After saving Texas from the oppressive regime of Governor Edmund Jackson Davis and overseeing the inauguration of Governor Richard Coke, United States Circuit Court Judge Mobley Meadows sets out on a full tour of his court circuit.
Accompanied by his two deputy marshals, Edson Rabb and Jack Anthony Lopes, he heads for Cimarron, New Mexico to settle a major land grant dispute. Along the way, they are attacked by remnants of the Kinch West gang, Comanche Indians, notorious highwaymen, cannibals, and outlaws hired by an English Land Company to drive settlers out of the Cimarron area. While engaged in these activities, he discovers that his fiancé, Lydia Sweetgrass, has been kidnapped by Quanah Parker, Chief of the Quahadie Comanche band, and must devise a way to find and save her from torture and death.