"Walter Jon Williams - The Last Ride of German Freddie" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Walter John)

The Last Ride of German Freddie
Walter Jon Williams

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. His
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 gray 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 Schwarzrei-ter of three centuries ago, horsemen whom all
Europe held in fear. They entirely outclassed that Lieutenant 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 zfree natureтАФa nature fantastic, wild, astonishing, arbitraryтАФthey must enslave this spirit first in
themselves before they can enslave it in others.
It is therefore our dutyтАФthe duty of those who are free, who are natural, valorous, and unafraid, those
who scorn what is sickly, cowardly, and slavishтАФwe must resist these Earps!
And already we have won a victoryтАФwon 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 ComariтАФbut then the complainant Lieutenant Hurst took counsel of his own
fears and refused to press charges.