The stranger rode in from the east.
Under the rays of the rising sun, through the dust of a swirling wind, the horseman rode downslope, down Rattlesnake Ridge, just as Blackjack Buck had seen in a vision, dreamed in a prophecy, a century ago.
In his rifle scabbard, laced low and tight, he carried a baseball bat made of hand-cut mountain maple, custom-lathed, and sanded to a shine.
Some say he rode in on a Santa Ana wind. Some say, on the lonesome trill of an elderberry flute. But everyone in this old town, Dillontown, set high in the California wildback near the Mexican line, will always remember that day.
It was a day of disaster, following a night of disaster, following several years of discord and disaster, the day Cruz de la Cruz came to town.
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