"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!"