by Leo Perutz
“It’s not for you to interrupt your captain,” the thief rebuked him. “Your duty is to keep mum and obey orders. What you swore is your business, not mine. I don’t want a multitude of men—I don’t wish us to catch the eye like a covey of partridges in winter. Five fingers on one hand are sufficient for their purpose, so who has need of six or seven or ten? Besides, five are already too many when it comes to sharing.”
Breathing heavily, for every word was an effort, he lapsed into silence. Wryneck, inspired by his talk of sharing, had been smitten with an idea and couldn’t keep it to himself.
“I know of a wealthy farmer not far from here,” he began. “He has plenty of hams in his larder, and eggs and dripping, and wine in his cellar, and chests full of coin.”
“No,” said the thief, feverishly turning on his other side. “I’ve no wish to break open farmers’ chests and closets or burn and plunder villages. You’re to leave the peasants to their honest toil.”
“In that case,” said Wryneck, “do you mean to lie in ambush by the roadside and prey on passing coaches?”
“No, not that either–I’ve something else in mind,” groaned the thief, and clutched at his wound. “I mean to relieve the priests of their gold.”
“Relieve the priests of their gold?”
“The gold and silver stored in their churches and chapels,” the thief explained. “I seem to hear it crying out to be taken.”
“I’d as soon be struck by lightning!” Wryneck exclaimed, aghast. “Robbing churches is sacrilege–it’s a mortal sin.”
“Listen carefully while I tell you something,” the thief whispered. “Everything on earth belongs to God. The gold and silver in the priests’ houses are His and will remain His, even when they’re safe in our saddlebags. To my mind, it’s a good deed to take unused treasures and distribute them among the people. But even if it’s a sin, as you claim, you know this full well: it’s as hard for a man to live without sinning at all, even on the best of days, as it is to make a coat without a yardstick and scissors or a house without masons and carpenters.”
Wryneck nodded eagerly to signify that he had understood and was at one with his captain.
“Now go down,” the thief went on, “and tell the other three to hold themselves in readiness to ride at midnight, and get me a cart filled with straw for me to lie on.”
Wryneck set off down the stairs, and the red-haired girl, who had overheard every word, came out from behind a heap of straw.
“Captain,” she implored, “take me with you and I will hold you as dear as my own heart.”
The thief opened his eyes.
“Who are you?” he asked. “I’ve no need of you. Your hair is red, and I like neither cats nor dogs with fur of that colour.”
“I’m Red Lisa, Black Ibitz’s ewe-lamb, but now he’s dead and I’m all alone in the world. Take me with you.”
“No ewe-lamb can run with wolves,” the thief told her feebly.
“This one can,” said the girl. “Take me with you and I’ll do any kind of work–spin flax, cook, launder clothes. I can also sing to the lute. I make warm gloves from hareskins, and for your wounds I have a salve compounded of fern and speedwell, plantain and checkerberry. Another ingredient is the flower called Devil’s Bit. Half an ounce of that and one-and-one-half of the dog-nettle with the red flowers.”
“Keep the gangrene at bay, that’s all!” groaned the thief.
“I’ll banish the evil spirits that cause it to a desolate spot–I’ll plunge them in water or bury them in a hollow tree,” she promised. “I know the spell.”
The thief gazed at her. “The spell?” he repeated in a hoarse, breathless voice. “If you know the spell, say it and I’ll take you with me. The spell, in God’s name, the spell!”
The girl thought for a moment. Then she began to sing:
When Jesus in a circle trod
all things began to weep.
The leafy trees, the grassy sod, the . . .
“No!” the thief broke in. “That’s not it. Say the other spell, the right one!”
“The right one,” Red Lisa repeated. Laying her hand on the blood-stained cloth with which his wound was bandaged, she began to sing again in a low voice:
Three flowers there grew . . .
“Yes,” gasped the thief, “that’s the spell, the right one. Go on, say it all!”
Three flowers there grew at God’s behest:
one red, one white, and one, the best,
named by Himself “God’s Will.”
Blood, be still!
“Blood, be still!” the thief whispered. He closed his eyes, and it was as if the pain, having removed its murderous talons from his flesh, were soaring away on slowly, ponderously beating wings. Weariness overcame him, and he sank into a deep, dreamless sleep. His breathing became regular, and Red Lisa nestled against him in the straw like the ewe-lamb of her nickname.
The Desecrators, as they came to be known, ravaged the countryside between the Elbe and the Vistula for more than a year. They roamed far and wide in Pomerania and Poland, Brandenburg and the New Mark, Silesia and the Lusatian Mountains. Although malefactors had always abounded in those regions, no thief had ever dared to lay hands on the treasures of the Church, even in time of war and famine. Now that times had changed, people were horrified. They supposed at first that there must be more than a hundred robbers at work all over the countryside, plundering and profaning the holy places. Then, when it turned out that these outrages were being perpetrated by one small band a mere half-dozen strong, they promptly concluded that the Desecrators possessed the sorcerous knack of rendering themselves invisible in time of danger, and that it was hardly surprising if the Bloody Baron, for all his strenuous efforts to hunt them down, had never succeeded in capturing a single one. Indeed, many said that Satan, God’s eternal foe, had taken personal command of them and made himself their captain in order to rob the churches and chapels of their sacred treasures.
The first to set eyes on this captain was the parish priest of Kreibe, a small Silesian village situated on the estate of a Herr von Nostitz.
One day in May after evening service, the priest, who kept bees, went to the next village to agree a price for his honey with the grocer there. A sudden downpour compelled him to take refuge in the local tavern, so it was close on midnight when he returned to Kreibe.
As he was passing the church he saw a light in one of the windows, and for an instant the pitchy darkness was enlivened by the spectacle of St George, in his blue cloak, skewering a stained-glass dragon to which the village painter had imparted the appearance of a bat-winged cow in calf.
The light promptly vanished, but the priest now knew that there was someone inside the church. Although it contained two objects of appreciable value–a yard-long crucifix of solid silver and an ivory effigy of Our Lady crowned with gold, both of them votive offerings from Herr von Nostitz, who had recovered from the smallpox four years before–it never for one moment occurred to the priest that the Desecrators were at work. His only thought was of his two firkins of honey, which he kept locked up in the sacristy. This being the one secure place in the village, or so he thought, he stored them there in company with his smoke pot, bellows, and other beekeeper’s implements.
The church door was locked, so he went to fetch the key, delighted by the prospect of catching the honey-thieves redhanded at last. Then, with a malediction ready on his lips and a candle in his hand, he entered the church.
The candle was extinguished by a gust of wind. He had taken a few more faltering steps in the gloom when the light of a bull’s-eye lantern fell on his face and travelled down his cassock to his feet. The man in front of him was, he saw, pointing a pistol at his chest.
The malediction died on his lips. All he could muster in his fear was a whispered “Jesus Christ be praised!”
“For ever and ever, amen, reverend sir,” the stranger said courteously. “If I alarmed you, please accept my apologies. I’m here
at my own invitation, though I don’t have the honour of your acquaintance.”
Just then the priest discerned that the stranger was wearing a mask. He realised that he was confronted by one of the so-called Desecrators, and his blood ran cold. He was still staring at the masked man when the sacristy’s heavy iron door swung open and three more men emerged with their faces similarly concealed. One was carrying the silver crucifix, another the Virgin’s gold crown, and the third the priest’s smoke pot and a bull’s-eye lantern.
“How in God’s name did you contrive to open that iron door?” he quavered, trembling in every limb, for the door had been well and truly locked, and he had only just fetched the key from his closet.
The masked man lowered his pistol and gave a little bow as if obliged to the priest for paying him the greatest of compliments.
“You should know, reverend sir, that to us iron doors are so many cobwebs to be brushed aside, nothing more. They trouble us not at all.” He turned to his companions. “Hurry, we’re pressed for time. Besides, we’ve no wish to incommode this reverend gentleman longer than is needful.”
The priest saw the crucifix and the gold crown disappear into a large sack. As guardian of these hallowed objects, he knew that he ought to raise the alarm, cry murder, run up the stairs to the belfry and sound a tocsin loud enough to be heard for miles around. Being mortally afraid, however, he did none of those things; he merely stood there wringing his hands.
“Those are votive offerings from our gracious lord,” he wailed. “Surely you wouldn’t lay hands on them! His lordship presented them to God, not man.”
“Not so,” the masked man retorted calmly. “Only such part of his wealth as he gives to the poor is given to God. Everything else he gives to the world, and I am taking my share of it.”
“But robbing a church is as grave a sin as any,” the priest cried. “Return those sacred objects, or you condemn yourself to the uttermost depths of hell for all eternity.”
“You should be less severe with sinners, reverend sir,” said the masked man. “We all have need of one another. If there were no sinners and no sin, what use would anyone have for a parish priest?”
This robber captain was the Devil’s mouthpiece, the priest knew it now, for only the Antichrist and Arch-Deceiver could bemuse a person with such smooth, insidious, pernicious arguments. He recoiled a step and hurriedly crossed himself.
“Satana, Satana!” he muttered in horror. “Recede a me! Recede!”
“What did you say, sir?” inquired the masked man. “I failed to catch your drift, not being a learned man myself. Latin is of little use to me in my profession.”
“I said you were possessed by the Devil,” the priest exclaimed. “He speaks through your lips.”
“Not so loud, reverend sir, I beg you–someone might hear,” the masked man said in a gently mocking tone. “If I’m possessed by the Devil, it was done by God’s will and command, for not even a pig can be possessed by the Devil without His divine consent. I refer you to St Matthew, sir.”
So saying, he turned and went over to his companions. The priest watched him go, wondering how best to describe him so that he might be recognised and arrested later on.
“Taller than most,” he said to himself, “and lean of face, so far as I can tell. If only he weren’t masked! A curly wig, a black hat and cloak trimmed with white. That’s all, and little enough it is by way of a description . . .”
Meanwhile, the robber captain had taken the smoke pot from one of his comrades and was regarding it attentively. He rejoined the priest.
“I see you’re a diligent beekeeper, reverend sir,” he said. “How many hives, if I may be permitted to inquire?”
“Three hives,” replied the priest. To himself, he added, “Slender hands such as are more usually found in persons of quality. Long, pickpocket’s fingers, the chin cleanshaven . . .” Aloud, he went on, “I keep them in the meadow behind my house.”
“Three, eh? They must yield eighteen or more measures of spring-gathered honey.”
The priest sighed. “This year, ten-and-a-half measures only.”
“That’s very little for three hives,” the captain said. “Yet it was just the kind of year the beekeeper craves: a summer with cool winds and heavy dews, a long, dry autumn, and a snowy winter. What was amiss?”
“Alas,” the priest lamented, his thoughts flitting back and forth between his hives and the theft of his church’s treasures, “my bees were afflicted with nosema.”
“And you did nothing to cure it? You had no remedy to hand?”
“No,” the priest said sadly, “there is none. One must simply let the disease take its course.”
“Mark this, sir,” the robber captain told him. “Wild thyme pounded up with a little oil of lavender and added to the bees’ sugar-water–that’s a proven remedy for nosema.”
“I’ll try it,” the priest said thoughtfully. “But where am I to find wild thyme? I’ve never seen any in the fields hereabouts. Meantime, what of the honey? It refuses to clear. I’ve sieved it twice, but it remains as cloudy as before.”
They were now alone in the church, the others having made off with their loot. The robber captain shook his head.
“That comes from the dampness in the air,” he said. “The sacristy is no place for honey–the walls are streaming with moisture. Put it in the warmth of the sun, sir.”
“I would, if it weren’t for the peasants,” the priest said plaintively. “They’re such a bunch of thieves, they steal my honey at every opportunity. It’s safe from them only in the sacristy, for I keep the iron door securely locked and bolted.”
“So I discovered,” said the robber captain. “It’s a sorry thing when peasants are thieving rogues. Where property is concerned, each should attend to his own and refrain from coveting his neighbour’s. But now, sir, I must bid you farewell and go.”
They had been pacing up and down the aisle while speaking. The priest came to a halt.
“A pity,” he said. “I’ve appreciated your company, sir.”
“And I appreciate your saying so,” the robber captain replied with equal courtesy, “but I must ask you to excuse me.”
He bowed to the priest, blew out the bull’s-eye lantern, and was instantly swallowed up by the darkness.
The priest lingered behind, debating where to keep his honey given that the walls of the sacristy were indeed streaming with moisture. Although it occurred to him after about a minute that he could now climb to the belfry and sound the alarm without risking his life, he thought it wiser to tiptoe after the robbers. Once he had seen where they went and whether they were mounted, he would summon the peasants and send them in pursuit.
But the Desecrators had gone by the time he emerged from the church. For all the moonlight in which the countryside was now bathed, not a sign of them could be seen in any direction. As he told the frightened peasants an hour later, it was as if they had borrowed the wings of the owl and the ravens that roosted in the church tower and flown away.
Unlike the parish priest of Kreibe, who escaped with nothing more than a fright, others unlucky enough to come upon the Desecrators at an inopportune moment did not always survive the encounter unscathed. One such was the verger of Tschirnau, a village on the right bank of the Neisse in the Bohemian county of Glatz, who surprised them just as they were making off. Their haul from this particular church, to which the peasants of the entire county made pilgrimage, comprised four silver candelabra, each six pounds in weight; a censer; a baptismal ewer and two patens, likewise of silver; a heavy gold chain; a piece of brocade embroidered with gold thread; and a book enumerating the charitable endeavours of Pope Martin V. The latter had been taken not for piety’s sake but because it was encased in ivory.
“They’ll all do nicely for the melting-pot,” said a voice as the verger entered the church. He saw no one at first but the robber with the book in his hands. Then he caught sight of another two intruders. He was a brave man, and he
knew that the peasants in the nearby tavern would come to his aid if they heard a commotion. For want of any better weapon, he snatched the staff from a figure of St Christopher and brought it down on the head of one of the robbers, whose red hair caught his eye.
The red-haired robber cried out in a woman’s voice. A moment later someone gripped the verger around the neck from behind, half-throttling him. He dropped the staff and strove to break his assailant’s hold, but in vain. Just as the staff clattered to the flagstones, another man appeared in the doorway, masked like the rest, and gave a signal.
“He’s alone,” the man said. “There’s no one following, that’s why I let him pass.”
The verger heard no more. A moment later he lost consciousness. When he regained his senses he was lying on the church steps bound hand and foot, his aching head swathed in a cloth, his eyes and lips sealed with plasters steeped in pitch. That was how the peasants found him on their way to the fields next morning, and beside him on the steps, broken in two, reposed St Christopher’s staff.
A far worse fate lay in store for a young Bohemian nobleman who met the Desecrators at an inn between Brieg and Oppeln: the encounter was to cost him his life.
The inn, which stood beside the highroad in densely wooded country, was seldom patronised by anyone but gipsies and humble folk such as journeymen or, at most, a pedlar with his wares on his back. The young Bohemian count, who was travelling to Rostock with his tutor and a lackey, had been obliged to spend the night there because his carriage had sprung an axle. It was autumn, and the rain was teeming down outside. While the young count’s coachman endeavoured to repair his conveyance, he and his tutor ate supper in the tap-room, waited on by the lackey. All the kitchen could produce was a small roast fowl and a pancake.
After supper the lackey went outside to assist the coachman. The tutor, being weary and in need of sleep, retired to the attic, where the landlord had made up beds for his two distinguished guests. The lackey was to sleep on a bench in the tap-room, the coachman in the stable.
