Eventually they rattled through a tall wooden archway and at last came to a halt in a courtyard. The horses, foaming at the mouth, stood trembling with steaming flanks as Aaron jumped off the coach box and opened one of the massive sides of the barn door. Anna followed him and opened the second. Then Aaron grabbed the bridles of the exhausted animals and led them into the dry and spacious barn.
Dripping wet, the horses looked out through the gate where the sky was still and where hailstones the size of pebbles were now pelting down. They pounded the barn roof as if the devil were demanding entry and in no time transformed the entire courtyard into a white field of ice.
Chapter III
A door opened and two rather agitated women came from the adjoining dwelling house into the barn. ‘God bless, sir! What a sight you are!’ lamented the younger of the two. She was wearing a bonnet on her head and an apron around her broad hips. At the sight of Aaron she threw her hands up in horror. ‘Who did this to you? Where is Nicolas?’
The older woman, grey-haired and close to sixty, was more composed. She pushed the wailing maid aside to take her brother Aaron’s sodden cloak.
‘You must immediately take off your clothes or else you’ll catch your death,’ she said and eyed Anna suspiciously who stood next to him dripping wet and feeling intimidated. Aaron did indeed look pitiful with the blood from his head wound trickling out of the bandage and down his neck.
‘Do me a favour,’ he said exhausted as he peeled off his cloak and handed it to his sister. ‘Look after the horses first. Nicolas asked to be paid off in Cologne and he enlisted with the archbishop’s guards.’
The two women stared at him in surprise. But Aaron gave them no chance to ask further questions. ‘I will send his belongings after him.’ He touched his skull gently. ‘As for my head, that was an accident.’
The sister came closer and looked at the blood-soaked bandage more carefully. ‘You are bleeding heavily, let me look after the wound first,’ she said.
‘This my new famulus will do,’ Aaron replied in a tone that did not permit contradiction. ‘He is knowledgeable about injuries though still very young in years.’ Pushing Anna forward, he held her by the shoulders. ‘He has learned everything necessary from an infirmarius in a monastery,’ he continued. ‘Marian will stay with us. Get the room next to my treatment room, Nicolas’s old room, ready for him.’
He pointed at the older of the two women and introduced her. ‘This is Esther, my sister and housekeeper, and this is my maid Rebecca.’ He pointed to the young woman with the bonnet, who curtsied even though Anna wasn’t an impressive sight with her wet, dirty cape and her rash. ‘Once you’ve cared for the horses, fetch some hot water and dry things to wear. Marian will now take care of my head wound. Come!’ he said firmly and pushed Anna to the door that led into the house.
Anna followed him into a large kitchen. At the hearth a kettle hung on a chain over the fire and the stove pots and pans were lined up on bars above. A large table stood in a corner on which there was a half-plucked chicken and some unwashed vegetables. The stone floor was covered with fresh straw as were all the other floors in the house. Everything was clean and tidy and it looked as if the master of the house laid great store by this. Anna could tell immediately that this was the house of a wealthy man.
Passing through a further door they reached a room with a table the size of a bed at its centre with a straw pillow at its head. There were shelves leaning against the walls on which there were all kinds of pots and jars and various metal instruments the importance and function of which Anna did not know. Light entered through a little window sealed with expensive glass. ‘This is the room in which I examine and treat the sick,’ Aaron explained. ‘And this . . .’ he said walking to another door and opening it, ‘. . . is my laboratory. Do not think that I am an alchemist, but this is where I mix my medicines and conduct my little experiments.’
He showed a room with a worktable, a few shelves and a small fireplace. The laboratory was crammed with strange equipment that Anna had never before seen. Drying herbs were hanging on strings from the ceiling, and a large cabinet with many doors and drawers all of which were labelled took up the back of the room. On a shelf there were dozens of old volumes of various sizes all with heavy leather spines, and on a desk, a weighty tome lay open to an illustration of the human body. Aaron took a jar and handed it to Anna. She lifted the lid carefully and sniffed its contents. It was a fragrant, oily substance.
Aaron pointed at it with his finger. ‘As soon as you have washed yourself thoroughly, rub this ointment all over your body. You will see that it works wonders with your kind of rash. It will be gone within a few days.’ Then he selected a small vial and handed it to her. ‘Add five drops of this tincture to your bathwater. No more!’
Suddenly he swayed, but before Anna could help he leaned against the doorpost touching his head.
‘You ought to rest,’ she said, leading him back to the treatment room, where she helped him gently but firmly onto the table, laying his head to rest on the straw pillow. The ointment jar and the small vial she put on a bench.
Just then Esther, his sister and housekeeper, entered with a bowl of steaming water and some towels.
‘Do you not want to change first?’ she asked Aaron anxiously.
Anna washed her hands in the bowl and started to loosen the bandage carefully from his head. ‘First, the bleeding must be stopped,’ she said.
Despite his sudden feeling of faintness, Aaron was still in a joking mood. ‘Don’t you want to bleed me first, Brother Marian? Isn’t that what you do with all your patients in the monastery?’ he managed to say with a forced smile.
Anna removed the last bit of the bandage as gently as possible.
‘A clean cloth, please,’ she said to Esther who was standing next to her. Aaron’s sister could not hide a certain mistrust as she handed Anna a cloth.
‘You have certainly lost too much blood for me to bleed you,’ Anna answered the medicus’ mocking question. ‘And now, if you permit, I will set to work.’
‘What kind of a way is this to talk to the medicus?’ Esther remarked indignantly.
Aaron gestured impatiently: ‘Brother Marian is absolutely right. I’d prefer if you brought me a blanket. I’m cold!’
Esther had wanted to say more but thought better of it, put the water bowl firmly down on the table, threw the cloths next to it and rushed off.
‘Don’t be angry with her,’ Aaron said. ‘Until now Esther has always assisted me. She will soon get used to your being here.’
Anna took a cloth, dipped it in hot water and carefully dabbed the head wound clean. ‘I will have to put on a strong compression bandage to stop the bleeding,’ she said.
‘Give me my hand mirror. It should be lying over there,’ Aaron said and pointed to one of the shelves. Anna found a small mirror with a handle. It was made of polished obsidian with a slight convex curve. She handed him the very expensive instrument.
‘Help me up!’ he ordered, and Anna pulled him half-way up so that he could see his wound in the mirror. ‘The wound is too big,’ he said. ‘A compression bandage will not suffice. I’m afraid you will have to stitch the wound.’
‘Stitch? Stitch a wound?’ Anna asked in surprise. She had never heard of such a thing.
‘But you know how to sew – with thread and needle, I mean?’ responded Aaron.
‘Yes, I do, of course,’ Anna answered quite bewildered.
‘Well then, it is very simple. You stitch together the flaps of skin at the sides of the wound just as one mends a hole in a piece of cloth, with a seam of approximately five or six stitches. This holds better than anything else. And when the wound has healed one can pull out the threads and nothing will be visible except a small scar. That’s all. Can you trust yourself to do that?’
‘I think so.’
‘Good. Because I will not be able to give you any advice while you are working. I will inhale some medicine to make
me sleep and not feel the pain of the stitching.’
Anna had indeed heard of such medicine which, once taken, apparently made one feel no pain any longer. Father Urban had mentioned it once, but she had never seen or witnessed anything like it. Beads of sweat appeared on her forehead as she considered her responsibility. ‘And what happens if you . . . if you never awake from your sleep?’
‘Do not worry. I know from experience how much of the vapour I have to breathe in. Moreover, as soon as you are finished stitching, you will give me a remedy which will fetch me back among the living.’
He lay back, closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths.
Anna waited patiently until he was ready.
Esther entered bringing the blanket he had requested, and spread it carefully over her brother.
At last Aaron gave his instructions: ‘Esther, please get the needle and thread. And you, Brother Marian, do as follows: in the red clay bowl with the lid on the shelf right behind me there are dried sponges. Bring me one.’
Anna found the bowl and lifted the lid. She picked out a sponge almost the size of a fist and replaced the lid. She handed Aaron the sponge.
‘Watch carefully now and you will learn something,’ the medicus said and held up the sponge. ‘This is called a sleep sponge and you will see why in a moment. I have soaked it in a mixture of mandrake root, opium, mulberry juice, hemlock, henbane and ivy and then left it to dry. The exact recipe I will explain to you on another occasion when we have more time. As soon as I moisten it again I will inhale the vapours that it exudes and will fall fast asleep. Be careful not to get the vapours into your eyes or nose, and be quick about the stitching, but be careful. As soon as you are finished, hold a cloth soaked with wine vinegar under my nose. The wine vinegar you will find in that green bottle. Did you understand everything?’
‘Yes, I think so,’ Anna answered.
She looked at Esther who nodded encouragingly to her. She had already fetched the wine vinegar and a cloth.
‘Goodnight, so,’ said Aaron with a feeble smile.
Anna took the sponge from him again, dipped it briefly in the water bowl and held it under Aaron’s nose, making sure all the time not to breathe in herself. Aaron inhaled deeply two or three times and a few moments later, his eyes glazed over and his head fell sideways. Anna carefully put the sponge aside. Esther, with needle and thread, had stepped up close and without taking her eyes off her, handed Anna the threaded needle. ‘My brother must have great trust in you to allow you to do this – considering your appearance!’
Anna didn’t comment but set to work with much concentration. Carefully she put in stitch after stitch and when she had finished made a knot in the thread before biting off the end. Then she made room for Esther who stood ready with the vinegar-soaked cloth, which she held under Aaron’s nose.
For an anxious moment nothing happened until Aaron began to cough and then he came to. He still appeared quite dazed. Esther and Anna helped him up and led him to a straw bed in the corner, where he lay down and closed his eyes.
‘Thank you,’ he murmured. ‘I would now like to rest a little. And you, Brother Marian, take a bath immediately with the tincture that I have given you. And after the bath rub in the ointment! Esther will give you soap and some clothes to put on. With all due respect, but you smell terribly . . .’ He just about managed to utter the last sentence before turning over and falling asleep.
Esther covered him and looked at Anna and went ahead wrinkling her nose. ‘When he is right, he is right,’ she said. ‘Follow me!’
Aaron’s spacious two-storey house was a massive stone and timber-frame construction. It had been planned meticulously and was laid out especially to cater for the needs of a medicus. There even was a bath chamber on the ground floor built directly over the river which ran beneath the house.
The medicus had enough money for such an extravagant building ever since he had been able to do the imperial family some favours. This despite his Jewish origins earned him the respect and recognition not only of the nobility but also of other wealthy clients, as news of his profound knowledge and cures got around. He had been granted by the emperor the privilege of living outside the city walls instead of in the Jewish ghetto and enjoyed the personal protection of the count of Landskron.
But Aaron could only preserve his wealth and continue with his unconventional practices as long as he was under the protection of his high-born patrons. His procedures were not at all in accordance with traditional medicine as recognised by the Church authorities. There were plenty of enemies and envious competitors who condemned his practice as pagan, or even as witchcraft, and who looked for an opportunity to get rid of the Jewish medicus who by his unchristian working methods called into question all current teaching.
When Anna entered the bath chamber she found a large tub prepared for her. Rebecca the maid had already filled it with hot water, and steam pervaded the room, making it warm and comfortable. Soap, towels and a robe had also been laid out for Anna. She placed the ointment jar and the small vial with the tincture on the edge of the bath and made sure that the door was closed. She was alone at last. Taking a warm bath was a luxury she had never enjoyed before. She took the bar of soap into her hand, holding it as if it were a precious treasure. Next to it stood a little bottle with a fragrant essence, which when she smelt it turned out to be precious rose oil. Was it vain and sinful if surrounded by these treasures? She felt like the Queen of Sheba.
No! She decided to push such thoughts aside for the time being and to enjoy what fate had bestowed on her so unexpectedly. After all, who could know if she would have to atone at some point in the future for this brief moment of happiness? Slowly she took off her cold damp clothes, suddenly feeling completely exhausted. Putting five drops of the tincture into the bath, she climbed in and slipped under the water. With her body covered she leaned back and closed her eyes. She had not felt this safe and well in a long time. Submerging herself completely for a brief moment she had the heavenly feeling of being weightless and floating. Perhaps there was a just God after all, one who rewarded those who endured the hardships of fate before their lives turned for the better.
As she washed off the dirt and the scabs of her rash, she remembered a dream she sometimes had had in the monastery when the patients no longer needed her help and all was quiet: she was a recognised medica and a terrible disease had spread through the whole country. But Anna knew from a secret book about a flower that could heal everything, every sorrow and every pain. Nobody took her seriously when she talked about this flower and they all just laughed at her. Disease, according to the Church, was a punishment for the sinfulness of humankind, and if a terrible disease afflicted countless people then it was a sign that their sinfulness must have been great. But Anna was unwilling to accept this. If only she could find the flower then she could prove to everybody that she had been right and that God did let a herb grow for healing each and every illness.
She searched the whole country: the snow-capped mountains, the inhospitable dusty plains and she went to countries where she had never been before. But nowhere could she find the small inconspicuous flower with the blue petals. She asked everyone she met, but nobody knew the flower. Exhausted at last, she lay down under a tree to rest.
Then, in the distance, she saw a rider on a dark horse galloping towards her. It was a knight of noble bearing with long black hair in a flowing cape but dazzled by the sun she could not recognise his face. He stopped in front of her and bent down. In his right hand he held the flower which for so long she had been searching in vain. But every time that she tried to see his face and take the flower – infinitely happy that at last someone in the world had found it – the dream came to an end. And she would wake with a terrible feeling of disappointment.
Of course a dream was only a dream, and it was foolish to think that she could ever be respected and recognised as a woman and a medica. Then again, one was surely allowed to have dreams. Once she ha
d confided in Father Urban, but he just shook his head sadly at her pride and explained that the order ordained by God was not like that and that the vocation of a woman was that of a wife and mother, unless of course she went to a nunnery and became a bride of Christ.
Anna did not want to be either. Was it not Father Urban who had told her that the possibility of realising one’s dream was what made life worthwhile? No, he could not have said that. In his eyes, that would have contradicted his faith and everything in his life; in fact it would have amounted to blasphemy. Every human being had to follow what God had intended. That was his creed from which he would never have deviated. But who then had spoken this sentence that kept coming back to haunt her? Could it have been her father when he brought her to Heisterbach all those years ago? Yes, it must have been he, even though at the time she was too young to understand those parting words. Nevertheless they had stayed with her: ‘It is only the possibility of realising your dream that makes life worth living.’
And he had added something else: ‘Our only obligation is to remain true to following that path. Never forget it!’
The older she got the truer these words became, but as the years passed, the further she moved from their realisation. What was dearest to her heart – bringing relief and healing to the sick – she could only do dressed as a monk under the guidance of the infirmarius. She became increasingly aware over the years that being female, she was nothing unless she could claim aristocratic ancestry or enjoy the protection of a nobleman of standing. She knew she would never be able to realise her dream of becoming a medica and certainly not as the young woman she was, Anna from Ahrweiler.
She lifted her hands out of the bathwater and noticed that the skin had become all shrivelled, so long had she been lying in the bath indulging in her reveries. But at the same time she was surprised to see how much better the backs of her hands looked now that the dirt was gone and the scabs had been exposed to the medicus’ tincture.
The Apothecary's Secret Page 8