Masked Prey (Lucas Davenport #30) - John Sandford Page 0,44
self-defense, we might train for that, but we’re not cold-blooded assassins. That’s all we were training for out at Milton’s place, self-defense. We were making a point about self-reliance.”
“I heard there was some sniper training going on.”
“I didn’t go out there, so I don’t know,” Oxford said. “Even sniping can be self-defense.”
“Depending on how you define self-defense,” Lucas said.
“Probably about the same as you do,” Oxford said.
“Or maybe a bit broader? People who hurt other people, maybe deserve to get hit?”
Oxford grunted again, and said, “We don’t think that somebody’s going to pass a law we don’t like, up in Washington, so we oughta kill a kid. That’s crazy.”
Lucas noticed that he’d evaded the question. “But you do have relationships with right-wing groups that might be a little crazy. Nazis, KKK, all that.”
Oxford lifted his chin and scratched his neck for a moment, then said, “We have not much to do with them. A little maybe, mostly by accident. Here’s the thing, Davenport: a group calls for a political protest on some point where we agree. We notify our folks, and if some of our members want to go, that’s up to them. Then the Nazis and the KKK show up, and we all get thrown into the same pot. You know, you get a rally over on the left side, say, pro-choice, or maybe gun control. The Communists and the anarchists and the socialists and the mainstream Democrats, they all show up, but the media doesn’t call them all Communists. That’s what they do to us. The fuckin’ Nazis, I hate those guys. The KKK, the same.”
Lucas looked at him for a couple of beats, and Oxford looked back, and finally Lucas said, “Suppose I buy all that, everything you said. I’m not sure I do, but maybe. My job is to find the people who put up that website and find out what the hell they intend. It sure looks like a threat of the worst kind. There are people in Washington, with the FBI, who see your group as their best candidate. It would be a good thing for you to put the order out on your networks that your people, whoever they are, help to locate that 1919 group and give me a name and address.”
Oxford continued to stare for a moment, then said, “Two things here. We’ve outlawed, in our group, the word ‘orders.’ We don’t give them and we don’t take them. We do what we call ‘asks.’ We can ask an individual or group to help out, but I can’t order anything. The second thing is, we’re not cops. We’re not going to investigate for you.”
“I’m not talking about being cops. I’m talking about self-defense,” Lucas said. “A senator’s kid gets killed and you’re gonna get torn up, because nobody’ll want to take a chance that you might be innocent.”
“That sounds about like our government,” Oxford said. He said in a new voice, quoting, “Another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword.”
“Who said that?” Lucas asked.
Oxford sighed and said, “Never mind. All right. I’ll put out an ask, heavy-like. I hate doing it, but I will. One of the things I hate about you guys, you government people, is that you put an innocent man in a box and make him do things he doesn’t want to do, isn’t required to do either legally or morally. It’s like the sixties with the draft. Government fights an immoral, unnecessary war in Vietnam, that all the politicians knew was wrong and unwinnable, fifty-eight thousand boys get killed, and what happens if you don’t want to go? You get your ass slammed in prison and your life ruined. I hate it. I hate every goddamned inch of it.”
“So hate it,” Lucas said. “But do your ‘ask’ anyway.”
The old man stroked his beard, once, and said, “Shit.” And, a moment later, “Goddamnit, I’ll send out your ask.”
“Thank you.”
“You better be on your way,” Oxford said. “If Marty finishes her mowing and comes in here and finds out who you are, she’ll tear a strip off your back.”
But the lawnmower was still going, so Lucas said, “I read the papers from your PR lady. You don’t seem nuts, but how the hell do you think the world would run without governments?”