Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 707

This Beadle and Adams dime novel, copyrighted 1891, presents "The Red Sombrero: The Romance of the Boy Trailer" by Colonel Prentiss Ingraham. Hugh Hammond, a nineteen-year-old, shoots his rival Gray St. John during a rigged duel in Maryland, then flees to Cuba and eventually Mexico. Years later, now calling himself Hammond Hughes, he encounters four bandits on a Mexican highway. Recognizing an opportunity, Hughes proposes they stage a fake robbery of wealthy Colonel Cortez Eldoro, with Hughes posing as the colonel's rescuer to gain his trust and access to his hacienda. The scheme succeeds when Hughes intervenes during the bandits' actual holdup, killing some and routing others. Eldoro, grateful and unaware of the deception, invites Hughes to stay at his palatial estate, setting the stage for further exploitation.