inda Markell was on her last nerve. Jennifer Konopisos tried to calm herself with coffee and cigarettes. And Karen Dahl, a sixth-grader who passionately supports Al Gore, had a sinking feeling that there was no way she could sneak past her bedtime.
Last night, as uncertainty about presidential election results went on longer than seemed possible, there was sense across Boston that newspaper presses were being held, that morning appointments might be canceled, and that a number of voters with bloodshot eyes simply refused to sleep through the decisive moment.
By midnight, the outcome was no clearer.
''I feel like I'm on the edge of a cliff. I've never lived through anything like this, and I've lived a long time,'' said Doris Yasse, 71, who watched the returns at a bar in the Charles Hotel. ''I'm panicky.''
Last night, a few who kept vigil across the city remembered the last time this happened.
Thirty-two years ago, when Richard M. Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey, the race wasn't decided until 6 a.m. That night, Boston College administrator James McIntyre stayed up until sunrise with the 10 student activists he had invited into his home.
Gathered with the same group in the same living room last night, he was not sure they would make it until morning.
''The older I get, the less interested I am in doing all-nighters,'' said McIntyre, now BC's vice president. ''I don't know what's going to prevail: my interest in the results or the weakness of the flesh.''
Even some among the young had their doubts.
''That was the Kennedy and Nixon period. This is Bush and Gore,'' said Sean Young, a 29-year-old bookstore manager who predicted he would stay up to hear the resolution of the state ballot questions, but no later.
Jeff Santucci, 19, a Northeastern undergraduate who voted for Gore, decided he'd wait to get the news with his morning weather report.
''I care, but it can wait till morning,'' he said.
For others, though, the level of anxiety had crept steadily higher during the past week.
At the 21st Amendment, a Beacon Hill bar, Julia Gaspar and her friend Paige Martin watched the numbers warily on TV. Both had been sending out anti-Bush e-mail to their friends, and neither expected to sleep until the last vote was spoken for.
''It's taken on a whole life,'' said Martin, 29, who works for a mutual fund.
Looking toward morning, some anticipated starting the day a little later than usual.
Linda Markell, who teaches advanced placement history at Brookline High School, cast her first vote for John F. Kennedy, and recalls staying up until morning with the feeling that ''the whole future of the world'' lay in the results.
And she has every expectation that some of her students may have done the same.
''Will the teachers be easy on them? I don't know. Would I be easy on them?'' said Markell, who is 61. ''I would probably give them extra credit.''
