"Legs," said Curly, "made out of candy, about so long, or maybe a little longer. Red, and white, and blue—all made out of candy, you know. Shoes on the feet, buckles on the shoes, and heels. Sort of frill around on top. The feller that made them things could shore do candy a-plenty. They was too pretty to eat up, so the little woman, she done put 'em in the parlor,—on the table like, in the middle of the floor; tied 'em together with a blue ribbon and left 'em there. Now, you all know right well that's the only pair of candy legs in Heart's Desire."
"That's legitimate distinction, Curly," Dan Anderson decided. "It entitles your family to social prominence."
"Oh, we wasn't stuck up none over that," laughed Curly, modestly, "but we always felt kind of comfortable, thinkin' them there legs was right there on the parlor table in the other room. You can't help feelin' good to have some little ornyment like that around the place, you know, special if there's women around. But now, fellers, what I was goin' to say is, there's mice, or rats, got in on this range some how, and they—"
"Why didn't you put 'em in a box?" asked McKinney, severely. "You ain't got sense enough to know the difference between a hair rope and a can of California apricots."
"Put 'em in a box?" cried Curly. "Why? Them was ornyments! Now you ain't got a ornyment on your whole place, except a horned toad and four tarantulas in a teacup. Now a real ornyment is somethin' you put on the parlor table, man, and show it free and open. It's sort of sacred like."
"Not for rats," said McKinney.
"You'd better keep your eye on that parrot," warned Doc Tomlinson. "About to-morrow, you tell us what you find out."
But on the morrow the mystery remained unsolved. "One heel's plumb gone," said Curly, sighing. "And they've begun on the toe of the other foot."
Bill, the parrot, remained under increasing suspicion. "He's got a wall eye," said McKinney, "and I never seen a wall eye in a man, woman, or mustang, that it didn't mean bad. This here bird ain't no Hereford, nor yet a short-horn. He's a dogy that ain't bred right, and he ain't due to act right." All Curly could do was to shake his head, unpersuaded.
Meantime, there went on in the little cabin across the arroyo, a reproduction of an old, old drama. Should we, after all, criticise these two descendants of the first sweet human woman of the world? Consider; to their young and inexperienced eyes appealed all the fascinations of this august but tempting object, new, strange, appealing. For a time their hearts were strong, upon their souls rested the ancient mandate of denial. They gazed, short breathed, in awe, upon this radiantly bestriped, unspeakably fascinating, wholly and resplendently pulchritudinous creation. They must have known that it was a part of the family pride, a part of the parlor—a part, indeed, of the intermingled fabric of the civilization of Heart's Desire! And yet—alas!