Authors: Kenneth Wishnia
But soon he caught his breath and became quite stern, and he told her that it is God’s will that men strive to acquire and maintain control over their wealth and property, and that in order to do this, one must invest wisely, and taste of many different wines; but while a finger or two of the cheap and ordinary wines may be good for a quick nip in the middle of the day, only the most valuable wines are lovingly stored in the master’s cellar, and that this arrangement would remain in place for the rest of her days. Nothing could change the way things were, which was a nice way of saying that she wasn’t fit to polish the hinges on the front door, much less cross its threshold as the lady of the house.
“So you just keep using the back door,” he said, and went back to shuffling his papers.
After a minute passed and she hadn’t budged, he turned back.
“What on earth is the matter with you? You stupid little girl! Did you actually believe that some handsome prince would whisk you away from the kitchen? Now get out of here!”
Erika left the room biting her lip to keep back the tears, because the awful truth was that she
did
believe that a handsome prince was going to whisk her away from all this drudgery. And now it wasn’t going to happen.
By the time she slammed the back door and ran through the streets, the tears were flowing, but they were tears of rage. A man could only get away with ruining a girl without getting married or paying a fine if it was her word against his, but if there were
witnesses
, that changed everything.
Master Kopecky had just provided her with two witnesses, and she was going to make him pay.
She ran all the way to Cervenka’s butcher shop, but her girlfriend wasn’t there, just some idiot named Janoshik who was babbling to her friend’s parents and saying that all he wanted was to get married, but that Anya had taken one look at him and Father Makofsky and had turned and fled
toward the ghetto
.
Erika dreaded the thought of going near that filthy place, but before she knew it, her feet were carry ing her toward the
Judenstadt
. She passed a church where some well-dressed Jews had fled seeking sanctuary, and the city guards were dragging them down the steps in irons while a group of cutpurses and whores stood around laughing at the luckless Jews.
But she also saw the neighbors—
her neighbors!
—welcoming some of the refugees, who were sick with fright, and snatching them off the street moments before they were found out by the authorities. It disgusted her to see good German families taking such vermin into their homes and offering them protection. They were nothing less than traitors to the race, as far as she was concerned.
The
Reiters
had taken a roundabout route to the Pinkas Gate, but by the time she got there they had already found some way of squeezing past it and entering the ghetto, and the street was overflowing with different factions arguing over tactics and strategy.
“I say we burn down the whole ghetto!” said one of the Catholic defenders.
“Not before its riches have been secured and returned to the emperor and the Church,” said another.
“So the plan is to loot first,
then
burn.”
“Right.”
“Why don’t we attack Bethlehem Chapel instead?”
“What the hell for?”
“It’s an easier target.”
“That’s because there’s nothing to steal.”
Erika felt herself being pulled in several directions at once as she got caught up in the maelstrom. The opposing streams repelled each other like oil and water, while a couple of Jews bobbled around between them like bits of driftwood.
One of the Papists grabbed the el der ly Jew and cursed him for supporting the Protestant rebels, and was about to slay him on the spot when Sheriff Zizka arrived with a crew of his brothers, and swung his club at the Jew’s attacker, smacking him so hard that the man’s nose and mouth bled all over the front of his shirt.
“How can you protect our enemies when they’re prepared to use black magic against us?” one of the assailants challenged him.
“They’re entitled to the same legal protection as anyone else,” said the sheriff.
By this time the gate had broken open, and the mob rushed in. Then suddenly everyone stopped in their tracks and stared open-mouthed at the hellish sight of a creature from the bowels of the earth standing in the middle of the street, surrounded by burning houses.
Erika heard the old Jew ask the sheriff, “Tell me,
pane Žižko
, why are you helping us?”
And she couldn’t believe her ears when the sheriff answered, “Some of us remember when the Jews helped defend the city by digging a moat around the New Town, even though—”
“Even though you wouldn’t allow us to swear an oath of loyalty to the homeland,” said the old Jew.
Zizka nodded gravely.
“We also supplied you with food and weapons, and what did it get us?” said the Jew.
“It got us expelled from Bavaria,” said the other Jew.
“Well, I say the hell with the Bavarians,” said Zizka.
Awful screams and howls came from one of the burning houses, and strange lights danced before her eyes.
“What the hell’s going on in there?” asked the sheriff.
The rabbi said some magic words in his Satanic language.
But only Erika knew the answer to the sheriff’s question. She yelled the sheriff’s name, and when she got his attention, she announced, her voice strong and unwavering, “There are two men in there, sent by my master, to plant a jar of cow’s blood in the Jews’ houses.”
CHAPTER 36
THE BIG FELLOW YANKED OPEN the drawers and dumped out the contents, tossing papers right and left, until he found a brass optical scope and some kreuzers that he stuffed into his pocket, and the grand prize—a thick gold pocket watch on a chain. He tossed the watch to the man with the gun, who caught it one-handed and flipped it open.
“My, my. Will you look at the time,” said the man with the mustache, glancing at the pocket watch.
His aim never faltered.
At least I knew who the leader was now. My eyes flitted to the other one, looking him over for any weapons besides what he was already carry ing. The heavy leather sack hanging around his shoulders seemed to contain nothing but loot, but I couldn’t be sure.
“What are you looking at, Jew?”
The other mercenary waved the long-handled pistol at me to regain my attention.
My nostrils tingled as the scent of burning wood and other chemical substances filtered up from below.
“We were just studying the workmanship of your gun,” said Rabbi Gans, emphasizing the phrase as if every word held great significance. “It’s a very finely wrought instrument, certainly a piece worthy of a nobleman or a burgher, not a lowly freelance soldier.”
“You fancy yourself an expert on guns, old man?” The mercenary’s eyes flashed as if he had just thought of something particularly vicious and amusing to do with us.
Thin gray tendrils of smoke were curling up through the floorboards.
“You fellows are going to be left holding the bag,” he said with more glee than the situation really called for. “Klaus!”
The big man took the bag from his shoulder and laid it on the table.
I felt a tingling in my spine as I became aware of a light scratching in the walls, as if a million tiny insects had gotten into the woodwork. It gradually swelled to an angry crescendo as thousands of rats fled the burning houses. It almost felt like they were crawling over my skin.
“Ha! Just look at him turning yellow on us,” said Big Klaus.
“He’s barely worth the price of the ball and powder,” said the other mercenary, raising the pistol and pointing it directly at my forehead.
“Wait!” I said.
The mercenary smiled coldly.
“O kind sir, grant us one last prayer of absolution before we die,” I said.
“That would be the Christian thing to do,” said Rabbi Gans, doing his best to sound like a pastoral minister.
The mounting flames were casting twisted shadows in the stairwell behind the two mercenaries.
“If we are to be martyrs,” I went on, “then we need to spend our last moments contemplating the true and ineffable Name of God with such devotion that its glowing letters appear before our eyes. One who is so transported will feel the flames as cold.”
This seemed to offer the promise of easy capitulation and some small amusement, so the mercenary agreed.
“O Lord, hear our prayer,” I said. “Grant us the honor of being martyrs for the Sanctification of Your Name.”
I started swaying like a candle in the breeze as the words poured out of me, keeping up the flow of formulaic syllables until I could get away with a short prayer in Hebrew that would translate roughly as,
Blessed art Thou, O Lord, our God, for giving me the scaling knife that is under my shirt
.
And Rabbi Gans swayed along with me and said many great and noble things in the language of our prayers before responding with the phrase,
Who hallows us with His Commandments, and Who commands us to know that mechanism of the wheel-lock pistol is notoriously unreliable at close range
.
“And let us say, Amen,” I said.
“Amen.”
Another shadow joined the ghosts of the dancing flames in the stairwell.
I continued: “For as Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel says, the world is sustained by three things. One—”
“Justice.”
“Two—”
“Truth.”
“Three—”
“Peace!
”
I lunged for the leader’s gun as Rabbi Gans flung himself at Big Klaus and tried to hold him in a bear hug. I grabbed at the mercenary’s forearm but he swung it away from me. Since he had no other weapon, he had to swing it back at me, only this time I got my hand around the barrel and pointed it at the ceiling. We wrestled for control of it, and I let him gain some ground, drawing his weight forward, so that just when he expected me to push harder, I gave way and let him fall toward me. Then I used his momentum to slip around and get him in an awkward one-armed neck hold while I grabbed the pistol stock with my scalded hand. I think I left some of my skin in the teeth of the wheel-lock device. It was painful as hell, and the pain came out of me in the terrible war cry of the tribe of Judah.
The floor was quaking beneath our feet, and the magic lantern fell to the floor with a crash. A number of candles rolled out and came to a stop in the middle of the pile of papers scattered around the floor. The papers caught fire and the flames spread quickly.
Rabbi Gans wasn’t much of a challenge for Big Klaus, who tossed him off like a feather pillow. But the big bruiser’s eyes widened when a giant of clay came stomping up the stairs and had to bend low to enter the room. Big Klaus stood frozen with fear as the Golem slowly straightened up and approached him, step by plodding step, inching ever closer.
My adversary jerked his elbow back and jabbed me in the gut again and again until I was forced to let go of him and pull away, but this also freed me up to get out the knife. He spun around and aimed at me, but I was already lunging at him with my knife. The pistol’s mainspring must have been pretty heavy because he jerked the trigger a little too hard, raising the barrel just enough to save my life as the spark was struck and the powder exploded and blew a hole in the wall about two inches above my head. Hot powder residue flew into my face as I got in close and thrust the blade in under his arm.