Father Benedict—(Shouting.) You hear me?
A Woman's Voice—Husband!
Father Benedict—(Enraged.) Malediction!
(The church door is jerked open, and the people come pouring out with anxious faces lest something terrible has happened. Back in the church, above the heads of the people, is seen the altar ablaze with lights, and high behind it a colossal cross with a beautiful carven Christ upon it. The wound in the side shows red and over the thorn-crowned brow is an arch bearing in golden letters the inscription: FORGIVE THEM FOR THEY KNOW NOT WHAT THEY—The DO has never been put on.)
Pierre— (Staggering up from the steps.)
Run, run to the mountains, men!
Quick! quick!
They're dragging him off! They're dragging him off!
O run, run, run, run, run!
Cries—What—where—who is it?
Pierre—Yonder! yonder!
Oh, get torches,
Get torches and run
And kindle fires on the mountain tops
So he may see his way!
No, that won't help! Oh, that won't help!
But he can hear, though!
Call, call to him!
Search all the places where the blind may be!
Run shouting "Oswald! Oswald!" through the woods!
Find him, oh, find him before Satan comes!
Before the storm breaks!
They'll track him by the blood drops!
They'll tear his body on the mountains!
O men, dear men— (A clap of thunder. Pierre dodges.)
What—what was that?
Oh, God said something! God said something!
(Pointing up at the sky.)
He knows! He knows!
Lord Jesus knows that it was not his fault!
And He will pay—oh, He will bless you, men!
Do, do, do run!