Into the open door of the church the fugitive turned—and disappeared.
The soldiers stormed in after him in a transport of fury and expectation, but the church was empty save for the figure of the curé standing at the altar. They searched for the hunchback, but he was nowhere to be seen. They threatened the curé, but he made no answer.
Then a corporal, avarice overcoming revenge, seeing a gold cross on the church wall above the pulpit, rushed up the pulpit steps and laid hand on it.
A "click" resounded through the church.
The curé said, quietly,
"The first man who robs the Church, dies, and dies with the sin on his head."
The words rolled down in German—the first German words ever spoken from those altar steps.
A peal of thunder crashed overhead and the soldiers paused as they gazed at the dimly-lit figure of the priest, standing in the chancel, in full vestments but—strange contrast—with a pistol in his hand.
The moment passed and then the corporal, with a rude oath, laid both hands on the cross and tore it from the wall.