For several hours thereafter he cooled his heels in that little cow town awaiting a west-bound train which landed him in Helena shortly before midnight.
The hour suited his purpose. Ordinary business flourishes by day but the busiest and most profitable period of a saloon keeper’s operations is—or was—likely to occur in the middle of the night. Like any other sound merchant a saloon man might be expected to attend his affairs in person during the peak—so Robin expected to find Jim Bond behind his own bar at that hour.
Bond, who proved to be elderly, stooped and rather saturnine in countenance, was totaling up figures at a desk behind the bar while a white-aproned employee waited on the customers. He rose to face Robin across the polished wood.
“Got a back room where we can talk?” Robin inquired.
“What kind of proposition you got that you have to talk private?” Bond asked. He seemed both doubtful and ill-humored.
Robin looked him coldly in the eye.
“One you might be inclined to listen to, if you got any interest in money—or cattle,” he said slowly. “I’m from Chouteau county.”
Bond led the way to a partitioned-off space in the rear. In one small room five men in shirt sleeves sat around a green covered table, fingering chips in a stud poker game. In another two painted women and a man had their heads together over a round of drinks. Bond found an empty cubicle and motioned Robin to a seat.
“What is it?” he asked curtly.
“You own the T Bar S brand, and you put a hundred and fifty head of stock on the range south of the Bear Paws two years ago, didn’t you?”