Jakob Kuisl took a knife from his coat and tried inserting the blade into one of the wounds. On either side there was a gap at least half an inch wide.
“It must have been something wider,” he murmured.
“A sword?” asked Simon.
Kuisl shrugged. “More likely a saber or a halberd.”
“Who could have done something like that?” Simon shook his head.
The hangman turned the body over. On the shoulder was the sign, faded a bit more after being carried up from the river, but still quite visible. A purple circle with a cross under it.
“What’s that?” asked Simon.
Jakob Kuisl bent down over the boy’s body. Then he licked his index finger, rubbed it gently over the sign, and put his finger into his mouth. He smacked his lips with relish.
“Elderberry juice,” he said. “And not at all bad.” He held his finger out to Simon.
“What? But I thought it was…”
“Blood?” The hangman shrugged. “Blood would have washed away a long time ago. Only elderberry juice keeps its color so long. Just ask my wife. She gets very angry when the little ones smear themselves with it. But anyway…” He began to rub the mark.
“What is it?”
“The color is partly under the skin. Someone must have injected it with a needle or a dagger.”
Simon nodded. He had seen such works of “art” on soldiers from Castile and France. They had tattooed crosses or images of the Mother of God on their upper arms.
“But what does the sign mean?”
“A good question.” Kuisl drew deeply on his pipe, puffed out the smoke, and remained silent a long time. Then he replied, “It’s the Venus mark.”
“The what mark?” Simon looked down at the sign. Suddenly he remembered where he had seen this sign before: in a book about astrology.
“The Venus mark.” The hangman went back into the little room and reappeared with a stained leather-bound tome. He turned the pages a little while until he found the one he wanted.
“There.” He showed Simon the place. Here, too, the same sign could be seen. Next to it was a circle with an arrow pointing up and to the right.
“Venus, goddess of love, spring, and growth,” read Jakob aloud. “Countersign to that of Mars, god of war.”
“But what can this sign mean on the boy’s body?” asked Simon, confused.
“This sign is old, very old,” said the hangman, taking another puff on the long-stemmed pipe.
“And what does it mean?”
“It has many meanings. It stands for woman as counterpart to man, for life, and also for life after death.”
Simon felt as if he could not breathe anymore. And this was only partly because of the clouds of smoke that enveloped him.
“But…that would be heresy,” he whispered.
The hangman raised his bushy eyebrows and looked him straight in the eye.
“That’s just the problem,” he said. “The mark of Venus is a witches’ mark.”
Then he blew his tobacco smoke directly in Simon’s face.
Schongau lay under the light of a pale moon. Again and again it was eclipsed by clouds, and the river and the town were plunged into darkness. Down by the Lech stood a figure looking into the murmuring waters, sunk in thought. The man put up the collar of his fur-lined coat and turned toward the lights of the town. The gates had long been closed, but for men like him there was always a way in. One only needed to know the right people and have the necessary small coins handy. For this man neither was a problem.
The man began to shiver. This was only partly due to the cold, which in April still was carried down from the mountains by the wind. Fear crept over his scalp. He looked carefully all round, but apart from the black band of the river and a few bushes on the bank there was nothing to be seen.
It was already too late when he heard a rustling behind him. The next thing he felt was the point of a sword in his back, boring through his fur coat, velvet cloak, and padded doublet.
“Are you alone?”
The voice was directly behind his right ear. He smelled brandy and rotten meat.
The man nodded, but that didn’t seem to satisfy the person behind him.
“Are you alone goddamn it?”
“Yes, sure!”
The pain in his back diminished; the sword point was withdrawn.
“Turn around!” hissed the man.
He turned as ordered and nodded apprehensively at his partner. The stranger, wrapped in a black woolen coat, a wide-brimmed feathered hat pulled well down over his face, looked as if he had just risen from the underworld.
“Why have you called me here?” he asked, calmly returning the sword to its sheath.
The man in front of him swallowed. Then he regained his usually unshakeable self-confidence. He straightened up, before replying, “Why did I call you here? You have all failed. You know that very well!”
The stranger shrugged.
“The boy is dead,” he said. “What more do you want?”
The man from the town was not content with this. Angrily he shook his head, the thin index finger of his right hand rising and falling. “And the others?” he hissed. “There were five! Three boys and two girls. What about the others?”
The stranger gestured dismissively.
“We’ll get them too,” he said and turned to go.
The other hurried after him.
“Damn! It wasn’t supposed to end like that!” he cried and gripped the stranger hard by the shoulder, an action he regretted in the next moment. A muscular hand seized him by the throat in a viselike grip. In the stranger’s face white teeth suddenly glistened and he smiled. A wicked smile.
“Are you afraid?” he asked quietly.
The man swallowed and noticed how difficult it was to breathe. Just before all went black the stranger let him go and flung him away like some annoying animal.
“You are afraid,” he repeated. “You’re all alike, you big, fat, rich people.”
The man gasped and retreated a few steps. After straightening his clothes he felt in a position to speak once more.
“Finish the matter quickly,” he whispered. “The children mustn’t squeal.”
Once again he saw the flash of his partner’s teeth.
“That will cost you a bit more.”
The man from Schongau shrugged. “I don’t care. Just get it done with.”
For a moment the stranger seemed to be thinking. Finally he nodded. “Give me the names,” he said quietly. “You know them, so how about the names?”
The man swallowed. He had only seen the children briefly. Nevertheless, he thought he knew who they were. Suddenly he was overcome by the feeling that he was standing on the threshold of something. He could still draw back…
The names came tumbling out before he could think about it anymore.
The stranger nodded. Then he turned abruptly and in just a few seconds had vanished into the darkness.
