I Dreamt I Was in Heaven_The Rampage of the Rufus Buck Gang

by Leonce Gaiter

  “I don’ know.”

  She moved closer. “I think you shot his ear off.”

  “I didn’t shoot him. Musta been Maoma.”

  “Lemme see,” she said to Callahan, approaching him. His hand remained glued to his bleeding head. “I wanna see it. I wanna see what’s left.”

  She gingerly touched his stubborn hand, as if it had thorns, and quickly pulled away. With a look of supreme confusion, he stared from man to man for answers, desperately questioning this little white girl’s presence and participation; but he got no answers, which only deepened his confusion and fear. Impatient, she slapped at his hand, trying to knock it away, but still as smartly as if it might bite back.

  “I wanna see,” she demanded.

  Rufus raised his gun. “Show her,” he ordered. “Your Daddy cut some blood on me with his little whip. Now the Rufus Buck gang’s got some o’ yours.”

  “I got nothin’ to do wit’ my Daddy,” Callahan pleaded.

  “My Mama said that the son lives with what the Daddy does, and his Daddy before. That’s why Indians got nothin’.”

  “Please,” Callahan almost wept. “What do you want? Take anything.”

  “I wanna see his ear!” Theodosia shouted.

  Rufus flicked the gun at Callahan’s hand. It slowly fell from his head. Theodosia’s face glowed with expectation. She stooped down next to the head, and peered at the red, pulpy mass that hung from the side of his face where his ear used to be. She reached out with her finger and quickly touched it. As the loose flesh jiggled, she snapped her hand away as if toying with sparks. Callahan screamed. Her eyes and feet danced again at the correlation: her touch and his scream. Quickly, surreptitiously, as if petting a snake, she touched it again, and again, the big man screaming and flinching each time, sitting with his arms across his chest, as if to keep his body from falling apart, moans and yowls accompanying the tears streaming down his face.

  “I ain’t never seen what’s inside a ear,” Theodosia announced as she turned away.

  “He dead now?” Luckey asked Lewis as Theodosia skipped toward the black cowboy lying on the ground. Lewis dutifully kicked the body once more. The test was, again, inconclusive.

  The girl approached and scrutinized the body with the big red stain. She struggled to turn it over. That done, she dipped her hand in the blood and felt the wound. After chasing the gang members with her reddened hand, she found nothing more of interest there.

  “We gonna shoot him?” Maoma asked of Callahan.

  Rufus regarded at the weeping cattleman. He imagined his former teacher’s reaction upon hearing of this day. He imagined the father suffering by proxy the son’s humiliation.

  “No. Take what you want. He’s gonna wear that face forever. His Daddy’s gonna look at it until he dies and know it was his doin’, and me who done it.”

  With a growing rage, Rufus grabbed Callahan by the hair and jerked his head up. “He shouldn’t o’ said those things,” Rufus spat at S.P. Callahan’s son. “He shouldn’t o’ done it.”

  9

  “I saw you in a dream,” he said to the wandering girl who paced, hopped, and strolled from one spot of nowhere-in-particular to another in blissful self-involvement as if practicing intricate dance steps. Rufus wasn’t sure if she heard him. He looked up. The glowing, fiery sunset screamed the earth’s own satisfaction at his work. Burnt orange and crimson, the colors seeped like blood across the sky. He had ridden with his Angel’s arms around him.

  “Like when you wake up screamin’ at night?” she asked, eyes fixed on her ever-moving feet and the dry, cracked ground they covered.

  “Not nightmares,” Rufus corrected. “Good dreams.”

  “My Daddy has the bad ones.”

  “It was an Angel,” he said. She stopped her strange dancing and looked at him.

  “Like in heaven?” she asked, her in a scowl of disbelief.

  “Uh huh.”

  She giggled. “But I ain’t dead.” She lifted her arms from her sides and began her jagged dance again. “I don’t think so.”

  Rufus shrugged. “Maybe it wasn’t you. Maybe it was a sign, and the Angel made herself look like you ‘cause she knew I’d find you.”

  “What’d she say?”

  “That I had to drive the white folks outta the Indian Territory.”

  “How come?”

  “It’s how it was. How it’s supposed to be.”

  “My Daddy woulda been glad you shot a nigger today. My Daddy hates niggers.”

  “Well I hate white people.”

  “I’m white.”

  “You’re the Angel.”

  “Angels is white.” Her previously elaborate movements devolved into an imaginary game of hopscotch.

  Rufus watched the darkness grow all around him.

  “If you hate ‘em, how come you didn’t shoot the white one, too?”

  Rufus shrugged. “So he’ll go tell all the rest that they gotta leave.”

  “My Daddy ain’t leavin’. They gonna kill you.”

  “Not if I kill them first.”

  “Then you better start killin’.

  “I killed a man jus’ yesterday!” Rufus insisted.

  She placed one foot precisely before the other as if walking a tightrope. “Prob’ly just another nigger.”

  They camped not far from John Buck’s ranch. After the day’s blood and frenzy, the place had tugged at Rufus and he had followed. It was safe. Rufus was far enough from his father’s to keep the old man out of danger, and close enough to enjoy his proximity—to know and exploit the terrain.

  Maoma and Sam excitedly relived the day’s mayhem, re-enacting scenes and taking turns playing outlaw and victim. Lewis and Luckey were sufficiently removed from memories of flies buzzing on the dead and near-dead, anguished horses screaming, from the eerie stillness amidst the quickly browning blood—far enough from the sights and sounds to concentrate not on the disquieting aspects of corpses and killing, but on the excitement of galloping down from the hills on unsuspecting men—white men—who cowered before them—of themselves as the most powerful force as far as they could see. They lay on their blankets, luxuriating in it.

  Theodosia discovered a new world that day, like walking inside a magnificent dollhouse. Everything changed. The air, the light, her self, her company and what she was in the world. She had changed. She had become one of the big, black birds she’d always admired for their ravaging efficiency. All of her life people from town to town had floated past her as if imported from a different kind of life than she could ever know, like different beings—observed as if from a lowly backstage seat. Now she stripped them from the world like the birds stripped flesh from the corpse—so much more liberating a role than a mouse in the corner, a silent watcher forever apart. Her arms flapped slowly and leaned forward to see if the wind would take her.

  As she bent forward, Rufus leapt from the ground and grabbed her around the waist. He rubbed his stiff penis against her buttocks as he raised her thin dress.

  “Cut it OUT!” she screamed as she pounded at the hands that held her waist so tight she could barely move.

  His fingers yanked down her threadbare drawers. Sparse hair, a cleave, and then warm moisture encased his exploring fingers. Theodosia convulsed. She uttered a concussive grunt, as if kicked in the gut. Her struggling stopped. His fingers sank insider her and moved in and out as his hand tugged and pulled and rubbed, smearing her wetness all over her down there. Her eyes wide, she marveled at the intermittent shudders, the chills that cut right down inside her. He’d move his hand and there it was and she’d grunt and sigh like an animal. She pushed her middle into is hand wanting more. He dragged her drawers down to her feet and fumbled with his own belt. He pushed her head down and then she felt like she’d been stabbed. She screamed. The shudders were gone—just gasping pain. He pushed hard against her again and again and each time it felt like she was torn apart. She tried to straighten but his strong hand held her head down. She tri
ed to walk forward, but he tottered right behind, still pushing his penis inside her. He began to moan more and more loudly. She grabbed the hand not holding her down and sank her teeth into his arm. The flesh gave way and she tasted his blood in her mouth. Rufus screamed as his body shivered and he grasped her even more tightly against his exploding orgasm. He drew backwards and pushed her away. She fell to the ground and he to his knees, cradling his bleeding arm.

  Maoma, Sam, Luckey and Lewis stood behind a wild hedge, watching Rufus and Theodosia, each stroking his penis, each heavy-lidded and dreamy as hands pumped madly and synchronous thick splats of ejaculate soared like white fireworks into the air before them.

  “Goddammit whadja do that for!?” Rufus cried, cradling his bloody arm.

  “Me?” Theodosia screamed back. “What’d you do!?”

  “I was lovin’ you!”

  She rose, rushed at him and kicked him. “That hurt like hell,” she screamed.

  “It’s what men and women do.”

  “If they tryin’ to kill each other.” She moaned in pain and doubled over, clutching her blood-stained dress against her crotch.

  Rufus realized her pain was real. He walked to her and tenderly placed his hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  She jerked his hand away.

  “It sounded like you was likin’ it,” he pleaded.

  She pouted. “At first. A little. Then you started cuttin’ me up. I heard about men stickin’ their things inside women like they was whores.”

  “It’s what men and women do,” Rufus insisted.

  She rushed at him and delivered a quick series of punches and slaps. “Not me!” she shouted. “Where’s water ‘round here,” she demanded.

  “I’ll take you,” he offered.

  “You stay away from me. Point me the way.”

  Rufus pointed her toward the west. Grumbling, still bent and clutching her crotch, she disappeared.

  Rufus turned to see the four members of his gang, all shaking legs and tugging at their pants. He ignored them as he stomped after Theodosia. He needed to wash his bleeding arm.

  The water chattered softly as it raced across the streambed rocks. He saw her, naked in the water, scrubbing at the bloodstain on her dress. He kept his distance as he leaned to dip his arm in the cold stream. She saw him and grandiosely paid him no mind. He rinsed his arm, and then sat, penitent. The blue-gray had almost faded into night, just a hint of red about it. He watched her to the water’s prattling, her naked body against the backdrop of earth and trees and sky. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Even more beautiful than the Angel of his dream because she was real and he could touch her.

  As the darkness fell, she wrung out her dress and emerged shamelessly naked from the water. Rufus tentatively walked toward her. She scowled but did not protest. He stopped five feet from her and stared at his feet.

  “I need somethin’ to wear,” she said.

  His eyes brightened. He instantly dashed up toward the camp. She heard the trees and bushes rattling as he barged through them. She threw her dress over the undergrowth to dry. Again she heard the bushes thrash and Rufus reappeared with one of his shirts and a pair of trousers. Panting, he held them out toward her. With less of a scowl, she took the shirt and put it on. It fell almost to her knees. He offered the pants, but she declined. She barely glanced at him as she shouldered past and flounced back toward the camp. Rufus followed a few paces behind. As he did, four heads peeked out from behind a screen of brush.

  Rufus exhaled with relief when she plopped down by his bed roll. He slowly approached and, with feigned unconcern, sat next to her, staring at the last sliver of light on the horizon. She ran her fingers through her wet hair and pulled the blanket to her chin as she lay down to sleep. As she closed her eyes, he quietly, slowly stretched himself out next to her, and lightly slipped beneath the blanket. He closed his eyes in silent thanks when he felt no resistance. Unbeknownst to him, she smiled.

  ~ ~ ~

  With earth-rattling thunder and buckets of rain, thick, bruised skies raged at everything beneath them. In the distance, bolts of lighting slit the sky.

  At first, the distant screams seemed part of it, an aural accompaniment to the hot, ominous blue-gray shroud thrown across the world. Had any man dared to walk about in the still-dark with the skies mimicking the violence awaiting every white man and woman, he would have seen figures in the distance, charging closer to Tahlequah. He would have heard the sound grow with the approaching figures. And then he would have recognized horses, their rhythmic hoofs: horses and wagon at a gallop. Then, he would have understood.

  It was screaming. Atop the wagon’s rattles and creaks, the horses pounding, a mindless wail, less demanding than an infant’s and all the more unnerving because it seemed so rootless and unreasoning. Just a monotonous keen, meaningless enough to denote madness and constant enough to threaten the same.

  The wagon approached and the screaming grew louder. It awakened the townspeople. They gazed out their windows and wondered if this is what they had so desperately feared and what they had sworn to fight. This ungodly sound, they thought, might herald the Bucks.

  The most practiced hands trembled on their rifles as the wagon raced into town, driven by an open-mouthed, bloody, wild-eyed man who screamed as if sound itself propelled him. Guns pointed at the wagon sagged as men saw the state of the driver. They thought the wagon might gallop straight through town but the horses read some undetectable slackening of will and slowed. Men surrounded them and brought the wagon to a stop. And the screaming continued. Henry Hassan sat atop the wagon, his eyes wide and staring at nothing ahead, his mouth wide and hollering, “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa,” until he had no breath and sucking in air like a drowning man to do it again.

  “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.”

  The crowd puzzled. Heads shook. In the back of the wagon sat an old woman cradling weeping children and a woman lying flat on her back. The prone woman stared at nothing, straight up at the sky, silent. The children cried softly. Townswomen moved to comfort them.

  A man climbed next to Henry Hassan, marveled at his butchered face, and shook him. Hassan did not stop screaming. The man shook him harder, and Hassan turned his face to him. The long, endless screams changed to shorter ones, and then to staccato bursts. Henry Hassan raised his hands, which shook like a palsied man’s.

  “What happened?” What happened, Henry?”

  “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…” The screaming started again.

  “It’s okay. It’s okay.”

  “Get the doctor.”

  They talked Henry back to his intermittent bursts as they pulled him from the wagon, as his wife was carried down the street and his crying children tended.

  That’s how the Territories learned of the outrage at the Hassan farm.

  10

  The widow and her sons drove two covered wagons containing their worldly belongings as the Bucks swooped down on them. At gunpoint, the gang rifled one wagon, taking everything of value, and ordered the sons to drive it away. Reluctantly and at gunpoint, they left their mother and the other wagon with the Bucks.

  The widow was forced to strip. Each one of the gang, in turn, then climbed beneath canopy alone with her. Her screams stopped after the second of them.

  “She dead?” Theodosia asked Rufus as he, the last, emerged.

  “Uh uh. She ain’t movin’ but she’s breathin.’”

  Theodosia raised her eyebrows smirkingly and walked away.

  Rufus felt her chastisement. She had said he’d better start killing or they would kill him. He considered going back. He even took his gun from its holster, but found that he couldn’t. He conjured the scene—the pleading eyes, the revolver’s noisy lurch, and then the blood splatter and the stillness—all alone inside the tiny wagon. It would be like Garrett all over, but without the open sky to justify and waft away the stain. He feared that he might h
ear the ringing again; and that this time it might never stop.

  “Killin’s for men!” he shouted after Theodosia the moment he thought of it; but she paid him no mind.

  ~

  The young white man they found between Okmulgee and Checotah had no idea that he had been condemned to die. They rode calmly upon his camp in the evening. He greeted them and asked what he could do for them. They pulled their guns and stripped him of his belongings. Rufus remained in his saddle, Theodosia seated behind him, as the others picked through and divided his few belongings. The young man looked on resignedly, assuming that having taken everything, they’d be on their way.

  “I don’t like him,” Maoma announced. “I say we kill him.”

  The man’s eyes widened.

  “Let’s vote on it,” Maoma said as the man looked on, disbelieving. His mind raced so fast he couldn’t conjure the words to plead for his life or convey his astonishment.

  Sam’s hand flew up. Maoma’s followed. There was a pause as Rufus felt Theodosia’s warm pressure up against him. He, too raised his hand. The moment he did, Lewis and Luckey shot their palms in the air. Once the unanimous hands had been acknowledged, arms fell slowly, and in silence.

  The man had never had much and expected little more. But he, who had harmed no one in his life, who carried no gun—he had not expected to die so soon, nor to die in violence. He had a few, appropriately small plans, but as he dreamed small, he had as much hope of fulfilling his dreams as any. In the quiet, he thought of them: the man for whom he broke sod all day offered to take him on permanent. He could settle down. He wanted a horse of his own—a palomino—a type he had always admired.

  The shot startled them. They jumped like colts. The man just stood there for a moment as the blood stained his shirt. Smoke seeped from Maoma’s gun. His sidekick Sam quickly snapped off two more ragged shots that sent the man spinning to the ground. Sam beamed with pride.