“Ted Smallwood testified that he had not witnessed the shooting, only heard it, so he could not say that Bill House’s account was not true ‘far as it went.’ House looked disgusted but remained silent. Smallwood and a couple of others signed their names and House and the rest took pains drawing their Xs, to make sure that X would not be mistaken for somebody else’s.”

—Peter Matthiessen, Shadow Country, 2008.