noon
They were fixed on ahead , up toward the summit of the hill , there where a Cross stood broken and lonely with wooden arms outstretched and the birds of heaven circling all round it . Every day for seven days now had the pilgrim wandered up the steep desolate hill . Every day for seven days he had reached the summit ere the ninth hour was called from the city walls . He lived at a small inn just inside the third wall , and every day at noon he set out upon his pilgrimage and only came home when the darkness of the night lay dense upon the valley . To-day he was more weary than he had ever been before . His feet felt like leaden weights that seemed to be dragging him down and ever downwards , and the loneliness of the place had its image within his heart . On the summit he fell on his knees and knelt at the foot of the Cross , leaning his aching forehead against the cold , dank wood .