Morning Glory by Carolyn Brown

Author:Carolyn Brown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-11-02T01:07:00+00:00

Lightning zig-zagged across the sky. Thunder boomed. Rain fell in sheets. Black clouds fluttered overhead, but they weren't all evidence of a storm. Some of them were billowing bubbles of smoke from the fire at one of the Crystal Oil wells. It was a well owner's worst nightmare, one that had happened in that very location more than once. Fires. Difficult to contain. Even harder to completely put out. Yet, it seemed to be the only thing that drew everyone together. Rich. Poor. Oil man. Townspeople. When fire threatened the wells or the buildings, everyone worked hand in hand. The oil men and the townspeople rallied together to put out the demon fires and to save their town and the other wells from total destruction.

A tent had been set up at the edge of town for the firefighters to get something to drink or eat or even to rest for a few minutes. Clara moved from one table to the next, pouring iced tea, serving ham sandwiches. Tilly had awakened her from a dead sleep at midnight and she'd hurriedly gotten dressed in her oldest, darkest skirt and blouse.

She'd done this job before, back in August of 1914. Twice in one month, oil wells had caught fire. The first one had been the result of lightning striking Crystal Oil storage tanks. The fire raged and the rain fell. By morning, so much soot had mixed in with the raindrops that the house roofs were literally painted black.

Clara had barely gotten rested from that catastrophe when the next one happened, exactly fifteen days later. The driving rain made the firefighting equipment near impossible to move. Electrical bolts danced around storage tanks like demons, teasing the whole area with their power. Clara and Tilly worked non-stop that time for two days in the tents trying to keep the firefighters fed and rested so they could continue their efforts.

A year later, Ardmore suffered from a huge fire caused when casing head gas in a railroad car exploded. That's when the rumors began. God was cursing the whole area for its wicked ways. Clara didn't believe any such thing. God had a little more on his list than worrying about whether or not oil was found in Carter County. But that didn't mean she'd changed her mind about the oil boom. Not one bit. She still wished for the old days when Healdton was cotton-growing and cattle producing country and life was slow. When she knew everyone in the area and hoboes didn't camp out in tents and roam the streets. A time when her father drove the family out to the farms on Sunday afternoon and she played with her two cousins, Tilly and Tucker. On Wednesdays they came to town with their mothers to do the week's shopping and would stop at the house for lunch and visiting. Then later, when the three of them were in high school they began the poetry club. Dreamers. Such a silly name, yet it was the one that stuck instead of the glamorous one they'd chosen.

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