And so, the abbot said in his calm voice, it had gone on and on, day after day, year after year. So much hunger. So much disease. The alternation of the armies and marauders. The land had been depopulated. The forests had disappeared, the villages had burned down, the people had fled, God knows where. The past year even the wolves had made off. He leaned forward, put a hand on the fat count’s shoulder, and asked whether he could memorize all that.
“All of it,” said the fat count.
It was important that the court learn of this, said the abbot. The Bavarian Elector as the supreme commander of the imperial troops was, in his wisdom, interested only in the big picture, not in the details. Often they had appealed to him for help, but the truth was that his own troops had wreaked worse havoc than the Swedes. Only if this was remembered had all the suffering had meaning.
The fat count nodded.
The abbot looked him intently in the face.
Composure, he said, as if he had read the mind of the man opposite him. Discipline and inner will. The welfare of the abbey rested on his shoulders, the survival of the brothers.
He crossed himself. The fat count did the same.
This helped a great deal, the abbot said, reaching into the collar of his cowl. And with a horror such as he knew only from fever visions the fat count saw a jute fabric, into which had been woven metal spikes and shards of glass with dried blood.
You got used to it, said the abbot. The first years had been the worst; at that time, he had sometimes taken off the sackcloth and cooled his suppurating upper body with water. But then he had felt ashamed of his weakness, and time after time God had given him the strength to put it back on. There had been moments when the pain had been so intense, had pierced and seared him with such diabolical power, that he had thought he was losing his mind. But prayer had helped. Habit had helped. And his skin had grown thicker. From the fourth year on the constant pain had transformed itself into a friend.
At that moment, the fat count later wrote, sleep must have overpowered him, for when he yawned and rubbed his eyes and took a few moments to remember where he was, someone else was sitting opposite him.
It was a scrawny man with hollow cheeks and a scar that ran from his hairline down to the root of his nose. He was wearing a cowl, and yet it was clearly discernible—even if it couldn’t be said how—that he was not a monk. Never before had the fat count seen such eyes. When he described this conversation, he could not quite remember whether it had really taken place as he had recounted it over the years to friends, acquaintances, and strangers. But he decided to stick with the version that by now too many had heard for him to revise it.
“Here you are at last,” the man had said. “I’ve been waiting for a long time.”
“Are you Tyll Ulenspiegel?”
“One of us is. You’re here to fetch me?”
“On behalf of the Kaiser.”
“Which one? There are many.”
“No, there aren’t! What are you laughing at?”
“I’m not laughing at the Kaiser, I’m laughing at you. Why are you so fat? After all, there’s nothing to eat, how do you do it?”
“Hold your tongue,” said the fat count, immediately annoyed that nothing wittier had occurred to him. And even though for the rest of his days he thought about a better response and even found a whole string of them, he deviated in not a single account from this embarrassing phrase. For these very words seemed to seal the truth of his memory. Would anyone invent something that made him look so bad?
“Or else you’ll hit me? But you won’t do that. You’re soft. Gentle and soft and kindhearted. All this is not for you.”
“War is not for me?”
“It certainly is not.”
“But it is for you?”
“It certainly is.”
“Will you come of your own free will, or do we have to force you?”
“Of course I’ll come. There’s nothing left to eat here, everything is falling apart, the abbot won’t last much longer—that’s why I sent for you.”
“You didn’t send for me.”
“I sent for you, you big dumpling.”
“His Majesty heard—”
“Well, why did His Majesty hear that, then, you giant ball of flesh? His Majesty, His Idiotic Majesty with his golden crown on his golden throne, heard about me because I sent for you. And don’t smack me, I’m allowed to say that, you have heard of fool’s license, haven’t you? If I don’t call His Majesty an idiot, who will? Somebody has to. And you’re not allowed.”
Ulenspiegel grinned. It was a terrible grin, wicked and mocking, and since the fat count couldn’t remember how their conversation had gone on, he used half a dozen sentences to describe this grin, then rhapsodized for a page about the deep, sound, and refreshing sleep he had enjoyed on the floor of an abbey cell until noon the following day: O Morpheus, merciful god of slumbers, bringer of peace, holy guardian of sweet oblivion, in this the night of my most dire need thou didst not fail thy servant but broughtest rest to mine eyelids, and I awoke renewed in flesh and spirit, rejoicing in thy blessings.
This last phrase reflects less the feelings of the young man than the religious doubts of the old, on which he expatiated in moving words in another passage. Out of shame, however, he withheld a detail that even at a distance of fifty years made him blush. For when they met toward noon in the courtyard to take leave of the abbot and three emaciated monks who looked more like ghosts than like real people, they realized that they had forgotten to bring a horse for Ulenspiegel.
Indeed, none of them had thought about what the man they were to bring to Vienna would actually ride on. For of course there were no horses here to buy or borrow, there weren’t even donkeys. All the animals had been eaten or run away.
“Well, then he’ll just mount behind me,” said Franz Kärrnbauer.
“That doesn’t suit me,” said Ulenspiegel. In the light of day he looked even thinner in his monk’s cowl. He stood bent forward, his cheeks were hollow, his eyes were set deep in their sockets. “The Kaiser is my friend. I want a horse of my own.”
“I’ll knock your teeth out,” Franz Kärrnbauer said calmly, “and I’ll break your nose. I’ll do it. Look at me. You know I’ll do it.”
Ulenspiegel looked up at him reflectively for a moment. Then he climbed into the saddle behind Franz Kärrnbauer.
Karl von Doder put a hand on the fat count’s shoulder and whispered: “That’s not him.”
“Pardon me?”
“That’s not him!”
“What’s not whom?”
“I don’t think that’s the man I have seen.”
“What?”
“That time at the fair. I can’t help it. I don’t think it’s him.”
The fat count looked at the secretary for a long moment. “Are you certain?”
“Not completely certain. It was years ago, and he was above me on a rope. Under such circumstances, how can one be certain?”
“Let’s not speak of it again,” said the fat count.
With trembling hands the abbot blessed them and advised them to avoid the cities. The royal seat of Munich had closed its gates against the onslaught of people seeking help, no one else was allowed in, the streets were overflowing with the hungry, the wells were filthy. Things were similar around Nuremberg, where the Protestants were encamped. It was claimed that Wrangel and Turenne were coming with detachments from the northwest; therefore it would be best to steer clear of them by heading northeast in a wide loop, between Augsburg and Ingolstadt. At Rottenburg they could head straight east; from there the way to Lower Austria was clear. The abbot fell silent and scratched his chest—a seemingly ordinary movement, but now that the fat count knew about the sackcloth, he could hardly watch. Rumor had it that both sides were bent on battle before the armistice could be proclaimed in Westphalia. Each side wanted to improve its position first.