For many years Oliver Colfax worked as a hired killer. But after he developed a friendship with one of his targets, Colfax lost heart in that line of work and quit. A few odd jobs keep body and soul together, but until Colfax decides what to do with the rest of his life, he’s content sitting in his St. Louis hotel room and drinking fine whiskey.
When a rancher from Colorado asks him to deal with some cattle rustlers, Colfax declines, thinking it is just one more case of a big landowner wanting it all. But when Colfax learns that a production of Titus Andronicus is playing in nearby Pullman, Colorado, he has a change of heart. He has always longed to see someone play Titus.
Dealing with the cattle rustlers proves to be a routine job, but investigating the tragedy that hits the touring Shakespearean drama troupe turns out to be a tough assignment. It may be the hardest case he’s ever taken on, one that is certain to change his life forever.
Robert J. Conley was a Cherokee author and enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, a federally recognized tribe of American Indians. In 2007, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers' Circle of the Americas.
This short novel is a curious cross between a standard western and an Agatha Christie murder mystery. The central character, Oliver Colfax, is something of a range detective, with a license to kill, should he be so inclined. But he’s grown weary of the work that has been his livelihood and is looking to retire from being a gunman for hire. It is, as he says, “quitting time.”
Considering a job for a Colorado rancher who believes he is the victim of rustlers, Colfax travels to a small frontier town, drawn in part by the opportunity to see a touring theater company perform Shakespeare’s bloody tragedy Titus Andronicus. Agreeing with the cattleman to find out who, if anybody, is rustling his stock, Colfax gets to work and determines before long that a gang of cowboys at a nearby camp are the only likely suspects...