The Witch of Cologne
‘Then surely there is even more reason to visit her now?’
Detlef again speculates on Ruth’s intentions. Convinced by her tone that she knows he and Birgit were lovers, he wonders if this is another trial of his affection.
‘You are suggesting I should take her confession?’ he asks incredulously.
‘I am suggesting that we should do everything in our power not to attract suspicion.’
‘Naturally, but I cannot execute what you suggest, out of respect both to Meisterin Ter Lahn von Lennep and to myself. I am no longer a man governed by his bodily desires alone.’
Ruth turns away to hide her dismay at the confirmation of what she had only suspected, questioning the perversity which has forced this revelation. He is a man, naturally he has loved before, she thinks. Again she finds herself trying to apply Spinoza’s philosophy, to achieve liberation through reining in her passions.
The philosopher’s animated face appears before her. ‘If you can free yourself from the dictatorship of the passions then all that occurs will be a result not of your relations with the external but of your own true nature within, which is God himself.’
His words come back to her, a consoling remembrance that anchors her to some semblance of reality. Rebuking herself for depending on Detlef’s affection for her contentment, she decides she must rely only on the happiness she can muster from within: the strength of man’s inherent state, solitary, at one with nature. But still she loves him. Only God knows how much she loves him.
Detlef watches her, her eyes downcast, staring at a line of ants that are transporting a crumb of cheese down the carved leg of the table. It is this very complexity which causes him both to adore her and suffer for her, but there is a mystery about her that is equally tantalising and infuriating. He fears she is a terra incognita that he will be driven to possess over and over.
‘You are unhappy?’
‘I am not unhappy, I am asleep and it is taking a long time for my furies and joys to shake themselves awake,’ she answers softly, hoping he will be assuaged by the plea in her eyes.
Detlef drinks down the last of the wine then reaches for the leather travelling sack slung across the arm of a chair. He takes out a small red silk pouch.
‘I purchased a curio for your pleasure. From Adolf Bescher of the watchmakers’ guild.’
He opens her curled hand and places the soft pouch into it. ‘I hope it will amuse you.’
She pulls open the purse: a ground lens falls out, its curved surface glinting on the wooden table. Crying out with delight she holds it over the trail of ants.
‘Now we shall be the giants who decide the fate of others and marvel at the most intricate of God’s work.’
She places a fork across the insects’ path and watches through the lens as one ant, an Atlas dwarfed by its globe of Edam, struggles bravely to climb the massive pewter arm of the utensil.
‘Let us be benign giants, in case our actions be judged by less generous giants above us, my Ruth, for tolerance must be the only way.’
‘Something I have seen little of these past few months.’
‘Indeed, but faith is an inspiration towards the betterment of the self. We must not allow ourselves to be contaminated by hate.’
She suddenly grips his hand. ‘Promise me you will never travel without bearing arms. Swear that if you are attacked you will fight back to defend yourself.’
‘You forget that I was a trained soldier before I was a cleric.’
But Ruth, instead of being comforted by these words, winds her arms around her womb and rocks gently.
The heavy scents of rose and benjamin fill the chamber. Crinkling petals cover the small walnut side table where they have fallen from a brass vase in which Ruth has arranged a bouquet of the yellow and burgundy blooms. The window, its diamond panes creating a prism of moonlight, has been pushed open. A heavy tome, its yellowed pages fluttering slightly in the breeze, sits open at a reading stand beside a silver candleholder embossed with the von Tennen shield.
Across the stone floor is a bed whose carved wooden frame is over a hundred years old. Ruth and Detlef lie stretched out half under the embroidered coverlet. Eyes open, his long lean form is curled around her, his arms under and around her belly, a glistening pale sphere. The tautness of her flesh amazes him, her breasts are like veined fruit about to burst. He buries his face in her hair and breathes in her scent. He has never felt more at peace, never closer to God. Suddenly he feels the child beneath kick.
Ruth is woken by the movement. ‘He will have strong legs like his father,’ she murmurs, pulling the coverlet across her chilled skin.
‘She will be wilful like her mother,’ Detlef answers, smiling in the dark as he feels another ripple in the flesh.
‘It is a male child.’
‘But how do you know?’
‘I have seen him in my dreaming and also he is sitting high in the womb.’