The barber asked the
banker for his views and reviewed the financier's opinion to the judge
while a farmer and a preacher listened. The milliner told her customers
about it and the stenographer discussed it with the bookkeeper. In the
homes, on the streets, and, later in the day, throughout the country,
the shock of the crime was felt.
Meanwhile, the efforts of the police to find the assassin were
fruitless. The most careful search revealed nothing in the nature of a
clew.
Millsburgh had been very proud of Captain Martin and the honors he had
won in France, as Millsburgh was proud of Adam Ward and his
success--only with a different pride. The people had known Charlie from
his birth, as they had known his father and mother all their years.
There had been nothing in the young workman's life--as every one
remarked--to lead to such an end.
It is doubtful if in the entire community there was a single soul that
did not secretly or openly think of the tragedy as being in some dark
way an outcome of the strike. And, gradually, as the day passed, the
conjectures, opinions and views crystallized into two opposing
theories--each with its natural advocates.
One division of the people held that the deed was committed by some one
of Jake Vodell's followers, because of the workman's known opposition
to a sympathetic strike of the Mill workers' union.
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