slapped with a switch, a stick, a calloused hand; I’d been forced to sleep in the stables without food or a blanket; I’d been called a fool and a slob and a thousand other useless names. But my legs eventually went numb, my bruises healed, I learned to withstand hunger and cold and harsh accusations, and I never confessed to something I didn’t do.
Eva was going through each book on the shelf with a feather in a largely symbolic search for wayward crumbs that might have fallen into the cracks between the pages. Rabbi Loew gave her a pat on the shoulder as I followed him toward the door.
We stopped to look at what Rabbi Gans had written. After the first few words, he had switched from ornate Hebrew capitals to cursive Yiddish:
On Friday, the 14th of Nisan, 5352, or March 27 of the Christian year 1592, in the sixteenth year of the reign of Emperor Rudolf II, may his glory be elevated, there arose a new persecution based on the ancient lie, the dreaded blood libel.
“Good start,” said the rabbi. “Now write that the first thing Rabbi Loew and his assistant shammes did was go to the kehileh to secure a formal request for the transfer of the accused, Jacob Federn, from the municipal to the imperial prison. He’ll be safer there.”
I asked, “Why are we wasting time going to the Town Council? Why not go directly to the keyser?”
“We’ve got a better chance of getting the emperor’s ear if the request comes from the whole community.”
I nodded.
“All right,” said the rabbi. “Then kum aseh.” Get up and do.
I helped Rabbi Loew put on his winter cloak, and together we went out to the street armed with nothing but the will to perform a mitsveh, a positive act, almost a holy deed, since it is written that whoever saves a single life is looked upon as if he had saved the entire world.
CHAPTER 7
WHEN THE INQUISITOR’S CARRIAGE and retinue crossed the Vltava River into Prague, the waters were churning so violently that it spooked the horses. The driver said the river was riding high with early runoff from the highlands, but the Inquisitor knew this was surely the Devil’s work. And so was the slow fire eating through his guts. His backside also hurt from the long, hard ride down through the Brenner Pass, another sign of the Devil’s torment, but he took courage from the protective shield of the true faith that hung around his neck like a mantle of steel. Bishop Heinrich Stempfel had spent a lifetime sniffing out unbelievers and heretics, and was ready to confront the enemy in any form. He challenged the wicked ones to reveal their ugliness and try to keep him from exposing their sinful acts to the pure, bright light of truth.
He winced as their hellfire clawed at his tender places, but he was damned if they were going to keep him from seeing this mission through to the end. His cause was just.
Bishop Stempfel had his own priorities, but the new pope had given him his orders: Catholic Prague had been without a leader for two years since Archbishop Medek’s death, may God rest his soul, and that empty seat had to be filled by someone who was prepared to crush the gathering forces of Protestant heresy and reclaim the fractious Bohemian territory for Rome. As his caravan pulled into the courtyard of Our Lady of Terezín, with its Italian-style parish house, all arches and orange roofing tiles, Bishop Stempfel thought, “And here come a couple of the contenders.”
Archpriests Hermann Popel and Andyel Zeman were positioning themselves at the head of a long red carpet, jabbing each other with their elbows while waiting to receive the Pope’s envoy with all the drums and colors and pomp and protocol appropriate to his station.
A pair of liveried footmen opened the carriage door and placed a velvet stool on the flagstones for the bishop, who waited for them to lay an embroidered handkerchief on the cushion before he stepped down. He was followed by his closest aide, Grünpickl, and his scribe, Stuck.
Popel and Zeman led a procession of choirboys holding pure white candles to greet Bishop Stempfel, who took a gilded casket from Grünpickl and presented it to the two archpriests as a gift from His Eminence in Rome to the faithful of Prague. It contained a holy relic, the bones of a child killed by King Herod of Judea during the slaughter