Just a few moments later, Simon was hurrying through the little streets of Bamberg to St. Martin’s Church, where the suffragan bishop lived. It was a simple, middle-class house connected to the church by a passageway. As he approached the door, he noticed that someone had drawn a large pentagram on the ground. From the door handle hung a small bouquet of dried Saint John’s wort; according to ancient tradition, it would ward off witches, demons, and evil spirits.
Simon looked around carefully. A few people walked by with their heads down, making a wide arc as they passed the house, as if fearing an infection. In the meantime, Simon had again donned his old medicus’s robe, as the splendid outfit he’d borrowed from Samuel was much worse for the wear after the attack by the deranged suffragan bishop. At least now he wouldn’t attract much attention from the crowd in the church square.
Bells rang out over the city, summoning the faithful to the mass for the dead up in the cathedral. Simon was sure the service would be well attended that day. In times like this, he knew from experience, people always looked to the church for consolation.
Besides, no doubt they’re looking forward to a fiery, bloodthirsty sermon, he thought. Hatred and fear of Satan are always a good adhesive for holding a city together.
He tapped cautiously on the door, and at once Samuel appeared in the doorway. The Bamberg city physician was unshaven and white as a sheet, looking as if he’d kept watch by the sick man’s bed all night. Through the crack in the door, Simon could smell the strong fragrance of incense.
“Come in,” Samuel said, sounding exhausted, and beckoned for Simon to enter the vestibule. “His condition has not changed much. Unfortunately, none of the servants are here except for a single lackey and the fat maid, both of whom you met yesterday. All the rest fled in terror. So you will have to do without your morning coffee.”
Simon smiled wanly. “I’ll survive, though I admit that the dark devil’s brew would help me to think. I’ve been racking my brain for half the night trying to make sense of all this.”
They went up to the second floor, entering a dark corridor whose walls were lined with votive pictures and paintings of saints, and with many doors leading off it. From his visit the day before, Simon knew that the patient’s room was at the far end of the hallway; he could have found it blindfolded, as the fragrance of incense became stronger, almost sickening, the closer they got.
“Don’t be surprised at how things look in there,” Samuel warned him as he opened the tall door. “None of this is mine. But the maid, this superstitious harpy, insisted, or she would have left.”
They entered the darkened room, and Simon thought he could already smell the stench of death-the familiar mixture of incense, burned herbs, sweat, feces, and disease, so familiar to him from his countless house calls. Just like outside the house, here, too, a large pentagram had been drawn on the floor; bundles of Saint John’s wort were tied to all four bedposts, and crucifixes of all sizes had been hastily hung around the room. The windows were covered with heavy curtains.
The old maid sat slumped over on a stool in the corner and seemed to be sleeping.
Samuel cleared his throat, and she awakened with a start and let out a sharp cry. For a moment she looked like she was going to faint, but then she recognized the two men standing in the dark room and crossed herself with a sigh of relief.
“Ah, it’s just you,” she sighed. “I was afraid that-”
“Don’t worry, the werewolf rarely uses the door,” Samuel interrupted. “He jumps through the window, howling. Isn’t that what you yourself said yesterday?” He pointed toward the hall. “Everything is fine, Agathe, you can go to mass now and we’ll care for the patient.”
Agathe nodded gratefully and dashed out of the room. As soon as the door had closed behind her, Samuel ran to the windows and tore open the curtains.
“Damn, damn, damn,” he cursed. “She thinks she can ward off evil this way.”
The bright light of morning came flooding into the room and onto the bed, and only then was Simon able to get a look at the Bamberg suffragan bishop. Under the many blankets, Sebastian Harsee looked like a little puppet, an impression reinforced by the waxen expression on his face. It took a while for Simon to realize it was because all the muscles in his face had tensed up; the only things moving were his eyes, which darted back and forth like those of a nervous mouse. A thin stream of saliva was oozing out of the corner of his mouth.
He can see us, I’m certain of that, Simon thought, and he can probably hear us, too. What a horrible condition. It’s as if you’re buried alive.
“Last night he quivered a bit and even moved a few times,” said Samuel as he pulled off the covers, revealing the pale body of the suffragan bishop dressed only in a thin nightshirt. “But in the last few hours the paralysis has spread to his entire body-except for his eyes. He can still give you that grim and threatening look.”
“And how about his teeth?” Simon asked. “Yesterday they looked so long and sharp. Have you examined them?”
Samuel nodded. “They look quite normal. I think that was because his lips and the muscles around them were pulled back due to cramps. But the reaction we witnessed yesterday was certainly interesting. .”
The doctor took a cup of water and brought it toward the patient’s face for him to see. Suddenly Harsee’s body began to tremble all over. Though he couldn’t move, the aversion he felt was evident in his eyes. Every fiber of his body seemed stretched to the limit, and white foam formed on his lips. Samuel set the cup down on a table a bit farther away, and the suffragan bishop became visibly calmer.
“He’s afraid of water,” Simon whispered.
“Any liquid,” Samuel corrected him. “As I said, extremely interesting. I’ve never seen anything like this before.” He sighed and wiped the saliva from Harsee’s mouth with a cloth. “Unfortunately, our dear Agathe sprinkled him with holy water this morning, and he thrashed about like a fish on dry land. So now, of course, the old woman is completely convinced the suffragan bishop is a werewolf.”
“Well, he did pounce on me just like a wolf,” Simon mused. “What terrible illness is it that. .” Suddenly he paused.
“What is it?” Samuel asked, puzzled.
Without replying, Simon leaned over the patient and quickly examined the spot on his neck. The small puncture wound was still there, as well as the red circle around it. Something Magdalena’s uncle had said kept going through his mind, like the murmuring of someone reciting the rosary.
You can learn all sorts of things from animals, Master Medicus. For example, humility and modesty.
Outside, the bells rang for the last time, and after that an eerie silence fell over the city.
You can learn all sorts of things from animals. .
“We were so foolish,” Simon finally murmured, “so incredibly foolish. The whole time the answer was right before our eyes.”
“What do you mean?” Samuel asked. He, too, had now approached the patient and looked at Simon excitedly. “If you can solve this riddle, don’t torture me any longer!”
Simon grinned. “How many bags of coffee beans do I get if I can?”
“A whole storehouse full, if I can find them, you schmuck.” Samuel raised his arms to the ceiling. “Why has God punished me with a friend who’s such a joker? Say something, will you? Speak up!”
Simon cast one last look into the eyes of the suffragan bishop, who glared at him with a mixture of hatred and infinite terror. Another thread of saliva ran down Sebastian Harsee’s mouth and trickled into the pillow.
Then the medicus gave his diagnosis.
Wrapped in a simple, wide cloak and with his hood pulled down over his face, Jakob Kuisl stomped up the steep hill to the cathedral square. A gentle drizzle had set in, so his garb didn’t attract attention. Even though hardly anyone in this city knew him, the hangman considered it prudent to be as inconspicuous as possible. For a man of his size, that was a tall order.