“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.” CHAPTER XXIII--CROSSED WIRES 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.”