Fourteen year-old Mortimer Ridley Chalmers III had cracked the Code of the West back in Philadelphia—in his treasured pulp novels. But in the Black Hills, Coffee Arbuckle is only aware of one code—protecting your own life with the best gun you can get. This Civil War Veteran is set spinning by the violent Gold Rush. He's in for about as much trouble as the teenage dreamer Mortimer, who's caught up in his books. But a partnership may be just the solution for these two desperadoes in a land where every man fights for his own interests.