Peter smiled and hurried off with the two boys. Perhaps his stay in Oberammergau wouldn’t be as bad as he feared after all. For the time being, he’d forgotten how much he missed his parents.
Exhausted, Simon put down the cauterizing iron and wiped the sweat from his brow.
The operation had taken over an hour and had required his full attention. On the table in front of him lay the young man whom Jakob and the woodcutters had pulled from under the boulder in the Laine Valley. His face was pale, as if there were no blood left in his body, but he was breathing regularly and his eyelids fluttered slightly from time to time. Mercifully, the boy had passed out shortly after Simon had started sawing, but until then he had been screaming so loudly that curious neighbors peered in through the window. Jakob, who stood alongside Simon during the entire procedure, glared at them angrily to chase them off, and quiet finally returned.
The hangman continued puffing on his pipe as he applied a fresh dressing to the stump of the boy’s leg. The room looked like a slaughterhouse, the floor littered with blood-spattered cloths and flies buzzing around stinking puddles.
“That was a good job,” Jakob grumbled. “Your hand was steady, as it should be for every surgeon.”
Simon pricked up his ears. “Was that a compliment?” he asked in a weary voice. “It’s the first time I’ve heard anything like that.”
“Miracles happen.” Jakob grinned, tying the last knot in the dressing. During the operation Jakob had held the boy in a viselike grip and kept giving him diluted brandy mixed with a henbane potion to drink. Simon had already realized at the accident scene that the lower part of the left leg would have to be amputated. Even if he’d been able to reset the shattered bone with a splint, the boy would have died of gangrene.
Simon first cut through the skin above the knee with a scalpel, then he sawed through the bone. The important thing was to work as quickly as possible, without hesitation, or the pain would become so severe that the brandy and the henbane wouldn’t be enough to prevent the patient from dying of shock. The same applied to the final cauterization of the wound to stop the bleeding.
“It’s so damn annoying that I don’t have my own instruments here,” Simon cursed as he settled down on one of the rickety chairs. “The saw was rusty and dull, and the knife so dirty it looked like the old medicus used it to dig in the garden.”
Simon had washed off the scalpel first, even though most of his colleagues thought that was silly, but the cleaning was only superficial, and the rags they used stank of mold and mildew. He pointed with disgust at the jars on the shelves with frogs, salamanders, and cows’ eyes floating in them. “Old Landes was a superstitious quack. How can anyone say that a powder made from dried corpses will relieve headaches or the blood of beheaded criminals will cure the falling sickness?”
“Hmm . . . It seems to me I’ve seen mummy powder in your bathhouse,” Jakob answered with a grin. He continued puffing on his pipe.
“Because people believe in it,” Simon conceded. “Faith is sometimes the best medicine.”
“Faith, love, and hope,” Jakob said, pointing at the unconscious boy. “Why isn’t someone coming to care for the poor fellow? Doesn’t he have a family?”
“That’s what we have to find out.” Simon groaned and got up from his seat. “I’d better ask Georg Kaiser. He is the village schoolmaster, so he should know all the children and young people here in town. In any case I wanted to go and check up on Peter. School was over long ago.”
“Go ahead. After all the brandy and henbane the boy will sleep like a rock for a while.” The hangman stretched and walked out into the hallway, ducking under the low door frame. “Secretary Lechner is expecting a report from me. No doubt he wants me to pick a suspect somewhere out of thin air. He’ll have to wait a bit for that.”
Without another word, he left, and all that could be heard for a while were his footsteps trailing off into the distance.
Soon afterward, Simon was ambling through the dirty lanes of Oberammergau, lost in thought, on his way to the schoolmaster’s house. The amputation had shown him once again how helpless people were in the face of sickness and injury. If only there were some way to control the pain . . . There were some preparations, like mandrake, henbane, and the sap of the opium poppy, that dulled the pain, but it was always there, like a buried thorn that sooner or later drove the patient mad.
After a while, Simon had reached his friend’s house and looked around in the happy anticipation of seeing his son again. The garden in front of the house had been dug up, and a wheelbarrow was standing next to the pile of dirt, suggesting that Kaiser had just been at work. But no one was there, and there was no response when Simon knocked on the door.
“Peter!” His voice echoed through the silent house. “Are you here somewhere?”
He frowned. Perhaps Peter was running errands for Kaiser somewhere in town, or the two were still in the schoolhouse next to the church, but it was already late in the afternoon and school had ended for the day long ago. Simon turned around and headed over to the village church. In the distance he could hear voices in the cemetery, and when he reached the wall he peered over and saw several men standing amid the gravestones. Another group was on the stage, where a long, heavy table was located, along with some chairs.
The rehearsals for the Passion play, Simon thought. He’d completely forgotten about them. Certainly Peter is there watching.
At first glance he didn’t see his son. Curious, he opened the cemetery gate, and as he approached the group he heard a droning voice coming from the stage. Evidently they were at that very moment rehearsing the famous scene from the Last Supper.
“Uh . . . Take this my body and let it be a . . . remembrance. This is my blood . . .”
“Louder!” cried Georg Kaiser, whom Simon recognized now in the crowd of men. He was holding some tattered manuscript pages in his hand that he glanced at from time to time. “I can hardly understand you, Josef. How will it sound when people are standing here by the hundreds?”
The young bearded man playing the part of Jesus made a deep sigh. Like most of the other actors in the play he wore a long white linen robe. “And I can’t even remember my words,” he mumbled to himself.
“This is the scene at the Last Supper,” Kaiser exclaimed. “Everyone knows these words from the Holy Communion, or weren’t you ever in a church? So continue. ‘This is my blood, given for you . . . Drink you all of it in remembrance of me . . .’” he prompted the actor, “‘so that . . .’ ?”
“Good Lord! This is hopeless,” said another actor. It was the manager of the warehouse, Sebastian Sailer, whom Simon hadn’t recognized at first because of his red wig. In contrast to the others, Sailer wore a yellow robe that identified him as Judas. “This will be a disaster as long as that scatterbrained Josef is playing the part of Christ. A smallholder playing the part of the Savior? If you had chosen me, we’d be doing much better.”
“Aha, so you want fat Judas to play the part of Jesus?” scoffed Konrad Faistenmantel, who had been assigned the role of Peter by Kaiser and the priest. The town council chairman was slouching on one of the chairs at the Communion table. “That would be even better.”
“I am not Judas, I just play his part,” Sailer replied, visibly exasperated and tired. “But some people seem not to understand the difference.”
“How long is the rehearsal going to last?” asked Josef. “I’ve got to go home to feed the cows and clean out the barn.”
“It’s going to continue as long as I say,” Faistenmantel shouted, “and if you don’t stop asking such asinine questions you can take this Communion and stick it you know where.”
“Please, please! I don’t insist on being Jesus,” Josef added, removing his white robe. “Find yourself another jackass to be your Messiah. In any case, it’s much too dangerous being in this play.”
He jumped down from the stage and disappeared behind the gravestones.
“Josef, Josef, don’t lea
ve!” Georg Kaiser called as he started running after the Savior. “Faistenmantel surely didn’t mean it that way.”
“Of course he did,” whispered one of the apostles. “The old man gives orders and we obey.”
“Careful what you say, Mathis,” replied Konrad Faistenmantel, who had apparently overheard the remark. “Just make sure the setting for the scene in hell is ready on time,” he continued, waving his finger menacingly. “I’ve paid your carpenters good money for it.”
“But how can I finish if every day the priest gives me new instructions on what hell looks like?” he complained. “Moreover, Hans Göbl promised me he’ll paint the flames, but pretty soon he’s due to get roasted himself.”
Faistenmantel was about to reply when Kaiser returned, shaking his head. Evidently, Jesus Christ had quit, at least for the day. Kaiser sighed and turned to the other actors. “I’m afraid there’s no point in going on. I’ll talk with Josef later, after things have settled down, and we’ll meet tomorrow at the same hour.”
The others nodded. They, too, seemed relieved that the rehearsal was over for the day. One by one they left the cemetery, until finally Simon and Georg Kaiser were standing there alone.
“We need a miracle if I’m going to put on the Passion play with this crowd in three weeks,” Kaiser lamented, as he started picking up the chalice, the plates, and the remaining props from the stage. “I thought Josef was a good fit for the role of Jesus—at least he looks the part with his long hair—but all he can think about is his little farm. I would have given up long ago if Faistenmantel and the priest hadn’t insisted we continue.” He shook his head and turned to Simon. “I’ve heard there was an accident up in the Laine Valley. You no doubt have been caring for the injured.”
Simon nodded. “The boy’s name is Martin. I had to amputate his left leg. I wanted to ask you about him.” He told Kaiser what had happened, and the schoolmaster looked troubled.
“I’ve known Martin for a long time,” Kaiser finally replied. “He comes from a poor family of workers who live in a mountain pasture down by the Laber River. Until just a few weeks ago he was a pupil in my school, but now his father has died by a falling tree and his mother is bedridden. Martin is the eldest, and all his younger siblings are able to do is collect windfall in the forest—not enough to support them.”
“That’s dreadful.” Simon went up a staircase on the side of the stage to join his friend. “Can’t anyone in the village help them out?”
Kaiser laughed softly. “A starving family of laborers? I give something to Martin now and then, but nobody else gives a thing. You heard it yourself in the council meeting. Most of them just want the poor people to get out.”
“And the murder of Gabler comes just at the right time. It’s easy to blame everything on people who have nothing. How disgraceful.” Simon stopped short, as something else occurred to him. “There’s something I wanted to ask you,” he began. “The woodcutters said something about little people from Venice who are supposedly roaming about here—not that I believe any nonsense like that. But do you know what there is to it?”
“The Venetians?” Kaiser looked at Simon in surprise and once again a fit of coughing came over him. Gasping, he sat down on a stool on the stage and motioned for Simon to come over. “It’s interesting that you bring it up just at this time,” he said. “Only yesterday I read again about the Venetians in an old book, and it appears they really were here at one time.”
“You mean these dwarfs really existed?” Simon asked suspiciously.
“Oh, no!” Kaiser laughed. “The Venetians weren’t dwarfs. They were people prospecting for ore and minerals who came here long ago from across the Alps—from Venice and southern lands. That’s where their name comes from.”
“And why do people say they were dwarfs?” Simon persisted. He was about to tell his friend about the strange little fellows he and Jakob had seen just before the landslide in the Laine Valley, but then he decided not to, for fear that Kaiser would doubt his enlightened nature.
Georg Kaiser shrugged. “Probably they used smaller people for this work, as it would be easier for them to get through the narrow tunnels. Moreover, people coming from south of the Alps are all a little smaller than we are. At one time the Venetians were here mining cobalt, alum, or manganese used in making the famous Venetian mirror glass.”
“And gold, silver, and gemstones as well?”
Georg Kaiser took the chalice used in the Last Supper, which still contained a bit of real wine, and poured himself a cup. He swallowed deeply before continuing.
“I don’t believe so, but the people often say that. It’s a good story, isn’t it? Mysterious little people looking for treasures and protecting the hiding places with magic signs and encrypted books. Who wouldn’t want to find a treasure like that and become rich?” Kaiser winked at Simon. “Wouldn’t you?”
Simon laughed. “If I had all that money I’d probably not stay in Schongau as a bathhouse owner but go to Augsburg or Venice. I’d be a famous doctor, Magdalena would have the finest clothes and the most valuable jewelry, and my children wouldn’t have to go through life as the dishonorable grandsons of a hangman.”
“You see? You, too, are starting to dream,” the schoolmaster replied with a laugh. “That’s what legends are for—they help us to dream. But as far as I know, there haven’t been any Venetians in the Ammer Valley for centuries. All that lives on are the stories.”
Simon sighed. “I like these little people more than all the rumors about witches and devils in the valley—they’re just stories to scare little children, but don’t mean anything to . . .” He clapped his hand to his forehead. “Now I remember why I’m actually here. Have you seen Peter? He’s obviously not here.”
“No doubt he’s running around somewhere with the other boys.” Kaiser got to his feet. “Be happy he’s not always thinking of you. It seems he’s found some new friends.” He shivered and looked up at the sky, where the sun had already moved far to the west. He coughed again.
Simon was shocked. He had completely forgotten the time. “I’ve got to go back and check on Martin’s injuries,” he said. “It would be best for him to spend the night with me in the office, but tomorrow he should be ready to go back home.”
Bitterly Simon thought about what home meant for this young man with a deathly ill mother and lots of hungry younger siblings. If the Oberammergauers didn’t help the family, then he would.
He nodded to his friend then hurried back through the darkening lanes to the bathhouse. Casting one final look back at the cemetery, something there troubled him.
But no matter how long he thought about it, he couldn’t figure out what it was.
“I’m really very anxious to know the reason for your unaccustomed visit, Frau Fronwieser, and I hope for your sake it’s a good one. I’m very busy.”
Burgomaster Matthäus Buchner leaned his fat upper body over the oaken table and eyed Magdalena with a mixture of curiosity and loathing. Finally, he leaned back with a sigh. “Laws must be signed, decrees issued. Now that the honorable secretary is detained in Oberammergau, unfortunately the burden that lies on myself and the council is twice as great.”
Evening was approaching. They found themselves in the Schongau Town Council chamber on the second floor of the Ballenhaus, the storage warehouse for goods in transit. A huge U-shaped table stood in the middle. At the table sat the most influential men in Schongau, their chubby hands folded in front of their tight-fitting vests, their eyes directed curiously at Magdalena. It was extremely rare for a simple woman to address the council. The fact that in this case it was the daughter of the Schongau hangman made it even stranger.
It startled Magdalena to see that Melchior Ransmayer was also invited. Though he sat along the back wall where the simple councilors usually took their places, he seemed extremely smug and confident, crossing his legs and playing apathetically with the locks of his full-bottomed wig. She herself had not been offered a seat.
Magdalena swallowed deeply. She knew that Barbara’s life could hang on what she had to say. She had put on her best dress and tied her hair in a modest bun. Just before the meeting she had reviewed her speech thoroughly with Jakob Schreevogl. Now, though, even he couldn’t help her. She was all on her own.
“Honorable councilmen, Herr Burgomaster,” she began, her eyes wandering over the fat, mostly gray-haired men who determined the fate of the town. Among them were cloth merchants and tavern keepers, builders and potters, all clothed in velvet vests, fustian, and fur-lined cloaks with wide sleeves. The six members of the Inner Council presumably had more money than the whole town put together, but their eyes still sparkled with greed for more wealth.
“The Kuisl family has lived in this city for many centuries,” Magdalena began, her voice sounding somewhat uncertain at first, but gaining confidence with each word she spoke. “It has provided the town with executioners who are among the best in the Reich, and made itself useful in other ways as well. Our family’s knowledge of herbs and healing is recognized by most doctors. Further, sick people come from far and wide to be treated by our family.” She raised her head proudly. “Even here in the council, my father and my husband have assisted a number of esteemed gentlemen with their knowledge.”
The Play of Death Page 18