Taken in by ranchers as a child, Cougan Banks, off on his own at 15 and drifting from ranch to ranch, takes a job for the winter in Elk Basin, 40 miles from nowhere, still nursing the memory of the girl who spurned him. Their paths cross when a blizzard, a plane crash, and a fight for survival bring them together. Red Cloud Wolverton writes from his lifetime experience of punching cows, ranching, raising horses and kids, and working as a stuntman at Old Tucson Studios in its heyday of filmmaking.