The Relic Master

by Christopher Buckley

  “He will not live long,” Magda said.

  “How do you know this?” Dismas said.

  “You saw the way he was holding his chest? In the last stages, it attacks the heart. The pain is very great. There is something that helps. A distillation from a flower. We passed many of them, up there, in the Bauges. Fingerhut. You saw.”

  “Yes, I know this flower,” Dismas said.

  “Digitalis purpurea. In England they discovered it. They call it glove of the fox.”

  Dismas considered. “A duke who rules one-quarter of Italy, sure, his doctors would know of it. With such an entourage, he must have twenty doctors.”

  “Perhaps. Still, you saw how he held his chest.”

  Indeed, Dismas had.

  • • •

  The next morning before dawn, Magda led Cunrat and Nutker and Unks back up into the Bauges to scour the meadows for fingerhut. They returned toward sundown, looking like flower merchants, sacks filled to bursting, trailing purple petals in their wake, Unks muttering that such a girlish errand was beneath the dignity of any self-respecting Landsknecht.

  Dismas and Dürer spent the day in the city looking for quarters. They shed their habits, since monks looking to rent rooms would only arouse suspicion. It came as no surprise that all the landlords were asking usurious, inflated rents.

  “Pilgrimages always bring out the best in Christians,” Dismas observed.

  After lengthy searching, they found a usable space in a basement near the church of St. Anthony, not overly dank and only moderately infested with rats.

  27

  A Plan

  Dismas sat watching Magda grind fingerhut petals in a mortar and drop them into a bubbling cook pot.

  “It takes time,” Magda said. “The liquid must reduce, to have potency.”

  Dismas took her wooden spoon and stirred so she could concentrate on her pestling. On the table were vials and bottles and boxes Magda had taken from her saddlebags—the gifts from Paracelsus. She finished with the petals and held up one of the vials, uncorked it, and sniffed.

  “What’s that?”

  “He’s always traveling, bringing back treasures. Especially from the East. He’s a magus, like one of the three kings in the Bible. This truly is a gift.”

  Dismas took a sniff.

  “Cistus ladanifer,” Magda said. “He mixes it with twigs of rockrose. Also he puts in lavender.”

  “I think you are a witch.”

  “If a witch could stop pain as this can, there would be no more burnings. One day I watched Paracelsus remove the leg of a man. It had been crushed by a cart. The man was in great pain, crying out. Paracelsus put four drops in a cup of wine and gave it to the man. After drinking, he was quiet. Like he was asleep. Paracelsus took his saw and started. Not once did the man cry out. The only sound was the saw.” Magda winced. “I don’t like surgery. I prefer apothecary.”

  She held the vial over the cook pot and with her finger gently tapped out ten drops, counting silently as she did.

  “You must be careful with ladanum. Too much and it stops the lungs.”

  Dismas had been leaning over the pot. He jerked back his head, not wanting his lungs to stop.

  “What’s in that box there?” he said.

  “Papaver. Also from the East. They put it on embers and breathe the smoke.”

  “What does it do?”

  “Makes dreams.”

  “Why would Paracelsus give you this?”

  Magda smiled. “It brings sleep, with the dreams.”

  Dismas nodded. “Yes, that could be useful.”

  “Also . . .”

  “What?”

  “What you told me that night, when you tried to scare me to go away. About the execution.”

  “Yes?”

  “If it should come to that, it would be good to have this.”

  Dismas left her to her cooking and went to the other side of the room where the others were. What a chorus of moaning and gnashing of teeth.

  Dürer was complaining about the spiders. The Landsknechte were in a foul temper at being separated from their weapons. Dismas had ordered that the cart with the weapons be stabled outside the city gates. There was to be no killing. They’d come to Chambéry as translators, not assassins. He told them: if this is the burial cloth of Christ, and we commit murder to possess it—can you imagine who will greet us on the shores of the next world? Satan, with arms wide. Even if the Shroud is not real, and we arrive in the next life with innocent blood on our hands, do you suppose we will be greeted by angels?

  A fine speech, but pointless. Homilies on the subject of virtue and the afterlife were wasted on Landsknechte. The lads listened impassively, then spat on the ground and said, “And who are you—Moses, with Ten Commandments? What was that we did, back in the Black Forest? What was that, but killing—killing good and hot?”

  Dismas replied that surely even Landsknechte could distinguish between defending themselves from attack—for rescuing an innocent woman—and slitting throats in a chapel while trying to thieve the Shroud of Jesus. He threw up his hands.

  He left the basement and walked the streets of Chambéry to cool his kidneys. Later he returned carrying a flagon of expensive wine as a peace offering.

  Cunrat took from his satchel the soft leather pouch of boar scrotum that had been Lothar’s purse. He emptied the contents onto the table. Jewelry, coins, and baubles tinkled onto the rough surface of the table, glinting in the candlelight. Cunrat picked idly through the remains of his loot, like someone at supper, picking out the choice bits.

  Dismas spoke in a comradely tone.

  “Ah, so that’s how you scoundrels have been financing your nights of bliss.”

  Dismas reached and found a bauble. He held it to the candle. It was Lothar’s signet ring. Dismas recoiled at the memory of Cunrat hacking it from the dead count’s hand.

  “Is this all that remains of your spoils?”

  “Um,” Cunrat said. “But it paid for some fucking good fucking. Didn’t it, lads?”

  “Did you sell some in Basel?” Dismas asked nervously. “To purchase your cock tonic?”

  “Some in Basel. Some in Neuchâtel. Some in Fribourg. Lausanne. Geneva.”

  “It’s a good thing no one’s looking for us,” Dismas said. “What a trail you’d have left.”

  But there had been no sign of pursuit. In every town, Dismas had discreetly inquired. No one knew anything about a vanished German count in the far-off Black Forest.

  “Let’s hope your trollops were clean,” Dismas said. “So you don’t end up like the Duke of Urbino.” Dismas gave Cunrat a pat on his sternum.

  Dismas said to Dürer, “Never mind how to rule. Your Machiavelli should have written Lorenzo a treatise on how to avoid the pox.”

  Cunrat held up a flask and regarded it mournfully. He turned it upside down. Empty. He called out to Magda across the basement, “Little Sister. Can’t you cook us some?”

  “Cunrat,” Dismas scolded. “Don’t you suppose she has more important work?”

  “What could be more important than the rigidity of my cock?”

  Dismas put Lothar’s signet ring back on the table. “What else is left of your spoils? Wasn’t there a sword?”

  Cunrat said sulkily, “You said we couldn’t have our swords inside the city.”

  “Yes. But didn’t you take Lothar’s sword? The gift from his godfather, the new Emperor. Or did you sell that along with the rest?”

  “Of course not. That’s special. Not for pussy-money. “It’s in the cart. With our other weapons. Let’s just pray we are not attacked.” Cunrat held up the empty flask, smiling like a boy trying to wheedle sweets. “Little Sister. Please?”

  28

  Lothar Redux

  No,” Dürer said. “Absolutely, no.”

  “Nars—”

  “Are you deaf? No!”

  “Don’t you understand that—”

  “I understand very well. I understand this is
a lunatical proposal that will get me killed. I came with you—out of goodness of heart—to help you. Not to offer myself as a sacrificial lamb. Suicide is a mortal sin. So no. And don’t ask me again.”

  “Don’t you see the logic?”

  “Logic you call this? Don’t make me laugh.”

  “You’re a melancholic. I gave up trying to make you laugh ten years ago.”

  “Well, you are making me laugh now. Ha-ha-ha. And go to Hell. You impersonate a dead count.”

  “If you would cease these hysterics and listen for one moment, you would understand why it is you—not me—that has to play the part of Lothar. If it works—”

  “Ah! Did you hear?” Dürer appealed to the others. “Two sentences into his hortation and already he says, ‘If it works’!”

  “Nars. There is no reason that the Duke of Savoy would not clasp to his bosom the godson of the Holy Roman Emperor. Duke Charles despises and fears the King of France. The Holy Roman Emperor also despises the King of France. Nothing would make the Duke of Savoy happier than to be host to the Emperor’s godson. Why? Because the godson will go home and tell his godfather-emperor, What a wonderful fellow is the Duke of Savoy! Such a gracious host! I made a pilgrimage to Chambéry, to venerate the Shroud. Going as a simple pilgrim, of course I expected nothing from the Duke. But he learned I was there and treated me like his own son!”

  Dürer’s arms were tightly folded over his chest in a posture of defiance.

  “If you think it’s such a splendid idea, you play Lothar.”

  “Nars. Please to focus. It’s not me who needs to get close to the Shroud in order to make a copy. You are the artist, not me.”

  Magda spoke. “There is wisdom in what Dismas proposes, Master Dürer.”

  “Logic and now wisdom?” Dürer snorted. “I think you are all deluded.”

  “Ach, show some spine, man,” Cunrat said. “It’s a good plan.”

  Dürer looked up at the ceiling, as if appealing for divine intervention.

  “What if someone in the castle knows Lothar of Schramberg? Eh? What then?”

  “Unlikely,” Dismas said.

  “Unlikely?” Dürer snorted. “You are blithe, Dismas, to gamble my life on ‘unlikely.’ ”

  “Nars. I’ll be there with you, at your side. As your servant. It’s my life, too. Don’t play the solitary martyr with me.”

  “So we present ourselves at the castle? Knock on the door and say, ‘Hallo! I am Lothar! Let me in!’ ”

  “You wanted nice rooms, didn’t you? But to repeat one more time—no. We do not, as you put it with such great drama, bang on the door and demand rooms. You present yourself to the castle guard. Give them them a letter, and leave. The letter will be from yourself, that is, Count Lothar of Schramberg. The letter will say that you are here in Chambéry, that you have come as a pilgrim, with a few retainers. You ask nothing. The letter is simply a formal courtesy, from one noble to another. The letter will say some nice things about how lovely is Chambéry, how wonderful that the Duke is displaying the Shroud for everyone to venerate. La, la, la. You wish him all health and God’s blessing and bye-bye. That’s it. If he takes the bait, then we’re inside the castle. If not . . . then we must devise some other way to breach the ramparts of Chambéry. Perhaps a siege tower. But this would be easier.”

  Dürer fumed in silence, thinking of some way to avoid this unwanted role.

  “A depraved oaf like Lothar, tell me this—why would he make a pilgrimage? Even if no one in the castle knows him personally, what if someone has heard of his appalling reputation?”

  “Nars. Let me explain Christianity to you. Pilgrims make pilgrimages to atone. Do you think people walk hundreds of miles to grovel before relics because they feel wonderful about themselves? No. They do it because they think otherwise they will go to Hell. If someone says to you, ‘Hey, are you the naughty Count of Schramberg of whom we have heard so much?’ You give your breast a good mea culpa thump and say, ‘Yes, I am this same naughty count. What a sinner I was! Then one day I was hunting in the Black Forest with my fellows—also naughty fellows—and suddenly I heard a voice in the sky. I looked up and—there was Jesus. He said to me, Lothar, Lothar, why are you so naughty? Like what he said to Saint Paul when he was on his way to Damascus to torment Christians. I fell down on the ground and rolled around. It was then that I decided I must make a pilgrimage and walk all the way to fucking’—don’t say ‘fucking’—‘Chambéry to worship at the Shroud and cleanse my filthy soul.’ ”

  “No.”

  “Nars. I entreat. The Duke of Savoy craves the protection of the Holy Roman Emperor—your own godfather. The Duke is called Charles the Good. He is not going to eat you!”

  “I’ll consider it. That’s all. I make no promises.”

  Dismas looked at his recalcitrant friend. Time to play his last card.

  “There is another reason why you, Nars, are the only one among us who could do this.”

  “What?”

  “Your sophistication. You are cosmopolitan. You’ve spent time at court.”

  “So have you,” Dürer shot back.

  “Yes, but in Germany. Mainz and Wittenberg are . . . I don’t want to say second best, but how can they compare to the splendor of the courts you have seen, in Italy and other parts? You have met the Pope! You know Raphael and the other masters. Titian! This makes you a natural aristocrat yourself. You are on equal footing with dukes, kings, emperors. Me? As you say—often—I am only a Swiss peasant.”

  “I said I would consider it. For now, enough.”

  Dismas left Dürer to his ruminations and went out to take some air to clear his head. He returned to the basement an hour later. Only Dürer and Magda were present, the lads having gone out to whore.

  Dürer snarled at Dismas, “Sure, you’re a bastard.” Dürer turned and huffed out of the basement.

  Dismas went over to Magda’s apothecary laboratory and sat.

  “He’s in a state,” Dismas said.

  Magda stirred her pot. “After you left, the lads had a little talk with him. I didn’t hear everything. But enough.”

  “Ah?”

  Magda smiled. “Inspiration takes many forms.”

  “I didn’t tell them to threaten Nars. Inspiration shouldn’t come at the point of a dagger.”

  “There was no dagger.”

  “Sweet reason, was it?”

  “There was mention of a hammer. And fingers. And the effect of the first upon the second, with reference to the career of painting.”

  Dismas groaned. “He won’t believe me when I tell him this was not my doing.”

  “I’ll talk to him. He’ll listen to me.”

  “He can be very stubborn. His people came from Bohemia.”

  “Why do you smile?”

  “I should like to have seen his face.”

  29

  Rostang

  They sat, the six of them, under the plane trees in the public gardens, doing their best to look like pilgrims.

  Dürer stood apart, facing away, leaning against one of the trees, striking a pose that Magda said reminded her of the depictions of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. Dismas said he had little doubt Nars was praying, Lord, let this cup pass from me.

  Nars’s expression was equal parts gloom, contempt, and fury. But these, Dismas thought, combined into a simulacrum of nobility. He looked quite plausible in his white pilgrim robe. The others were happy no longer to be wearing their scratchy monk habits. The white cotton pilgrim robes were greatly preferable to monk wool. Only Magda remained religiously garbed, as a nun.

  Dismas rose and went over to Dürer and said, “If you want to hate me, fine. But if they come, for God’s sake, play the part or we will all die.”

  Some hours earlier, Dürer had presented himself to the stony-faced guards at the castle gate to deliver his letter to the Duke of Savoy. As Dismas had instructed, he engaged the head guard in banter so that he would remember Dürer’s face.


  “They have to be able to find us,” Dismas pointed out as a practical matter. Also per Dismas’s instruction, Dürer had mentioned to the guard how pleasant he and his companions found the public gardens, where they were camped.

  “How long must we wait like this?” Dürer grumbled. “It’s been hours. It’s obvious they’re not coming. Let’s go.”

  “Patience, your worship,” Dismas said.

  “If they were going to come, they’d have come by now. I say enough of this charade.”

  “What’s the hurry? It’s nicer here than in the basement, with your spiders.”

  “One more hour. One. Then to hell with this scheme of yours.”

  Dismas kept his eyes on the Porte Recluse.

  Presently, he saw an older man with an air of authority emerge from the Porte, followed by a castle guard. They walked toward the public garden.

  “Look alive, everyone,” Dismas said. “And remember who you are. My lord? My lord Lothar?”

  Dürer was still leaning against the tree, facing away. “What?”

  “Why don’t you turn around so they can see you.”

  Dürer turned and saw the guard approaching.

  He said plaintively, “Dis!”

  “Steady,” Dismas said soothingly. “You make an excellent count. You’ve always been a terrible snob. Now finally you can greet yourself as an equal.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Shh.”

  The guard was pointing at Dürer.

  “All right,” Dismas said, “here we go. Stations, everyone.”

  The older fellow approached and spoke to Dürer.

  “Permit me, but are you by chance the Count Lothar of Schramberg?”

  Dürer blenched, cleared his throat. “I? Er . . . well . . . er . . .”

  The man bowed. “My lord.”

  “Er?”

  “Permit me. I am Rostang, chamberlain to his most royal highness Charles, Duke of Savoy. Mm!”

  “Ah? Well . . . Hello.”

  Dismas mentally kicked Dürer in the shin. Whence this stage fright? Dürer regarded most monarchs as beneath him. Now he was tongue-tied speaking to a chamberlain. Pull yourself together, man!