The Unhired Man is another well-written old western tale written by R O Lane. Like his other novels this one is short. It is 185-pages, but both characters and the storyline are well-developed.
The tale begins in Wyoming territory in the spring of 1884 when Noah Buckley was just 8 years old. His dad, Abner, and his mother, Emma were farmers that a local bully, Nate Treadwell who owned The Circle T ranch and was harassing the Buckley’s and all of the local homesteaders. He offered the settlers $2 per acre and when they refused he hassled them trying to scare them off and take all of the familiy’s land. Treadwell even hired a killer who murdered a local neighbor whose wife and kids were still in Germany waiting to move to their new home.
A cowboy, named Dutch came upon the Buckley homestead and asked if he could water his horse, Blue. The family invited Dutch in for dinner and told him about Treadwell, the harassing neighbor. Abner told him about Nate’s ranch hands running their longhorn cattle through Emma’s garden during their most recent episode destroying the mass majority of the plants.
It turns out that Dutch knew of Treadwell from his confederate army days. Nate was a deserter from the Confederate Army in Texas who's on father disowned him.
Abner was telling Dutch that he planned to build a fence around both the garden and the ranch to try to keep Treadwell’s cattle of his property. That is how Dutch became the Buckley’s “Unhired Hand.” Dutch, Abner, Noah cut the post and installed the fence within a year and Dutch dealt with Nates hired killers warning him that he would kill him if of the consequence of future harassment.
Dutch mores on, but the harassment began again.
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