The Dark Monk (41 page)

They had rented a young gray for a few silver coins in the post station at Semer’s Tavern. Benedikta had paid, and Simon was embarrassed when she took out her purse and handed the coins to the postmaster. The medicus couldn’t help grinning. This woman wouldn’t let herself be bossed around by a man, and she didn’t demand any favors, either. In these matters, Simon thought, she was just like Magdalena. Perhaps they weren’t so different, after all, and perhaps under different circumstances, Magdalena could have become another Benedikta.

They arrived at their destination in less than two hours, leaving the forest and entering a snow-covered landscape dotted with houses, churches, walls, and archways. For a mile around, men had wrested open land from the surrounding wilderness, and at its center was the Rottenbuch Monastery. On a road entering the cleared land from the opposite side, Simon could see a group of silent monks giving alms to a wailing beggar. A farmer was pulling a calf on a rope across the paved main street of the town. Ladders and scaffolding lay against many of the as-of-yet unplastered buildings while workers rushed around with buckets, shovels, and trowels. Just as in Steingaden, people were obviously busy here removing the rubble of war and building a new, larger, and even more beautiful monastery.

Simon and Benedikta rode through a gate toward the wide square in front of the Augustinian Canon Monastery. A huge clock tower rose up in front of them. On their left was the church and, next to it, the monastery, which in contrast to the other buildings was already resplendent in a fresh coat of stucco. After they’d found a place to stay and a stable for the horses, they went in search of the superintendent.

Putting on a serious face, Simon addressed one of the monks entering the church. “Brother, may I have a word with you? We are looking for the venerable leader of this wonderful monastery. Could you direct us to him?”

“Do you mean our Right Reverend Brother, Superintendent Michael Piscator? You are in luck.”

The monk pointed to a somewhat stout elderly man dressed in the typical white alb of the Augustinian canons. Standing nearby among some laborers, he seemed to be giving directions to the construction foreman. “You can see him engaged in his favorite pastime,” the canon said, winking. “Building churches, for him, is the highest form of worship.” With a grin, he disappeared through the portal to the monastery.

Simon couldn’t help but think of the Steingaden abbot, Augustin Bonenmayr, who had devoted himself, just like the superintendent in Rottenbuch, to the construction of his monastery. Simon was certain that if the church authorities continued in this way, the most beautiful monasteries in Bavaria would soon be standing in the Priests’ Corner.

“Your Excellency?” Benedikta walked toward the group and curtsied to the superintendent.

Like so many monks, Brother Michael had a weakness for the fair sex. He paused, then made a slight bow and offered Benedikta his hand, which was adorned with the signet ring of the monastery. “I’m honored, beautiful lady. How can I help you?”

The workmen and architects packed up their plans, disappointed, while Benedikta kissed his signet ring. Simon rushed to her side, doffed his hat, and went through the same routine that had been so successful in Wessobrunn.

“Allow me to introduce the lady. Before you stands none other than Madame de Bouillon, royal dressmaker to the mistress of the French king,” the physician declared. “She has made the long trip from Paris in order to view the famous relics of Saints Primus and Felicianus here in Rottenbuch.” Simon lowered his voice to a whisper as he leaned toward the superintendent. “She made a vow not to share her bed again with her husband until she’d kissed the bones of the martyrs.”

Benedikta glanced at Simon in astonishment, but Simon maintained a serious face.

“The poor man,” Brother Michael sighed. “What a waste! But may I ask how the lady came to choose these two particular saints for her long pilgrimage?”

“She gave her newborn twins the names Primus and Felicianus,” Simon continued in a firm voice. “But they’ve fallen seriously ill, and now she hopes through her pilgrimage to be heard by our beloved Virgin Mary.”

“Get a hold of yourself, damn it!” Benedikta whispered in his ear. “You’re really going too far. Nobody will believe that stuff!”

But the superintendent nodded sympathetically. “What a misfortune! I’ll guide you to the relics personally! Follow me.”

Simon cast a surreptitious glance at Benedikta and grinned. Then they followed Brother Michael’s clipped steps to the church. Huffing and puffing, he pointed toward the scaffolding, where workmen were replacing old, broken church windows with stained glass.

“In a few years this monastery will be a jewel in Bavaria, believe me!” the superintendent said. “An incomparable pilgrimage site! We will house not just the relics of Saint Primus and Saint Felicianus here, but two teeth of Saint Binosa, some hair from the Virgin Mary, a knuckle belonging to Saint Blasius, the skull of Saint Lawrence, and the collarbone of Saint Brigida…to name only a few of the most important.”

He opened the church door, and Simon cast his eyes on a splendor that had to look like heaven on earth to the simple people in the area. Bright paintings of angels and saints on the ceiling gave the impression of infinite heights, marble slabs memorialized the former superintendents of Rottenbuch, and a huge organ with pipes as big as a man was enthroned over the portal. On the east wall opposite them, an altar at least twenty feet high depicted the Ascension of Mary, flanked by the apostles Peter and Paul. At the sides, two skeletons stood upright in glass coffins, each with a sword in hand and a laurel wreath on its bare skull.

“Saints Primus and Felicianus…” Brother Michael whispered, pointing at the skeletons. “Aren’t they beautiful? We placed them there during the dedication ceremonies for our new altar at this site. They look down on us protectively and benevolently.” He turned away. “But now I shall leave you alone with the relics.”

“Ah, excuse me,” Simon whispered, “but Madame de Bouillon promised she would kiss the bones of the saint.”

“Kiss?” The superintendent looked at Simon, bewildered.

“
Ah, oui,
” Benedikta interjected with her best French accent. “I must…how do we say it…
embrasser…
kiss the sacred bones with my lips. Only in that way can the vow be honored.”

“I’m dreadfully sorry, madame, but that’s not possible.” The superintendent pointed up at the high altar. “As you can see yourself, the bones are up there, beyond our reach. Moreover, the coffins are sealed. Send a kiss with your hand, and I’m sure God will understand.”

“
Mais non!
” Benedikta exclaimed. “I must kiss them.
Mes enfants…
my children…” She raised her hands to her neckline. “Otherwise, they will never regain their health!”

But Brother Michael couldn’t be moved. “Believe me, it’s impossible. But I’ll include your children in my prayers of intercession at evening mass. Tell me their names, and I—”

“My dearest Brother Michael! The workmen told me I would find you here. What splendid windows you have installed here!”

The voice came from the church portal. When Simon turned around, his heart almost stopped. Approaching them with hasty steps, arms outraised in greeting, was none other than Augustin Bonenmayr, the abbot of Steingaden.

Now Michael Piscator also recognized his colleague from the Premonstratensian monastery. “Your Excellency, to what do I owe this honor?”

Bonenmayr gave the Rottenbuch superintendent a hearty handshake.

“I have some errands to run in Schongau and Peißenberg. The new chapel in the pasture near Aich is in dreadful condition! And whose job is it to care for it?” He sighed. “I thought that, on my way there, I might stop for a rest here. There’s so much to discuss concerning the renovation of our monasteries. You must tell me the name of your glazier. Is he from Venice? Florence?”

Brother Michael smiled. “You’ll never guess. Promise me you’ll stay the night, and then perhaps I’ll tell you the name of this artist.”

“If you insist…” Only now did the Steingaden abbot notice Simon and Benedikta, who were trying to slip away unnoticed behind the columns. “What a coincidence! The young widow from Landsberg!” he called to them. “And Simon Fronwieser! Well, have you made any progress in your investigations of the murder? Or are you applying for a position as physician here in Rottenbuch as well?”

Michael glanced from Bonenmayr to Benedikta and Simon, who came to a sudden stop between two columns as if they had been hit by a bolt of lightning. “Landsberg? Murder?” the superintendent asked, perplexed.

“Thank you. We…we…have figured everything out,” Simon stuttered. “But we don’t wish to disturb you gentlemen any further. Your Excellencies certainly have things to discuss.” He pulled Benedikta along with him, leaving the two gentlemen alone in the church.

Outside, in the church courtyard, Simon began to curse so loudly that some monks turned around to look. “Damn! What bad luck! The Steingaden abbot will certainly tell Brother Michael who we really are, and then this whole masquerade is over!”

“A masquerade that began with you!” Benedikta snapped.

“Oh, come now, what should we have said in Wessobrunn, and now here in Rottenbuch—‘Good day, we’re looking for the treasure of the Templars? Can we desecrate some of your holy relics?’ ” Simon talked himself into a rage. More and more monks turned around to stare and whisper.

Benedikta finally softened a bit. “In any case, the superintendent won’t let us open the coffins, and we can forget getting any help from him.”

“So much the worse,” Simon grumbled. “Then we’ll never learn whether a message is concealed in the relics. What now?”

Benedikta looked up at the church’s window frames, where workmen were just beginning to insert the new stained glass. The men were standing on a rickety scaffold, carefully raising the colorful windows on a pulley. Simon was certain that each window was worth a fortune.

“If the superintendent doesn’t open these coffins for us, we’ll just have to do it ourselves,” Benedikta said. “Primus and Felicianus could certainly use a little fresh air.”

“And just how do you intend to do that?”

Benedikta pointed again at the open windows. “We’ll pay a visit to the two dusty old gents tonight,” she said. “The glaziers certainly won’t finish their work today, and I can’t imagine that the church is guarded overnight. No doubt, the superintendent thinks that lightning will strike any grave robber and send him running.”

“How are you so sure that lightning
won’t
strike us?” Simon whispered. “Stealing religious relics is a sin that…” But Benedikta had already charged off.

Neither of them noticed the two figures hiding among the other monks. Like long shadows, they slipped away from the group and went back to following Simon and Benedikta’s trail.

In his cell in the Schongau dungeon, the robber chief Scheller was turning the poison pill in his fingers, looking out at the snow falling in front of his barred window. Behind him, many of his companions were dozing in expectation of their imminent deaths. The women whimpered and fathers said their farewells to their children in whispered voices, telling them about a paradise that was also open to robbers and whores where they would all see one another again. They spoke of a better life in another world and made the sick ten-year-old boy swear to God and to the Virgin Mary that he would lead a respectable life. They had robbed and killed, but now most of them had become penitent sinners. Some of them prayed. The next morning, the local priest would come and take their last confessions.

Hans Scheller stared at the little pill and thought back on his life so far. How had it come to this? He’d been a carpenter in Schwabmünchen with a wife and child. As a young boy, he’d witnessed the execution of the notorious murderer Benedikt Lanzl, who had screamed for two whole days while being beaten by the hangman. Tied to a wheel, the highway robber and arsonist had become the focal point of a spectacle unlike anything little Hans had ever seen before. At night, he could still hear Benedict Lanzl’s scream in his sleep.

Sometimes Hans Scheller could even hear it today.

Never did he dream that one day he, too, would stand up there on the wooden platform. But God’s ways were inscrutable.

Hans Scheller sighed, closed his eyes, and gave himself up to the memories that came flooding back.
A laughing boy, his face smeared with porridge…his wife bent over the washtub…a field of barley in the summer, a good glass of beer…the smell of freshly cut spruce…

There was much that was wonderful about the world, and he could leave it behind without regrets. But he still owed the hangman something.

The night before, something occurred to him, a small matter he’d overlooked until then. But now, after everything Jakob Kuisl had told him, it suddenly seemed important.

He would tell the hangman the next day at the gallows.

Hans Scheller leaned against the ice-cold wall of the cell, fingering the pill, and whistled an old nursery tune. He was almost home.

He was called Brother Nathanael. This was the name the order had given him long ago—he’d long forgotten his real name. Where he came from, the sun burned brightly with a shimmering, unending heat, and thus the snow drifting down now in soft flakes seemed, to him, like a personal messenger from hell.

He was freezing under his thin tunic and black-hooded coat, clenching his teeth but not complaining. His former master had trained him to be tough. He was a guard dog of the Lord, and his command was to follow the woman and the man. And if they found the treasure, he was to kill them quickly and silently, retrieve the treasure, and report back to the brotherhood. That was his assignment.

Trembling with cold, he played with the dagger in his hand and pressed his back against the frost-covered wall of the monastery. Snowflakes melted as they fell on his brown, scarred face. He was from Castille, near the magnificent city of Salamanca, and his task at the moment seemed to him like a test from God. The Lord himself had sent him to this inhospitable, remote region and, as an additional punishment, had sent him Brother Avenarius.