This being done, they entered a big picnic wagon with parallel
seats and set out for the scene of the crime. Coroner Bogle demanded
that the body should be viewed officially before the man-hunt should
begin. Scattergood threw the weight of his opinion with the coroner.
The body was found lying beside a narrow path leading from the road
through a field to Asa Levens's farmhouse; it lay upon its face, with
arms outstretched, very still and very peaceful, with the morning sun
shining down upon it, and the robins singing from shadowing trees, and
insects buzzing and whirring cheerfully in the fields, and the fields
themselves peaceful and beautiful in their golden embellishments, ready
for the harvest. Scattergood looked about him at the trappings of the
day, and the thought came unbidden that it was a pleasant spot in which
to die ... perhaps more pleasant than the dead man deserved.
"Shot from behind." said the sheriff.
"By somebody a-layin' in wait," said Jed Lewis.
"It was murder--cold-blooded murder," said the sheriff.
Scattergood stepped forward as the coroner turned the face up to the
light of the sun.
"It was a death by violence," said Scattergood.
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