The Dark Monk (59 page)

Magdalena Kuisl ran down the narrow overgrown path from the Tanners’ Quarter to the Lech, her skirt fluttering behind her. Her mother had given her the day off and her strict father was far away, so she raced through the cool, shady land along the river, happy to escape the stuffiness and stench in town.

Magdalena looked forward to a swim in the river, as the odor of manure, feces, and mold clung to her matted black hair. She and her mother had been busy in town all morning collecting garbage and shoveling it into their cart. Even the nine-year-old twins, Georg and Barbara, had to help. The work seemed harder than usual because Magdalena’s father had left for Regensburg a few days ago. As the family of the hangman, it was the Kuisls’ job to clear the streets in Schongau of garbage and animal carcasses. Every week mountains of trash piled up at the corners and intersections in town, rotting in the hot sun. Rats with long, smooth tails scampered about on top of the piles and glared at passersby with evil little eyes. At least Magdalena had the afternoon to herself.

After just a few minutes, the hangman’s daughter arrived at the riverbank. She turned to the left, away from the raft landing where there were already a half-dozen rafts tied up. She could hear the shouts and laughter of the raftsmen as they unloaded the barrels, crates, and bales and took them off to the newly rebuilt storage building, the Zimmerstadel, on the pier. She turned off the narrow towpath and made her way through the green underbrush, which now, in midsummer, was shoulder-high. The ground was swampy and slippery, and with each step, her bare feet sank in with a slurping sound.

Finally Magdalena reached her favorite spot, a small, shallow cove invisible behind the surrounding willow trees. She climbed down over a large dead root and removed her soiled clothes. Then she scrubbed the dress, apron, and bodice thoroughly, rubbing them over the sharp, wet pebbles. She laid them out to dry on a rock in the warm afternoon sun.

As Magdalena stepped into the water, the gentle tug of the current flowed past her ankles and she sank gradually into the swampy ground. A few more steps and she slipped into the river. Here in the cove, hollowed out of the river ages ago, the current wasn’t quite so strong. The hangman’s daughter swam out, taking care not to get too close to the whirlpool in the middle of the Lech. The water washed the dirt from her skin and hair, and after a few minutes, she felt fresh and rested again. The foul-smelling city was far, far away.

As she swam back to the shore, she noticed her clothes had disappeared.

Magdalena looked around, unsure of what to do. She’d laid her wet clothing out on the rock right there, and now all that remained was a damp spot gradually vanishing in the hot sun.

Had someone followed her here?

She looked up and down the shoreline but couldn’t see her clothes anywhere. She tried to calm down. No doubt some children were just playing a joke on her—nothing more. She sat down on the tree root to dry off in the sun. Lying back with her eyes closed, she waited for the pranksters to start giggling and give themselves away.

Suddenly she heard a rustling behind her in the bushes.

Before she could jump up, someone wrapped a hairy, sinewy arm around her neck and placed a hand over her mouth. She tried to scream, but not a sound came out.

“Not a word, or I’ll kiss you till your neck is red all over and your father gives you a good spanking.”

Magdalena couldn’t help giggling as she sputtered through the hand held over her mouth.

“Simon! My God, you nearly scared me to death! I thought robbers or murderers…”

Simon kissed her gently on her neck. “Who knows, maybe I am one…” he said, giving her a conspiratorial wink.

“You’re a flake, a runt, and a quack, and nothing more. Before you even touch a hair on my head, I’ll wring your neck. God knows why I love you so much.”

She extricated herself from his grip and threw herself at him. In a tight embrace they rolled across the wet pebbles in the cove. Before long, she had pinned Simon to the ground with her knees. The physician was slender and wiry rather than muscular. At just five feet tall, he was one of the smallest men Magdalena had ever known. He had fine features with bright, alert eyes that always seemed to sparkle mischievously, and a well-trimmed black Vandyke beard. His dark hair was lightly oiled and shoulder length in accord with the latest fashion. In other respects as well, Simon was well groomed, though at the moment his appearance was somewhat in disarray.

“I—I give up,” he groaned.

“Oh, no you don’t! First you’re going to swear to me there’s no other woman in your life.”

Simon shook his head. “No—nobody else.”

Magdalena rapped him on the head and rolled down next to him. She’d never quite forgiven him for flirting with the redheaded merchant woman more than two years ago, even though Simon had sworn a dozen times that there really hadn’t been anything between them. But the day was just too beautiful to waste quarreling. Together they looked up into the branches of the willows swaying back and forth above their heads in the gentle breeze. For a long time they were silent, listening to the wind rustling in the branches.

After a while Magdalena spoke up. “My father will probably be away for a while.”

The medicus nodded and gazed out at two ducks flapping their wings as they rose from the water. Magdalena had already told him about her father’s trip to visit his ill sister. “What did Lechner have to say about that?” he finally asked. “As the court clerk, he could have simply ordered your father not to leave town—now of all times, in summer when the garbage stinks to high heaven.”

Magdalena laughed. “What was he to do? Father just got up and left. Lechner cursed and swore he’d have him hanged when he came back. It was only then that it occurred to him that my father would have trouble hanging himself.” She sighed. “There will probably be a big fine to pay, and until he comes back, mother and I will just have to work twice as hard.”

Her eyes took on a dreamy look. “How far away is Regensburg, anyway?” she asked.

“Very far.” Simon grinned as he playfully passed his finger around her belly button. Magdalena was still naked, and droplets of water sparkled on her skin, tanned from her daily trips into the forest to collect herbs.

“Far enough in any case that he can’t torment us with his lectures,” the physician said finally, with a big yawn.

Magdalena flared up. “If there’s a problem, it’s your old man, who’s always hounding us. Anyway, the purpose for my father’s trip was serious—so stop your silly grinning.”

The hangman’s daughter was thinking about the letter from Regensburg that had troubled her father so much. She knew her father had a younger sister in Regensburg, but she never realized how close the two of them had been. Magdalena was only two years old when her aunt fled to Regensburg with a bathhouse owner. They left because of the Great Plague but also because of the daily taunts and hostilities in town. Magdalena had always admired her for her courage.

Silently she threw some pebbles, which skipped a few times before finally being swallowed by the rippling water.

“It’s a mystery to me who’s going to clean up all the garbage in town for the next few weeks in all this hot weather,” she said more to herself than to Simon. “If the aldermen think I’m going to do it, they have another thing coming. I’d rather spend the rest of the summer in a hole in the ground.”

Simon clapped his hands. “What a great idea! Or we can just stay here in this cove!” He started kissing her cheeks, and Magdalena resisted, though only halfheartedly.

“Stop, Simon! If anyone sees us…”

“Who’s going to see us?” he replied, passing his hand through her wet black hair. “The willows certainly won’t tell on us.”

Magdalena laughed. These few hours spent down at the river or in nearby barns were all they had to show for their love. They’d always dreamt of getting married, but strict town statutes wouldn’t permit that. They’d been courting for years, and their relationship was like a desperate game of hide and seek. As the daughter of the hangman, Magdalena wasn’t allowed to associate with the higher classes. Executioners were dishonorable, just like gravediggers, bathhouse owners, barbers, and magicians. Accordingly, marriage to a physician was out of the question, but that didn’t keep the couple from clandestine meetings in the fields and barns around town. In the springtime two years ago, they’d even made a pilgrimage together to Altötting, basically the only longer time they’d been together. In the meantime, the affair between the physician and the hangman’s daughter had become a hot topic of conversation in the Schongau marketplace and taverns. Moreover, Simon’s father, old Bonifaz Fronwieser, was urging his son with increasing insistence to finally settle down with a middle-class girl. That was actually essential in advancing Simon’s career as a doctor, but he kept putting his father off—and meeting secretly with Magdalena.

“Maybe we should go to Regensburg, too,” Simon whispered between kisses. “A serf gains his freedom after living a year and a day in the city. We could start a new life…”

“Oh, come now, Simon.” Magdalena pushed him away. “How often you’ve promised me that! What will become of me then? Don’t forget I’m dishonorable. I’ll just end up picking up the garbage again, no matter where I am.”

“Nobody knows me there!”

Magdalena shrugged. “And what will I do for work? The cities are full of hungry day laborers and—”

Simon held his finger to her lips. “Just don’t say anything now—let’s forget it for just a while.” His eyes closed, he bent down and covered her body with kisses.

“Simon…no…” Magdalena whispered, but her resistance was already broken.

At that moment, they heard a crackling sound in the willow tree above them.

Magdalena looked up. Something seemed to be moving there in the branches. Suddenly she felt something warm and slimy hit her and run slowly down her forehead. She put up her hand to feel it and realized it was spit.

She heard giggling and then saw two boys, about twelve years old, quickly climb down the tree. One of them was the youngest son of the alderman and master baker Michael Berchtholdt, with whom Magdalena had often exchanged strong words.

“The doctor is kissing the hangman’s daughter!” the second boy shouted as he ran away. Disgusted, Magdalena wiped the rest of the spit from her forehead. Simon jumped up and shook his fist at the smirking boy.

“You impertinent little brats!” he shouted. “I’m going to break every bone in your bodies!”

“The hangman’s daughter can do that better than you!” cackled the second boy, disappearing into the bush. “Do it on the rack, you scum!”

Then little Berchtholdt stopped short. He turned and looked at Simon defiantly, with clenched teeth, trembling slightly as the physician charged after him like a madman, his shirt open and his jacket undone.

“It wasn’t me,” he squealed as Simon raised his hand to strike. “It was Benedikt! I swear! Actually, we were just looking for you because—uh—”

Simon had raised his hand to strike the boy when he noticed that young Berchtholdt was staring open-mouthed at the half-naked hangman’s daughter, who was trying to hide as best she could behind a rock while she buttoned up her bodice. The physician gave the boy a gentle poke on the nose strong enough to send the boy reeling backward into the mud.

“Didn’t the priest teach you any sense of decency?” Simon growled. “If you keep staring like that, God will strike you blind. So what are you up to here?”

“My father sent me,” the boy mumbled. “He wants to see the Kuisl girl.”

“Old Berchtholdt?” asked Magdalena stepping out from behind the rock now fully dressed. “What could he possibly want from me? Or is he sitting up there somewhere in the tree staring at me, too?”

The Schongau master baker was known around town as a lecherous old philanderer. He’d made a pass at Magdalena some years back and been rebuffed. Since then he’d been spreading gossip that the hangman’s daughter was in league with the devil and had cast a spell on the young physician. Three years ago, the superstitious baker almost succeeded in having the midwife Martha Stechlin burned at the stake for alleged witchcraft—something Magdalena’s father had just barely been able to prevent. Since then Berchtholdt harbored a deep hatred for the Kuisls and, whenever he could, tried to make life miserable for them.

“It’s on account of his maid, Resl,” the boy said as he continued to stare at Magdalena’s low neckline. “She has a fat stomach and is screaming like a stuck pig.”

“Does she have a child on the way?” Magdalena asked.

Puzzled, the boy just stood there picking his nose. “No idea. People think the devil has gotten into her. You should have a look, my father says.”

“Aha, so now I’m good enough for him.” She looked at the boy suspiciously. “Doesn’t he want to go see Stechlin?”

“Berchtholdt would rather cut his guts out himself than send for the midwife,” interjected Simon, who’d dressed himself in the meantime. “You know, he still thinks Stechlin is a witch and would love to see her burn. Anyway, many people in town think you’re just as good a midwife as she is, maybe even better.”

“Enough of your nonsense!” Magdalena tied her wet hair up into a bun as she continued talking. “I only hope there’s nothing seriously wrong with Berchtholdt’s maid. Now come along, let’s go!”

The hangman’s daughter hurried down the narrow towpath to the Lech Gate, turning around to Simon once more as she ran. “Perhaps we’ll need a professional physician, even if it’s just to go and fetch water.”

As soon as they arrived at the narrow Zänkgasse, Magdalena was sure this was no ordinary birth. Through the thin bolted windows of the baker’s house, the screams sounded more like a cow awaiting slaughter than a woman giving birth. Farmers and workers had come running to the door of the bakery and were whispering anxiously to one another. When Simon and Magdalena approached, the group stepped back reluctantly.

“Here comes the hangman’s daughter to drive the devil out of the baker’s maid,” somebody snarled.

“I say they’re both witches,” an old woman whispered. “Just wait, and we’ll see them fly out through the chimney.”