The reluctant lawman : a Ralph Compton western
(Book)

"Luke Lessing was told his career at the Pinkerton Agency was assured thanks to his skill with pistols and rifles. But after he and his partner got ambushed, Luke was widely blamed. Discouraged with Pinkerton politics, he moved on to a job as the lawman in a 'sleepy' little town in Colorado, only to barely escape with his life. So Luke happily traded wearing a badge for cooking at the Comstock Cafe in Virginia City, hub of the fabled Comstock Lode. He'd put his past behind him--until a bushwhacked marshal and a confrontation with an old enemy drag him into a whirlpool of corruption, missing miners, and concealed treasure, where you can never tell who will betray you next. Luke's pressured to pin on a badge yet again, not only by the secretary of the Nevada Territory but by the secretary's boss, who happens to be president of the United States. There's a lot of dough on the line, but not the kind he's got a talent for. What does a fella have to do to get back to baking biscuits?" -- Page [4] cover.