He's been dead for fifteen years. That's what everyone believes. The truth is, that's when Colonel Tyrone Rafter disappeared down in Mexico while on a top secret mission. After the loss of a leg and seven long years in a decrepit prison, he escapes only to learn his beloved wife, Laura, has married another. Rafter then manifests his bitterness by foisting terror on any and all who dare cross his path as he roams the Rio Grande area south of the border. Then, one night an old padre brings word that Laura has died. Rafter starts on a quest to clean up his life, get justice for his hardships, and find his son. He calls on his old friend, Abe Lincoln, newly elected President of the United States. Rafter once saved Lincoln's life when the two were teenagers. Lincoln now persuades this old spy to take on one more mission-well, two, really. Can this military hero turned outlaw, known to the fearful Mexican populous as El Pata Fantasma (the wooden-legged ghost), now "die" again, to be transformed forevermore into a radically new man: Parson Justine P. Stone?