Free The Last Ride of German Freddie by Walter Jon Williams

The Last Ride of German Freddie

    “ Ecce homo,” said German Freddie with a smile. “That is your man, I believe.”
    “That's him,” Brocius agreed. “That's Virgil Earp, the lawman.”
    “What do you suppose he wants?” asked Freddie.
    “He's got a warrant for someone,” said Brocius, “or he wouldn't be here.”
    Freddie gazed without enthusiasm at the lawman walking along the opposite side of Allen Street in Tombstone. Earp’s spurred boots clumped on the wooden sidewalk. He looked as if he had somewhere to go.
    “Entities should not be multiplied beyond what is necessary,” said Freddie, “or so Occam is understood to have said. If he is here for one of us, then so much the worse for him. If not, what does it matter to us?”
    Curly Bill Brocius looked thoughtful. “I don't know about this Occam fellow, but as my mamma would say, those fellers don't chew their own tobacco. Kansas lawmen come at you in packs.”
    “So do we,” said Freddie. “And this is not Kansas.”
    “No,” said Brocius. “It's Tombstone” He gave Freddie a warning look from his lazy eyes. “Remember that, my friend,” he said, “and watch your back.”
    Brocius drifted up Allen Street in the direction of Hafford's Saloon while Freddie contemplated Deputy U.S. Marshal Earp. The man was dressed like the parson of a particularly gloomy Protestant sect, with a black flat-crowned hat, black frock coat, black trousers, and immaculate white linen.
    German Freddie decided he might as well meet this paradigm.
    He walked across the dusty Tombstone street, stepped onto the sidewalk, and raised his grey sombrero.
    “Pardon me,” he said. “But are you Virgil Earp?”
    The man looked at him, light eyes over fair mustache. “No,” he said. “I'm his brother.”
    “Wyatt?” Freddie asked. He knew that the deputy had a lawman brother.
    “No,” the man said. “I'm their brother, Morgan.”
    A grin tugged at Freddie's lips. “Ah,” he said. “I perceive that entities  are  multiplied beyond that which is necessary.”
    Morgan Earp gave him a puzzled look. Freddie raised his hat again. “I beg your pardon,” he said. “I won't detain you.”

    *

    It is like a uniform, Freddie wrote in his notebook that night. Black coats, black hats, black boots. Blond mustaches and long guns in the scabbards, riding in line abreast as they led their posse out of town. As a picture of purposeful terror they stand like the  Schwartzreiter  of three centuries ago, horsemen who held all Europe in fear. They entirely outclassed that Lt. Hurst, who was in a  real  uniform and who was employing them in the matter of those stolen Army mules.
    What fear must dwell in the hearts of these Earps to present themselves thus! They must dress and walk and think alike; they must enforce the rigid letter of the dead, dusty law to the last comma; they must cling to every rule and range and feature of mediocrity ... it is fear that drives men to herd together, to don uniforms, to impose upon others a needless conformity. But what enemy is it they fear? What enemy is so dreadful as to compel them to wear uniforms and arm themselves so heavily and cling to their beliefs with such ferocity?
    It is their own nature!  The weak, who have no power even over themselves, fear always the power that lies in a  free  nature—a nature fantastic, wild, astonishing, arbitrary—they must enslave this spirit first in themselves before they can enslave it in others.
    It is therefore our duty—the duty of those who are free, who are natural, valorous, and unafraid, those who scorn what is sickly, cowardly, and slavish—we must  resist these Earps!
    And already we have won a victory—won it without raising a finger, without lifting a gun. The posse of that terrible figure of justice, that Mr. Virgil Earp, found the mules they were searching for in Frank McLaury's corral at Baba Comari—but then the complainant Lt. Hurst took counsel of his own fears, and refused