The Council of Twelve Read online

  She pulled the rag from Sophia’s mouth and sniffed it. “Schnapps,” she stated with disgust. “How many times do I have to tell you I don’t want you to give her liquor?”

  Kuisl shrugged. “That’s what my parents used to do. It’s only a few drops. I can’t see any harm in it.”

  “And I’m telling you for the last time that I don’t want a drunk baby,” Magdalena replied. “I’ve got plenty of other things to worry about with Sophia and Peter—who is at your house, by the way, where I’ve given him some shepherd’s purse. A bunch of his classmates bloodied his nose.”

  She sighed and shook her head, then motioned toward the executioner’s house, which lay not far from the pond. “Let’s go inside. Sophia has been outside for far too long, and I must feed her.”

  They followed the muddy track through the snow to Jakob Kuisl’s home. Since Magdalena and her family had moved up to town, eighteen-year-old Barbara lived alone with her father at the executioner’s house in the Tanners’ Quarter. She cooked for him, did the washing, and looked after the chickens and the dairy cow in the stable next to the house, as well as the small vegetable garden. On the outside, the house looked increasingly decrepit. Several shingles were missing from the roof, and the paint was flaking off all over. But inside, Barbara kept a tidy house.

  Peter was sitting on a bench next to the oven and, as usual, leafing through a book from Jakob Kuisl’s small library. His nosebleed had stopped, but he still looked very pale. He glanced up only briefly, when Paul grabbed the bowl with the now-cold porridge and finished off the remains of their shared breakfast with great appetite. Magdalena sat down at the table and started unwrapping her daughter.

  Sophia had bright-blue eyes and raven hair, and her almost always smiling face smelled of milk and honey. She gurgled happily and kicked her little legs. If you didn’t look too closely, you wouldn’t see anything amiss. But Jakob Kuisl had seen her flaw too many times to blank it out any longer.

  His granddaughter’s right foot was twisted to the inside and slightly thickened, the toes strangely grown together.

  Sophia had a clubfoot.

  She was almost fourteen months old now, and other children started to walk at this age. But Sophia would probably never walk very well. Jakob and Simon both tried their best to stretch the tendons every day amid heartrending wails, but they knew the foot would never be straight. Worse, it hadn’t taken long for Sophia’s handicap to become public knowledge, and to most people, a clubfoot was much more than a small flaw, especially when the grandfather was a living, breathing hangman.

  To many Schongauers, Sophia bore the mark of the devil.

  Since time immemorial the devil had been depicted with horns and a goat’s foot. He was a great actor, able to turn himself into handsome youths and beautiful women—but no matter how hard he tried, his limp always gave him away.

  For her entire life, Sophia would limp like the devil.

  When Magdalena had finished feeding the child, she turned back to her father, who had been sitting at the table in silence.

  “Where is Barbara? I haven’t seen her all morning. She could have looked after Sophia.”

  Kuisl tightened his lips; he had been waiting for this question. Magdalena guessed the meaning of his silence.

  “You had another fight, didn’t you?” she asked.

  “She said she didn’t want to go to Munich. Told me I couldn’t make her. My own daughter!” Kuisl spat into the reeds on the floor. He pulled out his pipe and began filling it. “She’s a pigheaded, quarrelsome thing,” he growled. “And that’s because she doesn’t have a husband to teach her some manners.”

  “She’s only as pigheaded and quarrelsome as her father,” Magdalena replied with a sigh.

  Kuisl fell silent again. His quarrels with Barbara had been an almost daily occurrence lately. He would have liked nothing better than to marry his younger daughter to the Schongau gravedigger, or perhaps the knacker, who had already given her two bouquets of dried cornflowers. But Barbara remained stubborn and did as she pleased. She had the reputation of being a wanton girl who liked to mess about with lads from neighboring villages or traveling journeymen. She danced passionately and frequently, and didn’t seem to care what people thought. Kuisl had tried to speak with her about it many times.

  Well, if he was honest, he usually did more shouting than speaking.

  But nothing he said or did changed Barbara’s behavior. Particularly in recent weeks, she had become increasingly irritable and withdrawn—something was up. But Kuisl had never been very good when it came to women’s emotions, not back when his beloved wife was still alive, nor with his daughters. And Kuisl’s order to accompany him to Munich hadn’t helped improve Barbara’s mood.

  That and the message that had gone with it.

  Perhaps I should have broken the news a little more gently, he thought.

  “When was the last time you saw her?” Magdalena wanted to know, drawing Kuisl back to the present.

  The hangman moved his head from side to side. “Hmm, earlier this morning. She was crying, the silly goose, when all I said was . . .” He faltered.

  “What?” Magdalena pressed on.

  “Well, that she must come to Munich with me because I’m finding her a husband.”

  Magdalena stared at him, aghast. “You said what?”

  Kuisl shrugged. “For God’s sake, a guild meeting is the perfect opportunity for an engagement. Lots of hangmen do it. You’ll see, Barbara will be swamped with suitors. She’s a good match, with her looks, especially now that I’m on the council. It’s for the best.”

  “And you wonder why she’s run away? You . . . you . . .” Magdalena pinched her lips and inhaled deeply. “Where did she go?”

  “She ran off toward Katzenweiher Pond. But—” Kuisl broke off. He’d just remembered the last thing Barbara had shouted at him.

  You can’t just sell me off like a piece of meat! I’d sooner die . . .

  “Katzenweiher Pond!” Magdalena breathed. “Where they found the body of a girl only a few weeks ago.”

  “What are you talking about?” Kuisl tried to laugh, but it came out more like a croak. Suddenly, he felt weak and helpless. “You don’t seriously believe my Barbara would . . . well, you know . . .” His voice faltered, and he slammed his fist into the table. “God damn it! If she does that to me, then . . . then . . .”

  But Magdalena had already turned away. She handed Sophia to Peter, and the girl immediately started to cry again.

  “Look after your sister. I’ll be back soon. And as for you, Father, pray to God that Barbara hasn’t done anything stupid.”

  Magdalena walked out of the house and hurried toward Katzenweiher Pond.

  The hangman muttered a curse and followed his elder daughter across the icy fields.

  Up in town, Simon closed the door behind the last patient and took a deep breath. He’d had to ask several people to come back tomorrow, and others he’d sent home with a cheap cough syrup made from an ivy decoction and honey. He needed some peace and quiet—rare commodities this time of year. Why did everyone always fall ill at once? It was like a conspiracy of all the noses and throats in Schongau.

  Simon had had to use all his powers of persuasion to appease Josef Seiler. Finally, the corpulent patrician had let him cut open the boil, though not without a barrage of curses on womankind in general and the doctor’s wife in particular. At least Seiler had paid three thalers for his efforts—that was more than a doctor usually earned in a whole day.

  Simon still couldn’t believe how Magdalena had behaved. Didn’t she see that her loose tongue could cost them their income? The rent they had to pay to the city was huge, and there were still plenty of wealthy citizens who hadn’t accepted him as the town doctor, not least because of his wife, the hangman’s daughter, whom many avoided. But he knew he had used the wrong tone, too. What devil had possessed him to say Magdalena didn’t want to be seen with Sophia? He decided to apologize to his wife as s
oon as he saw her.

  Exhausted, Simon trudged back to the treatment room to clean up. Bloody rags and the scalpel he’d used to cut open the boil were still lying on the table, next to dirty urine phials, more knives, and some blood-caked pincers. He fetched a jug of hot water from the stove and poured it over the scalpel, knives, and pincers in a bowl. Then he started to clean his instruments thoroughly—a ritual he had begun about a year ago.

  Simon had told only Magdalena and a handful of close friends about his obsession with cleaning. Martha Stechlin, the old midwife who gave him a hand from time to time, thought that washing surgical instruments was utter nonsense, and Simon guessed that many other Schongau citizens shared her view. Dirt and filth were as much a part of the human body as blood and saliva. The old bathhouse owner over at Altenstadt even prescribed mouse droppings for gas, and cemetery soil for back pain. For burns and amputations, even respected doctors used egg yolks and moldy bread. So what harm could a little dirt do on surgical instruments?

  But Simon had found in recent years that wounds tended to heal better if treated with clean tools. He even went as far as washing his hands before examining a patient—although he did so secretly, because he was afraid of gaining a reputation as a charlatan and quack. But somehow he knew he was doing the right thing, even if he couldn’t prove it.

  Perhaps one day it will be possible. Maybe when Peter becomes a doctor . . .

  He winced at the thought of Peter. He had forgotten all about his son’s bloody nose. Well, some shepherd’s purse and a few kind words from his mother would have to do this time. It hadn’t been anything serious, after all. Unlike Sophia, who would need the help of her family for a long time to come. Nevertheless, Simon decided to pay his boys a little more attention—especially Peter, who had a hard time with his classmates. The trip to Munich would do everyone good.

  But before they left for Munich, Simon had to finish the job for which he had closed his doctor’s office early once again. It was the perfect opportunity, with Magdalena and the boys down at their grandfather’s. Finally, he’d found a quiet moment to finish the last few lines.

  Simon placed the clean phials back on the shelf and went over to their living room. The last light of the afternoon fell through the crown-glass panes, and he lit a pine chip so he could see better. On the shelf next to the family shrine lay a folder full of loose pages. Many of them were smudged, with lines crossed out and written over. On the first page, inscribed in thick letters, was the work’s Latin title. Simon nodded contentedly. At least the title stood, and he liked it, too, especially the ending.

  De Rebus Sanitariis et Sanitate Adnotationes Auctore Doctore Simon Fronwieser.

  For almost two years Simon had been working on his treatise on cleanliness and well-being. He had put down his observations over about fifty pages, and all that was missing was a poignant conclusion.

  That, and the recommendation of a famous doctor, because who would read a book written by a completely unknown physician from the middle of nowhere?

  When his father-in-law had first asked Simon to travel to Munich with him, Simon hadn’t been overly enthusiastic. It wasn’t that he’d miss out on work, as the trip to Munich would be at Candlemas, the feast during which servants received their annual pay and no one worked—which was also why Jakob Kuisl had been granted permission to leave by the city clerk. It was just that Simon could think of better things to do than sit in some drinking hole with a bunch of dirty hangmen and watch them down beer and swear. But then he’d had an idea.

  The recommendation of a famous doctor . . .

  He knew of such a doctor in Munich. If Simon could only convince him he was right, nothing stood in the way of his treatise being published. His work would get printed, with his very own name on the front page. The scholarly world would be scrambling to get their hands on a copy, even the erudite physicians in faraway Rome and Avignon. Not to mention his former professors at the University of Ingolstadt, which he’d had to leave when he ran out of money. Ha, he’d show them all . . .

  Loud knocking tore Simon from his daydreams, just when he was about to start writing.

  He tried to ignore it. Maybe the unwelcome visitor would go away again. Frowning, Simon tossed words back and forth in his mind, but the knocking grew louder and louder. Eventually he gave up. Annoyed, he put down his quill and walked to the door.

  “All right, for God’s sake,” he called out. “I’m coming!”

  When he opened the door and saw the patient, he knew right away that every second counted.

  Magdalena ran as if the devil were after her.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw her father following her to the pond. If she hadn’t been so worried about Barbara, she would have cursed and sworn at her father. The old man truly was as sensitive as a rock! He had probably told Barbara in just a few blunt words that she was to meet her future husband in Munich, whether she wanted to or not. Couldn’t he see how that would make Barbara feel? Especially since her sister had been more withdrawn than usual lately. Magdalena had tried speaking with her several times, but was always met with a wall of silence. She had a hunch what Barbara’s behavior might be about, and it was high time she got to the bottom of it.

  If it isn’t too late already, she thought.

  She headed east across the frozen fields and through a small wood until she reached the large pond not far from the old castle. It was much bigger than the pond by the executioner’s house, and the snow-covered surface was broken by brownish clusters of reeds, the dry leaves whispering in the breeze. Magdalena had hated this gloomy place even as a child. The Schongauers believed the small black lake was cursed, and no one liked to come here. It was called Katzenweiher—the cat pond—because it was often used to drown unwanted litters of kittens.

  And many women had suffered the same fate here.

  A chill ran down Magdalena’s spine as she looked out onto the frozen pond. While male felons were usually hanged, women—convicted child murderesses in particular—were drowned. The hangman would hold the bound and gagged women underwater with a wooden pitchfork, and sometimes they were put inside a sack as well. It was a slow, cruel death, because the bodies kept rising to the surface.

  In Schongau, Jakob Kuisl had ensured years ago that these brutal killings were abolished, but occasionally young women sought out this unfortunate place to take their own lives. Just a few weeks ago they had found the body of sixteen-year-old Anna Wiesmüller here. The girl had been a local farmer’s maid and had fallen pregnant. She had confided only in her sister. Then she had drowned herself in her despair, and the father was never found.

  Breathing heavily, Magdalena paused and ran her eyes along the opposite shore. In the fading light of the afternoon sun, Magdalena made out a person sitting on the small, rotten pier that had jutted out into the water for as long as anyone could remember.

  It was Barbara.

  Magdalena breathed a sigh of relief and made the sign of the cross. Her worst fears hadn’t come true. Then again, had she really believed her sister would take her own life? And perhaps Magdalena’s hunch was wrong, too—her sister could be incredibly hard to read. Only Georg, Barbara’s twin brother, seemed to understand her without words. But he’d been living in Bamberg with their uncle for almost six years now.

  Meanwhile, Jakob Kuisl had reached Katzenweiher Pond, too. He circled the small lake from the other direction, so that he and Magdalena reached the pier at almost the same time. But Magdalena had already heard her father’s thundering voice from right across the lake.

  “By Jesus Christ and all the saints, do you have any idea how worried we’ve been?” he ranted, his head bright red from the exertion. “God damn it! You have no business being up here by yourself, do you know that?”

  “So now I’m not allowed to go outside anymore?” Barbara snapped back. Her eyes were red from crying. She looked pale, and she shivered underneath her thin woolen coat. Magdalena noticed once more how beautiful her younger sis
ter was, with her raven curls and her full eyebrows. The two sisters looked much alike, though Barbara was a tad wilder and perhaps a little wicked, which was why the lads in town sometimes called her the devil’s wench.

  “Or have I done something wrong again?” Barbara continued, looking at her father. “Have I not swept the house properly, or fed the chickens, or milked the cow well enough? Is that it? Go on, tell me!”

  “Father was just worried, that’s all.” Magdalena tried to soothe her sister and placed her own coat around Barbara’s shoulders. She understood Barbara’s frustration well. Their grumpy old father wasn’t an easy man to live with, she knew from years of experience. It was high time for Barbara to find a husband before she really did something stupid.

  “How dare you talk to me like that?” Kuisl snarled at his younger daughter. “You won’t be doing so for much longer. As soon as—”

  “I’m not going to marry one of your stupid hangmen,” Barbara said. “Forget it!”

  “What would be so bad about it?” Kuisl shrugged. “They’re a decent lot, no cutthroats, knackers, or gravediggers. The Nuremberg hangman, Widmann, earns so much that he owns several town houses. And then there’s also a bunch of dashing apprentices.” He attempted an encouraging wink, but failed. “They’re strapping, handsome young lads. Ha, not skinny rakes like my dear son-in-law.”

  “All right, you’ve gone too far,” Magdalena interjected. “Simon is a doctor, after all, and—”

  She broke off when she saw the flicker in Barbara’s eyes. Why couldn’t she keep her mouth shut? How many times had Barbara lamented how lucky Magdalena was—a husband who had been appointed town physician, and three children—while she, the younger sister, had to keep their father’s house and put up with his tantrums.

  “I think you should leave us alone for a while,” Magdalena said to her father. “As you can see, Barbara is fine, and now we need some sister time.”

  Jakob Kuisl ran his fingers through his icy beard, then he nodded. “If you must. But don’t start thinking she can get out of the Munich trip. We’re finding her a husband, and that’s the end of it.”