only more painful than another had quick succession in the Colonel's thoughts. He vowed to himself he should never again wait for the co-operation of another in anything which was necessary to be done; and so only shook his head as Sir John hurra'd for the "sou'-wester," and, looking behind him as he descended from the carriage, shook his head still more, and felt the cold whisper of another wind rising upon his cheek. Sir John perceived it also, and grew pale. "It is only a current--there are always currents of wind under these archways," he explained, hurriedly. Then they drove across London in a cab to the Dover railway, snatched a hasty breakfast of boiling coffee and cold beef, for which they had not above ten minutes time, and so rushed on again to make sure of poor Roger's fate. Even Roger's uncertain fate, however, and all his self-reproach on this occasion, could not hinder the Colonel's eyes to brighten as they whirled past almost in sight of Addiscombe, and saw some distant figures in the Cadet's uniform on a distant road. Could one of them perhaps be Ned?--and the Colonel thought of seeing his boy to-morrow with a cheerful warmth at his heart, which, in spite of himself, made him more hopeful--thinking of Ned he could still believe to find the wind unchanged, the ship unsailed, the young man's mind unembittered. As the miles and the moments passed, as the green country sloped upward into grassy hills, and showed here and there its little precipice of chalk, the Colonel's courage rose. Not from any reason; he was a man to be above reasons sometimes, this tender old soldier; the comfort and the courage came, an inexplicable genial breath from the neighbourhood of his boy. While, in the meantime, a result perfectly contrary was produced on Sir John: he shuffled about in his seat with an incontrollable impatience; he gazed out of the window; he closed his eyes with disgust when he turned from that; he could have got out and pushed behind like the Frenchman, so eager was his anxiety. The express train was too slow for him--the wind had changed!