“HER NAME, FATHER,” said Prince Heinrich at last from the spot where he lay on the cold stone floor of his turret, and from which spot he had for some time stared in placid silence at the black-robed astronomer, “was Ludmila. She was the daughter, the only daughter, the only child, of the bloodletter Zikmund who came once a week to open my veins and bleed me into my father’s beloved agate bowl, a procedure intended to relieve my nervousness, Father, for I am a nervous person, I am a known nervous person, that is not meant as an excuse. From the moment I laid eyes on her I said to myself, You mustn’t touch her, Heinrich, no touching, no touching, this one is not to be touched! Even if she wants to be touched, you must not touch her, no touching, I said to myself. And for a long time, Father, I actually did not touch her.” The astronomer told Leibniz: “Meanwhile I am thinking, Does he actually believe I’m a priest? Perhaps he does, I hope he does, but it would also be quite in keeping with what little I know of Prince Heinrich’s character for him to be playing games with me, calling me Father, confessing to me some contrived and sordid tale, even asking me for absolution, all while knowing precisely who I am and lying in wait for the right time to reveal it. Do not forget,” the astronomer told himself, he told Leibniz, “that you might not be the only person here putting on a performance…” He, the astronomer, inspired by the prediction he’d allegedly made in his horoscope but which had probably been inserted by the Court Chamberlain, had returned to the Prince’s turret disguised in the vestments of a confessor, with a hood over his head, and he had knelt before the thick wooden door and rapped on the iron bars with the splendid gilded staff lent to him at the Emperor’s behest by the deacon of the Cathedral of Saint Vitus, and with the attitude of bemused compassion with which the Benedictine monks had gazed upon him he had asked the Prince to open the door so that he might hear his confession and provide to him the sacrament of reconciliation. His pleas were met, once again, with silence. This time, however, the four guards in the corridor leapt to their feet, as reverent of his religious regalia as they’d been scornful of his scientific paraphernalia, and as three of them genuflected before him the fourth took out a set of keys and said: “We can let you in if you wish, Father, but I’d advise you to minister to the Prince through the door, the last servant to go in the turret was stabbed five times in the legs with the Prince’s penknife and once in the head, and only by the grace of God did he come out again with his life.” And the astronomer said: “Let me in.” And as the other three readied their pikes, the tips of which could be seen to quiver, the fourth guard unlocked the door, bowed his head and mouthed a prayer as the astronomer entered, and then promptly clanged the door shut again and bolted it twice.