The starter, Dick Venable of White Rock, looked at his watch and this time did not return it to his pocket.
"It's two minutes of one," he said, his voice snapping out hard and curt. "This race is scheduled to start at one o'clock. All ready, Mr. Hume?"
"All ready," laughed Hume. He stepped to Endymion's head, jerked off the halter and swung up into the saddle.
"All ready, Shandon?"
Again Hume laughed. Dick Venable waited a moment and snapped his watch shut.
"My job's to start this race if there's one man here to run it," he said. "Shandon isn't here. It isn't my job to express any opinions. The first horse, ridden by either Sledge Hume or Wayne Shandon, to cross that line as a start and to break the tape by the platform at the Bar L-M wins the money. When I fire a gun you're off, Hume. Ready!"
The men began to turn away. Hume sat erect on his horse, coldly indifferent to the opinion these men held of him. He moved so that he held Endymion's restless head over the line marked by Venable's boot.
"All right, Charlie?" Venable asked of Granger.
"All right," grunted Granger. "And wrong as hell. Get it over with."
Venable raised his arm, his revolver high above his head. The bystanders swung up to their horses' backs. Two miles away another little group of men with field glasses were upon a ridge from which they could see the start, from which they in turn could signal the word to the crowd at the Bar L-M.