“One of ’em,” he blurted out, “the one that smoked me up, was right flashy with silver. I ain’t namin’ no names.” Mayne stared at him. His faded blue eyes blinked rapidly. “Great snakes!” he muttered. “I don’t blame you. That sure makes it bad.” He scowled reflectively. “The question is----” “The question is,” Robin finished the sentence in his own way, “is he stealin’ for the Block S or for himself.” “If he’s stealin’ for the outfit I got about as much chance on this range as a snowball in hell,” Mayne answered moodily. “If it’s his own iron, I got a show. I wish you’d seen what brand went on them calves.” “I was afoot, I told you. I don’t pack a gun. I ain’t a damn fool,” Robin protested. “You’re all right, kid.” The old man put his hand on Robin’s shoulder. “You’re no gun man, but you’ll burn your share of powder if you ever have to, I guess. Keep your eyes open around the Block S. I’ll find them fresh-branded calves, if it takes me all fall. And if you’re right----” He spat angrily into the dust and got down off the fence. When Robin drew clear of the ranch, jogging behind his string of thirteen mounts, old man Mayne rode out the other way, headed for Cold Spring with a blanket on the back of his saddle and food in his saddle pockets. Robin waved his hat to Ivy a last time before a dip in the rolling land hid the ranch from sight. A mile above the Bar M Bar he turned his horse back into the creek bed, the same fork of Birch Creek that flowed by Mayne’s house. Willows lined the course of the stream. Under a clump of thick-trunked cottonwoods stood a log cabin and a stable of peeled pine logs, a round corral, all on the edge of a few acres of natural meadow enclosed by a pole fence. Robin reined up at the door. His ponies ambled on a few rods and stopped to graze. He sat half-turned in his saddle, looking about him with a pleased expression. Ripe grass, yellow in the sun, ran in a rippling wave to the door. Robin had crossed Illinois and Iowa, he had gone more or less hurriedly through the great tier of corn states once or twice in winter. He had never seen wheatfields nor forest nor farmland nor pleasant gardens in midsummer bloom. He knew best the range with its endless miles of grass and sagebrush, peopled sparsely by riders and lonely ranches, grazed by hoofed and horned beasts. He knew the Bear Paws and the Little Rockies and the Sweetgrass Hills, where pine trees grew and wild roses bloomed in thickets under a June sun. The Rocky Mountains were a faint blue wall on the western limit of his journeyings. He had spent most of his years on the great plains that spread east to the Dakotas and south to Wyoming and Nebraska, where northern bunch grass merged into the arid desert of the southwest.