While M. Zola thus expressed himself, we sat face to face, he in his favourite arm chair on one side of the fireplace, and I on the other, in the familiar room, with its three windows overlooking the lively road, while all around curvetted the scrolls and arabesques of the light fawn-tinted wall paper. And after chatting about Du Paty and Esterhazy we gradually lapsed into silence. It was a fateful hour. There were ninety-nine probabilities out of a hundred that the decision of the Cour de Cassation would be given that same afternoon; and whatever that decision might be we felt certain that before it was made public by any newspaper in London we should be apprised of it. We knew that five minutes after judgment should have been pronounced a telegram would be speeding through the wires to the Queen's Hotel, Norwood. M. Zola did not tell me his thoughts, yet I could guess them. We can generally guess the thoughts of those we love. But the hours went by and nothing came. How long they were, those judges! Whatever could be the cause of their delay? Surely--trained, practised men that they were, men who had spent their lives in seeking and proclaiming the truth--surely no element of doubt could have penetrated their minds at the final, the supreme moment. Ah! the waiter entered, and there on his salver lay a buff envelope, within which must surely be the ardently awaited message that would tell us of victory or defeat. M. Zola could scarcely tear that envelope open; his hands trembled violently. And then came an anti-climax. The wire was from M. Fasquelle, who announced that he and his wife were inviting themselves to dinner at Norwood that evening. It was welcome news, but not the news so impatiently expected. And, at last, suspense become intolerable, I resolved to go out and try to purchase some afternoon newspapers. There had been rumours to the effect that as each individual judge might preface his decision by a declaration of the reasons which prompted it, the final judgment might after all be postponed until Monday. Both M. Zola and I had thought this improbable; still, there was a possibility of such delay, and perhaps it was on account of a postponement of the kind that the telegram we awaited had not arrived. I scoured Upper Norwood for afternoon papers. There was, however, nothing to the point at that hour (about five P.M.) in 'The Evening News,' the 'Globe,' the 'Echo,' the 'Star,' the 'Sun,' the three 'Gazettes.' They, like we, were 'waiting for the verdict.' I went as far as the lower level station in the hope of finding some newspaper that might give an inkling of the position, and I found nothing at all. It was extremely warm, and I was somewhat excited. Thus I was perspiring terribly by the time I returned to the hotel, to learn that no telegram had come as yet, that things were still _in statu quo_.