Legend With a Six-gun (9781101601839) (22 page)

Quickly she brought chairs for Longarm and Belivev, placing them at the table, with Longarm facing Danilov, and Belivev between them. The woman stepped to the stove and busied herself with the steaming kettle and thick, tall glasses. She carried the glasses to the table, set one in front of her husband, then served Longarm and Belivev.

Mordka raised his glass. “To your good arrival, Mr. Long.”

Longarm picked up his glass and, following the example of the other men, sipped the hot liquid. He recognized the flavor of honey, diluted by the hot water, and decided that a good tot of Maryland rye would have improved the brew.

Setting his glass back on the table, Nicolai Belivev told their host, “
Sodar Long ero priditi ohpravleny.
”

“
Na zemstud
?” the older man asked.

“Nyet,”
Belivev replied. “
Centrovley
.”

Mordka Danilov frowned thoughtfully, looking at Longarm. He asked, “You come, as Nicolai says, from the central government, Mr. Long? From Washington?” His English was much better than Belivev's.

“Not Washington. Denver. That's in Colorado. But I'm a federal officer, so I guess you could say I'm from Washington, in a manner of speaking. I'm a deputy U.S. Marshal, Mr. Danilov.”

“Ah.” Mordka nodded. “You do not belong then to the ranchers, as the sheriff does?”

“I don't
belong
to anybody but myself,” Longarm said emphatically. “I've got a job that I do, seeing that the law's upheld. That's all I'm interested in. It doesn't matter who breaks the law, I arrest him, whether it's you or the sheriff or the richest rancher in the county.”

“Why have you come here?” Danilov asked. “Who among us is breaking the law? Surely not the
Bratiya
?”

“As far as I know right now, nobody's broken any laws I'm obliged to enforce. My chief sent me down here to make sure there's not any crookedness in the election that's coming along.”

Mordka smiled somewhat bitterly. “I see. You do not interest yourself in trespassers who cut fences and destroy crops, then?”

“Not usually,” the deputy answered. “That's the sheriff's job.”

“If he refuses to do his job, then can we turn to you for help?”

Longarm wasn't sure exactly how he wanted to answer a question of that kind. He took his time in replying, and chose his words carefully. “The law's a pretty broad thing, Mr. Danilov. Federal officers are only supposed to handle cases where there's been a federal law broken. There are times when we've got to step in, like when a local officer breaks a law or doesn't do his job right. But it's not real easy to set up rules in cases like that.”

Danilov nodded thoughtfully. “You have not been here long, have you?”

“I just got in last night. Right now, all I'm doing is sort of looking around.”

“Nicolai has told you of the troubles we of the
Bratiya
are having?”

“About all he's told me so far is that you're having a bad time.” Longarm decided it was time for him to take control of the questioning. “You and Mr. Belivev keep talking about this thing you call the
Bratiya
. Do you mind telling me exactly what it is?”

“We have no secrets, if that's what your question means,” Danilov replied. “In your language, Mr. Long,
Bratiya
means Brethren. It is our religion. It is each man's personal freedom to choose his religion in this country, is it not?”

“It sure is,” Longarm agreed. “Though I can't say I've picked one out yet for myself.”

“You will, someday,” Danilov said with a smile. “But if you are not a pious man, I can understand why you would be puzzled by our religion. Tell me, do you know of the Anabaptists? Have you ever heard of the Mennonites? The Amish, I think they are called in America.”

“There were some Amish folks up north of where I grew up, I recall. I don't guess I've heard about the others.”

“They're much the same, Mr. Long. I'll try not to make my explanation too long and tiresome. The Mennonite beliefs were established three hundred years ago, Mr. Long, by a priest named Menno Simons, who found the rituals of the Roman Church too elaborate, too worldly. He began to preach only what is in the Bible itself—simple worship of God and Christ, without altars or incense or fancy robes. Menno Simons made many converts, who called themselves Mennonites. They renounced worldly trappings not mentioned in the Bible, and vowed to live in peace with all men. They put aside weapons and all acts of violence.”

Longarm broke in, “Wait a minute. That doesn't square up with Mr. Belivev taking a shot at me, telling me he'd shoot me if I put a hand on his fence.”

“Be patient, please,” Danilov said. “I will try to make that clear later. Menno Simons began his preaching in the sixteenth century, by your calendar. Even before he died, though, in many of the countries where he made converts, the Roman and Protestant churches as well as the secular governments had begun to persecute those who had adopted Menno's beliefs. His followers refused to serve in armies, or to take oaths in courts of law. The ancestors of our own people, those of us who now live here, were promised freedom to follow their own beliefs by the Tsarina of Russia, who came to be known as Catherine the Great. They migrated to Russia, most of them from Germany.” Mordka paused to sip his cooling honey mixture.

Longarm took the opportunity to insert a question. “That must have been a long time back. Dates ain't my strong suit, or history either, but wasn't she the Russian queen a hundred years ago?”

Danilov nodded. “Yes. A hundred years. For eighty of them, our families lived peacefully in Russia. Then a new Tsar came to the throne, and he decided that Russia must become one land, one people, with one language and one religion. Our fathers learned Russian, and taught us to speak it, but they would not give up our religion for the official Russian Church, and they would not serve in the Tsar's army. So the persecution began once more. For a while our families bowed under, but when the Tsar sent his Cossacks to imprison and kill those who would not worship as he ordered, or join his church, some of us reluctantly decided that we must fight back. It made us very sorrowful, but we learned to shoot and to do the other deeds a man must do to protect his family. Of course we could not do this and still follow all of Menno's teachings, so we kept what we could of our old beliefs and called ourselves the
Bratiya
.”

Mordka Danilov paused and looked piercingly at Longarm with his flashing blue eyes. “You understand, Mr. Long, it was not easy for us to do this, and our hearts were heavy. So, when the agents from your railroads came to find people who wanted to come to America and buy the land they were selling so cheaply, we saw that we could be free in America to follow our religion as we wanted to. That is why we emigrated; that is why we are now here in your state of Kansas. But even here, we are finding that we must still fight to protect ourselves. Does this help you understand why we ask you where we can find help?”

His face sober, Longarm nodded slowly. “I guess it does, Mr. Danilov. Only from what I've gathered, your troubles here don't come from what you believe in, but from putting your land into wheat, and fencing it off.”

“Only partly, I think,” Mordka said. “Perhaps if we had chosen to raise cattle, there would be no trouble. But we are farmers. We must work now and raise crops to pay for our land, and even to earn money for our food and clothing.”

“Oh, I understand that part,” Longarm told him. “The thing is, I don't see much I can do to help you, except to have a talk with the sheriff. Maybe I can get him to keep things peaceful, if he's not doing it now.”

“We would be grateful,” Mordka said, rising to his feet. Longarm and Belivev stood up also. Mordka went on, “It is close to the hour I spend in meditation. Nicolai, will you stay and join me? I'm certain Mr. Long can find his way back to town without help.”

“Sure,” Longarm agreed. He added, “And I'll come back and talk to you some more in a few days, Mr. Danilov. Maybe I'll see some way that I can ease things a bit.”

“You will be welcome in my house at any time,” Danilov said. “And if you are curious about our religion, you will also be welcome at our small church near the town.”

“Thanks. And if anything happens that you want to tell me about, I'm staying at the hotel.”

Outside once more, Longarm mounted with a thoughtful face and started the roan back toward the settlement. As he rode, he studied the fences that paralleled the crude road. He hadn't been assigned before to a case that took him into an area where Glidden wire was used. The barbed fencewire had appeared on the market fairly recently, and he'd heard the wire discussed—but mostly cussed—by cattlemen who'd encountered it. As he looked closely at the tautly stretched, saw-toothed wire, he could understand the reason for their displeasure.

Even at close range, under the declining afternoon sun, it was hard to see the fence against the growing wheat. At night, or in a storm, unless a horseman happened to notice the posts that supported the fence, it would actually be invisible. A horse moving at any pace faster than a walk could barrel into the sharp teeth of the Glidden wire and scrape cuts on its chest and legs that might cripple the animal. The top strand of the wire was just high enough to catch the legs of a mounted man, and against its barbs, the soft leather of boot uppers would provide no protection at all.

He could see, too, how cattle being driven across open prairie could pile up on a fence like that until the pressure of the herd on its leaders snapped the posts. That very pressure would shove the leading steers into the sharp, thin Strands and cut them to ribbons as they reared in panic from the pain of the metal points stabbing into their flesh.
It'd be easy as hell for a rancher to lose a good handful of steers that way,
Longarm thought as he let his horse set its own pace between the lines of posts.

I guess if I had a ranch around here, I wouldn't cotton to seeing the prairie all cut up this way,
Longarm told himself.
I'd be real tempted to carry a pair of nippers in my saddlebag and snip those wires, if it was my animals they were likely to tear up. But it'd be just as tough if I'd put my sweat into raising a crop and had a herd of steers or a bunch of riders cut my fence and trample my land. Damn it
, he thought,
this is one place where a man can have trouble making up his mind who's right and who's wrong, where these Glidden wire fences are concerned.

His thinking didn't comfort Longarm a great deal. It only aggravated what he'd felt about this assignment from the moment Billy Vail had handed it to him in Denver.

*   *   *

Vail was in a testy mood, and Longarm wasn't happy either. He'd just seen Julia Burnside off on the morning express; she was moving with her father back to Atlanta, and he hated like hell to see her go. Julia had been good company as well as a good bedmate for Longarm during the several months since they'd first met. Tired after a long night of lovemaking, and two hours late because the eastbound express didn't pull out of Denver until ten
A.M.
, Longarm snapped back at Vail when he made his usual remark about his deputy's tardiness. Usually the chief marshal's comment was half-joking, but this time it was completely serious.

“Damn it, Billy, I ain't married to this office the way you are,” Longarm retorted. “Seems to me you'd allow for all the times I work day and night on a case, when I show up a few minutes late.”

“If you call two hours a few minutes, you need a new watch,” Vail shot back, glaring out from under his heavy eyebrows. “I've got a new assignment for you, and now you'll have to hump it to catch the noon Santa Fe train to Fort Dodge.”

“I'll be glad to hustle, if it gets me out of this office. What's wrong at Dodge?”

“Nothing, except you'll have to stop there to pick up a horse. Where you're going is about fifty miles east of Dodge, some wide place in the road called Junction. If it'll make you feel better, you can ride the Santa Fe spur that goes right to the town, and save fifty miles on horseback.”

“Who am I going after, at this Junction place?” Longarm asked.

“Nobody. You'll be looking
at
, not
for
. There's a big squall blowing up down there. It seems the locals are ready to fight over who they'll elect to run the county. There're rumors of plans to stuff ballot boxes and keep a lot of people from voting.”

“Now hold up, Billy. That's for Kansas to worry about, not us. Hell, why are we sticking our noses into a local election fuss?”

“It's not just local,” Vail informed him. “You know this is a presidential election year too, and the big men in Washington are afraid it's going to be a close race. The smart money's betting there won't be ten thousand votes nationwide between the winner and the loser. They say even a few hundred votes are important in this one.”

“In a place like that, there can't be much over a hundred votes.”

“Maybe not. But when I get a wire from Washington telling me to send a good man to keep an eye on things, I know they're really worrying.”

“But damn it, Billy, it's not a job for a lawman!” Longarm protested. “What you need there is a nursemaid.”

The portly chief marshal pounded his desk with a large hand that showed the scars and calluses of a far less sedentary life than the one he was now leading. “Then, by God, you'll be the nursemaid! Now, I don't want to hear any more arguments. You get that noon train, and you see that the voting's honest. If it's not, you can call for a fresh vote. Is that clear?”

“Clear enough,” Longarm grumbled. “But I don't like it.”

“Nobody asked you if you did,” Vail said curtly. He picked up a fresh sheaf of papers from his littered desk, his signal that the time for talking had ended.