Murder, arson, robbery, rape, and kidnapping are alive and well in Tucson, Arizona during the blistering hot summer of 1894. Are they the result of several unrelated acts or the work of one criminal mastermind? Pima Gallagher, a detective for the Southern Pacific Railroad, must try to keep his landlady's eleven-year-old daughter, Scout, out of trouble while he follows clue after clue, until he ferrets out the real architect of evil from a mass of false trails and confusion.