FullReads

“That’s the trouble,” said the cow-puncher. “I do. Awful far.” He stared out of the window.

“Well, I might come some time. I wish you’d write me a letter. Can you write?” “What’s that? Can I write? Oh yes.”

“I can write, an’ I can read too. I’ve been to school in Sidney, Nebraska, an’ Magaw, Kansas, an’ Salt Lake–that’s the finest town except Denver.”

Billy fell into that cheerful strain of comment which, unreplied to, yet goes on contented and self-sustaining, while Mr. McLean gave amiable signs of assent, but chiefly looked out of the window; and when the now interested waiter said respectfully that he desired to close the room, they went out to the office, where the money was got out of the safe and the bill paid.

The streets were full of the bright sun, and seemingly at Denver’s gates stood the mountains sparkling; an air crisp and pleasant wafted from their peaks; no smoke hung among the roofs, and the sky spread wide over the city without a stain; it was holiday up among the chimneys and tall buildings, and down among the quiet ground-stories below as well; and presently from their scattered pinnacles through the town the bells broke out against the jocund silence of the morning.

“Don’t you like music?” inquired Billy.

“Yes,” said Lin.

Ladies with their husbands and children were passing and meeting, orderly yet gayer than if it were only Sunday, and the salutations of Christmas came now and again to the cow-puncher’s ears; but to-day, possessor of his own share in this, Lin looked at every one with a sort of friendly challenge, and young Billy talked along beside him.

“Don’t you think we could go in here?” Billy asked. A church door was open, and the rich organ sounded through to the pavement. “They’ve good music here, an’ they keep it up without much talking between. I’ve been in lots of times.”

They went in and sat to hear the music. Better than the organ, it seemed to them, were the harmonious voices raised from somewhere outside, like unexpected visitants; and the pair sat in their back seat, too deep in listening to the processional hymn to think of rising in decent imitation of those around them. The crystal melody of the refrain especially reached their understandings, and when for the fourth time “Shout the glad tidings, exultingly sing,” pealed forth and ceased, both the delighted faces fell.

“Don’t you wish there was more?” Billy whispered.

“Wish there was a hundred verses,” answered Lin.

But canticles and responses followed, with so little talking between them they were held spellbound, seldom thinking to rise or kneel. Lin’s eyes roved over the church, dwelling upon the pillars in their evergreen, the flowers and leafy wreaths, the texts of white and gold. “‘Peace, good-will towards men,'” he read. “That’s so. Peace and good-will. Yes, that’s so. I expect they got that somewheres in the Bible. It’s awful good, and you’d never think of it yourself.”

There was a touch on his arm, and a woman handed a book to him. “This is the hymn we have now,” she whispered, gently; and Lin, blushing scarlet, took it passively without a word. He and Billy stood up and held the book together, dutifully reading the words:

“It came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold;
Peace on the earth–“

This tune was more beautiful than all, and Lin lost himself in it, until he found Billy recalling him with a finger upon the words, the concluding ones:

“And the whole world sent back the song
Which now the angels sing.”

The music rose and descended to its lovely and simple end; and, for a second time in Denver, Lin brushed a hand across his eyes. He turned his face from his neighbor, frowning crossly; and since the heart has reasons which Reason does not know, he seemed to himself a fool; but when the service was over and he came out, he repeated again, “‘Peace and good-will.’ When I run on to the Bishop of Wyoming I’ll tell him if he’ll preach on them words I’ll be there.”