Death and the Devil: A Novel

by Frank Schätzing

  “A redheaded bastard. Tell us if you see him. We’ll be keeping up our patrol around here for a while yet.”

  “All that for just one guilder?”

  “Herr Overstolz doesn’t like being robbed.”

  “No, and he doesn’t like us shooting our mouths off either,” said the other, adding to the carter, “Off you go now.”

  Muttering something incomprehensible, the carter climbed back into his seat.

  “Matthias will be furious,” said one of the pursuers softly.

  “Not to mention his odd friend,” replied the other.

  “The long-haired Dominican?”

  “Mmm.”

  The cart started with a shudder, almost throwing Jacob off the shaft. He just managed to stop himself from falling. He heard something splatter onto the muddy ground, then another. Contorting his neck, he managed to look down.

  Octopuses!

  They were dropping off his habit. Christ Almighty, they must have stowed away when he landed on the fish stall. Now he was done for.

  But this time fate was kind to him. No one shouted, “Hey, you! Stop!” No one looked under the cart, a glint of triumph in their eyes. The voices grew fainter. They were going away.

  Jacob clung on as tightly as his throbbing fingers would allow. Better stay with the cart for a while before jumping off. It rumbled slowly along Pfaffenstraße, then turned into Minoritenstraße. Jacob was bumped and jolted until he felt none of his bones were left in their original place. Steeling himself against the pain, he put up with it all along Breite Straße with its stones and potholes, stops and starts, until they were opposite the Church of the Holy Apostles. There he decided to jump off.

  He tried to pull his fingers out of the gaps between the planks.

  He couldn’t.

  He tried again. Still no luck. He was stuck. That’s impossible, he thought, I must be dreaming.

  He gave a sharp tug to try to free his hands. The only result was a suppressed yelp of pain. He was stuck.

  “Stop.”

  Once more, swaying and creaking, the cart stopped. Jacob watched the iron-studded boots and leg-armor of soldiers go around the cart, heard the canvas being thrown back once more. They must have reached the city gate.

  The soldiers muttered to each other. Jacob held his breath. Another pair of legs appeared in his field of vision. The shoes below the richly embroidered robe were decorated with buckles at the side. They were in the form of lilies and glistened purple in the sunlight.

  After what seemed an eternity, the canvas cover was replaced.

  “Nothing, Your Excellency.”

  “Just barrels.”

  A rumble of acquiescence came from the owner of the purple buckles. The soldiers stepped back and the carter barked his “Gee-up.” Totally bewildered, Jacob lay back on the shaft as the cart rattled through the Frisian Gate, taking him out of Cologne and into the unknown.

  RICHMODIS

  At the same time on the Brook Goddert was grumbling to Richmodis. “Huh, and that Jacob of yours will be lying in Little St. Martin’s bathhouse indulging in God knows what dissipation.” His gnarled fingers were having difficulty tying a knot.

  “You just get on with your parcels,” Richmodis snapped.

  They had left at the same time as Jaspar and Jacob to return to their house on the Brook. It was high time they got back to their dyeing. Goddert seemed a different person. He no longer complained about being unable to work because of his arthritis, but set to as in the old days, though with a somewhat morose doggedness. Richmodis knew why. He felt useless and stupid. His hands were deformed, his brain hopelessly condemned to defeat by Jaspar’s razor-sharp mind. She was all he had. But Richmodis needed him less and less, while he needed her more and more. There was no one left to look up to him.

  They made up parcels of the blue cloth in silence. Goddert had decided to deliver them himself. He’d have to go around half the city, which meant he’d be late getting back, but he had obstinately refused all help. “You shut up,” he muttered. “If people knew how my daughter treats me.”

  “No worse than the way you treat me.” She let the parcel she was doing sink to her lap and brushed the sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes. “Look, Father—”

  “Other children treat their parents with respect.”

  “I respect you.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  She went over to him and wrapped her arms around his tub of a body. “I respect you for every pound you weigh.” She laughed. “Can you imagine how much that adds up to?”

  Goddert stiffened and turned his head away.

  “Father,” said Richmodis, sighing.

  “All right.”

  “I don’t know what’s the matter with you. I like this Jacob, and that’s all. What’s wrong with that?”

  Goddert scratched his beard. At last he turned and looked her in the eye. “Nothing. There are other lads I would have chosen for you, but—”

  “Well?”

  “Why can’t our family be like any other? The father chooses the husband, that’s the way things are.”

  “For goodness sake!” Richmodis looked up to heaven. “What makes you think I see anything in that stray fox other than a creature who’s been done an injustice? I feel sorry for him. Did I ever say I felt anything more?”

  “Hmmm.”

  “Anyway,” she said, giving his beard a good tug with both hands, “I do what I want.”

  “Yes, that’s what you keep on saying,” Goddert exclaimed. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

  “So? Where’s the problem?”

  “The problem is, you can’t fool me.”

  “You like him, too.”

  “Yes, certainly—”

  “And you married my mother against your father’s wishes.”

  “I did what?” Goddert was taken by surprise.

  Richmodis shrugged her shoulders. “At least you’re always bragging about not bowing and scraping to anyone and always getting your own way.”

  “But that’s not the same thing,” he growled, without being able entirely to repress a grin.

  “Oh, yes, it is.”

  “You’re a girl.”

  “Thanks for reminding me. I’d almost forgotten.”

  “Little minx.”

  “Pigheaded old jackass.”

  Goddert gasped and wagged his finger at her. “I’ll teach you manners this evening.”

  “I can hardly wait.”

  “Bah!”

  She thumbed her nose at Goddert, then helped him finish tying up his parcels. “You’ll be back by dinnertime, won’t you?”

  “Hard to say. There’s quite a pile of stuff.”

  “Look, Father, please. If it’s too heavy, leave it. You’re not as young as you were.”

  “It won’t be too heavy.”

  “You don’t have anything to prove. Least of all to me.”

  “But it won’t be too heavy for me.”

  “Fine.” She shook her head and gave him a kiss. “Off we go, then.”

  “What do you mean ‘we’?”

  “I’m popping over to Jaspar’s. They might be back already. Anyway, I thought the old toper might like a bit of fruit.” She took a basket and filled it with pears. They left together. Goddert, small, bent under the weight of his burden, waddled off in the direction of Mauritiussteinweg. Richmodis watched him go, wondering how to get across to him that she preferred him as an arthritic lazybones.

  She’d have to have a word with Jaspar about it.

  Eventually she set off, strolling to Severinstraße with her basket on her arm. She was still a long way off when she saw the handcart leaned up against the wall of Jaspar’s house. Rolof had obviously been doing some work. Who would he have been cursing today?

  She knocked and went in.

  Rolof was on the bench by the fireside. His greedy eyes immediately fell on the pears. “For me?” he asked, smiling all over his face.

  “No
t for you, greedy guts, I—”

  She halted and looked at the man at the other end of the bench, who stood up when she came in. He was unusually tall, and a torrent of silky blond hair fell down over his black monk’s habit to his waist. His forehead was high, his nose straight and slender, and his teeth, when he smiled, perfectly regular. His eyes, under brows the width of a man’s finger, glowed amber flecked with gold.

  Behind them was something else. An abyss.

  She looked at him and knew who he was.

  Jacob’s description had been sketchy, but there was no possible doubt. For a moment she wondered whether it would be a good idea to run away. The Dominican, or rather, the man pretending to be a Dominican, came toward her. Involuntarily she took a step back. He stopped.

  “Forgive me if I was too entranced by your beauty.” His voice was soft and cultured. “Would you do me the pleasure of telling me your name?”

  Richmodis bit her lip.

  “That’s Richmodis.” Rolof grinned. “Didn’t I say she was sweet?”

  “Truly, my son, you did.” He kept his eyes fixed on her. “Richmodis, an enchanting name, though the songs of the troubadours would better express such comeliness than any name. Are you a—relative of my old friend Jaspar?”

  “Yes,” she said, putting her basket down on the table. A thousand thoughts flashed through her mind at once. Perhaps the best thing would be to behave naturally. “And no,” she added quickly. “More a kind of friend, if you like”—she paused—“reverend Father.”

  “Nonsense.” Rolof laughed, snatching a pear before she could stop him. “She’s his niece, yes? Cheeky young hussy, but nice.”

  “Rolof! Who asked your opinion?”

  Rolof, who was already biting into the pear, froze, a puzzled look on his face. “Sorry, sorry,” he muttered with a timid glance at the stranger. But the stranger’s eyes were for Richmodis alone, and an odd change came over them, as if a plan were forming behind them.

  “His niece,” he said.

  “Uh-huh.” She threw her head back, shaking her locks. With pounding heart, but her chin raised defiantly, now she went up to him, scrutinizing him. “Reverend Brother or not,” she said pointedly, “I still think it is impolite not to tell me your name, when I have revealed mine. Is it not good manners to introduce yourself when you enter a strange house?”

  The man’s eyebrows shot up in amusement. “Quite right. I must apologize.”

  “Your name, then,” she demanded.

  The blow to her face came so quickly she was speechless with astonishment. The next lifted her off her feet. Arms wide, she flew over a stool, crashed into the wall, and sank to the ground.

  Rolof bellowed. Through a haze, Richmodis saw him throw the pear away and fling himself on her attacker.

  Then everything went black.

  THE RHINE WHARF

  The cranes groaned under the weight, and in the tread wheels operating the cranes, the laborers groaned. It was the sixth ship to be unloaded that day. The goods consisted entirely of bales of cloth from Holland, heavy as lead.

  Leaning against a stack of crates, Matthias checked the list of wares that had arrived, ticking off those he intended to purchase. The right of staple, he thought to himself with satisfaction, was rapidly becoming one of the pillars of the Cologne economy. It had been granted a little over a year ago, and now no merchant, whether from Hungary, Poland, Bohemia, Bavaria in the east, Flanders or Brabant in the north, or from the Upper Rhine, could take his goods through Cologne without first offering them for sale in the market for three days. The privilege also applied to goods that arrived by land.

  To Matthias’s mind it was a privilege for which the city had had to wait far too long. They had been pursuing it, like the Devil a lost soul, for over a hundred years. Since the channel of the Middle Rhine, which started at Cologne, was relatively shallow, merchants taking their goods upstream had no option but to transfer them to smaller ships there. Was it not then logical to take the opportunity to offer them for sale? Far be it from the citizens to assume this natural feature gave them any rights. After all, it would be tantamount to blasphemy to think that God had made the channel shallower just to divert a stream of gold into the pockets of the merchants.

  But then the Church, of all institutions, had promoted the worldly interests of the merchants and patricians. It was Conrad von Hochstaden, always mindful of the needs of his flock, to whom the city owed the privilege! A neat stroke that appealed not to their hearts, but to their purses. The good thing about the right of staple was that during those three days only Cologne merchants had the right to buy. What was more, they could inspect the goods and, if they were found unsatisfactory, tip them into the Rhine. The result was that only the freshest fish and best wines were served in Cologne and the most desirable wares never reached the southern German territories.

  There was just one thing about it that stuck in Matthias’s throat. The feeling of being under an obligation to Conrad. It was a paradoxical situation that could only be dealt with by cold reason, cutting out the emotions. His ice-cold reason was one of the few things Matthias thanked the Creator for. At least now and then, when he had time.

  His index finger slid smoothly down the list, stopping at one item, a consignment of brocade. “Inspect and buy,” he said.

  His chief clerk beside him gave a respectful nod and hurried over to where the ships’ owners were shouting instructions to the stevedores and waiting to start negotiations. Matthias added up a few figures in his head and decided it was a good day. Good enough to consider the purchase of a few barrels of fine wine newly arrived from Spain.

  “Matthias!”

  He stared out at the river, feeling his good mood evaporate. “What do you want?” he asked coldly.

  Kuno Kone came up from behind, slowly walked around, and planted himself in front of him. “I would like a word with you, if you would be so kind.”

  Matthias hesitated, one eye still on the barrels of wine. Then he lost interest in them and shrugged his shoulders. “I can’t think what there is to talk about,” he said irritably.

  “I can. You have excluded me from your discussions.”

  “That was Johann, not me.”

  “Yes, you, too,” Kuno insisted. “You agree with Johann that I might betray our plan. What an unworthy suspicion!”

  “Unworthy? Oh, we’re unworthy now, are we?” The corners of Matthias’s mouth turned down in scorn. “You won’t get anywhere with me with hackneyed phrases like that. What would have been your reaction if I’d knocked, say, Johann or Theoderich down?”

  “I—I would have taken a less heavy-handed approach.”

  “Aha, less heavy-handed!” Matthias gave a harsh laugh. “You’re a sentimental clod, Kuno. I’m not suggesting you’re going to betray us, but your brain is softened by emotion, and that’s even worse. With the best of intentions you can produce the worst of results. That’s why you’ve been excluded. There’s no more to say.”

  “There is!” Kuno shook his head vigorously. “I’m willing to ignore the hurt and the insults, but have you forgotten it’s my brothers who are living in exile, banished and outlawed?”

  “Of course not.”

  “They were magistrates too, just like—Daniel.” He had great difficulty pronouncing the name. “Bruno and Hermann would die for our alliance, they—”

  “No one is going to die for an alliance whose sole function is to represent his interests.”

  “But they believe in the alliance, and they believe in me. Who’s going to keep them informed, if not me?”

  “You should have thought of that before.”

  “It’s never too late for remorse, Matthias.”

  Matthias, still staring at the river, slowly shook his head. “Too late for you,” he said.

  “Matthias! Trust me. Please. I have to know how things stand. What about the redhead? Has Urquhart—”

  “Leave me in peace.”

  “And what shall I tel
l my brothers?”

  Matthias stared at him from beneath furrowed brows. “As far as I’m concerned, you can tell them they have a weakling for a brother who lacks self-control. They can always complain to me, once they’re allowed back in Cologne. For the time being—”

  He broke off. One of the servants he had assigned to Urquhart was coming into the customs yard.

  “Matthias, I beg you—” Kuno pleaded.

  Matthias silenced him with a gesture, tensely waiting for the messenger. The man was completely out of breath. Without a word, he took a parchment roll tied with a leather thong out of his doublet and handed it to Matthias.

  “What’s this?”

  “Your friend, the Dominican with the fair hair,” the servant panted.

  “Yes? And? Out with it!”

  “He gave it to me, sir.”

  “Without saying anything? Pull yourself together, man. Where did you meet him?”

  “He met me, sir. We were checking the area around St. Cecilia’s when he suddenly appeared. He was pushing a large handcart, fully loaded, with a blanket over it, all I know is—no, just a minute, I was to tell you the cart was full of life and that it was, was—how did he put it, for God’s sake?—oh yes, it was of the utmost importance that you read the letter, and, and—”

  He halted. From the expression of despair on his face, it was clear he had lost the thread of Urquhart’s words.

  “Remember,” Matthias barked at him, “or it’ll be the last thing you forget.”

  “—and lose no time at all.” As the words came rushing out, the servant heaved a sigh of relief.

  Impatiently Matthias tore the scroll out of his hand, untied the thong, and started to read. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Kuno edging closer. Lowering the letter, he gave him an icy stare. “It’s about time you left.”

  “You can’t simply send me away like that,” wailed Kuno. “I promise to make up for my mistake—”

  “Go!”

  Breathing heavily, Kuno stared at him for a moment, as if undecided whether to fall to his knees or strike Matthias down. Then he angrily gathered his cloak around him, turned on his heel without a further word, and stalked off. Matthias watched him until he had disappeared through the gate.

  The servant was hopping nervously from one foot to the other. “There’s something else, sir—”