The very air seemed to them a-quiver with expectation.

They, too, had an expectant smile upon their lips.

But there was no crack of thunder overhead, no roar of a slipping world.
[Illustration: "CHEEK TO CHEEK, SILENT IN THE ROOM, STARING FORWARD WITH EYES WIDE OPEN AND HOPEFUL."-- _Page 136_.] The Chevalier was the first to move.
"But we are children," he cried, starting up.

"Is it not strange the very pain which tortures us because we are man and woman should sink us into children?
We sit hoping that a miracle will split the world in pieces! This is the Caprara Palace; Whittington drowses outside over his lantern; and to-morrow Gaydon rides with his passport northwards to Charles Wogan." The name hurt Maria Vittoria like a physical torture.

She beat her hands together with a cry, "I hate him! I hate him!" "Yet I have no better servant!" "Speak no good word of him in my ears! He robs me of you." "He risks his life for me." "I will pray that he may lose it." "Maria!" The Chevalier started, thrilled and almost appalled by the violence of her passion.
"I do pray," she cried.