Beguinage — J.T. Edson

To protect the life of a visiting European Crown Prince from threatened assassination, the Governor of Texas could have called up the Texas Rangers, or even the United States Army. Instead, Stanton Howard obtained the services of Ole Devil Hardin's floating outfit. Dusty Fog, Mark Counter, the Ysabel Kid and Waco had handled many dangerous people in their time, but they'd never met the like of the one employed by this band of conspirators to kill the Crown Prince. Acknowledged as Europe's premier assassin, Beguinage came and went unnoticed by all except the victims. And had never failed in an assignment. The only way Dusty saw of saving the Prince was to use himself as bait for a trap -- knowing that when it was sprung, either Beguinage or he would be dead...

J.T. Edson was a former British Army dog-handler who wrote more than 130 Western novels, accounting for some 27 million sales in paperback. Edson's works - produced on a word processor in an Edwardian semi at Melton Mowbray - contain clear, crisp action in the traditions of B-movies and Western television series. What they lack in psychological depth is made up for by at least twelve good fights per volume. Each portrays a vivid, idealized “West That Never Was”, at a pace that rarely slackens.