by Tabor Evans
The pocketful of shell casings jingled as Longarm rode. Their weight pressed against his side all the way back to the Starbuck spread.
Chapter 9
Longarm cut through a stand of tall pecan trees to come around to the wide, dusty trail that led to the Starbuck residence. About three hundred yards from the house, Longarm reined in his mount. In the front yard sat a brougham hitched to a two-horse team. There were other mounts around the closed buggy, and several men.
Longarm unstrapped one of his saddlebag flaps and poked around until he came up with a small brass spyglass. He extended the segments of the battered telescope, spat on and polished the scratched lenses, and, squinting one eye, peered through it at the scene. The brougham was displaying a flag. As Longarm watched, a breeze fluttered the square of cloth. It was the flag of Texas: on the left, a broad, vertical band of blue with a single white star in its center, on the right, two horizontal bars — white above, red below.
Longarm shifted the spyglass's narrow field of vision to the men around the brougham. There were three of them. One was obviously the buggy's driver, while the other two were escorts. They were mean, hard-looking men who appeared as if they needed both baths and shaves. The only things they didn't seem to need were more guns. They all wore two pistols holstered butt-forward in crisscross gun belts, and Winchesters were tucked into the saddle boots of the two mounts. One of the men had some sort of badge glittering on his chest. No matter. Longarm had run into men like these before, and knew that they were lax about everything but fighting. They were Texas Rangers.
Longarm kneed his gelding into a slow walk toward the bunkhouse and stables. The Rangers glanced his way, but Longarm knew that at this distance they could only assume he was one of the hands coming in early. At the stable he turned his mount over to the wrangler on duty, informing the kid that the horse would be needed later in the afternoon. Winchester in hand, Longarm walked around the back of the stables, by the corrals, to avoid any chance of being spotted by the Rangers. He had a good idea who the visitor to the Starbuck spread was. If he was right, there was no problem, although he would still want to keep from revealing himself to the Ranger escorts.
His plan was to rest up on one of the empty beds in the bunkhouse. There'd be cool, fresh water there, for washing as well as drinking. Longarm intended to ride into town for the evening and make a tour of the saloons. It had been his experience that the best thing a lawman undercover could do was to go trawling for information, and there were no more fertile fishing holes than the saloon row of a cow town in the middle of roundup fever.
He was about to enter the bunkhouse when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Some distance away he spotted Ki, partially hidden within the shadows of a grove of leafy hardwoods. Ki spotted him at the same time, and waved. Longarm strolled over.
"You're practicing archery, I sec," Longarm said by way of greeting. "Funny-looking bow, though. It's crooked, ain't it?"
"Hello, Longarm," Ki said. "This is a Japanese bow."
Ki was shirtless, his torso filmed with sweat from the heat of the day. Longarm considered him very unusually built for a man who had been powerful enough to toss about the much larger Higgins during their fight. Ki's muscles were long and slender. His biceps bulged very little when he strung his bow. But lean of build as Ki was, and without an ounce of excess fat on him, the rippling pattern of his belly muscles and the cords of his shoulders showed clearly.
Longarm had to smile. If he were a betting man, he'd still have put his money on Higgins during that fight, and sure as hell, he'd have lost his cash. It was a simple fact that Ki looked skinny by Caucasian standards, which preached that there was no such thing as strength without bulk.
"Do you not wish to meet our esteemed governor?" Ki asked. He selected an arrow from the leather quiver by his feet, and fitted the notch to the string.
"Thought it was him. I spotted his flag on his buggy. Who else would rate three Texas Rangers as babysitters?" Longarm glanced overhead. The sunlight was filtering through the thick foliage of the grove. He tugged out his pocket watch. Eleven-thirty. Close enough. He took a cheroot from the breast pocket of his coat and lit up. "The governor come all the way from Austin to see Jessica?"
"More or less," Ki said. "He came by rail to address tonight's Cattlemen's Association meeting in Sarah. The meeting will be held late, after the day's work is done. A tally boss will be voted on. The various outfits are ready to combine their herds."
"Seems a mite unusual for a state governor to take an interest in something like picking a tally boss," Longarm remarked.
"There is more to it, of course. Alex Starbuck lent the cattlemen a great deal of money. He cared for their well-being in other ways, as well. Jessica is not the only individual in these parts who feels as if a father has been lost."
"So the governor is here to reassure them that all's well?"
"No." Ki seemed amused. He flipped his long hair out of his eyes and rested his bow, along with its notched arrow, against his hip. "If the governor did try to reassure them, who would believe? He has not brought the army, his only source of power, knowing full well that Texans would not be happy if he had done so. No, my friend. The governor is here to convince Jessica Starbuck that she must reassure her neighbors. As heir to her father's holdings, it is she who can extend the notes on the land, defer payments on the loans for cattle, and pledge the Circle-Star hands to keeping the peace and protecting the big main herd."
"Will she do it?" Longarm asked. "Whatever it is the governor wants?"
"Of course!" Ki threw back his head and laughed heartily. "She will do so much more than he wants. The governor will be very surprised. He expects to comfort a trembling, frightened, frail female, to offer her a masculine shoulder on which she can cry. You see, he does not really know Jessica. The governor thinks that all that he had once owed to Alex Starbuck has been canceled out by the man's death. He is about to find out that Jessica controls the payment schedules to those debts of honor, as well." He swung his bow up into position.
Longarm looked the way Ki's arrow was pointing. One hundred yards away, a two-by-four post stood vertically planted in the bright sunshine. "You forgot to mount your target," he said. "And I still say that bow is lopsided." It was about five feet long, with several asymmetrical bends and curves in it. Ki gripped the bow a third of the way up from the bottom.
"All Japanese bows are shaped in this manner," Ki explained. "Although some are considerably longer." He pulled the notched arrow back to a point well behind his ear.
Longarm nodded silently, in respect. The strength it took to keep the bow flexed to that degree was clearly enormous, but Ki's arm and hand were rock-steady. "You still forgot to mount your target on that there post," he reminded the archer.
"That post is the target," Ki murmured absently. He turned his head as if he were shunning the distant two-by-four. He released the string, the twang of the hemp cord turning the bow a full one hundred and eighty degrees around in Ki's left hand. The bow was now pointing at the archer.
The method and style of Ki's shooting was so different from that of Indians, that Longarm forgot to watch the arrow's flight. When he thought to look, he saw that its head was firmly embedded in the two-by-four.
"How the hell did you manage to hit that itty-bitty stick without looking?" Longarm demanded.
"The arrow hit the target. All I did was prevent myself from getting in its way." Ki's soft voice was slightly slurred, and his dark brown, almond-shaped eyes were halfclosed. He resembled a man more than two sheets to the wind on fine whiskey, but there was nothing drunken about the way he selected another arrow from the quiver. "With the proper mind, or zanshin, Longarm, there is literally 'no way' I can miss even the smallest target. It is, as Westerners say, 'as easy as hitting the broad side of a barn.'"
"What kind of arrow is that you've got?" Longarm peered at the projectile's head. Instead of a point, or series of barbs, the arrowhead was a crescent-s
haped wafer of steel. "May I look at it?"
Ki handed it over, warning. "Do not touch the edge. It is razor sharp. In my homeland, this sort of arrow is called the 'cleaver.'"
"What's it for?"
"For severing ropes or, say, the harness binding together a team of horses. In my own land, such an arrow was often used to cut down the enemy's battle flag, and in that way demoralize his forces." He took back his arrow, and notched it. In one smooth motion he raised his bow, drew the string back far past his ear, looked way from the target, and let the arrow fly. Without even watching it, he turned back to his quiver to select a third arrow.
Longarm, meanwhile, watched the 'cleaver' bury itself an inch or so beneath the first arrow. "Lord, the way you bend that bow, I'd think it would snap."
"A Japanese bow does not snap," Ki explained patiently. "Look." He turned the bow sideways, to show Longarm a light-colored sort of wood sandwiched between two layers of another kind. The layers were glued together, and wound at several points with a red-colored, silken thread. "This bow's core is held between two pieces of a wood called bamboo. The bamboo has been tempered by a special fire treatment. It's flexibility, lightness, and strength are unsurpassed by any bow devised by Americans."
It took Longarm a moment to figure out what Ki had meant by that last remark. "You mean by Indians, right?"
"I am an outsider," Ki shrugged. "Are not all people born here Americans?"
"It depends on who you ask, and how you look at it." Longarm said ruefully. "Someday maybe all folks will be considered just plain Americans. At least we can hope."
"You should hope," Ki said adamantly. "To remain strong, a nation must not divide itself. It is a bad thing to be an outsider in one's own nation." The arrow he was about to fire had a head as twisted as a corkscrew. "This is called the 'chewer.' It is designed to be fired into the midsection of the enemy so that it can rend and chew his bowels."
"Nice," Longarm said with a grimace. He watched as the arrow went whizzing on its way to join its brothers. "Seeing as you don't need to spend much time on aiming, do you mind if I ask you a couple of personal questions?"
Ki's eyes crinkled with amusement. "Actually, I have spent long years in aiming, without ever firing an arrow, but as to your questions, you may certainly ask."
"But you may not answer, that it?" Longarm finished for him. Ki did not answer, but only shrugged as he bent to his quiver. "Well, we'll cross that bridge when and if we come to it," Longarm decided. He flicked an inch of gray ash off the glowing tip of his cheroot. "I'm interested in why you're not up at the house with Jessie and the governor. Don't you care about what's being discussed? It could concern the future of this spread."
Ki sighed. "You know so little of me, Longarm. Be careful. In my homeland, ignorance is no excuse for compromising another man's honor."
"I'm just curious as to where you fit in. Are you Jessie's partner?"
Ki smiled at Longarm like a man looking at his dinner. "I help Jessie. I help her accomplish things."
"Ki, you're a man with a shitload of surprises up your sleeve. You've got all kinds of unusual weapons." Longarm dropped the stub of his cheroot to the dirt. Before he could grind it out with his boot, Ki did it for him, with the sole of his bare foot.
"Alex Starbuck was killed with an unusual weapon, was he not?" Ki asked.
"He was. That makes you a suspect, Ki." Longarm waited for the other man's response.
"In my homeland…" Ki began.
"We ain't in your homeland."
"In my homeland," Ki raised his voice to override Longarm's interruption, "a man who even accidentally brushes against another's blade must be prepared to pay for this dishonor with his life. But you do not even realize the dishonor you have done me."
"I'm still waiting for your answer, Ki." Longarm swept his coat from the butt of his Colt as Ki let his bow slide to the ground and shifted his weight onto the balls of his feet.
"Withdraw the question, Longarm, or I will kill you," Ki said matter-of-factly.
"Reckon we're at that bridge I mentioned a minute ago," Longarm said sadly.
"It is a very narrow and delicate bridge you bid us to travel," Ki whispered. "The bridge will only allow one of us to survive this journey."
Longarm watched Ki carefully. He'd seen this before, in Mexicans and Indians. They didn't bluster and fume the way a white man did when something got his dander up. They just got quieter and quieter. Maybe they would even smile. But finally there would come a moment — faster than the eye could see, faster than thought — and woe be unto the one who'd insulted or riled them…
Longarm decided it was time to defuse this situation, before things got past the point of no return. He brought his hands up to chest level, palms forward. "Easy, my friend," he said. "You don't have to answer my question. You already did. No guilty man who was smart would show that he was so upset at being accused. You got to realize it's my simple duty to pry into the business of anyone involved in any way with a crime."
For one measured moment, Ki stood silent, his eyes as if he were listening to distant sounds too faint for Longarm's ears. Then he smiled and relaxed. "We are not in my homeland. Your authority is the relevant point of this… discussion we are having. You are still my friend, Longarm."
"Glad to hear it," Longarm chuckled.
"I am not at the house because I am not concerned with wealth. I care only about Jessie's well-being."
"That I do believe, old son," Longarm interjected quietly.
"You must also realize that the agenda the governor has planned for today is, well, known to us. Jessica has been well trained in many aspects of business, but especially in the art of negotiating, an art the Japanese take very seriously.
"The governor will suggest that she give him power of attorney, that he sell off parts of her holdings. He will suggest that it is all too much for a young woman to comprehend. 'Don't you want to enjoy life?' he will ask. Jessica, meanwhile, will ponder what she has been taught, and do her best not to insult the governor by showing her boredom. They will dine together this evening, and then the governor will offer his protection as an escort to tonight's meeting. She will accept, of course, out of politeness, but she will have her horse towed along by one of the Rangers, so that she will be able to ride back with us."
"With us?" Longarm asked innocently. He tried hard to keep his amusement hidden.
Ki smiled to show that he understood the joke they were acting out. "Of course, us! Sarah has filled up with drifters and strangers working for the roundup. I know quite well that you must have planned to circulate around the town to see what you can learn. I intend to do the same."
"The governor isn't staying here?"
"Jessica could not bear that," Ki laughed. "He will stay at the hotel."
"That place didn't seem fancy enough to me to be fit for a governor," Longarm kidded.
"Oh, he will have a much nicer room than the one they gave you." Ki remarked innocently.
"How would you know? They let in folks barefoot in that place?"
Ki, his dark eyes sparkling, held up another arrow. "This is called 'death's song.' The bulb you see fined just behind the head has a hole that catches the wind and, in that way, sings the last song the enemy will ever hear. Would you like to hear it?" he asked politely.
"Just a couple of opening stanzas," Longarm warned.
"Of course." Now Ki was grinning like a wolf. "In any event I advise you not to miss the Cattlemen's meeting. It will be a treat to see Jessie…" His voice faded as he notched the arrow and let it fly.
Instantly the air around them was filled with a high, sharp keening sound. To Longarm it sounded like a combination of the world's biggest mosquito — one with murder on its mind — and a violin's strings being tortured to their breaking point. The arrow's pitch would have made a dog howl. The nightmare sound ended with an abrupt thud! as the 'death's song' found its target post.
Throughout the arrow's flight, Ki had stood as
if mesmerized. "Once I heard that sound multiplied by several hundred. I was just a young boy, not yet in my teens. The army of archers were all accomplished masters of yugamae." In answer to Longarm's look of puzzlement, he added, "Yugamae is the term used to describe the correct etiquette with which to approach kyujutsu, the technique of bow and arrow. The battle taking place was one between rival warlords. The force for which the archers fought was badly outnumbered, so their warlord decided on the strategy of intimidation. He ordered his archers to being the technique of inagashi, the style of archery in which the bowman sustains a rapid rate of fire — fifteen arrows per man, let us say, accurately shot as fast as you could fire fifteen accurate rounds from your Winchester. As intimidation was the object of the attack, the 'death's song' was fired exclusively, with the exception of one 'cleaver' arrow, fired by the chief archer, to cut down the enemy's flag. Think of it, Longarm! The sky darkened by the hailstorm of so many arrows. The world was filled with the sound of 'death's song!' Now the warlord was careful to instruct his men not to hit any of the enemy, for if intimidation brings about anger in the adversary, it has failed in its purpose. No, all of the arrows landed in the same area to prove that the archers had the ability to control their weapons, but none of the arrows drew blood." Ki stared into Longarm's face to make sure he was understood. "They did not have to draw blood. At this warning chorus of 'death's song,' the enemy soldiers and warriors threw down their arms and clapped their hands over their ears in terror. Their warlord had no choice but to surrender to his opponent. His men had been intimidated. The battle was over, with not one drop of blood spilt, except for the vanquished warlord, of course, who committed seppuku. That is suicide, Longarm. It was the only way he could expunge his shame at being defeated."
