In this lively western yarn told in a third person, limited omniscient-observer style, and enhanced by certain autobiographical hints, Crane also uses a dual perspective to convey special meanings that might well be inaccessible or seriously obscured, if only a single line of thought were being projected for the reader. There are at least two instances of this dual perspective, each different from the other in format and purpose, but equal in that they are both necessary to the integrity of the story.

The first involves a special subtext by means of which Crane appears to make a running commentary on Potter's marriage and his honeymoon-return to Yellow Sky.

Read closely the entire story takes on the appearance of an extended string of theatrical entertainment numbers, climaxed by the anticlimactic encounter with Scratchy, what might be called The Showdown That Was Not. This spoof of a gun battle...