The lawman Drew Sodenmire is in exile.
Drew has fought his way through enough tight spots with the toughest of opponents even when he isn't sober. But now he has lost his position after a fatal drunken shooting. He is to lie low and behave himself the Governor insists, and that's how he ends up in one small isolated community.
It's a dull and boring place for the recalcitrant Drew with little option but respite to the bottle.
Then ghastly items start turning up and it's Drew's job to sober up and discover who is guilty and what lies at the heart of these gruesome deeds.
Whilst he searches for the perpetrators even more danger looms as land hungry opportunists bring aggressive speculators of the most violent kind to the tiny township.