Judy Culp Books

Tilman Wagner receives a telegram for help from long-time friend John McCandless Law, an army captain serving at Fort Davis, Texas. John's daughter, Lomida, and the girl's young schoolteacher, Madeline Brown, have fallen into into the hands of Mexican bandits. The leader of the bandits, Chuy Ayala, wants to ransom the girls for the Gatling gun at Ft. Davis, a weapon he needs to begin his revolution. The action intensifies when renegade Indians arrive on the scene. Lomida and Madeline find themselves trapped on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande in an escalating war surrounded by renegades and bandits. Tilman and his friend, Butter, plan to ride into the melee to rescue the girls and return the Gatling gun to its rightful place at Fort Davis, ending Ayala's revolution.

Tilman Wagner is back, this time with his new wife Catherine and her son. In response to a telegraphed plea for help from Catherine's sister-in-law, Esperanza, the new family is on their way to the New Mexico Territory to help Catherine's brother try to save his land and his family from greedy cattle rustlers and no-account lowlifes. They get more than they bargained for in the form of a wayward son's rage against his father, a stolen herd of cattle, and some unsavory citizens of the Texas cattle town of Tascosa. The roots of greed extend to Santa Fe where dishonest men are hard at work to skin the family out of its land. Along the way, Tilman calls in a favor from cattleman John Chisum at the Bosque Redondo. Once again, Butter Pegram is on hand to help Tilman in his attempts to aid a frontier family struggling with their search for justice.