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you’re a pretty fair hand with a gun yourself. But you were with us on the cattle drive to do a job . . . your newspaper reporter job. There won’t be any daily reports sent from where we’re going, young lady. And besides,” he added, “I thought you quit that newspaper business when you married Rod?”
    â€œThe news syndicate where I worked left it open for me to submit whatever stories I thought might be of interest to the public . . . and a bunch of ex–Texas Rangers getting together to rescue an abducted husband and wife from a brutal Mexican bandit gang, below the border, sounds pretty interesting to me. In fact,” she continued, “this story could also be turned into a book, more than a newspaper series like I did with the cattle drive. Plus, I won’t have to tell anyone where I’ll be going, or what I’m writing about, since I’ll be submitting the manuscript way after we get back from Mexico . . . after the story’s been written.”
    Charley turned to Rod.
    â€œHow do you feel about your wife coming along with us?”
    Rod shrugged.
    â€œAre you going to argue with her, Charley?”
    Charley looked away. Henry Ellis was overjoyed.
    â€œThat’s what I thought,” said Rod.
    He turned to Kelly beside him.
    â€œWell, Mrs. Lightfoot, you’d better get to packing. I’m sure these two gentlemen have other places they need to be.”
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    Charley and Henry Ellis rode along again, with the boy just as unsure of where they were going this time as he was before their stop at the Lightfoot ranch.
    â€œIs Rod still studying to be a lawyer?” Henry Ellis asked his grandfather.
    â€œBetter than that,” said Charley. “Rod’s working on his law degree by mail order. Seems these days it’s possible for a man . . . or a woman, I suppose . . . to go to college by mail. And that’s what Rod’s doing.”
    How about that , thought the boy. And no one will know if he’s an Indian or not if they’re dealing with him through the mail . That had been one of Rod’s previous problems in his quest to obtain a law degree—certain people’s prejudice against Indians.
    â€œWe don’t have much farther to go, son,” said Charley. “I just wanted to see if we could find Plunker Holliday where he said he was going to be.”
    â€œThat’s great,” said the boy. “I always did like ol’ Plunker.”
    â€œBesides still being as good with a gun as he is at his age,” said Charley, “Holliday is also a person I feel I can trust, even though he’s not family.”
    â€œWhat about Rod, Kelly, Roscoe, and Feather?” said the boy. “They’re no relation to us.”
    â€œMaybe there aren’t any blood ties between us and them four, Henry Ellis,” said Charley, “but, they’re family, by God.”
    Charley and Henry Ellis rode down the one-sided Main Street of Spofford, Texas, with Charley checking out the signs on the storefronts until they came to an alleyway with its own sign directing them to:
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    SPOFFORD SHOOTING RANGE, ONE BLOCK SOUTH
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    The two reined their mounts in between two storefronts before continuing on .
    It wasn’t much of an alley. Just the backsides of a few more establishments, spread out here and there along the way. But it was definitely not another street.
    They hadn’t gone that far when they heard the sound of gunshots.
    â€œThat’d be Holliday, I suspect,” said Charley.
    They came to a rather large, man-made mound of dirt and stopped. Charley motioned for the boy to follow him as he rode around to the other side.
    It wasn’t Holliday doing the shooting. It was one of Holliday’s customers. He was a man dressed in a three-piece business suit who appeared to be quite good with the six-shooter in his hand.
    The man had been reloading from a box of cartridges on a bench