A monk who was indeed very old and bent indicated the tall man at his side who was regarding them with a benevolent gaze. He and Jaspar grasped each other by the shoulders and exchanged a brief kiss.
“What can I do for you at this late hour, Brother Jaspar?” the abbot asked.
“A small matter. It is very important I speak to someone in the hospice.” Jaspar smiled. “If it is no trouble, of course.”
Clasping his arms behind his back, the abbot assumed a lofty expression. He looked as if he were giving the matter earnest consideration. “You’re late,” he said skeptically.
“I know.”
“Did you not say something to Brother Laurence here about the machinations of the Devil? As you will know, the monks in this monastery fear the Devil at all times, but experience tells us that he is at his most dangerous after dark. That is why we have to subject guests who arrive this late to particular scrutiny. You must not interpret our cautiousness as suspicion, but—”
“Not in the least,” Jaspar broke in. “To be precise, the Devil I was talking about is the fiend that comes from the past to torment our innermost souls. Old wounds reopen. But often it is the old wounds that lead us to new weapons, if you get my meaning?”
The abbot clearly did not, but he nodded affably.
“Furthermore,” Jaspar went on, “this fiend manifests itself in madness and speaks out of the mouths of those whose spirits are confused. I do not mean to suggest you are housing this fiend here. The balm of your care, I have heard, soothes the sufferings of those poor souls whose minds rave in a confusion of tongues.”
“We have established a special section for that kind of case,” said the abbot, not without pride.
“Yes, it is praised far and wide. Your reputation for compassion is only exceeded by the fame of your learning. Or was it the other way around? I know that the brothers here have astonishing expertise in that area. But to get to the nub of my request, there is in that section a poor soul whose name, I believe, is Hieronymus and who may be able to help us track down this foul fiend.”
The abbot pricked up his ears. “What am I to understand by that?”
“The precise details,” said Jaspar mysteriously, “must remain a secret. It is an extremely delicate matter involving some very important personages.”
“Here in Cologne?” the abbot whispered.
“In this very city. The poor man I am looking for lost both his legs at Acre.”
“Yes, that’s Hieronymus.”
“Excellent. We have to speak to him.”
“Hmm, that will not be easy. He’ll be asleep. Hieronymus has been sleeping a lot recently. I think he will soon go to his eternal rest.”
“All the more important we speak to him before that,” declared Jaspar. “It will not take long, and if Hieronymus has nothing to tell us, he can go straight back to sleep.”
Jacob shivered. They were standing in the cloisters around the inner courtyard and the wind was blowing in through the narrow arched windows, tearing at the flames of the torches in the iron rings.
Again the abbot thought long and hard.
“Very well,” he said eventually, “I would not want to stand in the way of a holy work. Our reputation for good works has always imbued our monastery with a—let us say an aura of mystical greatness which gives it a radiance we must strive to keep shining untarnished.”
“It will shine ever more brightly, I promise you.”
“You would be willing, er, to bear witness to that?”
“Wherever I can.”
“So be it. We humbly praise Thee, Lord. Brother Laurence will take you to Hieronymus. But do not keep him from his divine repose for too long, I beg you. The grace of the Lord is about him.”
The abbot dismissed them with a wave of the hand and they followed the old monk as he shuffled around the cloisters. After a while they turned down an unlit corridor at the end of which Laurence pushed open a door.
In the semidark they saw a room full of wooden beds with men, or what was left of them, asleep on them. The abbey looked after the sick men without charge, solely for God’s mercy and grace, as long as they came with a recommendation from the city council. That kept the situation in St. Pantaleon within bounds. Really bad cases, those who were raving or dangerous, were locked up in the towers of the city walls, with windows facing out toward the countryside, so that those who lived nearby were not disturbed by the shouting and screaming. The worst were kept in chains. The straw in their cells was changed four times a year, when the barber also came to shave their beards and heads, generally with the help of strong men. Some families sold their lunatic members to showmen who made large wooden cages, known as loony boxes, for them outside the city gates. For a few coppers people could observe their drooling, grimacing, and frequent fits for as long as they could stand it.
Compared to these, the poor souls in St. Pantaleon were relatively well off, even if they were bound to their beds with leather straps and ate out of iron pans. The monks regarded them as material to study the boundary between madness and possession by the Devil, something that was of the greatest importance for the spiritual welfare of their patients. The treatment consisted of benedictions and other ecclesiastical rites; occasionally it was even successful.
A monk with a candle came hurrying up to them. He had obviously been sleeping. He was rubbing his eyes and stretching his neck.
“What’s this?” he mumbled. “Oh, it’s you, Brother Laurence.”
“What were you doing, Henricus?” the old monk asked irascibly.
“Preparing myself for compline.”
“You were sleeping.”
“I wasn’t. I was deep in meditation—”
“You were sleeping. I must report it to the abbot.”
The monk looked over the old monk’s shoulders at the two visitors and rolled his eyes. “Of course, Brother Laurence, you must tell the abbot. Is that why you’re here?”
“Take these two gentlemen to Hieronymus. They wish to talk to him.”
“He’s probably asleep.”
“Then wake him up.”
Jaspar gave the monk a friendly nod. The monk shrugged his shoulders and turned. “Come with me.”
They followed him between the beds. Most of the patients were sleeping or staring into space. One was muttering a litany of animal names. When Jacob looked back, he saw the old man disappear into the corridor, shaking his head.
Hieronymus was not asleep. He was sitting on his bed, his little finger boring into his left ear, an activity which seemed to demand his full attention, for he ignored the new arrivals. A threadbare jute blanket covered him up to his waist. Where the outlines of his legs should have been it lay flat on the bed.
“Hieronymus,” said the monk in a friendly voice, stroking his hair, “someone’s come to see you. Look.”
A toothless, twisted face covered in white stubble squinted up at them. “Not now,” he said.
“Why not? It’s a long time since you had a visitor.”
Hieronymus dug his finger farther into his ear. “Leave me in peace.”
“But Hieronymus, we haven’t prayed to Saint Paul yet today. Saint Paul won’t like that. And now you refuse to receive your visitors.”
“No! Wait! Wait!” Hieronymus suddenly shouted. “I’ve got him. He’s trapped. Think you can get away from me, do you? I’ve got you now.”
Henricus gave them a significant glance.
“What’s he doing?” whispered Jaspar.
“He’s convinced someone moved into his ear some time ago. With all his furniture and everything. And he makes a fire in the winter, Hieronymus says, and complains of earache.”
“Why doesn’t he just let him stay there?”
Henricus lowered his voice. “Because the creature in his ear keeps telling him evil things. So he says. We’ve checked up in various books. It’s obviously a manifestation of the Devil, any child could see that. On the other hand, the Devil taking up residence in someone’s ear is new.”
“He resides in hell, and that’s what I would call earache.” Jaspar bent down and gently pulled Hieronymus’s
