Boom Town Boy

  All at once he saw Mama. She looked flushed and worried. Addie had three sacks of candy in each hand and was chewing noisily.

  “How will we get everything home?” Orvie asked.

  “Tell them to deliver it,” said Mama.

  “What did you buy, Mama?” Orvie asked.

  “So many things I can’t remember,” said Mama. “Have you seen Della?”

  “No Mama …” said Orvie.

  A young lady came up. “Do I have the pleasure of addressing Mrs. Al Robinson?” she asked, making a deep bow.

  “Why, Della! Why.… Della!” cried Mama and Orvie together. “I thought for a minute you were Hazel Daley. What are you doing all decked out in clothes like that?”

  “I bought them, Mama.” Della swished around to show her new gown of Belgian blue crêpe de Chine, with long flowing sleeves, long, slinky skirt down to her ankles, and a squashy-looking hat with drooping feathers.

  “Oh Della, what awful clothes!” gasped Mama. “They don’t look right for a girl like you. Why didn’t you get some new middy blouses?”

  “I’m not a girl any longer,” said Della. “I’m a rich young lady.”

  Mama stared at her, unbelieving.

  “I bought a beautiful fur coat …” continued Della.

  “Of genuine rabbit-skin?” laughed Orvie. “To keep you warm on the hottest day in summer?’

  “You little pest!” scolded Della. “Don’t you think I can keep it until winter comes? I bought a player-piano, too—fifteen dollars down and only thirteen dollars a month after that.”

  “Good land! A player-piano! What on earth?” asked Mama.

  Grandpa came bustling up, fresh as a daisy. “Got everything you want, everybody? All ready to go eat? It’s nearly three o’clock. But before we go home, I want to show you something on the way out of town.”

  They ate in style in a Café, but Orvie wasn’t hungry. Dishes rattled and men talked in loud voices. Orvie let his plateful of food sit in front of him and get cold. As they left the restaurant, Orvie decided not to buy the things he had picked out, after all. It was too much trouble.

  Following Grandpa’s directions, Papa drove to a side street on the edge of town, and pulled up in front of a large red brick house.

  “Who lives here?” asked Mama, peering out.

  “There’s nobody home today, but they said we could go in and look around,” said Grandpa.

  They got out of the car and went in the house, which Grandpa opened with a key. They walked over velvet carpets and peered through thick lace curtains. The house had running water and two bathrooms. It was completely furnished, but looked cold, empty and cheerless.

  “It’s very nice,” said Mama, and they got in the car again. Papa drove faster now. He was getting used to the car. They went home by way of Tonkawa just for the ride.

  When they came by the Prairie View Church, they saw a crowd of people in the churchyard. Two oil wells in the field behind were hammering away noisily.

  “Looks like a funeral,” said Mama. “Wonder whose it can be.”

  “We’ll go in,” said Papa. He parked the Packard inside the fence with the other cars. A high new fence of barbed wire encircled the churchyard, and two men with large clubs stood by the gate.

  The funeral was over and flowers were being carried out to a freshly dug grave in the cemetery. The organist was still playing. Mama saw Liza Pickering and hurried over to her.

  “Saddest funeral I ever been to,” said Liza, wiping her eyes. “It’s that little Soaper girl—Annie. Her mother’ll never get over it.”

  “Mrs. Soaper’s little girl is dead? The one they called Annie?” asked Mama. “And her funeral’s over?”

  It was true. The people were streaming back from the cemetery into the church yard.

  “How did it happen?” asked Mama.

  “Her two little children was playin’ out in the yard,” said Liza Pickering. “There was a leak in the gas pipe that went to their house, and they was spittin’ at the leak to make bubbles. Pretty soon little Georgie run to the house and told his Mama that Annie had gone to sleep. They’d been leanin’ over the leak and she breathed in the gas. It was a still day, no wind at all—day before yesterday. They took her to the Tonkawa hospital, but she was dead. That poor mother—she was wringin’ her hands and screamin’ something awful.”

  “She was my neighbor,” said Mama slowly, “and I never knew about it until it was all over.”

  “Oh, they’re only poor oil workers, Jennie,” said Liza. “They spend their lives following the oil fields—he’s just a roustabout. Here today and gone tomorrow.”

  “She was my neighbor,” repeated Mama in a low voice, “and I never went to her when she needed me. What if she was poor? She loved her little one and lost her, and I was out spending …”

  Liza said, “Let’s go hear what them men are sayin’ about drillin’ in the cemetery. Did you see them guards with clubs?”

  “What are they there for?” asked Mama.

  “To keep the oil men out,” said Liza.

  The women went back of the church where the men were shouting in loud voices. Orvie followed his mother.

  “I gave this land to the church,” said Sandy Watkins. “My father took this quarter-section in the Cherokee Strip opening, and he and my mother are buried here. As long as the land is used for church and cemetery, it belongs to the congregation.”

  “But Sandy,” said Walt Pickering. “With all the money we get from the oil company, we can buy land somewheres else and build a church ten times as big.”

  “But we live here, and we want our church here,” spoke up a woman.

  “Now friends, we’ll locate one well ten feet this side of the cemetery and another one in that bare spot where nobody’s buried.”

  “We’ve got our lease and we’re going to drill. You can’t keep us out!” shouted an important-looking man.

  “Listen to those oil men!” said Mama to Liza.

  “No, no, the women won’t allow it,” spoke up Sandy Watkins. “They say you’re too close to the back fence as it is.”

  “You’ve got that whole Watkins lease …” began John Murray.

  “But the churchyard and cemetery are a part of the Watkins lease,” protested the oil man. “We’ve got a right to …”

  “Your derricks are throwing shadows on the tombstones as it is—they’re so close,” John Murray went on quietly. “We ask you not to come any closer than you are now.”

  “Our guards will keep you out by force!” Grandpa Robinson shook his fists in the oil men’s faces.

  The clamor of the oil wells kept on and on.

  “Golly, let’s go, Mama,” said Orvie, “before they start fightin’.”

  The family waited in the Packard for Grandpa to come, and then drove home. Orvie went straight into Grandpa’s little house under the cottonwood tree. He stood by the bed and turned his pants pockets inside out. He dumped the silver dollars, bills and change onto the bed.

  “Hey, what you doin’?” asked Grandpa. “Didn’t you do what I told you to do—spend it and get all the things you been wantin’?”

  “I picked out lots of things, Grandpa,” said Orvie, “and then … I didn’t want ’em after all.”

  Grandpa patted him on the shoulder.

  “Don’t surprise me none!” he said.

  CHAPTER XII

  Summer Tragedy

  “Hello, everybody!” called a familiar voice. “Has Grandpa moved back into the house and decided to be civilized?”

  Aunt Lottie and Uncle Mart stepped in, prepared to spend Sunday as usual. “Now that he’s the richest man in the county …” Aunt Lottie stopped and looked around her. “Land sakes! What’s all this? You folks startin’ a furniture store?”

  “No, Lottie,” said Mama. “Grandpa gave us some money to spend. We’ve just been getting us a few little things we’ve been wanting.”

  The deliveries had rolled in all through the week. Hardly a day pa
ssed without the arrival of a purchase made by some member of the family. By Sunday, the Robinson house had a changed appearance.

  For Della, fur coat, player-piano, fancy clothes and hats had arrived. For Mama, electric icebox, a new wash-machine, toaster, vacuum cleaner, dishes, silver, curtains and carpets. For Bert, an Edison phonograph, a radio and a drum. For Papa, two overstuffed chairs and a sofa, twelve pairs of suspenders, and four new suits. For Addie, twelve dolls and all kinds of doll furnishings.

  “It is a little crowded,” said Mama, as she began to step over things to return to the kitchen. “I declare, the house just isn’t big enough.”

  “Why don’t you buy a new one?” asked Aunt Lottie. “Why don’t you buy a house in town?”

  “Oh Lottie, do you suppose we could?” asked Mama.

  “Why not?” laughed Lottie. “The way you folks are throwin’ money around …”

  “It sure is nice to have millionaire relations!” laughed Uncle Mart.

  “I just can’t get used to spending,” said Mama.

  “You will in time,” said Lottie. “Any time you have too much money, you know what you can do with it.”

  Mama took her pocket-book from behind the clock on the shelf. She brought out a handful of bills and gave them to her sister. “Here, I want you to get some nice things too.”

  Lottie stared at the money, astonished. “These are one hundred dollar bills, did you know that?”

  “That’s all right,” said Mama. “I got plenty more.”

  “Well, I like the casual way you do it,” laughed Lottie. “Remember the good old days when we had to save up for weeks to get things we really needed?”

  “We had so little then,” said Mama, “I couldn’t even buy a handkerchief without feeling I ought to do without it.”

  “I bet you wouldn’t like to go back to that again,” said Lottie.

  “I wonder … how it would feel …” said Mama.

  Sunday dinner was very quiet because there was only the family besides Aunt Lottie and Uncle Mart.

  “What! No greasy dirty oil men?” exclaimed Aunt Lottie.

  “Where’s your boarders?” asked Uncle Mart.

  “I had to tell ’em to go,” said Mama sadly. “The house was so crowded with all the furniture and things we bought, I didn’t have room for them.”

  “Why should you go on cooking for boarders?” demanded Lottie.

  “I hated to see them go,” said Mama. “They liked my cooking, and they didn’t make a bit of trouble.”

  “Why should you cook for boarders,” asked Aunt Lottie again, “now that you’ve come into all that money?”

  “What money?” asked Grandpa, leaning back in his chair.

  “Your money!” retorted Lottie. “Everybody says you’re the richest man in the county.”

  Grandpa stuck his thumbs in the armholes of his vest, leaned back and beamed with pride. “They do, do they? Well, we got an idea we wanted to spend some of it …” He waved his hand. “Did you look things over, Lottie?”

  They got up from the table and went into the front room.

  “Della, I see you’ve got your piano,” said Uncle Mart. “When will you start taking music lessons?”

  “I’ll play it for you,” said Della. “It’s a self-player. You pedal with your feet and the keys go up and down by themselves. I’ll play The Blue Danube.” She inserted a roll.

  “Uncle Mart, I got me an Edison,” said Bert. “I’ll play it for you. I got an Atwater Kent radio too, but can’t work it without electricity—forgot to get batteries.” He put on a record.

  The player-piano and the Edison began to make a lively clatter, playing different tunes. Orvie sat down beside Grandpa on the new overstuffed sofa that Papa had bought. Soon the music stopped. Bert put on another record and Della started the player-piano again.

  “All you do is pedal!” she cried suddenly. “Canned music—that’s no fun. I still want to take piano lessons and play it myself.”

  Bert threw the Edison record on the floor. “Sounds terrible. I don’t like that one.” He put on another, then began to beat his drum.

  Addie came running into the room, crying. “Mama, I had six of my new dolls in one doll carriage,” she wailed. “Shep got in the way and I bumped him and they all rolled down the back steps and every one broke.”

  “What do you care?” said Mama. “Oh Bert, do stop that noise.”

  “Never mind, Addie,” said Della. “Grandpa will buy you a hundred more dolls tomorrow.”

  “Sure, Addie,” said Grandpa. “As many as you want.”

  “Don’t want any more dolls,” screamed Addie. “I’m sick and tired of dolls.”

  “All right, Addie.” Grandpa smiled. “Don’t surprise me none.”

  Mama began to show Aunt Lottie her new purchases.

  “Is this a whole new set of China?” gasped Aunt Lottie.

  “Yes—one hundred pieces—Bird of Paradise pattern,” said Mama. “Now I wish I’d taken Garden Bouquet instead.”

  “Remember that first set of dishes you got at Peg-Leg’s store, long ago when you were first married?” asked Lottie. “The set with the gold band around?”

  “I’m still using them,” said Mama. “I fed the boarders on them. They’re so thick, they don’t break easy. This new set is so thin you can see through it. Somebody’d be sure to break a piece. I’ll keep it locked up in this new china closet.”

  “And a new set of table silver!” exclaimed Lottie. “Solid or plated?”

  “Solid,” said Mama. “Remember that cheap set I got with coffee coupons? These are too good, and I won’t have time to polish knives and forks every day.”

  “You’re not going to use them?” asked Lottie.

  “I should say not,” said Mama. “And all these electric things—I can’t use them either. We don’t have electricity, so they’re just clutterin’ up the place. I don’t know what I bought ’em for.”

  “You’ll have to do what I told you,” said Lottie. “Buy a house in town and move there.”

  “Oh!” exclaimed Della. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful?”

  “They’re staking off new locations all over our quarter-section,” said Papa. “There’s to be one well on every ten-acre tract.”

  “Whew! Sixteen wells!” whistled Uncle Mart. “My! Ain’t it nice to have rich relations!”

  “They’re goin’ to use a new kind of rotary drill so they can go deeper,” said Papa. “The new rigs will be of metal not wood, and they’ll be a lot higher and stronger. Most of the oil is in the deepest sand. The wooden rigs will soon be out of date.”

  “Sixteen wells, all on your farm! Ain’t you glad?” cried Lottie.

  “The Superintendent told me we will have to give up farming,” Papa went on. “He advised us to move for our own safety. I always did say farming’s a mighty slow way to make any money.”

  “You just better not leave this farm!” sputtered Bert.

  “Oh, you’ll like it in town,” laughed Aunt Lottie. “You’ll be close to the stores and everything!”

  Bert marched angrily out the back door.

  Mama shook her head. “That boy’s still peddlin’ milk and eggs to his customers. We don’t need the money, and cows and chickens are a lot of trouble, but I can’t make Bert stop.”

  “He’ll stop soon enough,” said Papa. “There’ll soon be no place left for the cows. I’ll have to sell off the stock.”

  “Since you’ve got to move,” Grandpa spoke up, “why not try that house I showed you?”

  “Who does it belong to?” asked Mama.

  “To me!” said Grandpa. “While you was buyin’ all them other things, I just up and bought us a house. It’ll do you good to try it.”

  Mama told Aunt Lottie about the velvet carpets and lace curtains, and Della talked about the two bathrooms and hot and cold water. There would be electricity, so all the new appliances could be used. Before Aunt Lottie and Uncle Mart went away, the Robinson family had decided
to move to town.

  Orvie followed Grandpa out to his little house.

  “Grandpa, did you buy that town house like you said?” he asked.

  “Yes, Orvie,” said Grandpa.

  “Why do we have to go live there?”

  “To learn a few things,” said Grandpa, smiling.

  “Are you coming with us?”

  “No, Orvie, I’m comfortable here.”

  “I’ll stay with you, Grandpa,” said Orvie.

  “Your Mama won’t allow that,” said Grandpa. “You’ll have to go with the family.”

  “I don’t know how I can leave Star and Shep …” said Orvie.

  “I’ll take good care of them for you,” said Grandpa.

  That evening a man came to the door and brought news for Papa and Grandpa. “The Tumbleweed Oil Company has staked a well and dug a cellar in the Prairie View cemetery,” he said. “We’ve got to go over tonight.”

  Mama thought of her baby and of Mrs. Soaper’s little girl. She thought of all the old families who had members buried there. “You won’t let them drill, will you?”

  “No,” promised Papa and Grandpa. “We’ll keep them out.”

  Mama saw the men put their six-shooters in their pockets. “You’ll do it without fightin’ and shootin’, won’t you?” she begged.

  “Yes, if we can.”

  The men got in the car and rode away. Orvie had no desire to go with them, but he was ready to hear all about it when they came back next morning.

  “What happened?” asked Mama.

  “A picnic!” laughed Grandpa. “Half of our men stood guard, while the rest of us filled up the cellar hole. That’s all we did—just shoveled the dirt back in.”

  “Was there any shootin’?” asked Orvie.

  “Not a shot,” said Grandpa. “We managed everything peaceable. The superintendent of the oil company got there at daylight. He was awful nice, admitted he was beat, and said he wouldn’t bother the church people any more. Said he had not realized how strong the local people felt about it. He wasn’t here thirty years ago, when we started that church for anybody who wanted to come, right after the Cherokee Run. We wanted a church to go to, and we couldn’t see the harm of all going to the same one. We’re still standin’ together, the way we did then.”