The Last Ride of German Freddie by Walter Jon Williams Read Free Book Online

short by a storm of fire.

    *

    A steam whistle shattered the air as Freddie ran south. Someone was blowing the alarm at the Uzina Mine. And when Freddie reached the corner, he saw the vigilante mob pouring up Allen Street, heading for the front gate of the O.K. Corral. He waited a few seconds for the leaders to swarm through the gate, and then he quietly crossed the street at a normal walking pace. Despite the way he panted for breath, Freddie had a hard time not breaking into a run.
    He had never felt such joy, not even in Josie's arms.
    By roundabout means he made his way to his room at the Grand Hotel. Once he had Zarathustra in his hand he began to breathe more easily. Still, he concluded, it was time to leave town. There were any number of people who could place him near the site of that streetfight, and possibly some of the vigilantes had seen him stroll away.
    And then a thought struck him—he had no horse! He was a bad rider and had come to Tombstone on the Wells Fargo stage. The only way he could get a horse would be to stroll back to the O.K. Corral and hire one, with the lynch mob looking on.
    He laughed and put Zarathustra in his coat pocket. He was trapped in a town filled with Earps and armed vigilantes.
    “It is time to be bold,” he said aloud. “It is time to be cunning.”
    He washed his hands, to remove the reek of gunpowder, and changed his shirt.
    It occurred to him that there existed a place where he might hide.
    He put his journal in another pocket, and made his way out of the hotel.

    *

    Oh, she is magnificent! Freddie wrote in his journal a few hours later. She hid me in Behan's house while Behan lay painted in his coffin in the front window of the undertakers—Ritter and Reams are making the most of this opportunity to advertise their art! I rested on Behan's bed while she received callers in the front room. And then, at nightfall, she had Behan's horse saddled and brought to the back door.
    “Will I see you again?” she asked.
    “Oh yes,” I said. “Destiny will not permit us to part for long.”
    “Do you have money?”
    I confessed that I did not. She went into the house and came back with an envelope of bills which she put in my pocket. Later I counted them and found they amounted to five thousand dollars. The office of sheriff pays surprisingly well!
    I took her hand. “Troy is afire, my Helen. Do you have what you desire?”
    “I did not want this,” she said. Her fingers clutched at mine.
    “Of course you did,” I said. “What else did you expect?”
    I rode to Charleston with her kiss burning on my lips. Charleston is a town ruled by the Cowboys, and so I knew I could find shelter there, but it is also the first place a posse will come.
    It will be a war now—my bullets have decreed it. I welcome the war, I welcome the trumpet that will awaken the new Romulus. Battles there shall be, and victories. And both those who die and those who live shall be awarded a Tombstone—what an irony!
    I am curiously satisfied with the day's business. It is a man's life that I am leading. Were I to live these same events a thousand times, I would find no reason to alter the outcome.

    *

    “There are more Earps than before,” John Ringo observed from over the rim of his beer glass. “James and Warren have come to town. You're creatin’ more Earps than you're killin’, Freddie.”
    “Two hundred rifles,” Freddie urged. “Raise them! Make Tombstone yours!”
    Curly Bill Brocius shook his head. “No more shootings. The town's riled enough as it is. I don't want my parole revoked, and besides, I've got to make certain that our man gets in as sheriff.”
    “Let us purge this choler without letting blood,” Ringo said, and wiped foam from his mustache.
    “Still these politics!” Freddie scorned. “Who is our man this time?”
    “Fellehy.”
    “The laundryman? What kind of sheriff will he make?”
    Brocius gave his easy grin. “No kind,” he said. “Which is  our