Nothing was farther from Venters's mind than bravado. No thought
came to him of the defiance and boldness of riding Jane
Withersteen's racers straight into the arch-plotter's stronghold.
He wanted men to see the famous Arabians; he wanted men to see
them dirty and dusty, bearing all the signs of having been driven
to their limit; he wanted men to see and to know that the thieves
who had ridden them out into the sage had not ridden them back.
Venters had come for that and for more--he wanted to meet Tull
face to face; if not Tull, then Dyer; if not Dyer, then anyone in
the secret of these master conspirators. Such was Venters's
passion. The meeting with the rustlers, the unprovoked attack
upon him, the spilling of blood, the recognition of Jerry Card
and the horses, the race, and that last plunge of mad
Wrangle--all these things, fuel on fuel to the smoldering fire,
had kindled and swelled and leaped into living flame. He could
have shot Dyer in the midst of his religious services at the
altar; he could have killed Tull in front of wives and babes.
He walked the three racers down the broad, green-bordered village
road. He heard the murmur of running water from Amber Spring.
Bitter waters for Jane Withersteen! Men and women stopped to gaze
at him and the horses. All knew him; all knew the blacks and the
bay. As well as if it had been spoken, Venters read in the faces
of men the intelligence that Jane Withersteen's Arabians had been
known to have been stolen.
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