“It does have a strange, unearthly look,” Cornelius agreed. “But I don’t believe it’s a manifestation of the gods’ anger, though I’ve never seen one before like this. Could it be a heavy mass of sand borne in from the desert? If that’s it, then maybe the sun shining through the concentration of sand accounts for this strange greenish color.”
“That’s probably it,” Decius agreed. “But then, where is the wind?”
“It may be the lull before the wind. This unseasonable heat is bound to bring on a storm. Look!” He pointed. “The sun.”
High above the city, beyond its southern wall and past the ever smoldering refuse heaps in the Vale of Hinnom, the sun rode like a pale copper disk behind a thinning portion of the veiling cloud. In the same instant its rays found a rift in the mantle covering the city and shot a pinpoint of light to bathe in sudden brilliance a small eminence just beyond and slightly to the right of the Fortress Antonia.
“By all the gods! Bar Abbas and the two henchmen we captured last week!”
On the summit of the little hill stood three crosses, and stretched upon each cross was the body of a man. A staring throng of spectators stood scattered about below.
Then suddenly the rift in the covering cloud was healed; darkness swallowed the burdened crosses.
“Poor devils,” Cornelius said. “That’s an assignment I’m glad I didn’t get. Being late returning may have saved me.” He looked up again toward the lowering sky. “But we’d better be getting on to Antonia. This storm may break at any moment, and when it does, I don’t want to be in it.”
Quickly the cavalcade moved down the slope toward the Garden of Gethsemane and the Brook Kidron beyond. Entering the walled city by Dung Gate, it went through Ophel and ascended the slope westward to move along the lower level of Mount Zion and cross the bridge spanning the Tyropoeon Valley. At the eastern end of the bridge the procession turned northward and marched along the way paralleling the Temple’s wall to the entrance gate of the Antonia.
When Cornelius had dismissed his men, he went up at once to his apartment in the officers’ quarters on the south side of the fortress. He had been looking forward eagerly to a refreshing bath and a short nap before dressing in fresh clothing for the evening meal. But as he was about to enter his quarters he encountered a centurion coming into the corridor from the apartment next to his.