"Saunders died a
few minutes ago. Pete says you better notify the coroner--and I
reckon the sheriff, too. Pretty tough to be shot down like that
in broad daylight."
"I think I'd rather be shot in daylight than in the dark," Miss
Georgie snapped unreasonably because her nerves were all
a-jangle, and sent the messages as requested.
Saunders was neither a popular nor a prominent citizen, and there
was none to mourn beside him. Peter Hamilton, as his employer
and a man whose emotions were easily stirred, was shocked a shade
lighter as to his complexion and a tone lower as to his voice
perhaps, and was heard to remark frequently that it was "a
turrible thing," but the chief emotion which the tragedy roused
was curiosity, and that fluttering excitement which attends death
in any form.
A dozen Indians hung about the store, the squaws peering
inquisitively in at the uncurtained window of the lean-to--where
the bed held a long immovable burden with a rumpled sheet over
it--and the bucks listening stolidly to the futile gossip on the
store porch.
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