The Duke of Chimney Butte

I mentioned that one of the books I had read in the past few days was The Duke of Chimney Butte. I think the publication date was 1920.

It's a cowboy story that starts with Lambert, the protagonist, as a salesman peddling kitchen gadgets out in the middle of nowhere (or maybe it was North Dakota), pushing his bike with a flat tire. He comes upon a cow camp. One guy, Spence, especially befriends him, tagging him with the name "Duke of Chimney Butte" based on the trademark of his combination potato peeler-nail puller-apple corer-can opener. Another guy, Jim Wilder, tries to set him up with Whetstone, a man-killer horse; if Lambert can ride him he can have him. Lambert rides the killer horse, mentioning in passing that he used to work breaking horses back home. Jim tries to renege, Lambert trounces the fellow, who whips out a knife in the usual kind of dirty pool. One of the cowboys kicks the knife out of Jim's hand after he's slashed Lambert a couple times.

At that point, Jim and Spence shoot it out. The motivation is merely because they don't like each other. Jim blows a hole through Spence, killing him.

That's it. There's no further exposition of Spence's character, nor of Wilder's. There's not any further mention of Spence, who gave his all, for the rest of the book. Lambert returns from the chase leading Jim's horse with blood on the saddle. The author doesn't even say if the buried the villain. Lambert goes on to become famous as a cowboy for a hundred miles around, which is fine, but there's a paucity to that introduction that weakens what's a pretty entertaining novel:. If I'm ever lacking ideas, I could take the setup and write an entirely different book.

The rest of the book (that Ogden wrote, not what I'd write):

Lambert one day races the train through Misery on Whetstone and wins. A pretty young maiden flutters her hankie out the window at him and he falls in love. He quits his job and goes off in search of her, with his friend Taterleg as Sancho Panza, to fetch up in Glendora. They end up working for Vesta Philbrook, who's having trouble with rustlers. She's is a comely young maiden, pretty enough to "gladden a man's heart." She's a nice lady, too. 

One of the rustlers is father to Grace Kerr. She's the girl from the train, with whom Lambert is smitten enough to set out looking for in the general direction the train went. Grace is pretty gorgeous. She also turns out to be not a nice lady, though Lambert won't admit it to himself. Can she lure him from his duty as a hand on Vesta's ranch? 

Now, to me that's not a bad plot device. Grace isn't described as evil, except by Vesta. She's pretty well drawn, in fact probably better than Vesta, who kind of hovers in the background being good while Grace has the fun, until Lambert finally falls for her (Vesta) in the last chapter. Both girls are better drawn than, for example, most Louis L'Amour or Max Brand heroines. Both of them draw the reader's sympathy, Vesta for standing up to the rustlers and Grace for supporting her father's endeavors, right or wrong, legal or illegal, drunk or sober.