Robin came whistling down the slope into the home ranch. He noted the tents of the round-up on the creek below an irrigated meadow. He hoped both May and her father would be at home and not in town. When he drew up at the porch steps he saw that May, at any rate, was there. Her yellow head showed at an open window. She blew him a kiss with both hands and beckoned him to come in. Robin needed no second invitation.
“You glad to see me?”
“Glad?” The girl threw back her head and laughed happily. “Oh, Robin, you’re funny. Are you blind?”
Robin’s vision was keen enough. He could see the glow in her eyes, the flush that warmed her cheeks, and his ears drank in the note of gladness in her voice.
“Well, I like to hear you say it,” he smiled. “Because I haven’t much time to make love. I’m a foreign rider from a distant range and I’ve got to consult your father on business. Likewise I see the Block S camp on the creek, so I reckon Mr. Steele may be present, which makes me keep my weather eye open. Is the owner of the Block S around?”
Robin was standing with May in the bend of his arm. He kissed her with the last sentence—and started a trifle at the unexpected answer to the last question—since it came in the unmistakable deep tones of Adam Sutherland himself.
“Yes, the owner of Block S is around,” he said. And after a second in which his daughter and his foreman looked at him in silence he continued harshly: “And it looks to me like it stands me in hand to be around.”
May’s head went up. The hand that rested on Robin’s shoulder tightened a little in its grasp. Her color flamed. Her eyes took on a different brightness from the soft gleam that had welcomed her lover.
But Robin found his tongue first, forestalling her.
“You don’t sound very pleased,” he said quietly. “Do you reckon it’s a crime for a man to love your girl?”