Simon knelt down beside the corpse of the dead dog, examining it with Bartholomäus. The medicus looked like he was thinking it all over, trying to find some idea lurking in his mind.
“I think Brutus was rabid,” he told Bartholomäus, who appeared to be recovering from the worst of his sorrow at the loss of his pet. “All the foam around its mouth, that sudden attack, the rage, the trembling legs. . And Salter’s prisoner, the apothecary’s wife, just told me the poor animal had been prowling around the house for a long time, rooting around and digging.”
“When I went looking for him around here with Aloysius, he must have been very close by.” Bartholomäus paused to think, then stood up and washed his bloody hands carefully in a puddle nearby. “God knows where he picked up that infection, but if Brutus had rabies, that would explain his random, savage killing of animals in the forest and why he attacked Salter in such a rage.” He winked at Jakob. “But maybe the dog mixed the two of us up and thought his master was being attacked.”
“I always knew dogs were stupid,” Jakob answered dryly. “Who could have mixed the two of us up?”
“You’re more alike than you want to admit. When will you two squabblers finally realize that?” It was Magdalena. With a broad smile, she returned from the other side of the burning house holding her scarf, knotted together and full of leaves and herbs. “Here’s good news for a change,” she said, holding up the scarf triumphantly. “I found not just elderberry shrubs in the wild garden but also an old overgrown patch of herbs. Now, in late autumn, there wasn’t much there, but the flames from the house were so bright I was able to find some dried shepherd’s purse and buckhorn.” She gazed over at the hunting lodge, where the upper story had collapsed. Black smoke rose up into the night sky like a giant, admonishing finger. Magdalena suddenly pursed her lips.
“But even these herbs weren’t able to save Hieronymus Hauser,” she said darkly. “Katharina’s father burned to death in there. What a terrible end for the old man.” She handed the folded scarf full of herbs to Simon, helping him and her father as they crushed them in their hands and laid them on Barbara’s and Georg’s wounds. They tore Bartholomäus’s coat into long strips to serve as bandages.
“I don’t think the old scribe suffered for very long,” Adelheid Rinswieser replied after a while. She had been given Magdalena’s woolen coat and stood off to one side shivering, still looking dazed. “He was already unconscious when Salter dragged me out of the room. He must have suffocated without ever regaining consciousness.”
“A merciful death for someone who bought his fortune with the blood of others,” Bartholomäus growled, staring wistfully into the burning house. “As the scribe for the Witches Commission, Hieronymus made a lot of money during the trials. I see now how he could afford that beautiful house by the Sand Gate. I never really liked him-he was a very calculating person.”
“But he did agree to his daughter’s engagement to the executioner,” Jakob reminded him.
Bartholomäus gestured dismissively. “If Katharina will even take me anymore,” he said sadly. “After everything that’s happened in the last few days, I’m not so sure.”
Suddenly a hunting horn sounded in the distance. Jakob looked around in astonishment.
“Who is that? At this time of day it’s certainly not the bishop out hunting. Perhaps good old Answin?”
“Ah, not exactly,” said Simon as he cleared his throat and applied the last bandage. “I must confess I told Captain Lebrecht before we left. Aloysius was kind enough to tip off the city guards, and now it seems we can put them to good use here,” he said, pointing at Barbara and Georg, “if only to transport the injured and put out the fire before it spreads to the forest.” He rubbed his nose in embarrassment, then grinned. “They could also help us with a plan I’ve been thinking about for a long time that might end this miserable werewolf story once and for all.”
“A plan? Hah! I thought you were just scared,” Jakob replied with a smile. “I thought I’d always have to have a pussyfooter as a son-in-law.” He chuckled. “But then you went and killed a real live werewolf. What silly old bathhouse medicus can say that of himself?”
A few minutes later, the guards arrived. There were almost a dozen of them, led by the Bamberg captain Martin Lebrecht. Meanwhile, Simon had been trying to figure out how to win over the captain. The plan he’d thought up while studying Brutus’s carcass was quite risky, and it all depended on Lebrecht going along with it.
Him-and the apothecary’s wife.
The captain nodded when he saw the burning building. “Maybe it’s better that this building is finally going up in flames,” he said, mostly to himself. “There was always something evil about it. I’ve heard that all sorts of riffraff and strange people hung out here. I should have had it torn down long ago.”
He gave a sign to the guards, and they fanned out to extinguish some small fires smoldering in the woods despite the recent heavy rain. Only then did he turn to the small group of wretched-looking people in front of him. Simon had quickly covered Salter’s corpse and the dog’s cadaver with brush in order to avoid premature questions. Jeremias’s body, however, still lay there, covered only with Jakob’s coat, next to Barbara, who had passed out again, and Georg, who propped himself up on a makeshift crutch, pale and with clenched teeth.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” the captain burst out. “What the hell happened here? And whose corpse is that lying there?” He leaned down, holding his torch.
“Well, ah. . It’s a long story,” Simon replied. “Perhaps it would be better if we talk about it in private first.”
“When you first called for us, I wasn’t sure if we should even come, but now. .” Lebrecht frowned and looked at the victims as if trying to make sense of it all. “Sure, why not? My men are occupied over there, anyway. Tell me what happened.”
Simon took a deep breath. Now he’d see if his plan would work.
“We caught the werewolf,” he began in a firm voice. “Actually, two of them-one an animal and one human. Come and see for yourself.” He took Lebrecht off to the side, where Markus Salter’s corpse and Brutus’s carcass lay underneath a brush pile. Simon pulled the branches aside, and the captain blanched.
“My God,” he gasped. “This is the werewolf? And the man here is one of those actors. Did that monster mangle him? And what brave fellow finally killed the beast?”
Simon blushed. “Ah. . that was me. But allow me to start at the beginning.”
He tried to explain as briefly as possible-the witch trial of Chancellor Haan and his family, Salter’s former life as Wolf Christoph Haan, and his plans for revenge that cost the life of the suffragan bishop. In conclusion, he explained how the trail had led to the old hunting lodge where there was a life-and-death battle.
“Salter often dressed up as a werewolf to spread fear in the city. First he observed his many victims, then he abducted them, and finally he tortured and killed them in this abandoned hunting lodge,” Simon explained. The captain listened in astonishment, his mouth agape. “As a former law student, he had precise knowledge of the different degrees of torture, just as they are described in the Bamberg Constitutio Criminalis, the criminal code. Salter punished his prisoners in exactly the same ways the members of his own family had been tortured, tit for tat.”
He pointed at the pale Adelheid Rinswieser, who up to then had been standing in the background. “The honorable wife of apothecary Rinswieser and my young sister-in-law are the only survivors; they can confirm all this for you. There was no real werewolf, only a man in search of revenge. Markus Salter, alias Wolf Christoph Haan, wanted to incite a panic in the city just like the one back then during the witch trials, when everyone in the city would point a finger at their neighbors. You must admit he succeeded.”