THEN, IN HER EMOTION, in her extreme but vague excitement, it happens—Madeleine makes a wheezing sound. If there is a nestling in her hands, she will fondle it to death. If there is a reflection in a pool, she will peer too closely, lose her balance, splash through it with her boots. Her rough hands, her muddy boots, and the wings thrashing savagely inside her, sending up this wheeze, this strange whistling sound.
The hand retreats. The two men step away from each other. They look about them slowly, blinking sleepily like children.
To her relief, to her anguish, they do not see her.