It was his rider's hot blood that prompted him to launch this
taunt. He could not help it.
"You wild-hoss chaser," roared Bostil, "your Wildfire may be a bloody killer,
but he can't beat the King in a race!"
"Excuse ME, Bostil, but Wildfire did beat the King!"
This was only adding fuel to the fire. Slone saw Holley making signs that must
have meant silence would be best. But Slone's blood was up. Bostil had rubbed
him the wrong way.
"You're a lair!" declared Bostil, with a tremendous stride forward. Slone saw
then how dangerous the man really was. "It was no race. Your wild hoss knocked
the King off the track."
"Sage King had the lead, didn't he? Why didn't he keep it?"
Bostil was like a furious, intractable child whose favorite precious treasure
had been broken; and he burst out into a torrent of incoherent speech,
apparently reasons why this and that were so. Slone did not make out what
Bostil meant and he did not care. When Bostil got out of breath Slone said:
"We're both wastin' talk. An' I'm not wantin' you to call me a liar twice.
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