Sometimes it battered him like the cannon rolling in the hold of the vessel.

Always, now, it brought with it a sense of quickened life, of stimulating danger.

To-night it came upon him suddenly, as he was walking the floor, after his wife left him.

It seemed impossible; he could not believe it.
He glanced entreatingly at the door, as if to call her back.

He heard voices in the hall below, and knew that he must go down.