The Law at Randado

by Elmore Leonard

  “Who is?” the woman asked.

  “Phil Sundeen.”

  “He was not here Sunday?” She could not remember the names of the two men who had come, but she knew neither had been called Sundeen.

  “That was Tindal and Stedman,” he said, answering the question that was in her mind.

  And it occurred to her as he said their names what it was that must be bothering him. The hanging of the two La Noria men. Sunday the three of them had talked about it over and over again and in the end there had been an argument because Beaudry would not go back with them.

  Tindal and Stedman. Those were the ones. Both of them beyond the middle of life, like Beaudry, though they dressed better than he did and they used language that was less coarse. She remembered now they had seemed frightened when they left. As Earl was now.

  “I thought there were four of them,” the woman said, remembering how they looked entering the square earlier that evening, riding almost single file.

  Beaudry looked at her intently. “You’ve got a lot of questions.”

  The woman shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “The other one works for Sundeen. That makes four.”

  “They are all your friends, but you don’t want them here?”

  “Friends,” Beaudry muttered, “bringin’ the law on me.”

  She did not understand this fully, but it seemed reasonable to say, “Then why don’t you ask them to leave?”

  He poured another drink before turning from her and this time didn’t bother to answer.

  Why don’t you ask them to leave? Across the square, now, light showed in the two windows of the cantina. Why don’t you ask Phil Sundeen to quit drinkin’ and join the monastery? That’d make about as much sense. A woman’s brain is just big enough to take her from the stove to the bed. For anything else it’s got to strain. Ask them to leave…just like that. “Phil, you and your friends move along. This is my home…my second home, but I got first rights to its use.” “Why sure, Earl, we’ll pack up and be out by the thirty-second of December.” Beaudry swore under his breath. In the doorway he could feel a mist of rain against his face as the breeze changed. All right. You can’t talk nice to him. “Phil—” Look him square in the eyes and stand close and don’t hardly move your mouth. “Phil, I’m not buyin’ any more of that. You’re not out of here in ten minutes I’ll come for you with a gun!”

  His elbow touched the bulk of the Colt beneath his coat as he looked across to the two lighted windows. The gun was the answer. But why take a chance facing him head on? (He allowed it to be in his mind, as if challenging Phil Sundeen was one way; although there was not even a remote possibility he would bring himself to do it.) The gun brought out the ultimate plan. The gun and the lighted windows.

  Now if he were to throw some shots inside, not trying to hit anybody—If he pulled it right they’d think posse. Sure, the first thing they’d think of…a big posse! They’d run. By God they’d run to China!

  He turned to the woman abruptly. “Didn’t I bring a rifle this trip?”

  You can smell a Mexican pueblo, Frye thought to himself. Even with the rain. Not a soul in the square and the adobes without windows look deserted, but you can always smell the good smell of the mesquite cook fires. If it wasn’t raining there’d be people sitting by that bandstand. He was thinking then that La Noria was like a lot of pueblos; crumbling sun-dried adobe out in the middle of nowhere, but with people in it to make the cook-fire smells and keep it alive.

  Frye was standing at the edge of an aspen thicket looking through the rain drizzle and across the open one hundred yards to the wide break between the adobes that showed the square. The bandstand, a dim outline of it, was on a straight line with his eyes and he knew that the cantina was along the row of adobes on the right. Merl White was next to him and Dandy Jim was one step behind.

  He’ll be in the cantina, Frye thought, thinking of Sundeen. Bet all you’ve got and borrow more to put on it, that’s where he’ll be. If he’s not, then he’s changed his ways—and you’d better change yours.

  Turning his head, keeping his voice low, he said, “Merl, would you say he’d be in the cantina?”

  Merl nodded and water rolled off the curled brim of his hat. “I wouldn’t think about it twice,” he said.

  “Just go in?”

  “We could wait for them to come out.”

  “Which could be a wet all night,” Frye said.

  “Let’s just go in and get it over with.”

  “All right. You want to get the others?”

  Merl said he would and moved back through the trees. Dandy Jim waited with Frye.

  Now, waiting, listening to the rain, Frye thought: You shouldn’t ask a question when you tell somebody what to do. He shrugged within himself. You don’t have to kick Merl in the tail. No, it’s not a question of the man. If you’re in an order-giving position then give the damn order and don’t be so damn hesitant. You don’t say, “Do you want to get the others?” What if he’d said no? Watch Danaher and learn a few things. Learn how to tell men what to do.

  He felt very much alone now, even though Dandy Jim was a step away from him, and he thought: I wonder if Danaher ever feels all by himself? Like the night after Galluro and John hit that man for smoking out in the open. I’ll bet he felt all alone that night. It probably goes with the job. You better watch Danaher and learn how to give orders and meet the cold looks that come back half the time. But he’ll be watching you tonight.

  Frye had told Danaher his promise to Digo. He had promised to bring Sundeen back himself, without shooting. Danaher had agreed. This is what he had hired him for. If he didn’t care to use his gun, that was all right. As long as he brought him in. Danaher mentioned that the shooting Sundeen on sight business was half scare anyway. Then Frye asked Danaher if he’d care to come along and Danaher said yes without hesitating.

  Frye turned now, hearing the others coming up through the trees. He saw Danaher and he thought for one last time: Just tell them.

  Merl White and the two other ex-Sun-D riders, Ford Goss and Joe Tobin, were following Danaher and behind them were a half dozen men Danaher had brought along to “fill out the posse.”

  Frye waited for all of them to come up close. “Merl and Dandy and I,” he said then, “are going into the square. The rest of you will wait till we pass the first adobe, then John”—he nodded to Danaher—“you and two of your men will follow to back us up. You other four men will stay here with the horses, mounted in case anybody slips through us.”

  He looked at Ford Goss and Joe Tobin. “The cantina is on the right. The…fourth adobe down, next to a wall. You’ll recognize it. Skirt around the back from here and watch the rear door.”

  Ford Goss said, “Do we shoot if they come out?” Almost as if he were anxious to.

  “If you see them,” Frye said, “you’ll know. Watch Clay Jordan.”

  One of Danaher’s men said, “I don’t want any part of him.”

  Frye looked at Merl, then to Dandy Jim. “Ready?”

  They both nodded and moved out into the open as he did. Frye and Merl carried Winchesters and Dandy Jim held a Springfield carbine up diagonally in front of him. Merl’s Winchester had a large ring-type lever and he jiggled it silently as they walked across the open one hundred yards to the square.

  They were almost to the first houses. Not looking right or left, Merl said, “Did you see something cross the square? The other side of the bandstand.”

  “I’m not sure,” Frye murmured. He glanced at Dandy Jim. “Vió algo cruzar por la plaza?”

  Dandy Jim nodded and they were sure.

  Beyond the first house they stopped. They were now at the edge of the square and from here the pueblo showed more life. Not all of the doors were closed against the rain and here and there the doorways were outlined by the cook fires inside.

  Merl White was looking toward the mescal shop. “The one over there with the ramada?”

  Frye said, �
�That’s right,” and pointed out the adobe to Dandy Jim. It was diagonally across the square on their right; the front of it, doorway and windows, in the deep shadow of the tin-roofed ramada.

  And looking at the shadowed front of the cantina Frye saw the muzzle flash as the shot was fired. The sound of it slammed across the square and another shot followed. Three in rapid succession then, and going down it was in Frye’s mind that the first one had been a rifle and the ones that followed from a .44 Colt. Merl and Dandy Jim were both on the ground with him, all of them down instinctively at the sound of the gunfire. There was a lull. Then two rifle shots, barely spaced, but there was not the lightning-quick on-off flash in the darkness this time. Coming from the side of the house, Frye thought. Suddenly there was firing from inside the cantina. Another lull followed. And again gun flashes at the front window. After that there was no more.

  Rising to his feet Frye could hear the others approaching from behind, but he was still looking at the mescal shop. He saw the figure run from the darkness of the porch going directly across the square.

  One! It flashed in his mind. That’s all there was. He called out, “Halt!” raising his Winchester, thinking of Sundeen, and Jordan. Merl was next to him. Merl with his face against the stock and his eyes along the rifle barrel that edged steadily after the running figure.

  “Halt!”

  The figure broke his stride, turning, raising a rifle, and threw a shot at them. He was moving as he fired, hunched, running sideways, and his shot was high and wide. Merl hadn’t lifted his head. He fired, aiming low, and the man went down, dropping his rifle, and his hands went to his thigh.

  Frye was running toward him, but he stopped at the sound of gunfire coming unexpectedly from off beyond the adobes to the right. He turned, seeing Danaher running toward the mescal shop.

  Then Danaher stopped and now he was looking back the way they had come, shouting something toward the openness and the dark expanse of the aspen stand beyond. As the sound of his voice echoed in the square, his riders broke from the trees, angling across the open space and were suddenly out of sight beyond the first adobe.

  Merl White glanced at Frye. “Behind the cantina!”

  “That’s where the firing was from,” Frye answered. His Winchester was trained on the wounded man who was sitting, holding his thigh and rocking back and forth as if to ease the pain; but Frye was watching Danaher. The sheriff had reached the front of the cantina. Now he disappeared into the shadows and the men who were with him followed.

  Still watching, Frye moved to the wounded man. He glanced down, kicked the rifle away from him and as the man rolled back looking up, the face glistening wet and drawn with pain, he recognized Earl Beaudry.

  “Don’t hold the wound,” Frye said. “Grab the inside of your leg and squeeze it tight.” He saw Beaudry’s hand groping at his knee and he said, “Up higher. It’ll stop the bleeding.”

  Beaudry gasped, “God…somebody help me,” then began to moan and rock back and forth again.

  “Quit moving. You’ll keep it bleeding.”

  “God, it hurts like fire!”

  Frye bent closer to him. “Wait about half an hour.”

  “Get me a doctor—”

  “You’ll get one.”

  “Right now!” Beaudry would moan and close his eyes tightly, but open them when he spoke.

  “You’ll have to hold your own a while,” Frye said.

  “I could lose my leg!”

  “Earl, what were you shooting about?”

  Beaudry was silent, breathing heavily. Then he said, “I wanted to make them surrender.”

  Frye smiled, but to Beaudry he said, seriously, “That was good of you, Earl.”

  “There’s Danaher again,” Merl White said.

  Looking up, Frye saw Danaher coming out from between the cantina and the next adobe. He had gone through, out the back door, and now had come around. Behind him were his two men, and following them were Goss and Tobin.

  Approaching, Danaher called out, “Who is it?”

  Frye waited until they were closer. “Beaudry.”

  “What was he shooting for?”

  “Earl says he’s on our side now.”

  “I guess he would,” Danaher said. “Let’s get him in out of the rain.”

  One of his men said, “He might catch cold.”

  Beaudry screamed as they picked him up. They started to carry him to the cantina, but he groaned, “Not there!” and pointed to the adobe across the square where the woman stood alone in the doorway. All about the square now doors were open and people were standing hesitantly watching.

  The woman stepped aside to let them carry Beaudry in, then moved to the hearth and placed on more wood to build the fire, filling the kettle with water after that. Rising, she saw that they had lowered Beaudry onto the straw mattress.

  Merl White asked, “What was going on back there?”

  “Sundeen,” Danaher answered.

  “He got away then,” Merl said, and seemed disappointed.

  Ford Goss shook his head. “I don’t want to see Jordan that close again.”

  “What happened?” Merl asked him.

  “We were almost back of the place when the shooting started. We stopped there by a shed to see what was going to happen and a minute later the back door flies open and there’s Jordan. Sundeen came next and then what must have been Tindal and Stedman. They were moving fast for the stable shed that connects to the back of the place. Then Jordan spots us and he lets go like he’s six men shooting at once. His shots come zingin’ through the corner of the shed keeping us back. Then they stop. I stuck my head out and like to got it blown off. Sundeen was in the saddle using his rifle while Jordan swung up. See, they must of had them already saddled. Then when we heard the horses Joe and me ran out, but all four of them were around the stable shed before we’d fired twice.”

  Frye said, “John, I saw your boys come out of the trees.”

  Danaher shook his head. “They won’t get them. It’s too dark out in the brush. Sundeen could hold up and let them ride right by.”

  “And with the rain,” Frye added, “by morning all the tracks’ll be gone.”

  Danaher took a cigar from his pocket, bit the tip off and lit it. “We’ve got time.”

  “They’re probably in Mexico by now,” Merl White said.

  “Well,” Danaher said, “that’s all right too. If they stay hidden, the world’s a better place to live in. If they come back, we take them.” Danaher looked at Frye. “What do you want to do?”

  “Take Earl back.”

  Merl said, “Maybe some of us could stay hereabouts and look around.”

  Frye nodded. “If you want to that’d be fine.”

  “You never know,” Merl said.

  11

  They had stretched a tarp over the borrowed wagon that carried Earl Beaudry and most of the way back to Randado Frye sat with him in the close darkness of it. The rain stopped during the early morning and they rolled back the tarp; but it was daylight before they reached Randado. There were figures in doorways and people standing by ramada posts watching solemnly as they passed down the street; watching curiously as they stopped in front of the doctor’s adobe and lifted out Beaudry, straw mattress and all.

  They had all returned except Merl White, Goss, Tobin and Dandy Jim.

  Danaher’s men moved off across the street to the boardinghouse, but the sheriff and Frye waited to hear the doctor’s report.

  And after that, out in the street again—

  “He’s got nothing to worry about,” Danaher said. “When the bullet doesn’t go all the way through, then it’s time to worry.”

  Frye’s hand moved over his jaw, feeling the beard stubble there. “I better go tell Mrs. Beaudry.”

  “What about the other women?”

  “I’ll have to tell them too.”

  “Why don’t you go over and talk to the Tindals? I’ll go up and see Beaudry and Stedman’s women.”


  “I could talk to them, John.”

  “Seeing the Tindals is enough,” Danaher answered.

  “Now?”

  “Might as well. I’ll see you back at the office.”

  Frye watched Danaher cross the street diagonally toward the last adobe building. The small residential hill was just beyond. Then he turned and crossed the street himself in the direction of Tindal’s store.

  Milmary opened the door for him. She had been standing by it, watching, waiting for him to come, going over in her mind the words she would use, but now he was here and she said nothing.

  Frye removed his hat feeling it sticking to his forehead and nodded solemnly. Milmary passed him and his eyes followed her to the counter. Her mother stood behind it.

  “Mrs. Tindal. Your husband’s all right.”

  Her mouth formed a smile, but the rest of her face did not smile, and her eyes were picturing something that was not in the room. He could see that she was trying to be calm, and pleasant. And it went through his mind: Why did she ever marry him? She was a plain woman, her hair parted in the middle and drawn back tightly into a bun, though there were thin wisps of hair not in place. He felt sorry for her because he could picture her combing her hair, trying to make it look attractive; but it was not attractive now, and probably it never had been. He felt sorry for her because she was plain, because no one would attach any importance to her, not even in little things, though perhaps Mil would. He could picture Tindal scarcely paying any attention to her when she spoke. But she would serve him and smile when he expected her to smile and praise him when he expected to be praised. And Frye felt sorry for her because he knew she needed to be held; but there was no one, not even Tindal if he were here.

  “Mrs. Tindal, I’m awful sorry about this—”

  He hesitated. She was looking at him, but not trying to answer. “I wanted to talk to you before, but I never got the chance.”

  Milmary asked, “Where is he?” Her voice seemed natural.

  He looked at her, conscious of his beard and his hair stuck to his head from the hat being on so long and his damp clothes shapeless and dirty looking. Maybe he smelled. All that riding, then under that hot tarp with Beaudry. He could feel her eyes on him when he was not looking at her.