Part 5

The people were like a wall separating me from the two lovers and holding me upright. I had now lost sight of Master Theodoros, the hooded Michael Groland and my cousin Cecilia. But I could still see over the heads of the crowd the fair pale virgin on the steps in the last rays of the setting sun standing in the middle of her family and looking down at the waggon with the holy casket and the bad, horrific legion of the lost and sick. A memory came back to me then of that time when, in the Church of the Holy Cross in Karlstein castle, the good knight Michael Groland had knelt down next to me in front of the imperial crown and swore that he would gain the Empire's other crown, the best wife from the best town in the Empire. And as this thought came to me there was a cry of amazement and the crowd drew back and in the evening light I saw Mechthilde smiling over the heads of the people and waving at the lepers. I felt myself shiver with fright and watched the maid climb down and vanish from under the red light that stained the portal of the Church of the Holy Ghost, but a sudden racket moved the people mightily. Under the porch the other young women raised their arms and cried out. The councillors too rushed forward and climbed down. I was dragged forward by a human surge and an arm grabbed me just in time and pulled me away from horses' hooves just as the imperial regalia were passing. The horses had reared and kicked out, but Master Theodoros Antoniades had saved me from their hooves and the feet of the crowd. And behold, and I saw before the shrine that concealed the most holy relics of the German nation that love truly is stronger than death, yes, even a fate worse than death.

In vain my friend and brother tried to draw back to the gruesome crush of his co-sufferers. The sword that had stood between him and the world outside the hospice of Saint John had no power here to protect him. In vain the grey-haired leper mother threw herself in Mechthild's way and tried to push her back with outstretched arms. In vain her relatives, her parents and her brothers rushed up to her. No-one was able to hold Mechthild back. She advanced with a firm step and placed both her arms on the shoulders of the lost one and laid her fair pale cheek against the hair shirt covering his chest. Healthy people drew back in fear whereas the lepers of Saint John's sick bay pushed forward. Deep silence descended.

"Michael," declared Mechthild. "Michael, look, you hid from me, but here on the holy ground of my forebears I have won you back for myself. I knew this moment would come when no power on earth could stop me. How else could I have put up with life? Will you not now keep your promise to me, my friend? The promise that you made before the imperial crown? Today before the same crown, I am reminding you of it. The earth is on its last legs, but we, you and me, have survived. You will not drive me from you! You'll not hide any longer from your bride, from your wife!"

Gently and yet almost wildly and with great panache she threw back his monk's hood from his brow and for the first time since we had said goodbye to each other in Castle Karlstein, I once again looked on my friend's beloved face. The scourge with which God punishes nations had not been kind to the proud knight and his fine head was dreadfully impaired. The leprosy that was eating away at his strong arms and feet and his brave true heart had rendered his face terribly old and gaunt and consumed all the fire in his eyes. And his hitherto so solid feet could not support this poor leper longer in his mixture of misery and unspeakable good fortune. He fell down onto the bright form of his betrothed and she bent down towards him as if she were comforting a child.

And because they were all well-informed now in Nuremberg about the love between this couple and the cruel fate that they now shared, a cry arose, an extraordinary cry. All of a sudden all the sick had started to shout: "Lord, have mercy on us!" From the Church of the Holy Ghost at the same time they had struck up with: "Gloria in excelsis Deo!" The doors were thrown open and across from the high altar lights and candles glimmered out into the night. The press of people on all sides grew and a wave of them eddied round the shrine containing the imperial crown jewels. In every street people moved towards the portal of the Holy Ghost Church in droves as the holy of holies was borne up the steps high upon the shoulders of its chosen bearers. In the crowd no-one was in control of themselves any more. I helped Cecilia Stollhoferin up from the ground and my Greek master Theodoros and I protected her with our bodies. The beautiful Mechthild was dragged off with the lepers and no longer visible when the imperial crown was laid on the altar and one could finally look for her. The storm and stress of the constant crush had slackened off.

How we searched for her in the streets of Nuremberg! The cousins and friends of the Grossen waited at the gates with drawn swords, but hundreds of lepers in dark patches had now got as far as the Church of Our Lady, were crossing the Herrenmarkt, going past the Town Hall and across the wine market through the night back to the New Gate. No-one in the course of that evening or that night was able to glimpse the knight Groland von Laufenholz and the charming Mechthildis in that awful procession.

At the New Gate I spoke to cousins and friends of the family. Truly Brother Johannes Capistranus today in his pulpit has not shed his heart's blood in his words as I did that night. With weeping and gnashing of teeth the noble lords withdrew and noble ladies and young ladies who were also related helped me to make sure that no wild action was committed out of madness, impotence and grief.

When everything had calmed down, I followed alone the way that the lepers had gone out of the town to the hospice of Saint John. It was not quite dark, but there was still some light in the darkness and when I came near to the stone cross, next to which the year before a sword had stood in the ground, I made out a dark shape sitting on the bench.

Shuddering I hesitated and called out to the shadow from afar.

Then a voice answered through the darkness: "Makarioi oi penthountes, hoti autoi paraklethesontai! Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted!"

It was the old faithful teacher, the homeless Greek man from the island of Chios who spoke to me the words from Our Lord Jesus Christ's Sermon on the Mount. I walked to him in silence and he took my hand, said nothing else, but pulled me down to the stone bench and pointed to the light streaming out of the windows of Saint John's hospice.

There was a humming sound and a crowd both in the house and around the house that was dreadful to hear and even worse to imagine during the night like that. We sat there until after midnight in the cold and dark and listened to the singing of lost souls and the sad tones dying away towards dawn. We sat there numb to night, frost and cutting wind. We sat there quietly, the Byzantine teacher and I, the old man and the young one and there was no difference in our state of mind.

That was the night in which my whole life changed. Through the dirges sung in Saint John's hospice I heard the sweet and childish voice as Saint Augustine once did. From the earliest times onward down to the present horrid time all that I experienced as I lived and breathed went past me and behold, out of great suffering great peace grew. Yes, I am a man and have become serene. The penance that Brother Capistranus demanded of the people of Nuremberg today is not the same as that imposed upon me by God's grace in the days of my youth when we fought for the imperial crown and the imperial crown was returned to us. I have witnessed with patience the barbaric noise of earthly battles, with patience the passing play and change in nature. Nevermore have I grieved when leaves in autumn turned to grey and gold. I take too but a modest pleasure when a new spring tempts forth fresh green grass to decorate the world. I have said goodbye to fear and remained unswerving in my resistance to the things that time has seen fit to torment me with.

Time's torments were appalling admittedly. Once more I rode out against the Hussites and saw at Aussig Germans laid low. I came home wounded from this bitter battle and found my friend and good knight Michael Groland of Laufenholz no more in need of things of earth. I encountered his wife in the streets, fine and upstanding in the habit of a nun. She was supporting old Stollhoferin, the leper mother and greeted me quietly. Foolish people made the sign of the cross on account of her strange fate, but the time was at hand when wise people too would envy her peace of mind. Mechthilde Grossin had a great life and eventually succeeded to the title of Mater Leprosorum. She picked up the name like a laurel wreath in the miserable surroundings of Saint John's hospice from the floor thereof and wore it like a crown till she died and there were many who called her the imperial crown herself though that name never got as far as her ears and would have had no meaning for her lofty heart.

I saw much that was splendid: the wealth and the hubbub of Venice, the ancient monuments of Rome and the sunshine and blue sea of Naples. I became aware of everything with open eyes and, applying my will and my knowledge to them, did not miss any of the things that my daylight paths offered. I spoke before princes and the senates of proud republics and my efforts for the health and good of my noble home town did not go unrewarded. Now all that is behind me. These are my twilight years.

In May of the year 1453 Constantinople fell into the hands of a pagan foe. The half moon of Diana, the crest of Byzantium, stood upon the Turkish field insignia against the cross of Christendom. But the books and parchment rolls, written out laboriously by the hands of monks and scribes, the noble manuscripts our good friend Michael Groland, when we were young, elbowed off the table in the garden bower, were put into the hands of humanity at large by the new art of printing. Tolle! Lege!

Master Theodoros Antoniades was spared the experience of the total collapse of the Eastern Roman Empire, but he saw the first printed book and had wise things to say about it.

The Holy Roman Empire's crown is still in Nuremberg. Who will once again bring honour to it in the world?