The Heart of the Range

"The Heart of the Range" by William Patterson White is a story set in the American West, where a man named Racey Dawson faces a series of comical problems involving a case of mistaken identity and horse theft. Racey then gets mixed up in solving a captivating mystery. The story begins one morning in the town of Farewell, where Racey wakes up with a bad hangover after riding off on a horse that wasn't his. He learns the horse belongs to a woman named Molly Dale, who is a frequent subject of the town's gossip. As Racey tries to fix his mistake, he meets interesting characters such as Piney, the funny blacksmith, and Kansas Casey, the deputy sheriff, who joke with him about his drunken adventures. The humorous conversations and Racey's attempts to make things right create a story filled with amusement, local appeal, and the realities of life on the range.