Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Hunter, “a true master at the pinnacle of his craft” (Jack Carr), returns with a classic Western—gunfights, horses, saloons, and looming above, the ominous presence of the railroad—about a Civil War veteran investigating the dark reality of a prosperous ranch. In the frying pan of a drought-scorched 1890s Southwest, an old man shows up at the region’s only prosperous spread, the Callahan ranch, seeking work. Jack is flinty, shrewd, tough, and a natural with a gun. As an incentive to be taken on at his age, he shows the foreman an uncanny skill with one of Mr. Winchester’s latest models. He knows a sharpshooter would be valuable to Colonel Callahan and head gun man Tom Voth. But he has his own mission. Aware that a young cowboy on the ranch has died mysteriously, Jack begins to investigate. He soon realizes that the death and the source of the Callahan wealth are dangerously entwined and that many of the dark forces of the American West are at play on the ranch. Soon enough, it’s the season of the six-gun and its fastest shootist. “Fans of classic shootist drama and the complex morality of the old west will find The Gun Man: Jackson Swagger wholly satisfying. Another in the long list of winners from Hunter.” ― Men Reading Books “This is a Western espionage novel filled with unlikely twists and turns… tremendously explosive... A superb and engrossing book by an award-winning author and highly recommended.” ― Historical Novel Society “ The Gun Man Jackson Swagger is like a long lost script for a Clint Eastwood western that was supposed to be directed by madman Peckinpah, but it somehow got lost over time and has now been dusted off and polished by an expert craftsman.” -- Zachary Leeman ― Hollywood in TOTO "Hunter, with his great command of the action novel, excels again with his unputdownable book." ― Library Journal Stephen Hunter is creator of the Bob Lee Swagger novels as well as many others. The retired chief film critic for The Washington Post , where he won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished Criticism, he has also published two collections of film criticism and a nonfiction work, American Gunfight . He lives in Baltimore, Maryland. Chapter One CHAPTER ONE The sun was a blowtorch, scorching the Arizona Territory crisp. Sagebrush, some living, some dead, bounced indifferently about the raw landscape. While most of America prospered in the wonderful year of 1897, here vegetation had turned brittle while the once abundant and variegated cacti had retreated within themselves, their spindly arms forming structures more appropriate to crucifixion than blossom. Every hillock was its own Golgotha. The wind was contaminated by the vast amounts of grit and other matter it hurled about, so that a man’s face went raw in the pelting. Hardly any water lay free, and access to what little remained was strictly controlled by men with shotguns. The mountains seemed like scar tissue on an immense scale, the rivers trickles, the watering holes puddles of mud and shit. Animals died in the thousands, mostly of the big dry. Bones, bleached white by the blaze, littered the land. Wolves, coyotes, and big cats, who fed on the smaller creatures in normal times, were out of business, having moved on or simply perished along with their prey. As for folks, most of them just hung on, hoping for rain, not believing that it would ever arrive again. They dreamed of water and cursed their god for withholding it. They breathed dust, grew sluggish with despair, and turned on one another. In this miasma of despond, only two areas of prosperity remained. The first was the railway town, called Railhead No. 4, the fourth on the way west to California. It was sustained by Eastern money, not cattle, bearing the name Arizona Southern and being a subsidiary of the great Union Pacific. It was laid out straight to run from Nogales to Yuma, hence cutting a day off the detour up through Tucson. It was largely populated by single men of singular immaturity, and was rich in vice. A whorehouse was a good business, while a hardware store was not. Second was the Callahan Ranch, the Crazy R, which alone among the big spreads had not dissolved under the pressures of the drought. Though its surviving cattle were as bony as anybody’s and its water holes as dismal, Colonel Callahan was able to keep a full complement of gun men on salary. Having more money than anybody, these boys tended to dominate all encounters that came their way. All wore Mr. Sam’s Peacemaker in Mexican holsters. All were said to be proficient. Naturally rumors arose, suggesting that the colonel’s sources of income might not be all legitimate. Some said that his secret business was railroad security and labor discipline, some said he owned interests in the string of brothels in Railhead No. 4. Some even said—though not to him—that the Dark Riders, a legion of enforcers and revengers unseen by day, were headquartered at the Crazy