The other three and he himself, Nelson thought with savage self-contempt, were not patriots, nor dreamers nor anything but soldiers of fortune.
Soldiers of fortune? The phrase lent an ironical twist to his lips. He and his fellow mercenaries were so far removed from the gay, gallant connotations of that name. Nick Sloan was a cool ruthless self-seeker, Van Voss a moronic sadist, Lefty Wister a spidery criminal.
And he, Eric Nelson? He, least of all, fitted that glamorous name. He was thirty years old, and the best years of his life had no other memorial than forgotten battles. Now he was a fugitive whose only out was to hire himself to Shan Kar's mountain people.
* * *
Nelson swept the empty Scotch bottle off the table to crash in splinters against the mud wall.
"Am I a dog to sit here untended?" he demanded of the fat Cantonese. "Bring another."
The liquor had lighted his somber mood by the time he went out into the night an hour later.
The few blinking lights along Yen Shi's wrecked and wretched streets danced in a cheerful rosy glow as he stalked along.
"I'm tired of Yen Shi anyway!" he thought as he, elbowed between shadowy, shuffling peasants. "San Kar's mountains will be new, at least."
"L’Lan, L'Lan the golden, inhere the ancient Brotherhood still lives— "