“I see.”
“It is a small denomination. Very fundamental. Would you like instruction in our views, Marshal?”
“Uh, thanks, Reverend, but, um, I think I’d settle for a refill o’ this liquor.”
MacNall laughed and motioned to the girl, who quickly brought the crystal decanter and filled both gentlemen’s glasses.
“Thank you, my dear,” MacNall said in a fatherly tone of voice. The girl mumbled something and backed away to what seemed to be her post, off in a corner of the room. A room which Longarm found to be quite a contrast with the rough quarters at Camp Beloit. He asked about the difference between the two locations.
“Yes, of course. But then you see, the military encampment is only now being established. To keep order on the agency reservation and, if necessary, to preserve the peace internally or impose punishments in the event of a general uprising. As for this headquarters, the Department of the Interior acquired the site intact, very much as you see it now. It originally was what you Westerners call a ranch. Only one. Perhaps you can imagine so vast a tract of land falling under the control of one individual. I cannot. But then, of course, I am accustomed to Eastern ways, while you may be more familiar with the way things are done here in the frontier territories.”
“Yes, sir.” Longarm helped himself to another swallow of the brandy and to a pull on the cigar. One was as fine as the other.
“I do not have details of the purchase. Is that important to your investigation?”
“No, sir, I’m sure it isn’t. I was just curious. Somethin’ that is important, though, is how you read the situation between these two tribes. Would you mind filling me in?”
“Glad to.” MacNall’s story was largely a repeat of what Tall Man had already explained. The Piegan shaman John Jumps-the-Creek had been murdered by a person or persons as yet unknown. The Piegan were convinced that the Crow killed John Jumper as an act of deliberate, and malicious, provocation. Neither side wanted the government involved in investigating the death, but if there had to be interference from outside, then both agreed they wanted a man known to be friendly to them—Longarm—to handle it.
“Doesn’t it seem dumb right on the surface of things for the Crow to start something when they’re outnumbered three or four to one?” Longarm asked.
“It might, except they probably know that the Piegan are locked in what we would call a struggle for political control within their own tribe,” MacNall said.
“This is the first anybody’s mentioned anything about that.”
“Frankly, Marshal, I’m not surprised. Tall Man and the Crow would want to feign ignorance to make it seem they would have no motive to kill John Jumps-the-Creek. That is, they would want to present themselves that way if they were guilty. It is equally possible that they are innocent and may not in fact have any knowledge of the battles for control going on within the Piegan tribe.
“And the Piegan themselves, well, they say very little about their own politics. I only hear bits and pieces of it myself.”
“John Jumper would have told me,” Longarm said. “He was a good man. If his son is anything like the father was, then maybe I can get Cloud Talker off alone an’ get him to open up to me.”
“I wish you luck. Cloud Talker tells me as little as possible. And I have to take what little he does say with a hefty dose of salt. Frankly, I am never entirely sure when he, or for that matter any other Piegan, is telling me the truth.”
“There is that,” Longarm agreed, finishing off the brandy.
“More?”
“No, thanks, this is plenty. Look, Reverend, do you at least know who’s in conflict in the Piegan nation and what it is that they want?”
“I know Cloud Talker is one of the principals,” MacNall said, “and I know that one of the issues is whether the tribe will remain peacefully here or if they will break out and try to force a return to their homeland.”
“Back to the Marias?” Longarm asked.
“There, or possibly they would be content to join the Blackfeet at their agency. The Piegan and Blackfeet have a kinship, I believe, but I am not clear on just what the relationship is.”
“It’s enough generally to know that they’re what we might call cousins an’ not try and get any further into it than that. It doesn’t make much sense to a white man anyhow,” Longarm said. “But it’s a genuine bond as far as they’re concerned. You want to remember that too. Could you send ‘em all back to the Blackfoot agency if you decided that’d be the best thing for everybody?”
“Of course not,” MacNall said. “I have some limited authority here at this agency, but none at all when it comes to the larger picture. I doubt the gentlemen in charge of things back in Washington would even welcome suggestions from me on the subject if those ideas were not in line with the policies already established.” MacNall spread his palms and smiled. “I am a very small fish, Marshal, in a rather muddy pond.”
“I know the feeling,” Longarm agreed. “Oh, yeah. Something else.”
“Yes?”
“The tribal police. Are the Crow involved in that too?”
“Not at this time,” MacNall said. “The Crow arrived here relatively recently and at a time of transition between the previous administration and my appointment. To date there are no Crow policemen. I have, of course, cautioned the Piegan officers to exercise restraint and a sense of brotherhood when dealing with their Crow brothers.”
“You do understand, I hope, that the Piegan an’ the Crow ain’t real likely to think of each other as brothers,” Longarm said.
“Marshal,” MacNall chided him in return. “We are all brothers upon this earth. We are all God’s children in equal measure.”
“That may be so when you’re lookin’ at them from a pulpit, Reverend, but there’s times when the man with the
