Lightning the Horse

"Blizz" Ballard, summoned by the Homesteaders' League to track down a gang of cattle rustlers, arrives in Paradise Valley. In the saloon, he is taunted by Jerome Garrett, who hopes to intimidate him but is himself beaten in a fight. Ballard, after proving himself by riding an outlaw horse, is taken on at the Gregg ranch. Garrett, in the family's favor and admired by Emily, the judge's daughter, accuses Ballard of being a cattle thief, while his accomplices capture and torture the sheriff.

Jim Wesley returns from college with a silk shirt and eastern ways, earning the contempt of the cowpunchers on his father's ranch. With a little hard riding and fancy roping, however, Jim proves himself to be a regular guy. Jim's father is involved in a dispute over water rights with Adam Grayson, a neighboring rancher, and the two men decide to settle the disagreement by a marriage between Jim and Grayson's daughter, Marguerite. The young people refuse, but when Marguerite is attacked by a rejected suitor, Jim comes quickly to her rescue.

There's dirty work afoot at the crossroads when arch-villain Howard Breen and a crooked banker are scheming to take over the Jeremiah Grant's ranch, and Breen also has his eye on Grant's daughter, Evelyn. However, cowhand Johnny Bowers, who also has an eye on Evelyn, and his horse, Lightning, put an end to the villainy.