Oliver Pötzsch: The Dark Monk

The Dark Monk: A Hangman’s Daughter Tale was first published in 2009 by Ullstein Bucherlage GmbH as Die Henkerstochter und der schwarze Mönch.

English translation copyright © 2012 by Lee Chadeayne

JAKOB KUISL, hangman of Schongau

SIMON FRONWIESER, son of the town doctor

MAGDALENA KUISL, the hangman’s daughter

ANNA MARIA KUISL, the hangman’s wife

GEORG AND BARBARA, the hangman’s twin children

BONIFAZ FRONWIESER, Schongau town doctor

BENEDIKTA KOPPMEYER, merchant woman from Landsberg am Lech

MARTHA STECHLIN, midwife

MAGDA, housekeeper of the St. Lawrence Church in Altenstadt

ABRAHAM GEDLER, sexton of the St. Lawrence Church in Altenstadt

MARIA SCHREEVOGL, wife of a town alderman

FRANZ STRASSER, innkeeper in Altenstadt

BALTHASAR HEMERLE, carpenter in Altenstadt

HANS BERCHTHOLDT, son of the Schongau master baker

SEBASTIAN SEMER, son of the presiding burgomaster

JOHANN LECHNER, court clerk

KARL SEMER, presiding burgomaster and innkeeper of the Goldener Stern Inn

MATTHIAS HOLZHOFER, second presiding burgomaster

JAKOB SCHREEVOGL, stove maker and alderman

MICHAEL BERCHTHOLDT, master baker and alderman

PHILIPP HARTMANN, hangman of Augsburg

NEPOMUK BIERMANN, owner of St. Mary’s Pharmacy in Augsburg

OSWALD HAINMILLER, merchant from Augsburg

LEONHARD WEYER, merchant from Augsburg

ANDREAS KOPPMEYER, priest of the St. Lawrence Church in Altenstadt

ELIAS ZIEGLER, priest of St. Michael’s Basilica in Altenstadt

AUGUSTIN BONENMAYR, abbot of the Premonstratensian Monastery in Steingaden

MICHAEL PISCATOR, superintendent of the Augustinian Monastery in Rottenbuch

BERNHARD GERING, abbot of the Wessobrunn Benedictine Monastery

BROTHER JAKOBUS

BROTHER AVENARIUS

BROTHER NATHANAEL

A LTENSTADT NEAR S CHONGAU

ON THE NIGHT OFJANUARY 18, 1660, AD

WHEN THE PARISHpriest Andreas Koppemeyer pressed the last stone into place and sealed the opening with lime and mortar, he had just four hours to live.

With the back of his large hand, he wiped the sweat from his brow and leaned back against the cool, damp wall behind him. Then he looked nervously up the narrow, winding staircase. Was something moving up there? Again, he heard the floorboards creaking as if someone were moving stealthily across the floor above him in the church. But it could have just been his imagination. Wood warps, and the St. Lawrence Church was old and crumbling. It was not for nothing that workmen had been there for the last few weeks repairing the building so that it wouldn’t someday come crashing down during mass.

A January storm was whistling around the weathered walls and shaking the wooden shutters. But it wasn’t just due to the cold down here in the crypt that the priest was trembling. Pulling his worn cassock tightly around him, he scrutinized the bricked-up wall once more and then started the climb back up the stairway to the church. His steps echoed on the worn, frost-covered stairs. Suddenly, the howling of the storm got louder so that he could no longer hear the soft creaking in the balcony above him. He must have been mistaken. Who would still be here in the church at this hour, for heaven’s sake? It was way past midnight. His housekeeper Magda had gone to bed hours ago in the little rectory next door and the old sexton would not return until it was time to ring the bells at six in the morning.

Pastor Andreas Koppmeyer climbed the final steps out of the crypt. His broad figure completely filled the opening in the church floor. He was more than six feet tall, a bear of a man who, with his long, broad beard and bushy black eyebrows, looked like the personification of an Old Testament God. When Koppmeyer stood before the altar in his black robe and delivered his homilies in a deep, gruff voice, his appearance alone caused his flock to tremble and instilled in them the fear of purgatory.

With both hands, the pastor gripped the slab covering the crypt. It weighed several hundred pounds, and he panted as he pushed it back over the opening. It made a crunching sound as he set it down, but it covered the crypt perfectly, as if it had never been opened. Koppmeyer examined his work with satisfaction and then made his way back through the storm.

As he started to open the church door, he noticed that snow was already gathering in high drifts in front of the portal. With a groan, he pressed his shoulder against the heavy oaken door until it opened a crack and he was just able to squeeze through. Snowflakes lashed his face like little thorns and he had to close his eyes as he trudged back to the rectory.

It was only about thirty paces back to the little house, but it seemed like an eternity to the pastor. The wind tugged hard at his cassock and it fluttered around him like a tattered flag. The snow was almost up to his hips and even Koppmeyer, with his massive body, had to struggle to move forward. As he fought his way step by step through the storm and the darkness, he kept thinking of the events of the last two weeks. Pastor Koppmeyer was a simple man of God, but even he had noticed that his discovery was something extraordinary, something a little too sensitive for him to deal with and that would best be left to others. He did the right thing in hiding it behind the wall and letting more powerful, knowledgeable people decide whether it should ever be opened again. Perhaps he should not have written the letter to Benedikta, but he had always trusted his younger sister. She was amazingly bright and well read for a woman and he had often asked her for advice. Surely she would know what to do this time as well.

Andreas Koppmeyer was suddenly wakened from his reveries. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw something moving to the right, behind the woodpile near the house. He squinted and held his hand over his eyes to protect them from the snowflakes, but he couldn’t make out anything. It was too dark and the falling snow made it even harder. Shrugging, he turned aside. Probably just a fox trying to sneak up on the chicken coop, he thought. Or a bird looking for a place to hide from the storm.

Finally, Koppmeyer reached the door to the rectory. Here, on the south side, the drifts weren’t as high. He opened the door, squeezed his massive frame into the hallway, and bolted the door. At once he was enveloped in silence. The storm seemed far, far away. On the open hearth in the main room, a small fire was still burning, spreading warmth and comfort, and behind it a stairway led up to the housekeeper’s room. The priest turned to the right and walked through the main room on his way to his private quarters.