New Mexico rancher Jesse Reade hires Paladin for $1,000 to bring back outlaw Dave Enderly, who has run off to Perdido, Mexico with Reade's daughter Nancy.

Manfred Holt breaks out of jail, killing two deputies. Is he on his way to kill the banker who testified against him, or to see his family for the last time? The banker hires Paladin.

An accused murderer who fears that he will be lynched before he can be returned to Bender, Wyoming, for trial, hires Paladin to make sure he gets there alive.

A wealthy cattleman holds Paladin and two other men hostage. They will all die at dawn unless one of them admits to the murder of the rancher's wife.

Paladin escorts an Englishman to his female cousin's ranch they have inherited in Montana, but finds that an embittered trader is plotting against them.

Paladin defends a schoolmistress who's being theatened for teaching about war crimes that took place during the Civil War.

Paladin comes to the aid of a young sheriff from the East whose attempts to keep law and order are particularly unsuitable for a cowboy town in Wyoming.

Dr. Phyllis Thackeray diagnoses the cook at the Barton Ranch with smallpox. All the cowhands may be infected and need to be vaccinated. Dr. Thackeray sends for the one man she thinks can help.

After an unsuccessful attempt on his life by young Roderick Jefferson, Paladin is prompted into remembering a similar incident from his past. Once, as a youth, he agreed to pay off a gambling debt by shooting it out with a professional gunfighter.