12 years after his family is murdered by civil war deserters, James Lee Cutler seeks a justice long denied. Though it occurred during that war, the military would not get involved in a "civil matter," and the civilian authorities seemed unwilling to do anything about it. James leaves behind the girl he intends to marry and travels from the fertile fields of Arkansas to the rough and tumble west of the newly built Tombstone, meeting such characters along the way as Geronimo, Bat Masterson, the Earp's, Doc Holliday, Big Nose Kate, Cowboys, Apache's, and other equally colorful people. Cutler's choice of friends and companions could, quite possibly, alter his quest for justice and change the course of the rest of his life.