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Business goes
on, no matter what.”
    Reinmar almost told his father that he had already been to see Albrecht, but
he strangled the impulse. Was he not playing his own game now? Was he not
determined to make his own discoveries, so that he might make up his own mind?
    “Are we really in danger?” he asked, instead.
    “I hope not,” Gottfried replied, dryly. “But it would be in the interest of
everyone in town if the witch hunter were to pass swiftly through. We must hope
that he finds what he is looking for, and that he brings his business to a swift
and successful conclusion.” He looked down at Luther as he spoke, but the old
man had pulled his black cap over his forehead and had closed his eyes.

 
 
Chapter Seven
     
     
    Reinmar would rather have gone with his father to see Albrecht than mind the
shop, but he knew that it was useless to protest. Godrich had better things to
do than stand at the counter, and Reinmar knew that it would take far more than
a mere witch hunt to make Gottfried Wieland consent to close his shop during
business hours.
    As it turned out, though, Gottfried’s was a wasted trip. Albrecht was not at
home, because Machar von Spurzheim had sent soldiers to arrest him and confine
him in the town jail. They would have arrested his housekeeper too, but she had
fled. The rumours that flew around the town were divided as to whether she had
merely run away for her own safety or had gone to warn the secret vintners that
trouble was on its way. As soon as Gottfried returned he threw himself into
making urgent preparations for Reinmar’s imminent buying trip.
    As Reinmar had anticipated, Gottfried delegated Sigurd to serve alongside
Godrich as his protector on the expedition. Sigurd normally worked on the quays
loading and unloading barges, in which service he had built up an impressive set
of muscles. Whenever the stevedores engaged in tug-o’-war competitions against
the local land-labourers, Sigurd was the anchorman who tipped the balance, and in any local contest of individual
strength he was the certain winner. He had never been trained in swordsmanship
but he could wield a staff with terrific force and cunning, and his fists were
as powerful as clubs. He was the kind of man in whose company any lesser mortal
would feel safe, and Reinmar was glad to see him waiting with the wagon when he
brought his own pack down from his room, not long after first light on the
following day.
    He was not so pleased, however, to find Matthias Vaedecker waiting alongside
Sigurd, with a pack of his own. He was not wearing his military colours,
although he was carrying a crossbow.
    “What are you doing here?” Reinmar asked, in frank astonishment.
    “I’ve been ordered to travel with you,” the sergeant said, airily. “Herr von
Spurzheim is anxious for your safety. There are rumours of monsters abroad in
the hills.”
    Reinmar’s eyes flicked back and forth between the squat sergeant and the
massive Sigurd. “There are always rumours of monsters in the hills,” he said.
“Wise men know better than to take them seriously.”
    “The truly wise man is the one who knows when rumours that are not usually to
be taken seriously begin to carry evil import,” the sergeant informed him,
coolly.
    It seemed perfectly obvious to Reinmar that Vaedecker had actually been
commissioned to spy on him, or at the very least to use the expedition as a
cover enabling him to spy on the vintagers they intended to visit and any other
travellers who might be abroad. He knew, too, that Vaedecker must be aware that
it was obvious—but that was not a licence to say the words aloud. All Reinmar
said, instead, was: “Where’s your horse?”
    “I’m an infantryman,” the sergeant replied, mildly. “The horses on which I
and my companions arrived in Eilhart were hired, time being short while we still
hoped to catch the man we were following before he disembarked. I shall be quite
content to ride in