Heidelberg Effect (11 page)

“I can imagine,” Ella said.
“But what about your situation
here
? You said something earlier
about some warlord raiding all the convents in Heidelberg? Man, I’d
give anything for just five minutes access to Wikkipedia to get a
little overview.”

“Wikki—?” The Mother Superior uncovered a
plate of cheese and set it on the table between them. She reached
for a carafe of red wine.

“Never mind,” Ella said. “Can you tell me
while we eat? Time travel is surprisingly strenuous work. If I
didn’t think I’d end up in a psych ward somewhere I’d consider
doing a blog on why that is.”

Greta crossed herself and took Ella’s hand.
She bowed her head and thanked God for the food they were about to
eat.

“Amen,” Ella said, watching hungrily as the
Mother Superior ladled soup into a stoneware bowl and set it down
in front of her. Ella picked up a large spoon and prompted her
hostess: “Okay. So, what’s the story?”

Greta served herself in silence and then
began.

“The family of Krüger has
informally ruled this part of Germany for nearly a hundred years,”
she said. “Before Krüger the Terrible, who rules now, there was the
father, Krüger the Wicked. If possible, he was even more
treacherous and cruel than the present Krüger. While it’s true the
city has a government and working laws, it operates in tandem with
Krüger, who has military and civil control over Heidelberg.
Krüger’s army, although not large, is loyal to him and not to any
central authority. Germany’s ruler,
Prince
Karl III Philip
, accepts this because
there is peace in this area. It is at the cost of hundreds of
innocent lives and constant terror among the people but such things
are rarely of interest to our politicians.

“Krüger has two sons. Axel, the eldest, is a
murdering fiend. He and his men have raided all the nunneries and
monasteries in this part of Germany. It is said that he sleeps on a
bed of skulls from the Catholic holy men of Germany. From the
nunneries—of which ours is the very last—he has murdered the old
women and taken the novices and young nuns as concubines. The ones
who do not remain at the castle, for whatever reason, are either
murdered or sold to the traders as they make their way to the
Middle East.”

Ella noticed that Greta’s voice shook as she
spoke.

“The other son, Christof, is not like his
brother. There is even a rumor that he is Catholic. Unfortunately,
he is also weak and passive. It is said that the brothers hate each
other.

“Just two days ago, one of my novices was
taken by Axel’s men. He informed me then that he will return to
destroy our convent and all in it before the new moon.”

“Informed
you?” Ella could only whisper. It was
unimaginable to Ella that such monsters were allowed to roam
unchecked.

The Mother Superior pulled back the long
draping sleeves of her habit to reveal the fresh wound carved into
her pale flesh. It looked like a crescent moon. “He has a wit, no?
This monster.”

“He…he did this to you?”

Greta stared at Ella, her eyes filled with
tears. “I wish you could have known this precious girl,” she said.
“I raised her since she was a child.”

“Oh, Greta, I’m so sorry.” Ella touched the
nun’s sleeve. “Wow,” she said, shaking her head. “This is bad. You
have officially scared the shit out of me.”

“Ella, we don’t speak like that here—”

“God, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking—”

“Or use the name of the Lord—”

“—
in vain, yes, sorry about
that, too. It’s just that, wow. This is a seriously scary dude you
are dealing with.”

“I know. I fear for us all.”

“Yeah, me, too, I fear for
us all. Wow. He sounds
relentless
.”

“He is.”

“But that’s good in a way.”

“Good?”

“Yeah.” Ella pushed her wine cup aside and
leaned back into her wooden chair. “You see, when it comes to
solving problems, I think it’s always good when you know ahead of
time about any dead ends. Knowing that helps you avoid wasting time
trying to fix them. So knowing that about him, that he doesn’t give
up and that any kind of parlay or negotiation is useless, is
actually helpful.”

“Do you…is there some way you think you can
help us?”

“Trust me, Greta. I’m not
sure what it is yet but we’re going to do
something
.”

“You are like every American I ever heard
of.”

Ella laughed. “In the
movies, right? But, seriously, this kind of injustice goes beyond
nationality. Me, I call it problem solving 101:
know thy enemy.”

“I don’t believe that’s in the Bible,” Greta
said.

“It’s in
my
Bible,” Ella said,
firmly.

Rowan stepped out on the balcony of his
apartment and stared out over the little manmade lake. He watched a
duck land on the lake and settle into a serene coast across the
surface.

The conversation with
Ella’s father had been vastly instructive, if mildly unpleasant.
The man had obviously been teetering on the edge of panic before
Rowan called him about not hearing back from his daughter. More
than once, Rowan wondered whether retired spies were usually this
neurotic.
Being this excitable, how had
the man ever kept a cover in the CIA?

“She told you she was in trouble?” her
father almost shouted.

“Something to that effect,” Rowan said.
“Thought you might know something about it.”

“She doesn’t really tell me
much about her life,” her father said with clear agitation in his
voice—as if Rowan were somehow responsible. “She never
mentioned
you
,
for instance. Have you talked to her office?”

“Thought I’d talk with you first,” he
said.

“Well, I know she got some bad news
recently,” Bill Stevens said.

“What kind of bad news?”

“The private kind.”

“I see. So you spoke to her?”

“Why are you looking for her?”

“She left me a voicemail last night saying
she was in some kind of trouble and needed help.”

“Sorry, son,” her father said. “That’s not
believable. My daughter is very independent. In fact, she has never
asked for help in her life. I’m afraid I must assume that you are
not who you say you are.”

Did retired spies just lose every bit of
sense they ever had when they were active or was the man
senile?

Before Rowan could insist to the man that he
was, indeed, a friend of Ella’s, the line disconnected.

Son of a bitch!
Rowan thought as he looked at the phone.
Was the man demented?
What news did Ella discover that had her calling him asking
for help? He swallowed his frustration and his temptation to drive
to Tampa where Ella’s father lived and throttle the information out
of him.

Instead, he punched in the number of Ella’s
branch office in Heidelberg.

On the second day of her
life at the convent, Ella dressed in the rough, itchy and very
heavy habit of a novice nun. She wore her own freshly laundered
panties since, as she was distressed to learn, undergarments in the
1600s were even more uncomfortable and ill fitting than outer
garments. After an unsatisfying breakfast of stale bread and sour
wine which only succeeded in half filling the hole of hunger in her
stomach and left her ready to murder for an egg and bacon biscuit,
Ella left the convent with Greta and Sister Beatrix. Ella knew that
if it were up to Greta, Ella would stay hidden in the convent
forever, but Ella insisted on seeing the town. In reality, the trip
was more than anything else to convince herself that she really
was
when
she
was.

After ten minutes, she was convinced.

In spades.

The convent sat on the Nekker River less
than a mile from the famous Heidelberg Castle. Surrounded trees and
rough hewn boulders, Ella wondered if the convent had been placed
there by design to hide it. In any event, as soon as they left the
narrow lane that led from the nunnery, there was little doubt that
she had landed in 1620 Heidelberg.

A sea of dirty, ragged peasants streamed
along the main thoroughfare that led toward the town’s center and
marketing hub. When she caught her first glimpse of the castle high
above the town, the view took her breath away. No longer the
majestic ruin she had seen every day in 2012, this castle was
complete, undamaged and imposing.

She could not stop staring up at it as she
walked.

“You are gawking, Ella,” Greta said.

“I can’t get over everything,” Ella said.
“Is the pedestrian bridge a toll bridge? Has the gateway not been
built yet?”

“It is best if you do not speak, I think,
yes?”

Ella tore her eyes from the towering castle
walls to see the curious glances she was getting from people around
her.

Guess I’m not fitting in
too well in 1620 Heidelberg
, she thought.
She dropped her eyes to the road in front of her but was soon
staring all about her again. There was so much to see, so much to
take in. It was impossible not to look. She tried not to gape in
astonishment. In some ways, the bustling streets of medieval
Heidelberg reminded her of a movie set. She half expected some
irritated director to jump out from behind a bush and redirect all
the extras to the canteen until a few more telephone wires could be
removed in order to get the period piece just right. Except there
were no telephone wires to remove. Or anything else that might
indicate that she was anywhere but in the early seventeenth
century.

She looked at Greta, forging purposefully
ahead toward the town market, her back straight and determined, the
rows of scowling peasants trudging along on either side of her.

I’m really here. I’m really fucking
here.

There was little similarity
to the
Altstadt
familiar to her. The street was rank with the stench of
garbage and raw sewage. As in 2012, the market sat behind the
Church of the Holy Spirit. Ella couldn’t get over how filth and
fresh produce were so close to each other and nobody seemed to
care. She tried to remember when exactly bacteria were
discovered.
No wonder these people didn’t
live to forty!
She walked closely behind
Greta, who nearly trotted in her blatant urgency to silently yet
quickly accomplish the convent’s shopping.

The narrow cobblestone walkway, so crowded
now with animals and people, was lined in 2012 with a mile of
quaint shops and homes with Baroque and Renaissance facades. It was
a bustling street of tourists and shopping, bratwurst and pretzel
stands, panhandlers, musicians and artful street cafés. As she
hurried after Greta, Ella couldn’t help but notice a particularly
slovenly fishmonger’s table set up precisely where she was sure she
had enjoyed a leisurely latté not two weeks earlier. The fishmonger
looked up and made a sign as if warding off evil spirits. Ella
resolved to try harder not to stare.

Just ahead, she could see the street opened
into the cobblestone courtyard around the Church of the Holy
Spirit. Jammed up against the church was row after row of produce
and fish stands beside crates of live chickens and pigs. The noise
and the smells were almost overpowering.

Ella nearly ran into Greta when she stopped
abruptly. She took the opportunity to look around and found herself
mesmerized by the swirling cacophony of color and motion all around
her.

“Don’t look!” The order from Greta was
fierce and whispered in German. Unfortunately, this just made Ella
snap her head up to see what she should not—to see what she would
never be able to blot out of her memory or her mind’s eye for the
rest of her days.

A large wooden stage was set in the middle
of the bustling marketplace, raised up and visible to all so that
they might witness the executions as they shopped. Ella saw a young
man and a boy cowering on the stage while a large, beefy man in a
black hood strutted and shouted to the crowd. In his hand was a
terrible axe. As the man spoke, he stripped to the waist to show
his massive chest gleaming with sweat and blood, Ella could see
there were women crying and waiting with raised hands at the base
of the stage.

“Oh, dear Mother of God,” Ella said. “Please
tell me this is not what I think it is.”

“Silence!” Greta whispered hoarsely to her.
“You can change nothing of what you see here.”

Ella pushed past Greta to the stage. She was
drawn to the horror and to the agony of the pleading women. Greta’s
fingers bit into Ella’s arm as she grabbed her. “Ella, no!” she
said. “You can do nothing but endanger us all!”

One of the women screamed and Ella turned
her head from Greta to the woman and then back to the stage. It all
happened so fast. The bare-chested monster stood in the center of
the stage as if congratulating himself on having won some special
honor. The axe lay on the stage beside him. He held in his hand
something horrible. He lifted it higher and higher and as he did
the crowd roared its approval.

Between the hysteria of the screaming women
and the thunderous, raucous laughter and applause from the gathered
crowd, Ella saw the boy fall to his knees in terror. He could not
be ten years old, she thought in amazement. As the executioner
threw the decapitated head of the young man into a nearby trough on
the stage and began his turn toward the child, Ella shook off
Greta’s grip and pushed to where the women were standing at the
base of the stage.