Arslan by M. J. Engh Read Free Book Online Page B

Frieda had lived alone for a long time, and she didn't want to change. “She's not thinking about the billet rule, though,” Luella remarked to me.
    We gave her a day to get settled at the Schillingers', and then paid her a call. And while Luella led Mrs. Schillinger into another room to talk about some sort of women's business, I had a little conversation with Frieda. Frieda had done all her own cleaning in that big house, except once or twice a year when she'd get a woman in to help with some of the heavy jobs; and I just felt it would be a good idea for somebody else in town to have a clear picture of the structure and layout of all three stories.
    Two nights later, Frieda Althrop died in her sleep. That was the first death, except for Perry, that we owed directly to Arslan. Frieda was getting on in years, and, as people said, it was too much for her to be uprooted that way. But we'd all been uprooted, and we couldn't all afford the luxury of dying.
    The sixth day—the day after Frieda died—a new army marched into town. People stood around dumbfounded, watching as if it was some kind of a parade. We had one of the best views in town. Like Arslan's first army, they came in from the east and turned down Pearl Street; but these marched straight on past the school, headed out of town towards the fairground. I made Luella stay inside, but I stood out on the front steps to watch them. I wasn't about to crawl into a hole.
    It was a very different bunch from the others, and that went beyond the different uniform they wore. They were younger and fairer than the swarthy veterans of the first wave, and not half as well disciplined. They stared and craned their necks and grinned, like a gang of kids on an outing.
    There were long gaps now and then between blocks of marching men, which meant people could cross over every so often to compare notes with the opposite side, and there were more grown-ups than children trotting along parallel with the parade. Fred Gonderling was one who came down my side of Pearl Street, working his way briskly along from one watcher to the next. I waved him up onto my porch steps. “What's the news from the square?” I asked him, which was a favor I was in the habit of doing him. He'd moved into his new office on the square that very spring.
    “Morning, Franklin. I suspect that they'll be out of your school before long.”
    “Why?”
    “A detachment of these fellows is taking over the Court House. I should imagine that that will be their new headquarters.”
    “I hope so.” As a matter of fact, I hoped not. If we had to have them at all, I was just as glad to have their pulse right under my fingers.
    “Incidentally,” he added after a minute, “I assume you know who these are.”
    One time a news item in the Kraft County Register-Blade had referred to Fred Gonderling as a “rising young attorney,” and he had been almighty pleased. Personally, I wasn't exactly sure how far he would rise, or would have risen. He was a spruce little fellow, intelligent and well-spoken; but it had always seemed to me that he was more interested in making a good show than in doing a good job. He was just at the point in his career of deciding whether he'd rather grow up to be a big frog in Kraftsville's puddle or go seek his fortune someplace else. I'd had my try at that when I was his age and found out I could make a lot more money in the city, and aim for a lot bigger position, but I'd also found out I didn't want it—not at the price of being cut off from the people I understood and the things I believed in. And till Arslan turned up, I never doubted I'd made the right bet. “Invaders,” I said sourly.
    “They're Russians.”
    "Russians!"
    “You bet they are. I remember that uniform from TV. And I've heard Russian. I took it in college.”
    “Can you tell what they say?”
    He shook his head shamefacedly. “They talk too fast for me. To tell the truth, I don't remember it that well. But it's Russian,