Notes

The next day, the archdeacon met Pierre Gringoire in the street.

“The Esmeralda saved your life, didn’t she?” he said. “Well, today she’s in danger…and you can save her.”

“I was told that she took refuge in Notre Dame, but that she is safe there, and I am delighted.”

“She is indeed in Notre Dame, but in three days justice will take her there and she will be hanged on the Place de Greve. Do you want to save her?”

“The Miracle Court thugs like her and I’m sure they’ll do anything to save her. I have an idea, listen.”

Gringoire leans over the archdeacon’s ear and speaks to him quietly. When he is finished, Claude Frollo takes his hand and says,

“See you tomorrow.”

The archdeacon, on returning to the cloister, finds at the door of his cell his brother Jehan waiting for him.

'My brother,' said Jehan timidly, 'I come to see you...you were right when you told me Jehan be wise, Jehan be a good student, Jehan don’t go out at night. How right you were! As long as I had money, I spent it in taverns and with girls. Now I have no money and I realize I want to study, but I have no ink, I have to buy some. I want more paper and I have no books. I have to buy them!”

“I don’t have one.”

“You don’t want to give me money? In that case, I’m going to be a crook.”

'Be a crook!' his brother said.

Jehan greets and whistles down the stairs. As he passed through the courtyard of the cloister under the cell window, he saw the stern head of the archdeacon pass through the opening.

'Go to hell, Jehan! This is the last money you will have from me,' he said, throwing his slipper at her.

Hobo Coward gets on a chair and screams,

“Now silence to cross Paris. We will all meet at the gates of Notre Dame. Remember the password and remember that anyone who doesn’t know the password will have to be killed."

Meanwhile, Gringoire went to get the archdeacon.

“Do you have the password of the thugs?”

“I have it.”

“Good. Otherwise we couldn’t get into the cathedral. The thugs are blocking all the streets.”

“And how will we get in?”

“I have the key to the towers.”

“And how will we get out?”

“Behind the fence is a door that opens onto the Seine. I have the key and a boat is waiting for us.

That night, Quasimodo looked at Paris from a tower when he saw a crowd of men and women in rags. This crowd is armed and approaching the cathedral. Quasimodo understands that the Esmeralda is in danger. He goes down to close the doors, then piles up stones left by masons.

Thirty sturdy men approach the door to try to open it with hammers and iron bars. But suddenly, a huge beam falls on them, crushing a dozen thugs. At the same time, a rain of large stones began to fall from the top of the tower and killed several thugs.

This unexpected resistance comes of course from Quasimodo. He sets fire to pieces of wood and pieces of iron and makes them fall on the crowd. At this point, Jehan approaches the cathedral with a ladder and explains to the thugs,

“You see this row of statues above the three portals? This is the gallery of the kings of France. At the end there is a door that is never closed. I will go into the cathedral and open it for you from the inside."

But when he arrives at the top of the ladder, he is facing Quasimodo. The hunchback takes Jehan by the arms and throws him into the void. The poor student crashes on the forecourt, dead. A cry of horror rises among the thugs. The death of the poor student fills them with anger and they resume the assault on Our Lady with more fury.

Quasimodo, who has no more stones or wood, feels powerless against so many enemies; he trembles with fear for the Esmeralda, and, seeing the thugs getting closer and closer to his gallery, he twists his arms of despair.

At this moment, the king’s soldiers, commanded by Phoebus de Châteaupers, arrived on the forecourt to defend the cathedral. The gangsters, badly armed, defend themselves with courage, but they eventually run away. Quasimodo, believing that the Esmeralda will be saved, runs to the young girl’s cell, but finds it empty.