silver.
Detlef jerks his horse’s bridle and leads off the procession,across the square and into Komodienstrasse towards the first of the accused. The mare, sensing her rider’s reluctance, is slow but then quickens her pace, excited by the scent of a distant ocean brought by a breeze off the Rhine.
Meister Matthias Voss is dreaming of frogs. Dancing frogs dressed in silver hose. They are singing and Meister Voss strains to hear the lyrics. He turns in the bed and pushes his plump buttocks towards his sleeping wife, Gretel. Dimly conscious, she smiles at the bulk of the man she loves and wraps her strong arms around his waist. Meanwhile, Meister Voss is wrestling with the amphibian ballet: he thinks they might be singing about being cooked in a soup, but the lyrics are in French and he is nervous that he has misunderstood the word consommé. Suddenly the singing becomes shouting and the frogs are flying everywhere. The dreaming Voss spins around, trying to catch them, then realises to his great chagrin that he is naked.
He wakes sharply to the sound of loud banging. Gretel clutches him, her long grey plaits falling between her pendulous breasts.
‘Matthias! What is it? Maybe Mathilde, maybe she has been taken! Oh, my poor child, to die so young!’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, woman!’ the merchant replies, still struggling with the dull weight of his dreaming. For a second he remains frozen upright in bed, his weeping wife beside him, unable to find a rational meaning for the calamitous pounding below.
‘I will go.’
‘No! Let the servants answer! Please, Matthias.’
But the old merchant is already on his feet, the furred nightcap pulled down over his weathered brow, his silk nightdress tumbling over the veined belly, the vulnerable sacof balls and cock, the gnarled feet which have stood on sand, grass, polished wood, marble and straw. Before Meister Voss can pull his old cloak trimmed with mink across his shoulders, his valet bursts into the bedroom followed by three young cathedral guards and a short friar of Mediterranean appearance bristling with self-importance.
For an instant Meister Voss thinks they have come to ravish his wife. Forgetting that she is now old and grey, he throws himself in front of her naked body. A soldier turns away to snicker.
Now visibly quivering with righteousness, the friar steps forward and speaks in German with a heavy Spanish accent. As Voss’s senses shake themselves awake and the words slowly penetrate his understanding, he recognises the man as Inquisitor Carlos Vicente Solitario, the friar he had ridiculed only the night before with his fellow bürgers in the local beer hall.
‘…the Grand Inquisitional Council of Aragon charges you with two indictments of wizardry, one charge of conspiring against the Holy Roman Empire and one charge of consorting with the devil himself,’ Carlos finishes.
‘You pumped-up piece of religious shit! You have no right to do this!’
‘Matthias! Please! Don’t make them more angry,’ his wife pleads, but the old man, his fur cloak now over his shoulders, has mustered his full authority. He glares at the friar.
‘This is a free city, you have no power over us bürgers! The Gaffeln shall hear of this, they will use your hypocritical shaved pate to wipe their arses!’
Canon von Tennen steps from behind the soldiers and Voss falters. Here is a man he both recognises and respects. Unable to connect Detlef’s presence with the proceedings, confusion muddles the old man for a moment as he ponders the frightening possibility that the canon might be there to give him the last rites.
‘My apologies, Meister Voss, for the inconvenience of our visit but the Gaffeln knows about the charges. They also know about the other matter—the passing of bad silver to a certain Portuguese merchant.’
‘What bad silver? I have never dealt in bad silver in my entire life.’
‘Nevertheless, the charges must be examined.’
‘You know these are
Detlef jerks his horse’s bridle and leads off the procession,across the square and into Komodienstrasse towards the first of the accused. The mare, sensing her rider’s reluctance, is slow but then quickens her pace, excited by the scent of a distant ocean brought by a breeze off the Rhine.
Meister Matthias Voss is dreaming of frogs. Dancing frogs dressed in silver hose. They are singing and Meister Voss strains to hear the lyrics. He turns in the bed and pushes his plump buttocks towards his sleeping wife, Gretel. Dimly conscious, she smiles at the bulk of the man she loves and wraps her strong arms around his waist. Meanwhile, Meister Voss is wrestling with the amphibian ballet: he thinks they might be singing about being cooked in a soup, but the lyrics are in French and he is nervous that he has misunderstood the word consommé. Suddenly the singing becomes shouting and the frogs are flying everywhere. The dreaming Voss spins around, trying to catch them, then realises to his great chagrin that he is naked.
He wakes sharply to the sound of loud banging. Gretel clutches him, her long grey plaits falling between her pendulous breasts.
‘Matthias! What is it? Maybe Mathilde, maybe she has been taken! Oh, my poor child, to die so young!’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, woman!’ the merchant replies, still struggling with the dull weight of his dreaming. For a second he remains frozen upright in bed, his weeping wife beside him, unable to find a rational meaning for the calamitous pounding below.
‘I will go.’
‘No! Let the servants answer! Please, Matthias.’
But the old merchant is already on his feet, the furred nightcap pulled down over his weathered brow, his silk nightdress tumbling over the veined belly, the vulnerable sacof balls and cock, the gnarled feet which have stood on sand, grass, polished wood, marble and straw. Before Meister Voss can pull his old cloak trimmed with mink across his shoulders, his valet bursts into the bedroom followed by three young cathedral guards and a short friar of Mediterranean appearance bristling with self-importance.
For an instant Meister Voss thinks they have come to ravish his wife. Forgetting that she is now old and grey, he throws himself in front of her naked body. A soldier turns away to snicker.
Now visibly quivering with righteousness, the friar steps forward and speaks in German with a heavy Spanish accent. As Voss’s senses shake themselves awake and the words slowly penetrate his understanding, he recognises the man as Inquisitor Carlos Vicente Solitario, the friar he had ridiculed only the night before with his fellow bürgers in the local beer hall.
‘…the Grand Inquisitional Council of Aragon charges you with two indictments of wizardry, one charge of conspiring against the Holy Roman Empire and one charge of consorting with the devil himself,’ Carlos finishes.
‘You pumped-up piece of religious shit! You have no right to do this!’
‘Matthias! Please! Don’t make them more angry,’ his wife pleads, but the old man, his fur cloak now over his shoulders, has mustered his full authority. He glares at the friar.
‘This is a free city, you have no power over us bürgers! The Gaffeln shall hear of this, they will use your hypocritical shaved pate to wipe their arses!’
Canon von Tennen steps from behind the soldiers and Voss falters. Here is a man he both recognises and respects. Unable to connect Detlef’s presence with the proceedings, confusion muddles the old man for a moment as he ponders the frightening possibility that the canon might be there to give him the last rites.
‘My apologies, Meister Voss, for the inconvenience of our visit but the Gaffeln knows about the charges. They also know about the other matter—the passing of bad silver to a certain Portuguese merchant.’
‘What bad silver? I have never dealt in bad silver in my entire life.’
‘Nevertheless, the charges must be examined.’
‘You know these are
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