[Illustration: "'Something has got to be did, and did mighty blame quick.'"]
CHAPTER XXIV
THE CONSPIRACY AT HEART'S DESIRE
This being the Story of a Sheepherder, Two Warm Personal Friends, and their Love-letter to a Beautiful Queen
When Tom Osby came back to Heart's Desire, he drew Curly to one side, and the two walked over to a shady spot at the side of Whiteman's corral, seating themselves for what was evidently to be an executive session.
Tom Osby continued to stuff tobacco into his pipe with a stubby forefinger, and Curly's hat was pushed back from a forehead wrinkled in deep thought.
"It's a good deal like you say, Tom," he assented; "I know that. Unless we can get Dan Anderson and that girl to some sort of an understandin', the jig's up, and there ain't a-goin' to be no railroad at Heart's Desire. But how're you a-goin' to do that?"
"Well, I done told you what I thought," said Tom Osby. "I'm a married man, been married seven times, or maybe six. There's just two things I understand, and them is horses and women, which I ought to, from associatin' with them constant. Now, I tell you, if I'm any judge of women, that girl thinks a heap of Dan Anderson, no matter what she lets on. It's her that's got the railroad up her sleeve. The old man just thinks she's a tin angel with fresh paint. Why, he's done give her the whole railroad. He don't want it. He's got money now that's sinful. Now, I say, she's got the railroad. Dan Andersen's chances, they go with the railroad. If she could just get him to go with the business chances, that'd about fix things; and I more'n half believe she'd drop into line right free and gentle."
"Well, why don't she say so, then," grumbled Curly, "and stop this foolishness?"
"Now there you go!" replied Tom. "Can't you see that any woman on earth, even a married woman, is four-thirds foolishness and the rest human? With girls it's still worse'n that. If I'm any judge, she's wishin' a certain feller'd come along and shake the tree. But she ain't goin' to fall off until the tree's done shook. Consequently, there she is, still up the tree, and our railroad with her."
"Looks like he ought to make the first break," observed Curly, sagely.
"Of course he ought. But will he, that's the question."
"No, he won't," admitted Curly, pushing his hat still farther back on his head. "He's took his stand, and done what he allowed was right. After that, he ain't built to crawfish. He's passed up the girl, and the railroad, too, and I reckon that settles it."
"And yet he thinks a heap of the girl."
"Natural? Of course he does. How can he help it? That's where the trouble is. I tell you, Tom, these here things is sort of personal. If these two folks is havin' trouble of their own, why, it's their trouble, and it ain't for us to square it, railroad or no railroad."
"When two people is damn fools," commented Tom Osby, gravely, "it's all right for foreign powers to mediate a-plenty."
"But what you goin' to do? She won't bat a eye at him, and he ain't goin' to send for her."
"Oh, yes he is," corrected Tom Osby; and the forefinger, crowding tobacco into his pipe, worked vigorously. "He's got to send for her."
"Looks to me like we can't do nothin'," replied his friend, pessimistically. "I like that girl, too. Say, I'll braid her a nice hair rope and take it down to her. Maybe that'll kind o' square things with her for losin' out with Dan."
"Yes," scoffed Tom Osby, "that's all the brains a fool cow puncher has got. Do you reckon a hair lariat, or a new pair of spurs, is any decent remedy for a girl's wownded affections? No, sir, not none. No, you go on down and take your old hair rope with you, and give it to the girl. That's all right; but you're goin' to take something else along with you at the same time."
"What's that?" "Why, you're goin' to take a letter to her,—a letter from Dan Andersen's death-bed."
"Who—me? Death-bed? Why, he ain't on no death-bed. He's eatin' three squares a day and settin' up readin' novels. Death-bed nothin'!"
"Oh, no," said Tom Osby, "that's where you're mistaken. Dan Anderson is on his death-bed; and he writes his dyin' confession, his message in such cases made and pervided. He sends his last words to his own true love. Says he, 'All is forgiven.' Then she flies to receive his dyin' words. You ain't got no brains, Curly. You ain't got no imagination. Why, if I left all this to you, she'd get here too late for the funeral. You're a specialist, Curly. You can rope and throw a two-thousand-pound steer, but you can't handle a woman that don't weigh over a hundred and twenty-five. Now, you watch your Pa."
Curly sat and looked at him in silence for a few minutes, but at last a light seemed to dawn upon him. "Oh, I see," said he, smiling broadly. "You mean for us to get up a letter for him—write it out and send it, like he done it hisself."
Tom Osby nodded. "Of course—that's the only way. There wouldn't either of them write to the other one. That's the trouble with these here States girls, and them men from the States, too. You have to take care of 'em. You and me has got to be gardeens for these two folks. If we don't, they're goin' to make all kinds of trouble for theirselves and each other."
"Kin you disguise your handwritin' any, Tom?" asked Curly. "I can't. Mine's kind of sot."
"Curly," answered Tom, with scorn, "what you call your brains is only a oroide imitation of a dollar watch. Why, of course we can't write a letter and sign his name to it deliberate. That's forgery, and we'd get into the penitentiary for it. That ain't the way to do.
"Now look here. Dan Anderson may be lookin' right well for a dyin' man, but he's on his death-bed just the same. That's needful for the purposes of dramatic construction. He's a-layin' there, pale and wore out. His right arm is busted permernent, and it's only a question of time when he cashes in—though he might live a few days if he was plumb shore his own true love was a-hastenin' to his bedside."
"But it was his left arm that got shot," argued Curly; "and it didn't amount to a whole lot at that."
"There's you go," jeered Tom, in answer, "with them imitation brain works of yours. It's his right arm that's busted. Now, him a-layin' there plumb helpless, his thoughts turns to his bride that might 'a' been, but wasn't. With his last dyin' words he greets her. If she would only hasten to his deathbed, he could die in peace. That's what he writes to her. 'Dear Madam,' says he, 'Havin' loved you all my life, I fain would gaze on you onct more. In that case,' says he, 'the clouds certainly would roll away!'"
"That shorely would fetch her," said Curly, admiringly, "but how you goin' to fix it?"
"Why, how? There ain't but one way. The dyin' man has his dear friend Curly, or Tom Osby, or some one, write his last words for him. That ain't counterfeitin'. That's only actin' as his literary amanyensis, and that's plumb legal."
"Things may be legal, and not safe," objected Curly. "Supposin' he finds out?"
"Why, then, we'll be far, far away. This letter has got to be wrote. I can't write it myself, and you can't; but maybe several of us could."
"I ain't in on writin' the letter," Curly decided; "I'll carry it, but my writin' is too sot, and so's my thinker."
"Well, I ain't used my own thinker in this particular way for about twenty years," said Tom Osby, "although I did co'te two of my wives by perlite correspondence, something like this; and I couldn't see but what them wives lasted as good as any."
"It's too bad Dan Anderson ain't in on this play hisself," Curly resumed. "Now if it was us that was layin' dead, and him writin' the letter, he'd have us both alive, and have the girl here by two o'clock to-morrer, and everything 'd be lovely. But us! We don't know any more about this than a pair of candy frogs."
"The fewer there is in on a woman deal the better," said Tom Osby, "and yet it looks like we needed help right now!"
The two sat gazing gloomily down the long street of Heart's Desire, and so intent were they that they did not see the shambling figure of Willie the sheepherder coming up the street. Then Tom Osby's gaze focussed him.
"Now there's that damned sheepherder that broke us up in business," said he. "It was him that got us into this fix. If he hadn't lied like a infernal pirate, and got Dan Anderson to thinkin' that the girl and this lawyer feller Barkley was engaged to each other on the side, why Dan wouldn't have flared up and busted the railroad deal, and let the girl get away, and gone and got hisself shot."
"S'posin' I shoot Willie up just for luck," suggested Curly. "He's got it comin' to him, from the way that Gee-Whiz friend of his throwed lead into our fellers, time we was arguin' with them over them sheep. This country ain't got no use for sheep, nor sheepherders either, specially the kind that makes trouble with railroads, and girls."
"No, hold on a minute," interrupted Tom Osby. "You wait—I've got a idea."
"Well, what is it?"
"Wait a minute. How saith the psalmist? All men is liars; and sheepherders special, natural, eighteen-karat, hand-curled liars—which is just the sort we need right now in our business."
Curly slapped his thigh in sudden understanding. The two sat, still watching Willie as he came rambling aimlessly up the street, staring from side to side in his vacant fashion.
"A sheepherder, as you know, Curly," went on Tom, "has three stages in his game. For a while he's human. In a few years, settin' round on the hills in the sun, a-watchin' them damned woolly baa-baa's of his, he gets right nutty. He sees things. Him a-gettin' so lonesome, and a-readin' high-class New York literature all the time, he gets to thinkin' of the Lady Eyemogene. You might think he's seein' cactus and sheep, but what is really floatin' before him is proud knights, and haughty barons, and royal monarchs, and Lady Eyemogenes.
"It ain't sinful for Willie to lie, like it is for us, because life is one continuous lie to him. He's seen a swimmin' picture of hand-painted palaces, and noble jukes, and stately dames out on the Nogal flats every day for eight years. That ain't lyin'—that's imagination.
"Now this feller's imagination is just about ripe. Usual, at the end of about seven years, a sheepherder goes plumb dotty, and we either have to shoot him, or send him to Leavenworth. Your Gee-Whiz man can maybe take to cow punchin' and prosper, but not Willie. His long suit is imaginin' things, from now on.
"Now, that feller is naturally pinin' to write this here particular letter we've got on our minds. You watch Willie compose."
"Here you, Willie, come over here!" Curly called out.
The herder started in fright. Timid at best, he was all the more so since the raid of the Carrizoso stock men. His legs trembled under him, but he slowly approached in obedience.
"Willie," said Tom Osby, sternly, "I'm some hardened as a sinner my own self, but the kind of way you do pains me. What made you tell that lie about seein' the lady and that lawyer feller makin' love to each other, on the back seat of the buckboard, behind the old man's back?"
"I thought I seen 'em," pleaded Willie. "I—I thought I heard 'em talkin'."
"Oh, sufferin' saints! Listen to that! You thought! Of course you did. You and that Gee-Whiz friend of yours ought to turn yourselves into a symposium and write for the papers. Now look here. Have you got a copy of the 'Proud Earl's Revenge,' in your pocket?"
Willie tremulously felt in his clothing, and did produce a dog-eared volume to somewhat that effect. Tom Osby turned over a few of the pages thoughtfully, and then sat up with a happy smile. "There ain't no trouble about that letter now!" said he.
"What—what—what do you want?" asked Willie. Then they told him. Willie radiated happiness. He sat down beside them, his hands trembling with joy and eagerness—conspirator number three for the peace and dignity of Heart's Desire.
"Go get some paper, Curly," said Tom Osby, and Curly departed. Willie remained wrapped in thought, his mind confused at this sudden opportunity.
"It's all about Lancelot," said he.
"What brand did Lancelot ride under? Now, no foolin', Willie."
"Why—why—why," said Willie, "Lancelot, he's at a tournyment. Now, he loves a beautiful queen."
"Shore he does! That goes. What's the queen's name?"
"Her name—her name—her name's Guinevere," replied Willie. "And the proud king, he brooks it ill. The proud king's name is Arthur."
"Oh, no, it ain't!" said Tom Osby. "There ain't no man who's name is Arthur that has no scrap to him. It ain't Arthur that goes on no war-path."
"Yes, he did," insisted Willie. "Lancelot gets herded out. He gets shot up some at the tournyment, so he leaves the beautiful queen, and he rides off for the range all alone by himself. He's like a sheepherder."
"Come on with the paper, Curly," called Tom Osby. "This feller's thinker is workin' fine. Go on, Willie."
"Now, Lancelot, he's layin' at the point of death, and he's thinkin' all the time of Guinevere. I reckon he writes her a letter, and he says, says he, 'Dear Lady, I send thee my undyin' love,' says he. 'I kiss the picture which is a-layin' on my breast,' says he; 'and with my last breath,' says he, 'I shorely yearn for thee!'"
"Meanin' Guinevere?"
"Shore! Says Lancelot, 'Fair queen, thou didst me a injury onct; but couldst thou but come and stand at my bedside, I hadst new zeal in life,' says he."
"Meanin' he'd get well?" asked Curly. "That's the same as Dan Anderson! This feller's a peach!"
"Shut up!" admonished Tom Osby. "Go on, Willie."
"It's always that-a-way," said Willie. Tears stood in his eyes. He looked vaguely out over the blue hills which hedged in the enchanted valley of Heart's Desire. "It's always that-a-way," he repeated. "Somehow, somewhere, there's always a beautiful queen, for every fellow, just over the mountains. It's always that-a-way."
Tom Osby reached out a hand and gently shook him.
"Set up, Willie," said he. "Come down now, till we get this business fixed. Now, what happens after that?"
Willie winked his eyes and smiled amiably. "The sick knight, he writes a missive to the beautiful queen," he went on. "He sets his signet ring on to the missive, and he hands it to his trusted henchman, and his trusted henchman flies to do his bidding."
"That's you, Curly," nodded Tom Osby. "You're the trusted henchman."
"I'm damned if I am!" replied Curly. "I'm nothin' but a plain cow hand from the Brazos; but I don't take 'henchman' from nobody!"
"Hush!" said his friend. "This feller's a genius. If he don't get side-tracked on Dead Shot Dick, or something of that kind, this letter is just as good as wrote, right now."
"The good knight presses his signet ring on to the missive," resumed Willie, "and his trusted cow hand wraps the missive in the folds of his cloak, and climbs on to his trusted steed, and flies far, far away, to the side of the beautiful queen."
"That's good!"
"And the beautiful queen reads the missive, and clasps her hands, and says she, 'My Gawd!'"
"Oh, now we're gettin' at it!" said Tom Osby. "Say, this is pretty poor, ain't it, Curly?"
"And then," went on Willie, frowning at the interruption, "the beautiful queen sends for her milk-white palfrey, and she flies to the distant bedside of the sufferin' knight."
"She'll take a milk-white buckboard, more likely," said Tom Osby. "You got any palfreys on your ranch, Curly? But we'll let it go at that. She's got to fly to the distant bedside somehow."
"Oh, that'll be all right," agreed Willie, sweetly. "She'll fly. She'll come. It's always the same. It's always the same."
"Write it down, Willie," ordered Tom Osby, thrusting the paper before him. Willie hesitated, and glanced up at Tom.
The latter balked in turn. "What! Have I got to start it for you? Well, then, begin it, 'Dear Madam!'"
Curly shook his head. "You couldn't never marry a woman writin' to her that-a-way." And Tom, rubbing a finger over his chin, had to admit the justice of the assertion.
"Leave it to Willie," suggested Curly. "He'll get it started after a while. Go ahead, Willie. How did he say it to her, now, when he sent for the beautiful queen?"
Tom Osby's pencil followed rapidly as it might.
"He writes," said Willie, "like they always do. He says: 'Light of my heart, I have loved you for these years, and they have seemed so long. I could love no other woman after seeing you, and this you should know with no proof but my word. If I have drawn apart from you, 'twas through no fault of mine, and this I pray you to believe. If I have not acted to my own heart the full part of a man, 'tis for that reason I have hidden away; but believe me, my faith and my love have been the same. If I have missed the dear sight of your face, 'twas because I could not call it mine with honor, nor dare that vision with any plea on my lips, or any feeling in my heart, but that of honor. Heart's Heart, and life of my life, could you not see? I could not doom you to a life unfit, and still ask you to love me as a man.'"
He passed his hand across his face, as though it were not himself he heard speaking; but he went on.
"'Now I lie here hurt to death,' says the good knight Lancelot. 'This is the end. Now, at the time when truth must come from the soul, I say to you, my queen'—she's always queen to him—'I say to you, I have loved you more than I have loved myself. But if you could come, if you could stand at my bedside before it is too late, before it is too late—too late—'" Willie's voice broke into a wail. The ray of light was almost fading from his clouded brain.
"Go on," whispered Tom Osby.
"'My queen, my darling—' says Lancelot."
Willie's hands, trembling, fell into his lap. "It's always that-a-way," he whimpered vaguely, coming now to himself.
"Willie," said Tom Osby, gently, "I ain't right sure I've got it all down straight, but I think I have. You read her over, and touch her up here and there where she needs it. Curly, look here. I don't believe Dan Anderson would hesertate one minute to sign this if he saw it."
"They sign it with their hearts," said Willie, vaguely. "They always do."
"He signs it with his heart," said Tom Osby, "and it goes!" He folded the paper and handed it to Curly.
"Saddle up that Pinto horse, Curly, if you can," said he, "and make the run to Sky Top as fast as God'll let you. This letter's all right, and it goes!"
So presently there rode down the long sunlit street of Heart's Desire, mounted upon the mad horse Pinto, this courier to the queen, bearing a message from a mad brain and two simple hearts,—a courier bound upon a strange and kindly errand.
The blue mountains, beyond whose rim lived the sovereign, looked gently down, and the stern walls of the cañon seemed to widen and make room for the messenger as he swept on, carrying the greetings of an absent knight to his distant queen.
"It's like he said," mused Curly to himself, feeling in his pocket for tobacco as he rode. "It's that-a-way, and I reckon it always has been. I've felt like that myself sometimes. Ola, Pinto! Vamos!"
CHAPTER XXV
ROMANCE AT HEART'S DESIRE
The Pleasing Recountal of an Absent Knight, a Gentle Lady, and an Ananias with Spurs
Long and weary miles lay before Curly, messenger to the queen, but the bigness of his errand lightened the way, and his own courage and hopefulness communicated themselves to his steed. The mad horse, Pinto, indomitable, unapproachable, loped along with head down and ears back, surly at touch of rein or spur, yet steady in his gait as an antelope. The two swept down the long cañon from Heart's Desire, traversed for twenty-five miles the alkali plain below, and climbed then the Nogales and the Bonitos, over paths known only to cattle thieves and those who pursued them. At last they swung down into the beautiful valley of the Bonito, and thence in the night far to the southward, until at length they reached the defiles of the Sacramentos. They pulled up after more than a day and a night of travel, weary but not hopelessly the worse for wear, at the end of the steep trail up the mountains to the Sky Top hotel.
Curly, a trifle gaunt, gave his first attention to his horse, which he unsaddled with a slap of approval, and turned loose to feed as best it might on the coarse herbage of the upper heights. His next thought was for himself, and he realized that he was hungry. Immediately there dawned upon his mind another great conviction. He was scared!
He looked about at the long galleries of the ornate modern log house, wherein civilization sought to ape the wilderness; but it was not the arrogant pretentiousness of the building itself which caused him to shift his glance and stand dubiously upon one foot. It was the thought of what the edifice might contain. There, as he began too late to reflect, was the queen! He, the trusted henchman, was bearing to her a missive regarding whose nature he now experienced sudden misgivings. Suppose Willie, the sheepherder, had not, after all, been able to meet the requirements of a situation so delicate and so important! Curly had known the plains and the mountains all his life. He had ridden in the press of the buffalo herd in the Panhandle, had headed cattle stampedes in the breaks of the Pecos, had met the long-toed cinnamon bear all over these mountains that lay about him—had even heard the whisper of hostile lead as part of his own day's work,—but never before had his heart failed him.
Nevertheless, his face puckered into a frown of determination, he stumbled, a trifle pigeon-toed in his high-heeled boots, across the floor of one gallery after another, and knocked at one door after another, until finally, by aid of lingering Mexican servants, he found himself in the presence of the beautiful queen whom he had sought.
He ratified her title when she came toward him where he stood, twirling his hat in his hands; so tall was she, so grave and dignified, yet so very sweet and simple. Curly was a man, and he felt the spell of smooth brown hair and wide brows, and straight, sincere eyes; not to speak of a queen's figure clad in such raiment as had not often been given Curly to look upon. He gazed in a frank admiration which lessened his fear.
Constance Ellsworth held out her hand, with questions for his own household at Heart's Desire. Was everything right with them? Was Arabella quite well of her accident? Was his wife well? And so on. But all the time she questioned him deeper with eyes large, wistful, eager. She had had no news since leaving Heart's Desire, and now she dreaded any. This, then, she said with tightening heart, was news, but fatal news, long withheld. Had Dan Anderson come back unhurt from his sheriff's errand, there would have been no message at all, and silence would have been sweeter than this certainty of evil. This messenger, reticent, awkward, embarrassed, brought her news of Dan Anderson—of the boy whom she had loved, of the man she loved, debonair, mocking, apparently careless, but, as she herself knew, in his heart indomitably resolved. Now he was gone forever from her life. He was dead! She could never see him again. Ah! why had they not used the days of this life, so brief, so soon ended? It was of his death that the messenger must speak.
Curly, already sufficiently perturbed, witnessed all this written on her face, stumbled, stammered, but was unable to find coherent speech; although he saw plainly enough the subterfuge with which even now the girl sought to hedge herself against prying eyes that would have read her secret. She began again, to ask him of his family, the same questions. "Is anything wrong?" she demanded. In some way they were seated before he could go on.
"It ain't the twins, ma'am," he began. "I got—I got a letter for you. It's from him—from us—that is, I got a letter from Mr. Anderson—Dan Anderson, you know."
He fumbled in his pocket. The girl, thoroughbred, looked him straight in the face, pale, meeting what she felt to be the great moment of her life.
"Then he's alive! He must be!"
Curly shook his head; meaning that he was feeling in the wrong pocket.
"He is dead! And I did not see him. He—went away—" Her chin quivered. "Tell me," she whispered, "tell me!"
Curly, busy in his search for the letter, lost the tragedy of this.
"Tell me, tell me, how did it happen?"
"Well, ma'am, he ain't hurt so awful," remarked Curly, calmly. "He just got a finger or so touched up a little, so's he couldn't write none to speak of, you see."
Her heart gave a great bound. She feared to hope, lest the truth might be too cruel; but at length she dared the issue. "Curly," said she, firmly, "you are not telling me the truth."
"I know it, ma'am," replied Curly, amiably; he suddenly realized that he was not making his own case quite strong enough. "The fact is, he got hurt a leetle bit worse'n that. His hand, his left—no, I mean his right hand got busted up plenty. Why, he couldn't cut his own victuals. The fact is, it's maybe even a little worse'n that."
"Tell me the truth!" the girl demanded steadily. "Is his arm gone?"
"Sure it is," replied Curly, cheerfully, glad of assistance. "Do you reckon Dan Anderson would be gettin' anybody to write to you for him if he had even a piece of a arm left in the shop? I reckon not! He ain't that sort of a man."
Curly's sudden improvement gave him courage. "The fact is, ma'am," said he, "I got to break this thing to you kind of gentle. You know how that is yourself."
"I know all about it now," she said calmly. "I knew he would not come back—I saw it in his face. It was all because of that miserable railroad trouble that he went away—that he didn't ever come. It was all my own fault—my fault,—but I didn't mean it—I didn't—"
Curly, for the first time in his life, found himself engaged in an important emotional situation. He rose and gazed down at her with solemn pity written upon his countenance.
"Ma'am," he said, "I don't like to see you take on. I wish't you wouldn't. Why, I've seen men shot like Dan Anderson is, bullets clean through the middle of their body, and them out and frisky in less'n six weeks."
"He will live?"
"Oh, well," and Curly rubbed his chin in deliberation, "I can't say about that. He might live. You see, there ain't no doctor at Heart's Desire. The boys just took care of him the best they could. They brung him home from quite a ways off. They—they cut his arm off easy as they could, them not bein' reg'lar doctors. They—they sewed him up fine. He was shot some in the fight with the Kid's gang, out to the Piños Altos ranch. The sherf tole me hisself Dan was as game a man as ever throwed a leg over a saddle. When he got back from takin' the Kid up to Vegas, the sherf—that's Ben Stillson—he starts down to Cruces. Convention there this week, ma'am. Ben, he allowed he'd get Dan Anderson nomernated for Congress—that is, if he hadn't 'a' got killed."
"I knew he was a brave man," said the girl, quietly. "I've known that a long time."
"You didn't know any more'n us fellers knowed all along," said Curly. "There never was a squarer, nor a whiter, nor a gamer man stood on leather than him. He come out here to stay, and he's the sort that we all wouldn't let go of. Some of 'em goes back home. He didn't. What there was here he could have. For one while we thought he was throwin' us down in this railroad deal, but now we know he wasn't. We done elected him mayor, and right soon we're goin' to elect him something better'n that—if they ain't started it already over to Cruces—that is, I mean, if he ever gets well, which ain't likely—him bein' dead. Now I hate to talk this-a-way to you, ma'am; I ought to give you this letter. But I leave it to you if I ain't broke it as gentle as any feller could."
Curly saw the bowed head, and soared to still greater heights. "Ma'am," said he, "I don't see why you take on the way you do. We all know that you don't care a damn for Dan Anderson, or for Heart's Desire. Dan Anderson knowed that hisself, and has knowed it all along. You got no right to cry. You got no right to let on what you don't really feel. I won't stand for that a minute, ma'am. Now I'm—I'm plumb sincere and truthful. No frills goes." There was the solemnity of conscious virtue in his voice as he went on.
"I'm this much of a mind-reader, ma'am," said he, "that I know you don't care a snap of your finger for Dan Anderson. That's everdent. I ain't in on that side of the play. I'm just here to say that, so far as he's concerned hisself, he'd 'a' laid down and died cheerful any minute of his life for you."
She flung upward a tearful face to look at him once more.
"He just worships the place where your shadow used to fall at, that's all," said Curly, firmly. "He don't talk of nothing else but you, ma'am."
"How dare he talk of me!" she flashed.
"Oh, that is—well, that is, he don't talk so blamed much, after all," stammered Curly. "Leastwise, not none now. He's out of his head most of the time, now."
"Then you've not told me everything, even yet," exclaimed she, piteously.
"Not quite," said Curly, with a long breath; "but I'm a-comin' along."
"He's dying!" she cried with conviction. Curly, now taking an impersonal interest in the dramatic aspect of the affair, solemnly turned away his head.
"Ma'am," said he, at length, "he thought a heap of you when he was alive. We—we all did, but he did special and private like. Why, ma'am, if you'd come and stand by his grave, he'd wake up now and welcome you! You see, I am a married man my own self, and Tom Osby, he's been married copious; and Tom and me, we both allowed just like I said. We knew the diseased would have done that cheerful—if he had any sort of chanct."
The girl sprang up. "He's not dead!" she cried, and her eyes blazed, her natural courage refusing to yield. "I'll not believe it!"
"I didn't ast you to, ma'am," said Curly. "He ain't plumb dead; he's just threatened. Oh, say, you've kind of got me rattled, you see. I've got a missage—I mean a missive—anyways a letter, from him. I had it in my pants pocket all the time, and thought it was in my coat. Them was the last words he wrote."
She tore the letter from his hand, and her eyes caught every word of it at the first glance.
"This is not his letter!" she exclaimed. "He never wrote it! It's not in his hand!"
"Ma'am," said Curly, virtuously grieved, "how could you! I didn't say he wrote it. He had to have a amanyensis, of course,—him a-layin' there all shot up. Nobody said it was his handwriting It ain't his handwritin'. It's his heartwritin'. They sign it with their hearts, ma'am! Now I tell you that for the truth, and you can gamble on that, anyways.
"I think I had better go away. I'm hungry, anyhow," he added, turning away.
"Soon!" she said, stretching out her hand. "Wait!" her other hand trembled as she devoured the pages of the message to the queen. Her cheeks flushed.
"Oh, read it, ma'am!" said Curly, querulously. "Read it and get sorry. If you can read that there letter from Dan Anderson—signed with his heart—and not hit the trail for his bedside, then I've had a almighty long ride for nothing."
CHAPTER XXVI
THE GIRL AT HEART'S DESIRE
The Story of a Surprise, a Success, and Something Else Very Much Better
As Curly stumped away, his spurs clinking on the gallery floor, he encountered Mr. Ellsworth, who held out his hand in recognition.
"I just heard some one was down from the town," he began. "How are you, and what's the news?"
"Mighty bad," said Curly, "mighty bad." Then to himself: "O Lord! I'm in for it again, and worse. I'd a heap rather lie to a woman than a man—it seems more natural."
"Bring any word down with you from up there?" asked Ellsworth. Curly nodded. "I brung a letter," said he.
"That so? What's it about?"
"Well, sir, it bein' a letter to a lady—"
"You mean my daughter? Now, what—"
"Yes, it's for her," admitted Curly; "but it's personal."
"Well, I didn't know but it might be news from that young man, Anderson. You know he went with the posse. Do you happen to know?"
"You ask her. It is, though."
"Did he send you down here?"
"I'm almighty hungry; I ain't had no breakfast, nor nothing." Whereupon Curly bolted.
Ellsworth, disturbed, went in search of Constance. He found her, a crumpled and pathetic figure. The news then had, indeed, been bad!
"Now, now, child," he began, "what's up here? You've a letter, the man tells me."
She covered it with her hand as it lay in her lap. "Is it from him, young Anderson?" he asked. She nodded.
"It's written by a friend of his," she answered presently. "He himself couldn't write. He was too—ill."
"Sent for you?" His voice was grave.
"Yes," she whispered, "when it was too late."
"We'll go," he said with decision. "Get ready. Maybe there is some mistake."
"Don't," she begged, "there is no mistake. I knew it would happen; I felt it."
"By Jove, I hope it's not true; I was beginning to think a good deal of that boy myself."
Constance was passing through the door on her way to her room. She turned and blazed at him. "Then why didn't you talk that way before?"
She disappeared, and left him staring after her, through the open door.
An hour later a buckboard, driven by a silent Mexican, rolled down the Sky Top cañon, bound for the northern trail.
Curly finished his breakfast, and then went out in search of his horse, which presently he found standing dejectedly, close where it had been left, apparently anchored by the reins thrown down over its head and dragging on the ground. Curly seated himself on the ground near by and addressed his misanthropic steed in tones of easy familiarity.
"Pinto," said he, "you remind me of a heap of folks I know. You think them reins holds you, but they don't. They ain't tied to nothing. You're just like them, hitched tight to a fool notion, that's all. If I don't take your bridle off, you'll stand there and starve to death, like a good many fool folks I've heard of. You've got to eat, Pinto."
Curly arose and with a meditative finger traced the outlines of the continental maps displayed on Pinto's parti-colored flanks. That cynical beast, with small warning, kicked at him viciously.
"Oh, there you go!" remonstrated Curly; "can't you get tired enough to be decent? Git on away—vamos!"
He stripped off the bridle from Pinto's head, and again gave him a friendly slap, as he drove him off to graze, without any precaution to prevent his running away. As for himself, Curly lay down upon the ground, his face on his arm, and was soon fast asleep in the glaring sun. Pinto, misanthropic as he was, did not abuse the confidence reposed in him. He walked off to a trickle of water which came down from a mountain spring, and grazed steadily upon the coarse mountain grass, but every now and then, under the strange bond which sometimes exists between horse and man, wandered around to look inquiringly at his sleeping master, whom he would gladly have brained upon occasion, but upon whom, none the less, he relied blindly.
There were long shadows slanting toward the eastward when Curly arose and again saddled up his misfit mount. He knew that the buckboard was well in advance of him in time, but it must take the longer wagon trail to the westward of Sky Top, while for himself there were shorter paths across the mountains. He rode on until night fell, and the moon arose, flooding all the mountain range with wondrous silvery light, which grew the plainer as he left the whispering pines and came into the dwindled piñons of the lower levels. Then up and down, over and over, he crossed the edges of other spurs, coming down from the great backbone of the range. It was past midnight when he reached the flat-topped mesa near the Nogales divide, where there were no trees at all, and where ancient pottery, relics of a forgotten Heart's Desire of another race and time, crumbled beneath his horse's hoofs. Here Curly loosened the saddle cinches, flung down the bridle-rein over Pinto's head again, and himself lay down to sleep, uncovered, but hardy as any mountain bear that roamed the hills.
When he awoke the red sun hung poised on the shoulder of Blanco, far away, as though to receive the ghostly worship of those who once lived and loved, and prayed here, in the long ago. So now he ate as he might, and drank at the Rio Bonito, a dozen miles farther on, and went his way comforted.
Dropping down rapidly on the farther side of the Nogales, Pinto shambling along discontentedly but steadily, Curly at length came to the wagon trail which led along the edge of the plain on the western side of these ranges which he had threaded. He leaned forward and examined the trail for wheel marks.
"By Jinks! Pinto," he muttered, "the old man and the girl is shore hittin' the trail hard for that there death-bed. I'll bet that pore girl's tired, for they must have made a short camp last night. Vamos, caballo!" and so he spurred on to the northward along the hot low flats.
By noon he sighted a dust cloud on ahead, which told him that he had the other party well in hand if he liked, in spite of the speed they were making.
"They travelled all night, that's what they did! If that Mexican don't kill his team, it's a lucky thing." He did not seek to close the gap between them, but on the other hand pulled up and rode more slowly.
"Now, Pinto," he pondered, "whatever in the world am I goin' to do when we all pull into town? Deathbed—and him like enough settin' up and playin' solitaire, or out pitchin' horse shoes. Shucks! If I could git around behind Dan Anderson's house, I believe I'd shoot him a few for luck, so's to make some sort of death-bed scene like is announced in the small bills. We've been playin' it low down on them two folks, and for one, I wish't I was out of it. Pinto, this here particular trusted henchman has shore got cold feet right here."
He trailed behind the buckboard hour after hour, dropping back into a gully for concealment now and then, and putting off the unpleasant hour of meeting as long as possible. He kept in the rear until the vehicle turned in at the mouth of the cañon which led up to the valley of Heart's Desire. Then Curly hastened, and so finally clattered up alongside the buckboard. Ellsworth was gray with fatigue, and Constance worn and pale; seeing which Curly cursed himself, Tom Osby, and all animate and inanimate things. "It's a shame, that's what it is!" he muttered to himself reproachfully, and averted his face when Constance smiled at him bravely and disclaimed fatigue.
The sun was beginning to sink beyond Baxter peak as they came in view of the little straggling town, clinging hard to the earth as it had through so many years of oblivion. It was an enchanted valley upon which they gazed. The majestic robes of the purple shadows, tremendous, wide-spreading, yet soft as the texture of thrice-piled velvet, were falling upon the shoulders of the hills. An unspeakable, stately calm came with the hour of evening. It was a world apart, beautiful, unreal, sweet and full of peace. Far, far from here were all the tinselled trappings of an artificial world, distant the clamorings of a disturbing civilization with its tears and terrors. Battle and striving, anxiety and doubt, apprehension and repinings—the envy and the jealousies and little fears of life—none of these lay in the lap of old and calm Carrizo. Peace, rest, and pause,—these things were here.
The ravens of the Lord had cared for those who had come hither, pausing, dreaming, for a pulse-beat in a frenzied century of rapacity and greed. Would the ravens care for a now pale-faced, trembling girl?
"It's perty, ain't it, ma'am?" said Curly. She looked at him and understood many things.
But Curly left them traitorously, almost as soon as they entered the lower end of the street, intent upon plans of his own. Those in the slower buckboard, whose tired team could ill afford any gait beyond a walk, saw him set spurs to his horse and dash ahead. There came more and more plainly to their ears the sound of a vast confused shouting, mingled with rapid punctuation of revolver fire. As they came into full view of the middle portion of the street, they saw it occupied by the entire population of Heart's Desire, all apparently gone mad with some incomprehensible emotion.
"What's the matter? What's the matter?" Mr. Ellsworth called out to one man after another as they passed; but none of them answered him. Coherent speech seemed to have deserted all. "Here, you, Curly!" he shouted. "What's all this about?"
Curly, after a swift dash up the street, was now spurring back madly, his hat swinging in the air, himself crazed as the others.
"He's in!" he yelled. "We done it!"
"Who's in? What've you done?"
"Dan Anderson—nomernated him for Congress—day 'fore yestidday, over to Cruces. Whole convention went solid—Cruces and Doña Ana, Blanco—whole kit and b'ilin' of 'em. Ben Stillson done it—boys just heard—heard the news!" After which Curly relapsed into a series of yells which closed the incident.
Constance listened, open-eyed and silent. So then, he had succeeded! The joy in his success, the pride in his victory, brought a flush to her cheek; but in the same moment the light faded from her eye. She caught her father by the shoulder almost fiercely. "Look at them!" she exclaimed. "They're proud of their victory, but they do not think of him. See! He is not here."
Her father, sniffing politics, was forgetting all else; but sobered at this speech, he now motioned the driver to move on. McKinney was there, Doc Tomlinson, Uncle Jim Brothers—the man from Leavenworth—many whom they knew, but not Dan Anderson.
As they turned from the street to cross the arroyo, they saw following at a respectful distance both Curly and Tom Osby, the latter walking at Curly's saddle-skirt, for reasons not visible at a distance. Tom Osby was still continuing his protestations. "You go on over, Curly," said he. "You've done mighty well; now go on and finish up. I ain't in on the messenger part."
"Maybe not," replied Curly, "but both halfs of this here amanyensis is goin' over there together. I told that girl that Dan Anderson was shot to a finish and just about to cash in. Now here's all this hoorah about his bein' put up for Congress! I dunno what she'll find when she gets into that house, but whichever way it goes, she's due to think I'm a damned liar. You come along, or I'll take you over on a rope."
The two conspirators crossed the arroyo and paused at the path which led up to Dan Anderson's little cabin. They saw Mr. Ellsworth and Constance leave the buckboard and stop uncertainly at the door. They saw him knock and step half within, then withdraw and gently push his daughter ahead of him. Then he stood outside, his hat in hand, violently mopping his brow. As he caught sight of the two laggards he beckoned them peremptorily.
"O Lord!" moaned Tom Osby; "now here's what that sheepherder done to us, with his missive and his signet ring."
Constance Ellsworth had grown deadly pale as she approached the dwelling. The open door let in upon a darkened interior. There was no light, no ray of hope to comfort her. There, as it seemed to her, in that tomblike abode, lay the end of all her happiness. In her heart was only the prayer that she might find him able, still to recognize her.
At her father's gesture she stepped to the door—and stopped. The blood went first to her heart, and then flamed back into her face. Her cheeks tingled. Her hand fell lax from the door jamb, and she half staggered against it for support, limp and helpless.
There before her, and busily engaged in writing—so busy that he had merely called out a careless invitation to enter when he heard the knock of what he presumed to be a chance caller—there, perhaps a trifle pale, but certainly well, and very much himself, sat Dan Anderson!
"He's alive!" whispered Constance to her heart.
"He's going to live!"
The future delegate from the Territory had slunk away from the noisy street to pen some line of acknowledgment to his friend the sheriff of Blanco. He had succeeded, so he reasoned with himself insistently; and yet a strange apathy, a sadness rather than exultation, enveloped him. The world lay dull and gray around him. The price of his success had been the sight of a face worth more to him than all else in the world. He had won something, but had lost everything. His hand stopped, his pencil fell upon the paper. He looked up—to see her standing at his door!
Dumb, unbelieving, he gazed and gazed. She turned from red to pale, before his eyes, and still he could not speak. He knew that in an instant the vision would fade away.
"Oh, why, hello!" said he at last, weakly.
"How—that is, how do you do?" Constance said, flushing adorably again.
"I didn't expect—I didn't know you were coming," stammered Dan Anderson.
She chilled at this, but went on wonderingly. "I got your letter—" she began.
"Letter? My letter—what letter?"
Constance looked at him fairly now, agitation sufficiently gone to enable her to notice details. She saw that Dan Anderson's left arm was supported upon the table, but apparently not seriously injured. And he had been writing—with his right hand—at this very moment! She almost sank to the ground. There had been some cruel misunderstanding! Was she always to be repudiated, shamed? She stood faltering, and would have turned away.
But by this time Dan Anderson's own numbed faculties came back to him with a rush. With a bound he was at her side, his right arm about her, holding her close, strong.
"Constance!" he cried. "Constance! You! You!" He babbled many things, his cheek pressed against hers. She could not speak.
"You see—you see—" exclaimed Dan Anderson, at length, half freeing her to look the more directly into her eyes, and to assure himself once more that it all was true—"I didn't understand at first. Of course, I sent the letter. I wrote it. I couldn't wait—I couldn't endure it any longer. Darling, I couldn't live without you—and so I wrote, I wrote! And you've come!"
"But your handwriting—" she murmured.
"Of course! of course!" said Dan Anderson. He was lying beautifully now. "But of course you know I'm left-handed, and my left arm got hurt a while ago, so I couldn't use that hand. I don't suppose my handwriting did look quite natural to you."
Her eyes were solemn but contented as she looked into his face, and saw that in spite of his words he was as much mystified as herself. Slowly she presented to him the letter which he had never seen. His face grew grave and tender as he read it line for line.
"It is mine!" he said. "I wrote it. I sent it. I've sent it a thousand times to you before now, across the mountains."
"Is it signed with your heart, Dan?" she whispered.
"With my heart—yes, yes!"
"It is beautiful," said she, simply. And so they dropped between them the letter to the queen. Hand in hand they stepped to the door, the room too small now to contain their happiness.
Two stumbling figures fleeing, pigeon-toed and sharp-heeled, on the further side of the arroyo meant much to Dan Anderson. A laugh choked in his throat as he caught her once more in his arms.
"It looks like Willie had made good!" said Tom Osby to Curly, as he took a swift glance back over his shoulder.
But Constance and her lover had forgotten all the world, as they stepped out now into the glory of the twilight of Heart's Desire.
"You remember," said he—"up there—the other time?" He nodded toward the head of the arroyo, where lay the garden of the Littlest Girl.
"You broke my heart," she murmured. "I loved you, Dan. What could I do?"
"Don't!" he begged as he tightened his arm about her. "I loved you, Constance—what could I do? We've been through the fire together. It has all come right. It's all so beautiful."
They stood together at the little garden spot. Two brave red roses now blossomed there, and he plucked them both, pinning them at her throat with hands that trembled. They turned and looked out over the little valley, and to them it seemed a golden cup overrunning with joy.
"Heart's Desire," he murmured, and once more his cheek rested against hers.
"Yes," she whispered vaguely, "all, all—your Heart's Desire, I hope—and mine—mine."
"It's the world," he murmured. "It is the Beginning. We are the very first. Oh, Eve! Eve!"