A man watching a musical show at the Windmill theatre is shot apparently from the stage. The cast continues the performance so that the detective can solve the murder.

When a British pilot is hospitalized after a plane crash, the woman he loves sits by his bedside and remembers, in flashbacks, key episodes from their life together.

Old Jerusalem: Matathias, spiteful over his lover's illness, spits on Jesus along the road to Calvary, and is cursed to live endlessly until His return. The Crusades, 1150: Matathias, now an anonymous knight, competes for glory in combat and for the wife of a soldier. Palermo, 1290: Matteos Battadios witnesses the death of his young son, leading to conflict with his wife over whether to take comfort in Christianity. Seville, 1560: Dr Matteos Battadios dedicates himself to the treatment and comfort of the poor, but his life and work are endangered by the arrival of the Spanish Inquisition.