 Immediately after his arrival in Milan, where he intends to spend a study visit, SEBASTIAN, a Jesuit novice from Munich, falls victim to a pair of under-age tricksters. SEBASTIAN tracks down the young thieves and is horrified to discover a criminal organisation that kidnaps children from all over Europe and subsequently trains them to become thieves and robbers. The two children who have robbed SEBASTIAN, 12-year-old LAURA and her 14-year-old brother LUIS, are also members of a children s gang. SEBASTIAN leaves no stone unturned to get in touch with them and to save them and their friend THIERRY-BIBI from disaster. He soon discovers the leaders of the gang to be unscrupu-lous criminals who will stop at no act of violence. For no sooner do they realize that SEBASTIAN is on their trail than they try to kill him. But the young monk does not give up easily. Together with GIULIANA, the niece of a Milanese Monsignore, he imperturbably traces the children. He is able to win LAURA s confidence in a relatively short time, but he has no idea that he is thus exposing the children to great danger. LAURA and LUIS, who love one another deeply, are separated by the gangsters. LUIS is sent to Marseille, where he is made to work as a pickpocket. He is forbidden to get in touch with his sister. He is told that she will have to suffer for it if he does not work successfully. Not until they have undergone numerous adventures, which even take them to Munich, is SEBASTIAN able to give the police convincing proof that the criminals must be arrested. In the end he even finds LUIS s mother, who has been searching for her lost son for many years. But the happy ending is not what SEBASTIAN had intended for LAURA and LUIS. LUIS and his mother, after their long separation, are not able to love each other any more. The boy feels shut in and overprotected. His mother s ordinary middle-class life is much too constricted for him to feel comfortable. So LAURA and LUIS decide, together with their friend THIERRY-BIBI, to lead an independent life together.They leave Munich, LUIS s mother and SEBASTIAN, to whom they owe their liberty. One day, SEBASTIAN learns that the children are now living in the south of France, where they are earning their living in a legal manner: LAURA sells homemade jewellery on the beach, and LUIS is working for a horse breeder in the Camargue. SEBASTIAN has to admit to himself that there is a lot about life and happiness he doesn t know. He is no longer sure whether being a monk is the right thing for him. He knows he needs time to come to a decision and asks for leave of absence from his order. But he also knows that one day he will meet his friends LAURA and LUIS again and that he is very much looking forward to this meeting.