Police scanner, circa 1963:

- Preacher,.ah'm onna be 10-9 out at the 78 washeteria. - 10-4, is there any disturbance?

- Negative, but they's two individuals with long hair and they got California plates. 
 
They probably put in down around Sowell's Bluff by early afternoon.There was really no need to sneak. Nobody in that neighborhood would question three young men hauling a war surplus 50 caliber machine gun, long as they were all white. 

They crossed to a sandbar with the river down low and set up their artillery. There was no one in sight so they owned the river. 

 Roddy was a firearms fanatic, and it was he who commissioned this operation. Firing commenced. It was just like the war movies down at the American.


Except  ...
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Willie is a jovial short,  one of the most affable guys you could find. But you don't wanna go casting hot lead in his direction. And here he was with a partner, scrambling their ponies up the bankside with 50 caliber rounds kicking up sand behind the  hooves of the trailing mount. 

It's probable neither Gary nor his buddies realized they had company way down along the riverbed that day. But they were about to find out.
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Did some riding in the river country, did Willie and his pals. Told me once how he tested out the Bob Steel mounted jump from a cliff into a river. No matter how many times you see Scout docilely follow along behind Silver, a spirited animal wants to lead, is always in competition with his rival. However, even a spirited animal ain't dumb enough to run off a cliff. So Willie and a buddy set up a competition through the brush, each pony vying for the lead and not much thinking about where they were headed, until Willie and his ride broke clear and were treading air out over the Red, his horse fooled just like Wile E. Coyote.

It worked well enough, except for the part that slapped against the saddle when they splashed down. Bob Steel never seemed to have that trouble. Movies just aren't realistic, we decided.
 
Carried a sidearm in the back country, Willie did. Could hook and draw just like Hoot Gibson. Brother Reloj watched him. "That there's plenty quick, Willie, and mighty loud, but can you hit anything?"

Willie grinned like he done.  "Go-lee, man don't believe nothing ..."

Set up facing a board nailed onto a  Bois d'Arc. Flash. Blast. Board splintered. 

"You're good, Willie. Real good."
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How the machine gun crew realized they weren't all alone down in the river bed was: Willie had ridden with his partner over the bank behind and had them covered with his .44 by the time they heard the hoofbeats and turned. Had the muzzle resting between the eyes of Gary, in fact. And Willie, he was trembling with rage.

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The great philosopher (not Annie Pearl, an earlier model) mused about canines to a companion. "Have you ever considered how a dog will growl at strangers and fawn before his master, even though the one has never done him any harm and the other not much good?  It's because the dog is a true philosopher. He only trusts what is known."

Willie, in his frenzy, recalled that Gary's uncle was cousin to his own mother. He was practically family!  
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Texas, according tho Manchester's Death of a President, was the murder capitol of the U.S in the era of which we speak, and the Metroplex was the hotspot of Texas for that particular statistic. And yet this is precisely where the President of the U.S. made his political junket plans for November of 1963. (History should be studied more in schools, and after. What happens when a Prince of the Blood appears with his wife in an open limo in a backward region in which he is hated ? World War I, for starters.)

But my train of thought here centers on the killer's killer, Jack Ruby, who was not a local and thus subject to scrutiny. He was Jewish, and what's more, he selected another Jew as his attorney, and what is still more a flamboyant lawyer with long hair and California license plates plus obvious contempt for the locals. The DA who prosecuted the case reported that the usual sentence for homicide with these particulars was five years. (Wherever firearms be frequent, life is cheap.) Ruby as you know drew the death penalty.

Willie like the rest of us was canny as a canine. Gary was one of the tribe, to the manner born. He let the hammer down, gently.

Sentiment. It's superior to any random factor, such as anger, love, ballistics. It's why when you read about tragedy, you hope it's from a far off country you don't know, and sickness in my family outranks yours, and the death of a dog is a worse tragedy than the demise of any number of rats. 
 
Or, as a great writer (not Hut Bowden, an earlier one) inscribed in a letter to a friend about the horrible losses of Napoleon's  invasion of Spain: "How horrible it is to have so many people killed! - And what a blessing.one cares for none of them!" - wrote Jane Austen.

The event down on the river that dog day afternoon worked out with more sentiment than sensation, more farce than fracas, and we should be happy about that. I know the machine gun crew certainly was.

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"The section of Highway 82 running east and west within the city limits of Bonham is no longer Fourth St, but Sam Rayburn Drive - Repeat: NOT FOURTH STREET. "  - Notice in the Daily Favorite during the era. Of course locals began referring to the roadway as Not Fourth Street.