This wind breathed on his right cheek steadily.

He never guessed that it came from the sea, nor remembered that when he ran towards the canal it had been blowing full in his face.
It was in the chilliest hour--the one before dawn--that a voice suddenly called out from the fog ahead: "_Qui va la ?_" Tristram halted, then took another step forward in some uncertainty.
The voice repeated its challenge in an angrier tone; and this time our hero stood stock-still.

The misfortune was that he knew not a word of the French language.
Once more the voice called.

Then a trigger clicked, a yellow flare leapt out on the fog with a roar, and something sang by Tristram's ear.

He jumped off the road and pelted across the meadow to his right.