Best-selling author of the COLDIRON series

London, 1860. Patrick Scanlan, an orphan of seven, is sold into slavery at a weaving mill. Half starved, often whipped for refusing to work, he escapes onto the city streets where there are whores, thugs and thieves. He survives by stealing.

He chances upon "Thief Takers" lying in wait to capture Claude Duvall, a highwayman. Patrick helps Duvall escape the trap. He joins Duvall and becomes a mounted highwayman robbing the rich travelers on the King's highways.

Thief Takers try to arrest Patrick and Duvall. Patrick kills two of them, and is captured. He is given a life sentence in the penal colony in Australia. In that harsh land, he is often flogged for fighting with the other convicts. He organizes five convicts into a “Sydney Trip”. In Sydney there's a chance for escape. The cost is for one convict to die, one to hang for the murder, the others to be witnesses.

Patrick escapes and steals a sailing boat and takes to the open sea. Half dead from frigid storms and starvation, he comes upon the whaling ship Huntress, and climbs aboard. Part of the crew has mutinied. He helps the captain kill the mutineers, and then sail the Huntress to California with its mountains of gold.