Jürgen Meister is a mestizo of European and Indian descent in his forties, a landowner outside Abeto Rojo — “the southern road, but more to the west” — and the last known bearer of the Meister name, that of “a family of renegades” left outside both tribe and town.
| Type | Character |
| Weapons | Two-handed hammer, short sword, long sword |
| Spanish entry | Jürgen Meister |
Description
“A two-meter man”, or two meters ten by another witness, with “an immense back”, coppery weathered skin, a red-black beard and thinning hair. He wears studded leather armor, once “other armor”; one piece is called the cámara de sangre (“blood chamber”). He wields “a two-handed hammer, a heavy hammer”, carries a short and a long sword, and travels in a donkey cart where the hammer is stowed. He fought alongside companions during the days at Abeto Rojo.
Family
There are two ranches. On Jürgen’s land lives his grandmother, who keeps it and raised him; she may know the entrances to the tunnels. On the other lives his grandfather, “a half-cracked old man”, estranged from her, with “the other children who did stay”.
His father is “a somewhat dark figure”: he lived through the time of the plagues, dyes his hair black with oil to look younger, and left town. Jürgen has not seen him in years.
Property and reputation
He owns acres west of the Southern Road and has “one of the Indians” as a servant, who drives him and minds the donkeys. He recovered “with much effort” a pig bandits had stolen from the rancher Harbrook. In a legal confrontation with Harbrook he disarmed in stages: short sword, long sword, and last the hammer.
In Abeto Rojo people step aside for him; the bad name is inherited: “you have a bad name because of your grandfather, your old man”.
A spot marked by tracks is known as the place where bandits attacked him and stole his gear. This drives him toward the bandits and toward the rock.
Conflicting accounts
- The Indian woman expelled from her tribe for being with a Meister is, in one account, the grandmother; in another, “My mother was expelled from her tribe”, the Gonquina tribe, “I was raised by my grandmother”.
- The father’s name: “I am Julio Meister, son of Oriote”; or “I am the son of Aria”.
- The father’s fate: “Yes, he’s dead. They were attacked, the bandits, they broke everything.” Or: “I’ve been told he’s at the rock. He told me he’s waiting for me there.”
Open questions
- Whether the two ranches are one split property; the number of acres.
- What the cámara de sangre is; the servant’s name and terms.
- What earned the Meisters their infamy.
- Whether he recovered his gear; where the rock is.