Fifty Years of Peace (Abrupt Dissent Series) (3 page)

“Thank you but I really can’t,” he said. “Please just go.”

“Ok,” she said and fled from behind the stage. She tried to compose herself, wiping at her nose and eyes as she picked her way through the crowd back up the hill to her tent. The people were smiling, laughing, carrying baskets stuffed with tomatoes and carrots and lettuce and the produce of the entire valley. It was so perfect, but still there were boys like that in the world who’d probably grown up in hardship and didn’t understand that things had changed.

Jacob was waiting for her outside the tent. He looked at her, noticing her red face, but then his eyes slid behind her.

“Who’s this?” he asked.

Jenny turned and saw that the boy had followed her. She could see how thin he was now that he was standing. He’d notched holes into his belt to keep his too-large pants on his waist.

“My name is George Washington,” the boy said. He didn’t hold out his hand.

“Is it?” Jacob said.

“He’s…from Lexington,” Jenny said. “His parents had an accident on the way here. I was going to give him some cheese.”

“Well it’s nice to meet you George,” Jacob said. He didn’t seem sincere, and stared at the boy as she led them inside the tent. She cut into a fresh wheel of cheddar, wrapped a wedge in cheesecloth and handed it to the boy.

“I can pay,” George said. He handed her a coin.

“No no, it’s ok,” she said.

“Jenny, if he can pay…?” Jacob prodded her.

She looked at George, then sighed and uncovered the cash box. Just as she lifted it back to the table though, Manuel burst into the tent.

“He’s coming!” Manuel called. “The assemblyman is coming! Why is the tent closed?”

“He’s coming now?” she asked.

“Yes! Yes! Hurry!” Manuel called and started rolling the canvas to reopen the tent. “If he likes our cheese it would be a godsend!”

She dropped the burlap bag on the cashbox and grabbed one of the flaps while Manuel and Jacob lifted the other. Just as she finished the last tie, she saw the big assemblyman making his way from the stage with Mayor Trestle alongside of him. She scanned the tent, but George had gone. The cashbox was still where she’d left it under the burlap.

“I do say Mr. Mayor,” the assemblyman was saying, “This is a fine set-up, very fine. Everyone will have such a good view of the stage, and I can promise you I project my voice quite well.”

“I’m so glad. Is there anything else we can do for you Linden?”

“You know, I’m a bit hungry. What can you recommend?”

“Well sir…” the mayor began.

“Fresh cheddar cheese, right here,” Manuel called. “Made with the best milk in all of Henderson county from the Two Star Ranch, famous throughout Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky. Our cheese has been served in Cincinnati, Knoxville, St. Louis, even in points east. They keep the peace just so they can import Two Star cheddar…”

The assemblyman smiled.

“All right my friend, you’ve sold me. I’ll try a bite.”

Manuel handed him the sample tray while Jenny watched. The field hand had been smart to recognize the opportunity. If an assemblyman commended her Grandpa’s cheese, it would mean a giant lift in orders. But the boy behind the stage worried her. Something had been wrong with him.

“Now sir, that is very good cheese. How much for a wheel?”

“Ten dollars,” Jenny said.

“A bargain! And who is this beautiful young lady helping you?”

“This is Jenny Williams,” the Major said. “She’s the granddaughter of Richard Williams, who’s owned Two Star Ranch since before the war. And these others are Manuel del Norte who helps at the farm and Jacob Johnson, one of my aides.”

“Well,” the assemblyman said as he licked his fingers. “That is some fine cheese, mighty fine. Mr. Mayor, we need to talk about how we can bring produce like this to Dallas.”

“Really?” Jenny couldn’t contain her excitement.

“That is the truth Ms. Williams. We don’t see this level of quality often. Would it be all right with you if I came out to see your operation this trip?”

“Oh we’d be delighted!”

“Then I’ll look forward to it. Now Mr. Mayor, what other deliciousness do you have for me?”

Mayor Trestle winked at
Jenny as he steered the assemblyman on with Jacob in tow. Manuel turned to her, beaming, and she threw her arms around him. The rest of the day passed in a blur. She couldn’t stop thinking about how the assemblyman commended their cheese, and the strange boy from the stage, and the odd encounter with Jacob in the closed tent. That night, as the exciting day began to fade from her mind, she opened the cash box to count their profit, and found a note stuffed between the coins.

Thank you for your kindness. I don’t want to hurt anyone but sometimes things have to be done. Please don’t leave your tent tomorrow.

She stayed up a long time listening to Manuel snore, trying to understand what the strange boy had meant and why she was suddenly so worried.

The morning of the festival started with
the traditional market parade. From the Two Star Ranch tent, Jenny could hear the brass band playing rollicking music all the way from the market’s entrance. The procession neared the parade grounds, and she could see members of the town’s police following behind on horseback, then a number of notable citizens from the city and outlying areas waving from carts and floats.

“Grandpa should be with them,” she said to Manuel as the parade passed by.

“He’s too humble for this. He prefers cows,” Manuel smiled.

She’d been thinking about George Washington all morning. The boy had been crying, and she couldn’t understand why. He’d seemed honest, kind even, but he’d given her what must have been a false name. What had he been trying to warn her about? She’d have to ask Jacob about it when she met him after the speeches, but that was another concern for her. Jacob stirred her in a way that she hadn’t expected, that she hadn’t felt with him before. Honestly, it was a feeling she hadn’t felt with anyone before. Now that she was out of school, she spent almost all of her time on the ranch except for the occasional trip into town, and there weren’t any other boys her age on the ranch. Jacob made her nervous, but in a way that excited her. He had grown up so much since she saw him last, and perhaps having a boyfriend like Jacob would help her grow up too, but did he really want her to be his girlfriend?

Assemblyman Arnold and Mayor Trestle brought up the rear of the parade on two fine white show horses. The assemblyman wore two strings tied like a bootlace at his neck, and a number of rings glittered from his fingers. A dozen large men wearing hats surrounded them on foot, carrying pistols on their hips and scanning the crowds; it was strange that the Texans always seemed so cautious like they were ready for a fight at any moment. The mayor was smiling and waving and enjoying himself, occasionally dancing to the music in his saddle. Beside him the assemblyman seemed preoccupied, being reminded to wave every now and then by the mayor.

When the pair reached the stage they dismounted and ducked behind the curtains, only to re-emerge a few moments later to the crowd’s cheers. Jenny perked up her ears and listened as the mayor pitched his voice to carry over the hundreds of people in the square.

“My friends and neighbors, welcome to the fiftieth anniversary of our great peace!”

The people roared. Jenny and Manuel clapped and cheered with their neighbors, and in spite of her worries, Jenny found herself smiling. So many people were so happy to be rebuilding, sharing their bounty with the less fortunate, making their country stronger.

“You all know what’s going to happen in a few minutes… We’re going to have the chili and pie competitions, Jack Ladd will attempt to defend his title in the arm-wrestling tournament, and, my favorite, the piglet rally, which will come just after lunch. Of course, don’t forget about tonight’s dance, I’ve heard a rumor about whiskey being available, but I can neither confirm nor deny that will be the case.” Laughter broke over the crowd. “We’ve got the brass polished and the fiddles tuned and it’s going to be a real hoot. It truly brings joy to my heart to see so many of you in the market sampling our first harvest’s good fortune. But before we get to it, I’d like you to turn your minds to the reason we’re all celebrating today. We all know things didn’t used to be like this, and to speak more on that I’d like to welcome our very special guest, all the way from the New States’ capital in Dallas, Texas, please give a warm welcome to Assemblyman Linden Arnold!”

The mayor clapped and took his seat at the back of the stage, replaced by the heavy Texan.

“Thank you, thank you,” Arnold called. “One thing that I can say being from Texas, is that I know good hospitality, and I have certainly found it here in New Louisville. Right over there in fact I had some of your delicious cheddar from the Two Star Ranch, which I can tell you will be in high demand wherever I travel next.”

Jenny blushed with pride, waving to those in the crowd that turned and clapped for her and Manuel.

“Now I’d like to ask you to take a moment to look back in time with me. On an occasion like this, it’s important to remember those who came before us, how we got here, and the sacrifices that made it possible. I was ten when the war happened, and I know there are many of you out there who are older than me and can tell this story a little better, but the way I remember it, our country was too dependent. We weren’t willing to put in the hard work. We had millions of people living on handouts, taking from the more fortunate without putting in any work and expecting to just be handed their share. Well as you all know, hard work and the freedom to provide for yourself and your family is what makes this country great, but when we lost sight of that fact, the whole system collapsed. We ran out of food. We fought with our neighbors and our brothers. Many of you here had parents and grandparents that served, or perhaps you served yourselves, and you well know that hundreds of millions, I’ll say that again, hundreds of millions of those neighbors and brothers and parents and grandparents died. It took us a long time to be able to trust one another again, but here we are. Thanks to your hard work and determination to rebuild your town, by God here we are.”

Applause rolled over the crowd, and while she was proud, Jenny was still disappointed. She’d been hoping for more facts that would explain things. How could people become dependent? She thought of the cities, how there was no farmland.
Is that what the assemblyman had meant? Had the cities fought the farmers? How did so many people die?

“And a related point,” the assemblyman continued, “I say this with a heavy heart but it needs to be said. Relations with the remaining United States, our uneasy brethren on the other side of these beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains, are not going well. We’ve found a number of their citizens sneaking across our borders. I don’t want to use the word spies, but I can tell you that they don’t have the proper papers, and we find them in places where we shouldn’t. I’m here to ask you to be on guard. If you see something or someone that looks suspicious, just tell your mayor here, or any one of your police officers. We’ll handle it politically back in Dallas, as we’ve been doing. There’s no cause for worry, but we need to send a message that our rights are paramount. We got into a big mess fifty years ago because some people thought they could take what they hadn’t earned, and we have to keep preaching that lesson.

“All right that’s enough seriousness. This is a celebration, so let’s talk about what we’re celebrating! This great nation is rebuilding everywhere I travel thanks to the hard work of fine, decent people like yourselves. As I told the mayor last night, we’ve finally got production from an asphalt mine in my home state of Texas, which means road repair is coming. We’re reclaiming rail lines all over the country, and we’re pushing our harvests north to help places like the Dakotas and Minnesota where people have been hunting and gathering since the war. Now they’re going to need a lot of food up there, those winters are hard, so understand that the quotas will rise, but I know you good people will be able to help as you always have. Thank you and God bless.”

Again the cheers rose. But Jenny had grown worried. She was starting to think the assemblyman’s purpose here was deeper than it had first seemed to her. He wasn’t giving anyone any specifics. He was just saying what they wanted to hear so they would work a little harder. He wasn’t helping them, only asking for things her town could do for the New States and planting worries in their heads.

“Now that’s about enough from me. I believe next on the agenda is our first contest,” the assemblyman called. “Who wants to eat some pie?” Mayor Trestle left his seat to greet the contestants as they jogged onto the stage, and Assemblyman Arnold turned to take his seat. The mayor whispered something to him, and Arnold turned to face the crowd again. Just as he raised his hand to wave, an explosion ripped from the back of the stage.

An orange fireball knocked down the first dozen rows of spectators sending people and debris flying. Black smoke billowed from a hole in the back of the stage, and flames climbed the curtains. People screamed and ran, hundreds fleeing the stage while at least that many pushed forward to try and help. Jenny could hear someone ringing the fairground’s fire bell, and men in pre-war fireman’s gear streaked through the market carrying a hose that ran all the way to the river. One of them slammed a hand pump into the ground and started pumping the lever up and down while water sloshed over the flames.

Jenny saw the mayor clutching his leg. Several of the pie-eating contestants squirmed nearby on what remained of the stage, covered in blood and black soot. She heard their screams above the rest of the crowd and the sound chilled her. Other contestants lay still, not breathing. Three of the Texans had been torn to pieces, and she saw the assemblyman staring out at the crowd with his pistol drawn, fury in his eyes.

She knew who Assemblyman Arnold was looking for, and she was terrified.