Elmore Leonard: Valdez Is Coming

They moved into a canyon, between walls that rose steeply and were darkly shadowed with brush. Valdez knew the place and the horses snorted and threw their heads when they smelled the water, the pool of it lying still, undercutting one side of the canyon.

The Erin woman moved around the pool while Valdez stripped off the bridles and saddles to let the horses drink and graze freely. He watched her, looking past the horses, watched her kneel down at the edge of the water and drink from her cupped hands. Valdez took off his hat and slipped the heavy Sharps cartridge belt over his head. A time to rest at dawn, before the day brought whatever it would bring. He moved around the pool toward her.

“Are you hungry?”

She looked up at him, shaking her head, then brushing her hair from her face. “No, not really. Are you?”

“I can wait.”

“Are you going to sit down?”

“If you’re not going to stand up,” Valdez said. He went down next to her, touching her hair, feeling his finger brush her cheek and seeing her eyes on him.

He said, “Gay Erin. That’s your name, uh? What was it before?”

“Gay Byrnes.”

He took her face gently, his palm covering her chin, and kissed her on the mouth. “Gay Erin. That’s a good name. You like it?”

“It’s my name because I was married to him.”

“What do you want to talk about that for?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Then don’t. Do you know my name?”

“Valdez.”

“Roberto Valdez. How do you like Roberto?”

“I think it’s fine.”

“Or Bob. Which do you like better?”

“Roberto.”

“It’s Mexican.”

“I know it is.”

“Listen, I’ve been thinking about something.”

She waited.

“You heard me tell him I don’t know if I’m going to give you back or not.”

“I told you before,” the Erin woman said. “I don’t want to go back.”

“That’s what you told me.” Valdez nodded. “All right, I believe you. Do you know why? Because it’s easier if I believe you. If I think about you too much, then I don’t have time to think about other things.”

“What do you think about me?”

“I think I’d like to live with you and be married to you.”

She waited. “We’ve been together two days.”

“And two nights,” Valdez said. “How long does it take?” He could see her face more clearly now in the dawn light.

Her eyes did not leave his. “You’d marry me?”

“I think I know you well enough.”

“I killed my husband.”

“I believe you.”

“I’ve been living with Frank Tanner.”

“I know that.”

“But you want to marry me.”

“I think so, yes.”

“Tell me why.”

“Listen, I don’t like this. I don’t feel right, but I don’t know what else to say. I believe you because I want to believe you. I say to myself, You want her? I say, Yes. Then I say, What if she’s lying? And then I say, Goddam, believe her and don’t think anymore. Listen, I couldn’t do anything to you. I mean if he says, I won’t give you the money, shoot her, you think I’d shoot you?”

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t think you would.”

“So don’t worry about that.”

“I never have,” the Erin woman said. “I may have been feeling sorry for myself, but I didn’t lie down with you just because I wanted to be held.”

“Why did you then?”

She hesitated again. “I don’t know. I wanted to be with you. I still want to be with you. If I’m in love with you then I’m in love with you. I don’t know, I’ve never loved a man before.”

“I’ve never been married,” Valdez said.

She took his hand and brought it up to her face. “I haven’t either, really.”

“Maybe we can talk about it again. When there’s time, uh?”

“I hope so,” she said.

Believe that, Valdez thought, and don’t think about it. He gave her R. L. Davis’s Colt revolver and that sealed it. If she was lying to him she could shoot him in the back. She had already killed one man.

Still, it was easier in his mind now. Much easier.

They found R. L. Davis a little after sunup, a hunched-over figure on the brush slope, dragging a saddle and a thin trail of dust. The two men who found him cut him loose. One of them took the saddle and the other pulled R. L. Davis up behind him and they rode double over to where Mr. Tanner had spent the night. He was alone; all the others were still out on scout.

He looked different. Mr. Tanner had not shaved for two or three days, and the collar of his shirt was dirty and curled up. His moustache looked bigger and his face thinner.

R. L. Davis noticed this, though God Almighty, his back ached from dragging the goddam saddle all over the countryside.

“I wouldn’t mind a drink of water from somebody.”

The rider who’d brought him in was about to hand him a canteen, but Tanner stopped him.

“Wait’ll we’re through.”

“I haven’t had no water since last night.”

“You won’t die,” Tanner said. “Less I see I should kill you.”

“Mr. Tanner, look at me. He drew down with that scattergun, like to took my head off.”

“Where are they?”

“He let me go about four hours ago and headed south.”

“Mrs. Erin was with him?”

“Yes sir.”

“How is she?”

“She looks fine to me. I mean I don’t think he’s mistreated her any.”

“God help him,” Tanner said. “Did you speak to her?”

“No, he was right there all the time. There wasn’t nothing I could say he wouldn’t’ve heard.”

“Then she didn’t say anything to you.”

“No sir. He said something he wanted me to tell you, though.”

Tanner waited. “Well, goddam it, go ahead.”

“He said, ‘Tell him he still has to pay the Indin, but I’m not sure now I’m giving him his woman back.’ ”

Frank Tanner hit him. He clubbed Davis in the face with his right fist and the man sprawled on his back in the dust.

“I didn’t say it – he said it! Them are his words.”

“Tell it again.”

“I swear it’s what he said.”

“Tell it!”

“He said you’re to pay the Indin, but he wasn’t so sure he was going to give you your woman back. Them words exactly.”

“Did she say anything?”

“No sir, not a word, the whole time I was there.”

“He keep her tied?”

“When she was in the draw, but not when he’s around. I mean riding or when he’s made camp.”

“Why’d he let you go?” Davis hesitated and Tanner said, “I asked you a question.”

“Well, I reckon to tell you what he said. There’s no other reason I know of.”

“God help you if there is,” Tanner said.

He was mounting his bay horse, when two riders came in with a string of fresh horses. They had walked all night back to Mimbreno from the place where they had left their dead mounts on the slope.

Tanner looked at R. L. Davis. “Put your saddle on one of them,” he said. “I want you present when we run him down.”

During the early morning the segundo, whose name was Emilio Avilar but who had been called only segundo for the past six years, found three of his men in the mountain wilderness and signaled them, gathering them in. The men were tired and their horses were worn and needed water. They were ready to head back, and Frank Almighty Tanner could whistle out his ass if he didn’t like it. They were paid to drive cattle and freight wagons and shoot rurales ; they had not signed on to chase a man who’d run off with Tanner’s woman. That was his lookout if he couldn’t keep her home. After all night in the saddle, it was time to unroll the blankets.