"Have you heard anything more about the show, Harry?" asked Jim Borum. "Is she sure to be here?" What did Tinkletown care about the train robbers when a "show" was headed that way?
"Sure. The press comments are very favourable," said Harry. "They all say that Miss Marmaduke, who plays Rosalind, is great. We've got a cut of her and, say, she's a beauty. I can see myself sitting in the front row next Thursday night, good and proper."
"Say, Anderson, I think it's a dern shame fer Mark Riley to go 'round pastin' them reward bills over the show pictures," growled Isaac Porter. "He ain't got a bit o' sense."
With one accord the crowd turned to inspect two adjacent bill boards. Mark had either malignantly or insanely pasted the reward notices over the nether extremities of Rosalind as she was expected to appear in the Forest of Arden. There was a period of reflection on the part of an outraged constituency.
"I don't see how he's goin' to remove off them reward bills without scraping off her legs at the same time," mused Anderson Crow in perplexity. Two housewives of Tinkletown suddenly deserted the group and entered the store. And so it was that the train robbers were forgotten for the time being.
But Marshal Crow's reputation as a horse-thief taker and general suppressor of crime constantly upbraided him. It seemed to call upon him to take steps toward the capture of the train robbers. All that afternoon he reflected. Tinkletown, seeing his mood, refrained from breaking in upon it. He was allowed to stroke his whiskers in peace and to think to his heart's content. By nightfall his face had become an inscrutable mask, and then it was known that the President of Bramble County's Horse-Thief Detective Association was determined to fathom the great problem. Stealthily he went up to the great attic in his home and inspected his "disguises." In some far-off period of his official career he had purchased the most amazing collection of false beards, wigs and garments that any stranded comedian ever disposed of at a sacrifice. He tried each separate article, seeking for the best individual effect; then he tried them collectively. It would certainly have been impossible to recognise him as Anderson Crow. In truth, no one could safely have identified him as a human being.
"I'm goin' after them raskils," he announced to Andrew Gregory and the whole family, as he came down late to take his place at the head of the supper table.
"Ain't you goin' to let 'em show here, pop?" asked Roscoe in distress.
"Show here? What air you talkin' about?"
"He means the train robbers, Roscoe," explained the lad's mother. The boy breathed again.