District Attorney Martin heard the shot that murdered Judge Foster. He was on the bridge driving to the Judges cabin. Ballistics experts say the slug that killed the judge came from the .38 Colt owned by D.A. Martin. A gun that was in his briefcase at the time of the shooting.
Martin calls his own private investigator, ex-FBI agent Webster and his companion, Cherokee tracker Stone Bear.
Stone Bear was an ex-marine with a reputation from his days as a guerilla warrior in the Pacific during WWII. With help from Berry, his Cherokee nephew, he figures out how the same bullet was used. Then he joins Webster in tracking down those behind the killing.
Judge Foster, in one of his last acts, testified at a parole hearing for a slumlord that the judge had sent up for five years as the result of the death of a teenage girl caused by Farley.
Solid police work by Berry ties Farley to the killer Claude.
Farley must live in one of his slum apartments during his parole at the suggestion of Judge Foster. There he must deal with the Blades, a black gang in whose turf he is located.
Farley hires Claude Flick, a pyromaniac and killer, to take care of the judge. He cons and bribes the judges bodyguard into helping him. He kills a young fishing guide as a way to get the police thinking he has fled to Canada. Claude goes to Mexico where he loses most of his money and returns to California without papers. He pulls off a fake kidnapping and gets a large sum of gold coins that he loses to a girl hitchhiker. He is chased into the desert by Stone Bear, shot and wounded by an arrow of a student doing research on early native Americans.
Claude starts a fire and escapes from a hospital and goes to San Francisco. There he robs a wealthy gambler and heads east. He is tripped up by a stoolie after the large reward the Friends of New York Judge Foster has offered. He is tracked down and shot by Stone Bear, a shot that breaks off part of the bone of his forehead.
Claude is up in a hospital for the criminally insane. He cant escape, but helps a crazy killer, Mad Dog Morkowski, escape and sends him after Stone Bear.
Stone Bear has married Faith, a Cree woman, and they, with his granddaughter, go to Canada. The younger sister of Faith has a problem with social services about her out-of-wedlock child and drinking problem. In the wilds, there is an attack by a pack of wild dogs. Mad Dog finds them and is shot and killed by Stone Bear.
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