The Dark Monk (13 page)

Magdalena ran after him and seized him by the shoulders.

“No, you don’t!” she shouted. “I want to know what happened there. Koppmeyer was poisoned! There’s a dusty old grave in the crypt and some strangers prowling around the area, speaking in Latin or some other secret language. What does it all mean? You can’t just go home and put your feet up by the fire.”

“Oh yes I can,” Jakob Kuisl said, marching forward.

Suddenly, Magdalena’s voice became soft and cold. “And suppose they pick up some innocent man for Koppmeyer’s murder and throw him in the dungeon? Just like they did back then with Stechlin?” Magdalena knew this was a sore spot for her father. “It was really poison that killed the priest, wasn’t it?” she added. “So it’s quite possible they’ll have you torture someone, just like the midwife the last time, only because she knew something about poison. Is that what you want?”

The hangman stopped in his tracks. For a while, the only sound that could be heard was the cawing of a crow.

“Very well,” he said finally. “We’ll have another look around the Saint Lawrence Church. Right away. Only so you’ll be able to sleep soundly again.”

The stranger watched the two as they walked down the main street toward the St. Lawrence Church. He struggled to calm himself by reciting the Lord’s Prayer. His plan had failed. He was dying to pry information out of the hangman’s girl about what her father had found in the crypt.

Magdalena…

A distant memory flashed through his mind, then vanished.

He shook his head. He would have to talk again with this clerk. After all, he had paid good money to make sure the hangman stayed out of their way. It certainly appeared now that this stinking butcher from Schongau could do as he pleased.

Under his black coat and white tunic, the man fingered a golden cross that hung directly over his heart. He would need strength. His brotherhood had never approved of the common folk learning to read—you could see what that led to. The people became rebellious and didn’t do what they were supposed to. He had learned in the tavern that the hangman, despite his origins, was smart and educated, and that made him dangerous. More dangerous, in any case, than that nosey little doctor’s assistant who kept running after his master like a little poodle.

The stranger kissed the cross and put it back under his tunic. He had made a decision: He couldn’t rely on the clerk; he would have to act himself. They would get rid of the hangman at once. The danger that he would meddle in their affairs was too great. Now the man would have to tell the others.

The sound of his steps was muffled by the soft, powdery snow.

The hangman and his daughter walked toward the St. Lawrence Church, its wind-battered tower almost obscured by rising clouds of fog in the gathering darkness. Though there was no wind, it was bitter cold. Magdalena could see light from torches inside the rectory through slits in the shutters. The housekeeper and the sexton were evidently still awake. Jakob Kuisl headed directly toward the church while Magdalena tugged nervously at his arm.

“Look over there,” she whispered, pointing at the church.

The door to the church was chained shut, but for a moment the light from a torch appeared in the windows. It was just a brief flicker, but Kuisl had seen it clearly.

“What in God’s name…?” he grumbled. He walked around the church, Magdalena at his heels. They discovered fresh footprints leading from the cemetery gate toward the apse.

The hangman stooped to examine the footprints. “There are two of them,” he whispered. “Solid shoes, good boots. They’re not workers or farmers from around here.” His eyes followed the footprints, which led to a shaky scaffold the workmen had constructed back in autumn and, high above, to a church window that had been forced open.

“We need to go and get help,” Magdalena said anxiously.

Her father laughed softly to himself. “Who shall we ask? Magda? The skinny sexton?” He walked over to the scaffolding. “I’ll have to deal with it myself,” he said, turning around once again to look at Magdalena.

“You stay here, do you understand? No matter what happens. If I’m still inside when the bells toll again, you can go and get help if you want. But not before.”

“Shouldn’t I come along with you?”

“Nothing doing. You’re no help to me. Go and hide behind the gravestones and wait for me to come back.”

That said, he began to climb the bars of the scaffolding. It creaked and swayed, but it held. In a short while, the hangman reached the second platform and was working his way across the icy boards to the window that had been forced open. Then he slipped inside.

Though darkness was just beginning to fall outside, it was already pitch black in the church. Jakob Kuisl squinted; it took a while for his eyes to get accustomed to the dark. He could feel the smooth, freshly planed flooring of the balcony beneath his feet and hear hammering and whispering voices from somewhere below. Finally, he could vaguely make out the flooring and walls of the church. Just one look showed that the mason, Peter Baumgartner, had spoken the truth—up here in the balcony, the wall was emblazoned with the red
cross pattées
of the Templars. The crosses had recently been painted over, but in a few places someone had taken the trouble to wipe off the white lime wash.

As if he wanted to check to see what was behind it,
the hangman thought.

Looking down from the balcony, he could see that the stone slab had been pushed aside again, even though he had replaced it the last time he was there.

He reached under his coat for the heavy, larch-wood cudgel that he always carried with him. He had avoided using it in the tavern, knowing that one blow from this weapon could smash the skull of any opponent like a walnut. Now he took it out and weighed the warm wood in his hand. He would need it today—that much was sure.

His feet groped for the flight of steps that led down from the portal. As silent as a cat, he slipped down and scurried over to the hole in the floor. He could hear voices below, echoing strangely—the intruders were no doubt in the back part of the crypt, where the sarcophagus stood.

The hangman paused for a closer look at the heavy stone slab, which lay on the floor off to one side. Whoever was down below must have just arrived; after all, he and Magdalena had just a few moments ago seen the light of torches in the church.

The hangman looked around again in the darkness, then climbed slowly down the stone steps until he reached the storeroom.

The oaken table along the opposite wall had been moved aside, and through the low entryway behind it, he could see the flickering light of a lantern and hear the voices clearly now.

“Damn! There has to be some hint here—something!” one of them hissed. His voice sounded strangely hoarse, as if the man had difficulty speaking. “This is the right grave, so he hid it here somewhere.”

A second, darker voice replied with a Swabian accent. “There’s nothing here, by God, nothing but bones, dust, and this marble slab with the inscription.” His voice fell to a low whisper. “I swear, I hope God does not punish us for disturbing the rest of the dead.”

“Don’t waste your time thinking about that…Think instead about solving this blasted riddle. That’s the only reason the Master summoned you to help us here. Don’t forget that, you fat, mollycoddled old bastard! If it had been up to me, you’d still be dusting off books in some cellar. So stop your whining and keep looking!
Deus lo vult!
God wills it!”

Not until that moment did Jakob Kuisl notice an unusual accent in the first stranger’s hoarse voice. He had to be a foreigner.

“All right, then, let’s have another look around the next room,” the anxious Swabian voice said. “Maybe I overlooked something in one of the boxes. The heretic could have hidden it there among all the rubbish.”

By the sound of the voices, Jakob Kuisl could tell that the figures were heading now toward the exit. He stepped back against the wall right next to the doorway. As the steps came nearer, a warm circle of light slowly moved in his direction. A sinewy hand, then the sleeve of a black cowl, emerged with an iron oil lamp.

Jakob Kuisl reacted fast. He brought the cudgel down hard on the hand so that the lantern fell to the ground and went out. The monk carrying the lantern barely had time to shout because Kuisl yanked him forward and struck him directly on the back of the head with his cudgel. Groaning, the fat man sank to the ground. For a moment, it was quiet; then the hoarse voice spoke up again from the other room.

“Brother Avenarius? What is the problem? Are you…”

The voice broke off, and all that could be heard was a soft rustling sound.

“Your Brother Avenarius is not feeling very well,” Kuisl called back into the silence. “But still, he’s better off than Koppmeyer. You killed him, didn’t you?”

He waited for a reaction, but when no sound came from the other side, he spoke again.

“I don’t like it when people are poisoned in my district. There’s only one person here allowed to kill other people, and that’s me.”

“And who are you that you think this is any business of yours?” the voice with the foreign accent hissed back at him from the other side.

“I’m the hangman,” Kuisl replied. “And you know what fate is reserved here for people who poison others. The wheel. But first I’ll string you up and probably cut you up, too.”

There was hoarse laughter in the other room.

“And how does the hangman die? Well, no matter, you’ll find out soon enough.”

Jakob Kuisl growled. He had had enough of this idle banter. The man on the ground next to him groaned—apparently the blow hadn’t been hard enough and he would come to soon enough. Just as the hangman was preparing to strike him again, he felt a draft of air. A shadow sprang out of the doorway and swung at him from the side. Kuisl jumped back and felt a curved blade slice into his left forearm. He took a swing with the cudgel again, but the heavy larch-wood club whizzed past his opponent’s head, just missing him. Kuisl picked up his foot and kicked the man hard right between the legs. He was happy to hear the man groan in pain and step back. In the darkness, Kuisl could see nothing but a black outline. The man in front of him seemed to be wearing a monk’s cowl and gripping a curved dagger like the ones Kuisl had seen before carried by Muslim warriors. But there wasn’t any time to look at him more closely, as he was preparing to attack again and this time lunged toward the hangman’s chest. Kuisl stepped back and drove off his opponent with his cudgel. When he took another step forward, he stumbled over something soft and large—the fat Swabian he had put down earlier, still lying on the ground in front of him.

He was about to fend his opponent off with a few more blows when he heard a soft scraping sound behind him. In the next moment, a thin rope came down around his neck.

But weren’t there only two of them?

Kuisl put his hands up to his neck, but the leather cord was already cutting deep into his skin. He gasped for air like a fish out of water, and everything turned black. In a desperate move, he threw his whole weight backward and could feel how he hit against something—the wall! He planted both feet firmly on the ground and tried to crush the man behind him between his broad back and the wall. Finally, the pressure on his neck decreased and air started streaming into his lungs again. He gasped and coughed, then with a loud roar, wheeled around, ready for the next blow. His left hand clawed at a piece of soft, velvety material and then tore it to pieces. With his right hand, he searched for the cudgel he had lost earlier. Then he crouched down, looking frantically around the dark room.

Everything became indistinct, and individual shadows blurred into others—a single, huge form.

Suddenly, he felt a numbness pulsating from his injured left arm into every corner of his body. He tried to move his fingers, but he couldn’t. He was paralyzed.

The curved dagger was poisoned!

As he slid down the wall of the crypt behind him, he noticed a strong perfume that reminded him of violets, or a large, colorful field of flowers. Wide-eyed, but unable to move even his little finger, he could only watch as three men in black cowls bent over him, whispering.

The third man…must have followed me…Where is Magdalena?

Jakob Kuisl felt the two strangers pick him up and carry him away.

When Simon awoke, he was lying in a bed covered with fresh sheets and staring at a ceiling made of freshly planed spruce. From somewhere outside, he could hear the muffled sound of construction: hammering, sawing, men calling back and forth to one another. Where in the world was he?

He sat up and felt a sharp, stabbing pain in his head. Reaching for his forehead, he could feel a fresh bandage, and the memory came back to him. He had been attacked by robbers! Benedikta had…Yes, that’s right, Benedikta had shot them; then he remembered the wild ride through the forest and how, finally, everything went black. He must have struck the branch of a tree. Strong arms had helped him back up on his horse, and he remembered the voices, but then everything went black again.

Thirsty, Simon looked around and spotted a knee-high nightstand on one side of the bed with a clay pitcher on top. Not only the wooden ceiling, but also the night table seemed freshly constructed, as did the wide bed. There was a fragrance of resin and fresh-cut wood in the air. A small stove was crackling in a corner, but otherwise the room was empty. The shutters were closed, but judging by a narrow, bright ray of light entering the room, it had to be daytime.

Simon reached for the pitcher and tested the contents: something bitter and aromatic, a bit like mint—apparently a medicine that someone had put out for him. He was drinking in deep gulps when a creaking sound announced a visitor. In the doorframe stood Benedikta, smiling.

“Well, have you had a good sleep?” She pointed to his bandage. “We didn’t have a doctor here to do that, but I think the canons here know how to sew things up with needle and thread.”

“The canons?” Simon looked at her, bewildered.