y 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,
m