Another rider jogged beside Robin Tyler when he rode out of Fort
Benton the following day, a man about thirty, a typical cow hand one
would say from a glance at his sunburned face, the easy effortless
way he sat his horse, the completeness of his riding rig. Sam
Connors was a cow-puncher, but he was also another of Tom Coats’
deputies, a dark horse on the county pay roll, his status as an
officer of the law remaining under cover for purposes best known to
a sheriff whose security in a political job rested on affording
protection to cattlemen against the occasional marauder who looked
too longingly on stock not his own.
The J7 riders were all in camp. They had feasted, so to speak, won a
roughriding contest in Big Sandy. They were very well pleased with
themselves, with their wagon boss, with the world in general. They
had rested for a couple of days and now with the impatience of youth
they craved action.
They got it speedily. Robin reached camp at three in the afternoon.
Before sundown he had bunched his day herd out of the PN pastures
and made it breast the Big Muddy. He threw his horse herd over the
river on the heels of the cattle, ferried his wagons on a scow
borrowed from the PN, and set up his camp on the north shore.
At daybreak he led his riders on circle. For one week he shifted
camp twice a day and swept the country for fifteen miles on either
side as he moved, so that on the eighth day he had picked up every T
Bar S ranging between lower Birch and Big Sandy Creek. He had by
actual count over six hundred in his day herd and the scope of
Shining Mark’s operations loomed bigger than ever. There might be a
few more scattered here and there on the Block S range, but Robin
had enough for his purpose. He reckoned that Shining Mark’s crew
would be taking a lay-off before beef round-up somewhere near the
home ranch. When the swing of his gathering brought the J7 under the
south slope of Shadow Butte, Robin left Tom Hayes in charge and rode
for the Block S.
He wanted to see Adam Sutherland and he wanted to see Shining
Mark--he wanted to get them together. He thought he would explode a
sort of bomb and see what would follow. Mark might stand pat and say
nothing--but he would do something, either at once or soon after. He
might open war at sight. Robin didn’t know how his tactics would
result. The uncertainty keyed him up a trifle.
Probably his greatest desire was to see May, to feel her lissome
body rest for a moment in his arms. There was a greater thrill in
that expectation, a more riotous quickening of his pulse, than in
the worst Mark Steele could do. Love was for Robin a far keener, a
more disturbing emotion than hate--and he didn’t hate Mark. He
despised him. But despising the man did not, as Robin knew, make him
any less formidable.
Dangerous or not, Mark Steele no longer had the power to make Robin
grow moody as he stared out across the plains, nor to hush the song
on his lips when he rode. He galloped now through the foothills
lilting one of those interminable ditties every range rider knew,
the saga of what befell a trail herd between the Staked Plains and
the Canada line. The ground was dry and hot, the grass a crisp
brown. All the delicate wild flowers, the tender green of spring,
had vanished under the brassy glare of a midsummer sun. The streams
were dwindling in their pebbly beds. Yet the old charm of the plains
held good. That wide land had changed its aspect but intrinsically
it remained the same, passing through its orderly cycle of blazing
July heat, to verge into brown, still autumn--then white winter, and
after that once more the green and beautiful spring.
Robin came whistling down the slope into the home ranch. He noted
the tents of the round-up on the creek below an irrigated meadow. He
hoped both May and her father would be at home and not in town. When
he drew up at the porch steps he saw that May, at any rate, was
there. Her yellow head showed at an open window. She blew him a kiss
with both hands and beckoned him to come in. Robin needed no second
invitation.
“You glad to see me?”
“Glad?” The girl threw back her head and laughed happily. “Oh,
Robin, you’re funny. Are you blind?”
Robin’s vision was keen enough. He could see the glow in her eyes,
the flush that warmed her cheeks, and his ears drank in the note of
gladness in her voice.
“Well, I like to hear you say it,” he smiled. “Because I haven’t
much time to make love. I’m a foreign rider from a distant range and
I’ve got to consult your father on business. Likewise I see the
Block S camp on the creek, so I reckon Mr. Steele may be present,
which makes me keep my weather eye open. Is the owner of the Block S
around?”
Robin was standing with May in the bend of his arm. He kissed her
with the last sentence--and started a trifle at the unexpected
answer to the last question--since it came in the unmistakable deep
tones of Adam Sutherland himself.
“Yes, the owner of Block S is around,” he said. And after a second
in which his daughter and his foreman looked at him in silence he
continued harshly: “And it looks to me like it stands me in hand to
be around.”
May’s head went up. The hand that rested on Robin’s shoulder
tightened a little in its grasp. Her color flamed. Her eyes took on
a different brightness from the soft gleam that had welcomed her
lover.
But Robin found his tongue first, forestalling her.
“You don’t sound very pleased,” he said quietly. “Do you reckon it’s
a crime for a man to love your girl?”
“From what I’ve heard you’re kinda free and hasty in your lovin’,”
Sutherland replied.
Robin’s face clouded.
“You have no right to say a thing like that,” he returned.
“I got a right to say what suits me,” Sutherland declared. “I don’t
know as you’re the man I’d pick for my daughter.”
“Your daughter,” May broke in with unexpected passion in her voice,
“will do her own picking when it comes to a man. You know that, dad.
I’ve told you time and time again. I’ve been good and obedient in
everything you’ve ever asked of me. But you can’t do my marrying for
me.”
“It’s come to that already, has it?” Sutherland muttered. He took
off his hat and rolled it in his hands. His glance, bent alternately
on Robin and his daughter, was doubtful. But neither that dubious
glance on his otherwise impassive, florid face, nor the tone of his
voice, gave any clue to what lay in his mind. “You ain’t lost no
time. Talk about marryin’--a couple of kids!” he snorted suddenly.
“I’ll have something to say about that.”
“Say it, then,” Robin suggested. “Say it right now. Let’s hear your
kick on me as a man, if you have one.”
“There’s something else I want to talk about to you first,”
Sutherland said slowly. His glance flickered toward the south
window. “This can wait awhile. Come out on the porch.”
“Dad.” May put her hands up on her father’s thick shoulder. “You
don’t really think I haven’t a right to pick my own man, do you?
You’re not going to make a mistake like that?”
“I never denied you much,” he looked down at her. “But the man that
gets you’s got to be all wool an’ a yard wide.”
“You won’t quarrel with Robin about me, will you?” she wheedled.
“No. He won’t,” Robin put in, his pride a little in arms at the idea
of her pleading for him. “It takes two to make a quarrel.”
“No, we won’t quarrel,” Sutherland answered. “There ain’t goin’ to
be any argument, even.”
“I want to see you before you leave,” May said to Robin.
“You will,” he told her. “I can promise you that.”
“Are you sure you’ll keep that promise?” old Adam’s eyes narrowed as
he asked the question.
“Yes,” Robin said gently. His gaze, which had followed Sutherland’s
look through the window, noted Mark Steele standing by a porch
column. He wondered how Steele had got there unheard and how
Sutherland’s heavy tread had not warned them of his coming. He had a
flash of how completely love may absorb a man and dull his alertness
for other things. Looking now at Shining Mark’s head and shoulders
limned against the sky he qualified his simple assertion. “Yes, if
I’m on my feet and able to navigate.”
Sutherland caught Robin’s meaning.
“There ain’t goin’ to be no show-down--not yet,” he said. “Come on.”
May, too, had seen Steele.
“I don’t like this,” she said sharply. She caught Robin by the arm.
“I don’t want you to go out there and meet that man. You mustn’t.”
Robin shrugged his shoulders.
“I got to meet him here an’ there, sometime,” said he. “I never did
really side-step him. I surely won’t now.”
“Listen, my girl,” Sutherland frowned. “I’m boss of this layout.
There’ll be no private wars started here. There may be some talk but
there’ll be no shootin’. Tyler’s right. He can’t side-step. There’s
a matter of business to be talked about. You leave keepin’ peace
between these two to me.”
May smiled and kissed her father brightly. Robin marveled at her
easy assurance. He doubted even Adam Sutherland’s power to avert a
clash if Shining Mark made a move. That, it seemed to Robin, was a
little beyond even a cattle king in the heart of his own domain.
“You run along, now,” Sutherland told his daughter. She obeyed at
once.
Robin moved toward the door. Almost instinctively he gave a little
hitch forward to the gun scabbard on his belt. Sutherland stopped
him with an imperative gesture.
“You heard what I said.” His tone was pitched low, but lacked none
of its habitual authority. “Don’t you make no breaks. _He_ won’t.
You let me walk out ahead.”
Robin gave way to him. He didn’t know what was coming, but he was
ready for anything. If a little tension seized him he was
nevertheless alert, mentally and physically prepared for the
unexpected.
Shining Mark greeted him as casually as if nothing had ever risen
between them. Robin looked at him in silence. He couldn’t simulate
that indifference. He wouldn’t pretend. He kept his eye on Steele
and his mouth shut. Mark shrugged his shoulders, looked at his
employer.
“What I wanted to ask you,” Sutherland turned to him and spoke, “was
what you’re doin’ on my range with the J7 round-up?”
“Oh, well----” Robin scarcely hesitated. This was as good an opening
as he wanted. It seemed almost as if Sutherland had made it for a
purpose. He couldn’t possibly know what Robin was there for, but he
could not have led up to Robin’s opening gun more directly. “As a
matter of fact I ambled up here partly to ask you if you had any
objection to me combing your range--and partly to see if I could
make a little deal in cows with you. I bought a bunch of cattle the
other day. That’s what I’m doin’ this side the river; gatherin’ ’em.
I wouldn’t mind sellin’ ’em to you. I only bought them on spec.”
Sutherland stared at him for a few seconds and Robin wondered if he
would turn and rend him or follow the lead--if he would understand
by any chance what Robin was driving at.
“I’ll buy cows any time the price is right,” he said indifferently.
“You’re sort of expandin’, aren’t you? What you got to sell?”
“The T Bar S brand. There’s a lot of ’em clutterin’ up your range.”
“If I don’t buy you out,” Sutherland inquired, “what do you aim to
do with ’em?”
“Oh, somebody else’ll buy,” Robin answered. “I don’t aim to go into
the cow business myself. The outfit I work for don’t care to have
its round-up foreman ownin’ cattle.”
“So you’ve bought the T Bar S and you want to sell it to me?”
Sutherland commented thoughtfully.
Robin watched Steele closely during this exchange of talk. He saw
Mark start when he named the brand, noted the flick of his eyelids.
Beyond that the man gave no sign. He _was_ cold-blooded, Robin
thought.
“What’s your price?” Sutherland asked.
“Eighteen dollars a head,” Robin announced.
“How many head you estimate the T Bar S’ll run?”
Robin could have hugged the old man for those pointed questions. If
anything could galvanize Steele into word or deed that might expose
his hand, that sort of thing would. Selling his own stock--no matter
if they were stolen--over his head, before his own eyes.
“I can’t say very close because I don’t know how many more I’ll pick
up. Right now I’ve got between three and four hundred head.”
Sutherland continued to stare at him hard.
“I might dicker with you,” he said slowly. “Can you give me a legal
transfer of the T Bar S brand?”
“I don’t know why not,” Robin said. “Anyway, I can deliver the
cattle.”
“I’ll give you sixteen dollars.”
Robin took a few seconds to consider this, in reality to watch its
effect on Shining Mark. And the effect seemed to be nil--unless a
slight twisting of his mouth meant anything more than a covert
sneer.
“Split the difference,” he suggested. “Make it seventeen.”
“All right. It’s a deal at seventeen,” Sutherland agreed.
“I can depend on that?” Robin inquired.
Sutherland frowned.
“My word’s never been doubted. What you mean?”
“Nobody’s doubtin’ it now,” Robin smiled broadly. “I just wanted to
be sure you wouldn’t change your mind. I’ll have the last of the T
Bar S’s picked up in a few days. Where do you want me to deliver?”
“Just a minute,” Shining Mark broke in crisply. “Before you consider
that deal closed I’d like to ask you who you bought the T Bar S
from?”
“I don’t know what your interest in the matter is,” Robin answered
him coolly. “But since you ask polite it’s natural I’d buy from the
man that owns it, Jim Bond of Helena.”
“Have you got a bill of sale, and the brand transferred to your
name?” Mark asked slowly.
Robin’s lip curled as he looked at Steele and made his bluff good.
“I’m proceedin’ to sell the T Bar S lock, stock an’ barrel to Adam
Sutherland,” he said. “You can take it I know enough about the cow
business to have a clear title.”
“You can’t sell nothin’ wearin’ a T Bar S to Sutherland or anybody
else,” Mark said very slowly and distinctly. He had drawn himself
straight as an arrow. His mouth had an ugly twist. “If Jim Bond gave
you a bill of sale for the T Bar S it ain’t worth the paper the
damned old crook wrote it on. He don’t own it. He never did. The
brand registry stood in his name, but I own the cattle and I can
prove ownership. I’ve owned ’em ever since the time the T Bar S’s
were turned loose on this range. I give you notice right now. I can
produce the papers for that. You won’t deliver no T Bar S cattle to
Adam Sutherland nor anybody else, Mr. Tyler.”
Anger rang in his voice. Unquestionably Shining Mark was stirred.
But he made no move beyond that defiant speech. Robin, watching him
closely, shrugged his shoulders.
“You may have the papers,” he said insolently. “But I’ve got the
cattle. I’ll deliver ’em to the Block S.”
Steele took a step forward. For a breath Robin thought Shining Mark
meant to burn powder at last and he stiffened in his tracks, half
turned, ready. But Mark controlled his temper. He, too, shrugged his
shoulders. His lips parted, but before the words were uttered
Sutherland faced him.
“So you claim to own the T Bar S brand?”
“I do own it,” Mark said coolly.
“An’ you’ve owned it for two years, here on my range, unknown to me?
Hidin’ behind another man’s registry of the brand?”
“I have. You can put it that way if you like.”
“I don’t like it no way you put it, Steele,” old Adam said. “If the
J7 has gathered between three and four hundred in that brand there’s
a screw loose somewhere. I know how many head came in here two years
back. That ain’t a natural increase. You know what I mean.”
“I can’t help what you mean,” Steele replied quite casually. He
leaned against the porch column, cocked up one booted foot and
played with the spur rowel. “If they’ve increased plenty so much the
better for me. I own ’em. I can prove ownership. You can be
suspicious if it suits you. If you think I’ve rustled you know what
to do about that. You’ve handled rustlers before.”
“You have rustled, by God--an’ you’ve done worse!” Sutherland
gritted.
Shining Mark looked at him unmoved.
“That’s open to argument,” he said brazenly. “You’ve got stock
detectives. You’ve got men with eyes in their heads. They’ve been
around me all the time. If you think you got a case, go ahead. I’ve
got a clear conscience, Sutherland. And I own that T Bar S brand.
Nobody’s goin’ to sell it but me--an’ don’t you forget that, Mr.
Robin Tyler.”
“I told you before you may have papers enough to choke a cow,” Robin
said. “But possession is nine points of the law, I’ve heard. I’ve
got the cattle. I’ll deliver ’em to the Block S. You can gamble on
that.”
“Maybe you will, maybe you won’t,” Shining Mark snarled. “I’m here
to tell you you won’t. I’ll tell you something more. I’ll----”
“That’s enough, Steele,” Sutherland stepped between them. “You make
a break on this porch and you’ll go feet first off the ranch. You
shut up an’ ride while the ridin’s good. An’ keep ridin’.”
“Oh, I’ll ride off your ranch fast enough,” Steele said with an ugly
laugh. “But after that I’ll ride where I damn please. This is a free
country, Sutherland. You can’t run me out of it because you don’t
like me to own stock on your range.”
“I don’t care a whoop about you ownin’ stock on my range,”
Sutherland growled. “But it sure don’t set well on my stomach to
have a man I trusted turn out both a liar an’ a thief.”
Shining Mark laughed sardonically. He turned and clanked down the
steps.
“Talk’s cheap but it takes money to buy whisky,” he flung back over
his shoulder. “Say what you like. Think what you like. But don’t
monkey with my cattle or you’ll burn your fingers--both of you.”
He mounted and rode away. They watched him lope toward the round-up
camp. In Robin’s mind lurked a wonder as to what Shining Mark’s next
move would be. Steele would never lie down under that, Robin knew.
He was too cool, too determined--so sure that he was safe that he
could and would defy them. The hate in his eyes and voice spelled
trouble to Robin’s discerning eye.
Then he turned to find Sutherland steadfastly regarding him.
“I sure got a couple of enterprisin’ wagon bosses,” the old man said
tartly. “One aims to steal my cattle and the other aims to steal my
daughter.”