The Odyssey of Danny Helm

Book excerpt: Danny Helm was thirteen in the eighteen fifties. His mother died. His brother John mistreated him which was overlooked and called him Miss Puss. Danny did the house work. John took the balloon payment for the hillside farm in the Ozark Mountains and went to California and bought a goldmine. After a few years his father headed for California. The neighbor lady who had home schooled Danny and whose husband had died accompanied them. Danny was abandoned on a ranch in New Mexico where the owners had been murdered. Some wounded troopers took refuge in the barn. Danny removed bullets from them. The Commanding officer of Fort Summer asked Danny to field test a repeating rifle. Danny operated on some Tesuque Indians and was made a Tesuque. He met Becky Summer. She fell in love with him. He went back east to buy a donkey to start raising mules. He was wounded by Abolitionist and treated in Fort Larned. Becky went to bring him home and he confessed he loved her. She planned their wedding. John said that their father had been killed in a mine cave in. Danny and Becky went to California on their honeymoon, to give his father a proper burial. They found his paralyzed father tended to by a Russian. They hit the mother lode and became rich. They returned to the ranch. Danny was conscripted by the Pike Peakers as a surgeon. He was captured by the Southern Army at the battle of Glorieta Pass. He was left to die. When he was found he had lost his memory. He was summoned to Washington by President Lincoln to receive the Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal. Becky took him to his old house and he recovered his memory. They went back home.