"Take her back to the rack. Apply the fire," ordered the Quatuorvir.
The executioners reclaimed her. She offered no resistance. Æmilius staggered to the _podium_ and grasped the marble top with one hand.
She was again suspended on the little horse. Again the windlass creaked. The crowd listened, held its breath, men looked in each other's eyes, then back to the scene of suffering. Not a sound; not a cry; no, not even a sigh. She bore all.
Æmilius had covered his face. He trembled. He would have shut his ears as he did his eyes, could he have done so. Verily, the agony of his soul was as great as the torture of her body. But there was naught to be heard--an ominous stillness, only the groaning of the windlass, and now and then a word from one executioner to his fellow.
At every creak of the wheel a quiver went through the frame of Æmilius. He listened with anguish of mind for a cry. The populace held its breath; it waited. There was none. Into her face he dared not look. But the twenty thousand spectators stared--and saw naught save lips moving in prayer.
The dense cloud that filled the heavens began softly, soundlessly, to discharge its burden. First came, scarce noticed, sailing down, a few large white flakes like fleeces of wool. Then they came fast, faster, ever faster. And now it was as though a white bridal veil had been let down out of heaven to hide from the eyes of the ravening multitude the spectacle of the agony of Christ's martyr. None could see across the arena; soon none could see obscurely into it. The snowflakes fell thick and dense, they massed as a white cornice on the parapet, they dropped on every head, they whitened the bloodstained, trampled sand. And all fled before the snow. First went a few in twos or threes; then whole rows stood up, and through the vomitories the multitude poured--freedmen, slaves, knights, ladies, _flamines_, magistrates; none could stand against the descending snow.
"Cast her down!" This was the last command issued by Petronius as he rose from his seat. The executioners were glad to escape. They relaxed the ropes, and threw their victim on the already white ground.
Still thick and fast fell the fleeces. Blanda had cast a mantle of wool over the prostrate girl, but out of heaven descended a pall, whiter than fuller on earth can bleach, and buried the woolen cloak and the extended quivering limbs. Beside her, in the snow, knelt Æmilius. He held her hand in one of his. She looked him in the face and smiled. Then she said: "Give to Blanda her liberty."