Likely he was a young, hungry writer trying a potboiler to make $. The writer’s life...
Your mention of a young hungry writer reminded me of a story Louis L’Amour told me when i was lucky enough to get an interview with him. When he was writing for cents on the word for pulp magazines, he would never write things like “Bart shot him down,” He’d instead write things like, “Griffith’s gun spoke first — a cacophony of bang bang bang that echoed off the desert floor. And it was still echoing when Bart shot him down.”
He said he had to chuckle when reviewers praised his descriptive style. It was developed in the interest of making more pennies!