and the roll-call of his allies would show many missing--and many gone
over to the foe. But greater than all these things was the change in
himself. The cloyed wolf who had gorged too deep of success was no
longer the lean fighting beast with a ravenous light of conquest in his
eyes. That Burton might have met even the present and triumphed. This
was a wolf on the defensive, fating a pack which had turned upon his
leadership. His weakened fangs were against the jaws of all the
rest--and he came scarred and spent from days and nights of physical
feebleness.

Paul sat beside Hamilton in his car as they drove down-town on that
first day when the financier defied the edicts of his physicians.

"Hamilton," questioned the younger brother, voicing for the first time
that deep anxiety which had been clamoring within him for weeks, "will
you be able to drive back your assailants? The papers predict that your
reign is broken and your ruin near at hand."

Hamilton raised his face and smiled. It was the old imperious smile, but
the face over which it spread was thinner and gaunter and between the
hollowed cheekbones the smile lost something of its wonted
illumination--failed somewhat of its old convincing force.

"The papers have had their opportunity to prattle without check. Now I
am back again--we shall see." He broke off and laughed, then he rushed
on fiercely. "They call this St. Helena. They lie." In the weakness
which was still upon him, he gasped a moment for breath. "When Napoleon
left Elba the papers of Paris raved about the escape of the unspeakable
tyrant. When he reached the borders of France they announced, without
comment, the approach of Napoleon Bonaparte, but when he was near the
gates they raised a paean of triumphal welcome to the Emperor, who had
returned to make France more glorious than ever among nations! I shall
soon be at their city gates, Paul, and, while my star shines, no mortal
power can stop me or stay my progress."

But the Napoleon of the later phases was not the Napoleon of Austerlitz.
Out of the great heart and brain some essential element had gone.
Burton, too, had tasted defeat and knew its bitterness. He was going
back to rally shrunken forces and lead a forlorn hope and his eyes were
grimly defiant--where once they had been regnantly confident. Perhaps
Hamilton Burton during those next few months was after all more worthy
of admiration than he had been since a boy whose dreams burned
city