Summary

When Captain Kidd arrives for his reading at the mercantile, there is again a U.S. Army soldier stationed at the door. The audience, Captain Kidd notices, has divided itself into two groups, and are giving each other “looks like warning flares” (141). Before the Captain is able to begin reading the news, a man stands up and shouts about Davis’s crooked legislation. Captain Kidd immediately should for silence; however, he is unable to contain the crowd. He reads quickly, but shouting voices interrupt him and two men—one, the owner of the hotel, and the other a schoolteacher—get to their feet “shouting about the turncoat Hamilton and the corrupt Davis” (144). Although some men try to separate them, their disagreement comes to blows. The women in the room grab “their husbands’ or fathers’ or brothers’ handguns” (144) on their way out.

While everyone is...