Matt Severance was accused of stealing a mine payroll with his older brother, Roy. Bloody Joe killed Roy but the other rider got away. Folks believe Roy hid the money before he died, and they think Matt has returned to retrieve it though Matt insists he's only back to clear his name and to take over his dead father's ranch. Matt faces harassment from all sides, and its Mannion's job to keep the young man, whom he comes to like, alive and to retrieve the hidden loot. As a savage war erupts in the mountains, in Del Norte, Mannion's deputy, Rio Waite, confronts his own growing lack of bravery in the face of many threats in town, and Mannion's wife, the former Jane Ford, confronts her own growing mortality after having been shot in the chest by the savage bounty hunter, Xavier Lodge.