ade at
the two or three local stores.

A murder was a rare event in Branson County. Every well-informed citizen
could tell the number of homicides committed in the county for fifty
years back, and whether the slayer, in any given instance, had escaped,
either by flight or acquittal, or had suffered the penalty of the law.
So, when it became known in Troy early one Friday morning in summer,
about ten years after the war, that old Captain Walker, who had served
in Mexico under Scott, and had left an arm on the field of Gettysburg,
had been foully murdered during the night, there was intense excitement
in the village. Business was practically suspended, and the citizens
gathered in little groups to discuss the murder, and speculate upon the
identity of the murderer. It transpired from testimony at the coroner's
inquest, held during the morning, that a strange mulatto had been seen
going in the direction of Captain Walker's house the night before, and
had been met going away from Troy early Friday morning, by a farmer on
his way to town. Other circumstances seemed to connect the stranger with
the crime. The sheriff organized a posse to search for him, and early in
the evening, when most of the citizens of Troy were at supper, the
suspected man was brought in and lodged in the county jail.

By the following morning the news of the capture had spread to the
farthest limits of the county. A much larger number of people than usual
came to town that Saturday,--bearded men in straw hats and blue homespun
shirts, and butternut trousers of great amplitude of material and
vagueness of outline; women in homespun frocks and slat-bonnets, with
faces as expressionless as the dreary sandhills which gave them a meagre
sustenance.

The murder was almost the sole topic of conversation. A steady stream of
curious observers visited the house of mourning, and gazed upon the
rugged face of the old veteran, now stiff and cold in death; and more
than one eye dropped a tear at the remembrance of the cheery smile, and
the joke--sometimes superannuated, generally feeble, but always
good-natured--with which the captain had been wont to greet his
acquaintances. There was a growing sentiment of anger among these stern
men, toward the murderer who had thus cut down their friend, and a
strong feeling that ordinary justice was too slight a punishment for
such a crime.

Toward noon there was an informal gathering of citizens in Dan Tyson's
store.

"