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Show cloak and used it to knock the head of a rat which was crawling up the leg of my hose. I jumped back as the rat fell dazed to the floor. "Put more water in the horn cup, Geist," he said to me. After I'd done what he asked, he picked up the stunned rat and held it head-down in the water. I saw no look of disgust on his face as the creature feebly kicked its hind legs before it drowned. When it was quite dead, he slipped it inside his cloak, and turned to leave. Just at that moment Master Hermann entered the shop, his ruddy face sprinkled with raindrops and his heavy belly heaving from the exertion of walking two squares from the Market Church. "Good day, Master Hermann," the dark man spoke. "Good day, Gast," Master Hermann replied, using our word for "stranger". Master Hermann looked at me, raising his hairy eyebrows to question what this man was doing in his shop. I couldn't answer, because I didn't know. "I see that Hamelin town is afflicted with rats, too," the stranger said. "Too...too? Are other places full of the filthy things?" Master Hermann kicked at one of the rodents that ran in front of him. "You haven't heard? The city of Magdeburg had a pestilence of rats just like this, not more than a month ago. Within two weeks the Magdeburg citizens caught a terrible illness, and many died." "What? A terrible sickness in Magdeburg? What kind of sickness?" The stranger had reached the door, but he stopped to answer Master Hermann. "The suffering was horrible. I saw it myself, even though I |
