Death and the Devil

Surely he could have killed me already, he thought. Why hasn’t he? Is he waiting for me to collapse? That’s it, he’s playing with me. He knows I can’t escape, so why bother to shoot. He’ll just keep after me until I’m so slow he can get a clean shot at me, the lazy, well-fed swine.

The next crossroad appeared in front, the right turn went up to the convent of the Ursulines, the left down to the Rhine. He could choose which street he wanted to die in, both were broad enough.

Fury blazed up inside him. Enough was enough. He was fed up with taking evasive action, running away, spending his whole life on the run. Fed up to here!

Then, just a few yards before the left turn down to the Rhine, he saw a passage open up between the houses.

He had a vague memory that it went to Bethlehem Chapel, a tiny church belonging to one of the neighboring properties. And if his memory was correct, the passageway led to a narrow alley overgrown with weeds and bushes, which branched out into a tangle of footpaths through the convent vineyards. He had been there once. The area around the chapel was neglected, the walls and fences broken in places, so that it was easy to get into the vineyards.

Where he could escape. In the thick undergrowth even this fiendishly swift pursuer couldn’t catch Jacob.

He kept running until he was almost past it. Then he suddenly darted to the left and skidded into the passage. He nearly left it too late. As it was, his shoulder scraped painfully along the wall. The regular pounding of the footsteps behind him faltered. The other was having to brake, losing time. Jacob had increased his lead slightly; now everything depended on his sense of direction.

At first all he could see was dense blackness. Then the faint outlines of the trees and the chapel emerged.

And something else.

Jacob couldn’t believe it. This wasn’t the alley he remembered. It ended in a high wall. There was no way out. His memory had deceived him.

The footsteps behind were swift and regular again. They were getting closer. If something didn’t occur to him soon, he might just as well stand there and wait.

Just a minute! That wasn’t a bad idea.

Jacob gasped for breath. He could almost feel the bolt in his back. Without looking, he sensed the other raising his crossbow, already celebrating his victory.

With his last ounces of strength he put on a spurt, despite the wall in front.

Then he suddenly braked, swung around, and ran straight at his pursuer.

RHEINGASSE

Johann climbed up the stairs, then stood, irresolute, outside the magnificent door. The flickering light of the candle brought the rich carving to life. As a child he had often stood looking at it, not long after his uncle Gottschalk had found the carved and inlaid wood in a Florentine warehouse and brought it back. It came, so it was said, from Byzantium and had fallen into the hands of Venetian knights during the first Crusade. Often, if the light was right, old ships would sail across an ocean of darkly grained wood, monsters and demons crane mahogany necks, and gargoyles with knotholes for eyes and worm-eaten teeth grin down at him, while cherubim and seraphim, on wings of walnut and ash, flew over them and the Holy City glowed in pure ebony on the horizon, such a glorious sight that he blushed with shame not to be one of those fighting to liberate it.

But then he had been a boy, his head full of ideals.

Now he was getting old, almost fifty. He had not been on a crusade, yet he had seen more of God’s creation than many of the self-appointed liberators who lay waste to the world in the name of God, then wasted away themselves in Seljuk prisons or suffered torture in Pecheneg dungeons, their heads impaled on lances lining the entrances to heathen strongholds. Johann’s spiritual ideals had taken a backseat to the study of profit and loss, but he never forgot to repeat the Psalm Have mercy upon me, O God, and to look on his wealth with due modesty.

He would establish a church, he swore for the nth time, and commission an altarpiece for it, a huge crucifixion on gold leaf. He’d start to make the arrangements as soon as the worries, doubts, and sleepless nights of the next few days were over. At the moment he had other things on his mind.

He knocked and entered the room beyond the door.

The old woman was sitting in the dark, but she was awake. Johann knew she hardly ever truly slept. Blindness was sleep enough for her, a sleep in which she could enjoy again the scenes from her life when she was young and held court with Werner, long since dead and almost forgotten. Their banquets were famous as far away as London, Paris, Rome. She had entertained Roman cardinals, seen rich merchants from Cornwall dancing in the great hall and gentlemen from Flanders with tall hats and full purses go down on their knees before her. She had been admired for her business acumen, respected for her keen mind, and desired for her great beauty.

All that was in the past.