'I know there _are_ swallows here,' she said to Rollo, 'for I've seen them. But I can't fancy where they live.'
'Nanni would say they were fairies,' said Rollo, smiling. He was more patient than his sister, and he was quite sure that godmother would not forget them. And by degrees Maia began to follow his example, especially after Rollo happened to remark one day that he had noticed that it was always when they had been working the most steadily at their lessons, and thinking the least of holidays and treats that the holidays and treats came. This counsel Maia took to heart, and worked so well for some days that Mademoiselle Delphine and the old chaplain had none but excellent reports to give of both children, and Lady Venelda smiled on them so graciously that they felt sure her next letter to their father would be a most satisfactory one.
One evening--it was the evening of a most lovely spring day--when Rollo and Maia had said good-night in the usual ceremonious way to Lady Venelda, they were coming slowly along the great corridor, white like the rest of the castle, which led to their own rooms, when a sound at one of the windows they were passing made them stop.
'What was that?' said Maia. 'It sounded like a great flutter of wings.'
Rollo glanced out of the window. It was nearly dark, but his eyes were quick.
'It was wings,' he said. 'Quite a flight of birds have just flown off from under the roof.'
'Ah,' said Maia, nodding her head mysteriously, 'I thought so. Well, Rollo, _I_ don't intend to go to sleep to-night, whether you do or not.'
'I shall wake if there's anything to wake for,' he said. 'I'm much more sure of doing that than you can be of keeping awake.'
'Why, I couldn't _go_ to sleep if I thought there was going to be anything to wake for,' said Maia.
Before long they were both in bed. Rollo laid his head on the pillow without troubling himself about keeping awake or going to sleep. Maia, on the contrary, kept her eyes as wide open as she could. It was a moonlight night; the objects in the room stood out in sharp black shadow against the bright radiance, seeming to take queer fantastic forms which made her every minute start up, feeling sure that she saw some one or something beside her bedside. And every time that she found it a mistake she felt freshly disappointed. At last, quite tired with expecting she knew not what, she turned her face to the wall and shut her eyes.