The Hangman's Daughter

Down by the Lech Gate he met Magdalena, whose mother had sent her to gather wild garlic in the wetlands. She smiled at him in that way again, and he simply followed her. A few washerwomen were standing on the Lech Bridge; he could feel how they were staring at him, but that didn’t bother him.

All afternoon they rambled through the forest down by the river. When her hand brushed against his again, he suddenly felt hot. His scalp began to tingle. What was it about this girl that disturbed him so? Was it perhaps the charm of what was forbidden? He knew that he and Magdalena could never become a couple. Not in Schongau, not in this stuffy hole, where only a small suspicion was enough to send a woman to the stake. Simon frowned. Dark thoughts arose like thunderclouds.

“Is there something wrong?” Magdalena stopped and looked at him. She sensed that something was troubling him.

“It is…oh, nothing.”

“Tell me, or we’ll go back at once, and I’ll never see you again.”

Simon had to smile. “A terrible threat. Even if I believe you would never do it.”

“You wait and see. Well, then, what is it?”

“It’s…about the boys.”

Magdalena sighed. “I thought as much.” Near the footpath was a tree trunk, blown down in a spring storm. She pushed him toward it and sat down alongside. Her eyes looked into the distance. After a while she began to speak again.

“A terrible thing. I can’t get the boys out of my head either, Peter and Anton. I used to see them in the market square, especially Anton. He didn’t have anybody. As an orphan, you’re worth about as much as a hangman’s child. Nothing at all.”

Magdalena pressed her full lips together until they only formed a thin red line. Simon put his hand on her shoulder, and for a long time they said nothing.

“Did you know that all the orphans used to meet at Stechlin’s?” he finally asked.

Magdalena shook her head.

“Something happened there.” Simon looked out across the forest. A long way away the town walls of Schongau were visible.

After a while he spoke again. “Sophie said that they were all at Stechlin’s the evening before the murder. Then they all went home, except Peter. He went down to the river to meet someone else. Who could that have been? His murderer? Or is Sophie lying?”

“And what about Anton Kratz? Was he with the Stechlin woman too?” Magdalena was leaning against his shoulder now, her hand resting gently on his thigh. But Simon’s thoughts were elsewhere.

“Yes, indeed, Anton too,” he said. “And both of them had this strange sign on their shoulders, scratched into the skin with elderberry juice. On Anton it was a bit faded, as if someone had tried to wash it away.”

“He himself?” Magdalena’s head nestled against his.

Simon continued to gaze into the distance. “Your father found sulfur in Peter’s pocket,” he murmured. “And a mandrake is missing from the midwife’s house.”

Magdalena, surprised, sat up suddenly. As the hangman’s daughter she was well informed about magical ingredients.

“A mandrake? Are you sure?” she asked, obviously alarmed.

Simon jumped up from the tree trunk.

“Witches’ marks, sulfur, a mandrake…It all fits together, don’t you think? As if someone would like us to believe in all this spooky stuff.”

“Or if all this spooky stuff is in fact true,” whispered Magdalena. A cloud had passed over the warm spring sun. She pulled her woolen scarf over her shoulders.

“I visited Goodwife Daubenberger this morning,” she began hesitantly. “She told me about Saint Walburga.”

She told Simon about her conversation with the midwife and that she supposed the murders had some sort of connection with Walpurgis Night, which was just a week away. When she had finished, Simon shook his head.

“I don’t believe in these superstitions,” he said. “Witchcraft and such hocus-pocus. There must be some reason these children had to die.”

Suddenly Simon remembered the man with the bone hand. Both Sophie and the maid from the Stern had spoken of him. Had he really inquired about the merchant’s son? Or was that just one of Sophie’s fantasies? With annoyance he recalled that the girl had stolen quite a large sum of money from him. You couldn’t trust that child as far as you could throw her.

With a sigh he sat down again next to Magdalena on the tree trunk. He was feeling cold too. The hangman’s daughter saw that he was shivering and spread her woolen scarf over his shoulders. She sought his hand, found it, and led it slowly to her bodice.

Simon could not stop thinking about the man with the hand of bone. If he really existed and was responsible for what happened to the children, why had he killed them? What connection was there between the two victims, apart from their having been at Martha Stechlin’s on that night of the full moon?

And above all…

Who else had been with Goodwife Stechlin?

Magdalena looked at the young physician from one side. He had been so reserved all day. She had to know where she stood with him.

“Simon, I…” she began.