Old Bailiff Werner raged about the abbey’s manors with surly men-at-arms in tow. In years past, his title ranked him just beneath the abbot in matters of administration. To his dismay, however, the new abbot had granted more and more powers over legal and financial matters to the lay counsel hired from Runkel, even recently conferring the title of “steward” on the man.
Werner’s duties now were more like a constable’s—keeping the peace, collecting taxes, arresting criminals, and the like. Given the perpetual threat of invasion he was instructed to maintain order at any cost to life, limb, or property. And so he did.
On a warm night a few days after the Assumption of the Virgin, the men of Weyer were summoned together by Reeve Dietrich. “I’ve news from Werner,” he began. “Seems the new abbot is severely troubled by all the scrumping. I’ve had grain stolen from the mill barns just this past week. Others have lost pennies here and there. Yeoman Gottshalk had near to a mark taken from his bed… behind a barred door! The church in Emmerich was pilfered of a relic! Abbot Udo says the Devil’s afoot again and needs be stopped.
“He’s begged more Templars’ help in keeping good order. He’s garrisoned more of their mercenaries in the cloister and Heribert’s men are roving about. Now here’s why you’d be called: Lord Heribert’s knights caught a young lad of Niederbrechen thieving the Templars’ strongbox in the abbey. Some say he’s filled with a demon.”
“How old?” came a voice from the crowd.
“Methinks he’s six or so.”
A rumble stirred through the men. “And what of it? Why needs we stand here?”
“Aye … here’s the rub for us. We’ve been ordered at the morrow’s eve-tide to witness the boy’s penalty, we and every boy of the village over three years.”
A loud protest rose from the men. “We’d be in harvest time! They drive us like oxen from light to light and now want us to walk hours for some waif from Niederbrechen?!”
“Aye, ‘tis the command.”
“But why?” shouted another.
“Seems the abbot is weary of the troubles. ‘Tis as simple as that.”
The men cursed and swore, groused, grumbled, and kicked the dust, but by the bells of vespers on the next day they were descending the winding road to Villmar.
Heinrich thought the evening to be eerie and filled with haunts. He and his sons followed his fellows through the waning light into Villmar village where he was led to a flat field adjacent to the abbey’s walls. Here the men and boys of the abbot’s manor crowded into a murmuring mass of some thousand souls—a legion of weary, wool-clad peasants sweating and cursing in the humid summer’s night. The men of Weyer found their place before a large square lined by torches and edged with well-armed footmen. The sight gave pause to all.
Heinrich held one son in each hand. The boys were crushed and pressed on all sides by the hips and elbows of those squeezed against them. “Vati!” cried Karl.
“Aye, little lad,” answered Heinrich, “let me lift you here.” The man hoisted his frightened redhead atop his broad shoulders and held one leg tightly. The boy grasped hold of his father’s head and stared at the torches lighting the square. He was a happy child and one apt to giggle before he’d cry. But on this night the weight of dread gave the lad a chill.
Heinrich noticed a column of mounted soldiers with torches snaking their way through the crowd. A wagon was in the center of the procession and it bore a wooden cage. Wil could only hear the comments of those taller than he, so, against his father’s command, the boy forced his way through the crowd and toward the square. He pushed and grunted, squatted and crawled his way to the front and finally found himself peering into the center of the field through the thighs of a wide-legged soldier. His gaze fell upon a platform and on the platform, two posts and a beam.
The wagon and the horsemen slowly made their way to the base of the stage and a company of footmen formed an impenetrable fence between the crowd and the gallows. Wil felt suddenly nervous and imagined the firelight was surely drawn from the furnaces of hell. The almost seven-year-old wished he had not left his father’s side.
A priest, none knew whom, stepped first upon the platform. Behind him followed Werner accompanied by two knights of Runkel and the executioner. The hangman was bare-chested and his head draped in a black woollen hood. At the sight of him the crowd began to murmur. The cart stopped at the steps leading to the gallows and Wil spotted a small, skeletal lad shaking and crying within the cage. Wil had learned to hide his heart but he surely had one, and the sight of the helpless boy released a flood of tears.