll be right near, all right,” Georg Riegg shouted at them. The wagon driver shook the iron bars again. At the same time he kicked the dozing watchman, who sat up suddenly and looked at him, shocked.

“You be quiet, Riegg,” the watchman whispered. “Just be happy that they’re not going to torture us.”

The hangman went out into the night. But at the next corner he stopped and stood as if rooted to the ground.

From the market square a crowd with torches was coming toward him.

When Simon Fronwieser reached the Schreevogls’ house to look at the sick child, he saw at once that something was not right. In front of the door a dozen people had assembled. A few had lit lanterns in the gathering darkness. The flickering light threw unnaturally big shadows on the walls of the houses, and the faces of the curious were bathed in a dull red light. People whispered, again and again fingers were pointed up at the second floor. Simon heard someone say: “He flew out of the window and took her with him. The devil incarnate, as true as I stand here!” Another uttered curses against Martha Stechlin and wanted to see her burn that very day.

Directly above the physician the shutters of a window stood wide open. The right shutter swung crookedly on its lower hinge, as if a heavy man had held fast to it. Splinters of glass were scattered on the street. From the upper rooms a woman could be heard sobbing. At that moment she uttered such a shrill cry of grief that Simon thought the other glass panes would be shattered as well.

The physician made his way through the crowd and began to climb the broad, thickly carpeted stairs up to the second floor. The crying came out of the room on the left. A maid and another servant, pale as death, were standing in front of the door. The maid was mumbling prayers and fingering a rosary. Simon examined the damaged door. The thin wood in the middle had been broken out and the splinters lay on the carpet. Through the chest-high hole Simon could see Maria Schreevogl lying on her stomach in the bed, her fingers clutching the comforter, her head buried in the pillows. Jakob Schreevogl sat alongside her on the edge of the bed and stroked his wife’s hair, talking softly to her and trying to calm her. Two chairs in the room had been upset; a picture of the Holy Virgin lay on the floor, the frame shattered. Right across her peacefully smiling face was the impression of a boot.

When Jakob Schreevogl saw the physician standing at the splintered door, he nodded to him and asked him to come in.

“If you’ve come to see our sick Clara, you’ve come too late,” whispered Schreevogl. Simon saw that he, too, had been weeping. The face of the young alderman was even paler than usual. The arched, rather oversize nose stuck out under eyes red with tears, his otherwise carefully arranged hair looked unkempt and fell over his forehead.

“What’s happened?” Simon asked.

Maria Schreevogl began to scream again: “The devil has taken her! He flew into the room and took our little Clara…” The rest was drowned in sobs.

Jakob Schreevogl shook his head.

“We don’t know exactly what happened,” he said. “Someone must have…kidnapped her. He opened the street door, although it was locked, then he kicked down the upper door, seized our little Clara, and obviously jumped out of the window with her.”

“Out of the window?” Simon frowned. He went over to the window and looked down. Directly beneath him stood a hay wagon.

The physician nodded. With a bold jump it would be possible to get down without breaking all one’s bones.

“Someone down on the street said that he or it flew away with little Clara,” Simon said, looking down at the crowd below. He could hear angry sounds like the buzzing of bees coming from the crowd down below. “Are there any eyewitnesses?”

“Anton Stecher says he saw it with his own eyes,” said Schreevogl and again took the hand of his wife, who was sobbing quietly to herself. He shook his head. “Until now I always believed that all this with the children and the murders had a natural explanation, but now…” Schreevogl’s voice faltered. He turned to Simon. “What do you think, then?” he asked the physician.

Simon shrugged. “I don’t believe anything that I haven’t seen for myself. And I see that the house was broken into and that the child has disappeared.”

“But the street door was locked.”

“An experienced man with a skeleton key, nothing easier than that.”

Schreevogl nodded. “I see,” he said. “Then Anton Stecher was lying.”

“Not necessarily,” answered Simon. He pointed to the hay cart under the window. “I think it happened this way. A man got through the front door with a skeleton key. Clara heard him and bolted the door of her room. He broke down this door and there was a struggle. Finally he jumped out of the window with Clara right into the hay wagon. Then he made off with her.”

Schreevogl frowned. “But why did he jump out of the window with the child? Couldn’t he have just gone out again through the front door?”

Simon could think of no quick answer. Instead he asked: “Clara was an orphan, wasn’t she?”

Schreevogl nodded. “Her parents died five years ago. The town assigned her to us as a ward. But we treated her exactly like one of our own children. My wife was particularly fond of her.”

Tears came to his eyes. He wiped them away hastily. His wife had turned away from the men and was crying quietly into the pillows.

Meanwhile the crowd under the window had grown larger. A noisy disturbance could be heard. Simon looked out. Newcomers were arriving, bringing torches. Something big seemed to be happening down there.

The physician thought a bit. Anton Kratz had been an orphan too, and Peter Grimmmer had grown up without a mother-and all of them had been at Martha Stechlin’s the night before the first murder…

“Did your Clara often visit the midwife Martha Stechlin?” he asked the alderman. Jakob Schreevogl shrugged.

“I don’t always know where she went. It’s possible…”

“She went to the midwife’s quite often,” his wife interrupted him. Maria Schreevogl’s voice was now firmer. “She told me herself that they met at her house. I thought nothing of it…”

“Two days ago, in the morning, when little Grimmer died,” Simon asked, “did you notice anything unusual about Clara?”

Jakob Schreevogl thought for a moment, then he nodded. “She was very pale and wouldn’t eat her breakfast. We thought she was beginning to run a fever…Finally, later in the day, she did become ill. When she heard about little Peter, she went up to her room and didn’t come down again until the evening. We thought it would be better to leave her alone for a bit. After all, Peter was her playmate.”

“She had the mark on her.”

“What!” Simon started up from his thoughts.

Maria Schreevogl had raised her head and gazed into the distance. Then she repeated: “She had the sign on her.”

Jakob Schreevogl looked incredulously at his wife. “What are you saying?” he whispered.

Maria Schreevogl stared at the wall in front of her as she spoke: “In the evening I gave her a bath in the tub. I thought a hot bath with herbs would drive away the fever. She resisted, but finally I got her undressed. Then she tried to hold her shoulder underwater, but I saw it. It was the same sign they’re all talking about, very faded, but still visible.”

Simon could scarcely speak. “A circle with a cross under it?” he asked at last.

Maria Schreevogl nodded.

There was a long pause. Only the angry cries of the crowd outside could be heard. At last Jakob Schreevogl sprang up. His face was bright red.

“Why didn’t you ever mention it to me, damn it?” he shouted.

His wife began to cry again. “I…I…didn’t want to believe it. I thought, if I didn’t think about it, it would go away…” She began to sob once more.

“You stupid woman! We might have saved her! We could have asked her what the sign means. Now it’s too late!”

Jakob Schreevogl rushed out of the room and disappeared, slamming the door. Simon ran after him. Standing on the stairs, he heard loud cries from below. “Let’s go!” someone cried. “We’ll get her!”

Simon changed his mind and ran downstairs. Outside he encountered a mob armed with torches, scythes, and pikes heading off toward Munzstrasse. He could even recognize some of the bailiffs. There was nothing to be seen of the court clerk and the other aldermen.

“What are you doing?” Simon screamed after the mob.

One of the rioters, the tanner Gabriel, turned round. He had told Simon about the accident with little Grimmer. “We’re going to get the witch before she takes any more of our children,” he said.

His face was twisted into a strange grimace in the reflected light of the torches and his teeth shone bright white in the darkness.

“But the Stechlin woman is in prison,” Simon said, trying to calm them down. “Anyway, they say it was a man who took little Clara.”

“It was the devil!” roared another. Simon recognized him as Anton Stecher, the eyewitness who claimed to have seen the abductor.

“He had a white hand of bone, and he was flying! That Stechlin hag brought him here by witchcraft!” he cried, as he hurried after the others.

“But that’s nonsense!” Simon shouted into the darkness, but nobody seemed to hear him anymore. Suddenly he was aware of noisy steps behind him. Jakob Schreevogl had hurried downstairs, a lantern in his right hand, his sword in the left. He seemed to have recovered his composure again.

“We must go after them and stop them before there’s a bloodbath,” he said. “They are completely out of control.” Simon watched as he headed into the Munzstrasse, then chased after him.

As he ran, he turned to the alderman and asked, “Then you don’t believe in witchcraft anymore?” he asked.

“I don’t believe in anything anymore,” panted Schreevogl, as they turned into the Weinstrasse. “Neither in the devil nor the Heavenly Father. And now let’s hurry, before they break open the door of the keep!”

The court clerk Johann Lechner was looking forward to a warm bath. He had instructed the servants to heat the boiler down in the court kitchen. In the meantime the wooden tub in his room had been lined with linen sheets and half-filled with hot water. Lechner opened his doublet and hose, laid his clothes neatly over the chair, and with a shudder of pleasure slid into the tub. It smelled of thyme and lavender. Brushwood and rushes were strewn on the floor. The clerk needed this bath urgently to think it all through.

Everything was happening so fast. There were now two dead children and a Stadel burnt to the ground. Lechner was still not quite sure there was any connection between the two events.

It was quite possible that the Augsburgers had set fire to the Stadel. The Schongauers’ transport monopoly had long been a thorn in their side. And hadn’t it happened once before, a long time ago? The clerk resolved to have a look at the records.

But it seemed too far-fetched to him that the Augsburg raftsmen would kill Schongau children. On the other hand…the Stadel fire, the horrible murders, and then the damned leper house being planned just outside town, only because the church had set its mind on it. There were certainly enough reasons to avoid Schongau at the present time and choose another route. So it was the Augsburgers who profited most from all the terrible events in the town. In his long years as clerk to the council Lechner had learned one thing above all else: if you want to know who is responsible for anything, ask who benefits from it.

Cui bono?

Lechner put his head under the water and enjoyed the warmth and silence that surrounded him. Peace at last, no boring discussions, no quarrelsome aldermen seeking only their own advantage, no intrigues. After a minute he ran out of air and had to surface, spluttering.

Whether or not there was a connection between the fire and the murders, there was one sure way to restore peace to the town. The Stechlin woman would have to confess. At the stake all the problems would go up in smoke. Tomorrow he would continue with the questioning, even if it was illegal without approval from Munich.

Perhaps, too, the questioning of the combative Schongauer Georg Riegg and that insolent Augsburger would somehow resolve itself. One of the Fuggers’ raftsmen! As if anything like that would impress him, Lechner! And just for his arrogant behavior alone he would keep him under arrest for a few days in the Ballenhaus.

There was a knock at the door, and a servant entered with another steaming bucket. Lechner nodded his thanks, and a deluge of hot water poured over the court clerk’s tense back. When the servant left, Lechner reached for the scrub brush. There was a second knock. Irritated, he let the brush sink.

“What is it?” he growled toward the door.

The servant’s voice sounded nervous. “Sir, excuse the disturbance…”

“Just tell me what the matter is!”

“Something else has happened. They say that…the devil has flown away with little Clara Schreevogl, and now the people are running to the keep and want to see the Stechlin woman burned at the stake. They have pikes and lances and torches…”

Cursing, the clerk threw the brush into the water and reached for a dry towel. For a moment he considered letting things simply take their course. The sooner the Stechlin woman was put to the stake, the better. But then it occurred to him that he still represented the law in Schongau.

Hastily he pulled his shirt on. The Stechlin woman would burn all right. But only when he ordered it.

When the hangman saw the mob he knew at once where they wanted to go. He turned and ran the few yards back to the keep and stood resolutely at the front entrance. The huge tower had only one way in. Anyone wanting to get to the Stechlin woman would have to get past him. With a determined gaze and folded arms he waited for the group, which had now grown to two dozen men. In the light of the torches Kuisl recognized the usual troublemakers. The baker Michael Berchtholdt was marching at the head of the group. But some of the aldermen’s sons were there also. He could recognize the youngest offspring of Semer, the burgomaster. Many in the mob were armed with pikes and scythe blades. When they saw the hangman, they stopped and started to murmur. Then Berchtholdt, eager to please the crowd, addressed him with a broad grin.

“We’ve come for the witch!” he shouted. “Hand over the key, Kuisl, or there’ll be trouble.”

Shouts of support were heard from the mob, and out of the darkness a stone was thrown at him, which bounced off his chest. The hangman didn’t yield an inch but looked at Berchtholdt with a cold stare.

“Is this the elected witness to this morning’s inquisition speaking, or a rabble-rouser whom I shall have to string up on the nearest tree this very night?”

The grin on the master baker’s face disappeared. Then he regained his composure.

“You must not have heard what’s happened, Kuisl,” he said. “The Stechlin woman called upon the devil, and he’s flown away with the little Schreevogl girl.”

He looked around at a few of his companions. “If we don’t hurry, he’ll fly away with the witch too. Perhaps she’s gone already.”

The mob growled and pushed nearer to the heavy iron door, which the hangman defended with his broad shoulders.

“I know only this: that the law still applies here,” said Jakob Kuisl, “and not a few stupid peasants running through the town with scythes and threshing flails to frighten peaceful burghers.”

“You watch it, Kuisl,” Stecher chimed in. “There are many of us, and you don’t even have a cudgel. We’ll kill you before you know it, and then we’ll burn you and the witch together!”

The hangman smiled and raised his right arm. “This is my cudgel,” he said. “Would anyone like to feel it on his back? Nobody?”

The crowd fell silent. Jakob Kuisl was famous for his strength, and anyone who had ever seen how he hauled up a thief with the noose around his neck or raised the six-foot execution sword to strike a blow at his hapless victim certainly had no wish to start a quarrel with him. Fifteen years earlier he had taken over his father’s office, and before that he had been in the Great War. They said that back then he had killed more people than would fit in the old Schongau cemetery.

The mob moved back several feet. There was silence. The hangman stood there rooted to the spot.

Suddenly Anton Stecher charged forward. He had a flail in his hand, which he brandished at Kuisl.

“Down with the witch!” he shouted.

The hangman turned away, avoiding the flail, seized it by the handle and pulled Stecher toward him. Then he punched him in the nose and tossed him effortlessly back into the crowd. The men withdrew, and Stecher fell to the ground, a stream of blood pouring onto the cobblestones.

The peasant, whimpering, crept back out of sight.

“Anyone else?” asked Kuisl.

The men looked at one another uncertainly, whispering nervously. Everything had happened so quickly. At the back of the group some started to put out their lanterns and scurry home.

Suddenly a rhythmic tread could be heard in the distance. Jakob Kuisl pricked up his ears. Marching feet were approaching from the castle. At last, followed by a squad of soldiers, Lechner and the presiding burgomaster appeared.

At the same moment Simon and Jakob Schreevogl arrived from the market square. When the young alderman saw the court clerk, he put his sword back in its sheath. “Thank God,” he panted. “It isn’t too late. They can say what they like about Lechner, but he has the town under control.”

Simon watched the soldiers approach the mob with their lances poised. In just a few seconds the rioters had thrown down their weapons and were looking about fearfully.

“It’s all over!” Lechner cried out. “Go home! Nothing will happen to anyone who goes now.”

One after the other they disappeared into the narrow alleys of the town. Young Semer ran to his father, who gave him a rap on the head and sent him home. Simon shook his head. The boy had almost committed a murder, and the presiding burgomaster sent him home to have supper…Martha Stechlin’s life was not worth a penny.

Only now did burgomaster Semer see the hangman, who was still on guard by the door of the keep. “You did well!” he called to him. “After all, the council rules here and not the man on the street.” He turned to the court clerk and continued. “Although one can understand the people. Two dead children and a girl kidnapped…Most of us have families ourselves. It’s time to put a stop to all this.”

The clerk nodded. “Tomorrow,” he said. “Tomorrow we shall know more.”

The devil limped through the streets and held his nose into the wind, as if he could smell his victim. He paused at dark corners and listened carefully; he looked under every oxcart, he poked at every dung heap. She couldn’t be far away. It was impossible that she had escaped him.

He heard a noise, and above him someone opened a window. The devil pressed against the wall of the house. In his black coat he was almost invisible in the night. A stream of urine poured into the street close by, then the window shut again. The devil pulled his coat closer around him and continued his search.

In the distance shouts could be heard, but they did not concern him. They were all about the woman they had put in prison. He heard they believed that the woman had summoned him. He couldn’t help smiling. What a thing to imagine. What did the witch look like? Well, he’d get to see her soon, no doubt. First he had to make sure that he got his money. He was hoping that the others had been doing good work out there while he was tidying up here. He spat. Again they had left the dirty work to him. Or had he wished for it himself? Shadows appeared in his field of vision, bloody shapes, terrible images…Screaming women with gaping holes where breasts should have been, babies dashed to pieces like toys on the burnt remains of walls, headless priests in bloodstained cassocks.

He brushed away the images with his hand and put his cool bony fingers on his brow. That did him good. The images vanished. The devil marched on.

Up on top of the Kuh Gate he saw the guard dozing. He was leaning on his lance and staring out into the night. He could hear a soft, snoring sound.

Then he saw the neglected garden near the Kuh Gate. The fence had collapsed, the building behind was a ruin left over from the last days of the war. In the garden ivy and knotweed crept up the town wall. There, almost hidden by the leaves, a ladder was leaning. The devil jumped over the remains of the fence and looked at the ground beneath the wall. It was just past the full moon and there was sufficient light to see prints in the damp earth. Children’s footprints. The devil bent down and inhaled the scent of the earth.

She had gotten away from him.

Though the ladder was not well attached, he was able to climb it nimbly, like a cat. At the top, a ledge, an arm’s length wide, ran along the town wall. He looked to the left, from where the snoring of the night watchman could still be heard. He turned to the right and ran along the ledge, where battlements with arrow slits appeared at regular intervals. After about a hundred yards he suddenly stopped and then went back a few paces. He was not mistaken.

Next to one of the arrow slits some of the stones in the wall had been broken out, so that the hole was three times as big as before.

Big enough for a child.

On the other side, the branch of an oak tree stretched out to the wall. One or two of the twigs had been freshly broken off. The devil put his head through the hole, sniffing the cool April air.

He would seek her and find her. Perhaps then the pictures in his mind would go away.