On the border of New Mexico, a dwarf tries to hide his secret froma down and outtraveling circus. In the mountains of Utah, a teen-age girl marries her cousin even though she is in love with someone else. In San Francisco, a whore tries to disobey her pimp and save the life ofthe strange boy who won her heart. In Death Valley a horse wanders across the desert afraid his rider might die. In the scab-lands, a tribe of African American Indians wait for a revolution that will never come. In South Pass, Arizona a black prostitute tries to hide an awful crime while a former outlaw is an upstanding mayor. And through it all there is Jasper, a boy trying to make sense of this strange land ... because in the Fifth World there are no white hats."