Kickapoo

By Hendrik E. Sadi

This is a story of a group of teenagers coming to Oklahoma in the late 1950s to redeem an inherited guilt by building a meetinghouse for an Indian tribe and evil, in the form of a comical old man, trying to stop them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 17, 2001
• ISBN: 9780595722525

Hendrik E. Sadi

The author was born in Norway, lived in the Middle East as a young teenager, and now presently lives in Westchester Country, New York State. He supports himself as a real estate broker, and writes in his spare time.

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Kickapoo

Hendrik E. Sadi

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Kickapoo

Copyright © 2001 Hendrik E. Sadi.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-0-5952-0313-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-0-5957-2252-5 (e)

iUniverse rev. date:  10/14/2022

Council, Oklahoma

Even from where he was, walking up the wide main street from the highway with two others, slouched over, with his hands in the pockets of his black chino pants and scuffing up the red-brown dust with the motorcycle boots he had on, in a town that seemed to be living a past, with wood post railings running up and down in front of the squat-like two story clapboard houses, whose upper windows eyed the wide expanse of the street like some guarding sentinel being on careful watch, he could see the hands moving above the head of the small childlike figure, sitting in the rocking chair on the porch floor.

There moving and striking, no snatching out it seemed to him, at some imagined air born figure; or just at the very air itself, he thought, coming closer to the long extension of the porch floor. Then he mounted the sagging wood steps leading up, and saw the childlike figure was an old man moving his small, thin, grimy looking hands above the straw weaved cowboy hat that he had slanted down over his forehead. Then he saw the flies and knew why.

But another thought came to him, looking at the way he was striking and snatching out at the flies he saw come and buzz in front of him, teasing and testing him in a wingspan, circular movement. And he thinks.

‘There is something else besides those flies that has him moving those hands of his like that, so spastically.’

Not the flies, but his own anger, he says, stopping the two who have come with him, the few feet away from the old man sitting, curled up, in the rocking chair, reading himself now for the fly.

And he sees the fly buzz in and land on the sunken face, and as quickly fly off before the thin, grimy looking hand could come down and claim it, hearing the smacking sound of flesh and skin meet with some angry words, mad without any meaning to him.

Slop! Slop! he hears.

He smiles then, looking at him, seeing the fly poised and buzzing in front of him again, in that teasing, testing wingspan venture, about to strike, he thinks when it suddenly turns and flies up the street to the north end.

And he hears him cursing it with those same two words he had heard before, while his small, thin, grimy hands, keeps striking and snatching at only the air now.

‘Yes,’ he thinks once more. ‘This old man looks to be fighting more than those flies that have been bothering him.’

He looks to be fighting something, something more personal, Ranen says to himself and moves on, with the floorboards sounding his presence.

And he sees the old man jerk around in the rocking chair and look at him with more than the tinge of blue that covers the gray of his eyes, and there focuses in him something old of evil, he feels while he looks at him, feeling the hold he has on him. Then he sees the smile suddenly move across the toothless, sunken face, welcoming him.

Hidy, he says as the two with him turn, wondering why he was not walking on towards the general store they had been heading for.

Say, com’on, what’s holding you? the taller of the two says, loud enough. Com’on, we got to get back to camp soon.

So, he tears himself away from the old man and the evil he has felt coming from him and scuffs the floorboards with his heavy looking motorcycle boots as he moves on, feeling the air suddenly being disturbed when he sees the thin, grimy looking hand at his side.

Wah’ch you want old man? he says in the street slang he has brought down with him. Wah’ch you want with me?

It stopped him then, the voice. And he stood there, a small childlike figure blinking its gray-blue eyes rapidly up at him, with his toothless, sunken face spread in a smile, wearing a pair of bib-overalls that have ironed out stiff from wearing them too long, he sees.

Suppose, suppose now ah try nd guess now?

Wah’ch you wana guess old man? he says, putting his hands back in the front pockets of his black chino pants.

Suppose, suppose now. Ah spect Misigan?

Michigan! Hell, you’re way off old man, he tells him, playing his game as he stands there looking down at him, with his pink shirt collared up in the back.

Suppose, suppose now. Ah spect Colado?

No old man, not that either. And he catches the screen door on the rebound, and turns in the doorway, his eyes meeting the gray-blue blinking eyes of the old man. Tell, you what. I’m just going in to get me a cowboy hat like the one you got. It’ll give you time to think about it some more, he says, and turns, and crashes the screen door behind him.

He goes into the store, not sensing or hearing the other one entering it. But there inside, the small, childlike figure is soon tagging along with him as he goes touching and smelling the store clothes lying on the counter.

Suppose, suppose now. Ah spect Califoni? he says, looking at his pink shirt.

No. Not that one either old man. On the other side of the continent, he just says, picking up a straw weaved cowboy hat. Wah’ch you think of this one? he asks him, setting the hat on his own head.

Suppose, suppose now. Ah spect Naew Yark? he says, thinking now he has it right. Then he skips about the store, voicing. Naew Yark, Naew Yark. That where yah’all get them shirts?

Yeah, that’s right old man, that’s where we get these here shirts, he tells him, seeing her coming towards him.

Mr. Pea. Mr. Pea. I’ve told you lord enough times now not to bother the customers, she says: A large, warm looking woman standing now in front of him.

Slop! Slop! he just says, and turns and hurries out of the store, crashing the screen door behind him, and sits again in the rocking chair, curled up in it.

You mus’n mind Mr. Pea young man, she says, turning to him. He is someone we all have to live with down here. Lord knows he’s trying sometimes.

That his name? he asks her, feeling the smile, even the laughter working its way to his mouth.

Mr. Pea? Lord no. We just call him that, she says. Then she is quiet and thinks again about it, about him.

‘Yes, he will want to know that, the reason, the many years. I can’t recall myself how many of them he was up in that institution at Permount and how he just came back no better than he had left. Yes, so they said they just couldn’t do anything for him, or with him, and sent him back home. So now he’s kind of our little responsibility, you might say.’

So now you mus’n pay any attention to Mr. John MacGrath, she tells him. He’s what you might call impaired.

You mean he’s crazy? he says.

Oh, ah wouldn’t call him that. He’s what you might call difficult at times, she says and goes and busies herself in the store.

John MacGrath, he voices.

And they step back out onto the porch floor. He, and Hubert Gorman, a taller, heavyset fifteen-year old boy, his own age, who walks like, no rolls in a way that reminds him of a penguin, and Krantz Morgan, also Junior, who has come down with him from Waincross, New York, to this place called Council, Oklahoma: A forgotten place lying somewhere in between Shawnee and Pawnee, Oklahoma.

From the porch, they jump down onto the red-brown dusted street, wondering why it had not been paved and poured with cement like any other city street, and see the brick laid school house up at the north end, while he observes the dust motes of sand grains spinning a late sun colored light about his boots, and the eyes of the old man following them as they go back down the wide expanse of the street to the highway.

And there he turns, and sees again the small, thin, grimy looking hands striking and snatching at the flies above the straw weaved cowboy hat that he has slanted down over his forehead, in the late afternoon sun that holds and bathes him now with a bronze-colored light.

*        *        *        *        *

He was still sitting in the room on the bed near the two windows he had covered enough of the glass with paper to keep the sunlight from entering. And he sat now in this semi-darkness, propped up at the head of the wide iron bed, with his hands, thin and long, suddenly moving to his eyes when he heard the screen door opening. So, he sat stiff, watching them entering, with his dark, deep-set eyes moving rapidly behind the long, bony looking fingers covering his thin, pale, colorless face like bars.

Di did did, you you, get them? he stutters at one of them.

Get what Will? the other one shot back, holding a smile back.

You you you, know, wha what!

You know, I almost forgot, the other one then tells him, walking over to his bed, pulling something out of his pocket. Here, he says and threw the pair of sunglasses on the bed. Put ‘em on. Let’s see how they look on you, he jests.

He moved a hand over the bed then, covering both of his eyes now with the other one, his thin, long, bony looking hand crawling forward for the glasses he soon finds in the recognized touch of the frames, and grabs them and puts them on and feels immediately the hidden privacy that seems to have been blown into the dark lenses. Looking at him, they all think the glasses larger than they are, next to his small, thin face.

Hey Willy, can you see? Krantz asked him, sitting down on his own bed that jutted out, wide and iron built, opposite his, into the room, and where above it one of the covered windows stood. Hey, let’s see, he suddenly says, and reaches up and tears away the covering, and sees the light crashing into the room, stark and bronze like, that bathes Will Ranson and the sunglasses he had just put on.

Yeh yeh, I can, see see, very, well well, now, he says.

The other two, who had come back with him from the general store, sat in the other two beds that jutted out into the room, near the entrance. One of them sat there now, idling the time away, feeling a stillness coming over him, with his feet dangling over the foot of the bed in some rhythmic time keeping while he waited, wondering what was next.

Yeh yeh, I can, see see, very, well well, now, Will Ranson said again, and grabbed at the coverings on the other window above his bed, his head and being then showered with the stream of bronze light that crashes into the room. There in the quiet space it spun the dust motes that had risen up from the broken linoleum floor.

Ranen Sarensen, from his bed, looking into it, remembered how the sun had spun some colors in the red-brown dust when he had jumped down from the porch, and sat back now in his bed, just staring into the lightshow, feeling a strangeness come over him, something wild and open that this land still seemed to be part of.

Not like his own city, he thought, thinking about New York City and Waincross, New York where he was from. He thought about home now and saw himself sitting at the counter inside the DiAngelos luncheonette, smoking a Camel cigarette, while behind him, the jukebox spun out the rock and roll songs and country ones.

Say, what we wait’n in here for anyways? he suddenly says, feeling a restlessness coming over him. And he leaned back in his bed and looked over at Hubert Gorman.

Huey, wah’ch you reading? he asked him, looking at his lips moving so passionately over the page.

What did you ask me Ranen?

The book...You’re always reading a book?

I like to read, Hubert Gorman tells him and moved his large face back to the page.

Wah’ch you wana be...A schoolteacher or something? he asked him.

But Hubert Gorman just ignored him and turned another page as if he hadn’t spoken to him.

Wait a minute now. What was his name now? Hey Krantz! Ranen suddenly then says and turns to the other boy sitting in the bed next to him, with his feet dangling above the broken linoleum floor of the room. Member the time you had to read out loud in English class? What was that you read anyways? he asked him.

I don’t remember, he tells him, turning his fifteen-year old face, that, in profile, reminds him of one of those Greek status cut in marble with curled light brown hair, and looks at him with his milk-watered, sky-blue eyes.

Wah’ch you wana know that for anyways? he asked him.

Ah, you just don’t want to remember it, he tells him and turns to Hubert Gorman.

Hey Huey, something of beauty...You know that one? he asked him and saw the head quickly turning up from the page. Now the gray-clouded eyes, looks at him with interest, he sees, and hears him reciting.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever, Ranen, Hubert Gorman tells him and feels, in the recitation of the words, the passion still glowing in him.

Huey, you really know all that stuff, he tells him and turns with a jesting look towards Krantz Morgan Jr., he sees lying propped up now in his bed, staring up at the ceiling with a grin masking his face.

Krantz, he says.

Ah mah boy, Junior returns without moving his eyes from the ceiling, Huey’s a poet.

Suddenly they heard the screen door opening slowly and quietly, even timidly it sounds to them, its un-oiled hinges piercing the air in the room, and see him standing there: A thin, frail looking man with an undecided air about him. He looks at them, moving his eyes about the room, but hesitates to tell them yet why he has brought himself down to the boy’s cottage: A large, one room house set back where the campground slants down, with pealing white paint.

Hubert, he finally says, quietly addressing the one he has come to believe approachable. I think we might need you boys to help unload the car, and becomes quiet again. And he looks further back into the room, and sees, in the far corner, the one staring back at him with the dark sunglasses on, and the one still watching the ceiling, before he rests his eyes on the remaining boy upfront dressed in pink and black, with motorcycle boots on. He forces himself now. Ranen, did you bring some work clothes with you? I think you’ll ruin...

Are we work’n now? Ranen Sarensen asked him, sitting up at the foot of the bed.

No, not yet, except to unload the car. Did you bring some work clothes with you? he asked him again.

Yeah. Are we working now?

He looked at him then, silently, almost fatherly in a womanly way, for a minute. We’ll probably start tomorrow, or the next day when the others have arrived. But we need to...I wouldn’t want you to ruin those clothes unloading the car, he tells him, and turns and looks at the dark glasses looking back at him, thinking fast now. ‘Is this what is expected of me. Have I not, with them, gotten myself into something, something I cannot...?’ But he does not want to think it.

William, do you have trouble with your eyes? Are those prescription glasses that you have on? he asked him.

No, no, Mister Franklin, he stuttered back to him.

But if there is nothing wrong with your eyes, why do you wear them? Can you see with them?

Yeh yeh, I can, see see, very, well well, now.

Well, I see.

And he turned for the screen door, moving his thin, frail looking thirty-year old body cautiously to it and stepped out onto the campgrounds: A place set back from the long tar highway, shaded in front by the clump of old trees. He moved to the right, opposite from where the two story house stands, where he and his wife and the girls will stay, towards the kitchen shack, thinking as he walked towards the green colored station wagon standing in front of the low roofed shack, whether this, this that he is new at, chaperoning with his wife for the summer, he will be able to do, remembering still the ones who are slowly walking behind him. He wished then in a prayer that the other ones who will be coming will be more normal, more like him and his wife, as he unlocked the back panel and reached in for the box of food, hearing.

We can do that Mr. Franklin, Hubert Gorman says behind him, and moves in quickly now, rolling his tall, heavyset body forward, like a penguin. Let me do that, he offers, and grabs hold of the box he is holding, their hands and fingers interlocking in a clumsy attempt at exchange that drops the box on the ground.

I’m sorry. My hands slipped, he says, and bends over and picks up the box and carries it over towards the woman’s face watching him from inside the screen door.

Mrs. Franklin, where do you want this? he asked her, standing above her.

You can set it down over there Hubert, she tells him, directing him to the metal table standing next to the gas stove.

So, he sat the box down and went back out, passing now the others coming in with more boxes in the line they make, stretching from the car to the kitchen shack, she saw. She looked now at the one going back out.

Ranen, didn’t you bring any work clothes with you? Some clothes that you won’t ruin while you work.

This ain’t work Mrs. Franklin, he tells her, letting the screen door crash behind him.

She does not say anything more to him and goes over to the boxes and unloads the food stuff; placing the cans and dried things she can in the cupboards and the rest back in the boxes, which she arranges neatly against the wall.

Well, she says, mostly to herself. I guess we better think about getting something to eat.

While from the long tar highway, down past the dirt footpath that leads into the campgrounds and turns in front of the one house and two cottages standing like a circle, a car is heard screeching past the sagging