Just west of the Spiller store on the same side of the street was a grove of young liveoaks. Several saddled horses, plus a couple of teams hitched to farm wagons, were tied there.

The Spiller store was housed in an unpainted frame structure, across the front of which, facing the street, was a loading dock. At each end of the gallery were two-step wooden stairs. Near the steps at the end lounged four young cowboys.

The drummer drove on to the oak mott and tied up, shouldering his bag of samples, and headed unsteadily toward the store. Obviously he was drinking on the job. As he climbed the two steps to the loading dock, one of the cowboys developed an odd little grin.

"Hey, Old man," He said, "you look a little trail weary. Maybe a good stiff toddy will pep you up a bit."

The drummer grinned happily, reversed his direction and walked back down the steps.

"That I would," the drumer replied with enthusiasm.

The cowboy extended his hand in greeting and said, "I'm Newton Worrell. Some folks call me "Cuter". These two birds here Charley and Lewis Deans. This old bean-pole over here is Big Boy Crumbley."

The drummer acknowledged the introductions but forgot to introduce himself. "Didn't you say something about a toddy," he inquired impatiently.

"Well, Uncle Wade Spiller don't much cotton to us drinking on his front porch here. We got our booze stashed away over there where you tied that old race horse of yours. Come on, friend, let's go."

The drummer and the four cowboys walked to the grove, and the drummer placed his bag of samples back in the buggy. From a few yards away a half-gallon jug of whiskey mysteriously appeared. Crumbley set the jug on the ground. Cuter Worrell sang out, "Gather 'round boys, and listen to my tale...." The five men sat cross-legged on the ground in a circle, with the jug as the center of attraction.

The drummer took frequent big drinks and the cowboys drank frequent small ones, but the drummer took no notice. As a matter of fact, in no time at all he had gone out like a candle in a tornado.

Charley Deans felt his pulse, pronounced the man dead, and suggested that every dead man ought to be buried. With that solemn pronouncement, Lewis Deans went for a shovel, Cuter borrowed a nail keg from the Spiller store, and Charley Deans and Big Boy Crumbley each grabbed an arm and dragged the drummer to the edge of the street where the sand had extra depth.

Lewis Deans scooped out a shallow grave in the ten-inch deep sand. Then carefully the four cowboys, two lifting by the arms and two by the legs, placed the sleeping drunk in the depression. By this time a half-dozen idlers had gathered to witness the fun.

"Brethren," Cuter began, "here lies the body of John Q. Doe." Some fifteen minutes later, following many Biblical quotes and misquotes, Cuter Worrell concluded his funeral oration with, "...a good example of the evils of drink. Rest in peace brother. Cover him up, boys, Amem."

They covered the drummer with sand, rounded in the shape of a grave, leaving only the man's eyes, ears, nose and mouth exposed..

Then, together with several spectators their activities had attracted, they retired to the gallery of the Spiller store to wait and watch.

Just at dusk, as the effects of strong drink began to wear off, the drummer tried to stir. The mourners quickly gathered round and never was heard a more tuneless rendition of "When The Roll Is Called Up Yonder."

Never did a drunk sober up faster. Cuter grinned. He grinned again some months later as he recognized Sheriff T. L. Sansom in plenty of time to avoid accepting free room and board in the county jail house.

Most everyone in the community said that Cuter left about three jumps ahead of the sheriff. That was not true. Cuter Worrell didn't operate that way. When he left the Voca community he was about three jumps behind the sheriff, and Sheriff T. L. Sansom wasn't looking back.

Cuter was a cowhand dekuxe. No man ever forked a horse who knew better the tools of his trade, or took greater pride in his profession. His hands were created to hold a lariat not the handles of a plow. To have called him a sodbuster or farmer would have been an insult of the greatest magnitude. Yet such was the role he affected in order to elude the numerous agents of the law who were looking for him.

T. J. Spiller had misplaced thirty-one head of cattle and Cuter just happened to be in the very near vicinity of those cattle when Sheriff Sansom was seen approaching. Cuter didn't wait to greet Mr. Sansom and delve into his thinking. It was just as well, because the sheriff claimed later to have recognized Cuter and went so far as to charge him with cattle theft.

Practically everyone knew that Cuter would head west. Cuter knew it too, but he didn't leave the Voca community immediately. He waited and waited some more. He planned his route, the hours he would travel, and resolved that he, himself would soon become a manhunter.

Unlike the sheriff he would not be seeking one certain man. Rather, he would be seeking a certain kind of man. And he knew that until he found that man, his wits would be taxed to the limits in order to remain free.

Cuter finally moved out, heading toward Arizona Territory. He took him two or three days to find the man he wanted - but find him he did.

The man was driving a broken-down mare and buggy. He was wearing a dirty, flop-brimmed hat and dashboard overalls. His flat heeled shoes were scuffed. And best of all he appeared to be about Cuter's size - even to the shoes.

It is not known what sort of tale Cuter concocted to make a trade sound reasonable, but the farmer ended with a well-trained cowpony, a pretty good saddle, a pair of shop-made boots that almost fit, plus a good Stetson hat.

Cuter, in turn, with his mare and buggy, his flop hat, worn out shoes and blue bib overalls, had the perfect disguise. He felt secure, but to add a bit more color he conned a farm wife out of a couple of hens and a coup to carry them in. The coup fitted perfectly in the carry-all behind the buggy seat.

Not even Cuter's family would have recognized him in that rig and in those clothes. To the world he depicted a hard luck farmer, not a cowboy with the law on his trail.

Cuter trotted that mare right out of Texas, across New Mexico, and into Arizona Territory without ever being questioned. Before reaching his land of sanctuary, however, he did have one minor problem; is meager funds ran dangerously low. Cuter didn't worry, but he kept alert for any kind of windfall, especially a free meal.

As a child Cuter was often shanghied to church to hear his uncle, the Rev. J. D. Worrell of Camp San Saba, preach. The child had a very retentive mind and memory, and it was not unusual for him to gather his playmates together, mount a stump and deliver a reasonable facisimile of his uncle's sermon.

The gears in Cuter's finely-tuned memory started whirring as he approached a camp meeting in progress. He sensed that windfall and a good meal or so.

Cuter got out of his buggy and introduced himself as Brother Worrell and inquired if he might preach for them. They assured him he might, and he preached.

Years later, after telling my father (his cousin) of the incident Cuter was quiered about the size of the collection he received.

"I got about six-bits, Ed."

"Wasn't that damn pore pay, Cuter?" Dad wondered.

Cuter grinned. "Yeah, Ed, it was. But you know, it was damn pore preach!"

Before Cuter reached his destination - an area covering probably one-fourth of Arizona Territory - he managed to divesy himself of his mare and buggy, secure some proper cowhand apparel, a horse and a Texas-type rim-fire saddle.

An old friend of Cuter's, George L. Mennet (a friend acquired after he arrived in Arizona), wrote me in 1971, some years after Cuter's death, that "the first time Newt went to Arizona it was mostly center-fire country."

The reference to rim-fire and center-fire have to do with the placement of the girth and cinches on the saddle. I gather that Arizona cowhands did not approve of a rim-fire saddle.