MAX BRAND – The Outlaw Redeemer. Leisure, paperback, March 2004. Hardcover edition: Five Star, 2000.

   One way or another, most traditional westerns have elements of crime fiction built into their plot structure, and naturally I wouldn’t have brought it up if both of the short novels contained in the case at hand, The Outlaw Redeemer, weren’t such prime examples, but in markedly different ways.

   In “The Last Irving,” which takes place in the more recent Old West (Irvington is wired for electricity, for example, and the characters drive proudly around in flivvers) the heir to the no longer existent Irving fortune, a city yokel by the name of Archibald, returns from the East to revenge himself on the two crooks who conned his Uncle Ned out of his total financial worth.

   This is the standard tall tale of a (perceived) dumb sap who (it is anticipated) comes out on top by the simple expedient of setting his two opponents one against the other.

   While there is more anticipation than there is follow-through, I can’t imagine anyone not finding the ending at least mildly satisfying. The title story which follows, however, “The Outlaw Redeemer,” comes with some real surprises, most of them quite unexpectedly so, and this is the one that’s by far the more enjoyable of the two.

   The opening is nothing less than Biblical in nature, with lots of “begat”s that trace the lineage of the tale’s two primary antagonists: (a) the pure in heart John Tipton, who becomes a Texas Ranger and whose constant quarry is (b) the brutish and devilish criminally-minded Hubert Dunleven, nicknamed either Shorty or Bunch, “both of which were derived from his physical peculiarities.”

   Their efforts as directed against each other are the stuff from which legends are made. Can a western ever be called utterly charming? Dunleven is that rarest of beings, an outlaw with a silver tongue. Take for example, this speech he makes to the beautiful Nell — and, oh, yes, there is indeed a girl, and of course she comes between them.

   Consider the eloquence to be found on page 118, after Dunleven has requested that Nell make breakfast for him, a request she cannot refuse:

   Nell is not, however, emphasis not, your usual western heroine. As are the two male protagonists of the tale, she also is flawed, and I confess – I admit it – I did not know, with several chapters remaining to go, which way the story was going to come out.

   That is it a happy ending, you may rest assured. You may also be assured that you will not know in which way it will end happily, but it will.

PostScript:   Both of the these stories first appeared in the pulp magazine, Western Story Magazine. “The Last Irving” appeared as “Not the Fastest Horse,” as by John Frederick in the November 7, 1925, issue; and “The Outlaw Redeemer” appeared as “The Man He Couldn’t Get,” as by George Owen Baxter in the February 27, 1926, issue.

   In a subtly strange but substantial way, I like the original titles better.

[UPDATE] 09-25-11.   Your mileage may vary, but although it doesn’t compare to the covers of the western paperbacks of the 1940s and 50s, I much like the cover of the Leisure book over that of the totally generic photo on the hardcover edition.

   And speaking of Leisure books, most mystery-oriented blogs have concerned themselves with the loss of the Hard Case Crime paperbacks when Dorchester went under, and rightly so. But I also miss the box of four western paperbacks that came by mail from them every month, with at least two of them almost always reprints from the pulps.