Heart's Desire by Emerson Hough (best free novels .TXT) 📖

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