“Show me. Hmmm… Interesting, interesting… Everything, it turns out, remains in the family. And revolves around the family.”
“What family?”
“So close to home, it couldn’t be closer.” Łukasz Friedmann still appeared to be utterly absorbed by his rings. “Thomas of Bohemia is the great-grandfather of our Reinmar, the lover of other men’s wives, the man who has caused us such confusion and trouble.”
“Thomas of Bohemia…” The burgermeister frowned. “Also called Thomas the Physician. I’ve heard of him. He was a companion of one of the dukes… I can’t recall which…”
“Duke Henry VI of Wrocław,” Friedmann the goldsmith calmly offered in explanation.
“It is also said,” Hofrichter interrupted, nodding in confirmation, “that he was a wizard and a heretic.”
“You’re worrying that sorcery like a bone, Master Jan,” the burgermeister said with a grimace. “Let it go.”
“Thomas of Bohemia was a man of the cloth,” the priest informed them in a slightly harsh voice, “a canon in Wrocław and later a diocesan suffragan bishop and the titular Bishop of Zarephath. He knew Pope Benedict XII personally.”
“All sorts of things were said about that pope,” added Hofrichter, not letting up. “And witchcraft occurred among protonotaries apostolic, too. When in office, Inquisitor Schwenckefeld—”
“Just drop it, would you,” Father Jakub said, cutting him off. “We have other concerns here.”
“Indeed,” confirmed the goldsmith. “And I know what they are. Duke Henry had no male issue, but three daughters. Our Father Thomas of Bohemia took the liberty of a dalliance with the youngest, Margaret.”
“The duke permitted it?” Hofrichter asked. “Were they such good friends?”
“The duke was dead by then,” the goldsmith explained, “so Duchess Anne either didn’t see it or chose not to. Although not yet a bishop, Thomas of Bohemia was on excellent terms with the other nobles of Silesia. For imagine, gentlemen, somebody who not only visits the Holy Father in Avignon, but is also capable of removing kidney stones so skilfully that after the operation, the patient doesn’t just still have a prick—he can even get it up. It is widely believed that it is thanks to Thomas that we still have Piasts in Silesia today. He aided both men and women with equal skill. And couples, too, if you understand my meaning.”
“I fear I do not,” said the burgermeister.
“He was able to help married couples who were unsuccessful in the bedchamber. Now do you understand?”
“Now I do.” Jan Hofrichter nodded. “So, he probably bedded the Wrocław princess according to medical principles, too. Of course, there was issue from that.”
“Naturally,” replied Father Jakub, “and the matter was dealt with in the usual way. Margaret was sent to the Poor Clares convent and the child, Tymo, ended up with Duke Konrad in Oleśnica, who raised him as his own. Thomas of Bohemia grew in importance everywhere, in Silesia and at the court of Charles IV in Prague, so the boy had a career guaranteed from childhood onwards—an ecclesiastical career, naturally, all dependent on what kind of intelligence he displayed. Were he dim, he’d become a village priest. Were he reasonably bright, he’d be made an abbot in a Cistercian monastery somewhere. Were he intelligent, a chapter of one of the collegiates would be waiting for him.”
“How did he turn out?” Hofrichter asked.
“Quite bright. Handsome, like his father. And valiant. As a young man, the future priest fought against the Greater Poles beside the younger duke, the future Konrad the Elder. He fought so bravely that nothing was left but to dub him a knight and grant him a fiefdom. And thus, the young priest Tymo was dead, and long live Sir Tymo Behem of Bielawa. Sir Tymo, who soon became even better connected by wedding the youngest daughter of Heidenreich Nostitz, from which union Henryk and Tomasz were born. Henryk took holy orders, was educated in Prague and until his quite recent death was the scholaster at the Church of the Holy Cross in Wrocław. Tomasz, meanwhile, wedded Boguszka, the daughter of Miksza of Prochowice, who bore him two children, Piotr and Reinmar, this Reynevan who is causing us so much trouble.”
Jan Hofrichter nodded and sipped beer from his mug. “And this Reinmar-Reynevan who’s in the habit of seducing other men’s wives… what is his position at the Augustinian priory? An oblatus? A conversus? A novice?”
“Reinmar of Bielawa,” Father Jakub said, smiling, “is a physician, schooled at Charles University in Prague. Before that, the boy attended the cathedral school in Wrocław, then learned the arcana of herbalism from the apothecaries of Świdnica and the monks of the monastery of the Hospital of the Holy Ghost in Brzeg. It was those monks and his uncle Henryk, the Wrocław scholaster, who placed him with the Augustinians, who are skilled in herbalism. The boy worked honestly and eagerly in the hospital and the leper house, proving his vocation. Later on, he studied medicine in Prague, again benefitting from his uncle’s patronage and the money his uncle received from the canonry. He clearly applied himself to his studies, for after two short years he was a Bachelor of Arts. He left Prague right after the… erm—”
“Right after the Defenestration,” the burgermeister said, undaunted. “Which clearly shows he had nothing in common with Hussite heresy.”
“Nothing links him with it,” Friedmann the goldsmith calmly confirmed. “Which I know from my son, who also studied in Prague at the same time.”
“It was also very fortunate,” added Burgermeister Sachs, “that Reynevan returned to Silesia, and to us, in Oleśnica, and not to the Ziębice duchy, where his brother Piotr serves Duke Jan as a knight. Reynevan is a good and bright lad, though young, and so able at herbalism that you’d be hard-pressed to find his equal. He treated the carbuncles that appeared on my wife’s… body, and cured my daughter’s chronic cough. He gave me a decoction for my suppurating eyes, which cleared up as if by magic…” The burgermeister fell silent, cleared his throat and shoved his hands into the fur-trimmed sleeves of his coat.
Jan Hofrichter looked at him keenly. “Now all is clear to me about this Reynevan,” he finally pronounced, “I know everything. Misbegotten, albeit, but of Piast blood. A bishop’s son. A favourite of dukes. Kin of the Nostitz family. The nephew of the scholaster at Wrocław Collegiate Church. A friend of rich men’s sons at university. On top of that, as if that weren’t enough, a conscientious physician, almost a miracle worker, capable of winning the gratitude of the powerful. And of what did he cure you, Reverend Father Jakub? From what complaint, out of interest?”
“The complaint,” the parish priest said coldly, “is no subject for discussion. Let’s just say that he cured me.”
“It’s not worth the worry of executing somebody like that,” added the burgermeister. “It’d be a shame to let such a lad perish in a family feud, just because his head was turned by a pair of beautiful… eyes. Let him serve folk. Let him treat folk, since he is skilled—”
“Even by using a pentagram drawn on the floor?” snorted Hofrichter.
“If it works,” said Father Gall gravely, “if it helps, if it eases the pain, why not? Such abilities are divine gifts; the Lord gives them according to His will and according to designs known only to Him. Spiritus fiat, ubi vult, it’s not for us to question His ways.”