CHAPTER 5

If Johnston wanted to play hardball, Alsop would pitch him a knee-buckler. He pulled up to the Johnston Building on Main Street where cars parked nose to the curb. Before the war and before Sears came along, Johnston had bragged that his three-story building was the town’s tallest. His office occupied a corner top floor. Beneath were rental offices and the Ellis movie theater.

Alsop entered through a side door, paced past an elevator and hit the stairs two at a time. He shoved open Johnston’s door and marched in. The place had the warmth of a bunker. Johnston sat slouched at his bed-sized desk looking grizzled and stone-faced, the phone pressed to his ear and a cigar stub clenched between his oversized teeth. Behind him hung two floor-to-ceiling flags--American and Confederate--the latter, a reminder of his great-grandfather, Joseph E. Johnston, the Civil War general. On the wall, there was a picture of Johnston wearing an OU football uniform and sacking a quarterback. The caption read Mad Dog Johnston. Five pounds of dynamite in a four-pound box.

“Cal just walked in,” Johnston said into the phone. His jowls jiggled, and he looked more dog than mad. He crushed his cigar in a dinner-plate-sized ashtray. “I’ll handle it.” He shot a nervous glance at Alsop. “See you at six.”

“Like hell, you’ll handle it,” Alsop exploded before the receiver hit home. “How dare you go behind my back? You’re sabotaging the very thing this town needs. We agreed to it.”

Johnston pulled out a fresh cigar from a drawer and gave it life with a boot-shaped table lighter. “Not everyone agreed. Besides, that was before your cozy arrangement with the mayor came to light.”

“The mayor just explained all that at his press conference. This has nothing to do with what you would call the mayor’s liberal policies.

Johnston pinched a piece of tobacco off his tongue and examined it intently. “Communistic is a better term.” He flicked the speck away. “Do you want your business run by unions?”

“No, I don’t. And if you want to run a campaign to unseat the mayor, that’s your business. But do it in a way that doesn’t ruin Defiance’s chance of making an historic mark.”

Johnston drew several short puffs on his cigar. He held it in front of him, exhaled, and examined the glowing tip through the smoke. “Come on, Cal, you’re talking to me. I know how you stand to gain.”

“You’re damn tootin’ I’ll gain. I’ll sell cars, sure, but it cuts two ways. The town will get national recognition and might even host the next County Fair. You, on the other hand, along with your pal Overstreet, sold the town out with your secret deal to build the racetrack in Tulsa County. That racetrack belongs right here in Garfield County--smack between Tulsa and Oklahoma City.” Alsop jabbed his finger at him. “And you know it.”

“Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” Johnston muttered.

“Hell you don’t. All pure and self-righteous. Espousing the evils of gambling, yet having a real estate interest in Tulsa County. Precisely where the racetrack’s to be built if the governor signs the bill, and you become richer than anyone deserves.” Alsop leaned over the desk. “I know all about you and Overstreet under the covers. And if you want that dirty little secret, plus a whole bunch more, to stay under this--” He tapped his fedora. “--you’d better cancel that six o’clock meeting.” Alsop turned and strode out.

***

Alsop returned to the office and called Jessie from Jessie Smith Construction, telling him to get to the courthouse and start digging. An hour later, Alsop arrived at the site to see Jessie unloading his backhoe. “Dig until dark,” he ordered. “Then continue first thing in the morning. And I mean first thing.” He held up two fingers. “Two days, like the contract says, then I want cement poured.”

Alsop left with mixed feelings. On one hand, they were breaking ground and finally underway. On the other, there was that scoundrel, Johnston. He didn’t retreat, he reloaded. Six months earlier, he’d bullied a reluctant council into passing bicycle license fees in spite of the Children of Defiance Petition of Protest. Johnston’s response had been, “If they don’t like it, let ‘em walk.”

Johnston had a point about the publicity helping Alsop sell cars, but Alsop would have buried a tricycle if it meant boosting the town’s status. Defiance was on its way up, and so was Alsop.

Businessman, councilman, mayor, governor, and who knows? Perhaps in fifty years, grand officiator of the time capsule opening. Lots of people lived to be eighty-three.