s were faint, "he had never had a star. I wish
that we were all back there, close to the strength of the hills and the
graves of our dead."

In these days Paul was very constantly with his mother, and by a
thousand little attentions made himself indispensable to her.

It was a small thing, but costly to his feelings, since, for every one
of these moments redolent of suffering and sadness, his own soul fiber,
delicate and thin as a silk thread, must afterward pay in the reaction
of a deep depression. To him echoes meant more than positive sounds, and
the tears in his mother's voice, the unshed tears in her eyes, brought
him a suffering so intense and genuine that when he went out the thought
of returning to either of the stricken houses where she needed him was
like returning to a jail. Then, too, there was the unexpressed fear
which gnawed incessantly at his heart, that, in spite of his belief in
Hamilton, business disaster might lie ahead. He wrote less often and
with more effort to Loraine Haswell--and thought longingly of Marcia
Terroll, who had forbidden him to see her.

* * * * *

Such a pregnant item of news as Hamilton Burton's accident could not
long be kept from the Street and the public. On the morning following
the occurrence it burst into print--and for a time the chorus of
invective was silenced.

But the hands that had been raised to pull him down could not be stayed.
He himself had never halted when the Gods of Chance had tossed into his
lap a mighty advantage. At the first announcement that "Ursus Major" lay
ill, perhaps mortally hurt, the trampled prices of securities began to
revive like dusty blossoms under a shower. Day long came damp extras
from the press heralding a bull day almost as wild and swift in its
price recovery as yesterday's bear day had been terrific in its
avalanche.

From post to post the deep voice of Len Haswell and other Burton
lieutenants thundered in an effort to stem the altered tide--but they
were generals of brigade without their field marshal, guessing blindly
at a plan which had not been revealed by the master-tactician. Into the
eyes of Jack Staples stole a glitter of premonitory triumph as he met
them and beat them back. Burton millions were melting like hailstones
falling on hot metal, and when the session ended Len Haswell turned away
with an empty face. For two days he had almost forgotten, in his
battle-lust, his own heart-ache. No