The Law at Randado Read online

  “We want your two prisoners,” R.D. Tindal announced.

  “Which two?”

  “The chilipickers,” Earl Beaudry said.

  “Which two are they?”

  “The Mexicans.”

  “What for?”

  Beaudry said, “To lynch ’em, for cry-sake!”

  This wasn’t the way to go about it and Tindal said, “By the power vested in my office as city prosecutor, I order you to hand over the two Mexican outlaws.”

  “City prosecutor?”

  Tindal nodded his head once. “City prosecutor. George Stedman now presides over our municipal bench.”

  Harold Mendez frowned.

  “Harold, we’ll explain this just once. Not a half hour ago the Citizens Committee elected everything we need to try persons accused of crimes in Randado or against Randado citizens. George Stedman is judge. I’m prosecuting attorney. We called a jury to hear the case of those two Mexicans. Well, they heard it, Mr. Sundeen’s testimony and all…and they rendered a prompt, just decision.”

  Harold Mendez shook his head. “I don’t work for you. I take orders from Kirby Frye. He takes orders from Danaher, and Danaher said keep the prisoners here until he sends for them. Kirby will be back some time today. If you want to take this up with him, all right. It’s none of my business.”

  George Stedman felt the crowd behind him and seeing just the one man in the doorway he felt foolish. “Harold, stop wasting time and bring those prisoners down. Representatives of this town, the most qualified people in the world to pass sentence on those two men, did just that. Now it’s time to administer justice.”

  Harold Mendez shook his head. “I want it down on the record that I’m opposing this.”

  Someone in the crowd said, “It’ll be down on your tombstone.”

  There was scattered laughter.

  Phil Sundeen pushed Tindal and the storekeeper lurched forward almost off balance. “Step up to him.”

  Digo grinned and pushed Beaudry and Stedman, a big hand behind each man.

  “Go on,” Sundeen said. “Use your authority.”

  “Look, Harold,” Tindal said. “We’ve explained it to you. We didn’t have to, but we did so you’d understand what we’re doing is legal. This is the same as a court order, Harold. Now if you had a court order given to you you’d hand those prisoners over fast.”

  Harold Mendez said, as if they were words he had memorized. “I take orders from Kirby Frye, who takes orders from John Danaher, who takes orders from the Pima County authorities. If you want to talk to Kirby, all right. It’s none of my business.”

  Phil Sundeen looked over his shoulder and said, “What time is it?”

  The man called Clay Jordan, who was now standing a few steps to the side with his thumbs hooked in the gun belt beneath his open coat, moved his left hand and drew his watch from a vest pocket.

  “Ten minutes shy of twelve.”

  “It’s getting on dinnertime,” Sundeen said thoughtfully. He was squinting in the morning sunlight; a bright sun, but with little warmth now at the end of November. Looking at Harold Mendez again, he said, “Digo, you think you can get Harold out of that doorway by yourself?”

  Digo did not bother to answer. He pushed between Beaudry and Stedman, going for the doorway, and as he neared it Harold Mendez, who had been standing with his feet apart watching him, stepped back into the office. Digo turned his head to glance at Sundeen, then followed Harold Mendez inside. The jailer stood in front of the desk stiffly.

  “Sit down,” Digo said.

  “It’s all right.”

  Digo shifted his body suddenly and swung his left fist hard into the jailer’s face. Mendez went back against the desk and holding himself there groped for the arm of the chair. Blood was coming from his nose as he turned the chair and eased himself into it.

  Digo went to the door and called out, “He says come in.”

  Sundeen came first, but he stepped back inside the door to let Tindal, Stedman and Beaudry pass him. Clay Jordan was next, but he did not come in. He said, “You don’t need me.” Only that. Sundeen watched him walk away, going wide around the people in the street, then up into the shade in front of De Spain’s, then inside.

  I shouldn’t have let him do that, Sundeen thought. But now he was looking at the people and he saw in the crowd, and over across the street in front of De Spain’s, many of his riders. He called out, “You Sun-D men, get over here!”

  In the crowd a few of them started to come forward, but stopped when someone called out, “When do we get paid?”

  “You don’t do what I tell you, you never will!” Sundeen answered.

  They came forward out of the crowd, almost a dozen men, and stood restlessly in front of Sundeen.

  “Where are the others?”

  One of the men shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  Sundeen’s gaze went to the people in the street again and his eyes singled out one man standing near the front, a lean man with his hatbrim low over his eyes and a matchstick in the corner of his mouth. Merl White, one of his riders.

  “Merl, what’s the matter with you?”

  “Nothin’.”

  “Get over here.”

  “I don’t work for you no more,” Merl White said. He stood his ground and did not move.

  “Since when?”

  “Since you stopped paying wages.”

  Sundeen smiled. “You don’t have enough patience.”

  “I lost it,” Merl said. “I can name three or four more lost theirs.”

  “Who are they, Merl?”

  “You’ll find out.”

  Sundeen’s mouth still bore part of the smile. “Tell you what, Merl. You and those other three or four meet me over to De Spain’s when I’m through here and I’ll pay you off.”

  Merl kept his eyes on Sundeen and he said, “We’ll be there.”

  Tindal was next to Sundeen in the doorway. He called out, “Where’re the rest of you committeemen?” A few men came toward him, then behind them more were pushing through the crowd. “Get in here!”

  “That’s the ticket,” Sundeen said. He slapped Tindal on the shoulder and moved back into the office. “What happened to him?” He nodded toward Harold Mendez.

  “He got a nosebleed,” Digo answered.

  “Where’re the keys?”

  “Right here.” Digo held them up.

  Sundeen looked at Tindal. “You think you can do the rest?”

  Tindal hesitated, but he said, “Of course we can.”

  “Like hell.” Sundeen shoved past him and started up the stairs, Digo behind him and the rest of them following.

  The Sun-D riders and the committeemen who had come inside moved up the stairs now, hurrying in the noise of dozens of boots on the narrow stairway and suddenly there was an excitement that could be felt; it came with the noise and the hurrying and there was an anxiousness inside of each man now, the last ones not wanting to be last, going up the stairs two at a time to be a part of the excitement, not wanting to miss anything now that it was underway and everybody was in on it. Suddenly a man felt himself very much a man and the ones who had reached the upper floor first stood with their hands on their hips waiting for all the stragglers to come up, looking at the two Mexicans who were both standing, but well back from the bars, and then looking at the Apache in the other cell who stood by the window, but with his back to it.

  A man who had never seen either of the Mexicans before spat on the floor and yelled, “Pull them bean-eaters the hell out!”

  They crowded in front of the cell, looking through the bars at the two Mexicans who stood close together staring at the crowd with their mouths foolishly, wonderingly open; then the younger one wetting his lips, his eyes going over the crowd of men, wetting his lips again and now his hands were clenching and unclenching with nothing to hold on to. He could feel the hot tingling in his body and his heart beating against his chest, his legs quivering—he was aware of his toes moving against the str
aps of his sandals—but there was nowhere to run.

  The older Mexican stood dumbfoundedly, not moving his body, and as his body began to tense he tried very hard to remain calm, talking to himself very slowly, telling himself not to become excited and act like a child, but this took a great effort and it was almost unbearable.

  He heard his companion’s voice—“Mother of God…Virgin Mother of God…”—and for some reason he did not want these men to hear this and he rasped at the younger man, “Shut up! Hold on to yourself!” A man was opening the door now, a big man who looked Mexican but who wore the hat of a gringo—like the one who had brought the food with the boy, but it was not that one.

  “Pull it open, Digo!”

  The sound of metal striking metal, clear, even with the voices, then Digo saying, “This goddamn key’s no good.”

  Someone said, “That one was praying…you hear him?”

  “He better.”

  “That’s the way they are…pull their own sisters in the stable on Saturday night, then go to church on Sunday!”

  “Give me it,” Sundeen said. He took the key from Digo, turned it in the lock effortlessly and pushed the door open hard making it swing clanging against the bars. “Get ’em out!”

  Digo went in, pushed in with men close behind him. He jabbed his elbows making room, then took hold of the younger Mexican who had backed away, but was now against the bunk and could go no farther, grabbing the Mexican’s arm and bending it behind his back.

  The younger Mexican screamed out, raising himself on his toes.

  “Let him walk like a man!” the other Mexican said.

  Digo pushed the man he held toward the cell door and as he did came around with his clenched fist swinging wide. The mustached Mexican started to duck, but not quickly enough and the blow caught him squarely on the side of the head sprawling him over the bunk and against the adobe wall. He sat up shaking his head as Earl Beaudry and another man each took an arm and dragged him out.

  Digo was grinning. “He walks strange for a man.”

  “Come on,” Sundeen said. “Get the other one.”

  As Digo took hold of him again the younger Mexican said, “We are to be tried now?”

  “You’ve been tried.”

  “But when?”

  “What do you care when?”

  Close to Sundeen, Tindal said, “Tried and found guilty by legal court action. Now, by God, take your medicine like a man!”

  “But it was only a few of those cows—”

  “Listen, you took a chance and lost. Now face up to it!”

  “They were returned…every one we took!”

  “’Cause you got caught.”

  “Come on!” Sundeen said suddenly, with anger. “Get him out of here.” He stepped aside as Digo twisted the man’s arm and pushed him, raising him to his toes, through the cell door, then down the crowded hallway, pushing the Mexican hard against the men who couldn’t get out of the way quickly enough.

  “Don’t touch me with that greaser!”

  “Then get out of the way!”

  Sundeen said to Tindal, “Digo’s a wheel of justice.”

  Tindal, looking at Sundeen’s beard-stubbled, sun-darkened expressionless face, hesitated, not knowing whether to laugh or not, then just nodded.

  Someone said, “What about this one?”

  “That’s an Indin.”

  “I got eyes.”

  “What’d he do?” a third man said.

  “That’s the one the soldiers brought in.”

  Another man said, “Fool around with army property and you get a bayonet in the ass.”

  “We’d be doing them a favor.”

  “Look at the eyes on the son of a bitch.”

  “Imagine meetin’ him alone out on the flats. Just you and him, no horses, not another livin’ soul around—”

  “For cry-sake come on…they’re taking them down already!”

  Dandy Jim had not moved from the window. Without expression he watched them take the Mexicans. He heard the men talking about him, understanding only a few of their words, and a moment later the hallway was deserted, the last sounds going down the stairs.

  Then suddenly voices again, a cheering from the people in the street as the men, dragging the two Mexicans, seemed to burst from the front door of the jail into the sunlight.

  And now the excitement, the not wanting to miss anything, the not wanting to be left out, was in the street. It was there suddenly with the noise and the stark violence of what was taking place. People joining the crowd, running neck-straining behind the ones closer to the Mexicans, some running ahead to the livery knowing or sensing that it would take place there; and others, standing in the long line of ramada shade and in windows; a man with his family standing up in the flat bed of a wagon and their heads turning as the crowd pushed by them; those in doorways watching fascinated, wanting to see it and not wanting to see it. Some went inside. A woman shooing three children into the doorway and the little boy yelling something as she herded them.

  De Spain was alone behind the bar. He had one customer, a man who drank beer slowly, sipping it, smoking and sipping beer, leaning on the bar. It was the man who had come in with Sundeen earlier. Clay Jordan. He paid no attention to what was going on outside; he did not even glance toward the windows at the noise. But when the noise was farther down the street he finished the beer and went out.

  Haig Hanasian, watching from the door of his café, saw them come out of the jail. He turned away and went back to the kitchen where there was no cook now. No cook, no waitresses. And looking toward the front again, down the whitewashed adobe length of his café and through the open doorway he could see his wife, Edith. She was standing with one arm about a support post raising herself on tiptoes, straining to see over the crowd; and as he watched her, she moved out of view.

  Now they were passing a sign that read R.D. TINDAL SUPPLY Co. Milmary Tindal was standing beneath the sign.

  “Dad!”

  “You go inside, Milmary.”

  “Dad—”

  “I said go inside!”

  Now they were beyond, almost to the livery stable that was set back from the corner with the fenced yard in front and in the middle of the fence, the main entrance gate—two upright timbers and a cross timber over the open gate.

  “We don’t have ropes,” Sundeen said. “Digo, get ropes!”

  “Mine?” Digo said. “That’s bad luck.”

  “I don’t care whose.”

  “We’ll have them.”

  Earl Beaudry looked up at the cross timber, then back to Sundeen. “Here, Phil?”

  “Why not?’

  R.D. Tindal waved his arms. “All right, you men back! Move back and give us some elbow room.”

  Now the two Mexicans were lifted to their feet to stand under the cross timber. The younger one put his head back to look at the beam, then looked at the crowd again, at all of the faces close in front of him, and he began to cry. His companion told him, for the sake of God, to shut up and to hold on to himself.

  “This is as good a place as any,” Tindal said.

  “How are you going to do it?” Sundeen said.

  “What?”

  “How do you go about hanging a man?”

  “All you need is rope.”

  “Just tie it around their necks and yank ’em up in the air?”

  “I don’t know…I guess I never thought about it.”

  Digo came across the livery yard with a coiled rawhide riata in each hand. He handed one to Earl Beaudry and they began to uncoil the lines and bend a loop into one end of each.

  The older Mexican said, “Your justice is not slow.”

  Close by, George Stedman said, “Nobody’s talking to you.”

  “Listen,” the older Mexican said. “You have us now…and you are going to kill us. But grant one last request.”

  “Go to hell.”

  “It isn’t much. Just get a priest.”

  “There’s no
priest here.”

  “At La Noria,” the Mexican said. “What difference does it make if you put this off a few hours?”

  “If you think somebody’s going to ride all the way down to La Noria to get a priest, you’re crazy.”

  Earl Beaudry looked up. “On Saturday.”

  “Look,” the older Mexican said. “We are going to die. Is that much to ask?”

  “You should’ve thought of that before.”

  Beaudry added, “Before you stole that beef.” He had tied the knot and now pulled on it, testing it.

  “Whether we should have or not is past. But it remains we need a priest.”

  “That’s tough luck,” Stedman said.

  The older Mexican said no more, but after a moment he leaned closer to his companion and said, “Pray. But pray to yourself.”

  “Who’s going up?” Sundeen said, looking at the beam.

  Digo grinned. “I’d break it.”

  “Need somebody light.” Sundeen’s eyes went to Tindal.

  Tindal forced a smile. “My climbing days are over.”

  Beaudry said, “Hell, give me a boost.”

  Digo stooped and they helped Beaudry up onto his shoulders, steadying him, holding his legs as Digo rose slowly. He threw the lines over the beam, looping them three times, then gave each a half hitch so that with weight on the hanging end the line would be pulling against itself; and when he came down the loops were hanging just longer than head high to a mounted man.

  Now Digo went into the livery stable. He was gone for a few minutes and when he reappeared he was mounted and leading two horses with bridles, but without saddles.

  “Mount ’em up,” Sundeen said.

  “Wait a minute.”

  Sundeen turned at the words behind him. Clay Jordan was coming toward him through the crowd. “You going to help out now?” Sundeen said.

  “Nobody rides that horse.” Jordan nodded to one of the mounts Digo had brought.

  “It won’t be but for a minute,” Sundeen grinned.

  “Nobody rides him.”

  “You superstitious?”

  “Either you tell Digo to take him back, or I do.”

  Sundeen shrugged. “You tell him.”

  Digo looked at them, not understanding. “What’s the difference?” But he saw the way Jordan was watching him and he said, “All right,” and led Jordan’s horse back to the stable. When he returned with another, Jordan was no longer in the circle beneath the cross beam.