The likening of himself to Mark Steele as a marauder made Robin
flush.
“Oh, is that so?” he said stiffly. “You put us in the same class, do
you? You figure that me lovin’ your girl and wanting her is the same
as him stealin’ your calves. I like that. I sure do!”
“I didn’t mean it quite like that, kid,” Sutherland stared absently
after his thieving foreman. “But it don’t seem like I can trust
anybody any more.”
“You can’t trust me because I like May an’ want her,” Robin said
hotly. “It don’t occur to you that her wanting me has anything to do
with it. I’m on the level with a thief because I want to marry your
daughter, eh? What’s the matter with me? Does a man have to be a
millionaire and a hell-roarer and a parlor lion all rolled into one
before you favor him as a son-in-law?”
“Not quite,” Sutherland replied. “But he’s got to be somethin’, an’
he ought to have somethin’. She’s all I’ve got--an’ she’s just a
kid. She owes me somethin’, too. I’ve built up a fortune for her to
have when I’m through. I got to be sure it’s her, not the fortune, a
man’s after--an’ that he is a man.”
“I don’t care a darn about your fortune,” Robin said angrily. “I can
make a fortune of my own, I reckon, if I get down to it. May’s of
age, anyway. If she’s the kind of girl I think she is she’d like to
have your blessin’, but if it ain’t to be had, in a pinch she’ll do
without it. You got no right to keep her in a glass case. And I
don’t think you can.”
“You’re just a couple of kids,” Sutherland repeated stubbornly. “I
won’t hear of it. I don’t know whether you’re the real thing or a
false alarm, Tyler. I don’t want to seem arbitrary, but you got to
put this thing out of your mind if you work for me.”
Robin shook his head.
“I can’t do that,” he answered soberly. “I couldn’t do that even if
I wanted to, even to please you. I’d like you to think I was the
real thing. I don’t know how I can do it any more than I have been
doin’. I’ve had my heart set on her ever since the first time I saw
her--an’ I think it’s the same with her. I’ll play fair, but I won’t
back down an inch where she’s concerned.”
“You’ll do this,” Sutherland said decisively. “You won’t see her no
more till this Shining Mark business is settled. Then you’ll have to
show me you’re capable of handlin’ a big cow outfit, top an’ bottom,
inside out, before I’ll hear of any marryin’. I’ve only the one kid.
I’ve raised her well. I got to make sure she’s makin’ no blunder.”
Some instinctive wisdom forbade Robin taking issue with that. He
rebelled against Sutherland’s attitude--yet saw dimly a certain
justice on the older man’s side. So he held his peace where his
feelings urged him to headlong defiance. He had had to be patient
before. He could be patient now.
And Sutherland, as if he had issued an edict which could not be
gainsaid, returned to the business in hand.
“So,” said he, “you took that five thousand dollars to buy the T Bar
S? What’s the idea, anyhow?”
“I did and I didn’t,” Robin brought his mind back to cattle and
Shining Mark. “I went up to Helena prospectin’. I ran a sort of
whizzer on old Jim Bond and found out what I wanted to be sure of.
Mark owns the T Bar S right enough, did from the beginnin’. Bond’s
just a cover, an’ he admitted that. Then I crossed the Missouri an’
worked some range. I’ve still got your check. I didn’t buy ’em, of
course. I thought maybe I could do that, an’ ball Mark up that way.
But I didn’t need to. I was simply runnin’ another bluff on Steele
because you gave me a good chance. I couldn’t sell the T Bar S to
you, lawful. But thinkin’ I might’ll make him do _somethin’_. I
don’t know but you could put him in the pen right now--since he’s
claimed ownership. As a matter of fact, by actual count, I’ve got
six hundred odd T Bar S cattle in my day herd right now, at Shadow
Butte. That number just naturally proves most of ’em stolen. A
hundred and fifty head mixed stock don’t double up twice in two
years.”
Sutherland grunted something unintelligible. He ran his stubby
fingers through his grizzled hair and looked at Robin. He did not
say Robin had done well or ill. He simply looked--deeply interested,
very thoughtful.
“There’s a few more I expect, scattered around,” Robin continued.
“Do you want me to get ’em all?”
Sutherland didn’t answer that question directly.
“I expect Mark feels dead safe,” he muttered. “He hasn’t run his
iron on anything this spring. I guess we couldn’t make out a clear
case if it come to a trial. I thought--I kinda--an’ we got to
connect him up with shootin’ Tex Matthews yet.”
He stood in a brown study.
“If he stands pat on what he’s got, an’ walks a chalkline, we can’t
do nothin’,” he said at last. “Your word alone, an’ circumstantial
evidence, won’t put him where I want him, Tyler.”
“He won’t stand pat,” Robin prophesied. “I won’t let him, for one
thing. I’ll never be safe on this range with him holdin’ out at
Mayne’s. I’ve troubled Shinin’ Mark too long an’ too much. He’ll try
to get me one way or another. I can see that in his eye every time I
look him in the face. He’ll never give up the T Bar S. And I’ve got
’em. My hunch is to keep ’em. I’d run the Block S on every hoof, an’
see what he’d do about it. Do you want me to hold those cattle?
Two-thirds of ’em he stole from you. Are you goin’ to let him get
away with them--and more?”
Sutherland ripped out an oath.
“I won’t let him sit like a wolf in his den at the Bar M Bar,” he
declared. “I’ll buy Mayne out. I’ll give him all his outfit is
worth. If he won’t sell I’ll freeze him out. An’ Steele won’t have
no hold out or herd to cover up with. But about these T Bar S’s--I
don’t know. Law’s law--when it comes to property. You can’t just
grab ’em.”
“But I _have_ grabbed ’em,” Robin declared. “The original idea in my
mind was to prove to you that he was a darned thief. Then I went
ahead an’ gathered those cattle, gathered and held them on my own
responsibility as boss of the J7--just to make Mark show his teeth.
He will--he can’t help it if he thinks I’m out to beat him at his
own crooked game.”
A queer gleam showed in Sutherland’s eyes.
“That’s up to you,” Robin added. “I’ve run the outfit in your
interest. If you don’t want me to use my own judgment, tell me what
you want done. Say what you want me to do with those stolen cattle.”
“Hold ’em,” Sutherland said briefly. “Gather all you can find.
Outside of that use your own judgment. I want to nail that murderin’
thief--both of ’em.”
“I guess that’s all, then,” Robin said after a brief silence. “I
want to speak to May like I promised. Then I’ll ride.”
“You got to promise me you won’t be seein’ her on the quiet,”
Sutherland persisted. “You’re young an’ you’re good-lookin’. I don’t
know how much more there is to you.”
“If there was no more to me than that,” Robin retorted, “I wouldn’t
be runnin’ a round-up for you.”
“You might be a top cowman an’ still be darned poor timber for a
husband,” Sutherland observed. “A girl’s judgment don’t go far. I
got to know you better.”
“Hell, a fellow would think it was you I aimed to marry, not your
girl,” Robin sputtered, “the way you want to be so sure I’m all wool
and a yard wide.”
“It’s all in the family,” Sutherland grinned slightly, for the first
time in their conversation. “I think a heap of that kid. I don’t aim
for her to take no chances if I can help it. Is it a promise?”
“Yes,” Robin agreed. “I know I have to attend to my work. But seein’
me once in a while is more her affair than yours, I think. If May
wants to have it that way, yes. And only as long as she wants to
have it that way.”
Sutherland fished a cigar out of his pocket, bit off the end with
utmost deliberation.
“I’ll give you ten minutes with her,” he said. “You tell her what I
said.”
Old Adam was still nursing the unlighted cigar when May and Robin
came out on the porch ten minutes later, ten minutes precisely by
the clock.
“Good-by,” Robin said to her. “I’m on my way.”
She put her face up to be kissed and Robin kissed her without regard
to her male parent. Then she went back into the house. He stood a
moment.
“You got no particular orders for me, I suppose?” he inquired.
“No. I told you to use your own judgment. It’ll be two weeks before
beef round-up starts. We’ll see what breaks by then.”
Robin went jingling his spurs down the porch steps. At the bottom
Sutherland halted him with a word.
“Look, kid,” he said. “You keep your eyes peeled for Mark. The
minute you think you’ve got him right--you call on Tom Coats. Don’t
go takin’ the law into your own hands.”
“All right.” Robin smiled to himself. “I guess I won’t do nothin’
rash.”
He had not told Sutherland that he already had one of Tom Coats’ men
on hand for just such an emergency, nor that he, himself, was
clothed in the majesty of such law as Chouteau county afforded. That
was his own affair.
He rode away, not altogether happy, but fairly hopeful. He had
truthfully repeated Sutherland’s ultimatum to May and she had
counseled patience.
“I know him so well,” she said. “If we defy him he might never
forgive us. I think he likes you well enough, Robin. But he has
often hinted at ambitious things for me. There was never a man paid
me any attention that he approved of. He has always made everything
come out the way he wanted and he can’t somehow think of me as a
woman with definite ideas of life for herself--only as a little girl
that he’s raised. So be patient, Robin. Don’t make me a bone of
contention. I will see you now and then, all open and above-board.
If in the end we have to take the bit in our teeth, we’ll do so. I’m
game. I’d turn my back on anything for you. But if you could be the
son he’s never had, it would be better--for all of us.”
And Robin had agreed; the more readily since he had a pride of his
own and Sutherland had touched it deeply. He _would_ show this
cattle king that a man could amount to something even if he were not
of the pastoral blood royal that counted its cattle on a thousand
hills. And there was Shining Mark to be coped with, one way or
another before he, Robin Tyler, could ever ride at ease in the Bear
Paws or lie down to sleep at night with no care in his mind. Neither
task would be easy; the second held as great an element of personal
danger as it did when Robin rode for Mayne. It seemed to him that as
his career and outlook expanded life grew more complicated, clashes
more inevitable, responsibilities greater. But he had no mind to
shirk anything that loomed on his horizon.
He reached his camp by Shadow Butte, slept on his plans, and flung
his riders abroad at dawn. Their circle brought them near the Bar M
Bar. Robin turned off all but Sam Connors and jogged with Sam down
by his own cabin to have a look. He paused a second on the bank
above to have a look around. Wild cattle were streaking westward
before the J7 riders. The Mayne ranch lay in the creek bed, a huddle
of buildings and corrals. Robin wondered, as he dropped into the
flat, if Shining Mark had transferred himself to the Bar M Bar now
that Sutherland had kicked him out.
He and Connors rounded the cabin. Before the door a saddle horse
that Robin knew stood with reins on the ground, head drooping in the
bright morning sun. On the little stoop Ivy Mayne sat nursing her
chin in cupped palms. She looked up as they drew rein, sprang to her
feet and held out both hands.
“Oh, Robin, Robin!” she cried. “I was thinkin’ about you.”
Her cheeks were tear stained. The look on her face gave Robin a
pang. And there was nothing he could do or say--nothing. He knew
that. He sat in his saddle, silent. Sam Connors glanced at the girl,
at Robin.
“I’ll ride on a ways,” he said and was gone before Robin could stay
him or bid him go. His own instinct was to ride on--and still--he
couldn’t be brutal in the face of her distress. Ivy held out her
hands again.
“Get down, Robin, and talk to me--please,” she begged. “Please.”
He dismounted.
“I was a fool.” The words tumbled out of her hysterically. “Come
back, Robin. I want you.”
She flung herself at him. Robin caught her by the shoulders, held
her at arm’s length, looked down at her sorrowfully.
“Get hold of yourself,” he commanded. “Don’t act crazy. You don’t
want me. You’d ’a’ kept me when you had me, if you’d wanted. You
can’t play with a man, discard him, and pick him up again, just as
you take the notion. You know that. What’s the matter with you?”
She turned away from him with a stifled sob.
“Oh, I know, I know,” she wailed. “I’ve lost you. I _am_ crazy. I’ve
always been crazy. I ought to kill myself an’ I haven’t got the
nerve. Oh Robin, Robin, I wish I was dead!”
She sank into that huddled posture on the step and cried in a way
that made Robin ache. Then suddenly, while he wondered if it were
wise or kind to say more, or if it would be better to ride away and
leave her, she stopped weeping, looked up at him.
“I didn’t mean what I said,” she whispered. “I don’t know why I said
it. I know you haven’t any use for me an’ I don’t blame you. I am
about crazy, Robin. You better ride along. Mark Steele’s ragin’
around this country somewhere.”
“He was at the Block S yesterday an’ he didn’t seem particularly
ragin’ when I was around,” Robin said quietly. “Has somethin’
happened?”
“He’s got me in trouble an’ just laughs at me,” she said wearily. “I
don’t know what I’m goin’ to do. Dad’ll just about kill me when he
finds out. Or he’ll go after Mark an’ get killed himself.”
“He can’t give you the worst of it that way,” Robin fairly
sputtered. “He promised to marry you, didn’t he?”
“Yes, but that’s nothin’ to him,” she sighed. “Promises don’t mean
nothin’ to Mark Steele. I took care of him last winter when he was
shot, like he was a baby. He fixed it up to buy a half interest with
dad this spring when he fell into that money. He’s backed out of
everything. He rode in last night fairly foamin’ about somethin’. He
had some things there he wanted. He got ’em an’ rode away an’ as
good as told us both to go to hell. He was wild. I never saw him so
ugly.”
Robin could easily guess the fury that raged in Steele once he had
time to think, feeling himself checkmated, his liberty as well as
the fruits of his crafty stealing endangered by Robin’s latest move.
But that was no matter to be discussed with Ivy. He was sorry for
her--but----She looked at him and her lips quivered. Then a curious
gleam lit her dark eyes.
“If you hadn’t met that tow-headed Sutherland girl, this wouldn’t
’a’ happened,” she blazed out at him.
There was no dealing with that oblique reasoning. Robin knew Ivy’s
wayward moods of old. He made a little impatient gesture. Ivy rose.
“I’m goin’ to the Block S one of these days an’ tear her eyes out,”
she said passionately.
“Look,” Robin said sternly. “You had me. You could always have had
me. I’d ’a’ stuck through anything. But he came along when I was
hoein’ a hard row. You got to despisin’ me an’ admirin’ him. That’s
all there is to it. When I came back after jumpin’ the country
because I thought I’d killed him, you had dropped me like a hot
potato. Don’t go blamin’ another woman for somethin’ you did
yourself, because you wanted to.”
“Both of ’em.” Ivy gritted her white teeth. “I got it in for both of
’em, her an’ Mark. He could ’a’ left me alone, an’ she could ’a’
left you alone an’ it would ’a’ been all right. I hate them both. I
have a mind to ride to the Block S and shame ’em before everybody.
That’s what I started out to do this mornin’.”
“Better turn around an’ go home,” Robin counseled. “No good actin’
like a crazy woman. Go home an’ make a clean breast of it to the old
man an’ let him deal with Shinin’ Mark.”
“He’s afraid. Everybody’s afraid of Mark Steele,” she sneered. “He’d
say I was to blame for givin’ in, an’ he’d about kill me. All he
thinks anything of is his cattle. He’s wild now because Mark backed
out of the partnership. Says Mark’s a darned cheatin’ cow thief.”
“He is, too,” Robin said coldly. “Only he’s as bad as Mark because
he knew that long ago.”
“Oh, I don’t care what he is,” she cried. “I don’t care. I’m so near
crazy I don’t care who is what, or what happens.”
“No good feelin’ like that,” Robin tried to soothe her. “Go home an’
try to settle down an’ forget it. You ain’t the first girl that
trusted a man that was no good. You’re better off without him.”
Ivy began to whimper again. Against that flood of rage and grief and
fear Robin was helpless. He was sorry, but there was nothing he
could do. He had his own crow to pick with Mark Steele. Ivy’s plight
added only a more burning contempt to the score already laid against
the man. So far as he was concerned Ivy Mayne and the Bar M Bar was
a closed book.
“I got to go,” he said gently. “Don’t cry. Don’t worry. You’ll come
out all right. So long.”
He swung up on his horse. Ivy made no move to stay him. Only she
looked up at him with big dusky eyes in which a fire glowed, the old
dumb sullen protest that he remembered when she was crossed in her
desires.
Sam Connors waited for him on the crest of the opposite bank. Robin
joined him, rode a little way, and looked back. Ivy had mounted, she
was galloping away from his cabin--but not toward home. She took to
the bench land above the creek. As far as Robin watched her she
loped steadily north--straight toward the Block S.
He remembered her threat, wondered if she would try to make it good,
and the thought made him a little sick at heart. Shining Mark
wouldn’t be at the Block S. Ivy was just frantic enough to do
anything, say anything. The storm in her breast was driving her mad.
He shook up his horse and bore away toward the round-up ground where
the J7 riders had bunched their cattle. He worked that herd with a
troubled mind. There were too many crossed wires. A sense of
something like impending disaster harassed him far into the night.
Long after the cook was snoring in the opposite corner of the chuck
tent Robin lay staring at the canvas overhead, listening to the
faint jingle of bells among the grazing _remuda_, hearing the night
wind flutter the guy ropes.
In his mind there suddenly flashed up the picture of Shining Mark
sagging to his knees that frosty afternoon in the Birch Creek line
camp.
“I wish to God I _had_ killed him that time,” Robin thought. “I’ll
have to kill him yet. He’s done more damage already than any man
should do an’ live.”
It was, Robin felt sadly, a little late for purely vindictive
reprisal. But there was still such a thing as simple justice, which
must somewhere, sometime, overtake such a man as Mark Steele.