There had been repeated threats against the Hen, and the landlord had grown cautious. Only recently a brewer in Cleves had been accused of sorcery and burned at the stake. The night that happened, the venerable Franciscan brethren had written the word “Cleves” in pitch on the door; the merchant families in the imposing neighboring houses, at the sign of the Large and the Small Water-Butt, wondered out loud about a denunciation to the Holy Inquisition because their children had seen black cats running out of the Hen while inside two demons, Abigor and Asmodeus, in the form of lecherous women had shouted obscenities and given off sulfurous odors. Jacob wondered how the children knew it was precisely those two demons when there must be at least—how many was it?—at least ten demons, but the Hen had its problems.
And for that, Jacob was told by tub of lard, they’d simply been thrown out.
“Nonsense,” whispered Tilman. “The money was finished. You’re too late.”
“Thrown out!” bellowed the fat man, who had heard and was obviously the one who had been standing the treat.
Tilman coughed his lungs out.
“Doesn’t matter,” he panted. “Back to the Duck Ponds then.”
“Yes, lie down and die.” One of the others laughed, slapping him on the shoulder. It wasn’t a pleasant laugh.
Jacob felt a wave of disappointment. Why did it have to happen to him? The chance of drinking something other than foul water didn’t come his way that often.
Then he remembered the apples and Maria.
“Come on,” he said, grabbing Tilman by the arm. The beggars disappeared in the opposite direction, cursing because the money hadn’t been sufficient to get properly drunk.
“Did you get any apples?” asked Tilman, out of breath.
“Here.” Jacob pulled one out. Tilman bit into it as if it were the first thing his teeth had had to bite on all day. Perhaps it was.
Behind them a late cart rumbled across the street.
“Where are we going, anyway?” Tilman wanted to know. The last syllables turned into a new fit of coughing.
“To Maria.”
“See you tomorrow.” Tilman tried to pull away, but Jacob kept his arm in a tight grip and continued along the street.
“You’re going nowhere. For one thing there’s an incredible story I want to tell you and Maria.”
“You and your stories. Was there ever one that was true?”
“For another, you’re not well. If you don’t get a dry bed tonight you soon won’t be needing any more apples.”
“You know Maria can’t stand me,” whined Tilman as he scurried along beside Jacob.
“I know she’s fed up with giving shelter to all and sundry, but you’re my friend. And who isn’t to say whether, tonight of all nights, thanks to a happy coincidence—”
“You can forget your happy coincidences.”
“You’re coming!”
“All right, all right.”
The oxcart rattled out of the side street and blocked Urquhart’s view. When the redhead and his companion reappeared they were way ahead. A few Greyfriars were returning to the monastery from New Market Square, pulling a cartload of thin boards. Urquhart let them pass, then hurried on after the two, but now other people were coming into the street.
He would have to be patient.
Urquhart thought it over. The meeting with the gang of beggars had been too brief for the redhead to have told them anything. The one who was going with him was quite another matter though. Every moment the risk of Gerhard Morart’s last words being passed on grew greater.
Of course, it was possible he had not said anything, just groaned and given up the ghost. It was possible, but Urquhart felt it was safer to assume the opposite.
After a few minutes the pair turned off to the right into Berlich, a seedy, sparsely populated district, best known for its pig breeders—which explained the stench. But there were others who went about their business there.
Were they going to the whores?
Urquhart stole along in the shadow of the dilapidated houses. In front he heard someone softly call out, “Maria.” A door opened a crack and the two slipped inside.
They had managed to escape.
For the moment.
He briefly considered following them in and settling the matter there and then, but decided against it. He had no idea how many people there were in the building. It was a small house, clearly a brothel. There might be a brothel keeper. Someone staggered out and waddled along toward him. Not one of the men he’d been following. Well dressed and too drunk to notice him. Clearly a merchant. Mumbling to himself, he disappeared behind some pigsties.
Urquhart watched him go, then turned his attention back to the house. A light appeared in a first-floor window and the shutters closed with a crash.
They had to come out again. Eventually.
Urquhart melted into the darkness. He could wait.
BERLICH
It was a whorehouse. The keeper, Clemens Brabanter, was a burly, good-natured fellow. He charged his customers, as a cover charge, so to speak, for four pints of wine, of which only three appeared on the table. A peat fire smoked out the cheap taproom that took in the whole of the ground floor, a grubby curtain dividing off the place where Clemens slept. Fatty, gristly meat was grilled over the fire, usually burned black, unless one of the guests brought a better-quality joint. Then Clemens would sit himself by the fire and keep turning the delicacy. He wanted his guest to enjoy it. The girls only got a taste if the visitor invited them. Since Clemens, as a man of honesty and fairness, did not exempt himself from this rule, the girls respected him, especially as he didn’t bother to beat them.
It was similar with the wine. In general Clemens served what in Cologne was known as “wet Ludwig,” the product of poor harvests, a sour nothing with neither body nor bouquet that you scarcely tasted but still paid for with excruciating heartburn. On the other hand, there were clients for whom Clemens went down into his cellar to decant a quite different vintage. This lured certain upper-class gentlemen back again and again, and Clemens’s most valuable stock, the three women upstairs, were all, apart from one on whom God, for her sins, had bestowed a skinny body and a squint, invitingly plump.
Outside business hours two of the whores, Wilhilde and Margarethe, were married. Their husbands worked as sack holders in the warehouses down by the Rhine. It took four to six of them to hold up the immense sacks while they were being filled with salt. Sack holders earned next to nothing, but then next-to-nothing in the way of skill was demanded of them. They scraped together enough to keep body and soul together; added to their wives’ earnings it just about made staying alive worthwhile.
The last of Clemens’s threesome was generally considered the most beautiful in the whole of Berlich. Her name was Maria. She was twenty-one, and already had rings under her eyes and a few teeth missing. On the other hand, she had wonderful, silky hair and shining green eyes beneath brows that arched like the Madonna’s. Her lips were two rose petals, one of the canons who sneaked away from the cathedral now and then had whispered drunkenly in her ear, her breasts temples of desire, and her womb burned with the fires of purgatory.
Given this, no one was surprised that Maria became prouder and prouder and talked of leaving Berlich at some point to marry a well-situated gentleman with whom she would live a devout and God-fearing life in a neat, solidly built house well away from the stench of pig dung and the grunts and groans from the neighboring rooms.