When the westbound stage came to town, more than the usual number of people were on hand to meet it, because David Farnham was returning after fifteen years in prison. He went away when his son, Jim, was only three years old. Now, Jim was eighteen, and he stood silently apart from the crowd that gathered - wondering what his father would look like. That afternoon found David and Jim in the office of Frank Taber - the only man who had kept in touch with David during his time away. They were warmly welcomed, but Frank wanted to offer David one thousand dollars for the two of them to start afresh somewhere else. A government detective had been hanging around the town lately, and would no doubt be watching David's every move, to see if he would reveal the secret hiding place for the $40,000 that was never recovered from the robbery he'd been jailed for.