• Written By: Mackenzie/Smith

Chapter 3:

The Americans took the trussed-up boy to a place called Fort Whipple,
a fly-blown group of tents surrounded by a stone and timber stockade.

An American called Willis was the boss there and he glared at the man of God as he entered with his captives.
He noticed the boy when he was brought in with a few Yavapai girls and he looked into the colour of his eyes.

"What do you make of him?" he asked the god man.
"He may be the young O'Brien boy who was lost here years ago
Or he could be from the Jepson party that never made it to New Mexico," said the God man back.
They named the boy Jepson O'Brien but the natives and frontiersmen called him "Blue",
Because of his eyes but also because of the baleful, almost sad expression he carried on his face.
The expression of someone who kills with compassion but not mercy.

Although he was still a boy, the men mostly kept away from him.
All except for one, a trapper who understood his skills, and in return, fed him and taught him the white man's way.
In a short while, he could speak, read, and write their language,
and he also added the calm, fast dignity of the gunman to his arsenal.

He was so fast that men treated him with care.
But he was slow to anger and when angry, swift and final in his reply.
In the Arizona desert in the 1860's,
He had every skill that you needed to survive. And he was just 17.