Texasville (15 page)

The threat of economic sanctions soon became a common tool. Karla despised Buster Lickle and was outraged by his pretensions to historical expertise. She threatened to organize a boycott of the Dairy Queen if he didn’t stop bugging people about things they weren’t interested in.

“He could have planted those boards himself, and aged them to look old,” Karla said.

“Even Buster wouldn’t be crazy enough to age boards in a place where there’s lots of old lumber,” Duane argued.

“I don’t like his attitude anyway,” Karla said. “I’m gonna print a T-shirt that says,
TEXASVILLE SUCKS.”

“Please don’t do that,” Duane pleaded. “I’ve got enough trouble without you doing that.”

They were bobbing on the surface of their vast waterbed at the time, watching David Letterman.

“I might relent and not do it but there’s no telling what else I will do if you start censoring my T-shirts,” Karla said.

Duane had never liked the waterbed.

“If they’re gonna make waterbeds this big they oughta provide life jackets, just in case,” he said.

“You didn’t used to complain about any bed as long as I was in it,” Karla said. “What do you say to that?”

Duane didn’t say anything to it. He tried to feign sleep.

“I’ve never heard of half the people on these interview shows,” Karla said.

She had graciously refrained from printing the
TEXASVILLE SUCKS
T-shirt, but the many issues raised by the fact that Texasville had been the first county seat continued to bedevil the committee. There was no getting around the fact that the place had once existed—any comprehensive celebration dealing with the history of the county would have to take it into account.

Buster Lickle, Texasville’s most vigorous sponsor, wanted a full-scale re-creation, with tourists being taken out to the site—to be called Old Texasville—on buggy rides which would start at his Dairy Queen.

Opposed to this plan was the Reverend Rawley, who was for ignoring Texasville entirely. After all, it had been a saloon and bawdyhouse, and G.G. stood ready to take the Byelo-Baptists to the barricades rather than have a centennial that glorified what he called “lowlife riffraff and persons who sold whiskey.”

It was the necessity of reconciling these two apparently un-reconcilable points of view that now faced the committee.

CHAPTER 20

“I
WONDER IF WE CAN’T COME TO A COMPROMISE
about Texasville,” Duane said. He felt that he would almost rather be on a trip with his children than to be doing what he was doing.

“Not me,” G.G. said. “There’s no compromising with what’s right.”

“But what we’re proposing ain’t wrong, G.G.,” Buster said. “This is gonna be a big celebration. We’ve got to give it the Old West flavor.”

“Not if the flavor’s Bourbon whiskey,” G.G. said. “I ain’t voting to build no replicas of saloons or whorehouses.”

“But it’s history!” Buster said.

“The only history worth putting on a show for is the Lord’s history,” G.G. said, his heavy jaw thrust forward.

“We’re gonna get Adam and Eve in the pageant,” Buster reminded him. “I don’t see why we can’t have a little of the Old West too.”

“It could create alcoholics if you start people at one saloon and give them a free buggy ride to another one,” the minister said.

Duane himself was dubious about the buggy rides, though on practical rather than moral grounds. The proliferation of events already had him worried. There was going to be a mini-marathon and a wagon train; the Governor was going to come and make a speech. There would be an art show, a visit to an oil rig (his), street dances, barbecues, class reunions and organized trips to every place of interest in the county. Buggy rides might be too much—besides, who knew how to drive a buggy?

“What if we just build a small replica of the Texasville post office and put it on the courthouse square during the festivities?” Sonny suggested. He and Duane had discussed such a compromise at length.

“I think that’s a good idea,” Duane said. “People aren’t going to drive way out in the country to see a replica of a post office.”

“Put a saloon right here in the heart of town?” G.G. said, not taken in by the pretense that the replica would merely be that of a post office.

Duane looked around the room, hoping for a show of support. Instead he found a show of indifference. Ralph Rolfe, the rancher, was carefully slicing a corn off his thumb with a large pocketknife. Old Man Balt watched the proceedings intently, waiting to burst into cackles if anything funny happened. Suzie Nolan and Jenny Marlow both seemed lost in thought. Duane was sure they weren’t thinking about Texasville either. They had a smoldering look beneath their new hairdos and vivid eye shadow. He wondered briefly if Dickie had actually had the good sense to proceed on toward New Mexico. It didn’t seem likely.

“We’ve got to make some progress here, folks,” he said. “Time’s running out. We just have to settle some of these issues as best we can.”

He felt himself building a considerable head of annoyance with G. G. Rawley. Behind the Texasville question lurked the larger issue of liquor sales during the centennial. The county was wet only to a degree. Liquor could only be sold in package stores. If people wanted to sit at a table and drink they had to drive out to Aunt Jimmie’s, just across the county line.

It seemed obvious to him that people who were gathered for
a once-in-a-century event would want to dance, holler and drink by way of celebration. Duane had thought the matter over and had decided to propose the radical step of allowing the sale of beer on the courthouse square during the time of the festivities, after which the county would have to return immediately to its sober ways.

The rationale he planned to advance was that most people would be drunk before the nightly street dance even started, and if they had to go racing off to Aunt Jimmie’s or some of the far-flung package stores to replenish their supplies, the roads of the county would soon be littered with car wrecks.

Toots Burns, the sheriff, was prepared to back Duane’s argument to the hilt.

“Let ’em dance and have fistfights,” he said. “If they get to chasing around in pickups there won’t be enough wreckers in North Texas to handle it.”

Still, it was obvious that the proposal would meet with the furious opposition of G.G. and the teetotaling Byelo-Baptists.

Duane had been postponing a vote in the hope that G.G. would be called away to preach a revival or something, allowing them to sneak it in behind his back.

But time had grown short, and anyway Duane had ceased to care about avoiding a fight.

“What this whole celebration is about is history,” Duane said. “It’s about the history of this county of ours. We can’t just put in the good history and leave out the bad.”

“Why can’t we?” G.G. asked. “The Lord don’t want nobody exhibiting any bad history.”

Buster Lickle, who had been pouting anyway, suddenly flared up.

“It ain’t the Lord that’s blocking this,” he said. “He don’t care what kind of little show we put on down here. You Baptists just don’t want normal people to have any fun.”

“Buster, I’m trying to make a motion,” Duane said. “I move that we build the replica of Texasville right here on the courthouse square.”

“I second that,” Sonny said.

“We can still do the buggy rides,” Duane said, noting that Buster was so disappointed that he was about to cry. “We can
put the buggies at the Dairy Queen and people can just ride through town. All in favor of the replica motion raise their right hands.”

Five hands went up immediately and Ralph Rolfe raised his as soon as he finished slicing off his corn.

“Opposed?” Duane asked.

G.G. glared at the two women. “I’m looking right at two people who just voted against the Lord,” he said.

“I didn’t,” Jenny Marlow said. “I just voted against you, G.G.”

“That’s just as bad,” G.G. said. “I’m the shepherd of your flock. You’re nothing but a woman that’s pitched softball until she’s got the big head.”

“Now let’s not get into stuff like this,” Duane said. “The motion carried and I want to make another one. I propose we authorize the sale of beer on the courthouse lawn while the centennial’s going on. I make this motion in the interest of public safety.”

“I second it,” Suzie Nolan said.

G.G. seemed thunderstruck. Suzie had led his choir for many years. But G.G. recovered quickly.

“Thou shalt worship no graven images!” he thundered. “Now that’s one of the Lord’s commandments.”

“We’re not talking about engraving no images,” Buster Lickle protested. “Just maybe putting Sam Houston on some of the T-shirts.”

“Hadn’t been for old Sam I doubt there’d even be Texas,” Ralph Rolfe commented.

“The motion was seconded,” Duane said. “Let’s vote.”

G.G. showed signs of bewilderment. Things were moving too fast. He had been about to preach a little sermonette demonstrating to the committee that building a replica of an old saloon was the equivalent of erecting a graven image, but before he could get his sermon untracked, an even worse proposal had been made, and seconded by another ewe from his own flock, the normally reliable choir leader, Suzie Nolan. He looked around in dismay. Sin was accumulating so fast that he hardly knew where to strike at it.

“What’s that about public safety?” he asked. “How’s the
public gonna be safe if it’s allowed to get drunk right in the middle of town?”

“What we hope to do is cut down drunk driving, G.G.,” Duane said. “The sheriff thinks it’s best to keep people off the roads as much as possible.”

“Toots Burns is a fat sot himself,” G.G. pointed out. “You can find him stretched out dog-drunk in his police car any night you care to look. Besides, letting people pour beer down their gullets right on the courthouse lawn won’t keep people off the highways. They don’t all live at the courthouse. They have to go home sometime, and I doubt they’ll want to walk.”

Duane had seen that objection coming and was ready.

“We’re gonna provide army cots so people can just sleep it off and go home in the morning,” he said. “All in favor of the motion raise your right hands.”

Six hands went up.

“Opposed?” Duane asked. Old Man Balt had been seized by a spasm of amusement and was cackling so loudly nothing else could be heard.

G.G. Rawley got to his feet.

“You can floorboard these votes through all you want to, Duane,” he said. “You’re a sinner and your wife’s a sinner and your kids fornicate and sell dope.”

“I don’t claim to be perfect, G.G.,” Duane said.

“Well, we won’t discuss personalities,” G.G. said with an air of dignity. “This is just a tawdry little old committee and it can’t vote to sell alcohol nowhere. I know that much.”

“No, but the City Council can, and several of us are on it,” Duane said. “I think we can get the liquor provision approved.”

“Well, now you’re flirting with hell, all of you,” G.G. said.

“Sit down,” Duane said. “You don’t have the floor.”

“I may not have the floor, but I’ve got the Lord,” G.G. said.

“Oh, stop bragging, G.G.,” Jenny said. “All you’ve got’s a big old swelled-up ego.”

“At least I ain’t married to a sinner that’s been indicted on seventy-two counts of crime,” G.G. said. “If you’ve got any shame you’ll get over to church and rededicate your life the first chance you get, which will be this coming Sunday.”

“If we don’t move along with the agenda, this meeting will still be going on Sunday,” Duane said.

“You blasphemers and idol-makers can sit here and propose all you want to,” G.G. said. “All this committee’s done so far is think up sins and temptations to put before the public.”

He paused, to give the committee a moment to contemplate the enormity of their error. Suzie Nolan was filing a nail. The rest of the committee looked back at him sullenly.

“I’m going home and pray,” G.G. said. “I’ll tell you one thing though. You won’t be selling no spiritous liquors on the courthouse lawn. If we have to fight the Alamo all over again, then so be it.”

With that he stalked out.

“That man’s got too bad a temper to be a preacher,” Suzie said.

“I don’t understand what he meant about the Alamo,” Buster Lickle said. “Would we be the Mexicans or the Texans?”

“I think he means for us to be the ones that get slaughtered,” Duane said.

CHAPTER 21

T
HE FINAL VOTE OF THE EVENING HAD TO DO WITH
the time capsule—Sonny’s idea. He thought it might be interesting to let people write notes to posterity. The notes could then be put in a bottle and buried on the courthouse lawn for a hundred years. At the bicentennial, which would surely be held if there wasn’t a nuclear war, the time capsule could be dug up and the celebrants could read what people in Thalia had on their minds in the late twentieth century.

“Sex and dope and making money,” Karla said, when she heard about the idea. “That’s all people around here ever have on their minds.”

“We write it on a piece of paper and put it in the time capsule,” Duane said.

“I will not,” Karla said. “I might have great-grandchildren alive. Do you want our great-grandkids to think I was a horny old woman?”

Duane didn’t answer. At the rate Little Mike was growing, several generations of Moores might sprout before the bicentennial. One of Little Mike’s grandchildren might be sitting
where he sat, at the head of a committee designed to organize appropriate festivities.

The committee took an enthusiastic view of the time capsule, approving it unanimously.

“I guess we all better be thinking about what we want to say to posterity,” Jenny Marlow said, looking at Duane again.

“Yes, and I hereby adjourn this meeting so we can get started thinking right now,” Duane said.

Beulah Balt, the old man’s daughter, was at the curb in their ancient Plymouth, waiting to take her father home. Duane helped the old man down the courthouse steps and inched along with him as he made his way along the sidewalk. He liked Old Man Balt and enjoyed watching him in action. The old man carefully emptied a half can of tobacco juice onto the courthouse lawn.