Curt Curran was a reporter for the Rocky Mountain News. His boss sent him to investigate the case of Gordy Morgan, a kid who had disappeared after killing the son of a powerful and unscrupulous rancher a couple of months earlier in the small town of Lark, Colorado. The Trinidad Weekly Tribune had picked up the story, but it seemed there was more to the story than what was being reported. The Tribune was comparing Gordy to Billy the Kid and was after the sheriff s hide for not apprehending him. They had given Gordy the name the Trouble Kid. The boss had warned Curran to take his handgun and his Winchester because he had a hunch that he might wind up in a pot of trouble.