Andrew Jackson Sinnickson had crossed paths with Jack Powers long before Powers' name was known and feared as the genuine article: the first and worst of the California bad men. Total contrasts in character, in values, in approach to life, the two men locked horns from their original encounter in the southern presidio of Santa Barbara to the gold miners' hovels of Angel's Camp in the Sierras. Sinnickson had been on hand when the Bear Flag rebellion had carried California from Mexican to American ownership. Now to the sleepy, sparsely populated western outposts came hordes of treasure seekers—honest miners, greenhorns, gamblers, sharps, and cutthroats. Gold-fever madness in a land without law burst open a door for exploitation, and Powers and his bandits soon established their upper hand. When the price of steers jumps from $2 to $100 to feed the starving miners, Sinnickson gets involved in the first-ever California cattle drive. But it's three hundred treacherous miles that lead into the heart of Powers' strength.