When the rest of the West was already won...the mountains remained unspoiled and deadly. The men and women who tamed this savage land were tough, lawless and, when necessary, as mean as the traps they carried. They lived by a private code of proud honor and swift justice. Burly, Isaac Beard was the living embodiment of that mountain code. To survive, he fought his way to a safe haven near Spirit Lake in the Colorado upcountry, forged an alliance with the untamed Ute Indians and made a place where generations of Beards resided in safety.