The Bloodletter's Daughter (8 page)

Katarina went back to lifting Marketa’s tresses and braiding it with her soft hands.

“If it were not so perfectly mixed, I could plait it into individual braids and no two would be the same color!” Katarina said.

Marketa felt herself drifting off as Katarina pulled her hair gently with her soft hands and tugged it into long braids. The girls would sit in the soft grass by the river and Katarina would adorn Marketa’s hair with wildflowers, which thrived in the rocky soil and laced riotous colors through the fields and meadows of Krumlov.

Katarina asked endless questions about Marketa’s father’s profession, about the sharpening of the blades, the four humors of the body that were released by surgery, the people he had saved, and the patients he had not. She wanted to know about the
fleam, the razor-sharp blade he used to nick the skin, the cupping glasses to pull out blood, and the leeches themselves.

Katarina had a curious habit of crossing herself anytime she asked a question, as if the science of Zigmund Pichler’s profession were somehow a sin.

“Tell me again,” she would implore, her hand fluttering about her face and bosom. “About the humors. I have them all muddled up, Marketa. I am not as clever as you.”

Marketa sighed because she couldn’t believe that a miller’s daughter, with a hundred recipes in her head, couldn’t hold on to four simple humors.

“The black bile. Now that one stays with me, Marketa. The sadness, melancholy humor.”

“Just the opposite of you, Katarina. It’s strange that you should remember only that one!”

“Maybe it is because I have heard it said that King Rudolf is haunted by melancholy. But tell me the others!” she begged. “And how your father brings them into harmony.”

Marketa smiled because Katarina was paying her father a compliment. A good barber-surgeon could cure the sickest man, woman, or child, if he could manage to balance the four humors.

“Blood, the sanguine humor, is for laughter, music, and passion. That one you have in your veins, my friend, by the bucketful.”

Katarina laughed, throwing her head back so that her white teeth gleamed in the sun and the light caught the granules of sugar that clung to her plump throat.

“The others, Marketa. Please.”

“Phlegm. The dull and sluggish.”

“Like the grave digger’s son, who is not saddened at his occupation, but is just like an old mole, bored with life itself. Oh, how I wish he wouldn’t stare at me in the streets with his sad face.”

“The last is yellow bile. It is the cruelest of them all. It causes outrage, ravenous lechery, even—murder.”

Katarina widened her eyes. Legends and fairy stories captured her like nothing else. And to her, the cholers were a witch’s tale.

“Murder,” she whispered.

“Too much yellow bile causes lunacy. It boils up in the veins and scalds with burning lust or murderous passion. That is what the book says.”

Katarina looked at Marketa in admiration, nodding her head.

“You and your books. Ah, what a gift it must be to discover the world in those squiggly lines.”

Marketa heard her mother call from across the river that she needed help in the bathhouse.

She rose to her feet and kissed Katarina on the cheek.

“I have to go now,” Marketa said. “But as always you have given me cheer, dear friend. Let me teach you to read, Katarina. Then you too can decipher those squiggly lines!”

Katarina looked at her friend, stunned.

“Me? Read?”

“Of course. Why not? It is not magic. Reading only takes instruction and practice.”

Katarina reached for her friend’s hands, kissing them.

“Oh, Katarina,” said Marketa, snatching her hands away. “Don’t make such a fuss!”

Marketa waved good-bye as she hurried to the Barber’s Bridge.

It was true. Reading was a rare gift that Pichler had given his daughter, and Marketa had the opportunity to practice with tutors who were too poor to pay for bloodletting and traded their bookish skills for her father’s services. Books were mainly in Latin, and she struggled with her father’s help to
decipher them. But she could understand Czech and German well enough to read and write simple correspondence, her mouth working over the sounds and threading them together into a word.

Her skinny twin sisters, Dana and Kate, age ten, could neither read nor write. Like most of the children in Krumlov who did not attend the Jesuit Latin school, they did not seem to mind in the slightest. The girls shook their heads as they saw their sister sitting with a book in her lap, her finger tracing the words to sound out their meaning. They never resented Marketa for having the education they did not, for neither of them had any desire to spend precious minutes of free time bent over a book.

Lucie would stomp over to the table in the evening where Marketa leaned over a precious book, poring over the words. With a wet pinch of her finger and thumb, she would snuff out the sputtering tallow candle, leaving Marketa in the dark, with only the glow of the embers in the hearth to illuminate the room.

“Do not waste candles,” her mother scolded. “We are not Hapsburgs! Go to sleep. Your reading will do you no good in the baths and is useless for a woman. It can only ruin your eyes!”

Marketa would sit in the sudden darkness as the rancid, smoking fat of the candle spread its last greasy fumes across the room. She breathed in the thick air, touching the parchment with her fingers.

Her father thought it was important for her to read, especially as she had taken an early interest in his profession. There was no such thing—there could be no such thing—as a woman barber-surgeon, but Marketa quickly excelled as an assistant. She knew how to keep his scissors and blades sharp, and when he performed surgery, she held the bowl to catch the splashing course of blood in a modest manner that reassured the patients. She learned the bleeding points, the system of veins, and how to stanch bleeding.

And Marketa knew she was never ever to touch hair that was cut with her father’s barber’s scissors. The spirit left in the strands could be malevolent and strike her dead. At the very least it might invade her soul, make cows’ milk curdle, or leave her infertile.

Marketa also took a keen interest in the humors and the diseases they created when out of balance. Marketa felt that her father’s profession was akin to the divine working of miracles. It was said that she was much more like her father than her mother, but some of the older folk in Krumlov whispered she was much like her revered aunt, the mother superior of the convent of Poor Clares. They nodded their white heads in silent agreement when they saw her in the street. Indeed, the girl possessed the same mysterious air the holy Mother Ludmilla had when she was the same age.

Marketa’s father whispered to her when she was a mere toddler that he was sure she had the gift of healing. He thought his daughter too young to understand and remember his words.

But she did.

As Marketa walked over Barber’s Bridge to the bathhouse, she thought wistfully of her father in Vienna. How she wished she could be at his side, listening to the latest discoveries in human anatomy and phlebotomy.

Little did she know that another discovery—a chance encounter in the streets of Vienna with a Hapsburg—was about to change her father’s life forever.

He would be the first to bring the unspeakable news to Cesky Krumlov.

R
UDOLF
II
AND THE
C
ODED
B
OOK OF
W
ONDER

King Rudolf scratched peevishly inside one nostril with his manicured fingernail. It wasn’t a particularly elegant act to perform in the Viennese court, but then what did it matter? He was emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, the king of Hungary, king of Moravia and Bohemia and Croatia. And the Eastern kingdoms paid him tribute and asked for his mighty protection, so he could include these in his possession.

And given the daily news of the outrageous behavior of his bastard son Giuglio—now known to everyone but the royal family as Don Julius—what condemnation could a little nosescratching merit? He had divine right, he was...

One of his many dwarfs, the pimply one, giggled and whispered something behind his pudgy hand.

“Do you mock me, you ugly sprite?” snapped the king. The finger so recently engaged in scratching now pointed ominously at the little man. “Approach me, you warty little toad!”

The dwarf widened his eyes in horror and tried to swallow his fear. The king was known for sudden fits of rage, and a court
dwarf was disposable, just one among the many given to Rudolf for his amusement. The man trembled at the thought of being plunged into the darkness of a Viennese prison.

“Of course not, my lord! I’d sooner cut off my right arm than to insult my king!” he said.

“Of what do you speak, then, so full of mirth?”

The dwarf hesitated, his eyes darting like scared minnows as he conjured his lie. “I—I was wondering if life in Prague and the
hrad
is as marvelously amusing as I’ve heard. The music, the feasts, the Vltava River that sparkles green—”

Everyone in the Viennese court knew of His Majesty’s preference for Prague, where he could escape the pressures and royal duties of Vienna and indulge his melancholy, his love for art, astronomy, exotic animals, beautiful women, and clocks.

The king’s minister, Wolfgang Rumpf, stepped in, perhaps saving the dwarf’s life.

“Yes, indeed. This little man does praise well the charms of the capital city Prague for one who has never laid eyes on her eternal beauty,” he said, casting a sardonic look at the trembling dwarf. “What an astute observation from someone so humble.”

“My holy city of enchantment,” murmured the king, momentarily forgetting his wrath. “Bah! Vienna sickens me with her air—the Danube cannot compare with the Vltava. Did I not proclaim Prague as City Eternal of the Holy Roman Empire? Why do state affairs continue to draw me back to this old whore of a city and the nagging voice of my mother? We shall prepare for Prague immediately. You, Rumpf, shall address these tedious councilors who suck my very marrow with their questions and pleas. They tire me with their wheedling.”

Minister Rumpf, who was long accustomed to taking charge of the reins of the empire, especially when His Majesty suffered a bout of melancholy, consented with a low bow.

“However, before your imminent departure, my lord,” said Wolfgang Rumpf, addressing the king’s polished boot, “if you please, we must discuss the fate of your son, Don Julius Caesar d’Austria.”

“Giuglio has the corrupt blood of his Italian mother in his veins. This is my punishment for coupling with the foreign wench.”

Minister Rumpf’s eyebrow twitched. It had long been assumed by the European royal courts that Emperor Rudolf’s own mental failings—bouts of melancholy and fits of temper—were a direct inheritance from his great-grandmother, Juana La Loca of Spain, the maddest perhaps of all the Hapsburgs. And now Don Julius, in turn, manifested undeniable signs of the Hapsburg lunacy. The bastard son did not share the dark, brooding melancholy of his father, but displayed a belligerent choler that endangered all near to him.

At least King Rudolf was more eccentric than macabre and his tempers were short-lived, blessed be, thought his minister. It could be worse. His ancestor, Juana La Loca, had kept the dead body of her consort with her for years, caressing and sleeping with the decomposing corpse. Certainly it was best not to have a rotting corpse at court and a queen who made love to it, especially with the Turkish sultan Suleiman waging war and demanding tribute in the southern regions. Still, the nagging problem of the bastard son had to be addressed.

“Last night, my lord, Don Julius attacked his own servant with a knife and thrust the blade through the man’s hand. He has been detained by the authorities and rests in a guarded room in the courthouse.”

The king’s face contorted, but he said nothing. Rumpf waited silently, hoping the king would gain control of his temper before he spoke.

Then Rudolf exclaimed, “Damn that bastard! Damn him and his brothers and sisters, all six bloody bastards! Well, set him free at once, by my order.”

Rumpf lowered his voice. He was nearly whispering. “This act was the culmination of a night of debauchery, Your Majesty. Don Julius is reported to have taken two whores into the streets and performed his sordid business in front of a crowd of drunken louts, who cheered him on. His servant tried to pry him from the thighs of the prostitutes and throw clothes on his naked back. The man received this unmerited assault as thanks from your son. He nearly bled to death, but a barber-surgeon in the crowd rushed to stanch the bleeding.”

The king said nothing. He remembered the one afternoon years ago when he had struck his son, the day he had found him trying to decipher the Coded Book of Wonder. He thought how his young son had been intrigued by the workings of clocks and other mechanisms such as music boxes and windup toys.

Perhaps it was this instinct for logic and order that had led Giuglio to study the incomprehensible text of the mysterious Coded Book of Wonder.

Why had he lost his temper that day? The memory from seven years ago still gnawed at the king.

What had happened to that boy with the curious mind, the intellectual? The king had pinned all his hopes and pride on his eldest son, the handsome boy who had inherited the good looks of his mistress.

And now...his son had grown cantankerous and fat, gorging himself on cakes and ale, ordering outrageous repasts from the palace kitchens, one after another, each more sumptuous: game, hams, ducks, pies, cheeses, and fancy Viennese pastries, laden with butter and heavy cream. At night, he whored and gambled, came home staggering drunk, and brutally attacked his servants.
He had disgraced himself in the streets and taverns of Prague and now Vienna.

How the boy had disappointed him! He was now twenty and Rudolf could make no more excuses for his outrageous behavior. His appearance, fleshy and swollen-eyed, disgusted his father. What had happened to the sea-green eyes, the color of Venetian glass, he had inherited from his mother? Submerged now in his swollen face, like raisins stuck deep in risen dough.

Had the boy no shame?

The minister dared to touch the king on the sleeve. Rudolf’s eyes focused on the light pressure of his hand.

“Your Majesty,” Rumpf said in a quiet but urgent tone. “We must do something immediately or your son will be assassinated or worse.”

“What do you propose, Minister Rumpf?”

The minister clenched his teeth and closed his eyes.

“The asylum.”

“Never! Not that nightmare we witnessed! Mention this to me again and I will have you dismissed.”

The minister sighed. “Then, if he cannot be confined to an asylum, Your Majesty, you will likely see your own son murdered by one of your subjects. Or perhaps your brother Matthias will use him as an excuse to seize the crown. No Viennese citizen would oppose Matthias if your son continues his present conduct.”

Rudolf’s back stiffened at the words.

“May the plague take Matthias and send my brother’s soul to hell!”

“You must not let him have an advantage. Show your supreme strength and banish your son before Matthias plays his hand.”

The king looked at his minister. He swallowed hard.

“Suggest a solution! I cannot condemn my son to that place we saw!”

Rudolf thought of the bald women, the screaming heads of the wild men, begging to be freed.

“Yet the bastard shall not cost me my throne, I swear it! Perhaps the astrological prognostication was right, and it will be a member of my own family who will bring me to my death.”

The king worked his ruby ring around his finger, thinking of the prophecy.

“Tell me, good Rumpf, tell me! What do you propose?” the king said. “But I will not commit my son to the hellhole we visited.”

“I have tried to have him enstated in Transylvania as you hoped, but they will not accept him, my lord,” said Minister Rumpf. “We would have to go to battle with the Wallachians again to gain him the post.”

“No,” said Rudolf. “That would give us another vulnerable front to Suleiman’s Ottoman army.”

The minister reminded the king of the other alternative they had already tried, interning Don Julius in a monastery.

“My lord, you well know that eighteen months with the monks in the Alps did nothing to extinguish his disease.”

“That was my mother’s idea,” grumbled Rudolf. “She always insists he is lacking in religious discipline.”

“Yes, well, you know how I feel about the clergy,” whispered Rumpf. “They only seem to complicate matters. However, I do have one more idea that might appeal to Your Majesty, and I have taken the liberty to investigate the possibilities. There is a township in southern Bohemia, less than two days’ ride from Vienna. It is a place called Cesky Krumlov, on that same Vltava that flows through Prague. Petr Vok and the Rozmberk clan have fallen on hard times financing the Bohemian resistance to the Turks. I
think we could persuade them to sell you the castle, and we could keep Don Julius under guard there.”

“A prisoner?”

“Under guard only until his humors improve. He will be ensconced in a beautiful castle that rises on a hill above the village. The Rozmberks have furnished it lavishly. It rivals your
hrad
itself. They keep wild bears in the moat to remind the people that they are of the royal Orsino blood of Italy.”

“A Bohemian family related to the Orsino? Impossible!” sneered the king.

Rumpf nodded, knowing the Bohemian lords and especially the Protestant Rozmberk clan were thorns in the king’s side. Rudolf could not even raise taxes without the consent of the Bohemian estates.

“Certainly, it is highly disputed, but my point is that they have spared no expense or luxury in the castle. Surely your son would find solace and his wits in such a situation.”

A smile spread across the king’s face. He pulled his ear, contemplating his son as master of his own castle and Bohemian estate.

“The matter is settled! Negotiate a good price with Petr Vok and acquire the castle and the township, too, while you are at it. My son will become Lord of Krumlov. The matter is settled.

“Now I must ready myself for Prague. Dwarf, fetch my valet.”

“Then I have your permission to send Don Julius to Cesky Krumlov?”

“I have just said so. He is a nuisance and a menace. But I must insist that a priest accompany him, to appease my mother—she and my uncle Felipe would never let me hear the end of it were he not administered by a Jesuit.”

The king stopped, his hand in the air.

“And, Rumpf. I know that it will be difficult to persuade Giuglio to go willingly, let alone cooperate once he is confined to
the castle. Yet he must improve his conduct or I shall take even sterner consequences—I will cut off his allowance and send him back to the monastery in Austria and let the bloody monks deal with him again!”

Rudolf tightened his lips, remembering that the monks had no success at all with his belligerent son. No one spoke and the hall resounded with the ticking of over a dozen clocks.

Then the thought came to him.

“Ah!” he said, looking at one of his favorite timepieces, a colossal silver piece with a figure of Bacchus playing the bagpipes. Upon the hour, the figure would come alive and a miniature wooden pipe organ would play music. This was one he had forbidden Giuglio to even touch, let alone dismantle.

“One carrot for my donkey of a son that is sure to snap his head around. Tell him, should he acquiesce to a more moderate life, I will reward him. Yes, tell him I will loan him the Coded Book of Wonder. Tell him I will loan it to him to decode, but only if he shows proper conduct as reported by a priest or responsible caretaker.”

“I shall see to it.”

“I have not let him touch it since he was a young boy, before he began this bestial conduct.”

“It sounds like a perfect occupation—translating a mysterious text. A worthy and dignified use of his intelligence and education.”

“By God’s holy name, yes!” said the king, smiling broadly. “If I could renew his interest, the Coded Book would keep him occupied for years! Even my most brilliant mathematicians and language experts have failed in deciphering it. I should like to see his mind engaged in something other than debauchery. I have invested a small fortune in tutors and books. Now Don Julius spills his seed in the gutters of Prague and Vienna for the drunks’ amusement!”

“A strict regimen will cure him of that,” said Minister Rumpf, trying to animate the king before he slumped into one of his dark spells of melancholy. “The Jesuits will see to his discipline.”

Rudolf thought about this and wrinkled his brow.

“Ah, yes. The Jesuits. I remember their cold touch when I was a boy in Spain. Rumpf, I want a doctor to treat him as well. Consult my physician, Jan Jesenius, and see if Doctor Mingonius can arrange to treat the boy in Krumlov for a few months. Mingonius could have some luck with him—an engaging sort who would not put up with my son’s threats and wheedling. Yes, I shall give Giuglio the Coded Book as a reward after successful treatment for his malicious humors.”

Minister Rumpf nodded. Doctor Mingonius had an excellent reputation at court, second only to the Polish Herr Doctor Jesenius. The only drawback was that he was a devoted husband and father and would surely balk at having to leave his family in Prague while he attended Don Julius.