to discharge the cargo of his freight wagon.
This done, he did not pause for a pipe and a parley, but, climbing up
to the high front seat, picked up the reins and drove off; not, as was
his wont, to the corral, or to Uncle Jim Brothers's restaurant, but to
his own adobe down the _arroyo_. We looked at each other in silence.

"Something on his mind," said Dan Anderson.

"He didn't bring my clothes," said McKinney.

"Nor my drugs," said Doc Tomlinson.

"And yet," said Curly, who was observant, "he kep' one box in the
wagon. Couldn't see the brand, but she's there all right."

"Curly," said Dan Anderson, "you are appointed a committee of one to
follow the accused down to his house and find out what all this means."

Curly deployed as a skirmisher, and finally arrived in front of Tom
Osby's adobe. The tired horses stood in the sun still hitched to the
wagon, and Curly, out of pity, made it his first business to hunt under
the wagon seat for the picket ropes and halters. He then began to
search for the oats bag, but while so engaged his attention was
attracted by something whose nature we, at a distance, could not
determine. With a swift glance into the back of the wagon, and another
at the door of the cabin, Curly dropped his Good Samaritan work for Tom
Osby's team and came up the street at as fast a gait as any cow puncher
can command on foot. When he reached us his freckled brow was wrinkled
in a frown.

"Fellers," said he. "I didn't think it of him! This here ain't right.
Tom Osby's got a baby in there, and he's squeezin' the life out of it.
Listen! Come on now. Do you hear that? How's that? Why, I tell
you--why, dang _me_ if it ain't _singin'_!"

There came to our ears, as we approached, a certain wailing melody,
thin, quavering, distant, weird. As it rose upon the hot afternoon air
it seemed absolutely strange, unimaginable, impossible. The spine of
each man crawled.

Dan Anderson, of the entire party, seemed to be the only one who
maintained his self-possession. He smiled gently. "Now," said he, "we
certainly are fixed; Heart's Desire ain't benighted any after this."

"What's the matter with you?" Curly questioned.

"Poor cow puncher," replied Dan Anderson, "I have to do the thinkin'
for you, and I ain't paid for it. Who, if not the Learned Counsel on
my right and myself, organized the social and legal system of this
community? Who paved these broad boulevards of our beauteous city?
Who