Sang saw them
drive off. They took the buckboard. He heard 'em planning it.
He was too scairt to tell till they'd gone. I just found it out.
They've been gone two hours. Must be going to make the Limited."
Parker fidgeted, impatient to be off. "You're wasting time," he
snapped at the motionless figure.
Suddenly Johnson's face flamed. He reached from his saddle to
clutch Jed's shoulder, nearly pulling the foreman from his pony.
"You lie!" he cried. "You're lying to me! It ain't SO!"
Parker made no effort to extricate himself from the painful
grasp. His cool eyes met the blazing eyes of his chief.
"I wisht I did lie, Buck," he said sadly. "I wisht it wasn't so.
But it is."
Johnson's head snapped back to the front with a groan. The pony
snorted as the steel bit his flanks, leaped forward, and with
head outstretched, nostrils wide, the wicked white of the bronco
flickering in the corner of his eye, struck the bee line for the
home ranch. Jed followed as fast as he was able.
On his arrival he found his chief raging about the house like a
wild beast. Sang trembled from a quick and stormy interrogatory
in the kitchen. Chairs had been upset and let lie.
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