The Grimscribe's Puppets Read Online Free PDF Page A

silence, slipping from the cloister through the east gate, never to return to those hallowed corridors.
    His departure wore hard upon me and was followed by the loss of many others. By November of that year, we were reduced to half our original number. My own life in Christ seemed more hesitant than before, less certain. Prayer times came to resemble a duty, a mere chore, bereft as they were of Friedrich’s voice. My faith had been emptied of all beauty, all substance, like a wine-jug that has been overturned but from which one longs to drink.
    And yet, for a time, this thirst was enough. Though empty, it sustained me through the chill of the subsequent winter, giving warmth by the desire it enkindled, the aching to be filled with something more: the substance of things half-glimpsed, or dreamt of.
    In the spring, the Count initiated the construction of a wooden amphitheater outside the city walls. The builder, a Florentine of some renown, modeled its architecture on that of the Roman Colosseum, albeit wrought in timbers rather than in stone, so that we feared the Count intended a return to the barbarisms of the past.
    The Bishop, too, was dearly aggrieved by the lavishness of the planned structure, as the Cathedral was in need of repairs and the church coffers nearly empty; but the Count would not hear his petition. Since autumn, the Count had abandoned all public appearances, to which he had once worn a silver mask, and it was rumored that his disfigurements had worsened in recent months, though these tales remained unconfirmed.
    Work on the amphitheater continued without abatement through Lent and the Easter season. During that time, the townsfolk spoke of little else. It was said that the entire city’s populace would fit within its walls, though to what purpose we knew not. The builders were from the south, and spoke a foreign tongue, while the two young boys who stole inside were returned in chains to the castle and never heard from again.
    In April, the amphitheater was finished, and on the first of May, the doors were opened. Criers throughout the city announced the performance of a morality play to be held that very evening. The Prior forbade us from going—the Abbot being indisposed, and the Order dependent on the good will of the Bishop—but we later learned from the madwoman Anna, an almswoman who lived off the fruit of our gardens, of that first night’s performance.
    The amphitheater, she said, was a thing of rare and marvelous beauty, with a flagstone stage ringed by half-a-dozen terraces supported by wooden joints and tresses. On that evening, the whole of the city crammed inside eagerly, laughing and whispering to each other in the hush of that new season.
    The best view was reserved, naturally, for the Count, who possessed a box overlooking the stage, with a heavy curtain drawn round it on three sides. A tunnel was said to lead directly to the box from the building’s exterior so that none might see him as he arrived.
    Much time passed. The Cathedral bell tolled not once but twice before the actors emerged onto the stage from the undercroft below. At first, Anna assumed the subject of the play was to be the torments of hell, for it dwelt heavily on the sins of its three principal characters, depicting their transgressions in vivid, near-loving detail.
    There were scenes of murder, theft, and rape; couplings with man and beast; and violence of the meanest sort directed toward a pair of maidens in white, much of it inflicted with a barbed whip. The actors—if actors they were—comported themselves with such zeal that many members of the audience crossed themselves and averted their faces, while others watched, enraptured, unable to look away.
    Anna belonged to the latter group. She detailed the characters’ exploits with obvious relish, giggling to herself as she described the violation of the maidens, which was followed in turn by the hearty consumption of communion wine and the spirited desecration