Longarm on the Santee Killing Grounds

by Tabor Evans

  The kid nodded gravely, eyes wide in the moonlight, and said he surely did and assumed Longarm meant to ride in and tell the sheriff about all this himself.

  Longarm didn't say yes or no. He wasn't sure as he thanked the helpful young cuss and rode on. He didn't see what the local law could do about some riders who, so far, hadn't done a thing to anybody. Meanwhile, it might be interesting to see who might know about any of this bullshit without being told.

  CHAPTER 12

  Night riders aiming to ambush a lawman along one stretch of the moonlit county road could be set up just as sneaky along another. So Longarm cut off across the moonlit grass as soon as he'd cleared the southeast corner of that fenced-in colored homestead. He let old Blaze have his head, since horses saw better in the dark than humans and Blaze likely knew the way to the stall he seemed so intent on reaching at an easy lope. But they were both saved by tumbleweeds, piled up in the moonlight against an otherwise invisible drift fence some son-of-a-bitching cattle outfit, most likely, had strung parallel to the road a quarter mile west, doubtless taking advantage of the wide-apart homestead fencing as well as their own. Drift fences were designed to prevent just what they were named after. A cow ranging wide from the water tanks and salt blocks of its home spread could wind up attracted by somebody else's, and road traffic tended to spook cows into drifting further.

  Longarm consulted his mental map of Brown County as he dismounted to break out his small claw hammer from a saddlebag. The country hereabouts was getting crowded for free-ranging beef if they'd spent money on this much bobwire. For while the Minnesota shared Brown County with other streams such as the Sleepy Eye and Cottonwood, there had to be at least ten miles of high and dry grazing off to the west, meaning some other cattle outfit had laid claim, and likely had its own wire strung between here and the Sleepy Eye creek and wagon trace.

  Tethering Blaze for the time being to a panel of four-strand he meant to leave intact, Longarm got to work with his claw hammer as he quietly explained, "It ain't neighborly to cut a man's fence if you don't have to. Since they were considerate enough to staple this murderous shit to cedar posts, we don't have to."

  He used the claw of his hammer to pull staples like tin teeth, palming each one as he did so, until nothing but its own mild tension was holding the wire off the moonlit grass. Then he untethered his borrowed mount, lowered the loose wire far enough with a hand to hook the instep of a boot over it, and flattened it in the grass underfoot so he could simply lead the pony over to the far side.

  Once he had, he was considerate enough to retether Blaze, get back on the eastern side, and restaple the wire back the way he'd found it with the business end of the hammer. No four strands of bob were able to stop a man afoot who knew how to duck through it, of course.

  He put the claw hammer away, untethered Blaze from the fence, and swung back in the saddle to ride on, knowing he'd be skirting the back forties of the Bedford place. He knew Israel Bedford wouldn't tell him anything he could be certain of, no matter what. He'd said he'd gotten that treasury note from Wabasha Chambrun. Everyone in town seemed to feel Bedford was less likely to fib than his new breed or full-blood neighbors. On the other hand, if those colored folks had heard those other sneaks right, they didn't seem to be in cahoots with Chambrun.

  "Mebbe," Longarm muttered aloud as he held Blaze to a silent walk as they moved along the far side of the fencing. A white man with a tolerable rep could alibi himself easy as pie just by claiming he'd gotten a recorded treasury note off any number of neighbors. On the other hand, a newcomer of at least mixed blood would have enough on his plate without his pals gunning a federal deputy right on his own homestead claim. So innocent or guilty, he'd want to tell the local law he'd never laid eyes on any rascals gunning folks after dark along a public right of way.

  "Chambrun can't be a full-blood," Longarm muttered to his mount as he reached absently for a smoke, warned himself against a dumb move, knowing a match flare could be spotted from three miles off on open prairie, and decided, "Not a registered full-blood leastways. Abe Lincoln's Homestead Act of 1862 was designed to fill this part of the country up with white folks. The government figured there were already enough Indians out this way."

  Some said, even some white folks, that the Homestead Act, passed as it was in the early half of the War Between the States, had been the spark that lit Little Crow's fuse. The Santee Sioux, as Washington called them, had already moved west to get out of the way of progress more than once. So they'd doubtless felt sort of squeezed, west of the big chalky water and with their Dakota cousins to the west, when all those Swedes, less successful Midwestern farm folks and draft dodgers crowded across the Minnesota to raise cash crops and kids where the Indians had just put down fresh roots.

  There was a lot of guff, from partisans of both sides, as to the exact details leading up to what could be described as a hen-house raid or a massacre, depending. But there was no doubt old Little Crow had known what the Wasichu would do to his people once Wasichu blood had been spilled, and he'd been enough of a general to hit first, hard as hell, even though they said he'd led his young men chanting his death song, cursing the killers from the Shakopee band as he promised them they'd all have the shit kicked out of them by wintertime, and promising true.

  Longarm had been busy killing other young men at the time further east, but troopers who'd been out this way said the Santee had fought like wildcats, more often on foot than their Dakota kinsmen, and more inclined to wear flowers than feathers in their hair as they came whooping and hollering, or, more often and more scary, creeping on their bellies through the bluestem like murderous animated pots of prairie posies. Likely cornflowers that time of the year. The fighting had broken out in early August. By late September a whole lot of red and white folks had died and the Santee were in one hell of a mess. It's tough to call off a war with pissed-off white men when they're winning. Most of the real fighters had lit out for Canada or the Dakotas, along with all their fighting chiefs. The seventeen hundred rounded up by Sibley and Pope, mostly women, children, and sissies, got marched to Fort Snelling, pelted along the way with stones, horse apples, and worse, to join their white admirers in watching the mass execution of the Santee. Lincoln just couldn't let off. Then they were moved to their swell new reservation at Crow Creek in the Dakota Territory. The few who'd drifted back to these parts over the years, such as old Little Crow himself, had been gunned down on sight as "wild" Indians. So that meant Wabasha Chambrun, even named as he was after a Santee who'd gone over to the whites, couldn't be a full-blood. No full-blood of any nation would have been issued a homestead claim by the Bureau of Land Management, which meant...

  "Where is it engraved on stone that any cuss named Chambrun has been issued doodly-shit by anybody?" Longarm asked his mount conversationally.

  When the pony failed to answer he explained. "You ain't supposed to fence in and improve no quarter section of public land without you file a homestead claim, wait for its approval, and pay the modest filing fee. But if you've never filed, who'd be likely to notice you ain't paid the fee on a claim you never really filed, right?"

  The pony might have opined that sounded sort of raw, if ponies had any say in such matters. But Longarm had arrested folks for far more casual views on property rights, and folks were forever gutting a mountain, logging a forest, or raising cash crops without getting arrested, paying taxes, or even being noticed by Land Management.

  A couple of dark masses off to the right jumped up to run off, cussing Longarm and his mount in cow. Longarm nodded and thought about cattle barons, filing or not bothering to file on a taxable quarter-section home spread so they could graze and often fence the surrounding range as far as they could see from high up.

  He started to rein in, thought better of it, and rode on, muttering, "Let's eat this cake a bite at a time, and look at some records by the cold light of logic, before we go asking a man late at night whether he holds lawful title to his spread or not."
<
br />   A man who'd lie about one thing would likely lie about others, and if the late Jacob Weber of Switzerland could claim a whole section of prime bottom land free as his private paradise, after proclaiming himself and his family The Father, The Son, and the Holy Ghost, it only stood to reason a squatter with Indian blood might say most anything.

  A heap of such folks had started to. Squatter-traders such as William Bent of Bent's Fort and mountain men like Kit Carson had married up with all sorts of Indian ladies from all sorts of nations, friendly or not, to produce all sorts of kids who tended to live red, white, or however the spirit moved them. So it was tough to say what the civil rights of, say, the Bent kids ought to be, with one grown son scouting for the army, a second living purely Quill in a tipi with the Cheyenne, and the one daughter married to a French-Canadian trader living white, even though he was said to be part Creek.

  Longarm decided the confusing ancestry of Quanah Parker was most relevant to whether Wabasha Chambrun might or might not hold a valid homestead claim. Old Quanah, born to a white captive woman and her Comanche husband, who'd done the right thing by the pretty little thing, had started out as a holy-terror Comanche war chief, scared the shit out of his white kin, and then, after they'd scared the shit out of him a few times, recalled he was half white after all and joined the winning side. This appeared to give old Quanah the right to a government allotment as a tame Comanche, and at the same time to wheel and deal in Texas real estate as a white or at least part-white Texican business man. Longarm figured that was as fair as the law letting the pure white Belle Shirley Starr live Cherokee at Younger's Bend in the Indian Nation, just because she screwed Indian moonshiners as well as white horse thieves.

  One of those spooked cows came tearing along the fence line at him, bawling fit to bust. Longarm swung Blaze out of the way as the full-grown steer tore past, spooked by something at least as terrifying up ahead.

  That was something to study on in light as tricky as this.

  That ink blot a pistol shot away in the moonlight appeared to be a clump of coppice, or second-growth saplings sprouting from the stumps of more serious cottonwoods cut a few years back, for corral poles or other such use most likely. Cottonwood wasn't worth much as firewood or construction timber. Longarm swung his mount out to his right, meaning to circle wide. As he heard the brush of metal against springy twigs he rolled out of his saddle, Winchester and all, to flatten in the tall grass as Blaze loped on a ways, and then stopped as if to ask how come those reins were dragging on the grass like so.

  Blaze could wait. Longarm addressed the inky shadows ahead in a firm but friendly voice, calling out, "Evening. I'd be Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long, out this way on government business with fifteen rounds in the tube of this saddle gun I can aim as polite or as rude as your answer might call for."

  There was a long silence. Then a youthful voice with just a whiff of that Swedish singsong in it called back, "Well, I'd be Gus Hansson, riding for the Rocking R, which you've been riding across, and Miss Helga figured you might be over this way."

  Longarm stayed put, keeping his guard up and his saddle gun trained as he called back, "Who might this Miss Helga be, and how come she figured anything about me, since we've never been introduced?"

  The kid who'd been hunkered in the coppice broke cover, turning out to be in his teens with batwing chaps and a hat big enough to house at least a small Indian family. "My boss lady is Miss Helga Runeberg, who's owned the Rocking R since her daddy's pony hit a prairie-dog hole at full gallop a couple of roundups back. Her home spread fronts on the Sleepy Eye trace six or eight miles to the southwest."

  Longarm started to comment on all the grass the mysterious lady seemed to think she held rights to, if this was her drift fence, but that was between her and Land Management. So he kept his mouth shut and his ears open, and sure enough, the kid explained. "Earlier this evening Some strange riders came by, allowing they was federal deputies looking to ride with you, since they'd heard you'd ridden out to the northwest of New Ulm."

  That meant at least the Bedfords and those colored folks were off the hook, if what this kid said was true. Longarm got to his own feet, gun muzzle trained politely but still ready for anything. He heard young Hansson say, "After we told 'em we hadn't seen any sign of you and they'd rid on, Miss Helga told us to fan out far and fan out wide, so's to tell you they were looking for you and telling whoppers about being on the same side."

  Longarm answered cautiously, "As a matter of fact, some lawmen from Saint Paul could be headed this way. How come your boss lady cast such doubts on their reasonable-sounding tale, Gus?"

  The young cowhand shrugged and said, "Miss Helga's smart, I reckon, or mayhaps she recognized one or more of 'em from somewheres else. She can be sneaky too, when she's giving a hand enough rope to hang hisself. But why not ask her your ownself, Deputy Long? Miss Helga said the rider as caught up with you was to carry you on back to the big house so's you could tell her what you wanted us to do next about the big fibbers."

  Longarm thought before he decided. "It's a tempting invite. But I'm already invited to supper with another lady in New Ulm, and I'd as soon go over some records at the county courthouse before I say what I want to do next with, to, or about anybody."

  Young Hansson was close enough now so they could converse in quieter tones as he shrugged and said, "Suit yourself, but don't you never say I didn't relay her invite after warning you about them odd riders. I swear I didn't know who you were when first I spied you way out here in the middle of nowheres. How come you ain't on the county road where I expected to meet up with you, Deputy Long?"

  Longarm explained, "I was afraid somebody less friendly might be expecting me to head back to town that way. You ain't the first who's told me or warned me I have so many admirers out searching for me by the light of the silvery moon, Gus. You know those colored folks a mile or so up facing that other road?"

  The local rider calmly asked, "Which darkies, the Conway family or the Bee Witch?"

  Longarm blinked uncertainly and replied, "The folk I talked with looked more like a family than any sort of bees, or even witches. I heard some riders had been asking about me ugly from a colored boy about your age. Your turn."

  Hansson said with certainty, "That sounds like one of the Conway boys. They're all right. We've told all the nesters along the bigger river we don't object to no quarter-section claims along the county road. For as long as they don't string bobwire more than a half mile southwest of the road, it helps our own drift wire hold Rocking R stock back from that dangerous river and spooky road travel."

  Longarm dryly replied, "I'm sure your new neighbors find that a generous offer. I thought those Conways had to be on my side when they warned me some rascals were talking mean about me. Try that Bee Witch on me some more."

  The white cow hand explained. "That's what they call this crazy old colored lady who dwells on a house raft and ranges her honey bees all along the banks of the river. When they ain't out foraging flowers they live in these white boxes, right on the raft with the Bee Witch herself. Ain't that a bitch?"

  Longarm shrugged and said, "Takes all kinds to work this land of ours, I reckon. Is this floating beekeeper supposed to be dangerous?"

  The cowhand shook his big hat. "Not to grown folk. I hear she threatens to hex kids who pester her or her bees. That's how come they call her the Bee Witch. They say she can threaten kids sort of scary with chicken claws, African goofer dust, and such. What might you want with an old crazy lady who keeps bees, Deputy Long?"

  "They likely sell her honey for her in town at some food shop," Longarm decided. "Wabasha Chambrun is the one I'd sort of like to talk to, without those mystery riders noticing. I reckon I might get straighter answers once I go over some courthouse papers in the morning. But seeing as you seem to know so much about nesters over on this side of your considerable range, what can you tell me about that bunch?"

  Gus Hansson said, "They're Sioux, part Sioux anyways, no matte
r what they say. I was still a toddler when Little Crow and his cruel Santee rose against us that time, but I was big enough to see what they'd done to the Atterbom twins and poor Ann Margaret Toligren, left all bloody and dead with her skirts up around her waist, and damn their two-faced lies, I remember what a damn Sioux smells like, dead or alive, and that lying Chambrun and all his lying kids smell the same way, no matter what he says about being mostly white with a part-Osage woman!"

  Longarm said soberly, "Indians allow they smell us as something different too. I ain't sure my own nose is educated enough to pick out a Santee from a distant Osage cousin, but like I said, I mean to go over some records before I call any man a liar."

  Gus Hansson asked, "What do you do when you prove a man's a liar?"

  To which Longarm could only reply, "Depends on what he's lied to me about, of course."

  CHAPTER 13

  Since first things had to come first, Longarm was rubbing down the widow woman's saddle brute in her stable when she caught up with them, lantern in hand, to say, "Oh, I was hoping it was you I heard out here. I'd about given up on you for the night. You said you'd be right back. I sure hope you like cold ham, Custis."

  Longarm smiled sheepishly in the lantern light, and explained how he'd gotten sidetracked without ever getting a chance to interview Wabasha Chambrun at all. When she said she could fetch her part-time stable hand, an old Finn who lived just down the alley, Longarm told her, "I'm better than half-ways done here, and there's no need to pester anyone else. You can see I've run some well water in this trough, but where might you be keeping your oats, Miss Ilsa?"

  She set the light on a keg and hauled a feed sack from another stall as she said, "Barley and cracked corn. Minnesota oats command a premium price back East, and I wasn't planning on entering the Kentucky Derby with either of these ponies."