Magnolia City Read Online Free Page B

what the time before the war meant to Texans? The tales from that era—tales that she grew up hearing—had grown so tall they dwelt on a plane only a little south of Mount Olympus. Her mother had spun them out like fairy stories, glimmering and strange. Once upon a time, she’d been told as a child, in the flat coastal land near the sea, there was something called a salt dome. Hetty had pictured a white mound like a pyramid with the blue Gulf in the distance. This salt dome hid fabulous treasure. From its depths, a black geyser shot into the sky. Spindletop erupted with one hundred thousand barrels of oil a day and took ten days to bring under control, wasting $90 million worth of petroleum. There was so much richness spewing from the earth, those early Texans squandered it.
    Nella had painted these wildcatters as bigger than life, like Johnny Appleseed or Paul Bunyan. They could hear oil flowing underground, she said. They learned how to drill through solid rock. They could tame the heart of the earth itself, bending the elements to their will. And, as a result of these superhuman powers, they grew hugely and suddenly rich.
    “Only in America,” her father the banker used to say, “can a man own the mineral rights to the land. In other countries, these belong to the king.”
    And so the risk takers had made their fortunes before the World War, then migrated to Houston to live like royalty. They built their mansions behind the palatial gates of Courtlandt Place, where magnolia grandiflora trees unfolded huge, glistening leaves over lush Saint Augustine lawns. They ran their empires from skyscrapers that looked like temples: the Esperson Building, the Splendora Tower, the Humble Oil Headquarters. They didn’t have names; they had initials. Or titles like “Chief” Rusk, Lamar’s father, founder of Splendora Oil. He’d been Chief so long, nobody remembered what his real name was.
    “Spindletop?” Hetty glanced at Garret’s profile and sighed. “That was so long ago.”
    “I don’t care. Another oil boom’s coming soon.”
    Hetty couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Do you really believe that, kiddo?”
    “I hope to tell you!”
    “I’d like to believe it, but my dad keeps telling me all the booms are over.”
    “He’s wrong!” he shouted over the revving of his motor as he outraced the long black car in their wake. “Land on that hill in Beaumont jumped overnight from ten dollars an acre to one million dollars an acre? It’ll happen again—why, did you know the other day Ford built nine thousand new Model As in one day? They all need gas!”
    “You seem to be up on all the latest figures, kiddo,” Hetty said.
    “Got to be.” He tore through the traffic lights at Polk and Dallas, then brushed her legs as he shifted gears to cruise more slowly along the busy stretch of Main.
    Hetty looked behind them. Her mother was nowhere to be seen. She whipped her hair off her face and peeked at Garret out of the corner of her eye. “But hey—I notice you don’t drive a Model A.”
    He smiled back. No, the speedster was his style—gliding like a yacht past the flivvers puttering through the currents of downtown traffic.
    “Pull over here at Everitt-Buelow.” Garret grazed the curb, and Hetty stepped out onto the sidewalk. “What’s the little door in the side of your car for?”
    “Golf clubs. I’d be glad to demonstrate.” He asked her where the best greens were.
    “Here comes my mother,” Hetty said as the Packard pulled up behind them. She twisted her hat on so Nella wouldn’t notice how intently she was peering into the blue eyes that had emerged from behind Garret’s shades. She had to see this man again. “I like to go strolling in the park in the afternoons.”
    “What time?”
    “I don’t know. Before dinner. I’ll be in the sunken garden tomorrow.”
    “It’s a date,” Garret said a little too loudly before he drove away.
    In a moment, she heard Nella at her side chiding,