It was merely an excuse, and at the outset no man knew it better than the banker himself.  But as time went by without bringing results and tongues grew sharper and more insistent everywhere, Engle grew convinced that there was a grain of truth in his trumped-up argument.  He invited Norton to his home, had him to dinner, watched him keenly, and came to the conclusion that Norton was riding on his nerves, that he had not taken sufficient time to recuperate before getting his feet back into the official stirrups, that the strain of his duties was telling on him, that he needed a rest and a change or would go to pieces.

But Norton, the subject broached, merely shook his head.

“I’m all right, John,” he said a little hurriedly and nervously.  “I am run down at the heels a bit, I’ll admit.  But I can’t stop to rest right now.  One of these days I’ll quit this job and go back to ranching.  Until then . . .  Well, let them talk.  We can’t stop them very well.”

Suspicion of the Quigley mines robbery had turned at first toward del Rio.  But he had established an alibi.  So had Galloway.  So had Antone and the Kid.

“There is nothing to do but wait,” Norton insisted.  “It won’t be long now.”

Engle, having less than no faith in Patten’s ability, went to Virginia Page.  She saw Norton often; what did she think?  Was he on the verge of a collapse?  Was he physically fit?

“All of this criticism hurts him,” said the banker thoughtfully.  “I know Rod and how he must take it, though he only shrugs.  It’s gall and wormwood to him.  He’s up against a hard proposition, as we all know; if he is half-sick, I wonder if the proposition isn’t going to be too much for him?  Can’t you advise him, persuade him to knock off for a couple of weeks and clear out?  Get into a city somewhere and forget his work.  Why, it’s the most pitiful thing in the world to see a man like him lose his grip.”

“He is not quite himself,” she admitted slowly.  “He is more nervous, inclined to be short and irritable, than he used to be.  You may be right; or it may be simply that his continued failure to stop these crimes is wearing him down.  I’ll be glad to watch him, to talk with him if he will listen to me.”

But first she forced herself to what seemed a casual chat with Patten, finding him loitering upon the hotel veranda.  She suggested to him that Norton was beginning to show the strain, that he looked haggard under it, and wondered if he had quite recovered from his recent illness?

Patten, after his pompous way, leaned back in his chair, his thumbs in his armholes, his manner that of a most high judge.

“He’s as well as I am,” he announced positively.  “Thin, to be sure, just from being laid up those ten days.  And from a lot of hard riding and worry.  That’s all.”