The Witch of Cologne

by Tobsha Learner

‘Really, Detlef, I am disappointed in you. Heinrich should keep you better informed; after all, you are his heir apparent. Or has the affable Wilhelm Egon von Fürstenberg now inherited that dubious honour?’

  Detlef, noticing the gleam of cynicism in the count’s eyes, wonders whether his brother has ever had any real affection for him at all. Or does he regard him merely as an irritating pawn in the endless game of chess he is forced to play between church and state, bishop and prince, in order to maintain his power in the patchwork of different allegiances between which the von Tennen family estate lies?

  ‘Not yet. But pray, illuminate me, why the arrest of the Hebrew woman? Surely she is utterly unknown in Vienna?’

  ‘Naturally. I believe she is a personal obsession of the Dominican, however the oily Spaniard is in bed with both Leopold and the Grand Inquisitional Council. ‘Tis a pity—I hear she is a talented medic as well as a midwife.’

  ‘So they say.’

  The young Prince Ferdinand, his face smeared with carmine kisses from the actor Alphonso, leans drunkenly towards the count.

  ‘A good medic? That’s exactly what I need.’

  ‘The best in the region.’

  ‘So why haven’t I heard of her?’

  ‘Perhaps because she is a Jew,’ the count replies smoothly.

  Alphonso, removing his tongue from the prince’s ear, enters the conversation with a cheeky audacity. ‘In that case she must be the best.’

  Intrigued the prince stops running his hands through the actor’s long hair. ‘So where can I find her?’

  ‘Sire, the said medic is currently incarcerated in the cathedral dungeon under the loving care of Monsignor Carlos Vicente Solitario. I believe the unfortunate woman is accused of sorcery.’

  ‘Solitario is a sanctimonious oaf who would happily trade lives for promotion. But he has caught my uncle’s ear at a particularly pious time. We are all victims of the emperor’s sudden virtuousness.’

  The prince petulantly knocks a bone off the table. One of the hunting dogs lurking beneath lurches up and grabs it.

  ‘The diocese of Cologne is always happy to accommodate the wishes of the Grand Inquisition,’ Detlef replies diplomatically, sensing a trap.

  ‘Naturally, Canon, everyone accommodates the Inquisition. Come, my lovely Europa, we shall lead the next quadrille.’

  Ferdinand escorts Alphonso across the marble floor, the actor’s Grecian robe trailing behind them. The dancers part and wait for the royal cue as the two young men take their places centre stage. The goddess’s glistening golden eyelids and scarlet mouth are infused with a raw dignity. The prince, for once looking regal, lifts Europa’s hand high and they wait, poised, before the musicians begin.

  There is an air of vulnerability about them. It is because of their youth, Detlef finds himself thinking, as if instead of prince and actor they are simply two youths in love at the brink of their lives.

  The violinist sounds his first notes, Europa flicks her fan shut and the dance begins.

  Dear Benedict,

  I write to you in darkness. I am confined in the bowels of the prison of Cologne, a guest of the Inquisition awaiting a reception of horror. They have charged me with witchcraft and heresy. Is it heresy to believe but not in the accepted creeds? Is it sorcery to use one man’s herbs and another’s faith? If so, I am guilty of both.

  Here it is perpetual night. Here there is but a wisp of candlelight which flickers precariously beyond the bars of my gaol. I have stared at it for so long now it has become the sun, God and the embodiment of all my hope. I know from the sliver of light it throws across the wall that there is much damp in here and, amid the filthy sawdust, God’s own rodents. They smile at me with long yellow teeth. Strange, but I have no fear of these creatures. There is one in particular, a motley mangy beast, who appears more decrepit than the rest. He is the Solomon of the rat kingdom and will partake of me for hours. In my madness I wonder if he is not the spirit of an ancient ancestor returned. It is such meanderings that have kept me sane. There is no light for me to mark time so I have slipped into a delirium of eternity. The only fellow human I have seen is one prison guard who brings me a thin gruel to eat and who takes out the slops. I have tried to converse with him but the creature appears to be a mute with limited intelligence.

  To further my humiliation they have stripped me not only of my freedom but also of my clothes. I cover my nakedness with a hessian sack; I am reduced to the bare bones of my soul. Despair lurks at every twist of the mind, longing to drag me down into an abyss. My anger saves me. Perhaps it shall be my redemption. It keeps me warm and quietens my starving belly. They shall not see me broken. My physical body shall surrender the spirit before the will. But oh, how I long to hear a friend’s voice, anything to remind me that I am not so completely alone…

  A shifting light which appears behind her shut lids causes her to break concentration. She clears her mind of the letter she is composing and contemplates whether she should open her eyes and let harsh reality annihilate her imagined liberation. Before she has a chance to decide, the reddish glow grows stronger. It is a dancing pinpoint that beckons her seductively: open up, open up…

  Tentatively she lifts her eyelids and immediately senses that she is in the presence of the unknown.

  Oh terror, where are you? she wonders, amazed at the tremendous tranquillity which has placed all of her six senses into suspension, for before her sits a ghost.

  He is a tall youth with jet-black hair and black eyes ringed by circles of exhaustion in a narrow face. He sits on the edge of the straw pallet gazing morosely into space. His feet are manacled by heavy chains and his arms and wrists bear the mark of torture. Like her, he is a prisoner in the gaol, but unlike her he has no sense of another’s presence.

  ‘Aaron?’ she whispers but is not surprised when he does not turn, merely exhales deeply, a sigh of complete resignation. He shifts slightly in his chains; to Ruth’s astonishment there is no rattle. It is as if the only sounds she can hear are those which emanate from the ghost himself.

  ‘Have they not executed you yet?’ she whispers again, her heart leaping with painful love. ‘Aaron?’

  She waits, half-elated half-petrified that the wraith might vanish at the sound of his own name. But absorbed in his own domain he shows no sign of being aware of her existence.

  ‘Ruth, forgive me,’ he whispers to himself and buries his face in his hands. The fragility of his thin adolescent wrists, the desperation in the narrow shoulders, the lock of unruly black hair falling across his bruised knuckles, release a wave of recognition deep within her. It is as if the memory of him is buried within her very tissue and now this simple gesture has unlocked it, and with it a deluge of grief.

  She moves towards him, to touch, to hold, to shelter that unassailable soul.

  The rattle of keys breaks the moment. Ruth turns to the sound then swings back. Aaron’s ghost has vanished.

  Again the jangle of metal startles her. It is the loudest thing she has heard in four days. She cowers against the straw as a shaft of bright light travels across the floor, highlighting the piles of filth, old rags and dank sawdust. It settles on Ruth, who is entirely blinded as she squints to see who waits beyond.

  ‘Midwife, to your feet!’

  The voice emerges from the darkness, authoritarian. Ruth, her ankles swollen, her feet bruised and oozing pus, struggles to stand.

  A guard steps forward and thrusts a burning torch into the iron holder. The whole cell is illuminated and now she can see that the walls are covered with graffiti carved into the stone. There is a multitude of tongues: Latin, German, Dutch, Arabic, Spanish and even some Hebrew.

  January 10th 1636. May God speed my demise and Angel wings carry me up to the skies…

  I die for Philip, King of Spain, long shall he reign…

  To all who have borne witness, I have been true to my word…

  And finally, in a hand she instantly recognises:

  Ruth, forgive you
r Aaron.

  Suddenly, it is as if her life is already over. As if she is already a sentence hewn into the limestone. The room fills with the whispers of the prosecuted, the forgotten, the executed. Dizzy, she swoons. She lies in the filth, her eyes wide, drinking in the light she has been deprived of for so long. All sensation rushes from her, emptying her completely. She wants to remain here in this great inner silence where it feels safe, in this place of no-being where she is conscious of nothing except the beating of her own blood in her ears.

  ‘I said get up, witch!’

  Her fears come tumbling back, inundating her whole being with an appalling cataclysm of dread. Terrified, she pisses herself as she staggers upright.

  ‘Do you know who I am?’

  Only vaguely aware of the hot fluid coursing down her thighs she shakes her head dumbly.

  Disgusted, Carlos Vicente Solitario, dressed in the dark robe of interrogator, stands over her. Mud streaks the young woman’s bare shoulders, her hair is matted and she stinks of her own filth, but still he stands close, breathing in her stench. He regards the proximity as a perverse martyrdom: it is his holy duty to deal with the corrupt, the evil, the unclean. A sense of purity washes through him. He is on a crusade, a just quest which raises him above his fellow humans. Setting his jaw the friar glistens with self-righteousness.

  Ruth stares at him. Even with her memory dimmed by pain she recognises the dark eyes.

  Detlef, standing behind Solitario, looks down at the ground ashamed. The midwife, out of her mind with fear, has let the hessian sack slip and stands rawly naked, oblivious. The canon steps forward and pulls the cloth gently over her shoulders. He cannot help but hold his breath as he does so.

  ‘Note how little time it took for the sorceress’s true nature to reveal itself. Look at her: she is now more animal than woman. This is why it is so important to enforce the limpieza de sangre.’ The inquisitor addresses Detlef and the guard as if giving a sermon on the methods of exposing the damned.

  No doubt he has performed such lectures with more appreciative audiences, Detlef observes, revolted by the obvious intoxication the Dominican displays, his eyes shiny, his scar an ugly throbbing crimson, his mouth wet with saliva.

  ‘For God’s sake, she is witless with fear.’

  ‘Such a creature knows no terror.’

  ‘Such a creature is as human as the rest of us.’

  ‘That is for the Inquisition to decide.’

  They are interrupted by Ruth’s voice, cracked and hoarse. ‘I know you for your cruelty. You are my nemesis, the persecutor of my race.’

  ‘I am the persecutor only of those who worship Lucifer, who manipulate simple souls with their sorcery. If you are not one of these, you have nothing to dread.’

  ‘You know I am not. You have no evidence other than superstition and fear, the fodder upon which the fat cows of the Inquisition thrive.’

  Carlos nods and the guard steps forward, delivering a blow to Ruth’s head which sends her reeling.

  Detlef steps forward. ‘Enough! At least keep her alive to stand trial. There are many in this city who have benefited at her hands.’

  ‘Are you one of them, Canon von Tennen?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous. I have never met the woman before.’

  The younger cleric looks vaguely familiar to Ruth. There is an intelligence in his face that makes her instinctively trust him. She turns, blood streaming from her nose. ‘Please, Canon, tell me: what is the evidence?’

  But the inquisitor steps between them. ‘You will address me and only me during all interrogations, Señorita Navarro.’

  ‘My name is Ruth bas Elazar Saul.’

  ‘Your status as Jew is not recognised by the Inquisition, therefore I will call you only by your mother’s family name. Do you understand?’

  At the inquisitor’s signal the guard lifts his fist to Ruth again. Flinching, she nods.

  ‘In that case, by what title, sir, do I address you?’

  ‘Monsignor Carlos Vicente Solitario.’

  The guard pushes her down onto a stool. Displaying no emotion he folds out a small wooden table and places a flask of wine and some freshly baked bread upon it. Ruth can smell the loaf so vividly she can practically taste it. She reaches out only to have her hand knocked away.

  ‘If I allow you to eat, you will answer, understand?’

  She nods then begins to stuff the dough into her mouth in handfuls. In a second she is almost choking.

  Detlef pours a goblet of wine and holds it out. Tears streaming from her eyes, the midwife gulps the liquid down. Struck by the exquisiteness of her hands, the fingers a chiselled filigree of muscle beneath the grime, Detlef realises that the bedraggled creature could possibly have some beauty.

  The inquisitor’s cold voice interrupts.

  ‘We have testimony from two women that you used kabbalistic amulets to assist in the birthings of their children. One child has not spoken since his delivery some two years ago; the other was stillborn, his soul stolen away by the devil himself, a barter you were no doubt responsible for.’

  ‘Frau Schmidt,’ she whispers, remembering the agony of presenting the dead child to his mother, his skin blue and mottled.

  ‘So you confess to the charge?’

  ‘No, I do not. The child had already perished in the womb. Sometimes even God takes without reason.’

  ‘Frau Schmidt claims you hung Hebrew symbols over the bed and used devilish instruments upon her body.’

  ‘The instruments are from Amsterdam, they are birthing tools designed by the eminent surgeon Doctor Deyman.’

  ‘And what qualifications do you, a woman, have that give you the right to use such tools?’

  ‘Those of experience and education.’

  ‘I am not aware that a woman—particularly a Jewess—is allowed to attend any university in the whole of Christendom.’

  The wine has fortified her, it gives her a momentary bravado.

  ‘I did attend, as an assistant and…not entirely myself.’

  ‘What exactly are you implying: that you transformed yourself?’

  Ruth hesitates. Honesty would be as condemning as a lie, but her father has indoctrinated her with utmost respect for the truth, no matter how uncomfortable. A halber emes iz amol a gantser ligen; a half-truth is a whole lie. It is her father’s favourite proverb. Ruth takes a long shuddering breath and gathers up her courage.

  ‘I was assistant to a student there. My name was Felix van Jos.’

  ‘You used magic to transmute your womanly shape to that of a man. Take notice, Canon von Tennen, this is another blasphemy.’

  ‘I did not! I merely donned the garments of a youth.’

  ‘You expect me to believe that for a number of years you lived as a man, Señorita Navarro?’

  The inquisitor reaches over and tears down the coarse sackcloth to reveal her breasts. The guard begins to laugh.

  ‘God has blessed you with the shape of a woman. There is no way to disguise this curse other than resorting to witchcraft.’

  With trembling hands Ruth covers herself up, her face rigid in an attempt to remain dignified. Her gravity transforms the laughter into an embarrassed silence.

  ‘I have learnt that perception is very much in the eye of the beholder, Monsignor Solitario. A man will see what he desires. You see a witch where others simply see a very good midwife.’

  At another signal the guard whacks her across the face. Ruth barely feels the blow. She has retreated deeper into herself while yet keeping her mind coherent, a scheme of survival she has perfected over the years.

  The distance in her eyes infuriates Carlos; he recognises the detachment as a trait of her mother’s. Passion burns at his vitals and he is infused with the desire to finally break the will of the Navarro women.

  ‘I assume this is a philosophy of the heretic of whom you were a disciple, the Jew, Benedict Spinoza, a man who has been excommunicated by his own people.’

  ‘I am one
of his followers, this I cannot deny.’

  ‘This man is evil personified, he does not believe in sin. He does not believe in the notion of Heaven and Hell nor even that a man has a soul. He is godless, señorita, like yourself.’

  ‘Liar! I am not godless, and neither is Spinoza. He believes that to understand the knowledge of nature is to know the works of God. And to know the works of God within the creation is to understand God himself, for God dwells in every visible work! Even you, Monsignor.’

  ‘I know what I am.’

  But Detlef notices that the inquisitor hesitates as if, like the canon, he is surprised by the young woman’s flawless high German and her urbane articulation of these revolutionary ideas. Concepts Detlef himself has secretly studied in the illegal imported pamphlets Maximilian Heinrich confiscates regularly, heretical treatises by the English Quakers, the Dutch Mennonites, the Tremblers and the Seekers. All pouring across the border from Amsterdam like light radiating out from a submerged city below a dark horizon. The ecstasy he has experienced on reading these writings is tantamount to eroticism. The notions of pantheism, of the marriage of scientia nova with religion, the idea that man may shape his destiny through rational conduct, deeply excite the young canon. For the first time in his life he has found himself doubting the indisputable right of the aristocrat—a hierarchy he was born into and has profited by. On occasion he has even feared for his soul.

  And now here before him is a creature—a woman, no less—who has studied and had discourse with those revolutionaries of the Enlightenment who challenge not only a faith but a whole world view. What is she—witch or philosopher?

  The inquisitor, refusing to be distracted, holds up a birthing tool. The instrument, a strange curved spoon designed to force open the cervix, glints demonically in the candlelight.

  ‘The human body and all that lies within it is one of the great sacred mysteries,’ he says. ‘It is a sin to defile and carve up the embodiment of God.’

  ‘I am not an anatomist, Monsignor, nor do I pretend to be, but like my master Spinoza I believe that knowledge is a knowledge of the Divine, for are our minds and our natural curiosity not a manifestation of God also?’