Free Zane Grey by Riders of the Purple Sage Page B

“I’ve been to the village. All is quiet. I expected—I don’t know what. But there’s no excitement. And Tull has ridden out on his way to Glaze.”
    â€œTull gone?” inquired Venters, with surprise. He was wondering what could have taken Tull away. Was it to avoid another meeting with Lassiter that he went? Could it have any connection with the probable nearness of Oldring and his gang?
    â€œGone, yes, thank goodness,” replied Jane. “Now I’ll have peace for a while. Lassiter, I want you to see my horses. You are a rider, and you must be a judge of horseflesh. Some of mine have Arabian blood. My father got his best strain in Nevada from Indians who claimed their horses were bred down from the original stock left by the Spaniards.”
    â€œWell, ma’am, the one you’ve been ridin’ takes my eye,” said Lassiter, as he walked round the racy, clean-limbed, and fine-pointed roan.
    â€œWhere are the boys?” she asked, looking about. “Jerd, Paul, where are you? Here, bring out the horses.”
    The sound of dropping bars inside the barn was the signal for the horses to jerk their heads in the windows, to snort and stamp. Then they came pounding out of the door, a file of thoroughbreds, to plunge about the barnyard, heads and tails up, manes flying. They halted afar off, squared away to look, came slowly forward with whinnies for their mistress, and doubtful snorts for the strangers and their horses.
    â€œCome—come—come,” called Jane, holding out her hands. “Why Bells—Wrangle, where are your manners? Come, Black Star—come, Night. Ah, you beauties! My racers of the sage!”
    Only two came up to her; those she called Night and Black Star. Venters never looked at them without delight. The first was soft dead black, the other glittering black, and they were perfectly matched in size, both being high and long-bodied, wide through the shoulders, with lithe, powerful legs. That they were a woman’s pets showed in the gloss of skin, the fineness of mane. It showed, too, in the light of big eyes and the gentle reach of eagerness.
    â€œI never seen their like,” was Lassiter’s encomium, “an’ in my day I’ve seen a sight of horses. Now, ma’am, if you was wantin’ to make a long an’ fast ride across the sage—say to elope—”
    Lassiter ended there with dry humor, yet behind that was meaning. Jane blushed and made arch eyes at him.
    â€œTake care, Lassiter, I might think that a proposal,” she replied, gaily. “It’s dangerous to propose elopement to a Mormon woman. Well, I was expecting you. Now will be a good hour to show you Milly Erne’s grave. The day-riders have gone, and the night-riders haven’t come in. Bern, what do you make of that? Need I worry? You know I have to be made worry.”
    â€œWell, it’s not usual for the night shift to ride in so late,” replied Venters, slowly, and his glance sought Lassiter’s. “Cattle are usually quiet after dark. Still I’ve known even a coyote to stampede your white herd.”
    â€œI refuse to borrow trouble. Come,” said Jane.
    They mounted, and, with Jane in the lead, rode down the lane, and, turning off into a cattle trail, proceeded westward. Venters’s dogs trotted behind them. On this side of the ranch the outlook was different from that on the other; the immediate foreground was rough and the sage more rugged and less colorful; there were no dark-blue lines of cañons to hold the eye, nor any up-rearing rock walls. It was a long roll and slope into gray obscurity. Soon Jane left the trail and rode into the sage, and presently she dismounted and threw her bridle. The men did likewise. Then, on foot, they followed her, coming out at length on the rim of a low escarpment. 11 She passed by several little ridges of earth to halt before a faintly defined mound. It lay in