Nan of Music Mountain

A Frontier Day shooting contest leaves Henry de Spain embarrassed and the Morgans celebrating in the railroad town of Sleepy Cat. Nan Morgan, Duke Morgan's eighteen-year-old niece, has outscored him before his new rifle breaks. In the superintendent's office, John Lefever turns the defeat into a subject for teasing, while Jeffries sees reason to keep de Spain in the district. This opening gives Frank H. Spearman's western a lively mixture of rivalry, wounded pride and talk among men accustomed to danger.

The mountain setting extends through stage roads, barns and lonely stretches of sand. Nan's anxious thoughts about de Spain introduce a more intimate tension alongside the frontier action. Spearman moves between quiet suspense and comic exchanges, drawing character from gestures, habits and conversation. Published in 1916, the novel offers readers western adventure in which marksmanship, reputation and personal feeling all shape the atmosphere.