Odent fell
without a sound. He was hastily buried under barely a foot of earth, and
his six companions were left on the spot through the night expecting the
same fate, till the morning, when they were released. Five other
hostages, "gathered haphazard in the streets," were shot the same night
in the neighbourhood of Chamant.
Meanwhile the Cure, knowing nothing of what was happening to the Maire,
had been thinking for his parishioners and his church. When the
bombardment began he gathered together about a hundred and twenty of
them, who had apparently no cellars to take refuge in, and after
sheltering them in the Presbytere for a time, he sent them with one of
his _vicaires_ out of the town. Then--to continue his narrative:
"I went to the southern portal of the cathedral, and stood there
trembling at every burst of shrapnel that struck the belfry and the
roof, and running out into the open, at each pause, to be sure that the
church was still there. When the firing ceased, I went back to the
Presbytere.
"Presently, furious sounds of blows from the _place_.
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