The Pardee Furlough — Tony Masero

Oregon, 1864
Wounded cavalry captain, Jason Pardee returns home on recovery furlough to find things have changed a great deal for people away from the front. His father's store is no longer the place he remembers but there is a kindly and attractive widow who has moved in as neighbor. With her help he manages to restore some of the failings but they are faced by another desperate problem in the shape of a predatory gang of marauders and a brutish provost officer who operates at the limits of legitimacy.
Times are hard with the war's enforced stringency and the plunderers are crippling the country store. Partnering up with a backwoodsman, a loner who has his own reasons for tracking down the raiders, Jason sets out to bring some justice to the hungry and lawless land.