Chapter XXIThe colonel took the ten centesimi gondola across the Canal, paying the usual dirty note and standing with the crowd of those condemned to early rising.
He looked back at the Gritti and saw the windows of his room; still open. There was no promise, nor threat of rain; only the same strong, wild, cold wind from the mountains. Everyone in the gondola looked cold and the Colonel thought, I wish I could issue these wind-proof coats to everyone on board. God, and every officer that ever wore one, knows they are not water-proof and who made the money out of that one?
You can't get water through a Burberry. But I suppose some able jerk has his boy in Groton now, or maybe Canterbury, where the big contractors' boys go, because our coats leaked.
And what about some brother officer of
