Elmore Leonard - Valdez Is Coming

“They killed the dogs,” the old woman said.

He turned to look at his oldest son, sleeping, and said to himself, Wake him. But he let the boy sleep. Diego Luz pushed aside the straw mat covering the doorway and went outside, out under the mesquite-pole ramada, and saw them in the yard.

An army of them, a half-circle of armed men in their saddles. No sound now, not even from the horses. A dozen of them or more. A dog lying on its side in the yard with a saddle blanket covering its head. The dog smothered. Twelve riders looking at him, staring at him or at the ramada or at the house, facing him and not moving. He heard hooves on the hardpack and two riders appeared from the side of the house. Diego Luz looked that way and saw more of them at the corral and coming up from the horse pasture. They were all around the place; they had been everywhere; they had closed in from all sides and now they were here.

Diego Luz moved to the edge of the ramada shade looking out. He said nothing because there was nothing for him to say; he didn’t ask them here; they came. But he said to himself, He did something to them and they’re looking for him.

He saw Mr. Tanner and his segundo and several people that he recognized who had been by here. He saw R. L. Davis and this puzzled him, R. L. Davis being with them; but the way they were here, not passing by and stopping for water, here, made him too afraid to wonder about R. L. Davis.

Diego Luz, the horsebreaker, who they said broke horses with his fists, looked out at them and said in his mind to them, Go out to the corral and eat horseshit, goddam you sitting there. But he thought of his wife and his children and his oldest daughter and he said, Jesus, son of God, help me. Jesus, if you listen to anything or have listened to anything. Jesus, from now on-

The segundo said in Spanish, “How are you, friend? How is your family? Are they awake?”

Goddam him, Diego Luz thought and said, “How does it pass with you? Come down and have something with us. I’ll wake up the old woman.”

“Good,” the segundo said, “Bring the woman out. Bring out your daughter.”

Over from him several riders, R. L. Davis said, “Mr. Tanner, you want me to ask him? I’ll get it from him.”

The segundo looked at R. L. Davis from under the straw brim of his Sonora hat. R. L. Davis saw the look, not moving his eyes to Mr. Tanner, knowing better, and decided to keep his mouth shut for a while.

“Now they come,” the segundo said pleasantly, smiling, touching the brim of his hat.

Diego Luz could hear them behind him. He thought, Jesus, make them stay inside. But they were out and coming out: his wife and his son and his daughter, standing close to him now; he could hear one of the smaller children, the high questioning voice, and heard the witch voice of his wife’s mother, the too-loud annoying sound telling them to be silent; God bless the toothless hag this time, now, Jesus, give her power to keep them inside.

Diego Luz tried to be calm and let this happen, what was going to happen. He wet his lips and tried not to wet his lips. He did not see the segundo motion or hear him speak, but now a rider dismounted, letting his reins trail, and came toward them.

He was an American, a bony man who had not shaved for several days and wore boots to his knees and spurs that chinged as he came forward. He moved past Diego Luz and took his son by the arm and brought him out several strides into the yard. He positioned the boy, moving him by his shoulders, to face his family as the boy looked up at him. The man glanced at the segundo. His gaze dropped slowly to the boy and when he was looking at him, standing a stride in front of him, he stepped in swinging his gloved right fist and slammed it into the boy’s face.

Diego Luz did not move. He looked at his boy on the ground and at the man who had struck him and at the segundo.

The segundo said, “We ask you one time. Where is Valdez?”

Diego Luz did not hesitate or think about it. He said, “I don’t know.” He added then, “No one here knows.” And then, because he had said this much, he said, “He hasn’t been here in four days.” He saw the segundo looking at him and he wished he had said only that he didn’t know.

The American with the bony face and the high boots walked over to the ramada. Diego Luz glanced aside and then half turned as he saw his small children out of the doorway. The American picked up the littlest girl, his three-year-old, and held her up in front of him. The man grinned with no teeth, with his mouth sunken. He said, “How’re you, honey?” The little girl smiled as he carried her out into the yard. The American looked out toward the mounted men and he said, “Mr. Tanner, I could swing this young’n by her feet and bash her head agin the wall.”

Diego Luz screamed, “I don’t know!”

Now several men dismounted and came toward him. One of them pushed him aside and they brought his daughter out into the yard. She was wearing only a nightdress, and in the sunlight he could see the shape of his daughter’s hips and legs beneath the cotton cloth and saw the men by the ramada looking at her. The man who brought her out was behind her now. He took her nightdress at the neck and pulled down on it. The girl twisted, wrenching away from him, screaming. Some of the men laughed, staring at her now as she tried to hold up her shredded nightdress to cover herself.

The segundo said to Diego Luz, “Maybe we take her inside and mount her one at a time. Or maybe we do it out here so your family can see.”

“I don’t know where he is,” Diego Luz said.

The segundo looked at Mr. Tanner, who was mounted on a bay horse. The segundo stepped out of his saddle. He took a plug of tobacco and bit off a corner as he walked up to Diego Luz, who watched him, feeling his hands hanging heavily at his sides.

He said to the segundo in Spanish, “Tell him to put my little girl down.”

“He’s talking,” the segundo said.

“Not that one.”

“He’s a little crazy maybe.”

“Tell him to put her down.”

“I won’t let him do it,” the segundo said. “She’s too young. Maybe she grow up to be something, like your daughter.”

Diego Luz said, “If you touch her you’d better kill me.”

“We can do that,” the segundo said.

“I don’t know where he is. Man, who do you think I put first, him?”

“We only asking you,” the segundo said. “Maybe you give us a lot of shit and we believe it. That’s a nice-looking girl,” he said, looking at the man’s daughter. “I like a little more up there, but first one of the day, maybe it’s all right.”

“Shoot her first,” Diego Luz said. “You’d do it to a corpse, you filthy son of a whore.”

The segundo said, “Man, hold on to yourself if you can do it. Just tell us.”

“I don’t know where he is,” Diego Luz said.

“Listen, leave Maricopa, you can ride for me.”

“I don’t know where he is,” Diego Luz said.

“I don’t care where he is,” the segundo said. “I mean it, ride for me.”

Diego Luz said, “Come here alone to ask me, I’d try to kill you.”

The segundo nodded, smiling. “You’d try it, wouldn’t you? That’s why I want you.”

R. L. Davis came out of his saddle. He walked part way toward Tanner and stopped. He eased his funneled hat up and pulled it down again.

“Mr. Tanner, I’d like to ask him something.”

“Go ahead,” Tanner said. He brought a cigar out of a vest pocket and bit off the tip.

“I want to ask Diego about seeing him in town with Bob Valdez’s clothes three days ago.”

Tanner lit his cigar and blew out the smoke. “You hear that?”

Diego Luz nodded his head up and down. “I was taking his clothes to him.”