Starting a cattle ranch in new country isn't supposed to be easy, and for big Jim Wade, it won't be. He and his foreman, Bob Jackson, have brought two starter herds from West Texas to the Tonto Basin of central Arizona Territory. There's plenty of work, and troubles, for Jim, Bob, and the crew of Texans they brought with them to Green Valley. And doing things the Texas way means if a rustler isn't lucky enough to be shot when they catch up to him, he'll be hung.And as if fighting off Apaches, bears, mountain lions, and the notorious Hashknife riders isn't enough trouble for Jim and the Rye Creek Ranch outfit, along comes Bob Jackson's niece, Miss Della Barlow. Della, a recent Kansas City Normal School for Teachers graduate, has come to Rye Creek Ranch for the summer before taking up her teaching position in Denver in the fall, assuming Jim doesn't get up the courage to ask her to stay.Wayne A. Walter's western adventure, Rye Creek Rancher, is set in the Tonto Basin, just south of the Mogollon Rim, an escarpment measuring as much as two thousand feet above the basin floor, and stretching halfway across Arizona. In the latter half of the 1800s the land was considered prime cattle country, and many a rancher, and would-be rancher, came to the Tonto Basin to make his fortune.The competition to be a successful cattleman was fierce. The rancher waged a constant battle against wild predators, raiding Apaches, rustlers, and less-than-honest cattlemen. Some, like Big Jim Wade, and his crew of Texas cowhands, would win the war.