John Banville - Kepler

"Why, Einhorn was delighted, of course, since he is very thick with the Reinbold faction, and straightway reported the attempt to buy his silence, along with the other charges. It is a pretty mess."

"We are glad to see, " Susanna said, "that the matter is not so serious as to trouble you greatly."

Christoph stared at her. She met him stoutly, and Kepler felt her fingers tighten on his shoulder. "Hush, hush," he murmured, patting her hand, "we must not fight. "

Katharina Kepler spoke at last. "O no, he is not much put out, for he and your sister Margarete, and her holy husband the pastor, have sworn the three of them that they will desert me willingly if I am found in the wrong. So they told the magistrate. Isn't that a fine thing. "

Christoph reddened. Kepler contemplated him sadly, but without surprise. He had never managed to love his brother.

"We have our own good names to think of, " Christoph said, thrusting his chin at them. "What do you expect? She was warned. This past year alone in our parish they have burned a score of witches."

"God forgive you," Susanna said, turning away.

Christoph soon departed, muttering. The old woman stayed for nine months. It was a trying time. Old age nor her misfortunes had not dulled her sharp tongue. Kepler regarded her with rueful admiration. She had no illusions about the peril that she faced, yet he believed she was enjoying it all, in a queer way. She had never before had so much attention lavished on her. She took a lively interest in the details of her defence which Kepler was busy assembling. She did not deny the evidence against her, only challenged the interpretations being put on it. "And I know," she said, "what they are after, that whore Ursula Reinbold and the rest of them, Einhorn too, they want to get their hands on my few florins when we lose the action. Reinbold owes me money, you know. I say we should ignore them, and they'll get tired of waiting. "

Kepler groaned. "Mother, I have told you, the case has been reported to the ducal court of Württemberg. " He did not know whether to laugh or be angry at the flicker of pride that brightened her ancient eyes. "Far from waiting, we must press for an early hearing. It is they who are delaying, because they know how weak is their case and want more evidence. Enough damage has been done already. Why, I too am accused of dabbling in forbidden arts!"

"O yes," she said, "yes, you have your good name to think of."

"For God's sake, mother!"

She turned her face away, sniffing. "You know how it began? It was because I defended Christoph against the Rein-bold bitch."

"You told me, yes."

She meant to tell him again. "He was in some business with her tribe, and there was a dispute. And I defended him. And now he says he will abandon me. "

"Well, I shall not abandon you."

He was writing off cannonades in all directions, to Einhorn and his gang, to acquaintances in the juridical faculty at Tübingen, to the court of Württemberg. The replies were evasive, and vaguely menacing. He was becoming convinced that the highest powers were conspiring to damage him through the old woman. And behind that fear was another, harder to face. "Mother," he ventured, squirming, "mother tell me, truly, swear to me, that… that…"

She looked at him. "Have you not seen me riding about the streets at night on my cat?"

The trial date was set for September, in Leonberg. Christoph, who lived there, appealed at once to the ducal court and had the proceedings transferred to the village of Guglingen. When Kepler and his mother arrived, the old woman was taken and put in chains with two keepers in an open room in the tower gate. The gaolers, merry fellows, enjoyed theirjob. They were being well paid, from the prisoner's own funds. Ursula Rein-bold, seeing her prospective damages dwindling, demanded that the guard be reduced to one, while Christoph and his brother-in-law, Pastor Binder, reproached Kepler for allowing the expenses to mount alarmingly: he had insisted that her straw be changed daily, and that there should be a fire lit for her at night. The witnesses were heard, and the transcripts sent to Tübingen, where Kepler's friends in the law faculty decided that the evidence was such that the old woman should be questioned further under threat of torture.

It was a tawny autumn day when they led her to the chamber behind the courthouse. A breeze moved lazily over the grass, like a sweeping of invisible wings. Einhorn the magistrate was there, a wiry little man with a drop on the end of his nose, and various clerks and court officials. The party made a slow progress, for Frau Kepler was still suffering the effects of her chains. Kepler supported her, trying in vain to think of some comforting word. The strangest thoughts came into his head. On thejourney from Linz he had read the Dialogue on ancient and modern music by Galileo's father, and now snatches of that work came back to him, like melodies grand and severe, and he thought of the wind-tossed sad singing of martyrs on their way to the stake.

They entered a low thatched shed. It was dark here after the sunlight, except in the far corner where a brazier stood throbbing, eager and intent, like a living thing. A tooth in Kepler's jaw suddenly began to ache. The air was stifling, but he felt cold. The place reminded him of a chapel, the hush, the shuffling of feet and the muffled coughs, the sense of rapt waiting. There was a hot smell, a mingling of sweat and burning coals, and something else, bitter and brassy, which was, he supposed, the stink of fear. The instruments were laid out on a low trestle table, grouped according to purpose, the thumbscrews and the gleaming knives, the burning rods, the pincers. Here were the tools of a craftsman. The torturer stepped forward, a fine tall fellow with a bushy beard, who was also the village dentist.

"Grüss Gott," he said, touching a finger to his forehead, and bent a grave appraising eye upon the old woman. Einhorn coughed, releasing a sour waft of beer.

"I charge you, sir, " he said, stumbling through the formula, "to present before this woman here arraigned the instruments of persuasion, that in God's grace she may bethink herself, and confess her crimes. " He had a wide smudged upper lip, a kind of prehensile flap; the drop at the end of his nose glittered in the glare of the brazier. Not once during all the days of the hearing had he looked Kepler in the eye. He hesitated, that lip groping blindly for words, and then stepped back a pace, colliding with one of his assistants. "Proceed, man, proceed!"

The torturer in silence, lovingly, one by one displayed his tools. The old woman turned away.

"Look upon them!" Einhorn said. "See, she does not weep, even now, the creature!"

Frau Kepler shook her head. "I have wept so often in my life, I have no tears left. " Suddenly, groaning, she fell to her knees in a grotesque parody of supplication. "Do with me as you please! Even if you pull one vein after another from my body, I would have nothing to admit." She clasped her hands and began to wail a paternoster. The torturer looked about uncertainly. "Arn I required to pierce her?" he asked, taking up an iron.

"Leave it now," said Kepler, as if calling a halt to an unruly children's game. The sentence had been that she should be threatened only. A general snuffling and muttering broke out, and everyone turned away. Einhorn scuttled off. Thus years of litigation were ended. The absurdity of the thing overwhelmed Kepler. Outside, he leaned his head against the sun-warmed brick wall and laughed. Presently he realised that he was weeping. His mother stood by, dazed and a little embarrassed, patting his shoulder. The seraph's wings of the wind swooped about them. "Where will you go now?" Kepler said, wiping his nose.

"Well, I will go home. Or to Heumaden, to Margarete's house," where, within a twelvemonth, in her bed, with much complaining and crying out, she was to die.