It told him that Routh had been summoned to London, on important business, by a telegram--"from that mysterious Flinders, no doubt," thought George, as he looked ruefully at the note--and that they were on the point of starting from Homburg. "Seven o'clock" was written at the top of the sheet. They were gone then; had been gone for hours. It was very provoking. How dreary the place looked after the storm! How chilly the air had become! How much he wished Arthur would "turn up," and that they might all get away! CHAPTER XXIX. THE SEVERING OF THE HAIR. The storm which had swept unheeded over the heads bent over the gaming-tables at the Kursaal that wild autumn night, was hardly wilder and fiercer than the tempest in Stewart Routh's soul, as he, making one of the number of the gamblers, played with a quite unaccustomed recklessness, and won with surprising sequence. This was earlier in the night, when the powers of the air were only marshalling their forces, and the elemental war had not extended beyond the skirmishing stage. Many times he looked impatiently round, even while the ball was rolling, as if expecting to see some one, who still did not appear; then he would turn again to the green board, again stake and win, and resume his watch. At length a touch on his elbow caused him to look round in a contrary direction, where he saw a man standing, who immediately handed him a note and went away. Then Routh smiled, read the words the note contained, smiled again, swept up the money which lay before him, and left the room. The battle had fairly begun as he stepped out from the shelter of the portico, and, buttoning his coat tightly across his chest, and pulling his hat down to his eyebrows, set himself, with bent head, against the storm. His way led him past his own lodgings, and as he took it on the opposite side of the street, he saw, indistinctly, Harriet's figure, as she sat close beside the window, her head against the panes. Something dreary and forsaken in the aspect of the window, with its flimsy curtains wide apart, the indistinct form close against the glass, no light within the room, made Routh shiver impatiently as he looked at it; and just then the light in the street flickered and swerved violently under the influence of a sudden blast, which drove a sharp cascade of rain rattling against the window. "Moping there in the dark," said Routh, with an oath, "and making things a hundred times worse, with her cursed whining and temper."