"Let them alone, Ferris, and come along. You'll get most of what you
lost back to-morrow, and we're going to take you home," he said.
Ferris turned upon him hoarse with passion, flushed in face, and
swaying a trifle on his feet, while Winston noticed that he drew one
arm back.
"Who are you to lay hands on a gentleman?" he asked. "Keep your
distance. I'm going to stay here, and, if I'd had my way, we'd have
kicked you out of Silverdale."
Winston dropped his hand, but the next moment the ornament of a
distinguished family was seized by the neck, and the farmer glanced at
Dane.
"We've had enough of this fooling, and he'll be grateful to me
to-morrow," he said.
Then his captive was thrust, resisting strenuously, out of the room,
and with Dane's assistance conveyed to the waiting wagon, into which he
was flung almost speechless with indignation.
"Now," said Dane quietly, "you've given us a good deal more trouble
than you're worth, Ferris, and if you attempt to get out again I'll
break your head for you. Tell Courthorne how much that fellow got from
you."
In another ten minutes they had jolted across the railroad track and
were speeding through the silence of the lonely prairie. Above them
the clear stars flung their cold radiance down through vast distances
of liquid indigo, and the soft beat of hoofs was the only sound that
disturbed the solemn stillness of the wilderness. Dane drew in a great
breath of the cool night air, and laughed quietly.
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