The Law at Randado

by Elmore Leonard

  “I don’t understand that, Harold. Everybody wasn’t in on the hanging. Why should they stick up for the few that were?”

  Harold shrugged. “Maybe it’s just that nobody likes Danaher. Or at least they feel closer to Tindal and Stedman…and Beaudry, and it’s a matter of principle with them. Like helping out a kin who’s in trouble. Not necessarily because you like him, but because he’s a him.”

  Frye said, “Do they feel that way about Sundeen?”

  “They don’t have to worry about Sundeen. Listen,” Harold went on, “probably everybody isn’t against you.” He hesitated. “But that isn’t much consolation because it seems like everybody, doesn’t it?”

  Frye nodded.

  “I know how you feel,” Harold said. “I’m glad I don’t have to feel that way any more. It’s something that comes with the job but isn’t important until something like this happens. You know I used to go out of my way to be nice to people…always with a good word; then one day I just got sick to my stomach of smiling, and I quit.” Harold’s eyes went to the window and he said abruptly, “There’s Digo on the porch.”

  “I saw him,” Frye said. He nodded. “He’s going in again.”

  “What does that tell you?” Harold said.

  Frye was silent, watching the front of De Spain’s, and he was thinking: How long will it take? The tails of the horses switched lazily in the sunlight of the street, but the shade of the porch was deserted and nothing moved there.

  “What did you say, Harold?” But now he wasn’t listening and he knew Harold would not answer. He saw both doors of De Spain’s swing open and hold open as they came out: Phil Sundeen first, Digo moving next to him as he started across the street; the one called Jordan was directly behind Sundeen and spreading out behind him were the four other Sun-D riders.

  “Harold, unlock the rifles.”

  “You can’t stop all of them.”

  “Before you do, go up and open Dandy Jim’s cell.”

  “I’ll give you a rifle first.”

  “No…get up there quick!”

  Frye moved to the door and opened it. In the sunlight, halfway across the street, Sundeen hesitated. As Frye stepped into the doorway Sundeen came on again until less than twenty feet separated them. Digo came even with Sundeen, but Jordan stayed back. He was almost directly behind Sundeen.

  Frye watched them, holding himself calm, knowing what would come, but not being sure what to do. They’ve rehearsed this, he thought, so let them play it.

  “I hear,” Sundeen called, “you got warrants to serve.”

  Frye hesitated. “That’s right.”

  “You got one for me?”

  Frye nodded.

  “One for Digo?”

  “That’s right.”

  “What about the Committee?”

  “For three of them.”

  “But they’re not about.”

  Frye nodded again.

  “What about Jordan?”

  “None for that name.”

  Sundeen grinned. “None for Mr. Jordan. Why don’t you have one for him?”

  “He wasn’t part of the hanging.”

  Sundeen stood relaxed. “I don’t think that’s the reason.”

  “I don’t care what you think,” Frye told him.

  Sundeen glanced at Digo. “Listen to the boy sheriff.”

  Digo grinned, looking up from the cigarette he was shaping. “He’s something.”

  “I think you’re afraid to put his name on a warrant,” Sundeen said. “That’s the reason.”

  “You think whatever you like,” Frye answered. Behind him he could hear Harold Mendez coming down the stairs.

  Sundeen took a full step to the side, half turning, saying, “I don’t believe you met Mr. Jordan.”

  “Not formally,” Frye said.

  “Mr. Jordan takes care of my legal affairs.” Sundeen nodded to Jordan who was standing directly in line with Frye now, his coat open and his thumbs hooked close to the buckle of his gunbelt.

  Frye said, “Then he can advise you about the warrant you’re getting.”

  “He says I’m not going to get one. Digo either.”

  Now it’s coming, Frye thought, holding himself still in the doorway, making himself relax. He didn’t know what to say, so he kept his jaw clenched and his eyes steady on Sundeen.

  “Jordan says I won’t get one ’cause you’re not man enough to serve it. He says when a sheriff’s got a yellow streak then he’s got no authority to serve warrants.”

  “Do you want it right now?” Frye asked.

  “You can try,” Sundeen grinned.

  “But you’d rather see me try for my gun.”

  “You might just as well. If your hand went inside your coat how’s Jordan to know whether it’s for a warrant or a gun. He’d have to protect himself.”

  “What’s he got to do with this?”

  “I told you, he’s my lawyer. Digo’s too.” Saying this he glanced at the Mexican. “That’s right?”

  “Nothing but the best,” Digo said, taking the cigarette from his mouth.

  “So if you got something to take out of your pocket,” Sundeen added, “it’s for Mr. Jordan.”

  Frye’s gaze shifted to Jordan, then returned to Sundeen. He hesitated before saying, “You won’t try to stop me because that would be resisting arrest, but there’s no warrant for him and if I put a hand in my pocket he’ll draw and you’ll all swear he shot in self-defense…”

  “This boy’s a thinker,” Sundeen said to Digo.

  “That’s if he shoots first,” Frye added, and immediately, in the silence that followed, he was sorry he had said it.

  Sundeen was grinning again as he turned to Jordan. “You hear what he said?”

  Jordan’s gaze remained on Frye. “I heard him.” This was the first time he had spoken; his voice was calm and his eyes watched Frye almost indifferently though they did not leave him for a moment.

  “He thinks he’s faster than you are,” Sundeen said.

  “Maybe he is.”

  “Only one way to find out.”

  Jordan nodded, still looking at Frye. “Let’s see those warrants.”

  “They’re not for you.”

  “I didn’t ask who they were for.”

  “I’ll serve them when I’m ready.”

  Jordan nodded slowly. “How’s your mother?”

  “What?”

  “Did she ever get married?”

  Frye held back, not answering.

  “I hear she works in a can house.”

  You know what he’s doing, Frye thought, and he said quietly, “You’re wasting your time.”

  Sundeen glanced at Digo, his gaze taking in the people standing off beyond Digo, and as his head turned slowly he saw the men gathered on De Spain’s porch and in front of the Metropolitan, and on this side of the street the people standing watching as far down as the bank, then his gaze returned to Digo.

  “If a man said that to me I’d be inclined to stomp him.”

  “Unless it was true,” Digo said.

  “Even then,” Sundeen said. “Just on principle.”

  Frye stepped down from the doorway. He was looking at Sundeen and moved toward him quickly. Then he was standing in front of him, and looking straight ahead, over Sundeen’s shoulder, he saw that Jordan had not moved.

  “What if I said it to you, Phil?”

  “Find out.”

  “I’ll say something else—” Frye’s hand brushed into his open coat. “You’re under arrest!”

  Close to him Sundeen was moving, shifting his weight, and as Frye drew his Colt he swung his left hand against Sundeen’s jaw, Sundeen fell away and he was looking straight at Jordan, seeing the gun suddenly in his hand, half seeing the people scattering on De Spain’s porch as he brought up his own gun, and he was conscious of himself thinking: Go down! as the rifle report filled the street. He saw the dust flick at Jordan’s feet and Jordan suddenly going to the side, firing at the jail, at
the doorway and then at both windows.

  Get him! It was in Frye’s mind as he swung the Colt after Jordan, but Digo moved. He was out of Frye’s vision but less than three steps away and in the moment Digo’s pistol was out and had chopped down savagely across Frye’s wrist.

  Stepping to the side Digo looked at Jordan eagerly. Jordan was standing still now watching the jail. “Where is he?”

  “He’s quit,” Jordan answered.

  Digo seemed disappointed, saying then, “Let’s make sure.” He raised his pistol and fired at the front windows, shattering the fragments of glass that remained, and when the gun was empty he called out in Spanish, “Mendez, you son of a whore, show your abusive face!”

  Harold appeared in the doorway hesitantly. Seeing him Frye breathed with relief. He heard Jordan say, “Leave him alone.”

  “We should teach him a lesson,” Digo said.

  Sundeen picked up Frye’s pistol. “We’re going to teach both of them a lesson…like we did Merl White and his hardhead friends.” He grinned watching Frye holding his wrist, bending it gently and opening and closing the hand.

  “Digo, help the man off with his boots.”

  Frye turned to face Digo, who moved toward him with his pistol still in his hand. “Don’t try it,” he warned the Mexican.

  “I’ve got something to convince you,” Digo said.

  “Not without bullets—” Frye lunged toward him, but Digo was ready, side-stepping, swinging the long-barreled .44 at Frye’s head, but missing as Frye feinted with his body and dodged the blow. He was crouching to go after Digo again when Sundeen’s forearm closed over his throat and jerked him off balance. Digo stepped in quickly and swung his free hand into Frey’s face, then waited as Sundeen threw him to the ground and straddled him, sitting on his chest.

  Digo holstered his pistol. “He’s something,” he said, shaking his head; then pulled off both of Frye’s boots and threw them toward the jail.

  Harold Mendez sat down in the street and removed his boots without a word.

  From the window directly above the Metropolitan Café sign, Merl White watched them get up as Digo and Phil Sundeen, mounted now, came into view reining their horses behind the two men.

  “They better walk faster’n that,” Merl said. The two men who had stayed with him were at the window. Haig Hanasian was in the room, but he was seated, not wanting to witness this again. Neither of the men at the window answered Merl. They watched solemnly: Digo yelling now, taking his quirt from the saddle horn and lashing it at Frye’s back, forcing him to go into a run, then lashing at Harold Mendez and Harold, starting to run, hunching his shoulders ludicrously and looking back and up toward Digo as if to escape the quirt.

  Merl White said, “Which one would you rather have?”

  One of the men, Ford Goss, said, “I’d take Digo, with a Henry rifle.”

  The other man at the window did not answer. He was older than Ford by ten years and was almost completely bald. His name was Joe Tobin.

  “I’d take Phil,” Merl White said. “I think with an empty whisky bottle.”

  Ford nodded thoughtfully. “That’d be all right.”

  “I wouldn’t cut him none, not on purpose, but I’d sure as hell bust it over his head.”

  Joe Tobin said now, “You notice the others aren’t in it.”

  He was referring to the four Sun-D riders who had backed Phil Sundeen a few minutes before, but who were not in sight now.

  “They’re having a drink,” Merl said.

  “You can stand just so much,” Tobin said. “I don’t know how I ever worked a day for a man like Phil Sundeen.”

  “It was different with Old Val,” Merl told him. “Old Val worked you, but he paid pronto at the end of a drive. Sometimes even a bonus.”

  “Phil won’t have any men left now,” Tobin said. “He’s gone too far.”

  “I think he’s drunk,” Merl said, squinting after the two horses nearing the end of the street now.

  “He was drunk Saturday,” Ford said. “He can be drunk and not show it.”

  “Everybody was drunk Saturday,” Merl said, “but they didn’t all go crazy.”

  “Many of them did,” Haig said now, quietly.

  Merl White nodded slowly. “I almost forgot about that.”

  “Jordan’s gone too,” Joe Tobin told them. “Try and figure him out.”

  Ford nodded. “It’s got to be something against him personally, or something he’s paid to do else he won’t have a part of it.”

  “Just to have around,” Tobin said, “a man like that would come high.”

  “He can afford it,” Merl said. “Phil could pay us and still afford a dozen men like that.”

  “But why does he want him?”

  “For days like today.”

  “I’ll bet he pays him a hunnert a month.”

  Merl shrugged. “I guess a gunman comes high…just for the good feeling he gives you being around.”

  Ford was watching the street, pressing his cheek to the glass pane. “They’re about out of sight.”

  “Will you go out and get them tonight?” Merl asked Haig.

  “I was going to take you to La Noria.”

  “We can wait. Fact is,” Merl went on, “I wouldn’t mind waiting just to have a talk with this Kirby Frye. I think we got something in common.”

  Milmary Tindal moved out to the edge of the walk as they started down the street. She would catch glimpses of Kirby, then Phil or Digo’s mount would side-step and she would not see him. When Digo’s quirt went up she flinched imagining the rawhide sting and now she could not stand still. She moved along the edge of the sidewalk stretching and leaning to the side to see Kirby. Less than an hour before she had told him to get out of the store. She continued to think of that and even the quirting would not jolt it from her mind. And she was thinking that if she had been kind to him this would not be happening now. There was not time to reason it carefully; it was in her mind in a turmoil watching them move down the street. There was nothing she could do. She could make promises about the future, but right now, even though her nails dug into the palms of her hands and her knuckles showed white, there was nothing she could do.

  “Do you think he’ll come back?” Edith repeated.

  She was in front of the Metropolitan now. Edith Hanasian stood a few feet away on the sidewalk. Milmary looked at her. “What?”

  “Do you think he’ll come back,” Edith repeated.

  Milmary was looking down the street again, but now her glance went suddenly to Edith. She had not asked herself that question and uncertainly, fearfully, she heard herself answering, “I don’t know.”

  Edith said, “If you don’t know then you haven’t been treating him right.”

  Milmary said nothing. Edith moved to the edge of the walk and stood close to her and looking down the street they saw the horses at the far end now.

  “He’ll come back,” she heard Edith say, and she could feel Edith looking at her closely. “Maybe it won’t be for you, but he’ll come back.”

  8

  Kneeling, Frye looked through the pine branches down the slope to the dim outline of the road, then glanced at Harold Mendez hearing him moving toward him.

  “What is it?”

  “A wagon,” Frye said. They could hear the creaking and the labored sound of a pair of horses in harness and Frye was thinking: It couldn’t be them, because they wouldn’t come out in a wagon. And they wouldn’t come out after dark when there are other things to do.

  Now they could see the shape of the wagon below them, but there was not enough moon to make out the man on the seat. He moved the team slowly, letting him have their heads going up the grade that rose gradually between the pine slopes.

  Frye felt the ground in front of him until his hand found a small enough stone. He waited until the wagon was even with them, then threw the stone. It struck the wagon bed, a sharp sound in the darkness, bouncing out and almost immediately the creaking and the harn
ess rattle stopped.

  There was silence. Then from the wagon, “This is Haig Hanasian—” the words carrying clearly in the stillness.

  Harold murmured, “That’s his voice.”

  “Up here!” Frye called. He rose and stood at the edge of the jackpines waiting for Haig to reach them.

  “I didn’t hope to find you so quickly.”

  Frye took his hand as he reached them. “You came out just to find us?”

  Haig nodded.

  “We’re obliged to you.”

  “How are your feet?”

  “About worn through.”

  “I brought your boots.”

  “You found them?”

  “They were still in front of the jail.”

  Frye was smiling. “We’re really obliged.”

  “Perhaps,” Haig said, “the boots will not fit now.” He pulled two pairs of socks from his pocket. “These will help some. But put them on quickly, it isn’t good to delay long on this road. It leads to Sun-D.”

  “Haig,” Frye said. “We appreciate this—”

  “Quickly now—”

  “You go on back, Haig.”

  “What?”

  “Danaher,” Frye explained, “is due to ride by Wednesday sometime. We figured to go back in with him.”

  “Well,” Haig said, “I can’t blame you for that, but it’s a long time to have to sit here.”

  “We’d have to hide out anyway, even in town, till we got our bearings.”

  Haig’s dark face was serious, even saying something in a light vein. “That is done every day. This man, White, and his companions have been there since Saturday night.”

  “Where?”

  “In my rooms.”

  Frye shook his head. “Right across the street.”

  “I was going to take them to La Noria tonight—”

  “We appreciate this, Haig.” Frye had spoken to Haig only a few times before this, but suddenly he felt very close to him. But he felt sorry for him at the same time and he wasn’t sure why.

  “Merl White is anxious to meet you.”

  “I guess we have something in common.”

  “He said the same thing.” Haig lifted a .25-caliber revolver from his coat pocket and handed it to Frye. “Take this. I’d better get the wagon moving.” He started to go, but stopped. “You don’t have any food.”