Outcasts of the Storm — Dan Cushman

If Comanche John has a last name, no one knows it, and it is not mentioned in the one hundred or so verses of the frontier ballad composed about him. When John happens accidentally on a stage robbery being arranged by a young greenhorn, professional pride forces him to intervene. The way the fellow is going about it will only end up getting him killed. The young man's name is Buck Pelton of the stagecoach firm of Hames and Pelton, or what was Hames and Pelton since Hames cheated the older Pelton out of his share of the firm. John decides to help Buck Pelton in his design to put a crimp in Hames's operation. Certainly John could not foresee that this little escapade would end up with his getting into the stagecoach business, operating a line to compete with Hames, and even building a road over a treacherous mountain stretch of land against a formidable foe who has the support of local law enforcement.

Dan Cushman was born in Osceola, Michigan, and grew up on the Cree Indian Reservation in Montana.