The sign at the town boundary read: ROSARITA—Pop. Growing Fast
Not a claim borne out by the deserted main — and only — street. Then a tolling bell and the sound of voices raised in a funeral hymn told Adam Steele that all Rosarita's human life was in church and that the town had recently suffered a net population loss of one.
Later he did not have to ask who shot the sheriff. It was in self-defense and the lawman was more creased than deceased. But with more killing to come, it soon became clear that most of the pains being suffered in the little Arizona town came not from growing but dying.