“I know you weren’t,” she smiled. “Well, maybe we’ll continue the discussion at that dance. Good-night.” This time she was gone, galloping into the twilight. Robin sat looking after her, listening to the _rat-a-pat_ of her horse’s hoofs until both sound and rider were swallowed in the dark. Then he let Stormy have his head and in half an hour was dismounting at the Bar M Bar. Lights shone in the windows. Old Mayne came to the door. Ivy peered over his shoulder, smiling welcome when the lamplight showed Robin’s face. “I guess I’ll put these nags in the stable for awhile,” Robin said, and Mayne brought a lantern. Sitting on the hewed timber doorsill of the stable once the horses were munching hay, Robin told his boss bluntly just what he had seen and what he surmised. Mayne cursed in impotent fury. “But it might be worse,” he took heart after a bit. “We’re gettin’ onto him. I’ll ride them bottoms. You bet I will. I’ll have to get hold of another cow hand until you’re through round-up, I guess.” “Be careful who you get and what you tell him,” Robin warned. “Steele suspicions me now. He don’t make no breaks but I know he’s thinkin’.” “I wish it was ten years back.” Mayne’s anger rose again. “I’d ride to the Block S an’ shoot that dirty thief like I would a mad dog. But the country’s got so God damned civilized you can’t even kill a thief unless he pulls a gun on you first. They’d bury me in Deer Lodge for life. Adam Sutherland’d never let up. He’d spend a barrel of money to convict a man that shot that pet snake of his. Don’t you let him provoke you, Robin. If he thinks you know too much he’ll pick a row with you an’ make you start somethin’. Then he’ll put your light out an’ it’ll be a clear case of self-defense for him. Or he’ll make you quit the country.” Robin didn’t need Mayne to tell him these things. It was only putting in plain English just what had been gathering in his own mind--just what he felt to be the secret thought Steele nursed. So he didn’t discuss that phase of it at all. He had said his say, had done his duty. He rose. “I’m goin’ to see Ivy,” he told Mayne. “Then I guess I’ll split the breeze.” An hour later he was loping steadily through the night, Ivy’s farewell kiss on his lips, but with his mind strangely divided between his sweetheart and May Sutherland. May was beautiful and so was Ivy Mayne, each in her own fashion. But May’s liquid, throaty voice lingered like an echo of faint music in Robin’s ears. Robin was unread in the nuances of feeling but no man can escape the subtle thing called charm. May was so utterly free from archness, little coquetries. She was so honest and direct. If she had challenged something dormant in him with all the weapons of her sex, it was an unconscious challenge.