Heidelberg Effect (16 page)

She nearly collided with Sister Therese when
the older nun halted abruptly at the first stall and began to talk
in a low voice to the proprietor, who was an old man missing both
ears. He appeared to have no trouble understanding Sister Therese,
because he nodded his head vigorously throughout the brief
one-sided conversation. When Therese handed him a handful of beets,
the earth still sticking to their roots in clods, he put a slim
flask of amber liquid in her hand. Ella didn’t know whether it was
brandy or wine or medicine. She watched as Sister Therese tucked it
away in the folds of a cloth in her basket, then nod curtly at the
man before walking into the street.

Not for the first time, Ella wondered about
the benefit of accompanying the nuns on their market trips. She
couldn’t speak the language—at least not this medieval version of
it—and they rarely traded enough produce to fill up the three
baskets they always started with.

The closer they got to the square, the more
Ella could feel the excitement and energy of old Heidelberg seep
into her bones. The little novice must have felt it too, because
Ella could swear the girl was moving with a bounce in her step.
Ella was hoping the novice would look at her so they could share an
anticipatory smile, but the girl kept her eyes down.

A squealing pig bolted out in front of them
and Ella looked up to see who was chasing it. Sure enough, a boy
dressed in rags emerged from one of the shops and gave chase. She
stopped to watch the boy tackle the screaming pig, wrestle it into
his arms, and begin to walk toward the shop. The pig squirmed out
of his hands and made another desperate bid for freedom. The boy
grabbed a back hoof and dragged the pig into his arms. By this
time, the boy, who was muddied and sitting in the middle of the
street, had drawn a crowd of people who were enjoying the show.
Ella was absolutely positive that she and Heidi had sat outside
this very shop a few weeks earlier drinking chocolate martinis and
gossiping as the sun faded and the evening claimed the street. She
turned to see how the novice was enjoying the pig wrestling, and
realized that the other two had disappeared.

Frowning, she quickened her pace to catch up
to them. How could she explain to Greta that she was distracted by
a pig and lost her companions? She began to run. She looked along
both sides of the street for two black forms in the shops although
she knew the nuns didn’t go into shops. Ella had only ever seen
them trade with stall owners, most of whom were in the square at
the Church of the Holy Spirit.

Damn! How could they have
gotten so far ahead of her so quickly?
She
willed herself to take a breath and slow down. A running nun was an
even more bizarre sight than one looking all around like she was
watching a circus on parade.
How can I
look down to avoid calling attention to myself and still find
them?
In spite of her best intentions, she
felt a creeping sense of panic welling up in her chest.

On the street, the pungent
smell of horse manure combined with the aroma of rotting vegetables
and mulled spice wine. Ella crossed the street in case there were
riders behind her. In her experience, they rarely made an effort to
avoid running one down in these congested market walkways. She
craned her neck to see over the crowd of people in front of her.
They were not moving toward the square as she would have expected.
They were just standing. Frustrated, Ella switched her basket to
her other arm.
Should she just return to
the convent?
Her companions obviously
weren’t too concerned by her absence. They
did
walk off and leave her. Then
again, they probably didn’t even know she wasn’t with
them.

She stepped on a man’s foot and he turned
around and snarled at her. He hesitated when he saw that she
appeared to be a nun—and that she was looking at him directly in
his eyes—but his lips still curled away from his teeth in an angry
grimace. Ella was too afraid to excuse herself, fearful that
something about her voice or her words would be too out of place in
this time, so she dropped her eyes and hoped she looked as penitent
and contrite as she was supposed to be. The man moved away and Ella
took in a long breath. She decided to slow down. She wasn’t going
to find them in all these people and it really didn’t matter
anyway—except for the fact that Greta would never want her to leave
the convent again.

It occurred to her that if this was going to
be her last taste of freedom for a while, she might as well make it
count. She made her way against the crowd to a point near one of
the many alleys and stood with her back to the brick wall. She
tried to tell whether any part of this Heidelberg was recognizable
as the Heidelberg she had known for the last three months. The
cobblestone street and the church were the only things she really
noted as the same. They looked like they had been superimposed over
a very dirty patch of countryside. The crowd seemed to be moving in
all directions in a sort of controlled pandemonium. The sounds were
a cacophony of talking, shouting and animal noises. Her stomach
clenched when it occurred to her that the larger-than-normal crowd
might be for an execution. One more reason not to head toward the
church, she thought, where the platform would be. She felt safe off
to the side and because she wasn’t dodging carts and horses or
having to look over her shoulder for would-be rapists, she was able
to detect when the crowd began to behave differently.

It started with a change in the volume of
the noise of the street. A growing roar seemed to sweep the narrow
road, culminating about a block further up. When Ella looked to see
if there was a reason for the crowd’s reaction, she could see that
most of the people walking down the road were bottlenecked in front
of the main grocer’s. Thinking it might be another escaped pig or
even a troubadour or street juggler, Ella edged her way closer to
the crowd, most of whom stood with their backs to her. Before she
reached them, the mob roared, in approval, it seemed to Ella, but
there was no applause. She tried to remember if people clapped in
this century when they liked something. Squeezing through the wall
of people was impossible unless she wanted to be manhandled.

She skirted around the group, hoping to find
a gap where she could see what the crowd was watching. As she got
closer, she could see there were men on horseback in the center of
the square. Her stomach did that funny flopping sensation she often
got when she felt, as they used to say in Atlanta, that someone had
stepped on her grave. She had managed to inch her way past only two
people in the crowd when the mob cheered again. This time, she took
advantage of the movement and pushed her way to the front of the
crowd, using her basket as a battering ram to push her way through.
When she saw what the street entertainment was, she cried out and
dropped her basket.

Two hooded men on horseback circled the old
nun as she ran to each one and tried to pull them from their
saddles. Ella thought Sister Therese must have gone mad until she
saw poor Anna, the novice, slung limp and still across the saddle
of one of the riders. She ran to Therese, stepping over the basket
in the street. The bottle of amber liquid was smashed against the
cobblestones.

“Leave her!” the nun
shrieked as she grappled with the boot of the man who held
Anna.
Before Ella could reach her, the
mounted man raised a slender baton over his head.

“No!” Ella screamed, as he brought it down
full force across the old nun’s face. Sister Therese crumpled to
the street, her arms upraised to ward off another blow. Ella ran to
her. In the back of her mind she could hear the crowd going mad
with cheering.

Dear God, are they applauding the murder of
an elderly nun?

She knelt by Therese and looked into her
battered face. Within seconds she was on her feet and facing the
two on horseback.

“You bloody bastards!” she yelled.

The crowd was stunned silent for a moment
and then roared with laughter at her outburst. The man holding Anna
began to laugh too but the man with the bloodied baton brought his
horse closer to where Therese lay and Ella stood.

“You are a slimy coward,”
Ella said, her voice strong but shaking, “to steal little girls and
beat old women. You must have balls the size of
lady peas
.”

The man leaned forward in his saddle until
Ella was in easy striking distance. She stood, unmoving, her legs
planted wide, her eyes tight with fury.

“I intend that you should find out the size
of my balls for yourself,” the rider said smoothly. When he pulled
his hood off as slowly as a magician presenting a magic trick, the
crowd sent up a cheer that he bothered to acknowledge with a boyish
grin and a wave of his bat.

It was Axel. His dark hair, ruffled by the
hood, looked playful and wild. If she didn’t know his heart to be
as cold as a pit viper’s, she would have called him handsome.

“Leave us alone,” she said
in her modern German, aware that the crowd was listening and
murmuring behind her. She held her chin up and forced herself not
to look at the baton in his hands. She could hear no sound from
either Sister Therese or the novice.
Dear
Lord
, she prayed,
please don’t let this be the end for them.

Axel wiped Sister Therese’s blood from the
bat onto his horse, then crossed his arms over the saddle
pommel.

Ella turned from him to the fallen nun and
immediately felt the baton press firmly between her shoulder
blades.

“Leave her,” he said.

Ignoring him, Ella knelt by the woman.
Within seconds a pair of strong hands seized Ella and dragged her
away from the nun. Ella gasped and struggled but the man, who had
been standing in the crowd, held her firmly.

She watched Axel swing down from his horse,
the baton in his hand. He approached her slowly then swiveled on
his heel and went to stand by Therese’s body. Without taking his
eyes off Ella, he put his foot on the old woman’s chest.

“The next time we meet,” he said, “I will
have you.” He smiled at her. “But today you are my message
bearer.”

“The hell I am.”

Axel dropped the bat and pulled his claymore
from the sheath on his back. He placed the tip of it on Therese’s
breast.

“I think she breathes yet,” he said to
Ella.

Ella sucked in a breath and lurched toward
him but was restrained.

“You will deliver my message?” he asked,
almost sweetly.

Ella nodded, not trusting herself to
speak.

“Tell the Mother Superior,”
Axel said with a smile, “that Axel Krüger says
bit by bit and piece by piece, the moon
wanes
.”

Ella ran the whole way back to the convent.
She ran not caring that she was making a spectacle, that she was
not looking down, that she had lost her basket, that her long hair
had escaped her nun’s wimple and was flying out behind her. In her
mind she saw Axel’s face leaning down to hers. She was astounded
that one man could hold so much hate. She ran in a panic, her only
focus to see Greta, to tell Greta. She needed to see her face.
Together they would make a plan. They would get Therese and Anna
back. They would stop this madness. Somehow.

She jerked open the convent door, stumbled
into the hall and shouted, “Greta! I need you!” Without waiting for
an answer, she ran to Greta’s bedchamber although it was barely
noon and Greta never went there in the daytime. Ella pounded on the
door but didn’t wait to see if anyone was inside. Instead, she
turned and ran to the kitchen. Before she reached it, she saw Greta
in the hall coming toward her.

Just the sight of Greta, walking toward her
so tall and erect, filled Ella with a peace as soothing as a
mother’s embrace. Ella stopped running and her breathing came in
gasps. The closer Greta got, the more Ella could see by the
resolute tilt of her chin and the sadness in her eyes that she
knew. She already knew.

An hour later, Greta put on her cloak and
spoke to the group of seven nuns huddled before her. “No one is to
leave until I return,” she said.

Ella grabbed her arm. “Greta, no! This is
exactly what he wants you to do. You can’t go!”

“Who would I send, Ella?” Greta asked
gently. “If not me, who?”

Ella looked around at the other women. They
looked at her with fear and confusion, not understanding her
English. She would offer to go herself and was on the verge of
suggesting it, but she knew Greta would go anyway.

“Promise me you’ll be careful,” Ella said.
“Even asking questions—”

“I will return, Ella,”
Greta said. “Or I won’t.” To the nuns, she said, “Do your chores.”
She turned to go and then spoke to Ella. “You
can
help me,” she said.

“Name it.”

“Pray.”

And then she walked out into the cold
afternoon air of early November.

Ella watched her go and had never felt more
helpless or angry in her life. She ran to the alcove window to
catch a glimpse of her as Greta walked up the narrow lane. Ella
watched until she was out of sight and then turned and went into
the kitchen, where she spent the day kneading dough and baking. She
pounded the dough vigorously, stopping only to peer out the stone
window in the front of the convent from time to time to see if she
could see Greta’s tall dark form coming down the pathway.

As the day dragged on, her
fears grew. The other nuns and novices were nervous and alternately
prayed loudly or wept in despair. Ella watched them go through the
motions of their daily chores, their heavy coarse habits dragging
in the dirt behind them as they moved.
What will I do if she’s gone?
she
thought.
There’s no one in this time who
understands me.