Six Gun Angel

Angel Eyes #7: “Six Gun Angel” by W. B. Longley (Robert J. Randisi). Six cowboys attack Liz Archer on the trail. Attempting to outrun them, her horse stumbles and falls, knocking her unconscious. When she awakes her money and saddlebags are gone. Walking her horse until it can get its legs back under it, she comes upon a man tied to a post, severely tortured. From behind her a shot creases her scalp and she drops unconscious again. This time her horse has been shot, too. She hears wagons coming up the road, which must have run her assailant off. It a travelling Wild West Show and Liz decides to join them until her horse heals. Now another mystery surfaces. The tortured man was a member of the travelling show, and Liz discovers that banks have been robbed along their route, and someone with the show may know where the bank loot is. This was an outstanding plot for an old west yarn, only marred by the numerous sex scenes to make this an adult western. A female gunfighter faster than the men she faces. I wish the author would rewrite these some day, leaving the sex out. The stories would make a good series.

The Red Rider of Smoky Range

“The Red Rider of Smokey Range” by William Colt MacDonald. John Demming, owner of the Rocking D Ranch is at odds with his son, Jeff. The boy doesn’t get along with his foreman, Quinn Barker, and thinks the foreman is rustlings their cattle. Figuring it’s time to sell the ranch, he leaves his son out of the deal, and sells to Barker. However, the foreman is a crook and plans on the murder of the senior Demming, and getting the money back. Having his gunman set up an ambush on the trail during a heavy rainstorm. That night there is a mudslide and the crime scene is covered up, but a body is found crushed by rock, the only thing recognizable are the clothes, and they belonged to John Demming. Also that night a man wearing all red robs Barker, taking the sales receipt for the ranch, and thus was born the Red Rider.

He was dressed all in red, with a long cloak of the same color flowing from his shoulders. A red mask covered his face, and a pair of holsters were on his hip with twin Colt .45s.  The first sighting, the man was merely wearing red underwear, and had wrapped a red bandana around his face, but now he wears a western suit of red, with a red facemask and Mexican style sombrero of red. He also issues a mocking laugh. No one knows his identity, but everyone thinks he’s Jeff Demming in disguise, warring against the man who stole the ranch and murdered his father. Jeff does team up with Three-Star, a rangy red-head and Hefty, both cowpokes from the Rocking D, as well as another rancher and Senor Medaro, thought to be a bandit. Cita, Medaro’s daughter is Jeff’s love interest.

This story originated in the western pulp magazines five years before The Red Ryder comic book appeared. And though the Red Ryder was actually based on another character from 1938, The Red Rider of Smoky Range appeared in 1935. The story was typical from that period, and may have been aimed at the masked rider mystery men of the pulps, modeled after Johnston McCulley’s many costumed characters. Actually, The Red Rider’s costume is designed by a Mexican after the red underwear is dropped for a real costume. Overall, an interesting character, and the secret identity had me fooled till the very end. A hint, it wasn’t Jeff Demming. Now read the story and find out who The Red Rider really was.

Gundown At Golden Gate

Six-Gun Samurai #3: “Gundown At Golden Gate” by Patrick Lee (William Fieldhouse). Thomas James Fletcher joined the Navy as a young boy, but while in Japan he is alone and struggling to survive when a powerful Samurai takes him under his wing. For the next twenty years he is trained as a Samurai. A letter from home tells him of the problems plaguing his family in Georgia, and he returns to seek vengeance upon Colonel Edward Hollister, the leader of a renegade commander and his troops, raiding and pillaging, killing and raping. As an American, raised in the land of the Shogun and trained as a warrior knight in Japan, he’s now known as Tanaka Tom Fletcher and bound by the Samurai code of the Bushido to a bloody vendetta against the Yankee marauders who slaughtered his family in Georgia. He must carry out his mission to its ultimate conclusion – the destruction of his enemies or himself. This is the basic premise of the backstory and series. In this current story Tanaka Tom Fletcher’s quest for vengeance has led him to San Francisco, where an agent of his archenemy, Colonel Hollister, is running for mayor of the great city. Tanaka Tom intends to terminate his campaign. However, there is a violent power struggle between the forces of the corrupt politicians and the ruthless blue dragon tong society, and Fletcher finds himself in the middle of two warring factions – and both sides want him dead. This is a silly plot for a western series, but good writing for the most part. Don’t expect much characterization, but there is plenty of action.