Washtown (Part Three)

August 15 - Washtown, Burnet

The colours were dull, subdued. The floor creaked and groaned as I crossed the room.

While Brooke was busy socializing with Mr. Cobb Compton, I took the time to look around his store. It was a wooden structure matching other buildings in town. A second floor on the back half.

Inside, a few barrels sat by the front entrance. A bank of shelves faced the side door. One single shelf stretched across the back wall, behind a counter and over a door to a back room.

The shelves themselves, were filled with products, government issued and all intended for other destinations. A majority of the goods were designated for Civil Defense use. Multi-purpose food next to boxes of cartridges. Stained cartons. Doubtful expiry dates.

The black market. That it could operate so openly here was an indication of how broken things were this far out on the frontier. You see this after a war, even long after the conflict is over. A shortage of goods. A local government limping along.

The sheriff likely knew very well what was going on here and probably rationalized the whole venture, especially if it meant the people of the area had access to food or medicines not otherwise obtainable.

Only a programme of reconstruction would squeeze out these profiteers. One that established working organizations of government and public service, and a healthy climate for commercial enterprise.

Until then, people will do what they can to get by.

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I pushed the door to his office open. It swung open slowly with a creak.

What else do you have in stock, Mr. Compton? I thought.

There were more Civil Defense supplies stacked in one corner of the backroom. Possibly products of better quality, more recent date, or simply overflow stock.

A simple desk was pushed against the interior wall. A padded chair for working at the desk. A folding lawn chair nearby for guests or customers.

There was an assault rifle propped next to the desk with the trigger facing outward away from the wall. Precious seconds would be lost grabbing for that rifle and turning it around to make it serviceable. If this was characteristic, then I imagine that in the event of an emergency, Mr. Compton probably depended on a handgun.

A white laptop sat slumbering on the desk. I woke up the machine and cycled through the files.

X-ray spectra. Grid scans. Chemical analysis.

It would seem that Mr. Compton was exactly what he presented himself to be. Whether it was gathering geological data or selling diverted goods, he was a middle man.

There was nothing here to suggest otherwise.