Dead Man’s Cañon

The trouble began for Sheriff Claude Rainey when the Hightower Ranch cowboys discovered a mummified man and his horse in a desert canyon near Springville, Arizona—both shot in the head. Ordinarily that would be the end of it. Few men riding the outlaw trail up out of Mexico make it through that godforsaken country. What troubled Rainey and the townsmen, however, was what Hightower foreman Al Trail had brought into town and given to the sheriff.

Near the body, the cowboys had dug up a box containing $10,000 in bloodstained packets of hundred-dollar bills. Who kills a man and leaves behind $10,000? The only clue to the dead man’s identity is the shriveled-up brand on the horse, which he sketches and sends to the registrar. The money stowed in a steel safe, the sheriff and townsmen wait to see who will ride in to claim it.

Two men arrive within weeks of each other. The first informs Rainey that US Marshal Jonas Gantt and his horse have been found shot in the head on his land across the border in Mexico—circumstances similar to those of the dead man found in the canyon. The second, Deputy US Marshal Arch Clayton, informs Rainey that the dead man was his partner back in New Mexico. Both men arouse Rainey’s suspicion and add to the mounting questions about the bushwhacking killer—foremost, whether he will show up in Springville, and what it is he’s really after.