The slang brander

In Monte Vista, Sheriff Joe Cook is determined to keep the peace—but first he must figure out what everyone is saying. Anonymous letters warn that serious “devilment” is happening right under his nose, while a mysterious caller demands that he investigate lightning strikes killing local livestock. Unfortunately, the sheriff’s greatest challenge may be popular slang, which turns dancing feet into “trained pups,” a stranger into “the nigger in the woodpile,” and ordinary conversations into baffling puzzles.

With his more streetwise deputy, Shorty McKay, offering translations and occasional doubts, Cook begins to suspect that the unknown guest at the Lone Spruce Hotel may be connected to the warnings. There is no obvious rustling, robbery, murder, or bootlegging to explain the alarm, but someone clearly wants the law looking in a particular direction. Blending Western humor, colorful dialect, and a developing small-town mystery, this lively tale follows a well-meaning sheriff whose investigation is complicated by every new word he hears.