As Kuisl continued standing at the entrance to the monastery, he wondered whether his suspicions were correct. The rain and wind were so strong that it would be suicide to go out into this storm and expose himself to lightning-especially since he didn’t yet know where to go next. Was Virgilius somewhere in the forest? In his house? Atop a hill? Kuisl knew from experience that lightning always struck the highest point, and the highest point here was…
The steeple.
He slapped his forehead for not having thought of it before. His fear for the safety of his grandchildren must have frazzled his brain. Virgilius was certainly up in the steeple. That’s where Nepomuk had set up his lightning rod, and that, too, is where the crazy watchmaker had been carrying on his experiments since then. Surely Virgilius was up there.
Just as Kuisl was about to leave the church portal, he heard hurried footsteps and could just make out in the darkness and pouring rain a group of men rushing toward the tavern: the count returning with his soldiers. They were soaked through and through; water flowed in streams from their sleeves and trousers, but Leopold von Wartenberg tried to preserve decorum in spite of it all. He was walking quickly, not running, and once he arrived beneath the archway, he looked the hangman up and down suspiciously, as if not yet sure what to do about him.
“I’ve just gone to check myself that those two miscreants were put under lock and key in the monastery dungeon,” he finally said. “The matter is concluded, and the elector can be reassured. As far as you are concerned,” he continued after wringing out his long black hair and wiping his beard, “give me one reason, hangman, why I shouldn’t have you locked up as well. Just one.”
Kuisl grinned. “Perhaps because Your Excellency will soon be in need of a good executioner?”
“I have Master Hans in Weilheim for that. An excellent man. He would break his own mother on the wheel if she was guilty and if he was paid well enough.” A thin smile crossed his face. “Perhaps I should ask him to take care of you, as well. After all, you’re clearly responsible for the death of one of the Andechs guards. I’ve been lenient because you’re the father-in-law of the bathhouse surgeon who’s been caring for my son. And because your daughter seems to be one hell of a woman. But my patience has its limits.”
The hangman nodded. “So does mine,” he growled. “Listen, the real sorcerer is out there somewhere with my grandchildren. I’ve got to find them, and now. After that, you can do whatever you want with me.” Without another word, he turned to leave.
Stunned, Leopold von Wartenberg stood as if rooted under the archway. Finally he pulled himself together and cast an angry glance at his soldiers, who prudently held their heads down.
“One hour, Kuisl!” he shouted into the howling wind. But the hangman was now no more than a shadowy figure in the darkness. “I’ll give you an hour to bring me the real witch. And don’t think you can count on my help. One minute longer, and I’ll give Master Hans a nice reward for your head. Understand?”
But Kuisl could no longer hear him. As hail drummed down from the sky, he turned right at the church square, where just that noon hundreds of pilgrims had assembled. Now the area looked forsaken. Puddles the size of small ponds had formed on the hard-packed ground, and a few remaining sacks of limestone stood out of the watery scene like little islands. The pilgrims were waiting out the storm in local farmhouses and barns, praying the lightning would spare them.
Kuisl stomped through the ankle-deep water, casting an occasional glance up at the steeple, but he couldn’t make out anything suspicious behind the wall of rain. Had he been mistaken? Was Virgilius perhaps still down in the catacombs, lying in wait for Magdalena? Why did his daughter always have to be so stubborn and have things her way? As so often in matters concerning his daughter, Kuisl was torn between fear and anger. In any case, when all this was over, he’d give his daughter a good thrashing.
If she was still alive.
The hangman tried to suppress these gloomy thoughts, once again directing his gaze at the steeple housing the belfry. Carpenters had installed a new roof and patched up porous masonry damaged by lightning, but on one side, a new wall hadn’t yet been constructed, leaving only a knee-high truss there as reinforcement.
Just above the truss, Kuisl spotted a shadow scurry by and then vanish in the gloom. Still, this brief moment was long enough to convince the hangman his suspicions were correct.
Someone was up in the tower.
Breathlessly he splashed the last few yards through puddles to the church entrance. The double doors stood wide open, and rain, leaves, and dirt had blown onto the pews. Wind had partially ripped away the makeshift canopy, leaving shreds fluttering like flags in the storm. Water streamed down over the altars, statues, and weathered tombstones in the nave.
The hangman looked around, perplexed. He thought at least a few Benedictines would be here to keep order, but the church was deserted. Were the monks frightened by the storm? Or had they learned that three of their members had been arrested for counterfeiting relics? In the latter case, it was quite possible the Brothers had retreated to their cells lest they themselves be questioned or arrested.
After hesitating briefly, Kuisl hurried past the wet, mud-spattered pews as the wind continued to howl above him. He had no time for idle speculations. If his assumptions were right, his two beloved grandchildren were up above, at the mercy of the hail, lightning, and rain. Virgilius would wish he’d never been born.
Kuisl ran up the stairs to the balcony and, from there, up another stairway into the tower. Even now, after a full two weeks, work was far from finished. The storm whistled through the open windows, and the narrow, newly built stairs up to the belfry were steep, slippery, and groaning in the wind. The higher Kuisl climbed, the more the entire tower seemed to sway back and forth.
When he got just a few yards beneath the belfry, he stopped and listened. Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed, but amid the constant drumming of the rain, he thought he heard a shrill voice. Indeed, as he climbed higher, he could hear it more clearly.
“Hurry up,” a man screeched directly above him. “Before the storm passes. Didn’t I tell you yesterday to nail the device down? Now the storm has blown it over, and we’re losing valuable time.”
The only answer was a deep grumble, followed by the sound of a hammer pounding and a child crying.
Kuisl winced. His grandchildren were up there, and the second man was evidently Virgilius’s assistant. Cautiously, he crept up the last few steps and stuck his head through the opening into the floor of the belfry.
At first, all he could see were three bronze bells hanging between the iron-clad beams of the belfry. Fresh, new spruce flooring had been put down, but the walls were still covered with soot from the disastrous fire a few weeks before. Behind a knee-high railing on the east side, rain blew into the room through a gaping hole.
Once Kuisl had finally hoisted himself all the way through the opening, he could just barely make out behind the bells the back of a broad-shouldered man who was nailing a sort of bier upright against the wall. The wooden board was fitted with metal clamps like the ones Kuisl knew from torture racks, and a heavy wire dangled from the ceiling, connected with clamps to smaller wires.
To the left of the bier stood three people looking like a surreal caricature of a family in the raging wind: alongside the hunchback Virgilius was a distinguished looking lady with a red cape and blond hair blowing beneath a lopsided bonnet. She seemed strangely stiff, and it took Kuisl a moment to realize she was actually a life-size puppet.