An elderly rancher is shot to death over a dispute about a hidden treasure
J. Pierce Buchanan has spent a lifetime tearing a living out of the open range—battling droughts and wildfire, Indians and bandits. At ninety, he has accumulated a fortune in gold pieces—some $50,000—but he will never get the chance to spend it. In the still of the night, someone sneaks into the old man’s bedroom and tortures him at gunpoint in a fearsome attempt to lay his hands on the treasure. When J. Pierce won’t speak, someone shoots him five times and disappears into the darkness.
Â
Heirs come out of the woodwork demanding a piece of the old man’s fortune, as the cowhands and yard men of the ranch scour the thirty-thousand acres searching for the stash. Into this frenzy of greed ride Glen Strange and Bobby Trapp, a pair of honest cowboys just looking for a scrap of work. The J-Bar Ranch has contracted gold fever, and J. Pierce Buchanan will not be the last victim.