Free The Rift by Walter Jon Williams Page B

life to be lovely,” she said.
    He fixed her with a look. “Wilona,” he said, “it’s too late to pledge Chi Omega now.”
    She looked away. “That was a mean thing to say, Omar.”
    “It’s true, ain’t it?”
    “You should shower and change your clothes. We’ll be late for the shrimp boil.”
    The phone rang. Omar took a pull from his long-neck, then rose from the couch to answer. It was his son David.
    “Congratulations, Dad!” he said. “I’m popping a few brews to celebrate!”
    “Thanks.” Omar felt a glow kindle in his heart. David was finishing his junior year at LSU and would be the first Paxton ever to graduate from college. Omar had got David through some rocky years in his teens— the boy was hot-tempered and had traveled with a rough crowd— but now David was safe in Baton Rouge and well on his way to escaping the shabby, tiny world of Spottswood Parish.
    A place that Omar himself planned to escape, rising from his double shotgun home on the wings of a Kleagle. Once you get the people behind you, he thought, who knew how far you could go?
    *
    The concussions of the earthquake still continue, the shock on the 23rd ult. was more severe and larger than that of the 16th Dec. and the shock of the 7th inst. was still more violent than any preceding, and lasted longer than -perhaps any on record, (from 10 to 15 minutes, the earth was not at rest for one hour.) the ravages of this dreadful convulsion have nearly depopulated the district of New Madrid, but few remain to tell the sad tale, the inhabitants have fled in every direction ... Some have been driven from their houses, and a number are yet in tents. No doubt volcanoes in the mountains of the west, which have been extinguished for ages, are now opened.
    Cape Girardeau, Feb. 15th, 1812

    “This is delicious, Rhoda,” Omar said. He had some more of the casserole, then held up his plastic fork. “What’s in it?”
    Rhoda, a plump woman whose shoulders, toughened to leather by the sun, were revealed by an incongruous, frilly fiesta dress, simpered and smiled.
    “Oh, it’s easy,” she said. “Green beans with cream of mushroom soup, fried onion rings, and Velveeta.”
    “It’s delicious,” Omar repeated. He leaned a little closer to speak above the sound of the band. “You wouldn’t mind sending the recipe to Wilona, would you?”
    “Oh no, not at all.”
    “This casserole is purely wonderful. I’d love it if Wilona knew how to make it.”
    Another vote guaranteed for yours truly, he thought as he left a pleased-looking constituent in his wake.
    He wasn’t planning on staying sheriff forever. He had his machine together. He had his people. The state house beckoned. Maybe even Congress.
    How long had it been since a Klan leader was in Congress? A real Klan leader, too, not someone like that wimp David Duke, who claimed he wasn’t Klan anymore.
    Omar waved at D.R. Thompson, the owner of the Commissary, who was talking earnestly with Merle in the corner by the door to the men’s room. D.R. nodded back at him.
    Ozie’s was jammed. The tin-roofed, clapboard bar past the Shelburne City corp limit had been hired for Omar’s victory party, and it looked as if half the parish had turned out for the shrimp boil and dance.
    The white half, Omar thought.
    Omar sidled up to the bar. Ozie Welks, the owner, passed him a fresh beer without even pausing in his conversation with Sorrel Ellen, who was the editor and publisher of the Spottswood Chronicle, the local weekly newspaper.
    “So this Yankee reporter started asking me about all this race stuff,” Ozie said. “I mean it was Klan this and militia that and slavery this other thing. And I told him straight out, listen, you’ve got it wrong, the South isn’t about race. The South has its own culture, its own way of life. All everybody outside the South knows is the race issue, and the South is about a lot more than that.”
    “Like what, for instance?” Sorrel asked.
    “Well,” Ozie