If we had only known that we were three!" The face of Professor de Worms darkened, and he did not look up.
"We were three," he said.

"If we had been three hundred we could still have done nothing." "Not if we were three hundred against four ?" asked Syme, jeering rather boisterously.
"No," said the Professor with sobriety, "not if we were three hundred against Sunday." And the mere name struck Syme cold and serious; his laughter had died in his heart before it could die on his lips.

The face of the unforgettable President sprang into his mind as startling as a coloured photograph, and he remarked this difference between Sunday and all his satellites, that their faces, however fierce or sinister, became gradually blurred by memory like other human faces, whereas Sunday's seemed almost to grow more actual during absence, as if a man's painted portrait should slowly come alive.
They were both silent for a measure of moments, and then Syme's speech came with a rush, like the sudden foaming of champagne.
"Professor," he cried, "it is intolerable.

Are you afraid of this man ?" The Professor lifted his heavy lids, and gazed at Syme with large, wide-open, blue eyes of an almost ethereal honesty.
"Yes, I am," he said mildly.

"So are you." Syme was dumb for an instant.