This was a surprisingly good read. Combining the history of the sordid treatment of the Apaches Indians in Arizona with fictional characters, Edwards manages to give the reader the background and eventual conclusion of the US Government's war with the Apaches.

Soldado is an Apache boy rescued by Army scout Clancy St. John from being killed by angry soldiers and raised as his son. They both rescue a woman and her two daughters from an Apache attack. St. John marries the woman and settles down. Soldado becomes an Army scout and is instrumental in the final defeat od Geronimo.

St. John is eventually murdered by a scalp hunter named Buchshot Reilly. Soldado avenges that murder and disappears into the wilderness and avoids the move of the Apaches to Florida.

There is another character, Lieutenant Hudson Lane, who comes west from West Point with the usual prejudices towards natives and through Soldado and St. John and General Crook learns that Apaches are just people who are trying to keep their land for themselves but are treated very badly by just about everyone including the Government. Lane falls in love with St. John's step-daughter which provides the love interest in the story but in the end she proves to be fickle. ( )