Backland Graces; Four Short Novels

by Hal Zina Bennett

  Before he got to the back door, Truman was out on the deck checking out why Menko was barking.

  “What’re you hunting?” Truman asked, nodding toward the shotgun on Loman’s right arm. “Ain’t nothing in season.”

  “They’ve took Della.”

  “Who took her?”

  “To the hospital. I want to know what you done to her.”

  “What’re you talking about, Loman?”

  “I want to know what you done with all this.”

  “I didn’t have nothing to do with it.”

  “At the hospital. You prayed.”

  “Sure…that she’d get well.”

  “What makes you think you got a right? You got no kind of hold on her. Talking to your god and what-all. I know what happens.” He waved the gun in Truman’s direction.

  “You planning to shoot me?”

  “Just might.”

  “I only do the Lord’s work, to bring health and comfort.”

  “I didn’t appoint you to butt into my life. She’s got something wrong. It’s for the doctors to make her well or maybe not even them if I don’t want it.”

  “I meant no harm.”

  Loman raised the gun to his shoulder and pointed toward Truman. “You ain’t nothing except a woodcutter. Tell me what you done to her. If you’ve brought her harm, I swear I will put you down, same as a bad dog.”

  “Put away the gun and come inside,” Truman said. “I got a pot of coffee on. Set with me, Loman.”

  “I know about your god,” Loman said. “The Lord God is an angry God. I heard ‘em say it right out. But you won’t get my little girl. If you can do whatever you done, you can undo it.”

  “Undo what?” Truman shook his head. “Put down the gun and talk to me.”

  “You said about the church where her play-school meets. And when the sirens came you knew they were coming for her, and at the hospital, and then you was at the end of her bed with raised hands. I’ve seen what God makes a man do, beat a man down and leave him to die in the dust when he doesn’t come to your way.”

  “I’m going inside,” Truman said. “If you have to shoot me, I guess you have to.”

  The explosion rocked Loman’s shoulder back as birdshot splattered against the side of the house. Flakes of dry paint fluttered into the air, leaving a two foot circle of pocks in the siding.

  Truman leapt inside, driven by old reflexes he thought he’d lost. He dodged into the tiny bedroom off the kitchen, flung himself across the bed and reached under the mattress for his Colt automatic. It was an ancient firearm by modern standards, an Army issue from WWI that he’d purchased at a surplus store back in the 50s when he was barely a teenager and a gun was still easy to buy. He kept it under his mattress as protection against thieves or perhaps to kill a raccoon that tangled with his dog. He wracked back the barrel sending the first bullet into the chamber from the clip, rolled off the bed and crawled back toward the kitchen. Loman was standing at the top step yelling something about God, but Truman couldn’t figure out what the words meant.

  “Get off my porch,” Truman yelled back. “If you cross that threshold you’re a dead man.” To drive his point home he pulled the trigger. The recoil of the 45 thrust his wrist back and reminded him that on the next shot, if there was a next one, he’d hold the gun with both hands to steady it. He was way out of practice.

  The bullet had nicked the edge of the screen door and ricocheted across the back yard. Loman leapt from the porch and landed on his back, rolled to his feet and raced toward the open garage fifty feet ahead, the dog barking viciously at his heels. As ringing filled Truman’s ears, set off by the report of the handgun still echoing inside the house, he noticed the splintered wood at the top of the doorjamb. What alarmed him most was how far off he’d been, at least 18 inches further up and to the left than he’d intended. It was the first time he’d shot the gun in more than a dozen years.

  From the garage came another burst from the shotgun, splattering against the side of the house, some of the shot penetrating the screen door and rolling harmlessly across the kitchen floor. Truman made a mental note. Loman’s double-barreled shotgun would be empty now and he’d have to reload. He took the opportunity to crab walk into the living room and slide out the front door. The door hadn’t been opened in several years so he had to tug on it and then slip outside past the blackberry vines that had invaded the front yard between the house and the road. He held the gun pointing up as he shoved past the thorny vines and around the side of the house. By the time he got to where he wanted to be, his arms were masses of long red scratches with tiny beads of blood and black stains from the overripe berries.

  Truman moved like a cat, working his way through the trees and underbrush at the edge of the yard between the house and the garage. Loman was yelling something but he could not make out what he was saying and cared even less. The big man was clearly not in his right mind. But right mind or not, a man with a gun was a man with a gun. At that moment, Truman began pondering the question of whether or not he would kill Loman if it came to that. He had every right to do so and anyone with a lick of sense wouldn’t have hesitated a moment. During the war he’d killed, though never anybody he’d known or had even seen. That was different. You were fighting for God and country. You couldn’t not kill. It was your God-given duty.

  Truman cut across the yard toward the back of the garage, figuring he’d get a look at Loman through the window and then take him by surprise. There was a side door at the back of the garage, with a window Truman could smash and get a shot off before Loman knew what was happening. As he approached the door, moving stealthily across the open area that he kept mowed as a fire stop, he caught a glimpse of Loman sitting with his back against the wall. But something was wrong. Loman slumped forward and he was not holding the shotgun outward, toward the house. He had the double barrels pressed against his forehead, both hands wrapped around the breech, his right thumb pressed into the trigger guard.

  For a moment Truman felt relieved. At least he need not fear that he was Loman’s only target now. Images flashed through his mind of dead soldiers lying in a field in a country he did not even know. They were people he’d fought with, men from his own platoon, three of them. It was the first time he’d seen up close what war was really all about. Until that moment, though he’d been under fire many times, he had not seen death up close. It had not been personal. Nobody he knew had died yet.

  He knelt down and ducked under the windows, working his way toward the open front of the garage. Loman was thirty feet away. If Truman stepped out the two men would be facing each other, each man with a gun. He did not want to kill anyone anymore, least of all Loman. He stepped out away from the wall, standing in plain sight before the other man.

  “Loman,” he said. “Leave it be.”

  The big man looked up, drew his head away from the muzzle of the gun and started scrambling to his feet, turning the gun in Truman’s direction. Suddenly there was an explosion and the shotgun jerked from Loman’s hand and spun crazily across the dusty cement floor. Like a madman, Loman scramble frantically after it.

  “Stop. Let it be,” Truman said. “Just set.”

  Loman froze, staring at the pistol in Truman’s hand as if seeing it for the first time. Truman stepped forward and kicked the shotgun out of range. Then he pressed the barrel of his pistol into Loman’s back.

  “Go ahead. Shoot me,” Loman whined. “Just do it. Do it, Truman. Just fucking do it.”

  Truman backed away toward the shotgun, which was well beyond Loman’s reach, bent down, picked it up and ejected the shells.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Truman asked. “What’s going on, Loman? What the hell are you doing?”

  Loman looked up at Truman. “You done this to her.”

  “Lord have mercy,” Truman said. “You poor dumb fuck.”

  Loman began crawling again, toward the shotgun.

  “You don’t quit this, someone’s going to die,
” Truman said.

  Loman dove for the shotgun and landed clumsily on top of it. He rolled and came up into a sitting position, the gun across his lap. He opened the breech, dug into his pocket and was trying to shove two shells into the chamber when Truman let out a mournful cry, raised his pistol, drew a deep breath, aimed and squeezed the trigger. The gun leapt in his hand and Loman tumbled backwards like a tree carelessly felled. The shotgun fell noisily beside him, the breech still open.

  In an instant, Truman was beside him. Loman lay stretched out on his back staring up at Truman.

  “Damn you,” Loman said in a voice like that of a small boy.

  “You’ll be alright,” Truman said. “I’ll call.”

  “Finish it!”

  Truman shook his head slowly. “You don’t understand…”

  Blood seeped from the wound on the left side of Loman’s chest, higher and to the left of what Truman had meant to hit. Truman jammed the pistol into his rear pocket, leaned over and picked up the shotgun. There was still one live shell that Loman had managed to load into the barrel, the other had rolled a few feet away from where he lay. Truman retrieved it, shoved it into the breech and closed the gun. He took it back to the garage and leaned it in the corner, then walked past Loman and up the back stairs to phone.

  Truman had always hated the smell of hospitals. He paced up and down the parking lot outside the ER, sticking his head inside the door of the small clinic every twenty minutes or so to see if they had any further news at the desk. The young nurse at the desk shook her head solemnly.

  Around two a.m. Truman went to sleep in the back of his truck, laying down in the sawdust and debris from the past month of hauling wood. Sometime between the hour he fell asleep and at five AM had a dream. He was approaching the front door of a great mansion. It was ten stories high, all made of white marble. But there were no windows and only a single, narrow door. A broad stairway led up to the door. There were many steps, more than he could easily count.

  Standing alone at the foot of the stairs, he was suddenly afraid. A voice came from somewhere above him and he looked up. Was it a bird or an angel? He could not tell at first but as he stared upwards its form became increasingly clear. It was an angel of sorts but the angel was Loman and he was holding something, the shotgun, and pointing it at Truman. Truman reached for his own gun which was still in his back pocket, drew it, pulled back the hammer, pointed it at the angel and shot. Loman sprouted wings and started to take flight. Then his wings collapsed. His shotgun clattered to the ground, bouncing crazily down the marble steps, landing at last at Truman’s feet. Seconds later, the angel Loman landed with a terrible heavy plop less than a dozen feet away. Truman stared at the beautiful white wings growing out of Loman’s back. Their downy feathers fell away and all that was left looked like the plucked wings of a giant chicken.

  Truman slowly opened his eyes, turned onto his back and looked up at the morning sky. It was overcast and gray. In this somnolent state, his dream seemed all too real and he wondered was it possible for an angel to die. And if it were possible, what was he, Truman, doing? Why would he shoot an angel? Surely God would not allow such things to happen. Surely if he violated God’s will there would be a terrible reckoning! The horror of this possibility was just beginning to seep into Truman’s mind when he heard footsteps approaching.

  A stranger leaned over the side of his truck bed and Truman pulled himself up to a sitting position. The stranger wore a green surgical gown and wore a forced smile on his face.

  “Your friend,” the stranger said, “we brought him out of recovery about an hour ago. I think he’s going to be okay. Bullet missed all vital organs. Lost some blood. Busted up a lot of bones in there. Big mess. You can visit him if you like.”

  “He has a little daughter,” Truman said. “Della…um…she’s…”

  “We know. Social services took care of that…”

  “Took care of what?”

  “Foster care. She’s a ward of the court, now. It’s okay. You a relative?”

  Truman swung over the side of the truck and dropped easily to the ground. He shook his head. “Brothers…um…we’re brothers. Family.” He was not really lying, he told himself. Loman was his brother as much as anyone was. In God’s family, everyone was brother or sister. “Where do I go?”

  The stranger gave Truman directions to Loman’s room, then followed along beside him. “He asked to see you,” he told Truman.

  Truman nodded. He was pleased to hear Loman had done that. “The girl…”

  “I can’t tell you anything.”

  “He knows?”

  The stranger shrugged. “I don’t know what he knows.” He stopped in front of a door marked Medical Staff Only. He pulled the door open and stepped back, inviting Truman to enter. The room smelled strongly of disinfectant. It was a small room with a bench along one wall and a large red plastic garbage can crammed full of soiled surgical gowns, some of them blood stained.

  “You’ll have to smock up to go into the recovery room. Mask and all. Do you need assistance?”

  Truman nodded. The stranger helped him put on one of the fresh green surgical gowns and affix a mask around his face.

  “He’s making it okay, though?” Truman asked. The mask made it difficult to speak and the inside was damp against his lips.

  “He’ll be fine. He’ll need a couple weeks of rest. Is there anyone who can watch after him, you know, see to it that he gets good care at home?”

  “He can come to my place,” Truman heard himself say. He did not know why he had offered this for there wasn’t a spare room where Loman could sleep. He could give Loman his own room, of course, and sleep on the living room couch. It could work out. He could tolerate anything for a couple or three weeks.

  The stranger in the green surgical gown opened the door to a room with several people in beds. Most of them appeared to be sleeping. A couple of the beds had metal frames attached overhead, with pulleys and ropes that were somehow attached to parts of the men’s bodies. Truman remembered the Army hospital then, where he’d spent several weeks recovering from shrapnel wounds to his legs. He’d been luckier than most of his friends. Some had lost arms and legs. Some had died. The stink of death, bad digestion, nervous sweat and hospital disinfectant fouled his nostrils and he wondered what he was doing there.

  He was escorted to the foot of a bed but did not recognize the man laying there. His face was clean-shaven and tubes had been taped to his nose and mouth, holding them in. Metal racks had been placed on both sides of the bed like a baby’s crib, preventing him from falling out. His wrists had been tied to the railings and there was a strap around his chest restraining him from moving too much.

  “He needs to be immobilized for some time,” the man in the green smock told Truman. Truman stepped over to the side of the bed and peered down at the man’s face. They’d raised the head of the bed so that Loman was nearly sitting up. The stranger explained that it was to make him more comfortable. He would have difficulty breathing for awhile. It would prevent his lungs from filling. He was still in some danger.

  As Truman leaned closer, studying the face, he could see that it was Loman, for sure, or another man just like him, another who had no teeth. It was difficult relating to this man, however, clean-shaven and so helpless. The big red beard had hidden a receding chin that now made the face look ineffectual and weak. Between that shiny, shaved chin that flowed into a chicken-flesh neck, and his long, beaky nose, Loman reminded Truman of a snapping turtle. Loman was far more attractive with his beard.

  Truman cleared his throat and put his right hand gently on Loman’s right shoulder, avoiding the bandages wrapped around his chest and shoulders. “You doin’ okay?”

  “Am I…” Loman’s words struggled to leave his mouth.

  “What’s that?” Truman asked, leaning closer to Loman’s face.

  “Am I…am I…am I…”

  “What are you saying?” Truman asked, impatiently. “Can’t
you talk?”

  “Am I…” Loman’s lips pursed out, the tongue feebly licking them, the jaw working up and down as if the movement alone might shove the sounds out of his throat. Loman coughed and a distressed look, perhaps pain, darkened his expression.

  “You are okay,” Truman said. “You’ll be okay. God be praised!”

  “Jesus,” Loman said. “Jesus Christ.”

  For a moment, Truman wasn’t sure he’d heard Loman right. He stared at him blankly. “What’d you just say?”

  “Jesus.”

  “Jesus, yes? What else?”

  “I’m saved.”

  Truman did not know what to say. “Praise the Lord,” he mumbled, talking to the floor. “Praise be to Jesus Christ!” He now felt the spirit moving in his heart and raised his face toward the ceiling, toward the sky he saw in his mind’s eye. He closed his eyes in blissful prayer and let his voice be lifted by his words. “Praise God that our brother’s life be given. Praise God that he be returned.” He raised his arms, spreading them out as if to hold the whole world. “Oh, Sweet Jesus, our Lord and Savior, thank you for all miracles today! Thank you for your blessings of eternal life beyond this veil of tears…”

  He suddenly fell silent. Something was wrong. He looked down at the man in the bed. His eyes had glazed over. They were glassy and cold. His face was frozen and waxen. Panicked, confused, he turned. The man in the green smock was gone. Maybe he hadn’t been there for a long time. Truman reached for Loman’s neck, touched his fingers to the skin, looking for a pulse. When he could find none, he rushed to the other side of the bed where the call button dangled from a black cord. He pressed the cord and a buzzer sounded somewhere in the distance. He pressed it again and again, looking down at the waxen face, fearing it was futile, stunned that it had happened so fast. The man in green had said he’d be okay. He dropped the call button and it swung down, clattering against the metal railings.