Next mornin', I hadn't been open more than ten minutes
when Doc Stair come in. He looked kind of nervous. He
asked me had I seen Paul Dickson. I said no, but I knew
where he was, out duck-shootin' with Jim Kendall. So
Doc says that's what he had heard, and he couldn't
understand it because Paul had told him he wouldn't
never have no more to do with Jim as long as he lived.
He said Paul had told him about the joke Jim had played
on Julie. He said Paul had asked him what he thought
of the joke and the Doc had told him that anybody that
would do a thing like that ought not to be let live.
I said it had been a kind of a raw thing, but Jim just
couldn't resist no kind of a joke, no matter how raw. I
said I thought he was all right at heart, but just bubblin'
over with mischief. Doc turned and walked out.
At noon he got a phone call from old John Scott. The
lake where Jim and Paul had went shootin' is on John's
place. Paul had came runnin' up to the house a few
minutes before and said they'd been an accident. Jim
had shot a few ducks and then give the gun to Paul and
told him to try his luck. Paul hadn't never handled a gun
and he was nervous. He was shakin' so hard that he
couldn't control the gun. He let fire and Jim sunk back
in the boat, dead.
Doc Stair, bein' the coroner, jumped in Frank Abbott's
flivver and rushed out to Scott's farm. Paul and old John
HYLAND
