"Peter? In his pocket? But how did the sulfur get there?"

"That's what I'd like to know too."

Jakob Kuisl reached for his pipe and began to fill it. Meanwhile Simon walked up and down in the little room and told about his encounter with the orphan girl. Occasionally Kuisl growled; otherwise he was fully occupied with filling and lighting his pipe. When Simon had finished his story, the hangman was already enveloped in a haze of tobacco smoke.

"I visited the Stechlin woman," he said finally. "The children had indeed been with her. And a mandrake is missing."

"A mandrake?"

"A magic herb."

Jakob Kuisl told briefly of his meeting with the midwife and of the chaos in her house. Again and again there were long pauses while he drew on his pipe. Meanwhile Simon seated himself on a wooden stool and fidgeted impatiently.

"I don't understand it at all," said the young physician at last. "We have a dead boy with a witches' mark on his shoulder and sulfur in his pocket. We have a midwife as a prime suspect, from whom a mandrake has been stolen. And we have a gang of orphans who know more than they will admit. None of this makes sense!"

"Above all we have very little time," mumbled the hangman. "The Elector's secretary is coming in a few days. Between now and then I have to make the Stechlin woman the culprit, otherwise the council will be on my back."

"And what if you simply refuse?" asked Simon. "n.o.body can demand that you..."

Kuisl shook his head. "Then they'll send another, and I can look for a new job. No, it'll have to be like this. We must find the real murderer, and right soon."

"We?"

The hangman nodded. "I need your help. People don't like talking to me. The fine people turn up their noses as soon as they see me in the distance. Although..." he added with a smile, "they would turn up their noses at you now."

Simon looked down at his spotted, foul-smelling doublet. It was still covered with brown spots. A tear in his hose ran from the knee down the left leg. A faded lettuce leaf hung from his hat...to say nothing about the splotches of dried blood. He would need new clothes and had no idea where the money for them would come from. Perhaps if the murderer was caught the council might contribute a few guilders.

Simon thought over the hangman's proposition. What had he to lose? Not his reputation anymore; that was already ruined. And if he wanted to continue seeing Magdalena in the future, it would be an advantage to be on good terms with her father. And then there were the books. Just now there lay next to the monocle on the table a tattered work of the Jesuit Athanasius Kirchner, who wrote of tiny worms in the blood. That priest had worked with a so-called microscope, which could magnify things many more times presumably than Kuisl's monocle. The possibility of reading this book at home, alone in bed with a hot cup of coffee...

Simon nodded. "Good, you can count on me. By the way, the book on the..."

The doctor's son got no further in expressing his wish. The door flew open, and Andreas the jailer staggered into the room, panting for air.

"Forgive me for disturbing you so late," he gasped. "But it's urgent. They told me I would find Fronwieser's son here. Your father needs help!"

Andreas' face was as white as a sheet. He looked as if he had seen the devil incarnate.

"What in all the world can be so urgent?" asked Simon. Privately he wondered who could have seen him going into the executioner's house. It seemed that you could not take a step in this town without being observed.

"Grocer Kratz's son, he's dying!" exclaimed the jailer Andreas with his last bit of strength. He kept reaching for the little wooden crucifix that hung round his neck.

Jakob Kuisl, who up to that moment had listened in silence, became impatient. He slammed his hand down on the rickety table, so that the monocle and Athanasius' masterpiece jumped up a little. "An accident? Tell us, then!"

"Everything covered in blood! Oh, G.o.d, help us, he has the sign! Just like Grimmer..."

Simon sprang from his stool. He felt fear rising inside him.

Kuisl stared at the physician's son through clouds of tobacco smoke. "You go there. I'll have a look at the Stechlin woman. I don't know if she's really safe in the prison."

Simon grabbed his hat and ran out into the street. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of Magdalena, who waved to him sleepily from the attic window. He had a feeling they would not have much time to see each other in the next few days.

The man stood at the window, his head only a hand's width away from the heavy red fabric of the curtain.

Outside night was falling, but what difference did that make? Here in this room it was always dusk, a depressing gray twilight, where even by day the sunlight was feeble. Through his inner eye the man saw the sun over the town. It would rise and set, again and again, nothing would stop it. The man would not let anything stop him either, even if delays occasionally occurred. These delays made him...irritable. He turned around quickly.

"What a useless a.s.s you are! Good for nothing! Why can't you manage to finish anything properly?"

"I'll finish it all right."

In the half-light a second figure could be seen sitting at the table and stabbing about with a knife in a pie as if it were the stomach of a slaughtered pig.

The man at the window drew the curtains still closer together. His fingers clutched the fabric like claws. A wave of pain overcame him. He didn't have much more time left.

"That business with the children was totally unnecessary. The talk is just beginning now."

"n.o.body will talk. You can count on me."

"Some people have already become suspicious. We can only hope that the midwife will confess. The hangman has already begun asking stupid questions."

The figure at the table continued to work the pie into a stew of meat and lumps of pastry. The knife rose and fell frantically.

"Bah, the hangman! Who's going to believe him?"

"Don't underestimate Kuisl. He's as sly as a fox."

"Then the little fox will run into the trap."

The man at the window quickly took the few steps to the table and struck him hard in the face with the back of his hand. The other held his cheek for a little, then looked up apprehensively into the face of his a.s.sailant. He noticed how his a.s.sailant put his hands on his stomach and was panting in pain.

A slight smile played on his lips. This problem would soon resolve itself.

"You will stop this nonsense now," murmured the older man, grimacing in pain. A steady ache throbbed from inside his abdomen. He leaned forward over the table.

"You leave it alone. I'll take care of it myself now."

"I can't."

"You can't?"

"I've handed it over to someone else. One who won't let us interfere with his work anymore."

"Call him off. It's enough. When the Stechlin woman confesses, we'll get our money."

The older man had to sit down for just a second. It was difficult for him to speak. d.a.m.n this body! He needed it still, just until they got hold of the money. Then he could die in peace. His life's work was in danger and this useless fool was ruining everything. But not as long as he himself could breathe. Not as long...

"This is an excellent pie. Would you like some?"

With his knife, the younger man had speared the pieces of meat spread out on the table and began to eat them with relish.

At the end of his strength, the old man shook his head. The younger man smiled.

"Keep calm, everything will be all right."

He wiped the gravy out of his beard, took his sword in hand, and hurried to the door.

Without waiting for the jailer, Simon headed to the Kratzes' house, which stood in a narrow side street in the Lech Gate quarter. Clemens and Agathe Kratz were regarded as hardworking grocers who had acquired a modest fortune over the years. Their five children all went to the local grammar school, and they did not treat their ward Anton, who after the death of his parents had been a.s.signed to them by the town council, any differently than their own four children. Clemens Kratz, the father, sat huddled by the counter. With his right hand he mechanically caressed the shoulder of his wife, who was pressed against him, sobbing. In front of them on the counter lay the body of the boy. Simon did not need to look long at it to determine the cause of death. Someone had cut little Anton's throat clean through. Clotted blood had dyed his linen shirt red. The eyes of the ten-year-old boy were fixed on the ceiling.

When they found him an hour earlier he had still been breathing noisily, but in minutes the life had ebbed from his little body. The only thing that Bonifaz Fronwieser could do was confirm the death. When Simon came in, the work was already done. His father briefly looked him up and down, and after expressing his sympathy to the Kratzes packed up his instruments and went out without saying goodbye.

After Bonifaz Fronwieser had left the house, Simon sat for a few minutes by the dead child and looked at his white face. The second death in two days...Had the boy known his murderer?

Finally the physician turned to the boy's father.

"Where did you find him?" he asked.

No answer. The Kratzes were sunk in a world of grief and pain not easily penetrated by the human voice.

"I'm sorry, but where did you find him?" repeated Simon.

Only then did Clemens Kratz look up. The father's voice was hoa.r.s.e from much weeping. "Outside on the doorstep. He just wanted to go over quickly to his...friends. When he didn't come back we opened the door to go and look for him. And there he was, lying in his blood..."

Mother Kratz began to whimper again. On a wooden bench in a back corner sat the four other Kratz children, their eyes wide open with fear. The youngest daughter pressed a doll made of sc.r.a.ps of cloth to her chest.

Simon turned to the children. "Do you know where your brother wanted to go?"

"He isn't our brother." The voice of the eldest Kratz boy sounded firm and defiant in spite of his fear. "He's an orphan."

And you certainly let him know that often enough, thought Simon. He sighed. "All right. Once more, then. Do you know where he wanted to go?" thought Simon. He sighed. "All right. Once more, then. Do you know where he wanted to go?"

"Just to the others." The boy looked him straight in the face.

"Which others?"

"The other orphans. They always met down by the Lech Gate. He wanted to go there again. I saw Sophie, the redhead, with him at the four o'clock bells. They were planning something. They had put their heads together like a herd of cattle."

Simon couldn't help thinking of the small girl he had only a few hours before rescued from a beating. The red hair, the defiant eyes. At the age of twelve it seemed that Sophie had already made a lot of enemies.

"That's right." The father chimed in. "They did in fact often meet at the Stechlin place. Sophie and the Stechlin woman, the same witches' brood. They are responsible! And they made this Satan's mark on him, for sure!"

Mother Kratz began to weep again, so that her husband had to comfort her.

Simon went over to the body and turned it carefully onto its stomach. On the right shoulder blade there was in fact the same symbol as had been found on the Grimmer boy. Not quite as clear, certainly. Someone had tried to wipe it off. But the color had already penetrated too deeply under the skin. Indelibly it still appeared on the child's shoulder.

Simon could sense that Clemens Kratz had come up behind him. Filled with hate, the father stared at the sign.

"The Stechlin woman did that to him. And that Sophie," he hissed. "For sure. They should burn them-burn them both!"

The physician tried to calm him. "Stechlin is in the keep, she couldn't have done it. And Sophie is still a child. Do you really believe that a child-"

"The devil has got into that child!" cried Mother Kratz from behind. Her eyes were bloodshot from weeping, her face pale and puffy. "The devil is here in Schongau! And he'll carry off other children!"

Simon looked once again at the faded mark on the boy's back. No doubt, someone had tried to remove it, without success.

"Did any of you try to wash this mark off?" he asked them.

Kratz crossed himself.

"We have not touched the devil's mark, so help me G.o.d!" The other members of the family shook their heads and signed the cross too.

Simon sighed inwardly. He wouldn't get any further here with logical arguments. He took his leave and went out into the darkness. Behind him he could still hear the sobbing of the mother and the murmured prayers of the old grocer.

At the sound of a whistle Simon turned around. His eyes searched the alley. At the corner a small form was leaning against the wall of a house and beckoning to him.

It was Sophie.

Simon looked around, then he entered the narrow alley and bent down to the girl.

"You got away from me last time," he whispered.

"And I'll get away from you again this time," replied Sophie, "but now just listen: a man asked for Anton, just before he was stabbed."

"A man? But how do you know...?"

Sophie shrugged. A slight smile pa.s.sed over her lips. Simon wondered for a moment what she would look like in five years' time.

"We orphans have eyes everywhere. That saves us from beatings."

"And what did he look like, this man?"

"Tall. With a coat and a broad-brimmed hat. There was a feather in the hat. And across his face there was a long scar."

"And that's all?"

"His hand was all bones."

"Don't lie to me!"

"Down by the river he asked a few raftsmen where the Kratzes' house was. I was hiding behind the trees. He kept his left hand under his coat, but once it slipped out and I saw it shining white in the sun. A skeleton hand."

Simon bent farther down and put his arm around the girl.

"Sophie, I don't believe you. It would be best for you to come with me now..."

Sophie tore herself away. Tears of rage filled her eyes.