Bounding swiftly away, Venters fled around the corner, across the
street, and, leaping a hedge, he ran through yard, orchard, and
garden to the sage. Here, under cover of the tall brush, he
turned west and ran on to the place where he had hidden his
rifle. Securing that, he again set out into a run, and, circling
through the sage, came up behind Jane Withersteen's stable and
corrals. With laboring, dripping chest, and pain as of a knife
thrust in his side, he stopped to regain his breath, and while
resting his eyes roved around in search of a horse. Doors and
windows of the stable were open wide and had a deserted look. One
dejected, lonely burro stood in the near corral. Strange indeed
was the silence brooding over the once happy, noisy home of Jane
Withersteen's pets.
He went into the corral, exercising care to leave no tracks, and
led the burro to the watering-trough. Venters, though not
thirsty, drank till he could drink no more. Then, leading the
burro over hard ground, he struck into the sage and down the
slope.
He strode swiftly, turning from time to time to scan the slope
for riders. His head just topped the level of sage-brush, and the
burro could not have been seen at all. Slowly the green of
Cottonwoods sank behind the slope, and at last a wavering line of
purple sage met the blue of sky.
To avoid being seen, to get away, to hide his trail--these were
the sole ideas in his mind as he headed for Deception Pass, and
he directed all his acuteness of eye and ear, and the keenness of
a rider's judgment for distance and ground, to stern
accomplishment of the task.
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