The Law at Randado

by Elmore Leonard

  “Assuming he’ll follow the stream as long as it bears generally south, we can make a straight line and be waiting for him when he comes out of the valley.”

  “Dandy knows the country?”

  “Like his hand.”

  “Just the two of you?”

  “We’d go a lot faster.”

  Danaher shrugged. “You’re in charge.”

  “You’ll keep after the others?”

  “Of course.”

  “We’ll catch up with you later.”

  “Kirby, just keep one thing in mind. He gets paid for carrying a gun.”

  Dandy Jim leading, they splashed over the shallow stream, then followed Jordan’s tracks along the bank and up to the clearing where he had waited. From there Jordan had gone down again, following the stream south. But now Frye and the Coyotero slanted up through the timber, their horses going slower, more carefully, as the slope became steeper, then making switchbacks through the trees as the pines near the rim grew more dense. At the top they looked back. They could see the stream and the camp they had left far below on the other side, but there was no movement and they knew Danaher had gone on.

  Daylight was beginning to fade, but here was open country dipping and rolling in long gradual swells and they gave the horses their heads, letting them run hard in the cool breeze of evening. Then, in gray dimness, they rode down the long sweep of land that stretched curving downward to the mouth of the valley.

  Now, looking back into the valley they could see gigantic rock formations tumbled through the wild brush of the valley floor. Following the stream, Jordan would move slowly. And the rocks would slow him even more, Frye thought. He was confident that Jordan had not left the valley before they arrived to seal its exit.

  Frye asked, “Where does the stream end?”

  The Coyotero pointed to the trees, now a solid black mass between the steep sides of the valley. “Beyond there the time it would take to ride one hour.”

  Then that’s where he will camp, Frye thought. By water. Because he doesn’t know when he will see it again. And he would camp early; rest the horse well; and make the border in one ride.

  “It is too wide here to wait for him,” Frye said.

  Dandy Jim nodded, agreeing. They moved their horses into the mouth of the valley that began to narrow abruptly after only a few hundred yards and now they angled toward the near side and left their horses in the dense pines that grew along the slope. They moved farther in on foot, then climbed up into the rocks to wait.

  “It will be all right to smoke,” Dandy Jim said, which was his way of asking for a cigarette. Frye made them and they smoked in silence. Afterwards, they ate meat which they had brought and drank water from their canteens. They smoked another cigarette before going to sleep.

  At first light, the Coyotero touched Frye on the shoulder. He came awake, sitting up, looking out over the rocks to the floor of the valley.

  “This is a good place,” the Coyotero said.

  “Even better than it looked in the dark,” Frye agreed. Across to the other slope was less than three hundred yards; then, to the right, another three hundred to the trees and tumbled rocks through which Jordan would come. The trees seemed less dense on this side of the valley, which meant Jordan would likely be bearing to the near side. That, Frye thought, would make it all the better.

  They decided how they would do it, watching the trees as they talked.

  After, Frye rolled four cigarettes and gave them to Dandy Jim with matches, then watched as the Coyotero scrambled down the rocks. First he would check the horses, then return to the pines directly below Frye ready to run out and disarm Jordan after Frye commanded him to halt. Dandy Jim had said, “Why not shoot him from here?” But Frye explained that it would be better to take him back as a prisoner.

  And now he waited, leaning on his left side, looking through a groove in the rocks in front of him. His Winchester rested in this V and from time to time he would sight on the break in the trees through which he expected Jordan to come.

  The rocks that jutted out from the opposite slope were clean and clear in the early morning sunlight, but the floor of the valley, almost all the way across, was still in shadow. He could hear the cries of birds back in the trees in the direction he watched, and the soft sound of the breeze in the pines. The rocks beneath him were cold and he thought, feeling the dampness of the rocks but meaning the entire cool early morning stillness of the valley: By the time the sun is high enough to warm it, this will be over.

  Keep listening to the birds. They’ll give you warning when he comes. If they are in the lower trees they’ll fly up as he passes them.

  He looked at the shadow below him and he thought: Like rolling up a black rug. You almost see it getting shorter. Eight o’clock? Something like that. He’s not rushing into anything. He looks ahead, and this morning he’s making sure his horse will take him to the border. It would’ve been good to have seen what happened between him and Sundeen. Maybe it was payday and Sundeen didn’t have the money. Maybe it was as simple as that.

  He could not hear Dandy Jim below him and he did not expect to. This is his meat. He’s Apache and could sit in an ambush for ten years if he thought it was worth waiting for.

  He could not hear the horses either. Purposely they were both geldings. There would be nothing between them that would be worth nickering about.

  He saw the birds rise from the trees. They were in a flock, now swooping and rising as one, and they flew out of sight up the valley. Frye rubbed out his cigarette.

  Jordan stopped at the edge of the trees. He dismounted and adjusted his cinch, pulling it tighter. Then he mounted and rode warily out of the trees.

  Frye’s front sight covered Jordan’s left side, the sight barely moving, barely lowering as Jordan came on. The Winchester was cocked.

  Mr. Jordan, Frye thought looking down the barrel, you’re about to make a decision. And you won’t have time to change your mind once you make it. The front sight dropped an inch as Jordan drew nearer to the slope and Frye’s finger was light against the tightness of the trigger. Just flick it, he thought, and you’ve solved everything. No, let’s take him home.

  Now Jordan was even with him and Frye knew that this was as close as he would come.

  “JORDAN! THROW UP YOUR HANDS!”

  The words echoed in the narrowness and Jordan made his decision. Frye saw the horse wheel suddenly toward the slope and rear up, rearing the same moment he fired.

  Jordan was reining again, pulling the horse’s head to face the trees, and the horse moved with a lunge that took it almost to a dead run the first few yards. Frye hurried the next shot and it was low and suddenly he had to go down as Jordan returned the fire, emptying his gun, at fifty yards, straight up through the V where Frye was crouched.

  Five shots! Frye was up, seeing Jordan slapping the gun barrel across the horse’s rump. He heard firing below him. Dandy Jim. Jordan was running now, not looking back, his right leg out of the stirrup, holding close to the horse’s off side. Frye fired, aiming at the horse now, but the horse did not go down. And in a moment it was too late. Jordan had disappeared into the trees.

  13

  How could you miss! Frye thought. He was angry because he had hurried the shot. Missing Jordan the first time was not his fault: the horse had reared. But the second shot: Jordan was running, for seconds less than a hundred yards away, and he had let himself be hurried. Now, there was not time to stand thinking about what he should have done, though as he went down the slope, scrambling from rock to rock, making sure of his footing, then sliding down on the loose gravel, he could still see Jordan crouched low in the saddle laying his pistol barrel across the horse’s rump.

  And as Frye reached the base of the slope, it went through his mind: Maybe you did hit him, but not where it would knock him down.

  Dandy Jim approached along the edge of the pines. He was on his gelding and leading Frye’s.

  “How could we have missed?�
��

  The Coyotero shook his head. “But I think we took the horse.”

  Frye looked across the open three hundred yards to the denseness of the trees and the rocks beyond. “He could be waiting for us to come after him,” he said, squinting toward the trees, dark and unmoving beyond the sunlight. “But probably he won’t wait, because he doesn’t know how many we are.” He looked at Dandy Jim, but the Coyotero’s face was without expression and he did not speak. “If his horse was hit, it might have dropped just in the trees. Then he would have gone on afoot…or waited, thinking one place to stand was as good as another.”

  Now the Coyotero nodded.

  Frye swung up. “We could talk about it a long time, but there’s only one way to find out for sure.” He was looking at Dandy Jim as he kicked his dun forward and he saw a smile touch the corner of the Coyotero’s mouth.

  Riding across the meadow Frye could feel his shoulders pulled up tensed and he told himself to relax, thinking: A shoulder’s no good against a .45 slug, is it? Still, he could feel the tightness inside of him and just telling himself to relax wasn’t enough.

  They covered most of the distance at a trot, then slowed to a walk the last few dozen yards and entered the trees this way, their carbines ready. There was no sound and slowly Frye could feel the tightness within him easing. If he’s close, he thought, he would have fired when we were in the open or just coming in.

  The Coyotero pointed ahead and Frye could see clearly the path Jordan’s horse had made breaking into the brush. His gaze lowered, coming back along the ground, and now he noticed the streaks of blood that were almost continuous leading from where they stood to the brush clumps.

  “There’s no doubt we got his horse,” he said to Dandy Jim.

  The Apache nodded, answering, “It won’t last very long.”

  “We’d better go on foot.”

  “I think so,” the Apache said. “Listen,” he added then. “I think I should go first, and you should follow, leading the horses.”

  “Why should you go first?” Frye said.

  “Because I always do.”

  “There’s nothing that says you have to.” He could see that the Coyotero wanted to do this to protect him. “I’m the one responsible for bringing him back,” Frye said.

  “I think we’re wasting time now,” Dandy Jim said. He turned abruptly and started for the brush leaving Frye with the horses. But as he passed between the first clumps he looked back and saw that Frye was following him, leading the horses, holding the reins in his left hand. He had replaced the Winchester in its saddle boot and now he had drawn the Colt and was carrying it in his right hand.

  They moved steadily through the brush patch stopping when they came to the end of it. From here the signs of blood angled more to the left, gradually climbing a bare slope, a slide of loose shale that reached openly almost to the rim high above them. He could be waiting up there, Frye thought. But if he didn’t wait before, why should he now?

  Halfway up the slope the blood tracks veered abruptly and slanted down again into the trees. His horse couldn’t make it, Frye thought. They followed, the shale crunching, sliding beneath their feet as they went down, and in the trees again it was quiet.

  Now Frye watched Dandy Jim who was almost twenty yards ahead of him. He would see the branches move as the Coyotero moved steadily along, but he would hear no sound. Farther along, he began to catch glimpses of the stream through the pine branches to the right. Then ahead he could see a part of the stream in full view, and as he looked at it he saw Dandy Jim stop.

  The Coyotero went down on his stomach, remaining there for what must have been ten minutes before rising slowly and coming back, running crouched, toward him.

  “His horse,” Dandy Jim said, reading him.

  “Where?”

  “By the stream.”

  “And you didn’t see the man?”

  “No. The horse is at the edge of the stream, part of it in the water.”

  “Dead?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Quickly then.”

  The Coyotero turned and crept back toward the stream. Frye followed, but left the horses where they were.

  Jordan’s horse was at the edge of the stream, its hind quarters in the water and its head up on the bank. As the swell of stomach moved, blood poured from a bullet wound in the horse’s right flank. It colored the water, red as it came from the horse, brown fading to nothing as it poured into the water and was moved along by the small current.

  The horse had been shot again just behind the right shoulder; and as Frye started to cross the stream, looking down at the horse as he stepped into the water, he saw where another bullet had entered the withers; probably his first shot and he wondered briefly why it had not killed the horse on the spot.

  He saw Jordan’s footprints before he stepped out of the water. They bore to the left following the stream.

  He signaled to Dandy Jim, who ran back through the trees for their horses. Then, watching him as he brought them back, he saw the Coyotero go to one knee next to Jordan’s horse, then saw him bring out his knife and cut the animal’s throat in one slash. The Coyotero brought their horses across then.

  “Listen,” Frye said, “let’s do it this way now. You go up the slope and work along the edge. I’ll stay on his sign and from time to time watch for you to signal. He won’t climb out of here now, not without a horse.”

  “But he could when night comes,” Dandy Jim said.

  “We’ve got to pin him down before that.”

  They arranged a signal: every ten minutes the Coyotero would imitate the call of a verdin. If he located Jordan he would imitate a crow. Then he would either return to Frye or lead him on to Jordan by the same signals.

  Frye watched Dandy Jim ride out of sight into the pines before he went on, following Jordan’s footprints: at first, the marks of high-heeled boots that were easily read in the sand; but farther on, as the sand gave way to rocky ground, the marks were less apparent. And often he went on without a sign to follow, choosing one path through the rocks rather than another because it seemed more direct, less likely to bring him back to a point he had already passed.

  Twice he heard the verdin, perhaps a hundred yards ahead of him and up on the slope.

  Then again. This time it seemed to be closer.

  Frye entered the narrowness of a defile and stopped in the deep shadow of it to drink from his canteen. He took a bandanna from his pocket and wetting it, wiped his horse’s muzzle, cleaning the nostrils. Then, as he started out again, he stopped and drew back into the shadows instinctively as the sound of gunfire came from somewhere off to the right up on the slope.

  Two shots from a revolver and a heavier report that was still echoing through the rocks.

  Springfield, Frye thought. Dandy’s on him and it must have been unexpected with no time for the signal. He reached past the horse’s shoulder and drew his Winchester and turning back, his eyes momentarily caught a movement in the lower pines. He raised the Winchester, waiting as the minutes passed.

  There!

  The figure darted from the trees running crouched low. The sound of the Springfield came from higher up on the slope and the split-second he heard it Frye fired.

  Too late. He was behind rocks now.

  Frye had waited because he had not been able to identify the figure, and by the time the Springfield told him who it was, it was too late.

  But now you’re sure, Frye thought, looking at the rocks where Jordan had disappeared. Now you know where he is…and all you have to do is go in and get him. Or wait him out.

  He studied the terrain thoughtfully. He was slightly higher than Jordan’s position and beyond those rocks there appeared to be an open meadow. Probably, Frye thought, that’s why he turned into the pines. He didn’t want to cross the open. Not now. To the east was the pine-thick slope, and Dandy Jim. Frye was to the south. Beyond the stream was the steep slope to the west. It could be climbed, but much of it was bar
e rock and it would take time…if Jordan ever reached it, which was improbable. Still, Jordan could move around to some degree in a fifty-yard radius of rock and brush.

  All of this went through Frye’s mind and he concluded: He has to be pinned to one spot before dark and not be able to leave it.

  He was sure that the Coyotero realized this. Now it was a question of working together. But first, Frye thought, tell Dandy where you are.

  He aimed quickly at the spot where Jordan had disappeared and fired. Now be ready, he thought.

  The Springfield opened up. One…two…on the second shot Frye was moving, running veering to the left…three…diving behind a rock covering as a revolver shot whined over his head and ricocheted off the crest of the rock. Frye exhaled, close to the ground. Now they both know.

  He crawled along behind the cover of the rocks, then raised his head slowly until he was looking at Jordan’s position from another angle. But he could not see the gunman even from here.

  A little more around, Frye thought. And a little closer. He brought the Winchester up and fired quickly.

  The Springfield answered covering him. Frye was up running straight ahead, then to the left again. He found cover, went to his knees, but only momentarily. The Winchester came up with his head—

  Jordan! A glimpse of him disappearing, dropping into a pocket among the rocks.

  Frye fired, levered and fired again—four times, bracketing the pocket and nicking one off the top of the rocks where Jordan had gone down.

  It had worked. Jordan was still behind cover, but now he could not move, not three feet without exposing himself; and even darkness would do him little good.

  Now we’ll see how good he is, Frye thought. We’ll see how good his nerves are—and if he has any patience. I should have told Dandy how he is with a gun. No, he already knows it. He was inside the jail when Jordan let go at Harold Mendez. And he heard how Jordan came out of the La Noria mescal shop. So he won’t underestimate him.

  Frye was on his stomach, but with his elbows raising him enough to see over the rocks and down the barrel of the Winchester in front of him. Mesquite bunched thickly all around him and even with his eyes above the rocks he knew Jordan would not see him. Not unless he fired. And Frye had no intention of firing. Jordan was flanked. He was cut off from water and cut off from escape—unless pure luck sided with him.