The deaths of Two-Spot and Wolf created a mild sensation over the range, particularly the manner in which each had occurred. The respect which Johnny had enjoyed in Gunsight and on the Double X was increased and the range enjoyed his other exploits. Dave was open in his sympathy for the SV and his growing contempt for the Bar H. Dailey said that he had a gun and could use it any time Johnny needed help, adding with a grin that he hardly expected to be called upon. The Double X was hilarious and brutally frank in everything concerning their neighbor on the southeast. On the Triangle, Frank Gurley became moody and silent, Sam Gardner and Reilly noisy and assertive. The latter, with Lefferts, took over the north end of their ranch and worked nearly as hard for the SV as they did for the Triangle.
Two-Spot\'s funeral was a holiday by tacit consent, and Gunsight was the Mecca for the surrounding country. Fanning offered the hotel, but Dave\'s eyes grew red and he declared that the saloon had been Two-Spot\'s home and that he would be buried from it, even if the cap-and-ball had to cast the deciding votes. Slim rode to Juniper half an hour after he had heard the news and brought a minister back with him. Cimarron sent Larry Hallock to the ranch with the news, George[252] Hallock to the SV, and went down to notify the Triangle himself.
The day dawned clear and reasonably cool, and at an early hour the riders began to come in. The saloon was as clean as Dave, Johnny, and George could make it, and the rude box which had kept Dailey and Fanning up most of the night with hammer and saw, was covered by green boughs and a few wild flowers. As each newcomer rode up to the door he was quietly informed by Dave that the bar was closed and would remain so until after the funeral. There would be no instrumental music, for Arch Wiggins\' offer to ride to the Double X for his fiddle was politely but firmly declined after he had been questioned about his repertoire; Jerry\'s harmonica was overruled, and Reilly\'s accordion was declined for the same reason which had barred the violin.
When Margaret Arnold rode up alone with a huge bouquet of old-fashioned flowers, Gunsight became tremendously interested and there was a great amount of surreptitious grooming going on in out-of-the-way places. Lin Sherwood regretted that he had not been more neighborly, and that he had decided against his new boots, tight though they were. He accused himself of being a poor sort of a grown-up man not to risk a corn or two under such circumstances. He frowned down Slim\'s sheepish remark about seeing Miss Arnold home after the ceremony as being unwarranted and too forward; and he kept Slim in sight thereafter. Dailey cursed Big Tom\'s warning about selling supplies to the SV and was gloomy because of the handicap it put him[253] under, but it became him well in such an atmosphere and nearly gave him the place of chief mourner. Several of the rejected suitors formed a consolation circle and deeply reflected the sorrow expected at funerals, grumbling because the universal remedy for grief would not be obtainable until the return from the grave. There was a suggestion concerning a concerted rush on the bar, but the tender flower of hope was frostbitten by a glance at the cap-and-ball protruding from Dave\'s waist-band. The proprietor had no consideration for the sacredness of the occasion to hang around the walnut armed like a highwayman, and the amount of pugnacious confidence he exhaled and exuded was entirely out of place.
"He acts like a cow with its first calf," growled Sam Gardner.
"He acts like it was his funeral, which I\'m sorry it ain\'t," snorted Pete Wiggins\' young hopeful, still raw about the matter concerning his fiddle.
The minister walking around from the hotel was the signal for the groups to fall in behind him and file into the Palace. This sky pilot was a stalwart member of his cloth and acted as though saloons were not strangers to him. He looked about and nodded his appreciation of Dave\'s efforts and at once became the friend of every man there.
"Friends," he said, looking slowly around, "a good, friend of the deceased, and one who knew him well and who cherishes his memory with gratitude and affection, will sing. Miss Arnold, if you please."
Margaret, tears in her voice and eyes, arose and[254] began her favorite hymn, her rich contralto voice playing upon the heartstrings of the rough men until they dared not look around. Cimarron coughed, and received Slim\'s elbow in his side with unnecessary force. Dave developed a sudden cold and reddened with self-consciousness, wishing he had chosen a seat in the rear of the room instead of standing at the end of the bar, which was an altogether too suggestive place for one in his line of business.
The singer\'s voice grew slowly lower and lower and it was only by exercising all her will-power that she managed to finish the last verse. Her own emotion and faith throbbed in the beautiful words and gave them a power which brought tears to nearly every eye. Finishing, she sank down in her chair and sobbed softly.
The minister, arising, looked over the room.
"\'Nearer to Thee,\'" he repeated softly, and then paused, and when he resumed, his voice struck through to the hearts of his hearers as a hand plucking the strings of a harp. "\'Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.\' Two-Spot. The name was lowly, and with thoughtless cruelty was given to Henry Travers, who once was under foreman for Simon Verrier, the former owner of the SV ranch. We have no knowledge of the interval between the days of his responsibility and strength, and that cold winter evening when Margaret Arnold found him, weak from hunger and exposure, freezing in a snow-drift not far from her home. Of the man\'s weakness we will not speak, except in charity and to show that the character which won for him the confidence and[255] trust of old Simon persisted in spite of that weakness and blazed out gloriously, to win for him an honorable death. It would have been easy to betray the confidence of another, especially when he knew the ability of that other to protect himself. He could have saved his life by telling the truth, and I say to you that there are some untruths more glorious than those truths which mean danger, or perhaps death, to a friend. And if he had yielded to fear to save his life he would have found that life to be a thing without value. He would have lost to himself all that remained worth while. Two-Spot, weak with a weakness perhaps passed on to him by the thoughtless and vicious lives of those others who had preceded him, was, nevertheless, a man, and will live in your memories as a man, a man who at the threat of death, rallied the best within him and died to protect a fellow-man who had been kind to him. He was a lowly card, but even a two-spot has a value, as every man in this room can testify. A two-spot, at the right time and in the right combination, makes a winning hand; and I have it on the authority of two people here that he was given one spot too many. Hardly an ace of diamonds, but surely an ace of hearts, for in his breast beat a heart as true and sympathetic as that of any man in this room.
"There was not a thing coming to his knowledge which affected the welfare of a struggling, defenseless family on this range, that he did not tell them; and when I say that for a man of his age and weakness to walk nine miles to warn them, and nine miles back again, in any weather, at the only time he could do so[256] without being seen and arousing suspicion, required such a heart, and a fine quality of courage, I know that you all will agree with me. Many nights when the range was wrapped in sleep, Two-Spot made that journey. And I say that he was a man, and I pay him the respect which such a heart and courage merits. And no matter what his weaknesses were, no matter how un............