And because they were all well-informed now in Nuremberg about the love between this couple and the cruel fate that they now shared, a cry arose, an extraordinary cry. All of a sudden all the sick had started to shout: "Lord, have mercy on us!" From the Church of the Holy Ghost at the same time they had struck up with: "Gloria in excelsis Deo!" The doors were thrown open and across from the high altar lights and candles glimmered out into the night. The press of people on all sides grew and a wave of them eddied round the shrine containing the imperial crown jewels. In every street people moved towards the portal of the Holy Ghost Church in droves as the holy of holies was borne up the steps high upon the shoulders of its chosen bearers. In the crowd no-one was in control of themselves any more. I helped Cecilia Stollhoferin up from the ground and my Greek master Theodoros and I protected her with our bodies. The beautiful Mechthild was dragged off with the lepers and no longer visible when the imperial crown was laid on the altar and one could finally look for her. The storm and stress of the constant crush had slackened off. How we searched for her in the streets of Nuremberg! The cousins and friends of the Grossen waited at the gates with drawn swords, but hundreds of lepers in dark patches had now got as far as the Church of Our Lady, were crossing the Herrenmarkt, going past the Town Hall and across the wine market through the night back to the New Gate. No-one in the course of that evening or that night was able to glimpse the knight Groland von Laufenholz and the charming Mechthildis in that awful procession. At the New Gate I spoke to cousins and friends of the family. Truly Brother Johannes Capistranus today in his pulpit has not shed his heart's blood in his words as I did that night. With weeping and gnashing of teeth the noble lords withdrew and noble ladies and young ladies who were also related helped me to make sure that no wild action was committed out of madness, impotence and grief. When everything had calmed down, I followed alone the way that the lepers had gone out of the town to the hospice of Saint John. It was not quite dark, but there was still some light in the darkness and when I came near to the stone cross, next to which the year before a sword had stood in the ground, I made out a dark shape sitting on the bench. Shuddering I hesitated and called out to the shadow from afar. Then a voice answered through the darkness: "Makarioi oi penthountes, hoti autoi paraklethesontai! Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted!" It was the old faithful teacher, the homeless Greek man from the island of Chios who spoke to me the words from Our Lord Jesus Christ's Sermon on the Mount. I walked to him in silence and he took my hand, said nothing else, but pulled me down to the stone bench and pointed to the light streaming out of the windows of Saint John's hospice.