In San Mateo CA, Tim Condon, range detective, and Hadley Graves, commission agent, hold a clandestine meeting. Tim accepts Graves’s request to stop a range war caused by cattle rustling in Apache Basin. Graves holds a debtor’s note signed by rancher John McLean for $9,000, which he hopes to avoid calling in as he believes that the rustler is neither McLean nor his neighbor Lafe Brennan, who suspect each other because of an old family feud. Later, outside a saloon, one-legged John Coffin explains to Tim that he is really Pegleg Sanderson, a friend of Tim’s father, who was a Ranger. Pegleg needs to smuggle $9,000 in cash to McLean, but Tim suggests he give the money to Graves. As they talk, Pinto Carew and Rawhide, henchmen for Lafe Brennan, hold up Tim and kill Pegleg, framing Tim for the murder. Meanwhile, Bob, Lafe’s brother, steals the $9,000, and Tim escapes the sheriff and goes to Apache Basin. Bob tries unsuccessfully to buy McLean’s note from Graves, and tells McLean that Pegleg is dead. Bob tells Lafe that he saw Pegleg murdered and withdraws from their partnership. After hiring cowpunchers, Tim discovers Bob, who was robbed by Pinto and Rawhide, by the side of the road. When the pair report to Graves and give him the money, he explains that Tim was hired to divert suspicion from him. Then McLean expels Bob from his ranch, and he and Tim decide to gather Lafe’s honest ranch hands and round up McLean’s cattle for him. Meanwhile, Graves announces the foreclosure and auction of the McLean ranch. Sheriff Joe Burns receives word that Tim is wanted for Pegleg’s murder, and tries to arrest him as Graves’s confederates stampede the McLean herd. That night, Tim and Bob break into Graves’s office and find railroad bills of lading which prove that Graves was rustling and shipping both Brennan and McLean cattle without their knowledge. The next day, Graves gives Pinto and Rawhide the $9,000 and orders them to use the money to purchase McLean’s ranch during the auction. However, Tim arrives in time to show his evidence to the sheriff, who orders Graves, Pinto and Rawhide arrested. The McLeans and Brennans end their feud, and Janet, McLean’s daughter, asks Tim to stay on. More on Wikipedia or Mubi
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