While Peamon was adjusting his tie, a vigilante down the track raised a deer rifle and shot him square between the shoulder blades. Then he ducked inside the crew shack and rang up Roger Moore’s post. He shouted into the mouthpiece, Tell the Colonel—I just shot Alex Manly!”

The Board of Aldermen assembled at the home of building contractor Charles D. Morrill, who was ill with pneumonia and could not make the short trip to city hall. They sat around the dining room table, hands clasped on the white linen tablecloth. It had the flavor of a religious service. Whenever they heard hoof-beats on the street outside, or the sound of men’s voices, they glanced nervously over their shoulders at the unguarded windows.

Mayor Silas Wright, as usual wearing white gloves, called the meeting to order in a quiet voice. “You-all are aware of what is happening in our city,” Wright began, speaking slowly and precisely, as if delivering an unpleasant diagnosis. As he spoke, his hands fluttered gracefully. It was impossible not to watch his hands. “We must take steps to restore order.”

“That’s putting it mildly,” Benjamin Keith said. He stood and circled the table, punching one hand softly into the palm of the other. This was about utilities, he figured: private water, private electric, private gas, even a private ferry. And railroad rates, municipal bonds, dollars and cents. Monopolies, and how to keep them. This white versus black business was just a screen—heartfelt, but still just a screen. The real issue was business. “The greedy sons of bitches finally—”

“Sit down, Bennie. Keep a level head.”

Abruptly, Keith parked himself in his chair, thudding his big fists onto the table. “Never thought I’d live to see this day,” he said, then said it again. Across the table, John Norwood nodded solemnly.

Wright continued, “If we’re lucky, we’ll all live to see tomorrow.”

“What do you propose?” Norwood asked.

“First, let’s continue the ban on alcohol.”

“Oh, that’ll fix everything, all right,” Keith said. “The town’s full of vigilantes, and you’re worried about beer. What we need is to wire Washington and ask for federal marshals! Federal troops!”

“Bennie,” Wright chided.

“Go on, we’re listening,” Norwood said tiredly, as if he knew what was coming. Had he been such a fool to believe things were getting better?

“Extend the ban on liquor and beer,” Wright said.

Alderman Daniel Gore, a bank vice president and insurance man, said, “Would that be all consumption, or just sale?”

Keith exploded. “Jesus Christ! The whole city is crumbling down around our ears, and all you can think to do is close down the saloons?”

Wright said, “Sometimes modest actions—”

“Modest actions? For Christ’s sake!” Keith bolted from his chair and slammed it hard into the table. Morrill, who sat at the head of the table wrapped in a shawl, said nothing—he hardly looked conscious.

“Sit down, Bennie,” Wright said again, but Keith remained standing. “The hooligans are fueled by liquor. If we can put an end to drunkenness—”