updated 12:54 p.m. ET Feb. 27, 2006

TURIN, Italy - All was well for Italian ice dancing stars Barbara Fusar Poli and Maurizio Margaglio, one night after what looked like an angry staredown following a fall at the end of their original dance routine.

At least they stayed upright — and amicable — in Monday night’s free dance, even if they did wind up sixth. They left the arena to loud cheers — and with smiles, not glares.

A big difference from the night before, although the local favorites insisted they had only been mad at their performance, not each other.

“No, no, we were not angry with each other,” Margaglio said after their free dance to “Prince of Egypt.”

“It was rage because one year of work, we came on the ice in first place, and we wanted to keep it. You don’t think you would be angry with that? We lost the timing between us and our rotation was not on a good axis. It was not anything between Barbara and me.”

After the original dance, instead of nodding to the judges and acknowledging the crowd, they stood apart and she glared at him. Finally, they turned, smiled weakly and left the ice, and as they waited for their marks, Fusar Poli buried her head in her hands and sat behind and apart from her partner.

“We were speaking with our eyes like, what we did? We did a mistake,” Fusar Poli said. “It was like, ‘Whoa! We made a mistake.’ It was nothing bad between us.

“We are like brother and sister.”

On Monday, skating in the next-to-last warmup, Fusar Poli gave Margaglio a stern look and the 2001 world champions and 2002 Olympic bronze medalists skated carefully.

There were plenty of slip-ups but no flops. At the end of the four-minute program, Fusar Poli stayed on her knees on the ice until he lifted her up. They hugged, he kissed her forehead and she kissed him on the cheek.

Slide show   Emotional Moments Feb. 26: See photos of athletes' highs and lows from Sunday.

Then they sat next to each other waiting for the scores, and she placed her left arm around his shoulder.

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