The Master's Apprentice, page 36
part #1 of Faust Series
The only thing that cheered up Johann during those days was the thought of seeing Margarethe soon. He counted the days until the feast day of Archangel Michael and wrote short love poems in Greek, which he burned as soon as he finished them. When he lay awake at night, he envisioned a simple life with Margarethe at his side, making wine or farming, with a lively bunch of children around them, somewhere far away from Heidelberg and the university. He fell asleep with those images in his mind.
It was the end of September, only two days before the rendezvous with Margarethe, when Jodocus Gallus called him to the front after a lecture. Johann braced himself for the worst.
The rector looked at him with a serious expression. “I don’t think I need to explain what position you got yourself into with your speech up at the castle,” he said as he cleaned his glasses. “You’ll understand—”
“I will pack my things today,” said Johann.
Gallus paused wiping his glasses, astonished. “What are you talking about? Do you think that just because for once the wind is blowing the wrong way you have to abandon ship? Are you that weak? That’s not like the Faustus I know.”
“So . . . so what do you expect me to do?” asked Johann.
“I don’t expect anything.” Gallus smiled. “I’m merely delivering an invitation. My friend Conrad Celtis would like to see you again, tonight at the castle. Just you this time. It looks like you’re getting a chance to patch things up.” He put his glasses back on and studied Johann out of small, reddened eyes. “For whatever reason, Conrad has taken a liking to you. I’d advise you to hold back on the newfangled ideas this time.”
“That’s . . . I mean . . .” Johann was too confused for words.
“Now you’ve lost the power of speech for the second time.” The rector laughed. “My dear Faustus, I just don’t get you. One day you’re as smart as three doctors, and the next you’re as slow witted as a peasant.” He cocked his head and wagged a finger. “Don’t put me to shame! If Celtis tells me of any foolishness on your part, I won’t be able to keep you here. For a student as young as you, you’ve made an astonishing number of enemies.” Gallus waved his hand impatiently. “Now get out of here before someone sees you with me and draws the wrong conclusions. This place is worse than a bunch of gossiping fishwives.”
That evening, Johann walked up to the castle by himself without any watchmen, torches, or fellow students. The guards had been expecting him and led him up a flight of stairs to the rooms of a side wing where Celtis resided during his stays at the castle. The scholar was sitting alone by a big, open fire that cast the plainly furnished room in a dancing red light. Moldy carpets covered the walls, and a rough-hewn chest stood in a corner. Apparently Celtis was no friend of luxury and comforts. When Johann lingered uncertainly in the doorway, the scholar gestured toward a stool by the fire.
“Sit,” he commanded coolly.
Johann nodded humbly and took his seat. He had sworn to himself to weigh each word carefully this time.
He began, “Honorable master, I am so—” but Celtis cut him off by placing one finger against his own mouth. For a long moment Celtis just sat and scrutinized Johann while the logs in the fire crackled and crumbled into ashes.
“Do you like poems?” asked Celtis eventually.
Johann nodded, surprised. He hadn’t expected this question. “I . . . I write some myself, occasionally. Nothing long, just short, silly lines.”
Celtis smiled suddenly, and dimples appeared in his hitherto stony, forbidding face. “So do I, as you probably know. You remind me very much of another stupid young boy who was hell-bent on doing things his own way and exploring new worlds. That was a long time ago.” He sighed. “But that’s not why I invited you here tonight. It’s about that one question you asked me at our last meeting.”
“You mean . . . Gilles de Rais?” Johann thought he could feel a cold draft sweep through the room when he spoke the name.
“Yes, Gilles de Rais.” Celtis nodded. “May his name be cursed for all eternity. I, too, was once preoccupied with Gilles de Rais, with the dark, the evil in this world. Youth is always fascinated by evil because it goes against order. It is the spirit that denies—much like small children like to say ‘no’ just to oppose their parents. Evil is the chaos that rails against the established truths and perpetually promises new beginnings. I admit, it’s a tempting thought. And I know from personal experience: once a thought has taken root in one’s mind, it gnaws and eats and doesn’t go away. That is why I decided to tell you about Gilles de Rais. So it stops eating away at you.” Celtis paused and stared into the fire, as if the answer to all questions lay in the flames. Then he turned back to Johann.
“Gilles de Rais was no scholar but a French military leader. In fact, he was one of the most famous and bravest knights that country full of noble warriors ever produced. He was a marshal of France and fought alongside the Maid of Orléans, whom the French venerated as a martyr and the English had burned at the stake as a sorceress and heretic. France and England were fighting a war that lasted for over a hundred years and only ended a few decades ago. De Rais was doubtlessly a brave knight, a baron from the lands near the Loire River, and a favorite of the king. He also was a friend of the arts, owned a large library, and tried his hand at acting, bookbinding, and illustrating. But as it often happens, his rapid climb was followed by a dramatic downfall—a fall right down into the depths of hell.”
“What happened?” asked Johann in a whisper.
“Gilles de Rais lived the lifestyle of an emperor, holding grand tournaments and feasts. Nothing was good enough for him, and eventually he ran out of money. First he sold and mortgaged his lands. When that no longer sufficed, he turned to alchemy. He hired a throng of alchemists to find the philosopher’s stone for him and turn lead to gold. He hoped to pay off his debts that way.”
“And? Did he succeed?”
Celtis smiled. “Well, the alchemists, at least, became rich—from his money. De Rais himself sank deeper and deeper into poverty.” He paused, and again the only sound came from the crackling logs in the fire. “It must have been around then that he first turned to the devil.”
“The . . . the devil?”
Celtis nodded. “He made a pact with him. What exactly this pact entailed we don’t know. The interrogation transcripts only tell us what the devil demanded of him—or at least what de Rais believed the devil wanted from him.”
“His soul?” guessed Johann.
“No. That was probably too black even for the devil.” Celtis shook his head. “De Rais gave him the most innocent thing that exists in the world: children.”
One of the burning logs cracked loudly, and Johann shuddered despite the warmth.
Small, twitching bundles in the trees . . .
“De Rais sacrificed children to the devil,” Celtis continued. “Not one, not two or three, but hundreds. He slit them open, bathed in their blood, and drank it. Sometimes he watched the children die and violated them at the same time. Others he suspended with ropes from the ceiling of his bedchamber and watched with relish as they danced and squirmed. Allegedly, he’d chant Christian hymns as they died. He also used their blood to write magic formulas to invoke the devil.”
Celtis sighed; he seemed to find it hard to tell Johann all this, and yet he went on.
“Some of the children were only four or five years old, and others were older. De Rais lured them into his château by the Loire with sweets and promises, and he kept their heads as mementos. Sometimes he painted the faces and asked his servants which head they thought the prettiest. The commoners knew about it, but no one believed them. They hid their children, but de Rais sent out his henchmen and took them all, one by one. He burned the bodies on large andirons and hid the bones in his castles, where they piled up like in ossuaries. It took decades before he was found out by the authorities. The only reason it came to a trial at all was that the king dropped him.”
“And . . . and what happened to him?” asked Johann with a lump in his throat.
“Threatened with torture, Gilles de Rais confessed to his crimes. He was hanged at Nantes, but he lives on in myths and tales. Till this day he is considered the personification of evil, the devil on earth, in some parts of France. But he was just an ordinary man, nothing more. Do you understand?” Conrad Celtis leaned forward. “He was wicked and evil, but he was no demon and certainly not Satan—only the people turned him into that.” He breathed out audibly, as if a heavy burden fell away from him. “I told you this story because I don’t want you to chase a ghost, young Faustus. No matter what you’ve read about Gilles de Rais, he is dead, and his bones have long rotted away. He was a person, no more and no less. We men, we don’t need the devil, because we are the devil.” Celtis slowly shook his head. “I’m rather alone with this opinion, I know. The church can never hear those words. I hope you won’t betray me,” he added.
“If there is a God, then there must also be a devil,” said Johann. “Good can only exist if there is evil, too. The day only bears its name because it differs from the night.”
“Yes, that’s what the Manichaeans used to teach—they were a sect from the early days of Christianity that has long since perished. Who knows, maybe they were right.” Celtis shrugged. “But even if the devil does exist, I’m sure it’s not in the shape of a spendthrift French marshal. Still, I admit that the common people need images in order to understand the abstract concepts of good and evil. In this sense—”
“How old would Gilles de Rais be now?” asked Johann abruptly.
“I told you, he is dead. Hanged on the market square of Nantes.”
“But if he hadn’t been hanged—how old would he be now?” persisted Johann.
Celtis gave another shrug. “I’m guessing around ninety. The war between England and France has been over for a while now.” He rose ponderously. “Now let us conclude our conversation for tonight. I’d still like to compose a few lines in Greek. Remember, I only told you all this so you can stop searching for answers that don’t exist. Understand? Don’t waste the intelligence and ambition you clearly possess on the unimportant. Focus on what’s essential.”
Johann nodded slowly. “I . . . I think I understand. Thank you.”
“Very well. Oh, and . . .” Celtis stopped, turned around, and started rummaging in the chest behind him. “Jodocus asked me to keep an eye out for a mirror for you. I know a glazier here at the castle, and he had this.” He held up a piece of mirror about the size of his palm, showing multiple reflections of the flames. “It’s just a shard, but at least it’s a mirror. Made by the hands of men, the result of intelligence and untiring aspiration—something tangible, not a flight of fancy.” Celtis placed the mirror in Johann’s hand. “Promise me you’ll forget Gilles de Rais for this, all right?”
“I . . . I promise.” Johann gratefully accepted the piece of glass. He looked at it and saw a contorted reflection of his face, as if it had been broken into pieces and put back together. He tried to smile, but the result looked strangely twisted.
Almost as if it didn’t belong to him, but to Tonio the magician.
Or to a man named Gilles de Rais.
When Johann had left, Conrad Celtis remained sitting by the fire, staring into the flames. That accursed cold! He just couldn’t get it out of his bones, not even in the middle of summer. It had lodged itself in his core and was eating him up from the inside.
In the same way as hatred and malice can eat a man up until nothing but an empty shell remains, he thought.
Shivering, Celtis rubbed his wrinkled, gouty hands together. He hadn’t told the promising young student everything about Gilles de Rais. Some details were so gruesome, so horrendous, that the thought alone could make a man feel sick. It was astonishing—for example—how many different uses there were for the skins of children. Or for their eyes.
Other details sounded too far-fetched. They haunted the tales of the simple people like a poisonous mist that never quite lifted. What was reality? What was merely an old wives’ tale? Certain things were so outrageous that they could never become public knowledge. It was impossible to predict how people would react if they found out.
The beast is nigh . . .
Conrad Celtis had been preoccupied with Gilles de Rais for decades. He had found the name in old chronicles and had kept digging. It had become almost an obsession over the years, and Celtis was afraid that this obsession might now be taking hold of a highly inquisitive young student who wasn’t ready for such knowledge.
And so Celtis had kept certain pieces of information from Johann. They were all written down in the book where he noted anything he’d ever learned about Gilles de Rais. Celtis had traveled to Paris and Orléans; he had scouted the counties and estates along the Loire and spoken to the old folks. He had found terrible things at the châteaux Champtocé, Machecoul, and Tiffauges. Especially at Tiffauges.
Conrad Celtis closed his eyes and tried to push back the memories into the deepest corner of his consciousness. By and by, the individual pieces had come together in a horrific mosaic. He had written everything down and then locked away the book, as if he could somehow lock away the truth.
And now this young student had come along, this Faustus, and asked about Gilles de Rais. It was as if he’d reawakened the evil with his question.
How did he know the name?
Celtis decided that all his cumulative research was too dangerous to remain in the pages of one book. If it landed in the wrong hands, it could set fire to the world.
He stood up with grim determination and walked over to the chest. He opened it and took out a small, tattered book. The pages were covered with handwriting, and in some places his hand had trembled so badly that the writing was barely legible. Celtis leafed through the pages one last time and shuddered.
This goddamned cold . . .
Then he hurled the book into the flames, which immediately started to devour the pages hungrily. One by one, the pages turned to ashes, and finally the leather book covers burned away, too.
The truth about Gilles de Rais had gone up in smoke for good.
When Johann showed Valentin the shard of mirror the following day, his friend looked at him with surprise.
“Celtis gave this to you, on the request of Rector Gallus?” he asked. “So you aren’t as deeply in disgrace as I thought. How was your conversation last night?”
“Oh, I apologized for my rash words and we talked a little about Plato and the Greek tragedies. That was all,” replied Johann. “Celtis truly is a learned man.”
Valentin scratched his nose. “I still don’t understand what your last question was about—you know, up at the castle. About that Gilles de Rais. Who is that guy? Something about it must have angered Celtis very much.”
“And now the waves are calm again,” replied Johann dismissively.
Celtis’s words the day before had unsettled him and stirred up old memories that he’d tried in vain to forget. He hadn’t been able to sleep, tortured by those memories: the missing children at Knittlingen and later in the mountains near Innsbruck, the pentagram in the tower, and then the eerie meeting with the man named Poitou—another French name. He and Tonio had conversed in French, of that Johann was sure. But he still didn’t know what had really happened in that clearing near Nördlingen.
Small, squirming bundles . . .
Just before dawn, Johann had dug out the knife that had been with him for so long now, and he studied the engraving.
G d R.
What if this knife truly had belonged to Gilles de Rais once upon a time? The blade was razor sharp. What had the knight from the Loire Valley used it for?
Johann shook himself, and Valentin gave him a quizzical look. “What is it?”
“Nothing. Let’s speak of something else. What about our laterna magica? Do you think the mirror glass will be enough?”
Valentin turned the shard in his hand thoughtfully. “Hmm. We’ll need a glazier to cut it first. The source of light ought to meet the mirror from as many angles as possible to achieve maximum brightness. We can’t do anything else until then.”
“Then we’ll just have to wait a few more days. I have other obligations anyhow.”
Valentin grinned. “Let me guess. Something about a girl at a nunnery?” He sighed deeply. “Afterward, don’t say I didn’t warn you. First the incident with Celtis and now this. If they don’t throw you out of school because of arrogance, then they’ll do it because you’re dallying with a nun.”
“Not if you keep your fresh mouth shut,” retorted Johann gruffly, and he immediately regretted his words. Why had he allowed his temper to flare up again? He had hoped seeing Margarethe would finally put his mind at rest. Valentin was the only friend he had in Heidelberg—he couldn’t lose him, too.
“Forgive me,” he said. “Things have been getting the better of me lately. Let’s take a look at our laterna magica. I need a distraction.”
“There’s nothing to forgive.” Valentin smiled secretively and gestured toward the door. “Come to the shed. I have a little surprise for you.”
Valentin had been busy indeed. The casing was finished and the oil lamp installed; they hoped it would provide a better light than a candle. Valentin shyly pulled a small wooden box from under the table. It contained several glass plates.
“I got the glass from the glazier of the Church of the Holy Spirit,” he said. “It’s nothing special—just a start. But I think the images might have a nice effect.”
Johann picked up the glass plates and held them against the sunlight streaming through the shed’s window. He laughed with surprise. Valentin had painted small animal scenes on the glass. Johann made out a wolf, a cat arching its back, and a stag with stately antlers.
“These are fantastic! The stag looks as if he’s about to leap off the glass.”
