“Are you sure of that?” May inquired smilingly. “I’m white and past twenty-one. I’ve got hands and feet, a nose and mouth and hair just like other girls. Where’s the difference?” But Robin grew wary of pursuing that inquiry. He was afraid of getting out of his depth, not too sure she wasn’t poking fun at him. Girls did that, he knew. He took refuge in the obvious. “Your hair’s sure different,” he grinned. “It is right now,” May admitted calmly. She ran her fingers through the tangle of short yellow curls. “But it won’t be by and by--when it grows again. I was ill. The fever made it come out. It’s a good cure for vanity to be bald as an egg, even if only for a little while. Let’s ride the way you’re going for awhile--toward the Bar M Bar.” Their horses struck a running walk, that untiring gait of the cow horse trained to cover ground with the least effort. As they rode May and Robin talked, until on a low ridge with twilight drawing in the girl pulled up and held out her hand. “Good-by, Robin Tyler,” she said. “I wonder when we’ll meet again.” “Lord knows,” Robin answered frankly. “If I had nothing to do but sit on a fat horse and let my feet hang down you might see more than you wanted to see of me. But I’m with the round-up until beef-gatherin’s done. By that time you’ll be gone.” “No,” May said. “I’m not going any more for awhile, except when dad goes to Helena or south for the winter. I’m through school.” “Got your diploma and everything?” “Yes. Although I don’t know what good it’s going to do me. If I’d been a boy I’d be on round-up now, myself.” “Tell me,” she asked, as if an afterthought had come, “you know Mark Steele pretty well, don’t you?” “No.” There was an unavoidable crispness in Robin’s tone. “I’ve seen him off and on the last three years. I never worked with him till this fall.” “You don’t like him, do you?” she observed. Her blue eyes burrowed into Robin’s. “I guess I like him as well as he likes me,” Robin said slowly. He didn’t want to talk about Mark Steele. “I don’t like him either,” May murmured. “I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him. Yet my father thinks he’s the only thing that ever happened around the Block S.” Robin sat silent. He could discuss Shining Mark to a limited extent with Ivy, freely with old man Mayne--somehow, not with this girl. “I hate the man,” she said sharply. “You won’t repeat what I say?” “You know I won’t--or you wouldn’t say it to me,” Robin told her bluntly. “If you hate him it’s because you’re afraid of him.” May looked down at the ground for a second. She lifted her eyes again to Robin thoughtfully. “I wonder if that’s it? It didn’t occur to me. I have no reason to be afraid of him. But I find myself wanting to avoid him although I’ve only met him three or four times. I rode away from home this evening because my father expected him at the ranch.”