Death and the Devil

“Forgive me if I was too entranced by your beauty.” His voice was soft and cultured. “Would you do me the pleasure of telling me your name?”

Richmodis bit her lip.

“That’s Richmodis.” Rolof grinned. “Didn’t I say she was sweet?”

“Truly, my son, you did.” He kept his eyes fixed on her. “Richmodis, an enchanting name, though the songs of the troubadours would better express such comeliness than any name. Are you a—relative of my old friend Jaspar?”

“Yes,” she said, putting her basket down on the table. A thousand thoughts flashed through her mind at once. Perhaps the best thing would be to behave naturally. “And no,” she added quickly. “More a kind of friend, if you like”—she paused—“reverend Father.”

“Nonsense.” Rolof laughed, snatching a pear before she could stop him. “She’s his niece, yes? Cheeky young hussy, but nice.”

“Rolof! Who asked your opinion?”

Rolof, who was already biting into the pear, froze, a puzzled look on his face. “Sorry, sorry,” he muttered with a timid glance at the stranger. But the stranger’s eyes were for Richmodis alone, and an odd change came over them, as if a plan were forming behind them.

“His niece,” he said.

“Uh-huh.” She threw her head back, shaking her locks. With pounding heart, but her chin raised defiantly, now she went up to him, scrutinizing him. “Reverend Brother or not,” she said pointedly, “I still think it is impolite not to tell me your name, when I have revealed mine. Is it not good manners to introduce yourself when you enter a strange house?”

The man’s eyebrows shot up in amusement. “Quite right. I must apologize.”

“Your name, then,” she demanded.

The blow to her face came so quickly she was speechless with astonishment. The next lifted her off her feet. Arms wide, she flew over a stool, crashed into the wall, and sank to the ground.

Rolof bellowed. Through a haze, Richmodis saw him throw the pear away and fling himself on her attacker.

Then everything went black.

THE RHINE WHARF

The cranes groaned under the weight, and in the tread wheels operating the cranes, the laborers groaned. It was the sixth ship to be unloaded that day. The goods consisted entirely of bales of cloth from Holland, heavy as lead.

Leaning against a stack of crates, Matthias checked the list of wares that had arrived, ticking off those he intended to purchase. The right of staple, he thought to himself with satisfaction, was rapidly becoming one of the pillars of the Cologne economy. It had been granted a little over a year ago, and now no merchant, whether from Hungary, Poland, Bohemia, Bavaria in the east, Flanders or Brabant in the north, or from the Upper Rhine, could take his goods through Cologne without first offering them for sale in the market for three days. The privilege also applied to goods that arrived by land.

To Matthias’s mind it was a privilege for which the city had had to wait far too long. They had been pursuing it, like the Devil a lost soul, for over a hundred years. Since the channel of the Middle Rhine, which started at Cologne, was relatively shallow, merchants taking their goods upstream had no option but to transfer them to smaller ships there. Was it not then logical to take the opportunity to offer them for sale? Far be it from the citizens to assume this natural feature gave them any rights. After all, it would be tantamount to blasphemy to think that God had made the channel shallower just to divert a stream of gold into the pockets of the merchants.

But then the Church, of all institutions, had promoted the worldly interests of the merchants and patricians. It was Conrad von Hochstaden, always mindful of the needs of his flock, to whom the city owed the privilege! A neat stroke that appealed not to their hearts, but to their purses. The good thing about the right of staple was that during those three days only Cologne merchants had the right to buy. What was more, they could inspect the goods and, if they were found unsatisfactory, tip them into the Rhine. The result was that only the freshest fish and best wines were served in Cologne and the most desirable wares never reached the southern German territories.

There was just one thing about it that stuck in Matthias’s throat. The feeling of being under an obligation to Conrad. It was a paradoxical situation that could only be dealt with by cold reason, cutting out the emotions. His ice-cold reason was one of the few things Matthias thanked the Creator for. At least now and then, when he had time.

His index finger slid smoothly down the list, stopping at one item, a consignment of brocade. “Inspect and buy,” he said.

His chief clerk beside him gave a respectful nod and hurried over to where the ships’ owners were shouting instructions to the stevedores and waiting to start negotiations. Matthias added up a few figures in his head and decided it was a good day. Good enough to consider the purchase of a few barrels of fine wine newly arrived from Spain.

“Matthias!”