Indian Agent

As the Carter Freighting Company wagons are crossing the arid southwestern range, an Indian warrior is spotted in the rocks overhead. Concerned, Carter speeds the wagons to his warehouse near the town of Boulder. Later, at the local Indian reservation, federal agent M. Hutchins is accosted by Chief Redfox, who threatens an uprising if his starving people do not receive their government rations soon. Hutchins denies any knowledge of the supply wagons, but immediately questions Carter, his partner-in-crime, about the missing goods. The greedy Carter insists that the supplies are to be sold at a gold prospecting camp, where a higher profit can be made, and convinces the nervous Hutchins to cooperate in the scheme. Carter then pays off two of his unsuspecting workers, Dave Taylor and Chito Rafferty, who plan to use their wages to buy cattle for their newly acquired ranch. As Dave and Chito head home, however, they see a small group of Indians descend on a wagon and ride to the rescue. Driving the wagon are editor Ellen Wheeler and her printer, Inky, who are on their way to Boulder to start a newspaper. Chito and Dave escort the grateful pair to town, then return to their ranch, where they discover an abandoned Indian baby in their bed. While the cowboys do their best to care for the hungry baby girl, whom they name Patchy, her parents, Redfox and Turquoise, are confronted by Hutchins at the reservation. The Indians, however, refuse to reveal the whereabouts of their baby, whom the starving Turquoise abandoned in the hope that she would be fed. Worried that the missing baby will cause the scheme to be exposed, Hutchins and his assistant, Nichols, trail Turquoise and soon discover the infant at Dave and Chito's ranch. Although unaware of Carter's duplicity, Dave and Chito refuse to turn the baby over to Hutchins, who then goes for the sheriff. Anxious to learn more about the child, Dave and Chito head for Boulder with her, but along the way, Dave senses that they are being followed. While Chito continues to town with Patchy, Dave ambushes his pursuer, who turns out to be Redfox. Dave convinces the mistrustful Redfox to accompany him to town, but before they get far, Carter, who knows Patchy is in town, shoots the Indian in the back. After Carter flees the scene, Hutchins arrives with the sheriff, and Dave is arrested for the crime. Once Redfox's condition has stabilized, Dave is bailed out of jail by Ellen and heads for the reservation. There, as the tribal warriors perform a menacing war dance, the wounded Redfox and Turquoise tell Dave about the missing supplies. Dave vows to deliver the goods immediately and rides to Carter's freighter company with Chito. When Hutchins and Nichols arrive at Carter's office, demanding cavalry protection, Dave has Chito create a diversion so that he can steal Carter's signed requisition papers as proof of the scheme. The cowboys then escape with the papers and ride to town. Carter, meanwhile, murders Hutchins and, after making Nichols his new partner, tells the sheriff that Dave is the killer. Dave and Chito flee the sheriff, however, and intimidate Carter into revealing the location of the supplies by having the Indians threaten to burn him at the stake. Dave and Chito intercept the wagons before they reach the mining camp, but Nichols frees Carter from the Indians, and both men fight to reclaim the supplies. After the cowboys eventually defeat Nichols and Carter, Redfox and Turquoise, whose story has been published in Ellen's newspaper, are summoned to Washington, D.C. To Chito's surprise and delight, the Indians entrust Patchy to his care during their absence.