The buggy, he saw, had one occupant: a man in a loose, tan-coloured topcoat and a light, narrow-brimmed hat, whose gloved hands -- one of which was still clutching the reins of his stalled two-horse team -- were now raised shoulder-high. Even from this distance the poor sonofabuck had the stiff, awkward look of a greenhorn about him … but then, O’Brien guessed he had every right to look stiff and awkward with a gun stuck in his face.

The men who were in the process of robbing him, by contrast -- for the guns and bandanas told their own story -- appeared altogether tougher and more trail-wise. The first, a thin man of what appeared to be average height, was wearing a high-crowned black hat drawn low over shaggy, corn-yellow hair, and buckskin gauntlets pulled up over the cuffs of a black pea-coat. Evidently he was the spokesman of the pair, because he was doing all the talking.

His silent partner, meanwhile, was content just to sit a chestnut mare slantwise across the trail about four, five yards behind him, and treat their victim to a menacing glare as he flexed thick fingers around the grips of a Remington Army .44. At this distance, and in the red, uncertain light of approaching sunset, O’Brien could only get an impression of him; that he was a tall, intimidating bear of a man in a dark, wide-brimmed hat and bright yellow mackinaw.

Then the first road agent was speaking again -- snarling, more like -- and making angry little gestures with his own Cavalry Colt to help get his message across. When he was finished, he kicked his spotted pony up alongside the buggy and brought the long-barrelled .44/.40 around in a hard, driving sweep that caught the greenhorn square in the face and flung him sideways across the wagon-seat.

Flinching at the brutality of it, O’Brien decided that he’d seen enough -- more than enough -- and without taking his eyes off the men below, stuffed the field glasses away and flipped the restraining thong off the hammer of the gun he wore at his right hip.

At the sound of his bellowed, “Yee-haah!”, the blood-bay leapt back out onto the trail, its earlier fatigue now forgotten, and at about the same time, the gun -- a .38-calibre Colt Lightning -- seemed almost to leap into its rider’s palm, spilling the orange glow of sundown off its short barrel as he brought it up and triggered a shot skyward.

“Hey, down there!”

The gunblast shattered the thin, high country silence and threw a scare the size of Arkansas into Pistol-Whipper and his buddy, and for a fistful of seconds after that there was only chaos as the startled robbers fought to bring their equally-spooked horses back under control.

Thundering on towards them, O’Brien fired the Lightning again, right over the robbers’ heads this time, just to let them know that he meant business, and that they should sink spurs and make dust while they still could.

At that, their faces whipped up and around in his direction, and above creased bandanas sucked in and blown out again by their rapid, flustered breathing, he saw their furious eyes fix on him, and knew that this was the moment when they either ran -- as he hoped they would -- or stood fast and made a fight of it.

Managing to check his prancing mount at last, Pistol-Whipper yelled something unintelligible to his companion, then did the very last thing O’Brien wanted him to do.

He brought his Colt up and returned fire.

O’Brien saw flame lance from the weapon about half a second before he heard the high, vicious crack of the shot itself, and instinctively swerved his charging mount a little to the left. Then, when no more than thirty yards separated them, he brought the blood-bay to a wild, slithering halt, turned the horse broadside on and fired again.

Bark exploded off a ponderosa pine to Pistol-Whipper’s right, showering man and horse alike with thick, reddish splinters, and as the would-be robber buried his head in his shoulders, he yelled, “Gun ’im, George! Gun the sonofabitch!”

Figuring that he must be the sonofabitch in question, O’Brien quickly brought the Lightning around to make sure he got Pistol-Whipper’s buddy, this here George, before George got him.

But George wasn’t even looking his way.

No -- the man in the buggy was his target.

That poor devil was still sprawled across the wagon-seat, one hand holding his bloody face, where Pistol-Whipper had struck him, the other still clutching the reins of his frantic team. He was scared and unarmed; a scared, unarmed greenhorn who posed no threat at all to his tormentors, and yet --

And yet they were going to shoot him down in cold blood.

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