From Booklist
In Al Murphy's hard-drinking days, Risa and Santiago Villabisencio nursed him back to health when he was wounded in a shootout. Times are better now; Murphy is the sheriff of Turret, New Mexico, when he responds to a desperate letter from Risa requesting help. He learns that Risa's lawyer husband and two sons left for Vera Cruz to get a warrant for the arrest of Ben King, a murderous local cattle baron. Risa's three men never arrived in Vera Cruz, and the family's buggy was found bloody and abandoned on the trail. Promptly thrown in jail for murder by the Vera Cruz law, Murphy, after escaping with the help of a street urchin named Gabriel, must prove himself innocent
and solve the Villabisencio disappearance. Once again Murphy proves to be one of the best series characters in western fiction, and now, with the appearance of Gabriel, he has a surrogate son to cope with in the next installment. Fun reading and very satisfying.
Wes Lukowsky