Oliver Potzsch: The Poisoned Pilgrim

“Is that the only reason you came?” Kuisl groused at Martha, with a furious look. “To holler at me like an old washerwoman?”

“Jackass! I’m here because of your wife, why else?” She pushed the two crying boys out of the room and took a worn leather pouch from her skirt. “I’ve brought along clubmoss, yarrow, and St. John’s wort to reduce her fever.”

“I have St. John’s wort myself,” the hangman said. “But, please, go ahead-help is always welcome.”

He moved to the side so Martha could enter the bedroom where Anna-Maria was laid out with closed eyes. Evidently she had fallen asleep again. While the midwife cooled her patient’s fevered face, she turned to Jakob. “Where are your two older children? Barbara at least could watch her nephews.”

Grumbling, the hangman sat back down at the table and continued crushing the herbs in the mortar. His movements were smooth and even. “I sent Barbara to the forest to gather some melissa,” he said. “Good Lord, my wife is not the only one in town with the fever. People are pestering me to death. And Georg is out cleaning the wagon used for carrying the prisoners to the gallows. It’s filthy and covered with blood.” Kuisl rubbed a few dry herbs between his callused fingers and dropped them carefully into the mortar. “In any case, that’s what he’s supposed to be doing. If I catch the kid hanging around down by the Lech again, there’ll be a whipping he won’t forget for a long time.”

Martha smiled serenely. “Oh, Jakob,” she replied. “The lad is thirteen; at that age he has other things on his mind than sweeping and polishing. Think back on when you were a child. What did you do when you were thirteen?”

“I went to war and slit open the bellies of Swedish soldiers. I had no time for nonsense.”

There was an awkward pause in which no one said anything.

“Even so, you really shouldn’t leave your grandchildren outside by themselves,” Martha finally said. “Down by the pond, I saw two of Berchtholdt’s boys hanging around. If I were you, I’d be a bit more careful.”

Sullenly resuming his work, Kuisl pushed the heavy pestle into the mortar. “What do you mean by that?”

“What do I mean?” Martha chuckled. “You know only too well. Ever since you caught the eldest Berchtholdt boy with the sacks of grain at the Stadl warehouse a few weeks ago, they’ve sworn bloody revenge.”

“I only told him that wasn’t his grain and to please keep his hands off it.”

“And for that you had to break two of his fingers?”

The hangman grinned. “That will help the little bastard remember it, at least. If I’d told the city council, the aldermen would have had him whipped and made him wear the shrew’s fiddle. Basically, by doing what I did, I missed my chance to collect a reward.”

Martha sighed. “All right, then. But in any case, you should watch out, at least for the children’s sake.” She looked at him very seriously. “I’ve looked these fellows in the eye, Jakob, and they’re as evil as Lucifer.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” The hangman pounded the mortar so hard with his pestle that his two grandchildren, who were playing, looked up in shock. They knew their grandfather, and knew he could get loud and angry. Now that he seemed especially irritated, it would be best for them to keep quiet.

“Bastards, all of them, these Berchtholdts,” Kuisl said. “Just because their father sat on the city council as the master baker until he died, they think they can do anything they want. People like us have to haul the garbage from the streets and be nice and keep our mouths shut. If I catch that Berchtholdt punk down in the Stadl again, I’ll break not just two fingers but both hands. And if he touches my grandkids…” His voice faltered. The hangman clenched his hands into fists and cracked his knuckles while his grandchildren stared up at him silently.

“If the Berchtholdts even harm a hair on the head of my grandkids,” he continued, his voice as sharp as a razorblade, “then, as sure as my name’s Jakob Kuisl, I’ll smash their bones on my wheel one at a time, slit open their bellies, and hang their guts out the window of the Schongau Tower.”

When he noticed the wide, anxious eyes of the two boys, a kind smile spread over his face. “And which of you scaredy cats wants to play piggyback now with his grandfather?”

Simon was awakened by coughing alongside him. When he turned around on the prickly, flea-infested bed of straw, he saw Magdalena wiping her pale face with the back of her hand.

“Damned bellyache,” the hangman’s daughter groaned. “My stomach has been queasy for days.” She tried to get up but collapsed again, moaning, on the bench by the stove. “And I feel a bit dizzy, too.”

“That’s no surprise with all the smoke in here.” Simon coughed and squinted at the door. It was ajar, and black clouds of smoke were coming through the cracks. “Your lousy cousin can’t even afford a decent tile stove. Why do we have to spend the night with this miserable horse butcher? Just because he happens to be a cousin of your father?”

“Shh!” Magdalena put her finger to her lips as Michael Graetz entered the room. The Erling knacker was a skinny, consumptive man whom no one would suspect was even remotely related to the robust hangman of Schongau. His shirt was torn and stained with soot, his beard unkempt, and his teeth shone in his cadaverous face like pieces of black coal. Only his eyes sparkled genially as he held out two steaming bowls to his guests.

“Here, eat,” he mumbled, venturing a wry smile. “Barley porridge sweetened with honey and dried pears. We have it only on holidays and when my dear aunt comes to visit.”

“Thank you, Michael. But I don’t think I can get any food into me this early in the morning.” Shivering, Magdalena took the bowl to warm her hands. It was just after sunrise, and outside the opened shutters fog was rising from the forest floor. Somewhere nearby a goat was bleating. Though summer had arrived, the hangman’s daughter was quivering.

“This is the coldest damn June I can remember,” she complained.

Her cousin eyed her anxiously. “It may be cold, but from the way you look, I’d say the cold comes from inside.” He quickly crossed himself. “Let’s hope you haven’t caught that damned fever that’s plaguing this area now. The Grim Reaper already took two Erling farmers and a maid from Machtlfing this summer.”

“Oh, come now,” Simon scolded. “Magdalena has a stomachache, nothing more. A little anise and silverweed will get her back on her feet again.”

The medicus glanced furtively at his wife, who had crawled back under the thin, torn blanket. The three had slept together in the same room-the horse butcher on the hard bench, Magdalena and Simon on the rickety couch in the niche by the stove. Lost in thought, Simon dished out a spoonful of the steaming porridge and sent a silent prayer to heaven. Michael Graetz was right. Magdalena had looked pale for days, and she had dark rings under her eyes. He could only hope she wasn’t really coming down with a fever. The medicus knew from his own experience that people who complained of a simple cold in the morning could be near death by nightfall.

“I’ll make something for you to drink,” Simon said, partially to reassure himself as he took another spoonful of the porridge. It tasted amazingly good, as sweet and rich as an expensive dessert for pampered councilors. “Some medicine from anise, camomile, and perhaps a bit of bloodroot…” he mumbled. He looked around the room that occupied almost the entire first floor of the house. There was a rickety table, two stools, a bed, an old trunk, and a crooked homemade cross in the corner.

“I assume you don’t have those herbs here in the house, do you?” Simon asked hesitantly. “Dried perhaps, or crushed into powder?”